Defend Karuk Read online

  Chapter Three: The Invasion of Karuk

  The Reclaimers marched through parched, sandy Arcon with no less verve and vigour than when they had set out from Arkataka. Their bronze column cut like an arrow through the dust-swept scrub, all following the winged goddess banner held aloft by a Reclaimer at the head of the column. Hatra was portrayed as a golden woman with wings in the place of arms. The sun bore down relentlessly from a vast blue sky, making their skin sweat and their armour shimmer. To their right, the horizon was lined with cliffs, hills and ridges. To their left it was flat, utterly flat, and shimmering with the heat.

  Optimus led the line, his gaze fixed ever onwards, his very presence spurring the men to march further and faster than they could do otherwise. While he remained silent, Meridon, his Lieutenant, led the war-chants. He would howl each line, and the men would respond in unison.

  “Bring the light!” he called, his voice hoarse and powerful.

  “Hatra’s light!” they responded, full-throated.

  “Reclaim the land!”

  “Hatra’s land!”

  “False idols!”

  “Tear them down!”

  “The wildmen!”

  “Destroy them!”

  There were dozens of cries and just as many responses, and the Reclaimers knew each one by heart. As the chant continued, imbuing the men with purpose and strength, Optimus’ keen eyes caught sight of their destination at last.

  Karuk sat alone in the wilderness. It was surrounded on all sides by empty scrub and desert. Its significance was great to the worshippers of Hatra, for it was the birthplace of Jynset as well as her tomb. Her ninety two loyal followers, what little remained of their charred bones, were buried beneath it with her. But even so it was a meagre village. It comprised of no more than two dozen squat stone huts. In the middle of the village was the Mausoleum – a grandiose name for what amounted to a small temple. No matter. It was not the size and glory of Karuk’s structures which concerned the Reclaimers, but rather the souls which resided beneath it.

  The war-chants heralded the coming of the Reclaimers, and the thump of their marching footfalls was heard by Karuk’s inhabitants. They had been spotted long before they had been heard, too, for the flat plains surrounding Karuk meant they could be seen from miles off.

  The inhabitants of Karuk gathered outside their huts and watched as the Reclaimers approached. When they first heard the sound of marching feet and military chants they had been fearful. But now, seeing that they bore the winged banner of Hatra, and realising that they were the Reclaimers, there was only confusion.

  The locals were a disparate bunch. Many were shepherds and small-time traders and craftsmen. But almost as numerous were the faithful who tended the Mausoleum and led the prayers of those who made pilgrimage there. Watching the Reclaimers approach, come to make a pilgrimage of their own, were the Mausoleum’s three resident priests, and some two-dozen priestesses of Hatra.

  “Are my eyes failing me, or are those bronze-armoured men Reclaimers?” wondered Meset, the oldest of the priests, squinting as he shielded his eyes from the sun. He was a doddery old man, hunch-backed, with quivering limbs, a bald head and a long white beard. He wore a dust-stained toga.

  “Reclaimers, yes. They follow the winged banner of Hatra.” spoke Batu, a decade younger, tall, skinny and upright. He had long white hair and a beard that had a black streak in the middle which stubbornly refused to surrender to the white around it.

  “We are safe, then?” posited Meset, with a twinkle in his eye and a knowing grin.

  Batu smirked. “For now, old friend.”

  “This can’t be good.” complained Lugon, joining them. He was the youngest of the priests, in his late thirties. He looked big compared to the frail old men, but in truth he was short and slim-built. His beard was long, braided and black, as was his hair, and his eyes were dark and full of worry.

  “We should hear them out at least.” said Batu.

  “Maybe they are here to protect us!” speculated Meset.

  Lugon harrumphed. “Those block-headed bronze jackboots? I wouldn’t count on it. If it were up to me I’d send them back the way they’ve come. But we can hardly fight them off, can we? Unless the virgin priestesses have been practicing their archery whilst I’ve been praying.”

  Sabin, the most senior of the priestesses, was fighting a losing battle in trying to get the girls back to their prayers and studying holy scrolls. “Go on now, get back to your books, ladies, nothing to see here!” she said, but few were listening. She was somewhat rotund, red-faced and ageing, her black hair becoming white and frazzled. She, like the other girls, wore the yellow-orange robes of her order, with her hair half-covered by a yellow cowl.

  The priestesses, all of them younger than thirty and some as young as twelve, could hardly take their eyes off the bizarrely splendid column of marching men. It was such a strange, otherworldly sight, to see these warriors marching in unison, chanting their war-chants, so far removed from the sun-frazzled shepherds and wild-eyed pilgrims they usually dealt with.

  Jamila approached her friend Aysha. “Reclaimers? What are they doing here?” she wondered aloud. She was a beauty – fair-featured, with long, curly black hair, thick eyebrows, and eyes so dark they were almost black. Her skinny form was hidden beneath her wind-blasted robes.

  Aysha was slightly older than her friend. She was a shepherd’s daughter, and so wore brown peasant robes rather than the regalia of a priestess. She was more curvaceous than the waifish Jamila and her robes were worn more closely around her figure. Unusually for an Arcite her hair was auburn. She smiled. “I don’t know why they’re here, but I’m glad to see them. My, aren’t they tall?”

  Jamila smirked and rolled her eyes, and she and her friend shared a laugh.

  The regular punters, sun-ripened shepherds and wizened old crones, gawping children and weary mothers, watched on in wonder, confusion and no little trepidation. Little of note had happened in Karuk since Jynset’s burial some two hundred years ago. They had a feeling that this was about to change.

  The three priests trudged out of the village to meet their guests. The Reclaimers came to a halt with a final stamp of foot. They stood to attention, as still as statues, seemingly ready to leap into battle at a moment’s notice. Optimus, Meridon and the banner-bearer strode forth from the head of the column and stood before the three old priests as the other Reclaimers remained sentinel-still.

  “Reclaimers, this is Arcon. You cannot wage war here.” demanded Lugon, with genuine irritation in his voice. “What is the meaning of this?”

  “It is an invasion.” spoke Optimus, with a knowing smile, his voice deep and authoritative.

  Lugon huffed, and looked each man in the eye in bafflement.

  “Deploy the banner!” cried Meridon, and on his instruction the bannerman rammed the winged banner into the dirt.

  Optimus smiled at the three priests. “Consider the invasion complete. Karuk belongs to Calclaska now.”

  Lugon scoffed in indignation, and so Batu took on the negotiations. “Explain yourself please, Reclaimer. The sooner we know what’s going on, the sooner we can come to an understanding.”

  “I shall explain all, and in detail.” said Optimus, putting a hand on Batu’s shoulder. “But first, I wish to see the tomb of Jynset with my own two eyes. Take me to her, and I shall explain all.”

  Meset looked at Lugon and shrugged with a wry smile. “Sound like a reasonable request from our benevolent conqueror.”

  “Fine.” snapped Lugon. “This way.”

  “Meridon, you will protect the banner with your life.” said Optimus, with a twinkle in his eye, as he followed after the priests

  “Aye, Optimus, I shall be as immovable as the temples of Arkataka.” smirked Meridon.

  As the priests led Optimus into the village and towards the Mausoleum, Meridon scanned the amassed onlookers who gawped in wonder at the statue-still column of Reclaimers.

  “Let me k
now if they start mobilising.” he said to the bannerman beside him, who stood erect with his spear in hand and shield across his breast. With that Meridon lay down, put his feet up on his shield and turned his helmet around to shield his eyes, taking the opportunity to get a few moments of shut-eye.

  Lugon led Optimus and the priests into the Mausoleum, which on the surface was little more than a small temple with a stone slab inside on which to make offerings, which sat before a crude, ancient stone carving of Hatra. In the middle of the shrine was a dark stairway, leading down into the underground catacombs which housed the tombs of Jynset and her followers. Lugon lit a torch and led them down there.

  As the stairs ended and the catacombs began, Optimus looked around in wonder. The tunnels were cool, dank and dingy. The blackness seemed to eat up the light of the torch as they paced their way through a series of tunnels, decorated with crude murals and carvings, and through various rooms that housed the simple stone coffins of Hatra’s followers. The coffins were surrounded by their residents’ meagre belongings and burial gifts – chests, decaying books, urns.

  Optimus removed his helmet and bowed to each coffin in turn as they passed. He was, like all Reclaimers, a fiercely religious man, and he was humbled to be in the presence of those who had given their lives for their faith, as he himself hoped to do one day.

  Eventually they came to Jynset’s tomb. The coffin itself was completely indistinguishable from the others, except for the fact that it had a room to itself. The room was filled with chests and urns. Optimus took in the holiness of the place, put his helmet down on the floor and placed his hand on the lid of the coffin. He closed his eyes and breathed in the cool cave air. Silently, he made a prayer.

  Lugon put the torch in a cast-iron holder, and, impatient to get to business, he snapped Optimus out of his contemplation. “We’re here now. Time to talk, Reclaimer. What is your business?”

  Optimus finished his prayer, opened his eyes and looked at the coffin once more. He couldn’t help but smile to know that he was in the presence of the bones of Hatra’s prophet. Still smiling, he turned to the priests and spoke.

  “Three weeks ago, Junto-General Praxos led his army into Arcon. By now I expect he will have made his move. By now, our peoples will be at war.”

  Meset looked down at his feet and shook his head, solemnly. “As regrettable as it is inevitable. I only regret that the good men of Calclaska must risk their lives to oppose our tyrant King. Arcon may not realise it yet, but she will forever be in the debt of your people.”

  Lugon looks perplexed. “If the Calclaskan army has marched into Arcon to make war, why have you not joined them?”

  “We do no answer to the Junto-General. Only the High Priest.” explained Optimus. “He ordered us to seize Karuk, and to defend it from King Khalim and his legions for as long as we are able.”

  Lugon shook his head in disbelief. “So instead of sending you to fight the wretched King Khalim, your High Priest has sent you to rot in this deserted backwater?”

  “I pray that rotting away is exactly what we do, Lugon.” said Optimus. “I pray King Khalim pays us no mind, and leaves Karuk well alone, and that we may see out this war without bloodshed. At least then we will know Karuk still stands, and the bones of the martyrs are unmolested.”

  “Small chance of that.” said Meset, looking away, sorrowfully.

  “Indeed. Meset was at the Sepulchre when the disaster happened.” explained Batu.

  Optimus watched the wizened old man as tears welled up in his eyes. “Tell me what happened, Meset – from your perspective.”

  Meset sniffed back his tears and began to tell his tale, though it was clearly painful for him to recount it, and he rubbed his quaking hands together as he spoke. He could not hold back his solemn tears for long, and Batu put a supportive hand on his friend’s shoulder. “There had been signs of Khalim’s madness even before he started wearing that infernal golden armour. He was rash. Harsh. Cruel. Prone to humiliating those who displeased him, punishing those spoke against him, even in the most trivial of matters. But then came the death of the Hu-Hatra, Myla, who fell, burning, from the window of his own bedchamber. Khalim did not emerge for several weeks, and when he did he would not be seen unless he was wearing his golden armour. Whatever happened in his chamber that night, it changed him, and entirely for the worse. His insanity had multiplied.”

  “It is rumoured,” said Batu, “that King Khalim had been in love with the Hu-Hatra. But of course, as our foremost priestess, she was sworn to a life of celibate devotion, and so must have spurned his advances. We speculate that the King did not take no for an answer, and tried to ravage her. To preserve her holiness, perhaps she threw herself onto his fireplace, dragging the King with her. Now, horribly burned, Khalim will not be seen without his golden armour and mask. He thinks himself cast out by Hatra, spurned by her, cursed by her, and seeks the comfort of older, darker gods.”

  Meset continued his tale. “At first he purged the lords who had sought to counsel him in the past – those what had cautioned him, opposed him at times, criticised his worst excesses. Then he purged those he saw as being too powerful, or guilty of imagined plots and conspiracies. They were all hunted down by his Azurian Guard, who are loyal only to coin. Their families and slaves were slaughtered, their villas were demolished and their possessions were seized to fill the royal coffers.”

  “Then Khalim turned his ire on the church. Believing himself to be cursed by Hatra’s spite, he turned to the Old Gods, with Venhotek, lord of death chief amongst them. The cultists of Venhotek spoke poisonous words in his ear, using his madness for their own infernal purposes. Khalim ordered that the Sepulchre in Azur be torn down. The priests were flayed or burned alive. The virgin priestesses were raped by the Azurian Guard and made into Khalim’s concubines. I saw it all. The carnage, the bloodshed, the fires…”

  Batu carried on for Meset, who was choking up and could not continue. Optimus listened in respectful silence, his head bowed to those who had suffered. “Though Khalim had labelled Hatra a demon, and made worship of her punishable by death, there were those who would not abandon their faith so easily. They helped to smuggle Meset and other priests and priestesses out of the city. Meset sought refuge in my temple in Sharut, but even that was too close to Khalim’s seat of power in Azur. So we came here, as far as we could manage from Khalim’s thugs, to lie low. We are enemies of the state now.” chuckled Batu, grimly, “We are on the run. Not much fun at our age!”

  “We are all enemies of the state.” lamented Lugon. “Worship of Hatra is banned. The cults of Venhotek and other demons consolidate their power in the cities, demanding human sacrifice and self-mutilation to appease their debased gods. It is only a matter of time before their foul doctrine spreads to the villages in the hills and deserts.”

  “And eventually, inevitably, we knew Khalim’s men would come for Karuk.” said Batu. “To destroy the tombs of Jynset and her followers, to snuff out the Hatran faith in Arcon entirely. That is why you are here, is it not?”

  Optimus nodded his head, solemnly. “Yes. We will not allow Khalim to defile the graves of these brave founders. Not while we still draw breath. Khalim’s crimes against Hatra appalled my people, and Junto-General Praxos has taken the initiative, and has decided to fight Khalim on his own turf before he can muster the full strength of Arcon. But if he should be defeated then Karuk would be defenceless. But no longer. Not while we’re here.”

  Lugon scoffed. “No offence, Reclaimer, but I pray Praxos is successful. They say that such are the rigours of your training, your Order has never numbered more than five hundred men. If Khalim wins and musters the legion of Arcon, five hundred men will be of little use against countless thousands.”

  “We shall see, Lugon. We shall see.” said Optimus, with a smile. “But I, too, hope Praxos succeeds and we need never find out. In the meantime I will need your help. Yours, and all of the people of Karuk. We must fortify the village.”

&nb
sp; Lugon scoffed again. “I am not in a position to refuse, but I warn you that a few rocks will not keep out the horde of Arcon. I hope you’re not expecting our young priestesses and sun-baked shepherds to man the walls too?”

  “No.” said Optimus, shaking his head. “With the land around Karuk so flat, we will see Khalim’s men coming long before they reach us. You will all have plenty of time to make your escape.”

  “Can you promise us refuge in Calclaska?” asked Batu.

  “It is not in my power to promise this, but Calclaska will never turn her back on the faithful of Hatra.” said Optimus.

  The priests all looked at each other, briefly, then turned to Optimus and nodded. “We will do what we can.” said Lugon.

  Optimus smiled as he shook each man’s hand in turn, put his hand on Jynset’s tomb once more, and then resolved: “We must tell the people. We must give the order.”

  Not long after, all had mustered around the Mausoleum. The civilians, priestesses and Reclaimers all formed a circle around Optimus and the three priests at the entrance of the temple. Stone steps led up to the temple, forming a platform of sorts.

  “I will address the good people of Karuk first, and then my Reclaimers.” spoke Optimus with booming authority. “To the people of Karuk I say this: evil stirs. King Khalim has turned from the light of Hatra to the darkness of Venhotek and other false gods. He has demolished the Sepulchre in Azur already – the time may come when he turns his demented eye to Karuk. We are here to protect it with our lives.”

  “I will not ask you, holy men and women, shepherds and craftsmen, to fight and die in battle with this infernal enemy. That is the job of soldiers. But I will demand that you support us over the coming weeks, until the enemy is in sight and peril is at hand, and then you may leave in peace to take up refuge in Calclaska.”

  “We do not know for sure if, or when, Khalim’s forces will come. We do not know how numerous or potent those forces will be. But we must be prepared for every eventuality. We must build a wall around the entire village, as tall and sturdy as we can make it. We must gather food and water in case they try to starve us out. My men will see to the bulk of the heavy labour. Those of you who are strong enough to help in this task will do so. The rest will feed the hungry workers, bring them water, and see to their spiritual needs.”

  “I now address the Reclaimers. We remain here, in Karuk, until the High Priest gives us new orders to the contrary. Nothing will move us except death in Hatra’s name. No vast legions, no horrors sent by foul Venhotek, no threats or perils will move us or shake our resolve. We cannot allow Khalim to destroy Karuk, for buried here are the very people who founded our religion. We cannot allow foul Khalim and his legions to snuff out our past.”

  “Nor can we allow him to extinguish our future. Jynset became the prophet of Hatra when she stumbled upon the tomb of a prophet who preceded her, one whose name is now long forgotten. One day, someone worthy shall come to this place, and they shall find the Eye of Hatra, and they shall become the next prophet to lead us into a new and glorious age of Hatra’s light.”

  “Come, then, Reclaimers.” he said, raising a clenched fist, “We must fortify Karuk. We shall build a wall to keep out the foul slaves of Venhotek!”

  “Bring the light!” howled Meridon, thrusting his spear into the air.

  “Hatra’s light!” roared the Reclaimers, doing likewise.

  Optimus’ heart swelled with pride as he looked upon his battle-brothers, ready and eager to give and shed blood in Hatra’s name. The civilians and the old priests looked at one another with trepidation – not just with dread for Khalim and his followers, but also for these strange fanatics they were to be shackled with until the day Khalim comes.