City of Daggers (The Iron Teeth Book 2)

by Scott Straughan

  “Yes, oh great-ss mistress,” Blacknail replied respectfully. He thought it was a good idea to make sure he was back on her good side. Herad wasn’t impressed though.

  “Shut your flapping trap and move. I’m busy.” She turned away dismissively.

  “You heard the boss; let’s get going,” Saeter told the hobgoblin.

  The pair hurried away from the irate bandit chieftain and went to find a good position. Blacknail started to head directly for the barricade, but Saeter stopped him and pointed out a nearby roof with easy access by an exterior stairway. It was off to one side of the barricade, was within easy bowshot of it, and had a clear view of the street. The building was also tall enough that anyone below would have trouble scaling it to get at them, so they made their way over to it. By the time they reached the rooftop balcony, the horseman had disappeared. The road in front of Herad’s barricade was now empty.

  “Maybe he got-ss scared and went home. I’m very scary; people run from me all the time,” Blacknail remarked hopefully.

  His master chuckled in reply. “Not likely.”

  Saeter and the hobgoblin weren’t the only ones getting into position; dozens of Herad’s bandits were also nearby and getting ready. The barricade was too thin to at the top to stand on, but platforms had been set up behind it for people to climb.

  Most of the platforms were stacks of crates or barrels that had been piled up behind the wooden wall. There were also one or two carts that had been dragged over. The makeshift footing looked effective though; the bandits standing on it could easily hit anyone that tried to get over the wall in front of them.

  Men armed with a variety of weapons, including spears and bows, were positioned all along the barricade to defend it. As Blacknail looked down, the last few bandits got into position and the sounds of activity died down. A sudden stillness then fell over the area as everyone waited for the enemy to show themselves. They didn’t have to wait all that long. Within minutes, there was a clatter of hoofs as several riders appeared at the end of the road. One of them held a long banner. There wasn’t quite enough wind for it to unfurl, so Blacknail couldn’t make out the symbol on it, but it still looked more than a little impressive.

  As all of Herad’s minions watched, the horsemen talked among themselves and observed the barricade that blocked their way. They didn’t seem very impressed by it. A deep keening noise suddenly rippled though the air as one of the riders raised a horn to his lips. The eerie wail washed over Blacknail and caused the hairs on his skin to rise. When the noise died down, Blacknail didn’t feel any better, because it was quickly replaced by the sound of pounding footsteps, and quite a lot of them.

  As Blacknail watched, the horsemen cantered off to the side of the road, and a rough-looking mob of men came down the street past them. Blacknail gulped nervously as he gave up trying to count. There must have been hundreds of them! Certainly, there were more of them than he had fingers and toes anyway.

  “They look like normal Daggerpoint riffraff. Zelena must be holding her real soldiers in reserve,” Saeter remarked matter-of-factly.

  Blacknail eyed his master skeptically. There were even more enemies than he could see? They already outnumbered Herad’s band!

  “They look more than scary enough to me. Let’s find somewhere safer to be, like the forest!” Blacknail whined.

  “Bah, stop being a coward. Fighting isn’t all about numbers,” Saeter replied scornfully.

  As the wave of armed and angry-looking humans descended upon the barricade, Blacknail got a better look at them. They did seem to be nothing special. Most of them wouldn’t have stood out if Blacknail had seen them walking down the street. Of course, this was Daggerpoint, so that just meant they weren’t armed with anything larger than a short sword or a large club. By contrast, Herad’s men were better armed and shinier. Almost all of them had helmets, and many of them had weapons larger than short swords. A few of them even had chainmail shirts and shields. None of the attackers had that sort of equipment, but there were still a bloody lot of them.

  Blacknail was brought back to reality by the sound of Saeter pulling his bowstring back. He looked over just in time to see his master release an arrow at the approaching enemies, and a loud twang sound echoed past him as the bowstring vibrated. The projectile sailed over the heads of the first few advancing attackers, and slammed into the throat of an unlucky man several ranks back. Instantly, the man collapsed and disappeared as he was trampled underfoot by the rest of the mob.

  A victorious roar went up from the rest of Blacknail’s tribesmen as they celebrated the kill. It was quickly matched by a chorus of bloodthirsty cries from the wave of heavily armed thugs that were bearing down on the wall. Now that they were within bowshot, the mob picked up speed as one by one they started breaking into full out sprints.

  The attackers looked eager to strike back and spill some blood of their own. Blacknail was going to have to do his best to disappoint them. He clenched his fists nervously as the violent maelstrom of noise from the young battlefield below washed over him.

  The first shot had been fired. The first death had been dealt. The battle that would decide the fate of Herad’s band and all of Daggerpoint had begun. Blacknail’s stomach grumbled. He wished he’d brought more snacks. Maybe he could loot something…

  Chapter 34

  The wave of attackers bore down on the barricade. The thugs and bandits screamed as they ran and waved their weapons. Blacknail and his master looked down over the battlefield from a balcony on the side of a building beside the makeshift wall. Both of them had bows and full quivers of arrows.

  “Don’t just stand there. Help me out!” Saeter growled at the hobgoblin.

  Blacknail smiled eagerly as he took up his bow and fitted an arrow to it. He gripped it steadily and pulled the string back all the way to his face. Then he carefully selected a particularly stupid-looking, red-haired human from among the advancing crowd, aligned his sights on the man’s chest, and let the arrow loose. The unleashed projectile sprung forward with a deep twang and bit deep into the knee of a man standing several feet to the left of Blacknail’s target. The accidental victim screamed before collapsing onto the ground. The hobgoblin grimaced at how far off he’d been. He was a great archer; that arrow should have gone where he’d aimed! The wind must have shifted or something… stupid wind.

  “Huh, not a terrible shot,” Saeter remarked as he let loose another arrow of his own.

  “Yes, now he can’t run-ss away,” Blacknail responded guardedly. He’d do better next time. The last shot had been a fluke after all.

  The hobgoblin selected another arrow and target. This time he chose to aim at the chest of a tall lanky man with a small steel helmet. If the man didn’t want to be shot, then he shouldn’t wear such a shiny hat. Maybe Blacknail would take it as a prize after the battle. The hobgoblin let go of the bowstring, and the arrow zoomed forward and straight toward the unsuspecting man. The hobgoblin grinned happily as he watched it fly true. The grin slipped from his face though, when the arrow ricocheted off the surprised man’s helmet and spun into the face of the man next to him. They both went down in a confused tumble of limbs, but then a few seconds later, they both got back up again.

  The first man looked pale and unsteady on his feet, and there was a large uncomfortable-looking dent in his helmet. He staggered and blinked uncertainly for a while before rejoining the charge. The second man had a large gash across his face that was bleeding heavily, but he appeared to still be able to fight as well. Both definitely seemed like they would live…

  “Dog breath-ss,” Blacknail hissed angrily.

  “Ha, that was an unlucky shot! Just keep on shooting. They’ve almost reached the wall,” Saeter yelled.

  Blacknail grunted unhappily in reply as he squinted at the mass of moving humanity below. As he watched, the front runners reached the wall and stalled before it. The hobgoblin was more than a little curious as to how they planned on actually getting over it. The
hurriedly put-together wooden barricade was only about as tall as a human, but there were dozens of armed men behind it who were extremely motivated to stop anyone from climbing it. It was too high to jump over, and to climb it, someone would need both hands, which would leave them more than a little vulnerable to being stabbed or hit over the head with something heavy.

  The hobgoblin’s next arrow missed completely and slammed harmlessly into the ground. He growled in frustration at his latest failure. The shaft must have been bent! In fact, if Blacknail turned his head just so and glared at the arrow a certain way, then it definitely looked curved. It wasn’t his fault he’d been given defective weapons!

  As more and more attackers reached the wall, their intentions became obvious to Blacknail; they were planning to simply overwhelm the defenders with the force of their numbers. As the mob rushed forward, they left a trail of dozens of dead and wounded on the ground behind them. More than a few of them had already been brought down by Herad’s archers, but there were still plenty more. Groups of Zelena’s soldiers began throwing themselves at the barrier. They aimed for any spot that looked undefended and easy to climb over. Some tried to go over alone while others worked together to try and distract the guards and protect the climbers. Blacknail was happy to see it didn’t work very well. Almost all the climbers got a blade shoved in their face as a reward for their efforts, but some made it and the fight started in earnest. Fighting began to break out on the other side as attackers scaled the barricade and found themselves face-to-face with Herad’s men. The defenders tried to overwhelm the initial attackers before more of Zelena’s hirelings could make it over, and the desperate attackers tried to survive long enough for reinforcements to scale the wall behind them.

  Blacknail was very glad Saeter had chosen a position that was nowhere near any place that was under attack. The melee below him didn’t look like a lot of fun. He liked it up on the balcony where he was safe and could shoot people without being distracted. Blacknail noticed one of his tribesmen along the wall cut down a climber and get dragged from his perch by several other attackers for his trouble. Immediately, more men began to scale the barrier where it was now undefended. The hobgoblin quickly chose one of the men and shot an arrow at him. Blacknail held his breath expectantly for the short seconds it took the arrow to hit its target, and hit it did. The projectile slammed into the man’s ass, and he howled as he fell from the wall.

  “Aha, that one-ss hit!” the hobgoblin laughed triumphantly. Blacknail raised a fist into the air and gave a little jump as he celebrated his glorious kill. He really was a great archer! He’d been aiming for the man’s back, but that was really close.

  “Get down!” Saeter suddenly roared. The old scout hurriedly grabbed Blacknail’s sleeve and yanked him to the ground. The surprised hobgoblin’s wrist jammed painfully as he tried to catch himself and stop his fall.

  “Wha?” he hissed in pain and confusion.

  Blacknail’s bewilderment was dispelled as an arrow whirred through the exact space his head had been a split second ago. The hobgoblin felt his throat tighten from the shock, and he gulped nervously. That had been very close…

  Saeter growled as he held the hobgoblin down. “Pay bloody attention to what’s going on around you, you damn fool.”

  “Yes, master. I will. I just-ss didn’t think they had any archers,” Blacknail replied submissively. His master had just saved his life. He was fairly sure getting an arrow in the skull was fatal for a hobgoblin.

  “Well, now you know they do!” Saeter answered heatedly as he let go of the hobgoblin’s sleeve. The old scout peered carefully over the edge of the balcony they were on. A few seconds later, he quickly rose to his feet, aimed, and shot his bow in one smooth motion.

  “There, I got the bastard,” he crowed proudly as he smiled.

  Blacknail was more than a little impressed. Since they’d left the forest, his opinion of his master had started to slip. He thought Saeter was… sort of useless in the city, but now he knew he’d been foolish to believe that. He still had a lot to learn. As Blacknail admired his master’s skill, Saeter suddenly tensed. The gray-haired scout then threw himself to the ground as a flock of arrows ripped through the air and smacked into the wall behind him and Blacknail. The hobgoblin flinched at the noise and dropped onto his stomach with his arms covering his head. Above him, several still-quivering and humming arrows protruded from the wooden side of the building. Apparently, Saeter had missed an archer or two…

  “It seems we’ve attracted some unwanted attention,” Saeter remarked as he grinned at Blacknail from where he lay next to him on the balcony.

  “Yes, so let’s leave,” the hobgoblin hastily replied. He didn’t like being shot at nearly as much as he did shooting at people.

  “Just a second.” Saeter crawled over to the balcony’s edge and peeked over it. He then scanned the battlefield below them thoughtfully.

  Blacknail crawled up beside him, while keeping an eye out for incoming projectiles, and followed his gaze. He quickly noticed what his master was looking at. In the center of the street, among the chaotic masses, a small disciplined group had appeared. They stood out from the others and were clearly more than normal Daggerpoint thugs. Their formation included several men with shields surrounding a group of archers. As Blacknail eyed them nervously, the bowmen resumed shooting. Arrows began to rain down on the defenders that were still struggling to hold the barricade, and the occasional unlucky attacker as well. The climbers redoubled their effort to make it over the barricade, and the sounds of fighting intensified.

  “So, Zelena has finally made her next move. I wonder what Herad will do. They’re both playing their cards close to their chests,” Saeter mused to himself.

  As Blacknail peered over the balcony railing, he noticed movement at one of the windows of a building across the street. He tried to see what it was, but it was too far away and all blurry.

  “There’s something there,” he told his master as he pointed to it.

  “Ah, here we go; there’s Mahedium,” Saeter replied.

  Blacknail had no idea how his master could tell who was at the window, the hobgoblin’s own eyes had trouble making out things that far away, but Saeter was soon proven right in a dramatic fashion. A heavy pulsing noise washed over the battlefield as a wave of rippling air shot forth from the window. The violent distortion slammed into the center of the shielded archers, and the street beneath them exploded. Sharp stone fragments flew off in every direction, and Blacknail was practically deafened by the blast. Mixed in among the dirt and rock of the explosion were shields and other pieces of equipment, as well as several torn limbs. Bodies were sent rolling across the ground as the impact threw them aside. Only a few of the men anywhere near the blast site managed to keep on their feet, and they looked worse for wear.

  The battlefield seemed to pause as everyone took in this new development. As the roar of the blast died down, the sounds of steel on steel, and screams of pain and rage, seemed muted and less frequent. A weird veil of quiet fell across the fighting.

  Then, Mahedium unleashed another barrage upon the largest concentration of attackers near the wall. Screams filled the air as men were torn apart by the magical force, and the tide of battle shifted once again. Blacknail grinned savagely at the beautiful destruction that filled his eyes. It was moments like this that made him really want to be a mage. The rest of the thugs attacking the wall faltered and began to panic. Men trying to climb the wall froze as their companions below them took a nervous step back. Blacknail even saw one shorter female fighter, who had successfully made it over the barricade, abandon her position and leap back across. She was obviously very smart for a human.

  Herad’s men were quick to take advantage of this opening, and they regrouped. Her bandits surged up to the wall and began to cut down Zelena’s stunned men. Soon, no attackers were left on the defenders' side of the barricade, and Herad had taken complete control of the wall back. That was too much for the rema
ining attackers at the foot of the barricade. They still outnumbered the defenders, but now they were disorganized and at a serious disadvantage. As one they seemed to waver, and then one of them screamed in surprise and pain as Blacknail’s latest arrow slammed into his left butt cheek. Why did that keep happening? That wasn't where he had aimed...

  As if the wail had been some sort of prearranged signal, the attackers broke and started to flee. Groups of them began dashing away from the wall and down the street. Within seconds, the fighting stopped and only the sound of panicked footsteps remained. Soon, even that was gone, and the last of Zelena’s soldiers disappeared down one of the many shadowy side streets.

  “Aha, we won! Run-ss stupid humans, run. I’ll find you though; you can’t hide-ss from me!” Blacknail cheered triumphantly.

  The hobgoblin then quickly turned away from the battlefield and headed for the stairs that led down to the safe side of the wall. He wanted to beat the rush and get the best loot for himself.

  “Where do you think you’re going, Blacknail?” Saeter asked.

  “I’m going-ss to go find some prizes. Some of the people in our band are really greedy and will take all the good stuff for themselves, unless I get-ss there first!” the hobgoblin responded.

  “The battle is far from over!”

  The hobgoblin turned around and gave his master an uncomprehending stare. Below him on the street, the last of the attackers had already fled. Only blasted rubble and a scattering of corpses remained. It certainly looked like his tribe had won…

  “Really?” he asked his master doubtfully.

  “Yes, that was just the first wave. They were disposable. Zelena’s commanders threw them at us hoping that they would weaken us. Their main force is still to come, and now they’ve tested our defenses,” Saeter explained.

  “… and that’s bad?” Blacknail asked with wide eyes.