And the other six leading warships sailed in. The island catapults fired again, one scoring a hit high atop the mainsail of the ship immediately to Assant Tigre’s left. The fires hardly slowed the vessel, though, and the crew, intent on getting ashore, hardly paid the small flames high above any heed. Many rowboats hit the water all about the ships, soldiers scrambling down with practiced efficiency and taking up the stroke immediately to get ashore.
Only Assant Tigre kept its course, straight in to the docks, maneuvering directly opposite the wounded sister ship.
“Master Stimson!” came Earl DePaunch’s prompt.
“Focus your energies, brethren,” Stimson told his six Abellican companions. “The catapult left of the tower.”
Warder Presso rubbed his face as he watched the continuing approach and battle below him. He had known from the start that holding the island against such a fleet, bearing so many warriors, would not be possible. He had hoped to thin the enemy ranks enough initially to slow down the progress until parley could be pursued, however, and fully expected that his well-trained men would do so.
Perhaps a catapult could put another two ships out of commission. Perhaps his archers would ward the docks for the remainder of the day—there was really only one safe approach to the island, and the long wharf would only accommodate two ships at a time. If he could win these first moments of battle, he would force his enemy to come ashore wholly by rowboat, a much more difficult and time-consuming proposition.
Despite the movements and the minimal effects of the second catapult volley, Warder Presso believed that he and his men were doing exactly that. The wounded ship would prove a difficult debarkation, given its angle against the broken dock, and the second ship moving in would have only a narrow channel upon which to gain access to the crushed wharf. A well-placed catapult shot would lock down the wharf altogether, he believed.
Warder Presso held his breath, knowing that his artillerymen would now attempt to do just that, using the second docking ship as a backstop for their bombs.
But then Presso’s breath came out in a burst, and his eyes popped open wide in both shock and horror as seven distinct lightning bolts leaped forth from that ship, each reaching up to blast the area about the catapult below the tower on the right. The warder leaned over the wall to see a couple of artillerymen scrambling weirdly, limbs flailing, hair dancing, while several others lay about on the ground, some moving, some not. Wisps of smoke drifted up from the war engine itself at several locations, and as Presso watched in dismay, one of the support legs of the catapult buckled beneath it, toppling the engine to its side.
“Abellican monks!” cried the commander standing beside the devastated warder.
“Allheart Knights!” cried another man, drawing Presso’s attention back to the wounded ship, to see warriors armored in the garb of the famed Allhearts moving across the planks to the dock.
A second volley of lightning bolts shot forth from the ship, wreaking similar destruction on the lone remaining catapult.
The only formidable magic-wielders in all the world, as far as Warder Presso knew, were the Abellicans who served the King of Honce-the-Bear. Pireth Dancard, an outpost of the same king, had little defense against such a magical assault.
Presso heard the ballista swiveling behind him, and he turned fiercely. “Hold fire!” he cried. “And put up your bows!” he screamed over the edge of the tower to the archers set about the defensive wall. He turned to his stunned commander and bade the man to run the white flag up at once.
“We must trust in the Allhearts and the Abellicans,” he said to the group on that tower top. “They are the heart and soul of Honce-the-Bear; we must ask them for mercy.”
“They serve the usurper king!” came the commander’s reply, for indeed, the Saudi Jacintha had stopped through Pireth Dancard on her way to Vanguard weeks before with just such a report. “What of Prince Midalis?”
“We shall see,” Warder Presso replied as he headed for the stairwell to take him down to the scene. “Without artillery, we cannot hold them off. We are outnumbered five to one, I would estimate.”
“We have defensible positions!” the commander argued, and indeed, Pireth Dancard was networked with many winding tunnels set with numerous bottlenecks and traps.
“Defensible against our own people?” Presso retorted. “Defensible against gemstone-wielding Abellican monks? Those tunnels were built for last desperate use against powries, Commander, or against any other foe who would not give quarter. Are we to expect such treatment from our brothers of Honce-the-Bear?”
The commander tightened his lips, obviously biting back a sharp retort. But he held it to himself.
A thin voice from the tower top was not going to suffice in making the surrender general, and many more, attacker and defender alike, were killed or wounded on the docks and lower battlements. More volleys of flaming pitch came soaring in from the warships, striking the rocky hill higher and higher in succession until they reached right up to the gates of the sturdy tower. On came the Allheart Knights, covered by archery fire and more devastating volleys by the gemstone-wielding priests. By the time Warder Presso made it to the gates and flung them wide, the battle had nearly reached the fortress, with many more invaders coming ashore from the rowboats all about the dock area. Presso could hear cries from the east, as well, and he realized that the four trailing warships had sailed about the island, likely lobbing their catapult bombs intermittently.
Warder Presso took the white flag of surrender from the man beside him and waded out into the melee. Or at least, he tried to, for a sudden jolt of lightning, and then a second and a third, perhaps even a fourth, jolted him and hurled him backward, where he lay helpless on the ground, his limbs twitching.
He took some relief when he noted another of his soldiers scoop up the flag and stubbornly run past, and then he knew no more.
“A glorious day,” Earl DePaunch said to Master Stimson and Giulio Jannet. The three walked the lower reaches of Dancard’s fortified southern expanse, the smell of burned pitch heavy in the air. About them, bodies were still being removed—twoscore of the defending Coastpoint Guardsmen had been killed, as well as more than sixty of DePaunch’s men, many of them the brave souls on the sacrificial boat that was still jammed up against the damaged long wharf. Other noncombatants had been killed in the village area, but no count had yet been formulated.
“Warder Presso will survive,” Master Stimson informed the earl. Stimson had worked on the man with hematite personally, and now the other six Abellicans were out among the islanders, helping to heal their wounds.
“Only to be hanged, likely,” Earl DePaunch replied, and he gave a coarse chuckle, which Giulio Jannet quickly joined.
“Take care of such an act,” Master Stimson warned. “Presso has served Dancard for many years and is much loved by his men and the townsfolk.”
“You would have me ignore his act of treason?” Earl DePaunch asked with feigned incredulity, for they all knew that the actions of Warder Constantine Presso were hardly treasonous, and were, in effect, more self-defense than anything else. “Good brother, we cannot have renegade commanders opposing the rule of King Aydrian.”
“Does the man even know our king’s name?”
“He will,” DePaunch assured Stimson, “right before the noose tightens about his neck.”
That brought another laugh from Giulio Jannet, which DePaunch summarily joined.
Master Stimson looked away, considering his own duties. There was one Abellican priest out on Dancard, a Master Coiyusade. He was a fairly distinguished member of the Church, and had been heard at the last College of Abbots, in which Fio Bou-raiy had been elected Father Abbot. As his name indicated, Coiyusade was of Behrenese descent, though his family had lived in Entel for more than a century, and had intermarried with folk of Honce-the-Bear so frequently in the past that the master’s skin was more the complexion of a man of Honce-the-Bear than that of a Behrenese. Despite his southe
rn heritage, Coiyusade had voted for Fio Bou-raiy and not Abbot Olin at that college. The man had served most of his time in St. Rontlemore, the sister abbey and rival of Olin’s St. Bondabruce in Entel.
He had wavered in his vote at that last college, though, Stimson remembered, and had nearly been persuaded over to Abbot Olin’s side. Perhaps he could be moved toward the new reality of the Abellican Church.
A cry to the side turned the attention of all three toward a woman, running and screaming for her husband. She almost got to the flat rock off to the side of the wall where the dead were being piled before a pair of Kingsmen intercepted her, one shoving her hard to the ground and ordering her away.
Stimson realized that his task concerning Coiyusade would be much more difficult if such actions became common. He looked to Earl DePaunch, expecting a scolding of the soldier, who continued his harsh treatment of the woman, even kicking her a couple of times.
But Earl DePaunch just laughed again, and Giulio Jannet joined him.
Chapter 24
Making a Man of Him
ON A COLD AND SNOWY WINTER’S DAY, WHEN FOLK THIS FAR OUT IN THE WILDERLANDS to the west were usually huddled before the hearth, families and friends close together to share body heat, all of the citizens of Festertool were outside, lining the main cart road through the small and remote village. They waved red kerchiefs and jumped up and down, cheering for their young king—this man, Aydrian, who had once lived in this town, and who had served all the region as Tai’Maqwilloq, the Ranger of Festertool.
Sadye hardly paid the jumping and shouting townsfolk any heed as she rode beside Aydrian, surrounded by the guarding cavalry of the few Allheart Knights who had accompanied them out from Palmaris. A score of Kingsmen had gone into the village before the main parade, ensuring Aydrian’s safety. The rest of the troop, more than three hundred strong, marched behind Aydrian’s group, with drumbeats cutting through the dull and snowy winter air.
And Aydrian was soaking it all in, beaming more proudly than Sadye had ever before seen him. They had come through several towns before this, of course, and with similar fanfare, but this one was different, Sadye recognized. This town had been Aydrian’s first real experience with a human community after his escape from the Touel’alfar. In this town, he had learned how to speak the language of Honce-the-Bear, and had learned the other manners, subtle and not-so, of human interaction. In this town, Aydrian had risen from wayward boy to hero in a short period of time, and now he was returning, the ultimate conquering hero.
He seemed a beautiful person to Sadye in that moment, his face aglow with the cold and the pride, rosy cheeks and bright red lips accentuating those marvelous blue eyes of his. He wore no helm and had pushed the hood of his heavy cloak back off his head so that his golden hair, all tousled and unkempt, was shining above him with an almost supernatural glow. Everything about Aydrian seemed larger than life to Sadye at that moment. Truly he was the king here, in every aspect of the word, and just being beside him sent a shiver coursing along her spine.
She was still staring at him when they reached the end of the lane, and Aydrian dismounted to stand before the town elders. He paused and glanced all around, surveying the group, and Sadye could tell by his movements and the sparkle in his eyes that he recognized more than a few.
“Hey, boy, are ye still needin’ old Rumpar’s sword?” one old man cried, and those around him laughed and tittered.
Until Aydrian fixed them with a warning glare.
Slowly, very slowly, Aydrian drew Tempest from its sheath on his hip, sliding the blade out into the air before him and lifting it high. That alone brought many gasps, and those only multiplied a moment later, when the brilliant blade erupted into leaping flames.
To his credit, Aydrian chose not to respond any more than that, and he promptly let go of the magical fires and slid the sword away.
“Good people of Festertool,” he began, turning as he spoke to take them all in, “you knew me as your ranger, defending your boundaries from highwaymen and monsters alike. And now I have returned to you as your king.”
A great cheer began somewhere to the side, and rolled along the line of townsfolk, growing with each passing second. No doubt, the Kingsmen standing among the crowd were urging them, Sadye knew, but in truth, it didn’t seem to her as if many needed that prompt. Their cheers seemed genuine, the hopes of a nondescript and usually ignored little town who saw one of their own step forward to the highest glory in all the world. Sadye wondered if Jilseponie had received such a reception from the folk of Dundalis after becoming Danube’s queen.
Aydrian caught her attention, then, looking over at her, his eyes sparkling with pride and also with something else, some intensity that caught Sadye off her guard at that moment.
Instinctively, she hugged her arms close in front of her, almost an attempt—a futile one—to deny the warmth that was suddenly flowing throughout her.
Their meal was served by a host of attendants, seeing to their every need, and while the food was rather plain, Sadye appreciated the great lengths to which Aydrian had gone to make this evening together something rather special.
She noted, too, the way he looked at her throughout the meal, and knew that the hunger in his blue eyes longed for something more than food.
This time, though, the woman was not caught off her guard as she had been earlier in the day. She did not recoil from Aydrian’s stare, did not hug her arms defensively in front of her. Rather, she lifted her glass of wine—one of the few delicacies the army had taken out of Palmaris—and replied to Aydrian with a leading and teasing smile.
Aydrian dismissed the servants before he and Sadye had even finished their meal. And when she was done, he wasted no time in coming around the table toward her.
Sadye rose before he got there and moved to the window, pulling aside the curtain to look out on the quiet town of Festertool and the many campfires of the army gathered about it.
“The hero comes home,” she said when Aydrian stalked up beside her, and her words slowed his deliberate approach somewhat. Still, he was right against her, looking not out the window, as was she, but at her. She could feel his stare boring into her, soaking in her delicate features.
Only after a moment did her words truly seem to sink in to him. “Home?” he asked. “This place?”
Sadye turned her gentle expression to him. “This is not your home?” she asked. “Where, then?”
The question seemed physically to push Aydrian back a step and he blinked repeatedly as if coming out of his intoxication with Sadye’s obvious charms.
“Is it this place you name as Andur’Blough Inninness?” the woman pressed, and Aydrian was shaking his head before she ever finished.
“I do not wish to talk about this.”
“These questions do not dig so deep, do they?”
“No, I don’t wish to talk about this!” Aydrian said more emphatically, and he turned away. “Not here. Not now.” He spun back on her almost immediately, moving close once again. “This is not the time,” he said, his voice going softer but hardly diminishing—rather, it gained a husky quality and a sense of urgency.
Aydrian pressed up against her, his arm going about her so that she could not even begin to lean away. “Not now,” he whispered, and he moved in to kiss her.
A deft twist and duck had Sadye sliding under that holding arm and moving back toward the center of the room.
Aydrian’s eyes popped open and he spun to regard her, his expression caught somewhere between surprise and anger. “You refuse me?”
Sadye recognized the genuine confusion in his voice, and, as she had expected, the lack of true confidence behind his imperial façade. She didn’t respond to him openly, not wanting to clear that confusion and those doubts, but merely smiled coyly.
Aydrian approached, but the graceful woman simply danced away.
“What game do you play?” the frustrated king asked.
“Game?”
Aydrian c
ame at her suddenly with a move that would have served him well as a swordsman, closing the distance too quickly for Sadye to move aside.
And so she stopped him instead, with a simple change in expression, a sudden frosty stare.
Aydrian halted and shook his head.
“You just take what you will?” Sadye remarked. She nearly laughed aloud when Aydrian started to answer in the affirmative, and her fluid expression stopped him before he made that mistake.
“I am the king,” he said instead.
“And so you have your kingdom.”
“And so I have what I desire.”
“No,” came the woman’s simple response.
“I could have any woman in the kingdom!”
“All but one, perhaps.”
Aydrian clenched his fists at his sides and Sadye half expected him to stamp his foot in frustration. She resisted the urge to giggle at him. “My word is law,” he argued, and then reiterated, “I will have whatever I desire.”
He started forward, but Sadye’s outstretched hand, backed by a look of intensity beyond anything Aydrian had ever seen from her before, stopped him as surely as any barricade ever could.
“No,” she answered in denial of his last statement. “Because what you desire cannot be taken.”
Those words seemed to calm Aydrian somewhat, and he settled back, looking at her curiously.
“You could take me, of course, by force,” Sadye went on with a shrug. “I could not stop you, nor would any speak ill of the act, since you are king.”
Aydrian’s expression showed her that he was considering that option at that very moment, and Sadye realized that she had a lot of work to do on this flawed young man.
“There would be no gain,” she explained. “You would find nothing but physical release, and if that is your goal, better that you seek out someone for whom you care nothing, or service yourself …”
“Enough!”
DemonWars Saga Volume 2: Mortalis - Ascendance - Transcendence - Immortalis (The DemonWars Saga) Page 208
