And I say unto you, those who stand against the word of the Angelus, they are forsaken.


    <ul>


    <li style="font-weight: 400">The Testament of Isrāfīl</li>


    </ul>


    ?


    19th Day of High Summer’s Moon, AC 297


    The first pair of guards were loitering at the base of the stairs which led down to the cistern level.  In the glow of an oil lamp, their eyes were blind to where Ismet and her men crouched in the shadows, close enough to hear the soldiers speak.


    “...the way he cut down the commander,” the guard on the left said.  Ismet had missed the beginning while she focused on creeping closer without giving herself away.  She had never trained as a spy, but had spent a day riding with her own scouts during the march to Rocher de la Garde.  In that moment, it didn’t feel like enough.


    “Be careful who you say that to,” the second guard warned, glancing back up the steps.  “He’ll cut you down as quick as he did Commander Rizqullah.”


    “But don’t you think we should do something about it?” the guard on the left insisted.  “It isn’t right.  And two Exarchs - I don’t want to fight that.  It’s like spitting in the face of the Angelus themselves.”


    “Listen to me,” the second guard said.  “You just keep your head down and stay quiet, if you want to survive all this.  And if an Exarch somehow ends up in front of you, just drop your sword and walk away.  Won’t no one blame you for that.”


    Ismet grinned.  She did not, after all, want to kill these men.  “Good advice,” she said, standing up and stepping out into the light of the oil lamp, where she raised her sword.  “I hope that you will take your own words to heart.”


    Both guards’ spun to face her, and Ismet’s men came up out of the gloom to either side of her, their weapons out.  “It’s you,” the second guard gasped.  “Angelus forgive me.”  He raised his hands in the air.


    “Maaz, take his weapon,” Ismet said.  “And find something to tie him up.  We can’t risk either of you men making noise,” she explained.


    “Exarch,” the first guard said.  “You’re here to do right by the commander?”


    “I’m here to get my army to Ma?īn, so that I can put an end to the Plague Dancer,” Ismet said.  “I don’t want to hurt any more people than I have to.  But Malik ibn Zain cut down a good man.  Yes, I intend to see justice done before I go.  And I do not think my father will give up vengeance for the loss of his friend.”


    “Then let me come with you,” the guard said.


    “Why?”  Ismet asked him.


    “When I die, and go before the Angelus,” the man replied, “and they ask me why I let a good man be murdered and did nothing, what am I going to say?”


    “Very well,” Ismet said, with a grin.  “Come along then.  I’ve only been here once before.  The quickest way to the gates.  What is your name?”


    “Nazih,” he said.  “Nazih ibn Farid.  Come, Exarch, I will show you the way.”  Nazih glanced down to where Rayan had trussed the second guard up like a goat.  “I will come back for you, as soon as it is done, Abdul,” he promised.  Abdul grunted and nodded his head, and they hurried up the stairs.


    Coming upon Nazih, Ismet quickly realized, was an unexpected stroke of luck.  The man was familiar not only with the layout of the fortress that was dug into the mountain, but also with the shifts, patrol routes, and routines of the other guards.  With Nazih’s guidance, they made it all the way up through the cellars and to the hallway which led to the winch room without having to fight.  There were a few tricky moments, when Ismet was afraid to even exhale, and wondered if passing patrols would hear the pounding of her heart, but left to her own she would have had to kill half a dozen men by now.  This was better.


    Unfortunately, at the door to the winch-room was where their fortune ended.


    “Malik replaced the guards here with his own men, from the capital,” Nazih whispered as they all huddled together, crouched down low in the darkest part of the hallway.  In the light of an oil lamp, Ismet could see both guards clearly, one to each side of the door.  There was no way she could find of approaching any further without being seen.


    “You did well, Nazih,” she said, adjusting her grip on her sword.  “Move when I do.  You will not be able to keep up, but that is fine.  Drag the bodies inside after me and bar the door.  Understood?”  Ismet looked around, meeting each man’s eyes in turn.  Each held her gaze, or nodded, to show they were ready.


    Ismet did not often find herself envious of anyone; she had been raised as the daughter of a powerful tribal leader, in more wealth and privilege than any common tribesman of the Maghreb.  She had learned from her own private tutors, and consumed everything they taught her voraciously, until only the University of Ma?īn offered her the opportunity to go further.  There, she had excelled, and caught the attention of one of the Angelus.  She had led men in battle, stabbed the Sun Eater itself through the eye, and been courted by a king.  Listed plainly, it sounded more like a campfire tale than someone’s actual life.


    Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    But she could have done with Sir Trist’s speed, right now.  The Faerie Exarch would have been able to close the distance to these men before they were even aware of him.  Ismet was not that fast on her feet, even with the Boons of the Angelus.  While her Tithes to Epinoia had given her greater strength and speed than any mortal woman, it was her stamina and endurance that were truly exceptional, and that wasn’t going to help in this situation.


    Ismet took a breath, shook her head, and put aside her second thoughts.  She would use the tools she had, and not waste her time wishing for more.  She pushed off the stone of the corridor floor with her left boot, springing up out of her crouch in a single motion, and sprinted down the hall, through alternating patches of darkness and light, as she passed each oil lamp.


    The two guards turned at the sound, and she saw their eyes widen in a moment of shock.  She was halfway there before either acted, but it was still too great of a distance to stop them from sounding the alarm.


    “Intruders!” one of the guards shouted, grabbing for the pull of a bell hung from the wall to the side of the door, and yanking it.  A peal rang out through the hall, while the other man drew his sword.


    By the time the blade had cleared the scabbard, Ismet was on him, her men only a few steps behind.  She opened the guard’s throat with a single quick cut, so that he couldn’t scream and make any further noise.  The other man let go of the bell pull and backed away, but Ismet kept right on toward him without slowing, reversing the swing of her sword and bringing it back around to take the second man through the throat, as well.  There was a moment of stillness, with the only sound the echoing rings of the bell, dwindling with each strike of the clapper against the bronze.


    Then, Rayan hit the door behind her with his shoulder, and one of the hinges broke with an audible crack.  The door collapsed inward, and her men tumbled into the winch-room.  Ismet followed them as soon as the doorway was clear, while in her peripheral vision she saw Nazih grab one of the dead guards under the shoulders, dragging the corpse with a grunt of effort.  She had no time for that.


    Rayan was exchanging cuts with one man, while the other had Maaz backed into a corner.  Ismet reached out with a yellow thread and touched each of her men, kindling their bodies with a jolt of yellow lightning visible only to her.  The Boon refreshed both of them, as if they’d just woken from a night’s rest.  With a sudden increase of strength and confidence, her two soldiers quickly cut down their foes, while Ismet turned to the winch.


    She sheathed her sword, and took a hold of the crank.  “Rayan, help me here,” Ismet said.  “The rest of you, drag the bodies inside and bar the door as best you can.”


    “My apologies for the hinge, Exarch,” Rayan said, getting in beside her to help turn the crank.  “Shoddy construction.”


    “For that, you can be the first in line to hold the door when they come through,” Ismet told him with a grin.


    “The gate is coming up!” Nazih shouted.  He was standing next to a vertical cut in the rock face; Ismet imagined it would make a good location for an archer, but from the torchlight coming in, she guessed it also provided a good view of the gate.


    Indeed, panicked shouts sounded out from the road and the wall.  Further away, horns sounded out in the night.  “That will be our men,” Ismet said, with one final grunt, as she and Rayan turned the winch one last rotation.


    “Here, let me,” Nazih said, coming over to them, and the guard engaged the brake.  “It will stay up, now, unless someone releases the rope here.”


    “Good,” Ismet said.  “Our task here is simple, men.  We hold this room, and let no one pass alive.”


    From outside in the corridor came the sound of shouting, and then, a moment later, a more distinct voice.  “Open this door!” a man called from outside the winch room.


    “Should we say anything?” Maaz asked, his voice hushed.


    “I do not think it will make a difference one way or the other,” Ismet admitted, grinning even though the men could not see her expression beneath the veil.


    “Goats fucked your mother,” Rayan called back out through the door.  “And we don’t want any goat-fucker’s sons in here.”


    It was ridiculous, and the men couldn’t help but laugh.  Ismet was surprised to find that she was laughing along with them.  A moment later, the door shook as the men out in the hall tried to break it down.


    “I regret breaking the hinge now,” Rayan admitted, as the head of a spear poked through the gap between the door and the frame carved into the stone.  Ismet backed up from the door, leaving it to her men to hold for a moment, and drew her sword again.


    “Let them through on my command,” she said, “and then get to the side.”


    None of the men objected, and when Ismet shouted, “Now!” they all jumped to one side of the room or the other.  The door tumbled in, and two men fell on top of it.  Ismet stabbed down twice, killing them both, then strode forward up to the doorway.


    Outside, the corridor was crowded with a dozen soldiers or more, all of them pressed together and trying to break into the winch room.  So long as Ismet didn’t go out to join them, they could only come through the doorway one at a time - two, at most.


    “I am Ismet ibnah Salah, Exarch of Epinoia,” she greeted them, settling into a low stance and raising her blade.  “Come against me, and die.  Flee, and you may yet live, if you run far enough and fast enough.”


    They did not believe her at first, but when she had slain the eighth man, piling the bodies up knee deep in the doorway, those that remained had seen enough.  The last of them broke and ran.


    “Hold the winch,” Ismet commanded her men.  “Rayan ibn Aadil has command here.”


    “Where are you going, Exarch?”  Maaz asked.


    “I said I would see justice done,” Ismet called back over her shoulder.  “I am going to find Malik ibn Zain.”  Sword in hand, she stalked out into the endless night.