And if by risking his life he could help the villagers, why not do it?
He deserved to die anyway for what had happened to Aelia.
To his surprise, Caius smiled. “Good. Our journey to Urd Morlemoch may have greater urgency, but it would not sit well with me to leave so many people at the mercy of a female urdmordar. Even the cultists, who may be surprised to learn their goddess regards them not as disciples but as food.”
“You came north to convert the pagan orcs to the church, Brother,” said Ridmark. “Perhaps you have the chance to convert some worshippers of Agrimnalazur instead.”
“Perhaps,” said Caius, and his smile faded. “But she is an urdmordar. Have you given any thought how to fight her? Magic is the only thing that can hurt a female urdmordar, and I fear Calliande’s power alone will not be enough.”
“No,” said Ridmark. “It won’t.” He had slain an urdmordar by himself ten years ago, but luck had played a far greater role in that than skill. Usually it took teams of veteran Swordbearers and experienced Magistri to defeat an urdmordar, and even then, they often failed. “The urdmordar are mighty. But I hope we can free the prisoners without ever facing her.”
He walked to where Calliande sat with Rosanna and Gavin.
“You look as if you are going somewhere,” said Calliande.
“I am,” said Ridmark. “Tomorrow, I intend to pursue the arachar and free their prisoners.” He looked at Rosanna and Gavin. “I hold no bond of command over you. You may stay here, follow me, or go elsewhere as you wish.”
“Of course I shall come!” said Gavin.
“Decide tomorrow,” said Ridmark. “Kharlacht, Caius, Calliande. Stay here and watch over Father Martel and Rosanna. I am going to have a look around the village, see if I can find any other survivors, along with additional food and water for us.”
“Be careful,” said Calliande.
“I am always careful,” said Ridmark.
Caius snorted. “Telling lies is a sin, you know.”
Ridmark left the church.
He walked through the square, staff in hand, his eyes and ears seeking for any sign of foes. He saw none, and the only sound was the low roar of the flames devouring the remains of the village, the air hot and smoky. Ridmark decided to make his way to the wall and walk a circuit of the ramparts. From there he could see if any of the villagers were still within Aranaeus, or if they had taken refuge outside the walls.
Or if any of the scarred orcs were returning.
He took another step, saw the flash of steel, and turned.
Sir Paul Tallmane stood before Aranaeus’s southern gate, his armor gleaming, his sword in hand. His men-at-arms followed him, carrying maces and shields.
“Ridmark Arban,” said Paul. “I would have killed you simply for the pleasure of it. That the Dux and his new friends in the Enlightened of Incariel shall reward me merely makes it all the sweeter.”
Chapter 12 - The Enlightened
“What in God’s name are you talking about?” said Ridmark.
“You haven’t figured it out yet?” said Paul with an amused sneer. “The great Ridmark Arban, the mighty Hero of Dun Licinia, the fearsome Gray Knight, doesn’t know that we’re about to kill you?” He shared a laugh with his men. “I marvel that you are bright enough to put on your boots in the morning, let alone survive all these years.”
“I understand well enough,” said Ridmark. “Dux Tarrabus Carhaine hates me, has always hated me, and will kill me if he gets the chance. You are a spineless toad exiled to the Iron Tower for incompetence.” Paul’s sneer hardened into a scowl. “But you see a way to buy your way into the Dux’s favor with my head. So when you heard about Qazarl, you came here to kill me.”
“You’re right on the first count, and wrong on the second,” said Paul. “I am here to kill you. But I didn’t come across you by chance, and a knight of Andomhaim does not go haring across the realm in search of rumor. Unlike certain renegades hunting the Frostborn. I knew you would be here. The Enlightened of Incariel knew it.”
“Who are these Enlightened?” said Ridmark. “Another cult devoted to the urdmordar?”
Paul laughed. “Hardly! The urdmordar would enslave mankind. The Enlightened of Incariel shall make us into gods.”
“I was never the most diligent student,” said Ridmark, “but as I recall, the serpent said the same thing to Eve in the Garden of Eden.”
“A myth,” said Paul. “A lie told by the priests to control mankind, to make us weak and obedient.”
“So you wish to add blasphemy to your list of offenses?” said Ridmark.
Paul’s smile was condescending. “I have seen the truth, I have seen through the lies the church pours into the ears of the foolish. The church would have us believe that all men are equal before God. But there is no God, Ridmark. There is only power, and those strong enough to use it. The prophet of Incariel has shown us the way. Mankind is at a disadvantage. The urdmordar are immortal, and the dwarves and dark elves and even the manetaurs live far longer than we do. But Incariel shall make us as gods.”
“And just who is Incariel?” said Ridmark.
“The darkness at the heart of the world,” said Paul. “The axle of chaos. Freedom from all laws, all restraints, all limitations.”
Ridmark felt a chill. “You have chosen to worship the great void of the dark elves?”
Paul laughed. “For all their power, the dark elves were superstitious fools, cringing and groveling before their great void. Incariel is the truth of the void, and with the power of Incariel, we shall become the immortal lords of this world.” His smile widened. “And when I put your head at the Dux’s feet, I shall rise high among the Enlightened.”
“You think you can take me, then?” said Ridmark, shifting his grip on his staff. There were only three of them, and he had defeated larger number of opponents in battle before. But despite his other failings, Paul Tallmane had always been a formidable fighter, and Ridmark suspected he had trained his men-at-arms to fight alongside him.
“I’m not a fool,” said Paul. “Certainly not foolish enough to fight you alone.” He beckoned, and his men-at-arms stepped to his side, shields raised, maces ready to strike. “So I came prepared.”
Yet neither he nor his men advanced. They outnumbered Ridmark, and had no reason not to attack. Unless…
Unless they were waiting for someone else.
A concealed archer, perhaps?
Ridmark threw himself to the ground and rolled, and an instant later two crossbow bolts bounced off the street, tips gleaming with poison. Paul shouted a frustrated curse, and Ridmark got to his feet.
Two men in dark cloaks emerged from the burning houses, crossbows in hand. Beneath the cloaks they wore black trousers, boots, and cuirasses of red leather.
Blood-colored leather.
“The Red Family?” said Ridmark. “You hired assassins from the Red Family of Cintarra? Have you utterly lost your mind?”
Paul laughed. “You’re a dangerous man, exile. Why not hire the best? Kill him!”
The two assassins and the men-at-arms charged, and Ridmark raised his staff to defend himself. The men-at-arms came at him, shields extended, while the assassins circled to the side. Each assassin carried a sword in his right hand and a dagger in his left.
“Leading from the rear, Sir Paul?” said Ridmark, hoping to goad Paul into a mistake. “Are all the Enlightened of Incariel so brave?”
“I’m going to live forever, exile,” said Paul. “As much as I shall enjoy watching you die, there’s no reason to risk my life.”
“You will die,” said one of the assassins, “in the name of Mhor, and your blood shall water his altar.”
“Then stop talking,” said Ridmark, “and do it.” He glared at Paul, still backing away. “I’m going to…”
In one smooth motion, he reversed his momentum and drove his staff towards the assassin on the left. The man reacted, bringing his blades up in a cross-parry to shield his face, bu
t Ridmark shifted his aim. The butt of the staff jabbed into the man’s belly, and the assassin stumbled with a wheeze. The other men rushed at Ridmark, and he whipped his staff in a wide circle, forcing them to take a cautious step back as the first assassin recovered his breath.
Ridmark was in trouble.
The men-at-arms and the assassins knew their business, and sooner or later they would rush him and kill him. Ridmark would kill one or two before he fell. Unless Ridmark changed the terms of the fight.
For a moment he considered running back to the church for help and discarded the idea. If he did, the assassins and the men-at-arms would certainly kill Gavin or Kharlacht or Caius or one of the others. Ridmark deserved to die for what had happened to Aelia. Caius and Calliande and the others did not deserve to die alongside him.
Not for the mistakes he had made.
Ridmark risked a look around the street. All the houses had burned, but the blacksmith’s shop stood mostly intact. Its walls had been built of stone, no doubt to keep a fire contained in the event of an accident. Yet a fire still crackled within the interior, the remnants of the roof dancing with flames.
He backed away another step, shifting his staff to his right hand and drawing his orcish war axe with his left. The men-at-arms continued their steady advance, shields raised. The assassins remained on the side, watching for an opening to strike.
Ridmark darted forward, swinging the axe. The man-at-arms on the left raised his shield and caught the blow, splinters flying from the impact. The assassins lunged, closing at Ridmark’s sides, and he jumped back, whipping the staff in a circle to ward off their blades. A sword struck the staff, the impact almost knocking the weapon from Ridmark’s grasp, but he moved out of reach.
Paul laughed. “This is more enjoyable than I thought! The great Ridmark Arban, the man who slew an urdmordar and returned from Urd Morlemoch, dancing in the street with a stick.”
Ridmark lashed his axe at the shield again. Again the assassins closed around him, and again he barely got out of the way. One of the assassins’ swords slashed his right shoulder, drawing blood. Their crossbow quarrels had been poisoned, but he hoped they had not envenomed their blades. He backed away, the men-at-arms and assassins moving with more confidence.
Ridmark attacked again, raising the axe in his left hand to strike.
The men-at-arms raised their shields, ready to absorb his blow.
At the last minute Ridmark spun flung the axe with all his strength.
His aim was off, and the heavy axe had not been designed for throwing. Yet the blade sank two inches into an assassin’s thigh with a meaty thud. The assassin’s eyes widened, his leg spurting blood the color of his armor, and he loosed a high scream, charging at Ridmark. But the assassin’s leg collapsed, the man tumbling to the ground before the men-at-arms. For a moment, just a moment, the men-at-arms hesitated, blocked by the prone form of the bleeding assassin.
And that was all that Ridmark needed.
He charged at the second assassin, both hands around his staff. The assassin raised his blades in a cross-parry, and Ridmark let his staff slam against the sword and dagger. The assassin growled, straining to hold the parry in place, and Ridmark spun his staff and thrust. The end of his weapon rammed into the assassin’s mouth with enough force to shatter teeth, and the man’s head jerked back. Ridmark kicked, his boot hammering into the assassin’s knee, and the man stumbled, giving Ridmark the opening he needed to slam his staff against the assassin’s temple.
The assassin fell dead at his feet.
But then the men-at-arms reached Ridmark.
He jerked back, and the blow of a mace clipped the side of his chest, spinning him around. Ridmark ducked under the next blow and thrust with his staff, the weapon bouncing off the chain mail of a man-at-arms. Paul charged with a yell, his sword a gleaming blur, and Ridmark fell back.
He had to get away. Facing Paul alone would have been a challenge, and the men-at-arms made it almost impossible. He had…
A click filled his ears.
The assassin he had wounded lay prone on the street, a loaded crossbow in his hands.
Ridmark feinted right, Paul’s sword clipping his left hip, pain flooding through his leg. But Ridmark kept moving, his staff sweeping low and tangling in the legs of a man-at-arms.
The man stumbled with a curse just as the assassin squeezed his crossbow’s trigger.
The man-at-arms jerked as the the barbed head of the quarrel erupted from his chest, and collapsed to the ground.
Ridmark raced for the entrance to the blacksmith’s shop. He rammed his wounded shoulder against the door, and he stepped into a room filled with smoke. The walls still stood, as did the timbers of the roof, but part of the second floor had collapsed, fires crackling across the piled debris scattered about the floor.
Yet the stairs to the remnants of the second floor still stood.
Ridmark dashed up the stairs, ignoring the pain from his wounds. He propped his staff against the wall, snatched his bow from his shoulder, and put an arrow against the string.
A moment later the final man-at-arms burst through the door, Paul on his heels.
Ridmark loosed an arrow and the man-at-arms tried to dodge, but the arrow struck his left shoulder. His armor turned most of its force, but the steel head sank an inch or so into his flesh. The man-at-arms shouted in pain and stormed up the stairs, his shield leading.
Ridmark grabbed his staff and swung with all the strength he could muster. The staff struck the shield with a resounding crack. The power of the blow put stress upon the man’s wounded arm, and his shield dipped. Ridmark whipped the staff over his head, driving its length into the man’s forehead, and again into his throat.
The man-at-arms toppled off the stairs, landed in a pile of burning planks, and did not move again.
“Very clever,” sneered Paul. “Very clever, indeed.”
“Then come up and finish it, then,” said Ridmark.
“I don’t need to,” said Paul. “I know something that you don’t.”
“What’s that?” said Ridmark, bracing himself for an attack.
Paul took his shield in both hands. “This.”
He swung the heavy sheet of wood and metal into a pillar.
As it happened, the last pillar supporting the remnants of the second floor.
The charred pillar snapped, and the floor collapsed beneath Ridmark’s boots.
###
“Let her sleep,” said Calliande. “When Ridmark gets back with water and food, we’ll wake her long enough to eat and drink, and then she should sleep for the rest of the night.”
Gavin nodded. He sat on the steps alongside Rosanna. Calliande felt a pang of sympathy for him. He was obviously in love with the girl, and she was just as obviously in love with the blacksmith’s apprentice. Between that, and learning that his father had betrayed his people to Agrimnalazur, Calliande would have expected Gavin to fall to pieces.
But he did not.
“What of Father Martel?” said Gavin.
“We shall let him rest,” said Calliande.
“We will pray for him later, you and I, after Ridmark returns” said Caius. “I fear that is all we can do for him now.”
“Thank you,” said Gavin.
“When Ridmark returns,” said Calliande. “He has been gone longer than I would have thought.”
Kharlacht shrugged. “It is a large village, Magistria. It will take time to search.”
“Perhaps he found another group of survivors,” said Caius.
“Or he ran into trouble,” said Calliande. Ridmark, for all his prowess, was just one man. Suppose some misfortune had overtaken him?
She made up her mind.
“I will go find him,” said Calliande, standing.
“Are you sure that is wise?” said Caius. “Ridmark bade us to stay here.”
“He did,” said Calliande, “but he may have encountered some difficulty.”
“I will go,” said K
harlacht.
“No,” said Calliande. “Stay here and guard the others. I have magic. I can defend myself, and if Ridmark has found wounded survivors I can aid them.”
That was not a pleasant thought.
To work a spell of healing, she had to take the pain of the injury into herself. She had felt every one of Rosanna’s cuts and bruises, the searing pain of Martel’s gash. Of course, the pain passed in moments, and if Calliande had not used her magic, the victims would have been forced to endure the pain for weeks as their bodies slowly healed.
But the pain was still real, and it drained her.
“Very well,” said Kharlacht.
“We shall watch over the others until you return,” said Caius.
Calliande left the church.
She stepped outside and stared at the burning houses. She was certain, utterly certain, she had seen places like this before, villages ravaged by war. But she could not recall where or when.
And she was certain the villages had been destroyed by ice.
The Frostborn.
This could happen again if she did not find Dragonfall and discover the truth of herself, if she did not stop the return of the Frostborn…
Calliande shook aside her fears and went in search of Ridmark. She could hardly stop the Frostborn if Agrimnalazur and her minions killed them all. She headed towards the village’s southern gate. Knowing Ridmark, he would make for the wall and walk a circuit of the ramparts. That would give him a view of the village, and…
She stopped.
Three bodies lay in the street outside the blacksmith’s shop.
The first was one of Paul Tallmane’s men-at-arms, the bolt of a crossbow through his chest. The man had not been dead for more than five minutes. Two other bodies lay nearby, clad in dark cloaks and armor of blood-colored leather.
And the sight of red leather pulled up dark memories from the mists choking Calliande’s past.
“My God,” she said. “The Red Family of Mhor…”
Then she realized one of the red-armored corpses wasn’t dead, that the assassin was sitting up and leveling a crossbow…
Frostborn: The Eightfold Knife Page 16
