The Grey Bastards_A Novel

by Jonathan French

  He did not make it in time.

  Dragging himself the last infuriatingly small span, Jackal rested his head upon Hearth’s face and wept in a futile rage.

  Above him, the gatehouse groaned. Small cascades of dust and powdered mortar drifted down as the stones loosened in the arch. Jackal got to his knees, then his feet, remaining in a squat as he took hold of Hearth’s tusks and dragged him out from beneath the gatehouse, not stopping until they were well clear. Kneeling beside his dead mount, he watched as the walls of the Kiln tumbled to rubble.

  The sun appeared over the horizon and still Jackal remained, bitterly feeling his unnatural strength return. He was still sitting there when a shadow fell over him and a strong hand clasped down on his shoulder.

  “I’m sorry, brother.”

  Jackal put his own hand over the thick, powerful fingers, relieved, but reluctant to look up for fear of what he might find. After a moment, he did.

  Oats stood above, soot-stained and a little haggard, but otherwise unchanged. Jackal let out a long breath.

  “Claymaster made me think you now carried the plague,” he said.

  Oats’s face fell. “Not me.”

  The mournful tone roused Jackal. “Then who?”

  Oats bade him follow with a small motion of his head. Getting to his feet, Jackal complied and the thrice led him a little farther away from the Kiln, where they found Fetching and the Grey Bastards, mounted and waiting. Red Nail, Kul’huun, Gripper, Dumb Door, and Slivers were with them. Beyond, the Winsome villagers milled about in the scrub, watched over by the slops. All appeared dirty and unnerved, some gazing fixedly at the conflagration of the Kiln, while others avoided looking in its direction. Jackal’s own stare settled on a familiar figure, standing amongst the hoof, holding a bundle wrapped in a blanket.

  Beryl watched as he approached, moving the folds of the blanket aside when he drew close so he could see. It was Wily, the toddling thrice-blood from the orphanage. He lay asleep in Beryl’s arms, his little brow creasing as he whimpered slightly. His round face was flush and pustules had already formed on his neck.

  Jackal’s heart sank and he looked at Beryl aghast. “I…I don’t understand. How?”

  For the first time in his life, he saw cracks form in the matron’s resilience, threatening to break her. Her voice came from quivering lips, barely a whisper.

  “This…fog. It came into the room. It was so fast, and…I thought he was going to die right then. But he didn’t. Jackal…he hasn’t woken up.”

  “Captain Ignacio was with her, Jack,” Fetch said softly from the back of her hog, clearly having heard the story. “He told Beryl the Claymaster wanted her and the boy protected.”

  “Crafty wanted a thrice to bear the plague,” Jackal said through clenched teeth, running a thumb gently across Wily’s forehead.

  “There was only one other in the Kiln after I left for Strava,” Oats said, his voice breaking. “This is my fault.”

  Beryl snapped a hard look at her son. “I already told you to stop that. This is on the chief’s head. His, and that wizard’s.”

  “The Claymaster’s dead,” Jackal said to no one in particular. He couldn’t take his eyes off the afflicted boy. Had he known this was where the plague would flee, he never would have chased it away. The guilt would kill Oats, no matter what Beryl said. “What about Ignacio?”

  “He fled when the plague entered the room,” Fetch replied, saving Beryl the account. “Forced the slops to lower the Hogback, took his cavaleros and rode away.”

  “That got us in,” Gripper uttered.

  “Your new boys were damn helpful getting everyone out, Jack,” Hobnail said, trying to sound hopeful.

  “Our thanks,” Jackal told them.

  “It was our honor,” Red Nail said, though his face held great pity. “All of your folk may shelter at the Wallow, if you wish.”

  Jackal nodded gratefully.

  “Any sign of Crafty?” he asked Fetch, but she only tightened her lips and shook her head.

  “I will hunt him down,” Jackal vowed to Beryl. “Make him undo this.”

  She wanted to believe him, he could see, but despair had taken root, refreshed every time she looked down at the child in her arms.

  A noise resounded in the early morning air. It was faint, but protracted, drawing the attention of all.

  “It’s…a voice,” Mead said, squinting in concentration.

  Jackal thought so too, and it was coming from the ruin of the Kiln.

  “Hob, Mead,” Fetch said. “Let’s go have a look.”

  Uninvited, Kul’huun rode with them. They weren’t gone long. When they returned, all four wore grim faces.

  “It’s the orc’s corpse, isn’t it?” Jackal said, knowing the answer. He had suspected as soon as he heard the sound.

  “Half-burnt and buried,” Fetch replied. “But the fucker’s still howling.”

  Slivers screwed up his face. “What the hells does that mean?”

  “Crafty said it would only do that for one thing,” Oats tolled, staring at nothing.

  “Thicks,” Jackal said.

  Polecat, recovered enough from his fall to sit a hog, swore under his breath. After that, all were silent. They stood displaced beneath a morning sky stained with the black fumes of their stronghold, listening to a corpse’s voice trumpet the coming of his kin. Looking at the people of Winsome and the slops, Jackal saw more than two hundred lives, nearly a quarter of them children. Most of the folk who came to live under the protection of the hoof were mongrels, orphans once, and now orphans again. Exposed in the badlands, the orcs would find them, sniff them out even with all the smoke. And slaughter would follow.

  Jackal set his tongue against his teeth to whistle for Hearth before remembering. Biting back the grief, he called to the slops.

  “Get me Grocer’s barbarian!”

  Soon, Biro rode up on Winnow. Dismounting, he turned the animal over, along with a tulwar, stockbow, and full quiver. Jackal gave the youth an approving look and climbed into the saddle to face the assembled riders.

  “Red Nail. The people of Winsome will accept the offer of shelter from the Tusked Tide. Will you lead them and our slopheads to your lot?”

  “I will,” the older half-orc replied. “What do you mean to do?”

  “Give you as much time as we can,” Jackal replied.

  Slivers barked a laugh. “We?”

  Slowly, Jackal looked at five faces. Polecat. Mead. Hobnail. Oats. And Fetching. He saw steel in the eyes of each.

  “Grey Bastards. We got orcs in our lot. Do I have to say how we deal with that?”

  “No, you don’t,” Oats rumbled, hauling himself atop Ugfuck.

  Mead began to nod, slowly at first, then building into an emphatic, feral motion. Hob smiled behind his red beard. Fetch’s stockbow was already loaded.

  Polecat grinned and shifted in the saddle. “All the hells, I’m hard.”

  “Six of you?” Slivers said, his voice high and incredulous. “That’s at least three hundred thicks out there. Could be the, the…what did you call the big fucking horde?”

  “Duulv M’har,” Kul’huun said lustily.

  Slivers hooked a thumb at the Fang. “That! Forty thousand strong? Are you mad?”

  “We don’t count them, frailing,” Fetch told him, winking at her brothers. “We kill them.”

  The Bastards chuckled.

  “Would you count another to ride with you?” Gripper asked.

  Dumb Door thumped himself hard in the chest.

  “Make that two more,” Gripper amended.

  Jackal gave the nomads a pardoning look. “No need for you to die for our lot.”

  “How about this?” Gripper returned. “We survive, we become sworn brothers.”

  Jackal looked at hi
s hoofmates. “What do you say?”

  There was a collective shout of approval.

  “Eight it is.”

  “G’haan,” Kul’huun said.

  “Nine, then,” Jackal announced with a smirk. “Though you have to go back to the Fangs of Our Fathers when this is over.” He turned to Biro. “Get our nomad brothers some stockbows.”

  “Well, don’t look to me to be the tenth fool,” Slivers whined.

  “You can ride with me,” Red Nail growled. “Help escort the innocents.”

  Slivers gave a sullen nod. “I can do that.”

  “My thanks,” Jackal told him earnestly. He was about to give the order to ride when he saw Beryl step up beside Ugfuck. Oats looked down at his mother from the saddle and a silent commiseration passed between them. She, who had lived with the ways of the hoof before he ever drew breath, was torn between respecting the rider and fearing for the son. Oats placed a broad hand over Wily’s head for a moment, then leaned down and kissed Beryl, his fierce beard lingering against her raised cheek. Everyone looked away.

  Only when Oats reined up beside him did Jackal give the command.

  “Let’s ride!”

  They went roughly south, passing the broken pyre of the Kiln, the bellow of the enchanted orc still ringing out from the wreckage. It did not take them long to find the thicks. They were less than a mile below the Kiln, a column of tall, swarthy figures moving within a cloud of dust. It was another ul’usuun, three hundred marauders armed with spear and scimitar. The hoof reined up directly in their path.

  “That it?” Polecat complained. “I thought they were bringing an army.”

  Laughing, they all checked their weapons. The orcs marched steadily closer and a guttural cry arose from their ranks when they spotted the riders. The tongue began to increase its pace, eager to run off the enemy or, better, come to grips and slay them.

  Jackal’s hoof waited, raising their stockbows.

  The orcs charged.

  As soon as the thicks stepped within range, they loosed. If any fell to their bolts, Jackal did not see, focused solely on reloading. To his right, Fetch’s thrum was already snapping again. After the fourth volley, Jackal called the withdrawal. Turning, they spurred their hogs away. The orcs gave chase, growling and snarling, their long, powerful legs eating up the ground. But the riders had the lead and soon turned, unleashing another swarm of thrumbolts before breaking away once more. Again and again they baited the orcs, until their quivers were spent. They rode farther away after the final volley, but Jackal signaled a turn before the enemy was lost from view. Baying for vengeance, the thicks pursued. If the ul’usuun was thinned, it was difficult to see.

  “How many did we get?” Mead asked, his face flushed.

  “A score, maybe,” Hobnail guessed. “No more.”

  Jackal freed himself from the strap of his stockbow and let the weapon fall. All around him, the others did the same, filling their hands with swords. Looking over, he found Fetch beside him, flush with the thrill of battle, savage and beautiful.

  She smiled at him. “Tusker, Jack?”

  “Down their throats,” he replied.

  Oats was a bulwark at his right, his brutish face fixed on the oncoming foe, whiskered jaw pulsing.

  The rest of the hoof formed up in a wedge behind, the Bastards trailing Fetch, while Kul’huun and the free-riders fanned out on the other side. Unspoken, they had all arrived at the same decision. There was no need to scout for good ground or search out ambush sites. When nine stood against hundreds, such tactics were simply tiring. They wanted to be seen, to be counted. For years they had lived a lie, believing they protected the Lots. And for years the thicks had been deterred by only one mongrel. Now, the Claymaster was dead, his legacy unjustly foisted upon a child. It was time for the half-orcs of the Lot Lands to mold their false purpose into something real. And they would do it with blood.

  Pointing his tulwar at the surging wall of orcs, Jackal kicked his mount forward.

  “Live in the saddle!”

  “DIE ON THE HOG!”

  Hooves thundered behind, orcs swarmed ahead, swelling as the distance closed. It was a howling sea of bulging muscles, fanged jaws, curved swords, and heavy-bladed spears. The riders plunged into those bloodthirsty waters with no hope of returning.

  The wedge slammed into the massed orcs and pierced deep. At its head, Jackal slashed with his tulwar, severing spear shafts and ringing scimitars. Beneath him, his barbarian cleaved a path with its tusks. The charge scattered the orcs, trampling those directly in its path, but their numbers made it impossible to win through. Closing the wound, the thicks bulled back in, pressing the sides of the wedge, squeezing it until it was forced to halt.

  Jackal heard a hog squeal in agony behind him, but he could not spare a look. Life shrank to the multitude of snarling faces before him and the swinging of his sword. Spears lunged at him, orcs screamed at him, and he lashed out at all. His tulwar lopped down upon necks and shoulders, but the thicks’ primordial frames feasted upon the edge of the blade, turning death strokes into flesh wounds. Fetch and Oats were by his side, preventing the thicks from reaching his flanks. Trained to battle, the barbarians bucked in tight arcs, sweeping and rending with their tusks. Jackal knew, even without seeing, that the wedge had become a ring. The hoof was surrounded, resisting the inevitable.

  A spear made it past Jackal’s warding blade, scraping across his hip to lodge in his saddle. He opened the offender’s throat with a reaping stroke, but there was no end to those wanting his blood. A scimitar swept in, wielded by a swart brute. Jackal turned the stroke, the force of it knocking him off balance. The orc seized the opening, and lunged, dropping his weapon to seize Winnow by the tusks. The hog tried to rear, but the brute held her fast, fell muscles bulging. Horribly, impossibly, the orc dominated the swine as four spears punched into her chest and neck. Screaming, unable to escape the pain, Winnow began to spin wildly, her fear allowing her to break free. Jackal fought to keep his seat, but the hog was frenzied, spooked beyond control. With no other choice, Jackal jumped from the saddle. Winnow attempted to flee. Powerful in her pain-fueled rage, she barreled forward, trampling and goring, cutting a swath through the orcs, but her strength was flagging and they drug her down to be butchered.

  Fetch and Oats closed ranks, shielding Jackal. He rose in the center of the ring and saw the end was near. Kul’huun’s hog was dead. The Fang fought on foot, covered in blood, a scimitar in each hand. He raged with a savagery to match his enemies, screaming abuses at the orcs in their own tongue. The rest were still mounted, but as Jackal watched, Hobnail took a spear through the chest, the blow so fierce it came through his back and knocked him from his hog. Bounding forward, Jackal vaulted onto the barbarian’s back, taking it in hand and slaying Hob’s killer. But the thicks struck with renewed furor. Next to Jackal, Mead let out a horrendous cry as his hand was hacked off by a scimitar. Gripper was dragged from his saddle and vanished amidst the ravaging press. Fetch’s hog was killed beneath her. She rolled free and, using her dead mount as a barricade, fought on.

  The ring began to collapse.

  Letting loose shouts and curses, Jackal kicked Hob’s hog forward. Ignoring his own defense, he allowed the orcs to surround him, hoping to draw them away from his brethren, even for a moment. He felt the edges of scimitars and the points of spears kiss his flesh. Damning the wounds, he continued forward, hells-bent on testing the limits of Attukhan’s relic to his final breath. He did not know when he was dismounted, only that somewhere in the red world he found himself again fighting on foot. His tulwar was broken, shattered on the skull of an orc. Taking up a spear, he slew until it too was sundered. Taller than he, stronger than he, the orcs threw themselves at him. They cut him, stabbed him, knocked him down and pummeled him with iron knuckles, yet he rose, cutting, stabbing, pummeling in return.

  Dozens lay
beneath his feet. Yet scores stood before him. Gathering themselves, slavering with the coming kill, they stared at him with dark, animal eyes. He braced himself to receive them.

  A great cry went up amongst the orc ranks, a single word bellowed in their savage tongue that Jackal did not catch. Every thick turned directly away from him and raised their weapons, howling as they charged. Bewildered, Jackal cast about and saw groups of riders coming in from all sides. Their mounts were great stags, the antlers imbued with a pale, ghostly light. On their backs were warriors with wild, plaited hair, shaven to the scalp down the sides of the skull. They loosed arrows from bows on the run, or impaled the orcs with wood-hafted war lances. The riders let loose an ululating cry as they killed, but the stags, though they ran mightily, were eerily quiet.

  Behind, Jackal heard a familiar voice lifted in elation. Turning, he found his hoof a javelin’s throw away, relieved of all foes, clustered together amidst the orcs they had killed. It was Polecat who cried out, laughing and pointing out the newcomers to Mead, whom he held close.

  “The Tines! Hells overburdened, it’s the Tines!”

  The elven hoof set upon the thicks without mercy. Riding in troops of ten, they seemed to hit from everywhere at once, never slowing. They were so swift, Jackal could not say how many they numbered. Eighty, at least. But the mongrels who rode with them were unmistakable.

  Warbler and Hoodwink were at the head of one troop, their stout hogs leading the harrow stags. They crashed into the nearest cohesive group of orcs and had at them. Other troops converged, herding and surrounding the soon-to-be outnumbered thicks.

  Jackal ran back to his hoof.

  Oats was still mounted, riding a protective circle around the others on Ugfuck, the only hog to have survived. Fetch was on her feet. The relief in Jackal’s face at seeing her alive must have shown, for she grinned wearily. Polecat had managed to get Mead’s stump bound, but the youngblood was ghastly pale and on the verge of passing out. Dumb Door had pulled Gripper’s body out from amongst the dead thicks and stood beside it, staring blankly. Stumbling into their midst, Jackal’s eyes settled on Hobnail’s still, impaled form. Kneeling down, he put a hand on his fallen brother’s shoulder. Fetch joined him, placing her hand atop his.