A Sea of Skulls (Arts of Dark and Light Book 2)

by Vox Day

  Now the other white rocks had similarly taken more lethal forms and were moving too, slashing repeatedly through the disintegrating ends of the rivulets. Their movements almost seemed choreographed, they were choreographed, she corrected herself, through the orders being given by the prince-general, whose distinctive bird she could see below and in front of her. Flanked by two warhawks on either side, the giant Fflyd-Adenyth soared serenely over the battle raging furiously below.

  Although the huge army’s central advance had slowed down, the southward motion of both its flanks was unimpeded, and particularly on the left, a sizable force began to angle inward, moving at a rapid pace nearly equal to the elven cavalry. Wolfriders, she knew, goblin light cavalry that was normally no match for the powerful horses and magically reinforced armor worn by the knights. But there were hundreds of them, thousands, and they did not need to defeat their bigger, faster, and heavier counterparts, they only needed to entangle them and slow them down long enough for the orc infantry to come to grips with them.

  Three sharp horn blasts echoed through the sky, accompanied by a bright green flash from below. That was their sign to descend and engage. Only four other triads would be making the attack with them; blue referred to the other five that would be remaining on high, and yellow indicated everyone. Red, which she devoutly prayed never to see, meant an immediate retreat to the most recent encampment.

  “See, I told you this would come in handy,” she shouted at Lassarian as she felt about the saddle for her quiver. She’d brought two of them, each holding forty arrows. She hoped they would be enough.

  “You said nothing of the sort!” he protested. He was fumbling awkwardly around the saddle, looking for the roll of darts he’d stowed in one of the pockets. She retrieved them for him and received a pat on her leg by way of thanks. Like most sky riders who weren’t particularly good archers, Lassarian preferred the lethal, iron-tipped darts that were half the length and three times the weight of her arrows. Thrown from above by a descending raider, they could crush even an orc’s heavy skull, or pierce both a wolfrider and his wolf alike.

  The darts also left one hand free to guide the raider’s hawk, which even a confirmed archer like Bereth had to admit was an advantage. Their horizontal range was considerably shorter, but on days like today, that was unlikely to matter. And three could be hurled in the time that it took to nock and loose a single arrow.

  Tywyllas held up a fist, indicating that they should follow him and await his signal to dive. Lassarian and Rhian both pumped their fists, acknowledging it. Bereth tightened her straps, then checked Lassarian’s as well. Her stomach tightened and her palms began sweating, so she consoled herself with the thought that at least this time they wouldn’t be flirting with the ground. Also, there weren’t likely to be any shamans worth worrying about in the middle of the goblin cavalry.

  It didn’t really help. She looked at her hands and saw they were actually shaking. She closed her eyes, closed her hands tightly around her bow, and tried to clear her mind. One deep breath. Then two. Then a third. She felt Mellt’s wings beat one, twice, three times in powerful strokes, then felt him angle to the left, drifting in the wake of two of the preceding triads.

  Down below, the goblin cavalry was arcing in towards Lord Malchderas and his regiment, who had reformed into a wedge again, as if to charge. Only they were not moving, they had come entirely to a halt despite the fact that they had enemies to fore and right flank. The other elven regiments were continuing to pursue the scattered central elements, but they were starting to fall back before the forward elements of the orc left wing that were now beginning to angle in to the center could come anywhere close to them.

  What could the Horse Lord be thinking? Then she realized that he was probably acting on orders from the prince-general and waiting for the High Guard’s aerial attack. She glanced back, and sure enough, saw that the elven infantry had emerged from behind the hill and was marching north, towards what was now the goblin cavalry’s right flank. Despite the apparent chaos, it was evident to her that the battle was proceeding more or less to the prince-general’s plan.

  Unfortunately, the knowledge did not make her feel any less stressed about the incipient dive. She saw the first triad leader lower his arm; his hawk furled its wings and fell, and was promptly followed by the other two hawks in the triad. The second triad waited a ten-count, then did the same.

  “Hold on!” Lassarian shouted unnecessarily. She already had both arms wrapped around his waist. Then Tywyllas brought his arm down and they were falling, falling, falling, towards the battlefield below.

  This time, she managed to keep her eyes open, although she had to squint against the force of the wind. She saw a pair of fiery explosions erupt at the very front of the onrushing goblins as the first triad’s mage hurled two fireballs, and then she was suddenly engulfed in a sea of screams and bloodshed and madness as the peaceful detachment she’d known above abruptly vanished as they hurtled down towards the ground.

  The first triad had blunted the tip of the goblin cavalry’s charge, but hadn’t even slowed it down. The grey river of wolves simply flowed at first around, then over, the dozen or so bodies that lay strewn about the point of impact. Then the second mage struck just as the second triad pulled out of its dive and swept over the goblins about thirty lathaid above their heads, detonating a thunderbolt so powerful that it not only sent a score of wolves and goblins flying through the air, but actually cracked the earth.

  That was enough to disrupt the elongated wedge and divide it into two, as wolves shied away from their howling, snapping brethren whose fur was on fire and goblins that were running every which way like shrieking torches. And yet, they were only slowed, they were far from stopped. The two sides of the shattered wedge continued charging forward, wolves slavering, goblins shouting in fear and rage.

  Bereth braced herself for the moment when Mellt would spread his wings as Tywyllas brought his hawk out of its dive and began rapidly hurling darts, one after another, into the teeming mass of cavalry below. She focused on one big goblin who was standing near the place where the second mage had struck; he was mounted on a wolf nearly twice the size of the others and was clearly attempting to get a group of riders milling about to rejoin the attack.

  She felt Mellt’s wings unfold and leaned back, rolling with the force of gravity pushing her down rather than fighting it, then flexed her stomach muscles to sit up, nocked, pulled and loosed the arrow at the big goblin all in a single motion. She didn’t see if it struck, and then her vision was blinded momentarily by a bright flash as the mage on Rhian’s hawk incinerated the wolfriders almost directly in front of them.

  “Anfon gyd i uffern!” Lassarian swore savagely. Bereth blinked, seeing mostly stars and all but useless, until her sight returned to normal. They had already swept past the goblin cavalry by the time she could see properly, so she turned in the saddle and loosed an arrow that struck a goblin in the back and sent him sprawling, arms flying high, from the back of his wolf.

  “Are you all right?” Lassarian shouted at her as he urged Mellt to regain the altitude for a second sweep. “What the devil was he thinking?”

  She didn’t say anything, as she was lining up a long shot at a goblin below. Missed! The arrow flew just wide. The fourth triad targeted the northern of the two prongs that survived of the original wedge, while the fifth one focused on the southern. But Tywyllas didn’t lead them on the second pass she’d anticipated, as the sound of horns from behind and below were echoed by the one sounded by Lord Malchderas’s standard bearer.

  They could not have had a better vantage point from which to watch the royal elven cavalry smash into the reeling wolfriders. As they soared over the heads of the embattled goblins, the heavily armored elves spitted goblins on lances, slashed heads from shoulders, crushed lupine bodies beneath silver-shod hooves, and left a wide trail of green, gray, and red devastation in their wake.

  As Lord Malchderas’s regiment plowed ov
er and through the near-helpless light cavalry, the elven infantry was rapidly advancing. They were armored less heavily than the knights, but they were armed with halberds that would allow them to impale a wolf or cleave a goblin with equal ease. A few of the wolfriders saw them approaching, but the few officers who realized their danger were unable to redirect their undisciplined riders and Bereth, after asking Lassarian to guide Mellt close enough to bring one goblin officer within range, put an end to his efforts to reform the southern flank by putting an arrow through his throat.

  “Devil of a shot!” Lassarian praised her.

  “Your darts are probably better on days like these,” she admitted. An arrow would kill, but it wouldn’t cause a goblin’s head to explode like a green grapefruit being struck by a dwarven warhammer. “But nothing beats a bow for selective slaughter.”

  “Can’t argue with that,” Lassarian called back as he guided the hawk back into formation. Tywyllas gestured angrily at them, but made a gesture of acceptance after Bereth raised her bow.

  They were almost directly over the infantry now. Their conical white helmets gleamed blindingly in the sun, and rays of light reflected from the polished steel of their large halberd blades. They advanced in grim silence except for the occasional shouts of their captains, tall, haughty, and utterly merciless. They were a sight to stir emotion in any elven breast, and Bereth felt her own swell with pride. Their white surcoats were embroidered with the Sun-and-Mountain of the High King; they were the catrodau brenhinol, the royal regiments of Elebrion and in more than a thousand years, they had never been defeated in battle. Six banners, each denoting a regimental insignia, fluttered brightly in the breeze.

  “Gatrawd, atal!”

  Less than fifty lathaid from the goblin right flank, they came to an abrupt halt. Even above the din of battle, she could hear the dull thudding sound of eight hundred wooden butts striking the earth at precisely the same time.

  “Gatrawd, paratoi eich gwaywffyn!” Eight hundred halberds were lowered, their deadly, gleaming spear-points aimed at the foe. A few scattered shortbows loosed arrows, but to little avail. Bereth and the two other archers immediately responded, and by the time she’d loosed six arrows, any goblin who still had a bow was unwilling to reveal it.

  “Gatrawd, ymlaen llaw!” The regiments advanced in line, two hundred wide and four deep. The surviving goblins in the front were doing their best to wheel about and attack the elven right flank, but they were still in so much disarray from the aerial assaults and the crushing charge of the heavy cavalry that it was obviously a hopeless task. Even reduced as they were, their numbers were simply too great to easily manage and lacking Bereth’s vantage point, very few of them could have had any idea what was happening.

  “Gatrawd, codi tâl!” Twenty lathaid from the teeming mass of the confused enemy, the elves responded to the shout with a thunderous roar and broke into a run. As they crashed into the wolfriders, the first rank speared, the second rank raised their blades and chopped. They moved forward methodically; it was more butchery than combat and Bereth did not see a single elf fall.

  The cacophony was horrendous. Wolves screaming, goblins shrieking, elves shouting, the clash of metal on metal, and the duller, more ominous thudding of metal on flesh and bone all combined to create a terrible music that was simultaneously horrifying and enthralling. But before long, Bereth saw the rear ranks of the wolfriders begin melting away, falling back and turning tail for the north and east. There were no horns, or whistles, or any sign that it was purposeful, but the rout was on and the goblin cavalry fled before the dripping halberds of the infantry.

  Lord Malchderas rode up with his regiment in three neat columns behind him, and as far as Bereth could tell, not a single knight missing. The infantry had suffered five or six wounded, but there were no tall white-surcoated bodies on the ground amidst the hundreds of slaughtered wolves and goblins. There were three dead goblins for every wolf, for like Bereth herself, the infantry were trained to focus on the rider, not the steed. There were dozens of wounded goblins too, who cried out and shrieked in their bestial tongues, but they were ignored. The elves knew, as did the goblins themselves, that there was no need to finish them off. Their cruel masters would devour them soon enough.

  Then a booming sound echoed across the battlefield. First one, then twice, then a third time. It was the war drums of the Great Orc. As the last of the defeated goblins disappeared to the right flank of the massive army, the almost-countless battalions of the orc infantry approached in a line that from the ground must have looked as if it stretched across the horizon. As the drums boomed out, again and again, the orcs advanced behind banners made of bone and topped with skulls.

  Even from above, it was a fearsome sight. The first line went twenty-five deep, each rank comprised of big, crudely armored orcs carrying thick wooden spears tipped with stone that were three times bigger in diameter than an elven spear. Their shields were triangular in shape, made from scrap metal beaten flat over hardwood and painted with clan and tribal runes. Their bulging muscular arms were strong enough to drive one of those stone-tipped spears right through elven mail as if it were made of silk, not steel.

  The second line was only fifteen deep, but what concerned Bereth was what she saw between them. There were at least 20 large ballistae on rollers, each angled at the sky, being pulled by teams of ten bare-chested orcs and the occasional blue-skinned troll. The crews were heavily armored, presumably against arrows, and Bereth squinted in a futile attempt to spot any obvious openings she might be able to target. To either side of each ballista, a pair of orcs dragged sledges containing huge bolts of the kind that had slain Merlian. It was evident that the Great Orc had devoted no little thought for the High Guard.

  She wasn’t the only one concerned about the approaching artillery. She heard four horn blasts and looked up to see a purple burst of light in the direction of the Prince-General’s quintad. Fall back. She felt Mellt begin to rise and arc away from the approaching artillery and saw that the other triads were also retreating.

  She could hear shouts coming from the infantry below and saw they were reforming and turning their backs on the great mass of the approaching orcs. Victorious once more, the catrodau brenhinol began marching south, their long legs setting a pace that would soon leave the orcs far behind. Wolfriders might have caught them, but the enemy light cavalry was shattered and Lord Malchderas’s heavy cavalry still held the blood-soaked field littered with dead and dying goblins.

  They rose about one hundred lathaid then circled around, lazily holding a position where they could still strike if ordered. She rather hoped they would not, though. The orcs were too obviously prepared for them.

  “What is he waiting for?” she asked Lassarian anxiously. The cavalry commander was still calmly holding his ground, his oversized regiment arrayed in perfect order, lances high, behind him. Were it not for their blood-spattered surcoats and the corpses surrounding them on every side, they might have been on review in Elebrion’s central square.

  The drums continued to boom and the orcs marched on. Now she could hear the roar of their angry shouting. The slaughter had enraged them, and the sight of the small body of elven horse responsible only seemed to inflame them further. But just as they were approaching within what Bereth considered to be the effective range of the orc bows, Malchderas’s standard bearer raised and lowered the Sun-and-Mountain banner and the knights kicked their horses into a gallop, riding east across the face of their furious foe in one last mocking gesture of defiance before turning south and abandoning the field to the Great Orc.

  She could feel Lassarian shaking as he laughed. She didn’t see much humor in it, though. For as the big warhawk rose higher into the reddening sky, she looked down and saw that despite all of the casualties inflicted upon it over the course of the afternoon, the massive army below looked every bit as imposing as it had before the battle began. And as it marched inexorably southward over what had been the battlefield, with t
he hooves of warboars and the booted feet of orcs tromping carelessly over the broken bodies of the slain, it looked as if no battle had been fought there at all.

  Bessarias

  The aged elf rose carefully from the chair that he had placed to face the morning sun. A mild jolt of pain shot through the underside of his too-slender thighs, which brought a thin smile to his lips. Not that there was anyone to look at his legs underneath his robes, not anymore, but if there had been, they would have been surprised to be informed that there were still any muscles there to ache.

  The pain was a blessing, though. It was one more reminder that he was, against all his expectations, still alive. He could still feel the magic all around him, feel the force of the life emanating from the grass underneath his bare feet, feel the exuberant spirits of the wind as they danced about his face and ran their invisible fingers through his white, thinning hair. It called to him, the magic of Earth and Sky, tempting him to open himself up to its sweet, siren song and let it fill him, heal him, and rejuvenate him with the mighty power of Nature herself.

  But it was not the prospect of renewed youth and strength that he found hardest to resist. Even the daily pain and indignities that age inflicted upon him now were little more than petty annoyances. After more than 600 years, he was content to do little more than sit in the sun, potter about the little garden he maintained, and if he was feeling particularly energetic, read a section or two of the three scrolls he had permitted to accompany him on his final journey into the unknown.

  He saw movement near the center of a white flower and leaned over to peer more closely to see what sort of insect it was. It was a little black-and-yellow bee, its legs and hairy belly marked with clumps of pale yellow pollen, and it crawled about the carpels as if it was looking for something. What that might be remained a mystery, but after a short time the bee gave up its futile search and rose into the air.