It would have been a beautiful day to travel if not for the general malaise that filled the air around them. Almost from the moment they’d left the inn, the Ral’i had been restless, tossing their heads and switching their tails at non-existent flies as they picked their way between the rocks strewn haphazardly along the trail.
Unconsciously, Kayla massaged her temples, trying to ease the dull, throbbing pain behind her eyes before, once again, scanning the walls of purple stone. And it was only through stubborn determination that she managed to keep the nausea at bay and her breakfast in her churning stomach whenever her eyes touched the webbed patterns of crimson veins crawling across the exposed stone of the cliffs.
Overwhelmed by a sense of dread, Kayla found that she had to make a conscious effort just to take her gaze away from the crocked fingers of shadow cast by the leering fangs of stone surrounding them for any length of time. Raising her voice to be heard over the clatter of hooves, she called, “I really don’t like this place, Garth. It feels… Well, it just feels wrong,” she complained, unable to find the right words to describe the deep revulsion this place aroused in her.
“Relax, the pass still retains a lot of bad vibrations, but it’s been safe for travelers for a couple of years now. Ever since the Emperor caught and executed the worst of the bandits and Others that had been prowling this sector as a warning that he would no longer tolerate their atrocities,” Garth told her.
“You’ve got to admit though, that those high walls and all this cover do provide the perfect setup for an ambush,” volunteered Troll, earning himself a withering look from Garth. “That is, of course, if all the bandits hadn’t been scared off,” he hastily amended.
Kayla didn’t challenge Garth’s words of reassurance, but she did notice that he seemed uneasy and on guard, and Troll was constantly shifting in his saddle to survey the dank darkness of the tangled underbrush and boulders surrounding them.
Lost in her own private silence, Kayla soon found herself daydreaming. She stared at Garth’s broad back swaying with the motion of his mount, enjoying the way his sleek muscles bunched and relaxed under the soft leather of his vest when he shifted his weight in the saddle or leaned off to one side to check the trail.
The rising warmth in her belly and the tautness of her nipples as they responded to the caress of the soft silk of her blouse returned her thoughts unbidden to last night’s lovemaking. And once again, Kayla found she was unable to understand all these new emotions threatening to take control of her, striving constantly to drive all sane thoughts from her mind.
She gingerly placed her hand on her hip, feeling the heat of the brand Garth had inflicted on her radiating through the thin leather of the riding pants, and she felt the anger rise in her again and the clouds of unreasoning love and passion were driven away by the unfamiliar sting of fear. It was too frightening even to imagine a man having so much power over her, but now, for him to be able to claim, not only her body, but her heart and soul as well.
Moodily, Kayla shifted the straps of the carrier holding the sleeping babe and returned half of her attention to the drone of conversation between the men when a sudden shrieking from the sky above jerked her out of her reverie. Drawing Hawk to a halt, she held one hand above her eyes to shade them from the sun’s dull glare as she searched the sky, seeking the source of the cry.
“Over there!” Garth pointed out the silhouetted forms of a pair of large birds. “They’re Silver Eagles. They make the high cliffs of this mountain pass their home.”
Kayla followed the flight of the circling birds as they glided on the wind currents, and when they dipped low in the sky, she was able to see them clearly for the first time. She was delighted when she realized that these magnificent birds were a perfect match for the eagles embroidered on the robes given to them at the inn the night before. The birds shrieked and swooped lower to investigate the riders, and in the doing so, they exposed their beautiful silver back and wing feathers. The contrasting white of the underside of the wings spanned an easy twelve feet from tip to tip and matched the snowy-white crowning of the regal head on the larger bird. As the smaller eagle banked and turned on the air current, Kayla could see that her underside showed as pristine as her mate’s but her silver plumage was duller, as if with tarnish.
The men were watching with as much pleasure as she, but a mixture of joy and sadness filled Garth’s voice when he explained to her, “This pass was named for the Silver Eagles that in days past were seen in great numbers in the skies of this region. Unfortunately, they’ve been hunted nearly to extinction by the humans for their unique silver feathers and by the Others for the psychic power that they believe is gained when one is killed, preferably after enduring great pain and torture. It’s believed by many that the silver eyes of an eagle killed this way gives great power to those who wear them.”
“When he took power over this region, the Emperor Caleis made it a crime punishable by torture and death to harm the eagles. His decree has nearly stopped their destruction, but unfortunately, it will be many years before their numbers are replenished,” added Troll.
“How sad,” Kayla said shaking her head. “It’s hard to believe that anyone could be so cruel.” Frowning, she turned to Garth. “Who are these Others you’ve been referring to all morning? I don’t think I’ve heard you mention them before today.”
Garth shook his head as if in reluctance before telling her, “The Others are almost too vile for discussion, but I guess it would be best if you were made aware of them and the danger they represent. The term is a collective designation we use and it includes those also commonly known as magicians, wizards, necromancers, and all others who have gained their foul powers, not through birthright as you and I, but through the ill use of potions and magic spells that often require blood sacrifices and torture.”
His voice grew deep with anger and distaste. “These are the twisted, perverted vermin that have earned the reputation and generated the existing fear directed at witch-kind and magic everywhere. Whenever the opportunity presents itself, I destroy them for they are truly evil,” he added vehemently.
“The eagles are, unfortunately, still considered the source of a very potent magic, one the magicians will pay dearly for,” added Troll. “Few have been brave enough to hunt them openly since the Emperor’s legions began patrolling the pass to protect them,” he paused a moment before adding, as an afterthought, “but, of late, the Emperor’s army has been occupied by other matters that he evidently feels are more urgent to his current agenda.”
Shaking off a sudden chill, Kayla asked, “Do you think there’s any danger of our encountering any of these Others today?”
When both Garth and Troll failed to answer her, Kayla nervously resumed her watch of their surroundings, now even more aware of the threatening tingle in the air around them.
They were approaching a sharp turn in the trail when a sudden change in the call of the eagles drew Garth’s attention. Drawing the mare to a stop, he held a hand up to shield his eyes from the glare of the sun so that he could better study the flight of the eagles.
Curious, Kayla watched too, seeing that their flight pattern had changed from one of graceful ease, to a frenzied series of dives and raucous shrieking as they alternately rose and disappeared, concealed from sight by the rocks and brush that formed the bend in the trail ahead.
“Something’s wrong,” Garth rasped. Without looking back, he reached one hand to the saddle pack behind him and freed one of the canvas-wrapped bundles he had secured to it that morning.
When he’d shaken loose the piece of canvas, Kayla saw that he held a sword. It was plain, even to the untrained eye that, even though it was much smaller than the one Garth normally wore strapped to his back, it was of the same making, for the sunlight glinted from the razor-sharp edge of the smaller sword’s blue, crystalline blade with an equal brilliance.
Passing it, hilt first, to Kayla, he growled, “Take this. I fear that you may have need of
it!” He released it into her surprised grip and, without pausing to explain, drove his heals into Star Dancer’s sides, sending her racing toward the disturbance ahead.
Behind her, Kayla heard the snick of Troll’s iron sword being drawn and turned to see him flailing his arms and legs to urge his lazy old hack into an awkward gallop after Garth. Not knowing what was going on but refusing to be left out, Kayla loosened her hold on the prancing stallion’s reins and let him leap in pursuit of the other horses.
Ears flattened to his head, the giant grey stallion stretched his long legs and easily overtook the men’s slower mounts. Determined to lead no matter the destination, Hawk rounded the bend well ahead of them and charged headlong into the middle of the bloody chaos of the ensuing battle!
Kayla drew back on the stallion’s reins to slow him down, trying to gain time to sort villain from innocent in the confused mêlée before her. He was dancing impatiently, fighting her hold on him, when she was nearly knocked from her saddle by a blazing bolt of pain behind her eyes.
Gasping from the pain, she grabbed at the saddle horn with one hand to keep her balance. Reacting to her pain and the lighter pressure on his reins, Hawk fought her, rearing and pawing the air in protest, but Kayla merely tightened her grip.
Excited by the noise and scent of battle the stallion reared again, trumpeting his challenge to all.
As if in answer to Hawk’s call, the larger of the frantic eagles dove from the sky in a flash of silver feathers and struck with talons and slashing beak at one of a pack of creatures that were struggling with a huge woven net that held captive a trio of eaglets. Two of the young birds thrashed and squawked hysterically. A third lay ominously quiet.
“I see,” Kayla murmured as she realized that the eagles were the ones being attacked. Fighting back the pain in her head, she released her grip on the angry stallion and allowed him to take them into a battle.
It was quickly obvious that, until their arrival the brave pair of eagles had been doomed to lose their struggle to the superior weapons and greater numbers of the grotesque, manlike creatures that had stolen their young.
Fearlessly, Shadow Hawk charged into the horde of ugly little monstrosities and struck at the nearest creature with his flint-sharp hooves. It tumbled to the ground where he trampled it under foot, but more of the short, bow-legged creatures swarmed around the stallion grasping with long, bony fingers at his bridle and saddle-straps, trying vainly to gain control of the animal so savagely attacking them.
“What are these things,” Kayla shouted at Troll as he drew his wheezing old hack up beside her and began swinging his blade at the heads of the nearest of the creatures.
“Horaggs!” he answered between sword thrusts. “The wizards employ them to perform some of their more distasteful duties.”
One of the Horaggs dodged the stallion’s hooves and managed to grab hold of Kayla’s leg. Jerking with unexpected strength, he nearly brought her to the ground.
“Hey! Let go of me!” She kicked her foot into the ugly little goblin’s face and swung awkwardly at it with the short sword still grasped awkwardly in her right hand. She was surprised when the blade sliced smoothly through the hairless head. To her disgust, a torrent of red-green gore spewed from the deep gash onto her legs and Hawk’s sweat-lathered side.
Gagging on the rancid odor of the thing’s blood, she quickly pulled back on the reins, trying to get them away from the smelly mess. Hawk bucked and kicked to clear their way but another of the toad-faced creatures leaped for Kayla, this time it managed to wrap its clawed hands into the leather of her boot and the straps of her left stirrup and proceeded to sink its jagged teeth into her leg.
The sudden intense pain triggered a blinding flash of anger and Kayla released the reins to free her left hand. Pointing at the toad thing, she delivered a small bolt of blue into its warty face. It dropped without a sound and lay twitching on the churned ground, its head a blackened mess.
Still off balance from the Horagg’s attack, Kayla was forced to grab wildly for the saddle horn to keep from being thrown when the Ral’i bucked hard and delivered a deadly kick with his powerful rear legs to a trio of the toads attacking them from behind. She had barely recovered her seat and reins when Hawk spun to face the main part of the battle and gave her a clear view of Garth and Troll and the enemy attempting to surround them.
Garth was surrounded in an aura of blue light and, for only the second time, Kayla witnessed the crystal sword in action. Plainly, it was not an ordinary weapon, but a tool meant to channel the power that was now flowing through the warlock’s hand. Using only the pressure of his knees, he was expertly guiding Star Dancer through the horde of Horaggs, slashing as he went at the green bodies of their rapidly dwindling numbers, cutting them down as if they were only clumsily formed clay figures.
Distracted by the artistry of Garth’s fighting, Kayla had to clutch at the saddle horn again to keep her seat when Hawk suddenly turned and leaped over the dead and wounded Horaggs lying under his feet. With a sharp snap of his head, the Ral’i took the bit in his mouth and charged toward the battle being fought over the netted eagles.
As they drew close, Kayla saw that several of the toad creatures were trying to make their escape with the pitifully squawking captives while a pack of four Horaggs held the male eagle trapped against the canyon wall. Only the desperate female was left to continue the valiant battle to free her young.
Desperate to free the eaglets, the mother pumped her wings and stabbed at the enemy with her sharp beak, managing to drive the Horaggs back long enough to hook her talons into the heavy netting. But with so little room to flex her big wings, she was only able to lift the heavy bundle a few inches from the ground before her efforts entangled both talons and wings.
Seeing that the eagle was hopelessly entrapped, the Horaggs were pressing their attack.
Kayla shifted the weight of the baby carrier for better balance and urged Hawk closer, shouting in hopes of drawing the Horaggs’ attention away from the weakening eagle. When that failed, she attacked the fringes of their circle but she knew that she, too, would soon begin to tire. Aware that she couldn’t risk using her strongest weapon to deal with the persistent little toads without also harming those she was trying to help, Kayla drew on the lesson she’d just taken from watching Garth’s use of the crystal sword.
Holding her own sword up, she allowed her power to flow out, into the crystal of the blade until she could feel the heat radiating from it. Allowing Hawk to choose their path, Kayla concentrated on guiding the sword in a wide arch, feeling the jerk of the blade each time it passed through the soft upper body of one of the creatures.
A part of Kayla’s mind was aware that she was now experiencing a lot less resistance to the swords cutting edge and only a fraction of the drain on her strength as she had been before she’d learned to allow her psi energy to power the sword. She also remembered her earlier lessons and was able to close her mind in time to protect herself from the energy backlash of their deaths. She felt no desire to be sullied by whatever life force as low and disgusting as any of these might have had.
The Horaggs surrounding her and the stallion were soon dead or retreating into the safety of the underbrush. Feeling sickened by the sight and smell of the carnage covering the ground around her, Kayla pulled Hawk to one side and out of the fighting. Her arm was so tired from the repeated impact of blade against the tough little creatures, and she couldn’t seem to get her breath! Leaning back in her saddle, she used the loose sleeve of her shirt to wipe away some of the sweat running into her eyes.
Seeing the witch’s attention waver for those few seconds, the Horaggs seized their chance and pounced on the entangled eagle, forcing her to the ground.
Alerted by the frantic squawks of the eaglets, Kayla spun Hawk toward them, but she immediately realized that she couldn’t bring the stallion close enough to help without trampling them. Leaping from the relative security of the saddle, she quickly unhooked the
straps holding the quiet infant on her back and secured the carrier to the saddle.
“Take care of the babe, Hawk,” she instructed him. Patting the Ral’i’s sweat-soaked neck, she slapped his rump and sent him out of the battle area. She waited only long enough to be sure of the child’s safety before she charged into the midst of the short, snarling creatures and started swinging her sword to and fro angrily.
“I told you to leave them alone!” she growled as she plunged the crystal sword into the neck of another toad.
Overwhelmed by her wrath, the Horaggs were forced to break off their attack on the eagles to protect themselves.
Totally lost in her bloodlust, Kayla was not aware that most of the creatures had retreated from the battle until the pain of a sharp, high-pitched whistle drew her attention to the ridge of rock behind her. Her remaining opponents quickly took advantage of this short reprieve to make their escape, running and tripping over each other in their haste.
It took her a couple of minutes, but Kayla finally traced the whistling sound to a lone Horagg standing to one side of the clearing. His behavior and stance labeled him as a probable commander of the nasty creatures and his cold, beady eyes were locked on her as he continued to blow into what looked to be a whistle carved from a piece of bone.
Another sharp blast rent the air, driving the remaining toads in a stumbling, gibbering rush for cover of the rocks and brush at the base of the ridge.
Relieved, but puzzled by this sudden retreat, Kayla rushed to help the eagle by cutting away the heavy mesh imprisoning her and the eaglets.
Grunting and groaning in the effort to get the eagles free, she barely heard Garth’s call. Impatiently, she looked up to see both him and Troll, on foot as she was, racing toward her with swords drawn, their faces distorted by fear and urgency. Confused by their behavior, Kayla rose from where she’d been kneeling beside the gurgling eaglets.
“Kay–la! Beware, the…” Only part of Garth’s warning reached her ears, lost beneath the roar of her own heavy breathing and a gust of wind. She saw him stumble and grab at Troll’s shoulder to keep from falling and nearly bring both of them to the ground. The rest of Garth’s warning was drowned out by the deep rumble of an animal too long without food.
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