The Way of Pain

by Gregory Mattix

  I hope I don’t get them all killed, leading this raid. We just have to ensure we find Sianna and get her to safety. The rest we deal with as it comes.

  A rustle of leaves made Creel start, and his hand went to the hilt of Final Strike. Gold-flecked eyes glittered in the bough of a maple a few paces away, the tree still stubbornly maintaining the last of its foliage.

  “Well met, Sirath.” Creel guided his mount nearer.

  The erinys cocked her head sideways, regarding the group curiously a moment, then she smiled, a cold expression devoid of humor. “So the stouthearted mortals are ready to risk all to rescue their fair queen?”

  “We are,” he replied.

  “What manner of creature have you made a pact with?” Sir Edwin demanded of Creel. He squinted at Sirath.

  Without the benefit of Creel’s sharper night vision, the others would find her nearly invisible in the shadows of the tree, save for her pale face and luminous eyes.

  “This is Sirath,” Creel said with a sharp glance at Edwin. He had only shared Sirath’s nature with Lord Lanthas to avoid unnecessary drama from the others. “She has brought hopeful word of our queen and agreed to teleport us to the camp. Concern yourself with that and leave the rest to me.”

  Sir Edwin bristled at that but wisely remained silent.

  “Sirath, we stand ready. And I thank you for your aid.”

  Her head bobbed once. “Save your thanks, monster hunter, for the night is full of danger, and you may not survive.”

  He felt a prickle of foreboding at her ominous words. “Does the queen yet remain in the camp as before?”

  “Yes, naught has changed.” Sirath looked at the others and raised her voice. “We shall arrive a short distance outside of the camp. My thralls have cleared the area of sentries, yet roving patrols could stumble upon you. Leave your mounts and be about your business. Should you return with your queen, I shall teleport you away. If you do not return, then your fates are in the hands of your gods.”

  “Fair enough. Ready when you are.”

  Final Strike’s pommel was a cool comfort in Creel’s hand. He looked around at the others, receiving nods of readiness in return. Sirath hopped out of the tree, her broad wings unfurling and stirring the air as she hovered before them. The sight of the erinys fully revealed in the moonlight was met by startled curses and the rasp of steel.

  “Hold!” Creel called.

  All save for Rafe and Iris looked shocked by her appearance. The horses neighed and stirred nervously beneath them.

  “You would make pacts with fiends?” Edwin hissed. His face was pale and his knuckles white around the pommel of his sword.

  Creel ignored the knight. He nodded at Sirath.

  “Gather close and make ready.” She raised her hands and spoke in the fell speech, the words slithering like worms in Creel’s ears, sending a shiver down his spine.

  Creel didn’t even feel a sensation of motion as the trees and distant campfire blurred and faded around them. Unfamiliar new terrain coalesced, and they found themselves on a plain of waist-high grass beside a cluster of stunted trees, the land around them flat as far as the eye could see. The exception was a lone hill in the distance lit up with torchlight and illuminating the masses of surrounding tents. Numerous campfires were spread around the hill, most of them dwindling down to coals at the late hour. The sound of a flowing creek came from nearby.

  “Let’s do what we came here for.” Creel dismounted and tied his reins to a branch of one of the trees.

  The others followed suit. The men loosened their swords in their scabbards and spread out, forming an arc facing the camp, alert for any sentries.

  Sirath was a darker shape blotting out the starry firmament as she flew a short distance away. She hovered and conversed briefly with a soldier who rose up out of the grass at her appearance. A moment later, they approached the others.

  “This one shall lead you to the tent where your queen is captive,” Sirath said. “Favorable hunting to you.”

  The Nebaran was a short, wiry man wearing the garb of a scout and carrying a short sword on his hip. He waved them to follow.

  “Good luck,” Iris whispered. She and Rafe shared a kiss, then they left her behind with the horses.

  Creel lengthened his stride to keep up with the thrall, who moved confidently toward the camp. Heavy footfalls thudded quickly behind as Kulnor ran to catch up to him, his hammer in hand.

  “Unusual contact ye’ve got there,” Kulnor whispered. “I thought that lordling was about to piss himself when he saw that Sirath.” He chuckled softly.

  “Aye. The gods sometimes give us no choice in our allies. The results are what matter.”

  “Well, let us rescue this queen o’ yers,” the dwarf replied, a grin on his face.

  Sirath’s confidence in her thralls proved justified. Their Nebaran guide led them up to the very edge of the encampment without encountering any sentries. Crouching low, the party darted across a fifty-pace-wide area where the grass was flattened down to provide better visibility. Just ahead was the perimeter of orderly rows of tents where the soldiers slept. The camp was mostly quiet although the expected sounds of drunken voices and laughter carried. As Creel slipped down an aisle between two tents, he could hear rasping snores coming from many of the tents.

  Sweat trickled down his back as he followed the thrall deeper into the camp. He stepped quietly as they moved, well accustomed to hunting prey, animal and monster both. His companions obviously lacked the same skill, making him wince at times. Directly behind him, Kulnor’s heavy boots seemed to find every twig to crunch and loose pebble to kick. The other men weren’t much quieter. Rafe’s heavy breathing sounded like a bellows just behind Kulnor. Someone near the back of their group tripped over a tent line and grunted a curse when he went down.

  Creel started when a spear-wielding sentry suddenly loomed out of the darkness, but their guide approached the other man without hesitation. The two briefly conversed, then their original guide waved them onward. The group circled to the left, avoiding a firepit still blazing brightly. The smell of roasting meat filled the air, along with slurred voices and laughter.

  A tent flap rustled to Creel’s left as soon as he passed it. He whirled, whipping his dagger free of its sheath. A Nebaran stumbled out of the tent, blinking in surprise at Creel. His eyes went wide, and he opened his mouth to cry out. Steel glinted, then a wet crunch followed, and the man pitched onto his face. Kulnor stood over him with his hammer raised. Creel nodded his thanks, and two of his men quickly dragged the man back inside his tent.

  “How much farther?” he asked their guide.

  “Officer’s camp.” The man pointed about fifty paces ahead on the hill, where the large officer pavilions were well lit by a circle of torchlight. The imperial lion was visible on a pennant fluttering over the largest tent.

  “Right. Keep going, then.”

  They continued through the camp, passing a paddock where a few dozen horses grazed.

  If all goes to shite, Edwin should throw Sianna on one of these mounts’ backs and ride like the hordes of the Abyss are on his heels.

  He held up and caught Edwin’s gaze then pointed to the horses. The knight nodded, evidently having come to the same conclusion.

  Good, then hopefully he will get her out of here and not do anything foolish.

  They skirted the paddock and had just reached the base of the hill when a clump of bushes rustled and a man stepped out a short distance away.

  “Oi! What are you men about?” The Nebaran was hitching up his breeches, frowning at them.

  Creel didn’t wait for the thrall to reply. He drew his dagger and loosed it. It glittered as it spun through the air then buried itself in the man’s throat. He gurgled and fell backward. Creel retrieved his dagger and rolled the man into the concealment of the bushes.

  The group paused a moment, crouched at the base of the rise in the shadow cast by one of the big pavilions.

  “Your queen i
s captive on the far side of the parade ground, two rows over,” the guide said. “There’ll be two guards out front. We’ll be visible to them once we approach.”

  “We can take them silently. You a good throw with that axe?” Creel asked Kulnor.

  “As if Reiktir himself guides me hand.” The dwarf slung his hammer back on his baldric and pulled the axe free. He slapped the axehead against his palm in anticipation.

  Creel raised an eyebrow at the old, battered weapon but held his tongue. It looked wickedly sharp despite its beat-up appearance. He nodded. “You and I will take the two guards at her tent. The moment they are down, the rest of you fan out and prepare for company. Sir Edwin—you know your role.”

  The men nodded, nervous but eager to free their queen and be on their way.

  “Let’s go.”

  With the guide leading the way, they moved quickly up the rise. Fortunately, the grass was fairly thick, so they were relatively quiet in their approach. They crested the rise and skirted around the largest pavilion.

  Hushed voices came from within, the sounds of men dicing. “Bah! What shite luck I’ve got,” someone grumbled to scattered laughter.

  They paused at the front corner of the command tent. The parade ground, a well-lit rectangular clearing, stretched about twenty paces across. Facing them was a line of more pavilions, likely officer quarters, then smaller tents behind those. Nobody was about, which seemed odd, but Creel wasn’t going to question their luck.

  The men quickly dashed across the parade ground and into the shadows between two of the large pavilions on the other side. The guide paused at the curve in the tent. He held up two fingers and pointed ahead. Creel peered around and saw he was indicating a burgundy tent in the next row. Two guards stood at the entrance.

  He beckoned Kulnor then, seeing the dwarf ready, stepped out into the open and loosed his dagger. His intended target saw him the moment he revealed himself and took a step forward. The blade struck the guard in the upper chest. He cried out and reeled back against the wall of the tent. Creel cursed and charged. Beside him, Kulnor hurled his axe. The second guard’s eyes went from his wounded companion to the intruders. When he opened his mouth to cry out, the axe buried itself between his eyes with a crunch.

  Creel leaped and caught the first guard before he fell. He wrenched his dagger free and opened the man’s throat to silence him.

  Footsteps pounded as Sir Edwin charged through the tent flap with Jahn and two other warriors at his heels. Rafe and the remaining men spread out to take up their designated positions around the tent.

  A disturbance prickled at the edge of Creel’s senses, a magical stirring. He looked around anxiously. “A ward,” he muttered. “’Ware, men!” He drew Final Strike.

  At the same time, shouts and steel clashing against steel rang out from inside Sianna’s tent. Creel pushed aside the flap and poked his head in. Edwin and the others were struggling and fighting with a knot of Nebaran soldiers within the close confines of the tent, but he saw right away Sianna wasn’t there.

  A warning shout came from nearby. He ducked back outside and saw his men facing outward with drawn steel. Nebarans were pouring down the aisles around the tents, swords drawn. In the distance, a jangling bell sounded.

  “Throw down your weapons!” an officer commanded.

  “It’s a trap!” Edwin cried. He appeared from the tent, sword bloodied and breathing harshly.

  Aye, so it is.

  ***

  Sianna was roused from her uneasy slumber by an alarm bell going off somewhere. She sat up on her cot and blinked back sleep to clear her senses. The guards froze at their games of dicing, exchanging glances.

  “As the warlord predicted,” one of the captains said. He knocked back the remainder of a cup of wine and stood up. “Traitors in our midst. I’ll have the bastards’ heads.”

  Sounds of fighting reached the tent, distant but clearly audible. The ring of steel on steel was a distinctive sound, one she’d come to recognize well. Sianna apprehensively got to her feet.

  “Sianna!” a voice cried out in the camp nearby. “Are you here?”

  Shocked, it took her a moment to reply. “I’m he—”

  Her shout was cut off by a rough hand clamped over her mouth. The guard grabbed her around the waist and roughly threw her back onto the cot. She tried to scream, but he kept his hand over her mouth.

  “Hush, Your Highness,” the man growled. “Your friends will be dead in a moment, and you can go back to your beauty sleep.”

  They’re trying to rescue me! A sudden surge of hope filled her, and she struggled to break her captor’s grip, but it was no use.

  Mighty Sol, please let them find me! Grant them your protection.

  ***

  “That fiend tricked you, Creel, you damned fool!” Edwin growled.

  Did she?

  Creel didn’t think so. The two thralls looked as startled as the rest of them. The thrall who had guided them abruptly drew his sword and charged at the officer demanding they surrender. The spearman turned the other way, raising his spear to hurl it into the approaching soldiers. One man was struck in the chest. The spearman then drew a short sword and charged.

  “Sianna!” Creel yelled. “Are you here?”

  A muffled cry came in response, swiftly cut off, faint over the sounds of fighting.

  “Seize them! Kill them if they resist!” the Nebaran officer screamed.

  Sirath’s thralls were quickly chopped down by their countrymen’s blades.

  Then all became chaos as the attacking Nebarans engaged Creel’s men.

  Creel held back a moment, focusing on where the cry had come from. It sounded as if it had originated in the direction whence they came.

  She’d be well guarded… that large command tent where the men were dicing. He knew instinctively that was where she was being held.

  “With me, men!” he shouted. “Edwin, Rafe, Kulnor, Jahn! Come on!”

  He ran to the nearest large pavilion, aware that to either side, his men were crossing steel with the Nebarans although they were sorely outnumbered. Creel plunged his sword through the canvas wall, slashing it open, then lunged through and into the tent. It was empty, vacated of its occupants but a moment before, he suspected. The canvas rustled as others started coming through behind him, but he couldn’t wait for them. Someone screamed from behind as the clash of steel continued.

  Creel lunged through the tent flap and into the parade ground at the center of the officers’ camp. He plowed into a handful of Nebaran soldiers heading toward the fighting. Before they realized he was there, he was on them. Final Strike punched through one man’s ribs then cleaved another’s throat. A third spun, slashing at Creel, but Rafe was there. He parried the blow aside and hacked the Nebaran in the belly with his broadsword. Kulnor bellowed a battle cry and crushed a fourth’s hip with a blow of his hammer, sending the man crashing into the wall of a nearby tent and partially collapsing it. Jahn ran his sword through the back of another, who was swinging at Rafe, and the Nebaran fell.

  Edwin emerged through the pavilion along with a couple other men at his heels. Nebarans were spilling back around the tents toward them, shouting warnings.

  Creel raced for the command tent. The flap rose just as he neared it. Without breaking stride, he threw his shoulder into whoever was behind the flap. A man bellowed out in surprise, breath whooshing from lungs, then Creel was inside, sprawled atop a man on the ground. He smashed Final Strike’s pommel into the Nebaran’s forehead and scrambled to his feet.

  “Master Creel!” a familiar voice cried.

  He looked up to find a score of soldiers packed into the tent. Off to his left, Sianna was struggling in the grip of a burly soldier who looked to have sustained a bite wound on his hand. One of the queen’s legs was shackled to the leftmost tent pole. Her green eyes were wide with surprise.

  A moment of silence followed as everyone stared at each other: Creel with his bloody sword in hand, a couple of his
companions behind him, and the score of surprised Nebarans in the tent.

  “Sianna!” Edwin’s cry broke the frozen moment.

  Soldiers rushed forward en masse, knocking over a table covered with dice and cups of wine. One man stumbled over an overturned chair and went down.

  Kulnor barked something in Dwarvish and reversed his warhammer, driving the top of his hammer’s head to the ground. A shockwave rolled off it, the ground quaking, and some men were thrown off their feet, others stunned.

  Creel leaped forward, taking advantage of the distraction. He cut down two soldiers in the blink of an eye. A third man raised a sword to strike, and Creel hacked his sword arm free just below the shoulder. The arm spun free in a spurt of blood, the shocked man shrieking.

  Rafe and Jahn bulled into the men around Creel. Edwin was shouting for Sianna, his voice shrill behind them, as he battled another soldier. Kulnor and a couple more of Creel’s men fought around them, but they were still outnumbered.

  There’s still a chance to get her out—cut through the back of the tent, down the hill, steal a horse… but first we need a distraction before a hundred men pour through the entrance.

  Creel lashed out, kicking the nearest tent pole. His kick wasn’t as impressive as Mira could’ve managed, but it was effective. The pole splintered and broke in half. The pavilion’s heavy canvas roof immediately sagged on top of the knot of fighting men.

  “Edwin, get Sianna! The rest of you, hold them off!”

  Kulnor shattered a soldier’s knee with his hammer, and the man staggered into Creel. He shoved the Nebaran aside just in time to intercept a stabbing blade, the wounded man taking his comrade’s sword in the back. Creel thrust Final Strike through the other soldier’s eye before he could recover.