by Ryk E. Spoor
I tore my gaze away and faced forward. “What are we waiting for?”
“These things must be done properly,” Nimbus responded. “We have brought our armies to face one another. Now one or the other will send out messengers under truce — most likely they will, as they hold this ground — and we shall formally introduce ourselves and present our demands, and they theirs. When we reject their terms, the battle will begin.”
I shook my head. “Where I come from, they’d have started the attack by now. Probably by a rearward assault, aerial bombardment, or simply by having mined the area we’re going to walk over.”
“Then allow me to say I prefer this way; war is terrible enough without it being something without restraint or honor.”
I wasn’t going to argue with Nimbus. To be honest, I was of two minds on the matter. This was a…prettier and more ceremonious way to wage war, perhaps, and seemed somehow more civilized, an echo of ancient traditions which probably had never really been adhered to in the real world, but in the end it was going to come down to sheer ugliness nonetheless. And the ceremony might simply be covering that up, allowing people to pretend that war was something more glorious and noble than it was.
Five figures advanced across the waving grasses, the foremost carrying a white flag. I glanced at the others; Polychrome nodded, and the five of us — Polychrome, myself, Nimbus, Ruggedo, and Zenga — moved forward to meet them.
As they got closer, we could see that it was one humanoid figure — no, too short, a Nome, almost certainly — with four others: one flowing, coiling Torrent; a glowing-eyed Temblor; a dancing flame of Inferno; and one of the green-black crackling Tempests.
Ruggedo was the first to speak. “Guph, my old friend. So we meet once more.”
General Guph did a double-take as Ruggedo pulled back his hood. “Ruggedo? You cowardly old tyrant, you petulant little child, how do you come into this?”
Only the narrowing of Ruggedo’s eyes showed his annoyance at the insults. “Oh, here and there, old friend. I see you’ve found someone else to hold your leash while I’ve been gone.”
Before Guph could do more than begin a snarling retort (rather, I thought, like the dog Ruggedo implied he was), Polychrome held up her hand. “Enough. General Guph, you represent the Armies of the Usurpers?”
He looked proudly back at her. “I represent the Armies of Ugu the Unbowed and Amanita Verdant, King and Queen of all Oz. They call upon you, who have intruded unwanted upon their domains, to surrender immediately or be destroyed; if you surrender, you shall be brought before them to experience their judgment and mercy.” His smile did not engender confidence in the nature of that mercy. “And who are you, who speaks for these invaders?”
“I am Polychrome Glory, Princess of the Rainbow Kingdom,” she responded.
The note I heard in her voice was that of steel being unsheathed; I felt a chill go down my spine. How can that make me find her even more gorgeous? I guess I like them badass as well as beautiful.
That reminded me of Zenga in her triumph, and I looked at her on my other side. She had a smile like a tiger baring its teeth. Oh yeah, that is definitely it.
“I am Polychrome Glory,” she repeated, “and I lead the Armies of Faerie, the Storm Legions and the Nomes and many others, and I say to you and your masters that it is you who must surrender or be destroyed.”
Guph began to laugh.
“Silence!” she snapped. The Nome General’s laughter cut off instantly, to his astonishment, and maybe — judging by the momentary blinking of her eyes — to Polychrome’s as well. But she did not pause. “You laugh at your peril, Nome, traitor to Faerie. Here assembled is a force never seen between the Above and Below, and though I be no warrior,” the glittering of her armor making that seem an ironic and dangerous lie, “I have threescore and fifteen thousand at my command, and other powers besides. Consider well, General Guph, for this chance will not be given you again. Surrender, or, if you will, stand aside and let us pass. Hinder us not, and you and your people will live past this day.”
Guph had recovered from the shock of her command, and was studying us with a military precision. He nodded, a tiny show of respect. “Your…courteous offer is noted. But I and my…associates,” the four twisted elementals chuckled in tortured sounds, “feel you overstate your case, and overestimate your powers. Perhaps — perhaps, I say — you may gain victory over these forces, but many more await…and at the end, you must face Amanita Verdant and Ugu the Unbowed, and none of you are their equal. So your offer, too, is rejected.”
“Then, General, the battle must begin. My pity to your forces.”
“Save that for your own.”
Both groups withdrew speedily then, and I could feel tense sweat under my armor, cool though it usually kept me. And I am supposed to be one of their super-weapons. I wonder how the regular warriors can stand it.
“General,” Polychrome said, still with the steel in her tone, “I give command over to you. As you will, direct our forces, including myself.”
And then suddenly she turned to me, stepping away from Nimbus as he began signaling the troops. “Erik…I wish we were back in the Rainbow Kingdom, studying,” she said, in a voice that was shaky, low, unsure.
At that moment, I wanted nothing more than to reach out and take her in my arms. But even if she had allowed it, it would have been a terrible mistake; she might speak to me like this, but no one else could see that she was any less than she had allowed herself to appear just a few moments ago.
“So do I, Poly,” I said, remembering the year I had spent with her… Now, I realized, it had been the happiest year I had ever lived, though I’d been driven by Nimbus to efforts I could never have imagined. Though I hadn’t ever had the courage -- or more likely the stupidity — to speak to her about what I felt. “So do I. But this is the beginning of the end. One way or another, we’ll finish this.”
“And after –” She stopped suddenly.
Could it be? I didn’t dare think on that. “If there is an after for me,” I reminded her, emphasizing what had obviously stopped her there. “If there is… Well, we’ll talk about that then.”
“Lord Erik, it begins,” Ruggedo said quietly.
The Usurpers’ Army was on the move, a large contingent moving forward, a smaller group remaining concentrated before the pass through the mountains. At the same time, trumpets sounded and now our army began to move, splitting into three sections, twenty-five thousand to the left, twenty-five thousand to the right, and the last twenty-five thousand straight forward. “No subtlety of strategy this time,” Nimbus said as we marched forward slightly slower than the main body, letting them come between us and the initial forces of the enemy. “I will keep my skills in reserve; the point of this battle, as we decided, is to hammer home to them our utter superiority. For that we use no special tactics save one, and that one after the first clash, when we have a chance to evaluate their forces.”
Half a mile separated the forces, and suddenly, almost as though signaled by the same impulse, the great war machines on both sides cut loose. Red-blue bolts of lightning screamed out into the Usurpers’ Army from Thunder of Dawn and Sunset, while black fireballs hurtled down upon our forces from a monstrous trebuchet seemingly carven of dark bones. One globe of ebony was dropping towards us; I gathered myself, but Polychrome held up her hand and shouted something in which I heard the name of her father; multicolored light caught the ball, crushed it into a shadow, into nothing.
Other great weapons were firing, blasts of light and dark, cold and fire, stone missiles and concussions of air battering at each other. The two armies were moving now, charging, a hundred and fifty yards apart, weapons cleared, spells being woven, shields of bright and dark materializing, Nomes in hard stone armor backing glittering-crystal Storm Guards while Infernos and Tempests bore down upon them. A hundred yards, fifty, twenty –
The clash of two armies was an echoing, shattering sound that shook the plains, thousand
s of throats shouting orders, screaming in rage or pain, swords meeting in bell-ringing opposition as spell rebounded from spell-shield or tore through with terrible effect.
Our fears were true; one to one, our men and women were no match for most of the Usurpers’ enchanted warriors, not even with the armor and arms of two Faerie kingdoms to draw upon. Tempests swirled through the ranks, controlled and hungry tornadoes, while the Temblors bashed through their opposition like walking landslides, Infernos turned our soldiers to ash, Torrents battered shields and bodies aside like a remorseless flood.
But there were far more of ours than theirs, and the monstrous creations of Ugu and Amanita had a fatal flaw; they were monsters, not very bright ones either, and were driven as much by hatred and a lust for destruction as they were by orders. Nomes and Storm Legions reformed, organized, focused, and by blade and spear and spell began to methodically, mercilessly, and inexorably whittle away at the berserk elementals, withdrawing, striking, distracting, using the maddened hatred to blunt the charge, divert them to something just out of reach and then strike from behind, causing the creatures to reverse, hitting them again.
The human forces — drafted from the Four Countries, Munchkin, Gillikin, Quadling, Winkie — may have been enhanced, modified, or controlled, or merely intimidated into serving; but in no way could they match this trained and coordinated force, not even directed by a General such as Guph. I realized that even with the superior powers of the Dark Elementals, our army would triumph.
But the goal here was not just triumph, but, as the game might say, “flawless victory.” Nimbus was watching, and I saw him straighten and gesture to us.
“There. Ahead of us. We need to break their hold on the pass. They have their most powerful forces there,” he said. “Princess, Lord Erik, Princess Zenga…Penitent,” he continued, “That is your goal. I want you to go and break them, cut through their forces from here to there as swiftly as you may, destroying what you can of their resources on the way, and then shatter their blockade. Lord Erik, you will lead the way, the others will follow and strike as they see best.”
My mouth felt like sandpaper and I almost couldn’t speak. There’s at least four or five thousand warriors between here and there, and gods alone know what else! I thought, but didn’t say. Instead, I swallowed, and pasted a smile on my face. “No problem,” I said.
His smile showed he saw through to my heart. He raised his hand, and the trumpeters blew a fanfare — one of those, I realized, they’d blown when I left the Rainbow Kingdom, and I glanced at Polychrome. She remembered too, and for just an instant she grasped my hand, squeezed, and I squeezed back. I had no doubts at all.
Seize your dreams. Be the Hero, if only for a few moments.
I charged forward, and the three others followed, as the mass of the Usurpers’ Army loomed before us.
Chapter 44.
Father and those Above, grant us the fortune to survive this, she thought, offering a rare prayer to the Powers which she knew existed, but almost never saw. Because it would be so terribly ironic for us to die here before we reach the end of the Prophecy, while trying to draw attention to ourselves.
The Armies of Faerie parted before them, and the four crashed into the main line of the enemy. But before the forces of the Usurpers could recognize the change, she saw Erik leap up, twenty, thirty, forty feet up, a jump that told her just how magical the entire Land of Oz must be, and come down, drawing his arm back to deliver a strike to the very ground itself.
She braced herself, remembering the first time he’d used that trick in the battle against Iris Mirabilis and herself; even so, the concussion staggered her, caused the front ten ranks of their own armies to stumble and fall to one knee; but that was the merest remnant, the backwash that the True Mortal couldn’t quite control. In front of him, fanning outward like floodwaters across the plains, the earth rippled, heaved itself up and flung hundreds, thousands of the opposing army flat, sent them spinning helpless through the air, toppled siege engines like toys. At the point of impact the ground was shattered; Erik stood alone in a dust-smoking crater, a blue-indigo-crystal-armored figure whose terrible power now, for a moment, had caused the entire battle to pause, all eyes staring at the inexplicable.
Of all the opposing creatures caught in the earthshock, only those that flew had been unaffected. After that moment of stunned immobility, the Tempests and Infernos screamed towards Erik Medon.
But Polychrome found herself already in motion. Springing from the edge of the crater, she leapt into the air, dancing on spectral light to meet the first Tempest with her sword. Its dark-crackling blade parried her strike, and then shattered to pieces. She watched, feeling almost outside herself, as Nimbus’ training sent her arm on a swift and sure course through the creature’s center; it burst in a whirl of dark energy and the body fell, looking now more like a human than a monster.
I… I killed him! The thought brought nausea to her gut, even as she turned towards an Inferno’s blazing brightness, and she wavered for a moment, blocking the fiery blows of its weapon but unable to bring herself to strike.
At the same time, she felt that strange, alien excitement rising. Below her, Erik struck twice and two of the Usurper’s monsters collapsed, puppets whose strings of power had been severed. The Penitent whirled his battlestaff and his blows struck fast and hard; she wondered, for Ruggedo seemed even more powerful, more swift and deadly, than he had when first they met.
Movement caught her eye, one of the stone-throwing siege engines slewing around, coming to bear on Erik, and her uncertainty evaporated. Two more blows and the fire before her blew out, ended in smoke; the nausea was still there, but fainter, and the excitement rose, a cold and thrilling feeling of certainty that terrified her even as it lifted her up in elation. “Erik! To your right!” she called.
His head turned, but it might be too late, the siege engine was loaded, almost aligned –
“Now that shall never happen!” The clear, confident voice was Zenga’s.
From the other side of the crater, the Princess of Pingaree picked up and hurled one of the other, toppled siege engines, throwing the multi-ton mystical cannon as though it were a child’s toy. It collided with one about to fire on Erik, and the two shattered in a black explosion that cast soldiers aside like burning chaff.
“Well struck!” Ruggedo shouted.
Erik’s grateful grin to Zenga was echoed in the dark-skinned girl’s own brilliant smile. Just as Polychrome registered the odd fact that something about that exchange of glances bothered her, Erik looked at her, and that was gone from her mind. Somehow, she knew what he was thinking.
“Follow me!” he shouted to the others before catching Polychrome as she dropped towards him. Then he flung her up and outwards, hurtling forward at a speed her dancing couldn’t have matched. Another concussion, focused, clearing the way, as she landed ahead, atop one of the dark magical engines hurling destruction at her army. She found herself laughing as she danced aside, around the defenders, striking down Temblor and Torrent, Inferno and Tempest, as though they were the least of Nimbus’ soldiers. The weapon itself shattered as Erik reached it.
It was not the Mortal’s strike, but Zenga’s, that cleared the next path, with a boulder the size of a house. She glanced behind, and saw that the Penitent was methodically and unstoppably guarding their backs, his blows as solid as the foundations of the earth, his defenses as impenetrable as a mountain.
From one mobile fortress to the next they moved, and it was like a dance, a wonderful, terrifying, perfect dance. Erik would catch her, toss her, then return, be carried by her upwards, then down; it was as though she knew his moves, and he hers, before either of them spoke a word. He merely looked, and she knew where they went and what they were doing.
A mob of fiery abominations swept down upon her, scorching her cheeks, pain of heat through even the silver Armor of the Above, but the pain meant nothing. She called out the name of her father and the Rainbow Kingd
om as her sword flickered back and forth like her enemies’ flames, her shield caught their fire and quenched it with cold, mist-born light. And then the mob broke and fled, screaming, many of their number already fallen before her and the others now running in terror from the terrible True Mortal whose merest touch was enough to put their fires out and still their movements, perhaps forever.
That seemed almost to be a signal. The enemy army withdrew before them in ragged order, trumpets braying retreat, regroup, fall back!
Breathing hard, a chill of victory down her spine that made her want to cheer or cry and she knew not why, she glanced around. Erik had a few scratches, but no real injuries. Ruggedo’s smile from under his hood showed no pain, and the only injury Zenga seemed to have suffered was a small cut on her upper arm.
Before them was the pass. Only a few siege engines, mostly abandoned now, blocked their way. In a few minutes, she thought, they would have finished!
But now she became aware of something else. The enemy’s army had withdrawn, but now formed up into lines, leaving a wide space through which they walked; but now the enemy soldiers were saying something. Just a few at first, but then more and more, until the indistinct, rhythmic sound became louder, more forceful, and finally became a single word, repeated over and over:
“Yoop. Yoop! Yoop! YOOP!”
Erik looked over at them. “I’m not sure I like the sound of this.”
From ahead, there came a booming noise, a faint shudder through the ground. Another, slightly closer, and then another, and she realized, that sounds like…footsteps?
Another massive footfall, another, and something moved ahead of them in the darkness of the pass, shoved aside barricades and rocks. There was an incoherent, echoing growl and a thirty-foot high siege engine of metal and stone was suddenly thrown aside like a pebble.
