by Greg Curtis
Someone cheered, a sound of relief and joy, and though it was far from the thing for a ranger to do, they all joined in. The battle was over, the enemy defeated, and the thrill of both victory and survival was racing through their blood. They cheered and screamed and yelled like those under the spell of the moon mist, lost in the moment. And when Ericus brought down another pillar of fire directly on to the fallen enemies and their stone altar, destroying them all, they cheered some more.
It was over. The battle was done and they could go home.
But was it really over? It was a long time before Dura could bring herself to ask that question, even to herself. Between the relief and feeling of triumph she didn’t want to let anything intrude. But she had to. The enemy was dead yes. Their bodies were smouldering piles of ash in front of them, and the altar was rubble. But where were all the missing people? Hundreds and hundreds of them had gone missing from Greenlands. Maybe even thousands, no one knew for sure. Where were they? And if what Lord Iros had shown them on his map was correct, this was only one small outpost. At least another dozen like this formed a giant ring through the southern lands of Irothia, right through Elaris and its eastern border with Solaria and then still further south into the gnomish realm of Vidoran, and west into the troll and dwarf lands. And each of them was losing people. And the heart of that giant ring lay somewhere in Elaris itself.
Though she didn’t want to admit it as the others continued with their celebrations all around, she knew that this wasn’t over at all.
It was just beginning.
Chapter Eighty Seven.
The sound of a man’s footfalls against the stone floor told Y’aris he had a visitor, and even though he could guess who it would be, he looked forward to it. Sitting in a dark, damp cell by himself for hour after hour, day after day, was hard on a man. It was harder still when he was still expecting that sooner or later, someone was going to finally come and rip his heart out. It seemed that he had avoided the likelihood of an immediate trial and execution in Leafshade, only to have replaced it with a lengthy prison sentence in a cold dark dungeon as he waited to have his body torn apart.
Still, maybe that wouldn’t be today. The high priest’s footsteps, and he knew it would be Crassis coming to see him, were far more rapid than they should be. The man was in a hurry, maybe even a panic. That could be good for him. At the very least it was enough to wake him from his almost perpetual slumber in this dank place. Even to persuade him to sit up straight on his cot.
“Winterford has fallen.” Crassis bellowed the news out even before his hand found the handle to his cell door.
The iron door swung open with a ear shattering creak as its hinges, too long without oil, resisted the high priest’s efforts, and then slammed into the stone wall in a small explosion of dust. Y’aris got up from his bed to greet his visitor, already enjoying the news.
“You don’t say.” He couldn’t stop a small smirk from finding his face, and Crassis spotted it instantly. He growled a little at him, something he often did. Y’aris suspected that as a part of the strange dark deal that existed between the high priest and his master, he had sacrificed a little self-control. Or a lot. Of course he had gained powerful magic and physical strength with it, so maybe the deal hadn’t been completely one sided. And maybe too, Y’aris shouldn’t bait him.
“The question is, what are you going to do about it?”
“Me?” Y’aris managed a look of surprised innocence that wouldn’t have fooled a young child. “What can I do when I’m locked up in here?”
According to the high priest he was actually a guest. Simply being given a room while they waited for the master to make a decision about his fate. But his room was an underground stone cell, with the only light coming from the candles in the hallway, beyond his locked iron door. He was a prisoner no matter what the called it. But maybe not for much longer. The Reaver hadn’t made a decision, or at least not one that he’d shared with his priests. But now that the faithful were starting to fail him, Y’aris knew that his position among the Reaver’s servants had to be improving.
“You can tell me how to defeat the cannon.” Y’aris almost laughed aloud at the idea. That Crassis who had scorned him and accused him of failure for losing to the humans and their accursed cannon, should come seeking the answer from him, that was funny. And it was also wrong. But the high priest wouldn’t understand that. Not for a while at least. Not until he told him.
“Winterford? Isn’t that in Greenlands?” Y’aris knew it was. He’d made a point of learning the strengths and bases of his new allies even before he’d joined them. It was simple prudence. And he had a special hatred for Greenlands, so the thought of the Reaver’s servants having an outpost there, killing and capturing utra, was a particularly pleasant one. The high priest nodded.
“Surrounded by leagues and leagues of tall tussock covered wetlands?” The high priest nodded again, sensing a trap.
“No roads there?”
“Make your point elf!” Crassis snapped at him, and Y’aris knew he was barely a heartbeat away from leaping at him and tearing his throat out with his teeth. The priests, whatever they actually were, were not that far removed from the abominations. They lived, he believed, on the very cusp between soulless abomination and wilful servant. It gave them their frightening power, but it also ate at their self-control.
“The cannon could not have been used against your people. They cannot be wheeled over such terrain and they’re too heavy to carry.”
Y’aris collapsed back on to his cot, leaned back against the stone wall, pulled his legs up against his chest as he sat on the bunk, and looked Crassis straight in the eye. The high priest for his part just stood there, trying to make sense of what he was telling him. It took him a while. He wasn’t a soldier.
“Then what?”
“Then it wasn’t an army your people faced. Not a proper human one at least. It was something else. The priests maybe.” He casually added the last, knowing the effect it would have on Crassis. He wasn’t disappointed when he saw the rage and horror growing in the high priest’s eyes.
Crassis feared little, but failing his master terrified him. When he lived on the very edge of losing his soul to him, not being consumed by the Reaver was his daily obsession. His only thought from dawn to dusk. And the Reaver had always been very explicit on that one point. Do not engage the priests. If the priests of another deity had destroyed their base, then the failure was far greater than anything the high priest had guessed. And it was his failure. Y’aris let him suffer for a while. It seemed only fair.
“Not to worry Crassis. Priests can be fought. Though not by those rotting piles of walking flesh you call soldiers. Real soldiers. Soldiers who can post watches, send warnings, use ranged weapons and even creep around under the cover of night unseen. They can kill priests.”
Crassis screamed something unintelligible at him, obviously thinking about killing him, and then stomped out of the cell still screaming. He paused only long enough to grab the iron door and slam it shut behind him, making sure that Y’aris was still locked up tight, before he headed up the passageway. But that was fine by him. More than fine. Y’aris had told him what he had for one simple reason. So that Crassis would tell the master. And Crassis had no choice in that. He could not defy the Reaver in any way. And he could hide nothing from him either.
So he had to tell the master that his priests had failed, that it was likely that the other deities were getting involved, that it was his responsibility and potentially his mistake, and that the only one who had a plan to deal with enemy priests was Y’aris.
Y’aris laughed happily to himself, the sound echoing up the long passageway beyond his cell, hopefully carrying to Crassis and annoying the others.
He hated this place. He hated the dark and the cold and the damp. He hated the smell of decay. He hated being locked away. But suddenly, for the first time since he had come to this dark temple, Y’aris was glad to be there. He laughe
d some more.
Things were looking up.
Chapter Eighty Eight.
When the first of them came shuffling out of the forests the people of Aellwy Te didn’t know what to make of them. They were hideously ugly and moved surprisingly quickly despite their awkward gait, and they knew they were abominations. Word of the creatures had reached even the small, wild towns. But despite all that they didn’t seem that dangerous. If anything they looked pathetic. Hideous but pathetic.
Still the women gathered their children together and pushed them inside the houses, behind the safety of locked doors, while the men gathered their weapons and stood waiting. Someone rang the town bell. It was a warning alarm that was mostly used when there was a fire. Even in the marshlands and fens they had fires.
Then the first of them approached the blacksmith Halders, and reached out with its talon like fingers for his throat. That was too much for the blacksmith, and with a scream such as only one of trollish heritage could make, he brought his hammer crashing down on the creature’s shoulder.
It was a powerful blow, the hammer shattering bone and flesh and all but tearing the entire arm free of the abomination’s body and knocking it back. It should have killed it. It should have at least made the creature cry out in pain. But it did no such thing. Instead the abomination leapt at him, grabbed Halders’ side with its only working arm, and swiftly buried its teeth in his shoulder. Suddenly it was Halders’ turn to cry out.
Shocked, he spun furiously, shaking the creature off a little, and then as it looked to reach for him again he buried his hammer deep in its head, ending the fight. But even as it fell down another two came hurrying his way and he realised that the battle was about numbers as much as anything else.
“Smash their heads in!” He bellowed the instruction, remembering the conversation he had had with the priests a few days earlier And then as he waited for the next to reach him, he spent the time wishing he had the chance to don some armour instead of his leather apron, and gather up some proper weapons. But he didn’t. He hadn’t kept his weapons close as he should have. And that had been a mistake.
The priests had said as much at the inn, told them of the danger and that they needed to be ready, but most of the people there had been drinking. They’d thought the priests had done the same and were speaking from their cups. He certainly had. But then the next one was on him and he didn’t have time for regrets.
He just hit it as hard as he could, sending his hammer swinging through its side, scooping out half its chest in the blow, and when it didn’t die, someone else smashed it over the head with an axe. Then it died.
The attack soon turned into a pitched battle in the streets, as the men lined up with whatever weapons they could grab, and the creatures came at them in their twos and threes.
The villagers were untrained. Few of the men had ever held a weapon in anger before, and none of them were properly armed. They were frightened as well, never having seen such monsters before. But still there were hundreds of them and the creatures by comparison were only a dribble. A few took nasty bites and were terribly clawed, but all the while they knew that the battle should have been theirs. It was just that no one had explained that to the creatures, and despite being outnumbered, they just kept coming. Two here, three there, they were a trickle that simply didn’t stop, and slowly they started pushing the villagers back.
It didn’t matter that the creatures died quickly when their skulls shattered. It only mattered that before they died, they hurt the villagers. Even if it was only a scratch. A bite here, a tear there, and little by little the defenders were being taken out of the fight. And if they’d had any sense, if they’d used any strategy at all, even simply tried mobbing them, the village would have fallen. It was only their complete lack of thought that saved them. As though someone had simply told them to head north up the trail and they’d obeyed, forming a line. But that couldn’t be. Could it?
Even so they didn’t stop, and they were relentless. After twenty minutes, a score of men were down, being tended to for their wounds. By the end of the first hour it was fifty and the skirmish line was starting to look a little thin in places. But the abominations showed no sign of stopping.
When the second hour had passed there were less than a hundred men still standing, and all of them were tired. All of them were bleeding too. And the abominations kept coming. By then they’d lost half the town, retreating back down the main street where the women were busy loading up wagons with children and the injured. So many were injured, and some he feared would die.
Meanwhile, in front of them the street was a charnel house. There were bodies everywhere, pieces of bodies as well, and worse, blood. The blood wasn’t that of the abominations, they scarcely bled at all, and what ran through their veins was black. This was the blood of the villages. A few of the creatures had arrows in them, but only a few.
The villagers had quickly given up on using bows. It was hard to hit the head of a creature that bobbed around so much, and no other part of their body seemed to matter. They just carried on with arrows sticking out of them. And none of the villagers had been the greatest of archers to begin with.
They needed the rangers. As Halders kept swinging his hammer, and sweating endlessly, that thought kept running through his mind. They needed the Otters. But they weren’t there. They’d left the town weeks ago, heading so he’d heard, for the human realm. At the time his only worry had been that he’d lose some business in their absence. But suddenly the loss of a few coppers from sword sharpening didn’t seem so important.
The elder was gone too. Also somewhere in the human realm according to gossip. And between her magic and her two cats, she could have been a valuable ally in the fight. Even with just that huge tree trunk she called a staff in her hands, she could have slaughtered a few of the enemy.
As for the small Dibellan monastery in the town, that too was empty. Brother Pietre had left a few days before with the sprite matron, not telling anyone where he was going or when he’d return. His magic could have been useful too, Halders thought, not to mention his skills with a poultice.
Everyone had abandoned them.
“Fall back.” Someone gave the order as another of the abominations fell down with its head crushed, and villagers took two steps back as they waited for the next creatures to arrive. They had to. If nothing else the sheer physical presence of the bodies in front of them made it impossible to simply stand in one place and fight. As the enemy fell the abominations behind them simply walked over the bodies of their fallen, and continued on, attacking them from the higher ground made of the fallen. And sometimes, those they thought were dead would wake up and attack them, reaching up to claw them. More than a few villagers had been surprised that way, a flailing hand reaching out from a body, and catching an ankle. After that came the screaming as they frantically had to free someone from the clutches of a creature that should have been dead.
“There’s too many.” Nicoli had been repeating that same cry for at least an hour by then, and no one paid him any attention. The farmer was right though. And as he gazed up the street at the hundreds and hundreds of broken bodies littering it, Halders realised that it was fast becoming time to answer him. The afternoon sun was still high, but it would not be forever, and the thought of fighting these things into the night was terrible. At night their blows would not be so accurate, and every miss would be another chance for the abominations to attack.
Maybe it was finally time to think about using the wagons.
Halders thoughts were interrupted again as another trio of abominations reached him and he concentrated on smashing heads instead. One of them came within reach of his hammer, and he let fly at the creature, breaking a flailing arm, before another villager cleaved its head in two with his axe. It fell down instantly, completely dead, and Halders breathed another sigh of relief. Every one that came for him was the same. He panicked for a moment, then struck at them furiously, and once they were down he
started breathing again.
Beside him the woodsman Dio continued to fight with gusto though he was probably even more tired than him. A wood chopper’s axe was a deadly weapon, but it was heavy and never designed for hitting moving targets. And the woodsman was mostly a mix of human and elf. He didn’t have the vitality and strength of a troll.
They could use more trolls.
“Ladies, get the wagons to the far end of the village!” Le’ Bowen shouted across the village, making the call that they had all known had to come. “Children in the ones furthest from us heading north, supplies and wounded next, and the empty ones nearest us. Every wagon hitched, every horse saddled.” Although he wasn’t in charge it was right that he made the call. Someone had to. Le Bowen might simply run a food stall in the market, but he had a good head on his shoulder. And out of all of them he at least had some combat experience. For a few years he’d been a member of the city watch in Whitefern. He even had a sword.
“Gentlemen, it has been an honour, but we cannot fight forever.” Le Bowen was proven right moments later as three more abominations crashed into their lines and in the resultant melee they heard someone scream and another figure fell. Another defender had been bitten.
