by Roland Green
Ohlt decided that praying could do no harm, but before he could decide which god to pray to, the battle of spells and golems was joined.
Jazra saw the dwarf march out into the open, axe in both hands. She saw the wizard seem ready to follow, then halt and raise his staff. She did not see the Doomed advancing ahead of the firestorm turn and slaughter the dwarf, then the wizard.
She would see it in moments, however, if she could not bring help.
"Zolaris, can you clear away the Doomed on your side of the valley? Covering fire for that short human with the axe?"
"Short human? I don't see—Authority be merciful. Is he mad?"
Jazra almost said, "No, he thinks magic will fight for him," but then Zolaris would think she was mad. Instead, she said, "He's sworn a death-oath of vengeance against the firestorm. If you take your half of the Doomed, I can do something to the other half."
"Commander, there's five more spider drones coming down the cliff. You'll be a naked target for them."
"Not if I'm so close to the firestorm that the drones won't shoot there," she shot back. "And stop arguing, Corporal. I know what I'm doing, and so does the short human."
Zolaris made a noise that indicated extreme doubts about both propositions, but a moment later blaster fire started licking toward the Doomed. She wondered if Zolaris had his favorite magnum cannon with him, although with enough ammunition to be useful it would have been a real burden on a long crosscountry march.
The ranks of the Doomed grew ragged. The dwarf marched on. He had to be coming within range of the firestorm's own sensors—more powerful than Doomed or drones could carry, and less easily confused by battle all around them—any second now.
The dwarf stopped. The firestorm's turret swiveled toward him. All the tank's sensors needed to know was that there was an organic target in range, and the dwarf would die.
Instead, Chakfor flung the axe, using both hands to whip it over his head so that it spun as it flew. It smashed blade-first into the firestorm's side just in front of the turret. A grand, defiant gesture. Jazra would mourn the dwarf.
The axe did not bounce off the armor. Instead, it disappeared in an eruption of raw orange and yellow fire, the eye-searing blaze of flamethrower fuel igniting. Somehow the axe had pierced alloy armor thicker than Jazra's thumb, and struck the fuel tanks.
Another explosion. This one had to be the charges for the blaster going off. A third explosion. The tank's bow gaped like a misshapen mouth, and the turret flew off, turning over and over in the air, and landing with a resounding clang!
Jazra still murmured the mourning ritual for Chakfor Stone-breaker, but she murmured it only with the breath she could spare from running. She sprang from her hiding place, and stormed across the rugged ground. She was looking for a fold of ground close enough to the burning tank that she could hide in its heat pulse while she shot down the Doomed.
She was halfway across the valley when she remembered to check the status of her holoprojector. It was still functioning, although she doubted that the existence of the Rael was much of a secret to the humans anymore.
As her eyes scoured the ground, she wondered only half-idly who had made the bet with Zolaris against her befriending the
humans. Whoever that was didn't known her very well.
• » •
Fedor Ohlt saw Hellandros all but dance a jig. As he ran past the wizard, he did not see Chakfor Stonebreaker anywhere. He did not know if he was running to rescue the dwarf or avenge him. It just felt good to run.
He also remembered clearly that Hellandros said something about "it was even stronger than I expected," as Ohlt ran past. But what "it" was, Ohlt did not care to guess.
Meanwhile, the warrior ghouls were milling around like sheep in a hailstorm. Perhaps their captain had been in that
I ALE OF THE COMET
moving iron cottage, and died in its flames? Regardless, this seemed the time for anyone with a weapon to strike.
Brinus and Elda needed no command. A spear thrust its point out the back of one enemy's neck. Another suddenly sprouted an arrow in its eye. Their comrades opened a circle around them, as if the rocky ground had turned into a bog and swallowed them.
From downhill, fire spat into the enemy ranks. One of the Doomed toppled, headless. Then the fire spat toward the cliff, where the spider-golems were making their way down toward the open ground. All except for one, still atop the cliff. Something happened, and it was gone in an instant, torn apart like a silk scarf in the hands of a furious child.
Ohlt suddenly found that he had no time to notice anything beyond arm's length. Just at that distance was a manlike creature, but with scales instead of skin visible where he was not armored. The exposed areas included his arms, and an arrow suddenly pierced the left one, as he swung something in the left hand toward Ohlt.
The snakeman threw its head back, then tried to pluck the arrow out with its free hand and still use its—it had to be a weapon—against Ohlt. Ohlt was too close, and his cudgel was already swinging down.
It crashed into the snakeman's already wounded arm. The snakeman reeled back, no longer clawing at the arrow but at something in a kind of purse at its belt. Its right hand came out with a red sphere, about the size of a small pear.
It had to be another weapon. Whatever it did, it would not be good to be close to it, any more than it would be wise to be under the maintop when it fell in a gale.
With years of tavern-brawl experience behind his leap, Ohlt sprang on the snakeman's back. He twisted, heaved, and kicked all at once. The snakeman crashed to the rocky ground, facedown and on top of the red sphere.
Ohlt felt as if he had been kicked in the stomach. He flew into the air, and the snakeman flew after him. The snakeman's
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body was in two large pieces, with smaller bits scattering far and wide. Bits of hot wreckage stung Ohlt, and one drew blood from the back of his hand.
He raised his head cautiously, just as another explosion in the iron cottage sent more wreckage flying about. A brief look 1 told him that all the ghouls were down and nearly all of them were motionless. Elda and Brinus were walking about, she guarding his back with her rapier while he thrust a spear down into the throat or neck of any ghoul who seemed too alive.
Ohlt wanted to vomit, but realized that the Ha-Gelhers I might be better judges of what the ghouls needed than he was. Most of all, they needed release from their slavery, of spirit and body, to the golem-makers.
Ohlt staggered to his feet, and not ten paces away, Chakfor Stonebreaker did the same. The dwarf looked as if he had been dipped in wax and then rolled in soot, but all his limbs moved ; normally. His beard and hair were a good deal shorter than they had been, and the eyes that glared out of a blackened face j looked like live coals.
"Where is that miserable oaf of a wizard who ruined Drakesbane? Where is he? He owes me an axe, and my honor, and my clan's honor. He stole Drakesbane for one of his tricks and ..."
The furious dwarf ran out of Common, so began cursing in j his own tongue. Ohlt was ready to laugh, but knew that would ; only deepen Chakfor's rage.
His silence was wasted, however, because Hellandros strode out into the open, staff striking the ground at each step, and altogether looking rather like a prince come to claim his inheritance. Chakfor met the wizard with a glare that promised blood j feud or worse.
Hellandros was too filled with triumph over his new spell to ' notice. He reminded Ohlt of a boy who's won his first real fight, 1 and ignores the black eye, the chipped tooth, the cut lip, and I the various aches and pains.
Chakfor stepped forward and grabbed Hellandros by the j shoulders, even though he had to stand on tiptoe to do it.
"What did you think to do with my axe, without telling me? Drakesbane was the best axe I ever carried! Ithun was there when the priest of the Stonebreaker clan blessed it. It carried Ithun's spirit as well as mine, and now it's gone. You ... you ..."
"You hero," Elda said. Bot
h dwarf and wizard stared at her, as if wondering which one she meant. She settled the question by bending down and kissing Chakfor. She had to grip his singed beard to pull his face up, and the moment the kiss was done he batted her hands away.
"Ewgh!" he said, spitting out a gob of black phlegm. "Too tall, too thin, and beardless as well. Not much of a reward for a hero!"
Elda gripped her stomach, as if she had a cramp in the bowels. Then she sat down on the nearest piece of wreckage. It was hot, and she sprang up again with a squeal, rubbing her bottom. Finally, she managed to support herself with one hand on her brother's shoulder and one on Ohlt's, while she laughed until the echoes rang around the valley, as the battle had done only a little while ago.
"It's been a long time since anyone's called me 'beardless,' " Elda joked. "Not since I was a girl—and then, they were right."
"Come now, sister—•" Brinus began.
"Brothers see sisters with eyes blinded either by love or by hate. Yours are blinded by love.
"But I never dreamed that the next time anyone called me ugly—and that's what he meant by 'beardless'—he would be a heroic little dwarf, standing before me in the middle of a battlefield."
Chakfor started to bridle at being again named a hero. Ohlt ignored him. Elda had reminded him that they were on a battlefield, and that the temporary absence of further enemies did not mean final victory. Ohlt had learned that lesson the hard way, from Gyotsi pirates, and only through his being worth ransoming had the lesson not been much harsher.
But nothing moved in the valley, save the mist, the smoke, the last flickers of flame, and the companions. At the base of the cliff they had been trying to descend, the remains of the rest of the spider-golems sent up spirals of smoke. Occasionally, flame or sparks cut through the smoke, as something burned faster or hotter than the rest.
They had certainly fared better than the others who had encountered this enemy, although they might be the first who had the aid of the . . . call them sky-warriors, Ohlt decided. Now it was time to leave the battlefield while they were still alive to carry the warning and lessons of—
Something was moving, after all. Ohlt blinked his eyes against the smoke. Even through the murk he could make out the monk approaching diem across the valley.
A little farther, and he saw that the monk held out both hands. A blessing, or a sign that he was unarmed? Ohlt jerked his head toward the monk and squeezed the Ha-Gelhers' shoulders as a signal for them to be alert.
It was amazing how quickly they found, on apparently open ground, hiding places where no one not looking for them could have hoped to find them. Ohlt handed Chakfor his boot dagger so the dwarf would have a ready weapon, hoped that M'lenda would stay in the forest to protect Erick if the sky-warriors turned hostile, and crossed his arms over his chest.
Jazra strode toward the humans against the advice of Zolaris, and not without her own qualms. It would have been better to have revealed herself in some quiet moment, before the battle.
Except that those moments had been few, and the battle had come on swiftly after she decided that these humans were more likely to be friend than foe. This argument had not convinced Zolaris, and it still didn't entirely convince her.
However, what anyone thought hardly mattered, compared to what the Overseer would do to this world if not halted. The defeat of one strong patrol was a good beginning—the better, if the Secondary Director was sending out Doomed with so little
armor that they were vulnerable to iron-age weapons.
Iron-age weapons wielded with sufficient skill, courage, and sense, at least. Not to mention magic. If she died in the next moment, Jazra would know what Hellandros had done to Chakfor Stonebreaker's axe.
"Hail, brother," Fedor Ohlt said. Once again she had approached him closer than she had intended. "How fared you this day?"
"Well enough."
There. Her voice was steady. She was breathing easily, in spite of the gas mask she'd pulled on to keep out the fumes. Her sweat would dry as soon as she was out of the stifling cocoon of her armor—although she would direly need a bath to be fit for civilized company.
Inside the holographic monk, the Rael warrior's hands took inventory of armor, equipment, and weapons. Nothing showed that was so obviously dangerous that it was likely to trigger an immediate attack. She was covered by all three of the marines in the forest, including Zolaris with his magnum—although he now had only a handful of rounds for it after slaughtering the spider drones on the cliff.
Not that it really mattered. A squadron of deathstrikes could hardly have kept the Ha-Gelhers—so conspicuously missing to the naked eye, and hard to detect on infrared amid all the heat pulses—from putting an arrow or a spear into a vital spot the moment she was vulnerable.
Jazra took a deep breath, and switched off her holoprojector.
Fedor Ohlt had some notion of what he expected, as the image of the monk wavered and vanished. Chakfor Stonebreaker had described the sky-warriors as clearly as he could, and Ohlt himself had glimpsed their manlike forms.
His breath still caught in his throat, as the illusion spell dissipated and the "monk" became one of the sky-warriors. It seemed to be clad from head to foot in grayish-white armor, more complete than a paladin's. The armor was made of cloth, metal, and what seemed like fine porcelain, as far as one could tell under some days' worth of soot, dirt, and grass stains.
Pouches, bags, and packs were hung about the armor, giving the sky-warrior a look oddly like that of a traveling peddler. Ohlt had just started to take comfort in this notion, when he noticed that the armor was changing color. It darkened slowly, like a sky with a storm coming on, until it was a darker gray,
mottled with green and brown. Looking down, Ohlt realized that the armor had changed its color to match that of the ground about them.
From a distance, or from the top of the cliffs, the sky-warrior would be very hard to see.
"Now, is the armor enchanted, or did you cast a spell?" Hellandros asked.
"Hellandros," Ohlt broke in, "you can behave like a boy let loose in a sweet shop when we have heard a little more. 1 will not say a word against it, but now, please let our friend explain itself."
It was notoriously impossible to tell the gender of a person inside such complete armor, particularly when the helmet enclosed most of the head, discs of smoked glass hid the eyes, and a curiously flexible faceplate covered the nose and mouth. Ohlt wondered how the sky-warrior could see or breathe, save by magic.
That it would need to see was evident from the weapons it carried. In one pouch was something that seemed to consist of two small rectangular boxes, one joined at an angle to the end of the other. Across the back, the sky-warrior carried what might have been a larger version of the other weapon. It was a longer cylinder, with a small, squarish handle toward the front end and a larger triangular handle at the end, with a larger rectangular box sticking out of the cylinder between the two handles.
Ohlt knew that these were weapons, because he had seen devices very like this, in the hands of the ghouls, hurling fire. He told himself that he fought enemies with these weapons using hardly more than his bare hands. So it should not make him uneasy to see them in the hands of one who seemed likely to be a friend.
He wished his knees would listen. They threatened to knock together so loudly that the sky-warriors in the forest would hear them.
Slowly, without bringing its hands near the weapons, the sky-warrior reached up and pulled off the helmet. Then it removed the glass discs, which came off together, and finally undid the faceplate.
Ohlt heard a gasp from Brinus, and what sounded remarkably like a giggle from Elda. Indeed, it was almost impossible to keep a straight face before a being from the stars who looked remarkably like an elf.
A second glance told Ohlt that the ears were not pointed, few elves had such angular features, and no elf had ever grown so tall. The sky-warrior could have easily looked Randu Dahan in the eye, although from its slenderne
ss it could not have weighed much more than Hellandros.
Ohlt looked a third time, and decided that if features among the sky-warriors followed any pattern like those of humans, elves, and other god-made races, the warrior was female. It made little difference, of course, and one could hardly ask the warrior to disrobe, but somehow Ohlt felt easier, calling the warrior "she" instead of "it."
That was as far as his thoughts took him, when he heard the dreadful sound of dwarven keening. He looked, and saw that Chakfor Stonebreaker had vanished. He could not have gone far, and indeed a few steps revealed to Ohlt the dwarf, kneeling on the far side of the ruins of the ruined golem-cottage, keening over a body.
It was no surprise to Ohlt to see a dead dwarf lying in front of Chakfor. Ithun Stonebreaker had been killed by a fragment of metal driven through his chest when the iron cottage fell apart, so was not badly mutilated. He did not look peaceful—few of the dead do, in Ohlt's experience—but he looked as if nothing had happened that he was not prepared to accept.
If being turned into a ghoul by the golem-masters took away the knowledge of what one had become, then perhaps there was some rough mercy in it. Of course, one might be unpleasantly surprised when one faced the gods, and they passed judgment for what one had done without knowing it.
Chakfor Stonebreaker rose and faced the sky-warrior. "Friend—if you are truly that to us—help me burn the body of my cousin. It is the dwarven way to return to the element that gives us our reason for living. Also, I think the soul-stealers will give him their evil imitation of life again, if we leave them his body."
"They cannot do that to the truly dead," the sky- warrior said. "But it is also our custom not to leave the bodies of our dead on the battlefield."
"Then give me one of your fire-throwers, so that I may do this work of honor swiftly, and we may leave this place. Also, I need a dwarven weapon, so that Ithun may depart bearing it."
