“Any ideas?” I asked, thinking of nothing that could remove the obstacles or stop the charge – which was already starting.
“Hope they see it?” he suggested, as the Nirodi archers let fly their second volley.
“I don’t think that’s going to work. Kaddel can be pretty stubborn. And note he’s put the Megelini in the van, at the point of the spear, ahead of the Hellriders. He’s using the locals to go first, soak up any damage before his men get there.” Stubborn, but not stupid.
“What if we just pulled the logs up? Simple telekinesis?”
“We could try – but there’s at least ten logs. How many do you think you could hold aloft at one time? Maybe in a year, when we’ve learned how to use the stones better, but I could manage one, maybe two. I’d burn them, somehow, but they’re still green.”
“Shit, Min,” Azar swore, as the Nirodi began to re-mount and the charged began in earnest. “They’re starting to cast something from the horde. We’re out of time.”
He was right. Maybe there was something I could have done, some spell I hadn’t thought of, but right then and there I couldn’t. Blame it on a lack of sleep, adrenaline, my incompetence, or anything else, but I couldn’t think of a damn thing to do about that barrier. All we could do was watch in fascination as the banner-bearer holding the standard of Megelin proudly in the first rank leaped the bank of bodies, his steed stumbled on a log, and his horse went down, impaled on a spear. More followed, and as the front ranks slowed to clear the debris, the rear ranks plowed into them.
Compared to this morning’s almost elegant charge, this was like a drunken folk dance.
The Megelini did their best to push through, but they lost a lot of horses doing it, and those who had fallen were quickly rushed by goblins. Kavial’s Company and the Hellriders, on the other hand, used the hole opened by the Megelini sacrifice and crashed into the crude shield-wall, executing a decent short-range charge that plowed through the front ranks and messed up all that lovely organization the gurvani just discovered.
But there was more – just as I was starting to breathe a little easier, the little bastards brought magic back into play.
There aren’t a whole lot of things you can do to a mounted knight on a barded warhorse to stop him or even slow him down, much less harm him on his majestic walking castle. The wood of his shield, the steel of his armor and a stout helm keep him safe from all but a few dangers: being pulled off his mount by hooks, stumbling, losing his horse, a stray lucky arrow . . . and now those sling-stone things the gurvani had used against us in the ambush. An armored knight can withstand rain, wind, cold, and even a fair amount of heat, if he drinks enough water.
But he’s essentially encased in a suit of metal, and so is his horse. The goblins had figured that out, and while their shamans were pretty dim about a lot of sophisticated magic, they were quite conversant with basic elemental magic. For example, if you can get a current of wind to speed up enough by pouring power into it, and had it run across another stream of air going in another direction in just the right way, and an imbalance occurs as the negative and positive properties of the air become estranged and separate.
You can see the same basic effect when you rub a glass rod through a dry piece of fur (I know, why would one possibly want to do such a thing?): the rod assumes the negative aspects of the fur, and the hairs will raise as if unbidden to meet it in proximity, because of the Law of Attraction Of Oppositional Forces. First year magic academy stuff.
But if you do it on a large enough scale – say, with a couple of shamans using irionite to power the spell – the effect is much, much grander.
The goblins had brought down lighting against our steel-clad defenders.
Azar and I were both expecting . . . something, I suppose. You could feel the seething of power on the field, emanating from the horde, but we were so distracted by the rapidly unfolding events that we had no time to determine what they were doing and, perhaps, prepare a counterspell. So I guess we shouldn’t have been surprised that it happened, but we were. While we watched the charge crash into the black furry line, power erupted from the back of the goblin army, lashing out against the knights like an angry storm.
The angry lance of energy forked out in a chaotic dance, leaping from warrior to warrior, carried by the conductivity of their armor. Horses screamed and men froze in mid-swing. Some limbs exploded instantly, some charred, iron-clad corpses tumbled to the ground, and some men just fell dead from the saddle. Plenty of others were wounded by the bolt of energy, but still able to fight on.
It was an impressive piece of magic, no doubt about it. And it was something we should have anticipated and been able to counter. I cursed myself for an idiot while we watched hundreds of men and horses die under the terrible blue-white lightning. We were too far away to hear the noise – and the thunderclap that accompanied it drowned out a lot of it – but we saw the devastating effect the spell had on our troops. And the loud thunderclap terrorized the horses with its shock wave.
“Ishi protect us!” Azar said in horror. That was impressive, too – Azar rarely appealed to the divine, unless there was some obscene angle to the oath. But his eyes were sincere in his prayer. “Damn them! Who taught the little peckers about electricity?”
“The sky?” I pointed out the obvious. “Forget that – the damage is done. If they try it again they’ll hit as many of their people as ours.” That was true – and it was unlikely they could get a second discharge ready that quickly, too. It takes a little time to accumulate that much negative potential. There were other spells being used, but magesight told me that the big one they had used to bring the lightning was expended.
“I don’t think that matters to them,” he said, pointing out the obvious. I couldn’t disagree – the goblin commander had been using up little black furry lives like he had an endless supply. The fact that he might not be wrong disturbed me on several levels.
“That’s going to keep the horses in a panic for a while, probably too long for them to regroup before they get stomped on. We’re going to need infantry for this,” I sighed. “You do what you can to mess up the goblins’ day, I’m going to call Astyral to bring his forces forward.” Azar nodded, and turned his attention to back to the battle, words forming on his lips as he began another spell.
Astyral! I shouted through the link. The cavalry is faltering and needs support! Tell the militia commander that this is his hour to shine!
Ishi’s holy tits, Min! What the hell was that noise?
Lightning, I explained. We took heavy casualties, too. Someone realized that we walk around in battle dressed in a highly conductive material.
Shit! Are you doing something about that? These guys aren’t going to be thrilled about walking into a wall of sorcery!
Azar’s on it, I promised. I’ll have the horse archers form up on your flank for support when you get to the bottom of the hill, but don’t take too long or they’ll miss all the fun.
Kaddel’s southern flank had borne the brunt of the electrical assault, and his forces were wheeling around toward the northern end of the line, away from us and the spell. Azar was sending spell after spell into the horde, although at this range it was hard to tell just what effect it was having.
It seemed to take forever for the infantry to arrive. They had to cross almost a half-mile of lightly broken terrain to get here, of course, so I should have been more understanding, but I was watching the Hellriders and Kaviel’s Company and what was left of the Megelini start taking a lot more casualties as the goblins bore down on them at close range. That’s the thing about cavalry – they’re unstoppable when moving, but once they get bogged down, they become more and more vulnerable.
And then the goblin commander demonstrated even more intelligence, which I found disappointing. While his front lines were battling the suddenly-disorganized cavalry and keeping them from pushing through, the goblin commander ordered a couple of thousand from his reserves to break away past t
he southern flank and run toward the Great Western Road. That’s where the column of civilian refugees was. I guess it was just too juicy a target to ignore.
“Oh, crap!” I moaned. There wasn’t much I could do about it, not from here. The break-out group was running along the creek bed, a quarter of a mile below, and the Nirodi were already beginning to reposition themselves to support the infantry in the opposite direction. The city militia had left a small rearguard to protect their way back behind its walls, but apart from a few squads of light cavalry, they didn’t have a force that could get there in time with enough strength to protect them.
I could try to bring the Nirodi archers to bear, but I could see that we still wouldn’t be able to do more than attack their rear after they’d achieved the road and started slaughtering people. Five hundred against more than two thousand just wasn’t going to be effective anyway, I knew, even from the rear. But I had to do something. Otherwise they’d go after the refugees unopposed. Sure, it split what was left of the horde effectively in half – but if those two thousand actually hit the defenseless refugees, then this whole battle would be for naught.
Azar looked from the goblin force back over his shoulder, where the first lines of the infantry and militia were starting to appear near the creek. He’d reached the same conclusion as I had: despite all of our efforts, we could slay every goblin and still lose the engagement, if their tactic succeeded. “We aren’t going to be in time,” he said, resigned. “The goblins are running like the Dead God was after them. Nothing to do about it now.”
I felt my heart sink as the black column raced along the meadows below us. A few Nirodi were taking long bowshots at them, but there wasn’t much else we could do from our position. I could just imagine the chaos now: a whole line of gurvani descending on the column of refugees, slashing, beating, killing, and capturing. The guards and homemade weapons the peasants and townspeople had wouldn’t be worth a damn.
“Well, maybe some of them will get through,” I said, a blind hope in my despair. I was just about to talk Rogo into a full on suicidal charge into their rear, a charge the Nirodi weren’t equipped to make, when suddenly one of my commanders used his head and took some initiative. We heard horns again signaling a cavalry charge – only not from the site of the battle, where the Hellriders and the Kaviel’s Company were still grinding away. The triumphant sound of the horns was coming from the east, from the temple, and that’s when I realized what was happening.
Sir Kavial had decided to commit the reserves – at the perfect place and time.
It was my third cavalry charge of the day, so you’d think I’d be a little jaded by now. But the first two were execute against a foe who knew they were coming and were prepared for it. The third had Sir Kaviel’s fifteen hundred troopers riding down the distant slope of the hill toward the black river of hatred below. It was like a waterfall of horseflesh and steel, and once again the rumble shook the ground around us and filled our ears.
“Yes!” Azar shouted, pumping his fist in the air. “Gods be praised, yes! The old sot did something right, for all of his bluster!” I found myself agreeing with him – I had figured Kavial would send his men to support the other cavalry, since cavalry officers tend to see the battlefield in terms of horses and it was clear that the lightning strike had disrupted the main cavalry force. I mean, it was natural to fight in support of the main battle, especially if it’s happening down the hill right in front of you.
But Kavial had kept his eye on the situation as a whole, and waited until spending his troops would do the most good. Had he failed, then hundreds, thousands of Alshari refugees would have paid the price.
It was just a bonus that I got to watch my third cavalry charge of the day.
Kaviel’s Company thundered over and down the gentle slope of the Temple hill, losing only a bit of their formation along the way down. Their sudden appearance made the break-out group of goblins falter, and then redouble their efforts to reach the road. To no avail. Horses run fast when they’re pointed downhill, and Kaviel’s men crashed into and through them like a wave over a sand castle. They were still outnumbered – it was just five hundred cavalry – but with that momentum behind them each horse who made it to the bottom was able to take out several goblins in the initial charge. Far more devastating than what the Nirodi could have accomplished against a foe on the move.
“Do you think that will be enough?” Azar asked, with a keen professional interest.
“They’ll have a hard time recovering from that charge,” I nodded, admirably, as I watched the goblin line bulge and then shatter under the onslaught of knights in shining armor. “He probably has enough outriders to chase down stragglers. If Kavial can eliminate two-thirds of their numbers, then they’re a nuisance, not a real danger.”
“Unless they have shamans,” he reminded me.
“Yes,” I admitted with a sigh, “unless they have shamans. Why don’t you go make sure they don’t? Or anybody else? With you defending the line, I’ll feel a lot better about taking on what’s left of the horde with Astyral. Take twenty archers with you,” I suggested.
Azar nodded and shot me a wolfish grin as he drew his greatsword from over his shoulder and kicked his mount. “Maybe we can get there while there are still some left!” he said, eagerly, and trotted his great sable steed out to speak to Rogo about an escort.
I shook my head. There went a man who enjoyed his work.
* * *
I’d be lying if I said the rest of the battle went off without a hitch. Indeed, there were several hitches, as I linked up with Astyral and Redshaft’s archers supported the militia as they stomped down the hill toward an incredibly weakened horde to mop up.
In any case, the goblins who fought against us measured in the hundreds, not the thousands, even after the disastrous second cavalry charge, and they still had plenty of fight left.
But so did we. Those cavalry unaffected by lightning, and whose horses didn’t bolt in terror, were able to slaughter goblins with the same gay abandon as the first charge. And those knights whose horses did bolt away uncontrollably from the direction of the lightning often ended up doing more damage to the enemy than that. A terrified, out-of-control warhorse moving at full speed isn’t something you want to be in front of. Especially when you’re a seventy pound, four-foot tall goblin.
But there was plenty of stiff resistance still there, and at least a couple of living shamans who weren’t afraid to go out in style. A second lightning bolt, far weaker than the first, slew over a dozen Orphans in the front line moments before it crashed against the goblins. Magical fire sprang up a few times, helped by some incendiary pouches they carried. Of course, that often did more damage to the furred gurvani than it did to the mail-clad men. But at that point the survivors were desperate and were acting accordingly.
The Nirodi archers caught up to the rear of the infantry just minutes before they got within bowshot, and it took them only moments to dismount and form themselves up for volleying. I dismounted from Traveler and handed the reigns over to Hamlan, who seemed perfectly happy moving my mount off to a safe distance behind the lines, instead of charging bravely into them. A mark of a good manservant.
I found Astyral about three ranks back, marching behind the heaviest-armored and best defended part of the Orphan’s Band while he hung spells and got himself ready for the coming battle. He had donned a tastefully silvered breastplate with matching shoulder pauldrons for the occasion, a conical metal helmet with cheek and noseguards, and dark blue waxed leather covering his extremities. He bore a weapons harness similar to mine, crisscrossed over the breast, with daggers, pouches, and sleeves for wants and other surprises built into it. His mageblade remained at his hip while he prepared his magical arsenal, and I fell into step next to him and began my own.
“Pretty day for a battle,” he muttered, when we were both able to talk again. We were about three dozen yards away from the horde at that point, and huge volleys of arrows were flyin
g overhead to land amongst the writhing, snarling black mass ahead. The knights had mostly withdrawn to try to regroup back up the hill, but there were still several very active knots of combat. Not all of them escaped getting peppered by the archers, either.
I glanced at the sky. “Looks like a front is headed in from the west,” I remarked, nodding off to the dark clouds in the distance.
Astyral looked at me, strangely. Then something occurred to him. “That’s right, this is the first time you’ve seen it.”
“Seen what?” I asked, suddenly conscious that we were having a casual discussion mere moments away from mayhem.
“That’s the Shadow. ‘The Umbra,’ Taren named it – he ranged there recently with Rustallo. That’s the visible sphere of the Dead God’s influence. Within that sphere, his power is nearly absolute. Outside of that sphere . . . it’s still pretty godsdamned impressive,” he said, shaking his head. “If we survive today, we should go take a walk and see it up close.”
“You said ‘if’ we survive today,” I observed. “That doesn’t speak to an awful lot of confidence in your leadership.”
“I’m confident as hell in my leadership,” he objected. “It’s the whims of the bloody gods I’m not confident in. All it takes is one stray arrow, one lucky goblin, one spell that slips through my defenses . . .”
“I see what you mean,” I nodded, reluctantly.
“But you’re right about the weather,” he continued, as we got close enough to the front to start making out individual goblins. “It’s a side-effect of the thing, apparently, is it attracts clouds and rain. You can see the clouds moving across the face of it, sometimes, in an endless spiral clockwise around the perimeter. The whole region around it – Taren calls it ‘the Penumbra’ – is dark, gloomy, and infested with goblins. Sun barely shines at all. But it’s the village commons on festival day compared to what the Umbra is like, from what the refugees have said.”
“Sounds like it’s worth the trip. Provided the inns are well-vouched for and the food is well prepared.”
The Spellmonger Series: Book 02 - Warmage Page 29
