“Oh boy, that's a lot more than before. Methinks they can build quite a few bridges,” King Gup said.
Sir Murith and Gorham, along with Hedor and Ruig, splashed into the water, advancing into the lake. They looked up at Alfred.
Murith called out. “We're going to meet them in the water. We'll fight them as they build!”
Alfred waved affirmative. They sloshed on until they were chest deep in the still clear waters of the Sanctuary, a mere dozen men preparing to battle hundreds of hormigs. The ants seemed to be preparing to form chains to reach the island Refuge. Then, waving their antennae in unison, they began to turn away. It took awhile for the men to discern this, but the ants were definitely crawling back into the tunnels from whence they came.
“It worked!” King Gup yelled.
“Now, to see a real battle!” King Alfred said. “Take me to the lookout tunnel!”
“Make them attack the bugbears! Kill the bugbears!” Dunther hissed at the woman. He delicately slid his blade across her throat. He could see the pain in her eyes as he sliced. Along her temple and hair, he noticed thousands of tiny antennae pricking her scalp. They went up into the Queen ant's mouth, like feelers. The Queen’s black orb eyes were moving, staring down at Dunther. He could sense their evil. He glanced down to see her mandibles were slowly crushing the imprisoned woman's body.
Dunther quickly withdrew the blade from the woman’s throat, leaving a minor cut. He twirled the shining sword out and up, pivoting it and thrusting it into one of the Queen’s eyes. The long blade went in deep. The giant insect body quivered and squealed. The woman began to choke in utter pain. Dunther saw the mandibles cutting into her folded arms. He swiftly pulled out a dagger and jabbed it into the flesh attachment of the mandible severing the gooey flesh. The mandible separated from the ant's cranium. He did the same to the opposing mandible, and the woman's arms unfolded.
Her green scintillating eyes were upon Dunther as she leapt from her imprisonment. She pushed Dunther out. As they came crashing down to the webbed wagon floor, she landed atop him. Verboden jumped out of the way. Pep and Gib wriggled free from the servant ants, which seemed dazed. The servants stood still, opening and closing their small mandibles methodically.
As Dunther exhaled air from his crushed lungs, his sword slipped out of the Queen's gooey cranium. She was squealing in her death throes. The blade dropped, rattling against copper and webbings. Meanwhile, the woman crouched atop Dunther like a black shiny spider, chattering with a voice coming from taught silver cords. On her back were bat wings, folded and dripping with black ooze. She pointed at Verboden with long sharp talons.
“Cleric! Heal me!”
Verboden lifted his staff to strike.
“Zith ah nah keeh! Heal me, cleric!” she hissed.
Verboden tried to resist but couldn't and murmured a spell.
Strength upon us
Light upon us
O domme rai
Vee bede mohn
She purred with each syllable. Dunther stared up at his captor. His mouth was gaping.
“Only a child of the Father of Light can be healed by the spell!” Verboden said, falling back.
Suddenly, the woman shook and quivered with animal fervor. Black oil and goo splattered everywhere. It struck Verboden, knocking him back on the webbings. It sprayed the gnomes, who trying to sneak over to rescue Dunther. And it dripped and splashed on the knight as he lay under the limbs and body of a flesh-toned woman. He stared in shock.
Verboden's jaw dropped. The gnomes gaped and stood up, rubbing their chins, giving each other furtive glances.
The woman’s shiny bat wings buzzed with electrifying speed. Now, the bat wings were not that at all; they were faerie wings, spreading outward, revealing a colorful array of sparkling rainbow and forest colors in a myriad of scintillating interwoven patterns.
As she buzzed her wings, more goo sprinkled repeatedly on the gnomes and Verboden. They waited patiently as the splatters built up, layer after layer. Verboden nodded in annoyed appreciation. Sure, she was free, but did he have to receive all the slimy black goo?
Dunther did not notice the wings as he stared.
She seemed to breathe in fresh air, stretching and purring from her newfound freedom. She looked down at Dunther and put a finger to his mouth. Then she focused for a moment, closing her eyes as the antennae from the deadish Queen slowly twirled down to her head.
“Hey, best we get her off him!” said Gib.
“Oh, I can grab her and pull for sure!” asserted Pep.
The gnomes advanced to attack, but the faerie opened her lustrous hands. Twinkling lights twirled and danced around them.
“Oh, look at the pretty lights,” they said, reaching joyfully for them. The lights fluttered away. The gnomes drew back, hesitating, worried that they might have hurt the pretty lights. Yet they hugged each other, staring blissfully.
Verboden stood up trying to balance on the webbings.
“I am Florina, Queen of the Faerie Realm! I have long been entrapped by Gorbogal to do her bidding.” Antennae encircled her head like a black spidery crown. “Now, see my power unleashed!”
Chapter Fifty-Nine: Battle of the Beasts
The bugbears stomped and hammered in all the holes they could find. They roamed about looking for any signs of a possible sneak attack.
“Children, we want children for breakfast! Hahr hahr!” they chanted as they kicked at snowy holes and poked into mounds of dirt.
Across the fields were nearly four hundred bugbears in groups and lines for battle. Wargog galloped about on his heavily breathing bear. Realizing that his warriors were spread out more than usual, he glanced back at the wagons. They were in a circle and unguarded. He snorted and turned his bear around.
“Rock Claws! Form up and follow me!” Several bugbear groups turned and trotted behind Wargog as he made his way back to the wagons.
What started as a trot was pushed to a gallop and then a charge as Wargog sensed something amiss. He charged into the area of the wagons with their steaming trenches and smoking coals. He looked about and then focused on the Queen's wagon.
“He's here!” Florina said, her lips close to Dunther's. “Right where I want him!”
Wargog trotted closer. His bugbear retinue finally reached him, exhausted. He pointed for them to take a look. They moved in toward the Queen's wagon. One noticed an ant in the embers of a trench under a nearby wagon. The bugbear motioned to another. It shrugged. The ant shoveled a pathway through the embers, approaching the bugbears. They tried to ignore it by stepping aside.
A bugbear screamed as it dropped. The ant had crushed its leg. Another bugbear turned and swung its heavy mattock down upon the ant's body, crushing it with a loud crunch.
Just then other ants swarmed out from under the wagons, burying or pushing coals aside. The bugbears formed shield walls designed for fighting upright humanoids, not crawling beasts. The ants merely climbed over them, and the bugbears were met with giant armoured mandibles. The fighting was furious and chaotic. The bugbears had to swing furiously and repeatedly to crush the ants’ armoured heads. At the same time, ant mandibles were crushing bugbear legs and arms. When mandibles closed in on their arms, the bugbears could easily pick up the ants and toss them around. But no matter how hard they shook their arms, the mandibles would not release.
The bugbears were soon overwhelmed – even though Wargog and his bear bit and splatted many ants near them. One ant had his bear by the paw, the bear's bite easily crushed its head. But the bear roared in rage and it took all of Wargog's strength to hold the reins to pull his bear under control.
Wargog retreated. “Form up, bears! Form up, man-beasts!”
The remaining bugbears across the snowy valley formed lines to join in the fighting at the wagons. They growled, howling chants in unison as they marched up the slopes, stomping methodically and encircling the wagons. In the ensuing melee bugbears rolled on the ground, flailing with what weapons they c
ould and crunching ant bodies as mandibles clung to and crushed their limbs. It was a mess of pain and devastation for all.
Wargog charged along behind his lines, roaring for the bugbears to stay in formation. “Crush the bugs! Get me to the Queen's wagon!”
The bugbears began marching in with a wall of shields and crossbows ready. As they neared the warm ground of the wagons, steadily marching through, drill ants surfaced from below and began piercing their furry feet. The bugbears dropped their shields. Their lines began to falter. The drill ants retracted. Mandible warriors burst forth. As bugbears misfired crossbows, their lines broke into further disarray. The crunching of bugbear feet, the crunching of ant armour, and the crunching of bodies falling, exploded into a horrific chaos of beast upon beast battle.
Wargog roared in frustration. His bear reared up as ants swarmed out from under the wagons and out of many holes, flanking the lines of bugbears not yet engaged. Wargog now saw the immense numbers of hormigs he had transported.
Ants swarmed over shield lines and crushed anything their mandibles could grab. As they swung crazily in the frothing melee, the bugbears smashed many ants, splitting them into parts. It was chitin brutality versus bugbear viciousness. The robotic onslaught of hundreds and hundreds of giant ants was taking its toll. As a bugbear crushed two or three ants, having sustained deep lacerations, more ants would come in. The bugbears would either fall under the onslaught or bound away, like rabid limping bears into the snow.
It was a disaster of epic proportions for Wargog. His bear crunched many ants near him, crashing his giant body against the wagons as he leapt and galloped over many clenching mandibles. Wargog held on as best he could. The bear finally careened and burst out from the encircled wagons, it too raced off into the snow.
As the bugbears saw their chief retreat, panic spread amongst them. Those that could, turned and fled. Others screamed for help as mandibles grabbed their legs and arms. It was a full chaotic retreat in all directions. Those caught in mandibles didn't get far before more ants climbed atop them and attacked with clenching mandibles.
The hormigs made chase. The bugbears ran, limped and crawled as fast as they could. No more than a few score managed to flee very far. The ants chased them through the snow, across chopped wood debris fields, and further into the forests. Bleeding and bone crushed, the fleeing bugbears were unaware that the farther they went away from the camp, the more the hormigs slowed and stiffened, gradually coming to a stop in the snow and trees, frozen into sculptures of terrifying bugs.
So across the snowy land, many hundreds of ants were caught in their own blind demise – led to it by the one who controlled them.
Florina, looked down at Lord Dunther. He stared up with wide eyes. Verboden looked about for something to cover her.
“It's very cold...” he mumbled.
He tried to use his own dirty tattered cloak, hoping it would light on her fluttering faerie wings, but it slipped off with each toss. Pep was still playing with the little dancing lights, cooing and ooing as they danced. Gib found staring at the Queen of Faeries more interesting. He elbowed Pep, who suddenly shook out of his dream of sorts. The lights, annoyed that they were ignored, disappeared. Pep looked over and saw Dunther's precarious situation.
“Lord Dunther, Royal Knight, Servant of King Alfred?” She spoke softly, her voice now sounding like the warming chords of a harp.
Dunther nodded slowly. She was too close.
“And my savior!”
She kissed him deeply on the lips – long enough that Verboden grimaced, looking to Gib and Pep for help. They simply shrugged and looked back at him. He looked at them again, pleading for help. They shrugged harder, not knowing what to do.
The winged woman pulled away as Dunther tried, in his fallen state, to prolong the kiss with pouty lips. He opened his eyes and looked at hers. She stared at him as a floral gown, embroidered enchantingly upon her.
Verboden sighed in relief. Gib angled a final look. Pep smacked him on the back of his head.
Dunther stared at her. She looked at him, raising herself up slowly, shaking her head as if awakening from a nightmare. Suddenly, she burst up through the wagon's roof, ripping and shredding apart the Queen bug and all its appendages and antennae. Then she fluttered out into the cold brisk air of winter. She looked at the sun and sky and breathed freedom as a blanket of sheen covered her in silk-like robes. She looked down one last time at Dunther.
Verboden and the gnomes stepped into the light to gaze up at her and her wintry beauty. Then she flew off.
With Verboden’s help, Dunther lumbered to his feet. He grabbed his chest, saying, “She cursed me!”
“What?”
“Help, cleric! She cursed me!”
Verboden looked at Dunther's body. “You're badly beaten up.”
“Here! I can feel it!” Dunther grabbed his chest and wavered on his feet, slipping in the slime.
“Where?”
“Here!” Dunther beat his heart. “It's empty! She took it!”
“What? How?”
“I can feel it! It's empty inside!”
“Oh?!” Verboden put his hand on Dunther's heavily breathing chest.
“She took it! It's empty! I'm cursed! A curse...” he gasped.
Verboden put finger to lips, thinking for a moment. He looked at the gnomes, who had smirks in their eyes as they glanced about.
“I don't think that's a curse, Lord Dunther.”
“It is! I swear it! I feel she must have taken part of my heart. It feels lighter. It feels weaker.”
“Oh, no, Dunther.” Verboden put his hand on Dunther's chest again. “It's not weaker. It is all... still… very… there. Pounding.”
“It feels panged, empty!”
“That's not a curse, Lord Dunther.”
“What is it?”
“Love.”
Chapter Sixty: Preparing for the Final Battle
Wargog and a few score of his bugbears made it back to the ruins of Grotham Keep. The War Chief and his ogres looked up from their dreary encampment. The War Chief could not help but chortle as the defeated bugbear army shuffled into the rubble.
The giant bear growled at the ogres. Wargog slapped his mount to calm it down and dismounted with weak knees.
The War Chief could see that many bugbears had matted dry blood and many wounds. He sneered at them.
Wargog walked up to the War Chief and pulled out his giant claw hammer. The War Chief and his score of ogres readied themselves for a fight, but Wargog went to a knee and raised his hammer. “I come to serve you in this fight against the boy king. I give you my allegiance. To the death!”
The War Chief grabbed Wargog and lifted him up. “Guhd, he will comez soon. We willz fightz! To duh death!”
The cold winter wind whipped up as much snow from the rolling terrain as dropped in from icy storm clouds. Bugbears trudged through thick snow. Much of their matted fur was frost ridden. They were cold, sluggish and hungry. They held their crossbows heavily, searching through the sparse forest.
One spotted something in the wind-whipped snow and pointed, hitting the others nearby. They growled and looked, their frost-ridden mouths frothing. They raised their crossbows.
Out of the corner of his eye, a bugbear noticed a bow floating above a mound of snow. He blinked, and a volley of arrows suddenly struck him in his chest and neck. He let out a moan and dropped into the fluffy snow. The others howled and attempted to retreat.
The War Chief huddled by a very small fire. Another ogre ripped a beam from the rubble to place on the limp flame, but the War Chief raised his hand. “Don't wazte itz!”
The shuddering ogres huddled under smelly stiff dino skins. The bugbears grouped in what few covered places they could find amidst the rubble.
“Yur hunting party iz dehd!” the War Chief told Wargog.
“They are going to starve us out,” Wargog growled. “Spring is a long way off.”
“Hahrzz! I'm zoh glad yuuz
came bakk, Wargog!” the War Chief said, turning to look at the puny dismal bugbear army.
Wargog looked at the War Chief as he licked his lips. “The Fight to Eats?! They can't stand against your ogres!” Wargog growled.
“Fight to Eat still weeez call. Lookz like bugbearzz iz what weeez eatz!”
Wargog stepped forward and looked at his huddled quivering bugbears. Many were severely injured and weak. They stared up like hungry puppies. “Do not worry, my comrades! The strongest will survive!” He raised his hammer. “To the strongest!”
So on a rare sunny day in the middle of winter, a clearing in the rubble was made. Ogres pounded the ground ceremoniously. Bugbears squatted high up on the ruins and beams to see. All were licking their hungry beasty lips. In the clearing, two wounded bugbears with heavy blades desperately fought it out. The War Chief laughed. Wargog sneered.
In the dark forest a distance away, Hedor, in thick furs, stood next to Loranna. They could hear the macabre ritual from afar. “What horrifying monsters,” Hedor said, shivering. “In desperate times or just for the fun of it, beast men will fight each other to the death. And the loser is dinner.”
“Thank the Father of Light, we are not like that!” Loranna said.
“Hey Hedor, sure you don't want any more deer?” Ruig said, munching on a meaty bone of roasted venison.
Hedor and Loranna turned to see their small group of archergirls and men greedily carving up a roasted deer. They ate voraciously. The girls grabbed at each other's meaty ribs with greasy fingers. Even as the meat steamed and burned their fingers, they were too hungry to resist. Many snorted and gurgled as they ate.
Hedor and Loranna chuckled.
Back at the Sanctuary, everyone was busy preparing for the battle ahead. Dunther, Gorham and Murith were getting their final pieces of knightly armour fitted. They were amazing and stunning, fitting the men’s bodies perfectly. Murith rotated his arm to find that the pieces would roll over each other smoothly. The gnomes were incredible at finessing the perfectly formed pieces. Many would tinker and hammer right on them as they moved their limbs. A gnome would stick its ear to steel and listen to the whispering motions. Then he would quickly tap its hammer at the right point and listen again. Now, instead of a whisper, they heard the sound of a cool silver breeze.
Alfred 2: And The Underworld (Alfred the Boy King) Page 36
