The Thunder King (Bell Mountain) Read online

  Cavall looked up at him and barked, his whole great body wagging now. Anyone could see the dog was trying to tell him something, and getting frantic because the stupid human couldn’t understand. Humans hardly ever understand when dogs have to tell them something.

  But then Ryons saw what Cavall was trying to tell him about, and he forgot to breathe. His heart forgot to beat.

  Above the line of full-grown apple trees appeared a head and neck and shoulders, a great beast taller than the trees.

  Nothing alive had a right to be that big. It was impossible. It towered over the trees. There was no telling what kind of animal it was because there was no such animal. It wasn’t a real animal grown to overwhelming size, but something you would only see if you’d lost your mind.

  It looked down at Ryons and Cavall, cocking an enormous head that seemed undersized because it was so high off the ground. Its ears flicked inquisitively.

  To have the monster actually looking at him broke the chains of astonishment that bound his legs, and Ryons turned to flee, if flight were even possible. But Cavall wouldn’t let him. Gently but irresistibly, his jaws closed on Ryons’ forearm and held him to the spot. He whined imploringly.

  The beast came through the orchard on pillar legs that were thicker than the tree trunks. It went through the trees as if they were grass. Its neck was long, thicker around than the body of a horse. From the depths of its colossal chest issued a rumble that was like boulders sliding down a mountainside.

  When it was past the trees, it stopped. It was waiting for something, but for what? It twitched its tail, as a horse would do—a little tail, in the scheme of things, but probably bigger than Ryons himself.

  Cavall released Ryons’ arm and trotted a few steps toward the monster, halting to look up at it and bark. Ryons froze again. He wished he could run, but his legs would not obey.

  The animal lowered its head until it almost touched Cavall: that undersized head was bigger than Cavall’s whole body. It wrinkled a pointed lip, revealing short tusks in its mouth, and sniffed with nostrils you could stuff whole apples into. The noise of its sniffing drowned out anything Cavall was doing. But Cavall was wagging his tail, and when he turned back to Ryons, he was grinning. He yapped at Ryons, and the boy knew the dog wanted him to come up and stand beside him.

  Come up and stand before that living mountain? But Cavall was doing it, and he was happy—anyone could see that.

  The thought came to Ryons that he was under God’s protection, that God had sent this great beast to him. Had it not followed him for miles and miles across the plains? Hadn’t its roar chased off the death-dog, which would have killed both him and Cavall? It came to him that the way to obey God, at this moment, was to stand before the beast.

  Ryons’ knees quaked and wobbled as he advanced. He had to take small steps or he would have fallen. Nevertheless he got there, finally, and stood beside Cavall. His hand trembled as he laid it on Cavall’s neck. The dog’s wagging tail thumped against his hip.

  The beast’s face was close enough to touch, not that Ryons would have dared. He stood as still as a statue while the beast sniffed him, gales of breath like hot wind. Because its head was so large and its eyes were on different sides of its face, it had to turn its head this way and that to look at him. Its eyes were a deep, dark, liquid brown, each one as big as a half-grown pumpkin. Short, bristly hairs lined its lips.

  How long he stood frozen to that spot, Ryons didn’t know. At a time like this, there is no time. But the time came to an end suddenly, and in a way Ryons never expected.

  With a quick movement, too quick for Ryons to react to it, the beast seized the boy’s head and shoulders in its mouth and snatched him up. Ryons felt his feet leave the ground. He couldn’t see; his head was inside the creature’s mouth. The only thought in his mind was that he was going to be swallowed whole, and there was nothing he could do about it.

  But in the next instant he was out of the mouth, out in the sunshine and the air again—no longer on the ground but high above it.

  He was on the beast’s broad back, just behind the mighty neck. The animal had picked him up and put him there.

  For a moment he was dizzy, and he might very easily have fallen off. But that passed; and as his mind cleared and he heard Cavall barking excitedly down below, he realized something.

  “This is what I dreamed of!” he thought. “This is what those dreams were all about!” He never could have imagined how they would come true.

  Then the beast moved. It was carrying him, and he was riding it. It was carrying him north to Obann. Its mighty strides forced Cavall to trot to keep up. Ryons looked down on the roof of the farmhouse, seeing things now as birds saw them. It was like flying, or else like being perched high in the branches of a walking tree.

  This was how he was going to come to Obann! This was what the old man meant by saying he would cross the river in style. And he knew from the dreams that when he got there, the enemy would flee from him.

  “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” he exulted. It wasn’t much of a prayer, but he knew that God would understand it.

  CHAPTER 39

  The Last Sunset

  By sundown the whole army was arrayed behind the hills, less than two miles from the walls of the city. As if to show contempt for so negligible a foe, the Heathen host ignored it.

  Helki and the chieftains stood on the crest of the high ground, under the cover of some trees, looking down at the great city of Obann and its mighty walls.

  “There are rich cities in the East, trading cities visited by many caravans,” Shaffur said, “but nothing like this city. But see the Thunder King’s armies gathered together against it! They are more than the sands of the desert. They have enough men to tear down the walls by hand. We are insane to come so close.”

  “They know we’re here, all right,” Helki said. “They’ve just decided to pay no heed to us. What could we do to them?”

  Old Chief Spider said, “We can always fight them. It’s as good a way to die as any.” But Obst said, “No! You can be sure God didn’t send us here to die.”

  “I’m not complaining,” Spider said, “but if not that, then for what purpose did He bring us here?”

  “We shall know before we leave this place,” said Obst.

  Lord Gwyll had supper with the governor-general at Lord Ruffin’s house. It was not often he was invited there: everyone knew he was a plain man, a soldier, who preferred his wife’s own cooking. But having sent his wife and his whole household into the west, Gwyll had no reason not to accept the invitation. And knowing his guest, Ruffin provided a simple, hearty meal washed down with peasant beer.

  “You are pensive this evening, my lord,” he said, when they were almost finished.

  “It’s nothing,” Gwyll said. “Nothing more than a vague suspicion of some important thing left undone, but no idea of what that thing could be. I’ve learned not to dismiss such feelings. A soldier who does that is a fool.”

  “You think they will attack again, and soon?” Lord Ruffin said. “You have a presentiment? But they’ve come many times, and we’ve always beaten them back. We’re strong enough for anything they might try to do against us—are we not?”

  “We are, my lord,” said Gwyll. “Nevertheless, I’m not easy in my mind. When I go to the Temple and join in the prayers, I have a sense that God has turned away from us. We should not have hanged the prophets.”

  “You were always against that, Gwyll: I haven’t forgotten. But it was Judge Tombo’s considered opinion that it was necessary, and I’d not overrule him in his special field—no more than I’d overrule you on a military decision. Besides, the Temple consented to it.”

  “So did the Temple in the bad old days, according to the Scriptures,” Gwyll answered. “They honored the false prophets and killed the real ones—with what result, we can see by looking across the river at the ruins of Old Obann.”

  “I’m sure Lord Reesh knows the Scriptures!” Ruffin
said.

  “I meant no disrespect, my lord. I’m only thinking out loud, and my thoughts have little rhyme or reason to them lately. All the same, I think I might inspect our state of readiness along the walls tonight.”

  “I’ll come with you,” the governor-general said. “Do you know, I think it’s the weather that’s preying on your mind today. It keeps threatening to rain, but doesn’t. The air is like foul water in a barrel. Maybe up on the walls we can catch a breeze.”

  At a certain hour of the night the great bell in the main tower of the Temple would toll, and after that, it would never toll again.

  There wasn’t room for everyone and everything in the secret chamber where Lord Reesh and Prester Orth had met with Mardar Kyo. Gallgoid had to arrange for some of the men and their baggage to wait in the passages around it—twenty men, all told, and twenty large chests full of papers, scrolls, and personal effects. Below the Temple was a honeycomb of passages, and no map that showed them all. But Reesh’s assassin knew most of them.

  Waiting, and waiting, and still more waiting—it was the longest day of Reesh’s life. As evening approached, he could stand no more of it. He summoned Orth to him.

  “We’ll go down to the chamber now,” he said.

  “My lord First Prester, we’ll be down there for hours—”

  “I don’t want to be up here anymore,” Reesh said.

  And so they waited down below, as minute crept after minute with exasperating sloth, and the sun set on the Temple one more time.

  Ryons, who could barely ride a horse, now rode a beast that had no name and could crush a horse and rider underfoot like helpless babes.

  The beast’s back was so broad that there was little danger of falling off—a good thing, too, because it would’ve been a long way to fall. Inching up a little closer to the base of the neck, Ryons found a place between the mighty shoulders where stout hairs grew out of the beast’s thick, pale-brown hide. These he could hang on to whenever he felt he might slip off. From there, too, he could see what lay ahead.

  You couldn’t say the monster ran. It was far too big for running. But its legs were like the trunks of trees, and its long, unhurried strides devoured ground. You might even say it was a smoother ride than any horse could give—no jouncing, no bouncing.

  The beast never turned its head to look at him, just kept striding northward on the way to Obann. Ryons found wrinkles in the animal’s back and used them to brace his feet.

  It was dizzying, to be so high off the ground. Some of the trees were taller, but Ryons looked down on others. He didn’t try to bend over and look straight down.

  Cavall stopped barking, saving his breath. “Please, Cavall, keep up if you can!” Ryons called. He didn’t want to leave him behind; but this was no horse to be halted by a pull on the reins, or turned this way or that by a pressure of the heel. Still, the dog kept pace tirelessly, trotting all the way.

  Slowly the sun traveled to the western rim of the world. Mile rolled after mile. The great beast thrust out its head on its long neck and set itself a straight course.

  Ryons didn’t dare look up, but if he had, he would have seen an eagle flying overhead, escorting him to Obann. Everyone knew eagles sought out battles. But Ryons kept his eyes peeled straight ahead—and, as he grew more accustomed to his outlandish perch, from side to side.

  Their road took them directly through a good-sized town deserted by its residents. Only the bell tower in the chamber house rose over them; all the other buildings lay below. The beast followed a broad street through the center of the town. Ryons tried to imagine what the people would do if they were here to see it.

  “Look out!” he cried, as if the beast would heed him. A cart had been abandoned in the middle of the street. In a moment he heard it being crushed to splinters as the great beast trod on it without breaking stride.

  Passing through the town, the land rose before them. But they were atop the hills before you knew it, and heading down again.

  Directly ahead, Ryons saw the silver ribbon of a river, acquiring a bronze sheen as the sun began to set.

  “There it is, Cavall! We’ve done it—we’re here!”

  Beyond the river lay the city of Obann, with white towers, green copper domes, and walls—such walls! Walls with forts and towers, with great gates guarded by the towers, mile after mile of walls: it seemed impossible that human beings could have built such a place. Ryons had never seen a real city, and this was the greatest city of them all. This was the prize that had drawn so many tens of thousands of warriors out of the East.

  As yet they were too far away to see the enemy encamped against it to the north and east and west, too far away to discern the great moat dug by the Heathen to keep their prey within the city. But as the sun set and the day waned, fires sprang up on the plain around the city, a host of fires like the stars of heaven—campfires of the enemy. They were past counting.

  But Ryons remembered his dream: mobs of men running before him in a panic, as seen from high above the ground. That dream, he knew, was going to come true.

  “Don’t stop!” he urged the beast. Its ears flickered, as if in answer. “This is what God wanted. This is why He sent us here!”

  Down, down toward the river strode the beast, with Cavall panting alongside and Ryons clinging to the stiff hairs on its back. Down, down sank the sun. In the northern sky, where clouds permitted, the early stars appeared.

  CHAPTER 40

  The Mission of the Temple

  Up on the walls after sundown, the air was no fresher. Clouds continued to pile up, and from time to time a flash of heat lightning bathed the scene in garish radiance.

  “Faugh! Why doesn’t it rain?” Lord Ruffin said. “It’s late in the year for such a stuffy night as this.”

  “Getting dark fast,” Lord Gwyll thought, as he and the governor-general toured the walls. All the defenses seemed to be in order, every man at his post. “Summer is hanging on,” he said.

  “Wonder if we’ll have a hard winter,” Ruffin said.

  They’d been up there for a good while, and Ruffin was about to go back down, saying he felt like going early to bed for once, when all things changed.

  From the tallest tower on the northern wall rang out the blare of trumpets. A moment later, the horns blew from the west.

  “They’re coming!” cried a watchman. “God save us, they’re all coming!”

  Alarms clanged. Catapult crews leaped into action. Down below, men who’d been resting in their barracks snatched up weapons and hurried to their stations.

  “A night attack!” Ruffin said. “That’s something new for them. But why should it go any better for them than anything they’ve done by day?”

  “It’ll be harder to shoot at them by night,” Gwyll said. “But it’ll be harder for them, too. They won’t be able to see their commanders’ signals.”

  As yet Gwyll and Ruffin couldn’t see the enemy. But then, in a flash of lightning, they could—a dark mass creeping across the plain. Within it sprang to life innumerable torches, red eyes flickering in the murk. Those would have to serve as signals, unless it rained and put them out. The attackers would then cease to be a military force, Gwyll reflected, and turn into a confused mob. For that reason few commanders risked a major operation in the dark.

  Ruffin’s face was pale. He flinched when Gwyll laid a hand on his shoulder.

  “Be at ease, my lord,” Gwyll said. “See how our men go so calmly to their stations: officers and men know what to do. Listen to the horn-calls of the lookouts. There—that one means that the enemy to the north is bringing up his rams. Our men on the claw machines will be ready for them. See the archers taking their positions. They’ll wait until they get good shots before they let fly. And if you go down to the streets, you’ll find our fire-fighting teams in place and well prepared. Be assured our city is as safe as mortal men can make it.”

  Ruffin nodded. “You’ve trained them well, my lord. I think now I’ll go down to the counc
il chamber to receive reports, and leave the fighting to you.”

  “If we’re hard-pressed,” said Gwyll, “you can always send Lord Davensay to reinforce us.”

  Reesh and Orth and a few others sat sweating in the secret room beneath the Temple, waiting and waiting. Here they were cut off from the upper world, and knew not that the assault on the city had begun. How long they’d been waiting, none could say; but no one dared complain in Reesh’s presence.

  One of the presters prayed silently, head bowed, lips moving. Reesh supposed piety had its place; but to him, all prayers were pointless. He no longer believed God heard them.

  For the Temple was not about prayer, or worshipping God, or studying the Scriptures. No, thought Reesh: “It’s about keeping order in a world of chaos. It’s about steering the progress of the nation in the long, slow, painful climb back to the heights Obann once occupied a thousand years ago.” It was about the rebirth of the Empire and the rediscovery of knowledge lost in its collapse.

  “Do any of these others truly understand?” he wondered. “Do they understand that in those days the men of Obann were like gods? Have they contemplated that brooding mass of ruins across the river, the Old City, and imagined it in all its glory? It would be worth any price we have to pay, to see such a city rise again.”

  In those days the men of Obann sailed the seas and flew in the air like birds. They spoke to one another across vast distances and destroyed the cities of their enemies in the blinking of an eye.

  It was no accident, he thought, that the Temple alone survived the destruction of the Empire. Oh, not the building—that Temple was a mountain of rubbish in the ruins across the river. But the Temple as a living thing, as a brotherhood of men, as a bright, shining idea—that survived. And it would survive this new destruction, too: Lord Reesh had seen to that.

  “That is why we’re here tonight,” he thought.