by Dale Lucas
Rem was about to suggest a plan of attack—which he knew Gnusha would immediately dismiss—when he heard voices raised and heated words exchanged. When he looked, he saw Captain Tuvera on the south side of the clearing, her sword drawn. She was leveling some threat at the man making the buy. Clearly she had hidden backup, probably Galen, ready with her bow in the underbrush.
That complicated things. Before, there had only been Tzimena and the Red Raven to worry about extracting in one piece. Now, if Tuvera and Galen were present, that could mean . . .
“Oh gods,” Rem whispered.
“Gods, what?” Gnusha asked.
Rem pointed to Tuvera. “She’s an ally. That means there may be more allies nearby. If there’s a fight, you mustn’t hurt them—though they may try to hurt you.”
Gnusha stared back, as if awaiting explanation.
“Well,” Rem said, mightily embarrassed to have to say it plainly, “you’re orcs. They’ll see you rushing in and just assume you want to do them harm.”
Gnusha stared at Rem, then looked to his companions, letting his grim glare meet all their expectant gazes. Finally he shook his head.
“Washab,” he muttered. The orcish word for human, spoken in a manner clearly indicating exasperation.
More raised voices. Rem turned his eyes back to the clearing. He saw a familiar figure striding out from the tree line a few hundred yards off to their right, his hands held high, his blue surcoat unmistakable despite the grime and soot now covering it.
“That’s the lord marshal,” Rem said, pointing him out to Gnusha. “He was the leader of our expedition.”
“Spare him too we?” Gnusha asked impatiently.
Rem was about to answer in the affirmative when the exchange between the lord marshal and the man making the deal to buy Tzimena and the Raven suddenly reached his ears, spoken as it was over a great distance, in raised voices. He couldn’t make out everything they said, but—
“Milord,” the lord marshal had said.
“Good help, at last!” the mysterious buyer answered with a hearty, delighted laugh. “Lord Marshal Kroenen, good to see you, sir!”
Then realization dawned. Though he was at least a hundred yards from the man, Rem could yet recognize the features of his face, especially when he smiled.
He and his brother had almost identical smiles.
“That’s the Duke of Erald,” Rem said. He turned to Gnusha, knowing that his shock was apparent on his face. “That’s your employer, Gnusha!”
Gnusha stared down into the clearing, squinting. “Met never a duke. Blooded warrant by herald.”
Rem didn’t have to wonder much what Gnusha meant. He had interacted with orcs in Yenara just enough to know that, when they were trying to speak in human tongues, the terms bonded and contracted and agreed to were often translated as blooded. For orcs considered all agreements bound by blood, even if no such ceremonies were observed.
And there he was, down in that clearing, trying to buy his brother Korin and Tzimena from the Devils of the Weald.
Rem supposed the duke could be attempting to ransom them both away from their captors . . . but somehow he thought that the duke’s ultimate intentions might not be wholly benign. After all, if he wanted his brother executed, and he realized Tzimena knew who he really was . . .
“Listen to me,” Rem said to Gnusha, “I think there’s something wrong unfolding here. Something sinister.”
“Attack now we?” Gnusha asked.
“Just listen,” Rem begged, wondering how long he could hold them off. “The duke is trying to buy that man and that woman to murder them. The man is his brother! The duke stole his throne and already tried to kill him once. The woman is the duke’s betrothed, but she knows that the duke’s brother—supposed dead by the rest of the world—isn’t.”
Gnusha stared, face twisted in perplexity.
Rem tried to decide just what Gnusha and his Blades needed to know—what might sway them to target only the right people in that clearing, and not go in hacking and slashing indiscriminately.
“We have to save her!” Rem said, pointing to Tzimena, who—he now saw with dread—had been snatched into the arms of one of the Raven’s people. She was being held at knifepoint. The situation down there looked tense. Dire.
“Save her,” Gnusha said. “Kill the rest, we?”
“Not the women in the red tabards,” Rem said hastily. And then he saw another familiar face down among those in the clearing—a face he’d almost hoped not to see, considering he was crouched at the edge of the scene with a band of orcs spoiling for a fight.
“And that dwarf,” Rem said, pointing. “He’s my partner. My friend.” He searched his storehouse of a dozen or so orcish words and phrases, picked up in his year on the watch. “Hrughar. Friend. My friend. I beg you—”
Gnusha was already on his feet and giving orders. He looked to the troll.
“Hrozhna,” he barked, then indicated a nearby cedar. “Uscatlu frawu’du.”
The troll nodded and went to work. They’d silently slain one of the duke’s guards hidden in the tree line where they’d crept forward, but apparently they’d missed another secret soldier: an archer, mounted high in the tree that Hrozhna now bent to toppling. The moment Hrozhna threw his weight against the tree and the whole trunk swayed, the archer in the boughs above suddenly screamed, terrified to realize that his perch was now under attack. He’d either completely failed to notice the party of orcs beneath him, or he’d stayed silent in fear of discovery. Either way, he’d given himself away now. Hrozhna threw his huge, thick body against the cedar, again and again, slowly but surely snapping the trunk and edging it toward collapse. Above, amid swaying branches, Rem saw the hidden archer trying to cling first to the big trunk, then to the thick branch he’d been mounted on. It did him no good. When the tree finally fell, the archer tumbled from his perch headlong with a cry and was buried when the tree thundered to rest in the clearing.
That was when Gnusha and the others showed themselves, standing tall and proud along the ridgeline of the knoll, raising their weapons and sounding hoarse battle cries to the open blue sky. The orc war cry sent the horses by the little pond scattering in all directions. The Raven, held prisoner by one of his own men, turned on the big fellow and started grappling with him. Galen spun and fired an arrow into the tree line at her back, probably aiming to take out a hidden archer she’d marked when the troubles began. The orcs charged down the slope. A number of the soldiers in the clearing charged to meet the orcs. Rem watched, helpless, as his captors bounded down the shallow slope toward their enemies, weapons and voices raised, dead set on chaos.
And that’s when he heard another battle cry coming up from below. There was a great deal of confusion and shouting, of course—the duke’s soldiers running to meet the incoming orcs, the Devils not in possession of Tzimena or Korin Lyr taking up position to do the same, arrows loosed, swords drawn—but there was only one voice down there raised in a full-throated battle cry that portended the rending of flesh and the spilling of blood wholesale.
It was Torval.
The instant he’d seen the orcs, his blood had boiled and he’d sounded his beastly intent to meet them, head-on, and trade deadly blow for deadly blow.
Already he was sprinting toward the slope to meet Gnusha’s Blades.
Rem took off running.
“Torval, no!” he shouted, waving his arms like a lunatic as he rushed down the slope of the knoll. “Torval, stop! Don’t engage them! Torval!”
Torval had almost reached the nearest orc to him—Thuwat, the young champion, with his fierce war hammer and heavily scarred shield, eager for the glory that killing a fierce dwarf in combat would earn him. Torval barreled on with all the fury and might his compact, muscular body could summon, wholly unafraid of the bigger adversary with the heavier weapon and a means of protection ready at hand.
No matter how loudly Rem shouted, his partner could not hear him—would not, more precisely
. All he could hear right now was his own battle cry and the thump of his pulse in his reddened ears.
Rem would have to take him down.
He ran faster.
Steel rang through the clearing, the battle joined. From the corner of his eye, Rem saw that little Wudji, the goblin, had mounted the fallen cedar and was scampering along the trunk, darting among the upturned braches and boughs, stopping at intervals to take rapid shots at any adversaries with bows, knowing that eliminating them was a good first step toward victory. The Devils so armed returned fire, everyone’s desperation meaning they missed nearly every shot they took. On the north side of the tree, Wallenbrand was engaged in a fight for his life with one of the duke’s soldiers, that match of mercenary versus house guard telling Rem that the duke and the lord marshal had decided, in light of all the adversaries present, to slice right through their remaining liabilities. If they were openly trying to kill Wallenbrand, then Croften and Captain Tuvera’s troops would soon follow. Off on Rem’s right, hulking Hrozhna advanced before his comrades like a one-troll cavalry, wading right into the heaviest fighting and using his big, apelike arms to sweep adversaries aside like mowed weeds.
Aemon, this was going to get out of control fast. Rem couldn’t even see Tzimena or the Raven any longer. The knot of bodies near where they were being held were all jostling and moving, surrounded by a cloud of swirling, boot-stirred dust.
And here came Torval, closer and closer as Rem poured on speed. The collision, he knew, would hurt like the sundry hells.
Torval saw him closing only at the very last second. Rem saw the dwarf’s furious face suddenly elongate into a mask of wonder and amazement, his eyes wide as saucers; then Rem launched through the air and slammed hard into his partner, enfolding him in his arms and letting his momentum knock the oncoming dwarf to the leaf-strewn forest floor. They hit the ground hard and rolled a little, and Rem struggled to raise his eyes and see what Thuwat had made of the situation.
The young orc stood with his war hammer high and his shield wide, frozen in midstrike, staring.
Rem waved him off. “Hrugahr,” he said, again and again. “Hrugahr modja.” Friend. My friend.
Thuwat made a sour face—robbed of a victory, robbed of glory—then shook his head in frustration and rushed off into the midst of the unfolding battle.
Torval punched Rem in the gut—or maybe he was just shoving? Rem wasn’t sure. He only knew that something heavy hit him in the middle and his breath was stolen and he fell right onto his back. Torval coughed and lay on his back beside him, but made no move to rise.
“Are you out of your fucking mind?” Torval snarled. “I had him, gods damn you!”
“They’re friends, Torval,” Rem wheezed. “I’ve been with them most of yesterday and through the night.”
The dwarf sat up. “Impossible!” he spat.
“I knew you wouldn’t believe me and I knew you wouldn’t hear me screaming at you as I came bounding down that hill because you were too intent on killing them, but I swear it! They’re a mercenary company, hired by the duke to scour the forest and clear it of brigands!”
Torval stared. His mouth was bloody. Rem tasted copper and realized his probably was, too.
The two partners turned and surveyed the scene. It was pure chaos. Orc fought Devil; Devil fought Eraldic soldier; Eraldic soldier fought Eraldic soldier, for that matter—for now it was clear that the duke’s men had been ordered to take down Wallenbrand and Croften and the women in Tzimena’s retinue. Everything was twanging bows and flying arrows and ringing steel and cries and curses and dust whirling in the slanting sunlight amid moving bodies.
Where was Tzimena? Rem could no longer see her. Was she wounded? Slain? Stolen away by the Devils?
“Well, what now?” Torval asked. “This isn’t our fight, lad.” Rem heard a note of sadness in his voice, as if Torval wanted to enter the fray but couldn’t justify the decision.
Rem saw a flash of shining black hair and a snatch of red fabric. There! On the far side of the insanity, making a break for one of the last trio of horses on the far side of the clearing that hadn’t bolted!
There was Tzimena. The Red Raven appeared to be with her, shoving her along, watching her back. Her hands were unbound now, but his were still tied.
And who was that, wending through the chaos toward them? A cloaked figure, indiscriminately hacking a path through the bloodshed toward his two most wanted prizes.
Verin Lyr, the Duke of Erald.
“Wrong,” Rem said. “It’s still our fight. You help Tzimena’s guard. Keep the orcs off them. Fight side by side with those orcs if you have to—just don’t let those brave women die in the midst of all this! They need allies, and you and I and those orcs are all they’ve got!”
Torval looked as if he was about to object to being told to fight alongside an orcish war band. Rem didn’t let him.
“I’m going after Tzimena and the duke.”
“Tzimena and the duke?” Torval parroted.
Rem was already up and running. His plan was to skirt the melee and stop the duke from pursuing Tzimena. Barring that, he’d steal a horse of his own and go after them.
“She doesn’t deserve to die here, Torval!” Rem shouted back over his shoulder . . . and then his partner was far behind him, and the world was fury and bloodshed all around.
On the far side of the clearing, Tzimena had just swung up into the saddle of one of the horses belonging to the duke and his men. She turned and said something to Korin, and then, before she’d even finished, the Red Raven shoved her animal’s face, to wheel it around in the opposite direction, and slapped its rump hard. The horse bolted, straight for the woods on the north side of the clearing. Tzimena bent into the headlong rush like a champion rider.
Rem was closer now, but not close enough. In the midst of the chaos, he saw Elvaris engaged with an Eraldic guardsman, her Taverando flashing divinely in the choked sunlight of the glade. Some distance from her, nearer in Rem’s vision, Captain Tuvera was being driven back by another of the duke’s men—only to be rescued a moment away from a killing blow by Gnusha himself. The orcish war chief grabbed her attacker by the trailing hem of his forester’s cloak, yanked him backward, and nearly cut the man in half with his huge, curved scimitar. Even as he ran, trying to concentrate on his ultimate goal, Rem clearly saw the fear and wonder on Tuvera’s face as she stared at the orc who’d just saved her.
And what good could Rem do? At the moment he wasn’t armed. What in the sundry hells did he plan to accomplish with his bare hands? Where could he find a sword or a weapon? He scanned the world to his right, where the fight was underway. A few bodies lay in the dirt, one moving, three others still. Rem noted that one of the dead men, skewered through an eye by an arrow, had a sword still sheathed at his belt.
Rem dove for it. In seconds he had the weapon in hand and had launched back toward his destination.
Across the clearing the duke was almost upon the Red Raven, his sword drawn and bloodied from his passage through the chaos, making straight for his brother. The Red Raven had his back to the duke, watching Tzimena’s escape, more intent on her flight than on his surroundings, the hazard bearing down on him, second by second.
“Korin!” Rem shouted, hoping his voice carried over the ringing steel and curses and cries.
The Raven heard. He turned just in time to see his brother closing in, raising his sword and drawing back for a savage overhand thrust. With a practiced nimbleness Rem could have mustered only in a dream, the Red Raven threw himself backward, hit the ground flat, then tucked in his legs and rolled aside. The duke’s thrust hit empty air and sent him stumbling forward—momentum carrying him toward a target that wasn’t there—as the Red Raven disappeared beneath one of the tied horses and sprang back to his feet on the animal’s far side. The duke regained his footing and moved to round the tied horse. Korin turned to the next horse in line. Something sharp and shiny protruded from one saddlebag, hard for Rem to see a
t his distance, but clearly metal. A woodsman’s hatchet or some similar implement. The Raven rubbed his bonds against the glinting blade and quickly cut through them.
The duke, though, had slapped the aft end of the horse blocking his advance and now drew back for another fierce strike, this one a sideward chop instead of a thrust.
The Raven charged his brother before the strike could come full round toward him, landing inside the arc of the swing and throwing the duke back in a fierce tackle. The two brothers stumbled backward, the duke struggling mightily to keep himself from falling under his brother’s hand-to-hand attack. He failed. Both men went down, duke on bottom, outlaw on top, the sword in the duke’s wildly waving right hand.
Rem had a plan now. If he could just get there while Korin had his brother pinned, he could strike the sword from the duke’s hand—or plunge a well-aimed thrust right into his rib cage, ending him with a single blow.
Are you ready for that? he thought absently. A poor, simple watchman slaying a duke? Especially when said duke is fighting for his life against a notorious outlaw? Don’t fool yourself that there won’t be consequences for that action.
Fine, then. He’d try to disarm him without killing him. Give Korin an advantage without saving him entirely. But first he had to get there.
The brothers were wrestling savagely. The sword had fallen from the duke’s grip and they were rolling about on the loam like a couple of drunken Kostermen brawling outside a tavern. Rem knew the look of such a fight—brutish and ugly, two men unwilling to back down, each ready to do the other in with his bare hands.
Korin landed a good, solid punch to the duke’s face. The duke landed a pair of his own to Korin’s ribs. Korin pulled the duke’s hair, bringing a scream from his noble brother’s throat. The duke reached for his belt, drawing something.
“No!” Rem screamed, in spite of himself.
The knife bit deep into Korin’s left side. The Red Raven threw back his head, teeth gnashing, and bellowed in pain. Verin, satisfied, shoved his brother off and tossed him aside. Korin caught himself in a half crouch and knelt there in the dirt, the hilt of the little dagger protruding from his belly. The duke, meanwhile, rolled sideward, scrambled across the dusty ground, and snatched up his sword again.
