A distant howl tears through the air, high-pitched, like the screams of those on the pyres but with an unearthly tinge that raises the hair on my arms. The pyres go out. The sudden darkness is blinding. As my eyes adjust, I realize the humming has stopped. Scraps of white rise from the pyres, looking for all the world like—

“Ghosts,” Harper says. “They’re summoning ghosts.”

From the Karkaun camp, screams arise from the men as the ghosts turn on them and plunge into the army, disappearing. Some of the men appear unchanged. Others jerk as if battling something none of us can see, their unnatural movements visible even from here.

Silence descends. Then the thunder of feet, thousands upon thousands of people moving at once.

“They’re rushing the walls,” I say disbelievingly. “Why would they—”

“Look at them, Shrike,” Harper whispers. “Look at how they’re moving.”

The Karkauns are indeed rushing the walls. But they run with inhuman speed. When they reach the forest of pikes poking out of the ground two hundred yards from Antium, instead of impaling themselves the Karkauns leap over them with unnatural strength.

Shouts of alarm sound from the Martials as the Karkauns come closer. Even from a distance, their eyes glow a startling, pure white. They’re possessed by the ghosts raised by their warlocks.

“Avitas,” I say so quietly that no one else can hear. “The evacuation plan. It is ready? All are in place? You have cleared the way?”

“Yes, Shrike.” Harper turns from the approaching horde. “All is prepared.”

“Then see it done.”

He hesitates, about to launch a protest. But I am already moving.

“Catapults!” I call to the drummer, who pounds out the message. “Fire at will!”

Within seconds, the catapults rumble and flaming projectiles fly over the walls toward the possessed Karkauns. Many go down—but more dodge the projectiles, moving with that eerie speed.

“Archers!” I shout. “Fire at will!” With breathtaking swiftness, Grímarr’s possessed soldiers have blown past the markers we set out on the field.

A hail of flaming arrows rains down on the Karkauns. It hardly slows them. I order the archers to fire again and again. Some of the Karkauns fall, but not enough. No wonder they didn’t have any bleeding siege machines.

An alarm goes up from the men, and less than a hundred yards away, a group of possessed Karkauns lift massive glowing missiles, seemingly unbothered by their flames, and fling them at Antium.

“It’s—it’s not possible,” I whisper. “How can they—”

The missiles fly into the city, smashing into buildings and soldiers and watchtowers. The drummers immediately issue a call for the water brigades. The archers fire volley after volley, and legionnaires reload the catapults as fast as they can.

As the Karkauns close on the walls, I hear their hungry, beast-like snarls. Too quickly, they are past the trenches, past the secondary forest of pikes planted at the base of the walls to deflect a human army.

We have no defense now. In the space of minutes, the battle will go from strategy and tactics thought up in a distant room to the short, desperate strokes of men fighting for their next breath.

So be it. The Karkauns begin to scale the wall, brandishing their weapons as if they are possessed by demons of the hells. I draw my war hammer.

And then I roar the attack.

XLVII: Laia

The soldier’s uniform is far too big, and there’s an unpleasant wetness across the small of my back. The previous owner must have taken a blow to the kidney. And he must have spent a long time dying.

Fortunately, the uniform is black, so no one notices the blood as I move through the lines of soldiers along the southern wall of Antium, doling out dippers of water. My hair is tucked tightly into a helm, and I have gloves on to hide my hands. I slump my shoulders beneath the yoke across my back and shuffle my feet. But, tired as they are, the soldiers hardly notice me. I could probably strip down to skivvies and run up and down the wall screaming, “I burned down Blackcliff!” and they wouldn’t care.

A light flashes on my helmet. Cook’s signal. Finally.

It has been two days since we arrived in Antium. Two days since the Karkauns unleashed their hordes of possessed, white-eyed soldiers upon the city. Two days of bone-shaking attacks and streets crumbled to dust. Two days of men with unnatural strength pelting the city with flaming missiles while the air is choked with screams. Above it all, the buzz of arrows as thousands are unleashed on the forces arrayed outside the city’s gates.

I have posed as a sweeper, a slops collector, a squire—all in an attempt to get close to the Blood Shrike. I have tried to use my invisibility, but no matter how much willpower I pour into it, I have been unable to harness it.

Which means the Nightbringer must be nearby. He is the only thing that has kept me from drawing on my magic in the past.

Thus the disguises—not that any of them have helped. The Blood Shrike leads the defense of the city, and she is everywhere at once. In the few glimpses I have had of her, her ringed hand has been clenched around her blood-drenched war hammer.

The light flashes on my helm again, this time with an air of impatience. I back away from the line of men, hurrying off as if to get more water, though the buckets attached to the pole across my back are not even half-empty yet.