The Spellmonger Series: Book 02 - Warmage

by Terry Mancour

  “So I can only imagine that they are holding Nandine to block us from taking their larger group in the flanks. And it’s the only other strategic target in the area, besides Tudry. I can only think that they’re holding out way up there to lure us north, away from their comrades.” I looked around at the faces of my commanders: Rogo Redshaft, Kaddel the Hellrider, Sir Pendolan of Kayfier, Bold Asgus of the Orphans, Baron Magonas of the Green Hill knights . . . and then there were my warmagi, each wearing a dirty yellow sash with our rune on it. They were all looking at me expectantly, after that preamble, waiting for the next clever trick we were going to pull. I know I would have been.

  “So we have a couple of choices available,” I offered. “We can sit here and wait for the gurvani horde to descend, and hope we can hold out and that Duke Lenguin will have the good sense to come and rescue us.” That produced more than a few wry chuckles. “We can ride in support of Duke Lenguin at Vorone, and sit there with the rest of his men and hope that disease doesn’t wipe us all out before the goblins get there.” I could tell that there was not much support for that proposition, either. “We could march north and try to attack the northern horde, but we’d be outnumbered pretty badly, and not even magic could save us. Not against ten times our number.

  “Or,” I added, with a meaningful look around the tent, “we can ensure this keep is properly supplied and garrisoned before we move . . . and then ride to the relief of Tudry.”

  “Tudry, Min?” asked Terleman, concerned enough to chew his lip. “If Lenguin isn’t defending it, why should we?”

  That brought a lot of chuckles from the men, most of whom were rough-mannered Wilderlands-bred warriors, iron and stone in their bones.

  “Because there are thousands of real people that live there and they were depending on their Duke to protect them. Since he’s abandoning them, we’ll do what we can.”

  “Peasants,” sneered the Baron, good-naturedly. “Shopkeepers and traders. All of the stout lads were recruited already. Thousands have fled toward Castal. The rest will just eat our rations without defending the walls.”

  That made me a little irritated, too. “Baron, with respect, not only are those people your fellow subjects, regardless of the station of their birth, they are also highly valuable to the Dead God.”

  “How so?” he asked, a little sarcastically. “Does he need a chambermaid?”

  “He needs sacrifices,” I said, flatly. “Human sacrifices. He can magically harness the suffering and death throes of his victims to increase his powers. To you Tudry might be thirty thousand extra mouths to feed – to the Dead God, they’re ten thousand brands ready to be thrown into his ovens. And his troops need to be fed, don’t forget. I’m certain that when he’s done with their bodies, they’re turned over to his commissary.”

  “Are you serious?” he asked in a whisper.

  “When I was scouting the western reaches,” Azar, who is nearly the most imposing man I know answered with a growl. “I saw strings of prisoners that stretched a mile long, captives taken at Ganz and Farenrose and Three Hills. They were marched to Castle Glandon, which was a fair place once.

  “Now it is blackened with soot and blood, it’s people slain or taken. The dead are the lucky, even as they simmer in the soup pots of the goblins. The unlucky are those who aren’t found useful by the goblins. They go see the Dead God, in person. Lords, peasants, men, women, adult or child, it didn’t matter: they were stripped naked and tied at the neck and dragged into that cursed valley,” he said, in a low, feral growl. “None came out again.”

  That shook everyone up a little. I seized it as an opportune moment to argue my case. “By depriving him of Tudry, we deprive him of a resource,” I repeated. “And we also save a few of our own people, if that makes any difference to you.”

  “Tudry is in the Barony of Megelin,” Baron Magonas said, shaking his stringy head stiffly. “And we’d have to pass through the northern reaches of Fesdarlen,” he said, as if it meant crossing a river of fire. “We are currently at war with Fesdarlen. That’s why I happen to have so many men at arms at the moment.”

  “Private wars are suspended when the Duke calls his banners,” one of the other knights observed. “We’re all at the Duchy’s service, now, you and Fesdarlen alike.”

  “Exactly,” I nodded. “The Baron of Fesdarlen won’t mind us using his lands, considering his are the next to face invasion if Tudry falls. Now, if we begin to move tomorrow morning just after dawn, we should be able to make our way westward around – what’s the name of this hill?”

  “Madiboll Hill, milord,” one of the local knights answered helpfully. “There is a large temple house there, dedicated to Huin, god of the fields. The priests provide a home for a burrow of River Folk to help with growing herbs, but nothing of value.”

  “River Folk?” I asked, intrigued. They were nonhumans, distant cousins to both the gurvani and the Alka Alon. Almost entirely peaceful and harmless – save when their burrows were threatened – the little brown furry people were waist-high and knew how to grow vegetables like a priest knows prayers. I’d only met a few – they aren’t common where I grew up. But I wanted to meet some, for professional reasons, and get their perspective on the greater battle between the gurvani and . . . everyone else.

  Most humans look on them with disdain and disrespect – they’re a silly, inconsequential people more akin to rodents than peasants, according to most peasants. But the truth was that when it came to non-grain crops – vegetables, legumes, roots, nuts and fruits – the natural techniques or inherent magic of the River Folk surpassed human skills by leaps and bounds. A medium-sized burrow reputedly can produce thrice the produce from a one-acre plot that a human garden does.

  Some of the Riverlands lords took advantage of this by treating them almost as well – or as poorly – as their human peasants. This did nothing for their reputation amongst those peasants, but where the River Folk were allowed to settle, the land prospered. They had some odd ways, and some queer ideas, but no stranger than those of the gurvani or the Alka Alon. And they knew the art of brewing by nature.

  “If we have a chance, I’d like to stop and meet them,” I mentioned, which earned me some strange looks from some of the local knights. “I have my reasons,” I said by way of an explanation. “But if we move north of the hill, we can skip the Great Western Road entirely and approach Tudry from the east.”

  “And if we do?” asked Rogo, astutely. “We put our four thousand lances against ten thousand maces?”

  “And a thousand bows, two thousand infantry, a few thousand merchant-soldiers from Tudry, a few hundred more knights from the Baron of Megelin, and let us not forget seven warmagi,” I reminded him. “That should count for something. “

  “A frontal assault, then, Master Minalan?” asked Kaddel.

  “There will be time for charging, but that’s not the entirety of my plan. If we can coordinate with the militia inside Tudry, we can get them to send a foray into their flank. Between the two forces—”

  “We could get pounded,” Wenek said, discouraged. “Captain, I’m as much of an optimist as anyone,” the portly warmage snorted, sarcastically, “but even I don’t think that would work. Maybe in broad daylight, in open country, with plenty of room for a massed cavalry charge, but . . . well, unless you figured out a mass-annihilation spell you didn’t mention . . .”

  “Well, let’s consider a magical solution, then,” I reasoned. “Four to five thousand humans against ten thousand goblins: how do we use magic to win a battle like that?”

  “We don’t have to annihilate them,” Captain Kaddel said, looking at the map and stroking his chubby chin thoughtfully. “We just need to break them down into smaller, easier-to-fight divisions.”

  “And just how do we do that?” asked Hesia. “Tell half of them that they’re invited to a party that the other half doesn’t get invited to?” she asked. She tries to be funny, and she really shouldn’t. She’s outstanding at fortification
magic, but Hesia can be a little hard to live with.

  “If they’re scattered around the town, then peeling them off in small bits shouldn’t be a problem,” Rogo pointed out. “Ride up close, drop a couple of volleys on them, get them to chase us, and catch them out in the open.”

  “They’d see us coming,” I said, biting my lip and shaking my head. “How exactly, are they situated, Terl?”

  My chief military aide grabbed a couple of battered wooden markers from a basket. “The main force is encamped here, just north of this little village – well, it used to be a little village. Now it’s a smoking ruin, and it’s surrounded by goblins. About six thousand in that band alone. Then there’s another band of a thousand on the eastern side of the Anfal, within sight of the temple of Huin. Then clustered around the town proper are five or six bands of a hundred or so, acting as interceptors, raiders and skirmishers.”

  “See?” I asked. “If we do this right, we can eliminate the first thousand on the eastern side, and then force the rest to cross the Anfal to meet us. And then we can catch them between us and the Tudryan militia.”

  Wenek groaned. “You make it sound so easy!”

  “We faced much worse odds at Boval, remember.”

  “I do,” he nodded, gravely. “I also remember how that turned out.”

  “You’re alive, aren’t you?” I asked, pointedly.

  “Yes, I am,” he sighed, looking at the map. “For a few more days, at least. All right, Min, suppose we march cross-country and take them from the northeast. And we get the burghers to trot their chubby butts out like real men and hit them from the other side. But what if the goblins don’t cross the Anfal?” he asked, tapping the bridge on the map. “What if they wait for us to cross it, and attack us then?”

  “We won’t,” I assured him. “Look, as long as they’re on the eastern side, they aren’t threatening anyone – anyone who still can fight, that is. If they stall their forces there, I’ll count it as a blessing.”

  “And then what? We ride to Tudry and get treated like heroes?”

  “With eight thousand gurvani still outside the gate?” snorted the Baron.

  “No,” I said, taking a deep breath. This was going to be the difficult part. “We evacuate Tudry.”

  I saw a wall of blank faces staring back at me.

  “Evacuate it?” asked the Baron in disbelief. “And leave it for the goblins?”

  “The goblins could care less about the town,” I pointed out. “They want the people. I think that’s what they’re doing, preparing to sack Tudry and drag its folk back to Boval to meet their shiny new divinity. Therefore evacuating Tudry will interfere in his plans. Which makes it an ideal plan in my book.”

  “Where do we evacuate them to?” asked Hesia. “That’s thirty thousand people, Min. You can’t stick them all in this castle. Or even the other big castles. There’s just no room!”

  “Then we escort them to Vorone, to go see the Duke who failed to defend them, and have them demand that he protect them and feed them. And eventually to Castal, I think. But at least further east, away from the hordes.”

  “Duke Lenguin isn’t going to like that,” the Baron pointed out, frowning.

  “I didn’t ask him to,” I shot back. “He abandoned those people – I’m just picking them back up. And he’ll be thanking me next year, when he looks around and realizes that half of his realm is under the sway of the Dead God. Thirty thousand extra subjects might seem more beneficial then.”

  “Be careful lest he take offense, Spellmonger,” the Baron said, quietly. “I know the man, though not well. He is a well-spoken gentleman, but rash.”

  “I’ll take that chance,” I said, shaking my head. “Tell me, Baron, has this barony here, to the east, contributed any men to the banner call?”

  “The Pearwoods?” he asked, surprised, then snorted. “Hardly. Those people are hill clans,” he explained, “only a barony by a technicality. Why, they’re one step away from a tribe! Their lord is Ozzig the Black, but his rule extends as far as the reach of his axe. He swore fealty to Lenguin, true enough, but his own people treat him as a king in ceremonial matters and just another lord in practical terms. But they won’t march without his say. He heard the banner call, but his people detest goblins and will not willingly go that far away from their homes to fight to defend Vorone – lowlanders.”

  “Doesn’t he fear reprisal from his overlord?” asked Terleman, surprised.

  Baron Magonas shook his head ruefully. “His Grace’s grandfather once sent an expedition into those hills, thinking to conquer the hillmen of the Wilderlands like another rebellious Riverlands fief. Three thousand knights and sergeants poured into the Pearwoods that spring. Less than five-hundred returned that autumn.”

  “Then they sound doughty enough,” I pointed out.

  He nodded, emphatically. “They can be ruthless. The men of the Pearwoods are expert shots with the longbow, and fearsome fighters on foot. They excel at sniping and hit-and-run raiding – just ask their neighbors. But put them on horses and they might as well be on stilts. Put both of their feet on the ground with the hills at their back and they can fight as well as any man. They use short swords and long, two-handed axes.” He sounded as if he’d been on the other side of one of those axes.

  “So why didn’t this Ozzig the Black send any men to Vorone?”

  “They’re hill clans,” Magonas repeated. “They consider the affairs of lowlanders as unimportant as the politics of geese. They can’t fight from a garrison, it makes them absolutely miserable and they drink and fight too much. They can talk for days about their honor and the grand feats of their ancestors, but unless their lands are threatened or there’s gold in it, they won’t serve a lowland lord.”

  “Pity,” I sighed. “I was hoping we could convince them to join us. A few hundred of them—”

  “Hundreds, my lord?” asked the thin knight who’d spoken earlier. “Nay, they number in the thousands. The hill men take many wives, and spawn brats like rabbits. They live on potatoes, beans, whiskey and rocks. Most yeomen have three or four wives and a dozen children in their halls.”

  “Really?” I asked, being unfamiliar with the culture. “Isn’t that against the custom of both Imperials and Narasi?”

  “They follow Pramm the Blessed, one of the gods of the Valley People, most of them,” the knight explained, a note of amusement in his voice.

  That did explain a lot about the notoriously rustic hill clans. Being the patron of distillation, Pramm was a notoriously raunchy divinity known for periodic wild orgies and drunken rites in his honor. It was a religion despised by the civilized Riverlands folk in the south as a twisted cult, and it was tolerated by the rugged Wilderlands lords as the butt of a thousand dirty jokes.

  But the hill clans welcomed the God of the Still every full moon, the knight explained, and their riotous culture thrived accordingly. They made liquor out of everything they could find, but particularly brandy from the pears their hills were named for.

  Parentage was such an open question that a new son belonged to the clan of his mother until he married, only acknowledged by his father (if known) if he won some token of renown. An interesting people, the hill clans of the Pearwoods.

  “They’re no good at marching, either,” Wenek agreed. “I should know. I was one. Before I came into my Talent, I was a lad in Clan Shorell. My chief sold me to a wizard in Flendon Town in the Riverlands when he found I could witch the winds.”

  “You know these people, then?” I asked, fascinated. Wenek, while sarcastic, had never struck me as backwards in the slightest.

  “Some,” he admitted. “I’ve seen them fight, up close. Clansmen are deadly with an axe or bow in their hands and the hills at their backs. You march them two days, three days away, and they become a bunch of whining peasants ready to desert the first moment they can,” he said, disgustedly.

  “Not all of them,” Baron Magonas said, shaking his head. “There are plenty of honorable wa
rriors, great heroes even, from the Pearwoods. But they do make shyte for soldiers.”

  “Then let’s not worry with them,” I dismissed, with a sigh. Another couple of thousand men would have been nice. “Because we’d have to march them west, against the goblins and away from their precious hills.

  “But that leaves plenty of men for our present task. I say we ride to relieve Tudry, and we move soon.”

  Gods help me, I tried to sound decisive and commanding. But I didn’t see the determined looks I’d expected. That bothered me, at the time.

  * * *

  Min!

  Pentandra screamed into my mind, loudly and suddenly. I was stumbling back to my personal tent – as opposed to my headquarters tent – and her instant summons was so startling I emitted a yelp that was not fitting for a valiant leader of men.

  WHAT? I screamed back. Are you in danger?

  No, no, no, she insisted, sounding irritated. Just excited!

  Obviously, I thought back, continuing on my way. What’s got you so excited? New crop of lusty young farmhands come in?

  No! But kind of you to ask. No, the Order met tonight. I automatically stopped and looked around, to see if someone could overhear my telepathic conversation, which was just silly. A testament to how tired I was. Hamlan was peacefully snoring, his head on my baggage. Isily had left the night before with Mavone, so I was alone.

  So? Did they successfully plan the spring picnic?

  They agreed – in principal – to back you and your proposal.

  I’m hardly shocked, considering how much it will benefit them. And considering I’m the one taking all the risks. Did you tell them it didn’t really matter what they did, that I was already in the field?

  No, I’m more diplomatic than you. But they did allow me to address them as your lieutenant. Assistant. Aide. Whatever.