The Crown and the Sword tros-2

by Douglas Niles

  “Dwarves can move, the same as buildings. Remind your workers they’re being well paid and will continue to be well paid. As to the logging, you can set up lumber camps in the Garnet Mountains just as easily as the Vingaard range. And you were telling me the steel comes from Kaolyn. This will put you that much closer to the alloy.”

  “No, it’s crazy,” Dram persisted, shaking his head. “I don’t see how it can be done. And there’s Sally, and Swig. I mean, they’ll have objections-”

  “I want this done,” Jaymes said coldly. “I want it done without delay. Sally and Swig can come along, or they can stay here and wait for you to return. But I need you and your operations, I need the black powder, and I need the Compound to be closer to the action. Now, I want your promise to get going on this-right away!”

  “All right, all right.” Dram’s voice was an angry growl, and his eyes all but flashed sparks as they shifted from the marshal to Coryn.

  Sulfie had watched the exchange, her eyes wide, still moist with tears. Now she spoke hesitantly. “But… what about… what about Pete’s ring? It’s out there somewhere!” She sniffled plaintively as she swept her hand across the blackened circle of soot, the wide scars from the previous day’s explosion.

  Coryn looked at the black swath as if seeing it for the first time then turned toward Jaymes and raised her eyebrows reprovingly.

  “An experiment that failed,” he said curtly.

  “And we will take the time to comb the wreckage,” Dram said bluntly. He rested a hand on Sulfie’s shoulder. “We’ll find your brother’s ring. And we’ll give him a hero’s wake.” The dwarf lifted his head and looked at Jaymes with a challenging glare. “That’s the least we can do here. And after that, then we’ll get ready to pick up and move.”

  The warrior regarded his old friend for a moment then nodded. “I’m sorry about your brother,” he said to Sulfie with unusual feeling before turning back to Coryn.

  “Take me back to the army,” he said.

  “We’re going to force the river crossing at every ford, first thing tomorrow morning,” Jaymes informed his generals after startling them at their breakfast with his teleported arrival. Coryn had appeared with him, but-knowing her presence made the knight commanders uneasy-she swiftly withdrew to a small tent to “tidy up.” The marshal wasted no time in issuing his orders and putting his generals on alert.

  “It will mean an all-night march to get the men in position,” Markus warned. “At least, if you want to cover more than ten or twelve miles of river. And then we’ll be attacking with exhausted troops.”

  “There’s nothing that can be done about that. And I do mean to cover much of the river, stretching Ankhar so thin he can’t hope to hold us everywhere. I want an attack at every crossing spreading over twenty-five miles in two directions-in effect, a fifty-mile front. General Dayr, you take the north flank. You’ll have to cross by boat, since there are no suitable fords there. It’s imperative you get started under the cover of darkness-that means I’d like to see you get moving less than twenty-four hours from now.”

  “Yes, my lord,” Dayr replied grimly. “Should I get the boat companies on the march immediately?”

  “Yes, do so.” As the general of the Crown Knights hastened to give the necessary orders to his subordinates, Jaymes turned to the other two wing commanders. “Have any of the bridging companies arrived from Palanthas?”

  “The first came in just this afternoon,” Markus replied. “I understand there are two more on the way, but they still must be several days out.”

  Jaymes nodded, thinking. “General Rankin, you will command the middle. There are three fords that should be passable. Make simultaneous attacks at each, and try to force a bridgehead on the east bank.

  “And Markus, you will take the south wing. There is one ford I believe you can use, but I want you to supervise the bridging company as well-post it north of the ford, where they won’t be expecting us to cross.” The first bridging company was a unit of the lord marshal’s own invention, a wagon train of pontoon boats and plank sections. They had practiced extending a temporary span across a wide river and had met with considerable success, but the tactic had never before been attempted in a combat situation. “Make your attack at the ford first, and see if you can take them by surprise with your bridge. I will see if I can get you some kind of concealment for your activity.”

  “Very good, my lord,” Markus said. He sent a runner to get the bridging company on the march.

  General Dayr returned, and Jaymes spent another hour making specific dispositions, speaking with the quartermasters to make sure the wagon trains of food, fuel, and arrows were dispatched with all haste. He spoke to the captains of two score companies, impressing upon them the urgency of the relief mission. He described the appearance of Ankhar’s new, powerful ally, and the desperate straits in Solanthus. By the time he was finished, the camp had become a frenzy of activity, with tents being struck, corrals dismantled, horses and oxen haltered and prepared for the march.

  Only then did Jaymes return to Coryn, who was waiting patiently beside the muddy patch of ground that had, a quarter of an hour earlier, been the command compound in the midst of neatly arrayed tents. “Once you make up your mind, things happen pretty fast,” the wizard noted wryly as a column of Crown Knights thundered past them, and three files of pikemen formed up for a rapid march to the north.

  “By evening tomorrow too many of these good men will be dead,” Jaymes said. “They know it-we all do-but no one hesitates when battle is necessary.”

  “You’re the only man who could bring all these knights, these soldiers, together,” Coryn said. “And I know the crossing will be dangerous. But it has to be done.”

  An advance team of boatmen trundled past, a caravan of five horse-drawn wagons. They, and others like them, would ride toward the major crossings, carrying bundles of canvas and strips of supple wood. Under the cover of darkness they would assemble hundreds of boats in a single night.

  The heavy bridging company also got under way, rolling south in a separate wagon train, carrying long pontoons and sections of planking. Their goal would be to establish a usable span across the river in the next twenty hours.

  “Send for Sir Templar,” Jaymes barked to a nearby courier. In a few moments the cleric-knight appeared, out of breath and red faced, before the army commander.

  “Yes, my lord!” he cried, extending a salute and standing rigidly at attention. “I await your orders!”

  “At ease,” Jaymes said. “I want you and your apprentices to go with General Markus-to the south. Stay with the bridging company. When they start to put their pontoons in the water, do whatever you can to help conceal their work-whether it be fog or darkness or some kind of invisibility spell. Many lives will depend on those bridging sections reaching far across the river before the enemy takes note of them.”

  “But…” Templar looked stricken, then immediately stiffened again. “Yes, my lord! As you wish! We will do whatever lies in our power.”

  “I’m sure you will. And understand, there is no time to waste.”

  “Certainly, my lord! Yes, of course!” Templar stood still for another beat then seemed to realize he had been dismissed. With a salute, the Clerist spun about and hurried away.

  “Do you think they’ll be able to help?” asked Coryn.

  “We’ll know better tomorrow. But they’ve been riding along with the army since we moved north from Caergoth, eating our food, preaching the creed of Kiri-Jolith to whoever happens to be within earshot. It’s time to find out if these cleric-knights can be any kind of real asset to this army.”

  The white wizard’s face went pale and her eyes moist as she watched another company, mostly young swordsmen from the northern plains, march past. They were singing a battle song, though several of the soldiers-mere boys, really-looked almost faint with fear.

  “War is such a terrible business,” Coryn said, a catch in her voice.

  “Yes. We’
ll lose a lot of men,” Jaymes said. “But by hitting them in so many places at once, I expect we’ll find a chink in Ankhar’s defenses somewhere. Once we find that chink, the knights will pour through.”

  “But Solanthus is still nearly fifty miles away,” the wizard pointed out.

  “We’ll march as fast as we can. One column, a steel fist that will smash any of Ankhar’s defenders out of the way.”

  “Even so, it will be costly,” she said quietly.

  “What would you have me do?” he demanded, his tone growing sharp. “We’re bound by certain restrictions-and the speed an army can march is one of them!”

  “Dammit!” she snapped back. Her dark eyes bored into his for a moment until she sighed and looked away, turning toward the east. “Yes, you’re right. I’m angry at myself-all this bloodshed.”

  “It ’s a fact we must deal with it and move on.” He grimaced and shook his head. “I do wish we knew more about this monster, this king of the elementals. If I could see it, observe it, I would have a better grasp on how we might make war against it.”

  “There is one thing we can try,” Coryn said. She sounded strangely hesitant, and when she looked at the marshal, her eyes had softened. There was fear, there, but it wasn’t fear of danger or death.

  “What’s that?” Jaymes looked away, studying the troops as a company of horse archers trotted passed.

  She bit her lip nervously then spoke. “I could try to teleport you into the city. You would have a chance to do something there that no one else can do because no one else possesses your courage… or your sword.”

  “Are you suggesting Giantsmiter could slay this elemental king?”

  “No, not slay it. I doubt that anything can slay it-it would be like trying to kill the very essence of the world. But I have been reading a great deal of history. The gist of it is that your sword was created by Vinas Solamnus, but he had the help of a mighty wizard. It might just help you to learn something crucial about the elemental, to discern some weakness, some way we might banish it back to its lower plane.

  “By pointing your sword at the being and staring into its eyes, you might be able to read its mind. It’s a dangerous strategy-reading the thoughts of other beings is a frightening experience under the best of circumstances. But if you can stand before the elemental and study it while you point your sword at it, it is possible you could perceive some weakness, some frustration of the beast that you might be able to exploit.”

  “If it doesn’t kill me first,” he noted.

  “If it doesn’t kill you first, right,” Coryn agreed.

  “And how do I go about this?”

  “You must stand before the creature. And try to get a look at its eyes, drawing the monster to look at you. If you concentrate, listen carefully, you’ll get a sense of its intentions, its fears.”

  “I’ll try,” he said without hesitation. “My generals can command their wings and win this battle. I myself will go to Solanthus and find the elemental,” he said. “Can you send me?

  “It’s not quite that simple,” she demurred. “You know about the Cleft Spires, of course?”

  “The big split mountain, in the middle of Solanthus? Sure.”

  “Well, it is a rock with powerful magical properties. Ever since the siege began, the wizards of the city have used it to block teleportation magic. This is to prevent Ankhar’s Thorn Knights from sneaking into the city or sending assassins, saboteurs, and the like into its midst. Their magic makes it more complicated to send you there.”

  “Is there any way around their magic?”

  “I think I can circumvent it, when the white moon is high. Solinari is full tonight, so I will send you when he reaches his zenith in the skies. Perhaps you want to get some sleep first.”

  “My troops aren’t sleeping tonight; I won’t either. But that will give me time to write out orders, send detailed plans to the generals.”

  “Very well,” Coryn said. “I’ll prepare the spell. And I’ll enchant your ring, the one I gave you years ago. You will have one teleport spell, so you can get out of the city when you’ve accomplished your mission.”

  “I thought you said teleportation doesn’t work in Solanthus?”

  She shook her head, like a tutor impatient with a slow-learning pupil. “The barrier keeps people from teleporting in. There is no restriction on leaving-in fact, I have been visited by wizards who have come from the city. It’s one way I’m able to keep aware of what’s happening there.”

  “All right. Let’s do as you say, then.”

  Twelve hours later, all but the last remnants of the army had abandoned the camp on the west bank of the Vingaard. The troops were advancing toward their planned crossings under the milky light of a full white moon. Jaymes stood alone in that same moonlight, and Coryn calculated the passage of time.

  Finally, she cast the spell. Magic swirled around Jaymes Markham. He felt the pull of the magic, a world whooshing past. He saw the walls of Solanthus and recognized the Cleft Spires outlined in the cold moonlight. Disorienting sensations surrounded him, surging through his gut, dizzying him so much that he could barely see. He sensed the nearness of his obstacle and wanted to reach out and bring himself to ground in the city.

  But there was a barrier! Strong magic reared before him, pushed him back, and screened the city from his sight, his reach. Finally the spell sizzled away, and he found himself standing on uneven, rocky ground. There was no source of light to illuminate the utter darkness, so for a few breaths he didn’t move. He groped with his other senses.

  The air was cool, still, and very damp. It penetrated his sweaty tunic and chilled him to the bone. Somewhere nearby water dripped, a musical plink-plink amplified by the lack of any other noise, save for his own increasingly ragged breathing.

  No wind. One eternal sound… and that penetrating cold. He knew at once:

  Coryn had teleported him some place under the ground.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  A PATH, FOUND

  Everywhere around him was pitch darkness, a cold and lightless void that utterly engulfed the lord marshal. Jaymes heard a terrible hissing in his ears and only vaguely realized it was the pulsation of his own blood, impelled by the heightened hammering of his heart. A sudden wave of vertigo swept over him, and he staggered, trying to regain his balance, but his foot stumbled over a jutting rock, and he fell to his hands and knees.

  His fingers felt rough rocks, some of them loose and crumbling, as small as gravel, and others that seemed to be part of the bedrock of what was obviously some kind of cavern. His right knee throbbed where it had landed on a jagged stone, and he clutched the ground like a drowning man clinging to a raft. Bile surged in his throat, but the warrior forced it back down and clenched his jaws, forcing his breathing to slow.

  “Where am I?” he demanded of the darkness, the words a bare whisper of sound passing through his parched lips.

  “ I’m somewhere under the Garnet range,” a voice said. “The question is, how did you get here?”

  The voice came from behind him and though the tone was friendly, the mere presence of the speaker was enough to startle Jaymes. He whirled around, pushed himself into a crouch, straining to see some sign-any sign-of the other person. Unfortunately, the rough ground proved his undoing again, and his feet slipped out from under him, dropping him unceremoniously onto his rump.

  “Who’s there?”

  This time the reply was only a sharp, scraping sound, followed immediately by a flaring of light. The brightness was a searingly painful sensation, blinding him every bit as effectively as had the previous darkness. Jaymes closed his eyes against a yellow brilliance that was like staring right into the sun. He raised his hand to screen his face.

  But he quickly realized that there was no sensation of heat upon his skin, nothing to suggest that sunlight was actually spilling into this forsaken pit. Almost immediately he recalled the harsh sound that had accompanied that flash: it was merely the scraping of a match u
pon tinder! Opening his eyes again, keeping one hand raised to shade the spot of fire from his direct gaze, he began to discern more about his surroundings.

  The match-holder’s feet were plainly visible; he was clad in moccasins that-like the voice-were strangely familiar. When those feet advanced closer, not in a stride, nor a charge, but with an almost childish skip, the warrior understood.

  “Moptop?” he asked in amazement. It was the first time in his life that he was able to derive even a modicum of pleasure from the presence of a kender. “Is that you?”

  “Sure is. This is the most amazing place! You should see it! Well, I guess you will see it, now that you’re here-unless you rush away as fast as you arrived. But tell me, confidentially of course, how did you do that? Get here so fast, I mean?”

  “Wait. Let me collect my thoughts.” Jaymes turned his back to the light and inspected his surroundings. He found himself in a cave, an area that was very constricted. A cracked and broken wall loomed no more than four or five paces away, and-though the overhead ceiling was lost in shadow for the most part-he could see the tips of fanglike stalactites jutting down from above in all directions.

  The floor was even rougher than he had imagined. A glance around showed that he would have been in for a nasty fall if he took more than a single step in any direction. It seemed the teleport spell had brought him to the top of some kind of square-edged boulder in the middle of a small cavern. The kender was standing on another rock nearby, and as Jaymes’s eyes adjusted, he perceived the opposite wall was not very far beyond his diminutive companion.

  “Where did you say we are?” asked the warrior. “Under the Garnet range?”

  “Yep. I just happen to be exploring through here. You know, working on my maps. I was thinking there might be a way to Solanthus through here. I wanted to go there and see that place-I’ve never been inside of a siege before! But the goblins wouldn’t let me walk through their camp when I tried to go the regular way. So I came down here. That’s what I was doing when I heard you come along. But you never told me how you-wait a moment! She sent you, didn’t she? The White Lady has magicked you here! Wow, that’s great! She must have figured I’d be needing a partner! Can’t have too many partners when you’re exploring. Real mind reader, the White Lady.”