Hell's Gate

Fort Rycharn's commander paused again, his face tight and grim.

"I'm afraid, though, that however much Thalmayr's mistakes?and mine?may have contributed to the disaster, there was an even more terrifying factor involved." He looked directly into her eyes, his own appealing, almost desperate. "Somehow, these people can fire artillery through a portal, Magister."

He stopped, and Gadrial stared at him. No wonder he was staring at her that way, pleading with her to explain how it might have happened. But she couldn't. No spell could be projected through a portal interface! That had been established two centuries ago. It was an absolute fundamental of portal exploration, and?

Her yammering thoughts stopped abruptly, as a truly terrifying possibility occurred to her. No, a spell couldn't be projected through a portal … but from Shaylar's reaction to Magister Halathyn, these people didn't even know what sorcery was! Their weapons obviously relied on totally non-arcane principles; she and Jasak had already figured that much out. But if that was true for their shoulder weapons, why shouldn't it be equally true for their artillery weapons? And if their artillery fired physical projectiles, like the ones their shoulder weapons fired, then?

"I don't have any idea what makes their weapons work, Five Hundred," she said frankly. "Not yet, at least. But one thing I do know is that they don't rely on any magical principles with which I'm familiar. Which means the limitations we're familiar with probably don't apply, either."

She saw fresh, even worse fear in his eyes, and shook her head quickly.

"Whatever they are, however they work, I'm certain they have limitations of their own," she said. "Any form of technology does. We simply have to figure out what limitations apply to theirs. For the moment, though, I think we're going to have to assume that instead of projecting a spell the way our weapons do, they launch a physical projectile which actually carries the spellware, or whatever it is they use. If that's the case, then they can fire them anywhere any physical object could pass. Like through a portal interface."

Klian and Jasak looked at one another, their faces tight, and then the five hundred looked back at her.

"However they did it, Magister, it was devastating. I'm sure Hundred Thalmayr never expected it, any more than I would have, and it turns our entire portal defense doctrine on its head. We're going to have to come up with some answer, whether it's a way to stop them from doing it, or a way of figuring out how to do the same thing ourselves."

Gadrial nodded, and a part of her brain truly was even then reaching out, looking for some sort of solution. But it was only a tiny part, for most of her mind refused to let her hide any longer from what she most dreaded.

"How badly?" She had to stop and clear her throat. "How badly did they hit us?"

For a moment, no one spoke, and she cringed away from their silence. Then Fort Rycharn's commander inhaled deeply.

"The only men left from the swamp portal detachment are in this fort, Magister." His voice was harsh with emotion that not even years of Andaran military discipline could disguise. "Of the men actually stationed at the portal at the time of their attack, including the wounded we hadn't yet evacuated, only Chief Sword Threbuch and Javelin Shulthan made it back. All the rest are either dead or prisoners."

Gadrial felt her hands clench into white-knuckled fists on the arms of her chair. Despite all they'd already said, all her own efforts to prepare herself because of what she'd seen in their eyes, the sheer scope of the disaster hit her like a hammer. And behind that was the regret, the pity, burning in Sarr Klian's eyes as he faced her squarely.

She couldn't speak, literally couldn't force the words past her lips to ask the question that would confirm what her heart and mind already knew. She tried, but nothing happened, and then it was no longer necessary.

Chief Sword Otwal Threbuch went to one knee in front of her chair. The man who was so strong, so professional, in such command of his own emotions that she'd privately concluded that he'd been chiseled from granite. That man knelt in front of her chair and took her icy fingers in his, and even through her pain she felt a distant sense of surprise as his own fingers actually trembled.

"My lady," he said in a choked voice, "I'm sorry. There wasn't anything I could do. Nothing at all. I was trapped on the wrong side of the portal, couldn't even get to our camp, let alone get to Magister Halathyn."

She started to cry, silently, because she was unable to draw a deep enough breath to sob aloud.

"How?" she whispered, the sound thin as skeletal fingers scratching on glass, and his eyes flinched.

"I wish to every god in heaven I could tell you the enemy killed him, Magister. One of their soldiers had pulled him out of his tent, was questioning him. About Shaylar, I think, because Magister Halathyn was pointing toward the coast, toward this fort. Then one of our field-dragon crews?"

"No!" The word was ripped from her. Jathmar's ghastly burns swam before her eyes, and the picture her mind's eye painted of Halathyn, caught in a dragon's fireball, was too horrifying to face.

"No, Magister!" Threbuch said urgently. The chief sword reached out, caught her chin in one hand, forced her to look into his eyes and see the truth in their depths. "I know what you're thinking, but it wasn't a fireball! The gods were at least that merciful. He didn't suffer, I swear that, My Lady! The lightning caught them both, killed them instantly?"

The sobs which had been frozen inside her broke loose. She sensed people moving, heard their voices, but couldn't make sense of the words. Threbuch's hands let go of hers, then someone else crouched in front of her, tried to hold and comfort her. But she jerked back in her chair, wanting to hate these men for not forcing Halathyn to leave the swamp portal with her.

"Gadrial, please." Jasak's voice reached her at last, hoarse and filled with pain. "Let me at least help you."

She opened her eyes, staring at him through the blur of her tears, and even from the depths of her own dreadful pain she saw the anguish in his ravaged face. And as she saw it, she realized that Sir Jasak Olderhan had just lost nearly every man of his command. Men he'd cared about, felt responsible for, had grown to know?even love?in that mysterious male way of soldiers: formal and distant, at times, yet as close as brothers. But he was also Jasak Olderhan, with all that name implied, captive to all those Andaran honor concepts she couldn't understand. Unlike her, he couldn't weep for his loss, for his dead. Shame stung her cheeks, punching through the wild rush of grief, and she shook her head.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. "You cared about him, too. About all of them… . "

He merely nodded. The movement was jerky and stiff, but that was because there were witnesses, both men he had commanded and the man who commanded him.

"I'm sorry," she said again, louder, looking this time at Otwal Threbuch. "You must think I'll hate you," she continued, trying desperately to steady her voice. "I'm trying not to."

His eyes flinched once more, and she bit her lip.

"I'm trying not to blame any of you. Trying not to blame myself. He was so stubborn?"

She broke off, gulping hard to maintain control, and looked Threbuch squarely in the eye.

"You were on their side of the portal, Chief Sword. I know that, and I've seen what their weapons can do. You couldn't possibly have reached him." Her voice was hoarse, cracking, but she forced it onward. "Nobody could have, I know that. Not through that kind of fighting. It's just such a terrible?"

She did break down again, then, but this time she let Jasak put an arm around her shoulders. There was great comfort in leaning against the strength of his broad shoulder, in the warmth soaking into her, helping her rigid muscles relax. She was mortified, at one level, to have broken down so completely and deeply, having wept in front of these men like any other helpless female. But losing Magister Halathyn for any reason, let alone this way …