Bronze Summer

57

‘We must be patient,’ Teel said.

‘And I agree,’ Raka said.

In this crowded room deep within the Wall, an annex to the great Hall of Annids, the air was thick with the smoke from the lamps on the walls, with stale aromas from cloaks of elderly feathers and fur, and with a sharper stink of fear, Milaqa thought.

Now Noli, her hunger-gaunt making her seem more stern than ever, held up a hand. ‘I do not question the vigour of our fighters, or their bravery, or the hard work and ingenuity that has been put into our defences. But the fact is the Trojan bear cub continues to find ways to test those defences. We were lucky that his absurd tower stumbled into a trap.’

Deri said, ‘The trap was meant for chariots, granted, rather than siege towers. But it worked. A simple hole in the ground defeated all the ingenuity and labour that went into that monstrosity.’

‘And the lesson you draw from that?’

‘Why, to dig more holes!’ Deri cried. ‘To be still more vigilant.’

‘And to wait?’ Noli asked. ‘Is that all you have? To wait, and wait, until Qirum gets bored and goes away?’

‘Yes,’ said Kilushepa sharply, in Northlander.

Milaqa turned with the rest. The Hatti queen swept into the room, with Muwa her Chief of Bodyguards and Hunda her sergeant at her side. Milaqa hurried forward to translate for her. The Tawananna’s hair was cropped short these days, she had only a touch of kohl at her eyes and rouge on her cheeks, and she wore a simple white robe, less grand than the Northlanders’ House cloaks. Yet she instantly commanded attention, Milaqa saw, even from the Annid of Annids.

‘Yes, you must wait,’ Kilushepa said. ‘It is how a siege must be withstood, and believe me, I have witnessed several, and studied many more from history.’ She waved a hand. ‘If you are improvising your defences, well, so is Qirum improvising his assaults. All this is as novel to him as it is to you. Let him waste warriors and wood on his ridiculous siege engines.

‘Meanwhile you people are safe, here in your Wall. I have seen it for myself. You have fresh water, from the streams that flow to the Wall. You are cut off from the country, but you have your ingenious harbours on the Wall’s ocean face; your fishing fleets come and go with impunity. You have tribute brought to you from the lands all along the northern coast, from the World River estuary to Albia — why, I believe there are even boats plying from Kirike’s Land. Meanwhile your people in the country have simply faded away into the marshes and forests, the wild land where Qirum’s troops cannot follow. They are safe too. You may be growing tired of the taste of fish — frankly, so am I, and I only just arrived. But that’s a small price to pay for survival. You are safe. Sit in your Wall. Wait it out.’

Milaqa thought she was hugely impressive. But since her return to Northland, and Milaqa had shadowed her closely ever since to aid with translations, the Tawananna had not asked about the fate of the child she had borne and left behind here. Not once, not a word. Any more than she had asked after the fate of her son in Hattusa.

‘But,’ Noli said, stressing her words with blows of fist into palm, ‘ for — how — long? Kilushepa, you have seen the flooding at the base of the Wall. The Beavers tell me that they have no record of a full year when they have been able to perform no significant maintenance on the Wall and its systems. In the end the flooding will eat away at the growstone. And out in the country the drainage and diversion systems are either neglected or purposefully wrecked — purposefully, we wrecked some of them ourselves, to make the land difficult for Qirum! How long do you believe the siege will last — years? There may not be a Northland left to recover by the end of it.’

Teel murmured, ‘Come, Noli. The Wall has lasted hundreds of generations. It is not likely to fail tomorrow.’

Raka said, ‘And we have our fallbacks. The wheels, the manually driven pumps.’

‘ ‘‘Manually,’’ ’ Noli said with disgust. ‘ That’s a milkwater word for what’s going on in those chambers. Trojan prisoners strapped to the wheels and whipped into the work by Hatti thugs!’

Milaqa was shocked. She’d believed the official story that the wheels were manned by volunteers.

‘It is necessary,’ Raka said unhappily.

Noli snapped, ‘Necessary! To keep slaves? Northland has never kept slaves, not since Ana’s time.’

‘They are not slaves-’

‘Slaves, I insist, who we beat and work to death. This is hypocrisy, Annids! Lies we tell ourselves, and our people. This may destroy Northland more thoroughly than any flooded lowland or blocked dyke.’

Deri said, ‘But, respectfully, what choice is there? If you are advocating going out to meet Qirum in open battle — I have seen his troops. I have fought them. I would not recommend it.’ He nodded at Kilushepa. ‘Even with your fine troops at my side, queen, and I mean no disrespect.’

Kilushepa said evenly, ‘I agree with you completely. It is easy to lose patience — but if you lose that, you lose everything. This is in fact the mistake that Qirum’s own people made at Troy, when that city was besieged by the Greeks. If only they had kept their patience they could be starving the Greeks out even now, still safe and rich and strong. Instead of which-’

There was a commotion in the corridor outside. People turned to look, and Milaqa peered to see over their cloaked shoulders, in the dim light of the flickering oil lamps.

Tibo stood there, panting, uncertain. ‘There is a man,’ he said. ‘He says he sailed from Kirike’s Land. He had a cargo of their dried fish…’

‘Yes, boy,’ Raka snapped. ‘What of it?’

‘He was attacked. His ship. Attacked on the Northern Ocean.’ He looked around, searching for Deri. ‘Father — it’s Adhao.’ A neighbour of Vala’s and Medoc’s on Kirike’s Land, before the fire mountain. ‘May I bring him in?’

Soaked by seawater, his tunic drenched in blood, Adhao had to be carried in by Tibo and the other men. He was badly wounded, a deep gouge in his belly. A priest hovered at his side, helplessly pressing moss into the wound as he was carried.

Muwa, watching, murmured to his queen, ‘That’s the mark of a sea pike.’

Raka frowned at Milaqa’s translation. ‘A what?’

‘A spear. Fifteen paces long. Bound at the joints with iron bands

… A weapon, lady, used when one ship attacks another. As the Greek galleys have for centuries assaulted ships along our own coasts.’

‘It’s true,’ Adhao said, gasping, his Kirike’s Land accent thick. ‘They came at us, big ships with painted eyes. We could not fight back. We did not know how. All of us died — all save me, and they did this to me before dumping me in the harbour on the Wall. They said I was to serve as a message.’

Deri sucked his teeth. ‘Then they have found a way to get their ships to the seaward face of the Wall. They must have sailed all the way around Albia, to the west and north. Quite a feat, for sailors from the gentle waters of the Middle Sea.’

Raka asked, ‘What does this mean?’

Kilushepa said, ‘It means Qirum has worked out how reliant you have become on supplies from the northern sea. And it means that he has found a way to cut off that supply, or impede it at least, by blockading it with his ships.’

Noli drew herself to her full height. ‘And do you still say we should do nothing, Tawananna?’

‘Yes,’ Kilushepa said sharply. ‘Even with this setback, you have reserves. Perhaps we can find a way to fight back. Greek galleys on your northern seas must be vulnerable. Yes, I still counsel patience.’

But Noli pointed at poor Adhao, who writhed with the pain as the priest tried to treat him. ‘Patience, until Qirum does to all of us what he has done to this man? Patience, while that monster from the barbaric east raises generation after generation of his cattle-folk warriors, right here in Northland? Patience, until the Wall itself crumbles and we are all lost, and our land, and even the memory of it, erased by the sea? I will not have it.’ She glared around at the Annids. ‘Will you? And you, and you?’

She was greeted by a swelling growl of approval.

And, before long, the decision became clear. Northland would fight.

As the meeting broke up Milaqa murmured to Teel, ‘It feels like everything’s changed.’

‘Yes,’ he said grimly. ‘Just as Qirum, or his wily basileis, probably intended when they sent us this “message”. For an open fight will suit them better than it suits us, believe me.

‘Maybe this day was inevitable, however. There’s much they couldn’t talk about in an open session. Such as the rebellion of the Districts, or the threat of it. Qirum, wily little brute that he is, has been making moon eyes at the leaders in the Market, the Manufactory — even the Scambles, it’s said. Not everybody in this great linear city of ours cares much for the Annids, who tax remotely and hand down their laws, and ask for young men and women to come lie down and die for Etxelur, while scarcely ever bothering to show a face beyond the Scambles. If even a few Districts broke away and threw in their lot with him-’

‘Once Qirum was inside the Wall-’

‘All would be lost. So maybe we have to act now while we still can. And — ah, Deri.’ He touched his brother’s arm as he passed.

Deri paused and looked at him. ‘Any bright ideas?’ he asked blackly.

The moment was tense. Though they had always tried to keep it from her, Milaqa had often glimpsed the rivalry between them, these brothers so different, the sturdy fisherman, the wily politician.

Teel sighed. ‘I don’t want this any more than you do. But if we must fight, let us fight to win. Let’s put our heads together, brother, for once. We must speed up the training for a start. Use more Hatti veterans to train more Northlanders. And we should call in favours, from Albia, Gaira, the World River.’

Deri nodded. ‘And we must put pressure on the iron-makers. What a bunch of fusspots they are! We must make them understand that a dozen flawed arrowheads are better than a single perfect specimen.’

Teel glanced at Milaqa. ‘Though we give battle, we must continue to think. For I continue to believe that it is through intelligence we will ultimately prevail.’

She wondered what he meant by this latest oblique remark; Milaqa had been used by Teel more than once.

Adhao cried out again. The Annids clustered around him, and Raka called for the priests with their medicine kits.

As it turned out they had only months to make their preparations. Before the end of the latest summer without the sun, the third since the fire mountain, the Trojan brought his army to the Wall.