When they made it back to the road where the infantry was still moving along their friends were nowhere in sight. The pair rode their beasts up the side of the road at a trot, passing foot soldiers who looked up at them with expressions of anger and envy on their faces. Marcus felt sorry for the men who must trudge through the heat of the day to get to where they would finally be safe. But they would keep going as long as they could, since no one wanted to be caught by this enemy. In that lay death and worse than death.
They finally caught up to the other mages, one of three groups riding along the route, separated so they wouldn’t all be killed if one part of the column was hit with an overwhelming attack by the nomad cavalry. The commanders didn’t think that was going to happen, but they lived by the philosophy of better safe than sorry. And Marcus, as the new leader of the wizards, had to agree.
The sun was going down over the hills to the west by the time the mages rode into the night camp. The foot soldiers behind them would still be coming in for the next three or four hours, walking along in the dark. Those men would still get a hot meal, and they would not have to pull guard duty during the night. But they would also walk for hours in the dark, not sure that the space outside of their sight was safe, and not hiding terrors that could strike at any moment.
Sentries surrounded the camp, pikemen marching along the hilltops or set up in company strength at the entry points. Marcus could see torches off in the distance, and a closer look revealed horsemen riding an outer circuit. The camp itself was spread out among several glens, reaching over the surrounding hills into the next hollow. Hundreds of fires burned, these not the banked flames of the night before. Scores of troops sat around each fire, eating from their mess kits while bottles of wine passed around the circle.
“Where do we get food?” asked Marcus of one of the sentries who had the look of a sergeant.
“Lieutenant,” shouted the NCO, waving his hands in the air. “Another group of the wizards are here.”
By the tone of the man it was clear that he didn’t approve of the magic that the king had brought into the kingdom. Many people still saw any non-divine magic as evil. I wonder how they feel about necromancy, thought Marcus as he waited for the officer to come up. That magic was also of divine origin, or maybe more like infernal. The point was, it came from deities, even if those gods were evil bastards. While their magic seemed unnatural to most of those with religion beliefs.
Marcus laughed at that notion. The magic he used was the most natural thing in the world, since it used the energy of that natural world. It was only because the human frailties of the priests, their own need to be at the top of the power structure, that wizardry was banned in most of the kingdoms of the west. Now that magic was needed again, and Marcus and his fellows were the only practitioners of the art in the Western world. To Marcus’ way of thinking, this was a tragedy, since wizards could do so much good in the world. Warfare was not their only purview, and the wonders they could do with non-combat spells were something these people needed to see to believe.
“We have a campsite already set up for you and your people, young Master,” said the officer, calling another trooper over. “Argyle here will show you to the camp. Most of your fellows are already there.”
“And food?”
“Food will be brought to you shortly.”
Marcus nodded his thanks, got down from his mount, then walked the horse behind the foot soldier, this one a musketeer walking along with his weapon slung over his shoulder. The twenty-one mages with him followed suit, forming a line that weaved through the campsite.
Soldiers looked up from their fires as the wizards walked by. Some were just too tired to even react. Others stared at them with fear or anger, many more with hope that maybe the newly discovered magic could save their lives, and more importantly, their souls.
The wizards sitting around the fire were talking and eating, those who weren’t asleep where they sat. Those still awake looked up as the late arriving party came into the firelight. Soldiers came forward to take the horses from those holding their reins, moving the beasts to one of the paddocks that had been set up for the livestock. There they would be brushed down, fed and watered, and allowed to rest.
“Wake those laggards,” said Marcus as he walked into the circle. “We have work to do, and spells to learn.”
“But, Master. They’re exhausted,” said Glenn, the most advanced of the new mages, rising from his seat on a log.
“They can sleep after we have gone over the illusion spells. And tomorrow I expect everyone to practice the words and gestures while they ride, and concentrate on drawing in the energy we will need.”
Marcus moved to a log that still had some space and sat down, motioning for Hemetre to join him. “The sergeant said there would be food along shortly.” He looked over at Hes-ra, now the youngest of the original group, with the death of Ruhak now the baby of the original party. “Send someone to the field kitchen and see if you can get some food sent to us. I’m too hungry to wait.”
Marcus reached into the bag he had carried through the day, pulling a large book from within, Aepep’s grimoire. The book opened itself to the page he wanted, the first of the illusion spells. The magic built upon itself, and the wizard would have to know the first spells in order to cast those later ones that required some of the chants and gestures of the earlier.
“We will start with a simple illusion, the blurring of on object to make it more difficult to target,” said Marcus, his finger running down the page. “Now, repeat after me.”
* * *
There was no moon in the sky this night, both of them on the day side of the planet. The nearer, which whipped around the world in a couple of hours, would appear again, while the farther, outside the orbit of both the planet and the Demon World it was in sympathetic movement with, and that remained unseen from this hemisphere, would not appear again for several days.
The five large bats winged along through the air, flying well above the camp, looking for a target that was worthy of their attention. There were several forms of undead. Liches were one of the more powerful variety, but they were rare. Zombies were the weakest, though they could be very common. Wights, wraiths, several other varieties, some powerful in a limited way, confined to the area of their deaths.
And then there were vampires, not quite as powerful as the lich, but much more common, able to spread their contagion and reproduce their kind like as plague. In some regions of the world their blight had wiped out all human life, finally leading to the extinction of most of the larger animals. New vampires were weak, and those in the areas of blight were stuck there, forever, while their masters moved on to more fertile feeding grounds.
The five bats came down in the shadows of an area of camp in a dead spot, outside the light of a number of fires. With a blurring of shadows the bats changed, grew, until five humans stood looking out over the camp. The eyes of the masters glowed red in the dark, their night vision picking up every detail. One, the largest male, pointed at one of the few tents in the camp, and the rest nodded. They left the shadows, though the darkness seemed to come with them, wrapping a protective cloak around the creatures.
The guards outside the entrance to the tent couldn’t see anything but the shadows moving toward them. They were smart enough to realize there was something wrong with the image of darkness moving along, blocking out firelight. One of the guards opened his mouth to shout out a warning while the other drew his sword from its sheath and prepared to battle whatever it was that was hidden by the shadows.
The shadows dissipated as the beings within moved as blurs. One grabbed the guard in the process of shouting the warning by the throat, lifting the man into the air and snapping his neck with the flick of a wrist. The other guard thrust with his sword into the body of the vampire coming for him. The blade passed into the body of the creature with the feel of slicing through cobwebs. The creature pulled the guard close and pushed his head to the side, biting d
own hard with sharpened incisors into the carotid artery, ripping back, then drinking the spurt of hot liquid that came out.
“We don’t have time to feed,” said the leader in a hiss.
The chastised vampire dropped the body she had been feeding on and looked hungrily at the dying man who would have fed her for the night.
“We will feed later. Now we have a mission to perform.”
The leader reached for the flap of the tent, listening for a second to make sure the inhabitant was still asleep. He wanted to get this mission over with. While the soldiers couldn’t hurt him or his kind, there were beings in the camp that could. If it was up to him he would not have come here, but the lich necromancer had given him his orders, and he and his coven were compelled to obey that being’s magic compulsion.
The master smiled as he looked into the tent, then stepped in. He had moved like a shadow, silently, but something must have warned the man within, because the prey came to his feet and pulled his sword from the sheath hanging from a tent pole.
“That will not harm me, mortal,” said the master in a whisper that carried to the ears of the prey. He moved forward, his eyes boring into those of the king. This was not one to simply kill. No, the necromancer wanted this one turned, to become one of the undead army.
The king came at him with a roar, the sound dying out in the field of silence another of the vampires had erected. The sword came down, slicing through the shoulder of the vampire. Too easily, and the king stumbled as the blade met little resistance and hit the ground. Then the vampire was upon him, grabbing the king by the front of his nightshirt and pulling him close. The creature opened his mouth and bared the neck of the monarch, preparing him for the first stage of the turning.
* * *
Tengri sat on anther log, this one at a campfire thirty yards from the tent of the king. Freya say beside him, drinking from a large mug of ale, the drink of her people. The demigod had already put down enough of the strong drink to have felled a squad of soldiers, with no affect. Tengri glanced at the woman who was of greater than human beauty, but also a warrior in his own class.
“So, what do we do the next time we fight?” asked the third being sitting around the fire.
Tengri looked over at the large male, actually larger than himself. The man radiated the same energy of the divine as himself and the Norse goddess. His armor, though of a different style than either of theirs, was of the same fine quality and carried the same touch of the divine as his own. He was the only other walking god still with them, Nefirtat having disappeared during the last battle. No one knew what had become of her. Whether she had died as a mortal, or ascended to some new realm. Tengri suspected that she was dead, her now mortal body lying on the ground to rot like any other. It was doubtful that she would rise as an undead zombie, since her soul was not the same as that of the mortals of this world.
“We will crush the necromancers,” said Tengri, smiling at the other man.
“And how do we go about doing that?” asked the other demigod, the Earth walking form of the Slavic God Perun, he of thunder and lightning. There was actually a hint of thunder in his voice, a flash of electricity in his eyes. He might have lost too many worshippers to have remained in heaven, but he still retained enough power to actually manifest as a god of storms, in a minor way.
“That is the problem,” said the Turkish sky god, himself no stranger to thunder and lightning. “And something we need to work out before the army goes back into battle. We…”
All three of the demigods looked up at the same time, their gazes moving until they were all looking at the tent of the king. All had heard the same thing, a whisper that threatened death to the monarch. All had felt the taint of unnatural evil, the chill cold of purveyors of death and undeath.
“The king,” yelled Tengri, jumping up and pulling his sword from its sheath.
Freya and Perun flew to their feet and drew their own weapons, then followed the Turkish demigod as he ran toward the pavilion. His eyes widened as he saw the forms of the guards lying on the ground in attitudes of death. And the four forms that seemed to materialize from the shadows as the demigods came into their sphere.
“Kill them,” hissed one of the females, and the two males and the other woman came forward in blurs of motion, hands turned to sharp taloned claws, sharp incisors thrusting from their cruel mouths.
Tengri matched their speed as he rushed ahead, his sword slashing in. The vampire’s face registered shock as the blade crunched into its flesh. This was no normal sword. It had a touch of the divine, brought forth from the heaven it came from. And it was anathema to creatures such as the one it now struck. The vampire let out a loud hiss of agony, then looked down at the sword that had penetrated his shoulder down to his chest. His eyes rolled up in his face and the creature began to slump to the ground. Before it slid off the sword it had started to change, going from a healthy looking creature of indeterminant age, through the aging process, until the body that hit the ground was that of an ancient mummy.
Freya struck another of the vampires, her lighter blade separating head from body. This male must have been an even more ancient vampire. The head hit the ground, went through the same process of rapid decomposition, but continued past the mummy stage to fly into dust, joining the body that had undergone a similar but lesser destruction.
The remaining vampires stepped back, raised their arms in the air, and transformed into great bats. With a flap of their wings they flew into the sky, beyond the reach of the demigods. Or so they had thought, until Perun raised a hand in the air and sent a brilliant bolt of lightning into the body of one of the bats. The sound of sizzling flesh preceded the smell of burning meat, and the targeted bat fell limply to the ground. It was badly hurt, but not dead yet. Freya’s sword took care of that little problem, and the body of the bat went through the same decomposition process as the human versions of the vampires.
Tengri was through the flap of the tent in an instant, stopping as he saw the master vampire holding the king in his grasp, clawed member held around the throat of the monarch.
“Another move and he dies, walking god,” said the master in a low voice.
“Why didn’t you kill him before I entered the tent?” asked Tengri, his eyes locked on those of the vampire. He could feel the hypnotic pull of those eyes, though they had little effect on him. Freya came through the opening and stood by his side, her own sword ready.
[He wanted to turn the king,] came the voice of Freya in his head. [To make him a servant they could control.]
[And he hadn’t had a chance to do so, yet,] replied Tengri. [We cannot allow him to kill the king. Without Rory, this army will fall apart.]
“I know what you are thinking, walking gods,” said the vampire. “I will kill the king before you can get to me.”
[Maybe we can,] sent Perun, slowly moving into the tent. [Be ready.]
[Be careful,] sent Tengri, figuring out what the other demigod was about to do. [We can’t harm the king.]
Perun nodded, then waved a hand, sending out a blast of thunder that washed over everyone in the tent.
The thunderous sound almost dropped Tengri and Freya to their knees, hitting their sensitive hearing with waves of pain. It hit the undead creature in the same way, and it was not as robust as the demigods. Its hands flew to it ears, Rory dropped out of its grasp, and Freya sped forward to scoop the monarch out of the air before he could collapse to the ground.
Tengri moved as well, blurring into motion, his hands grasping the undead monster and pushing it away from the king. The vampire recovered quickly and struck the demigod in the throat with a clawed hand, ripping into the flesh with a wound that would have felled a human.
Tengri roared his pain and anger, then grabbed the head of the vampire in his left hand, the right capturing the claw of the creature before he could strike again. The vampire was strong, with the strength of ten men. Tengri was stronger when he allowed his divine energy to flow through
him. With a wretch of both arms he turned the neck of the creature until he felt the snap of bone. The vampire went limp, its flesh beginning to dissolve, and Tengri dropped the disgusting thing to the ground where it could complete its dissolution to dust.
“You’re hurt,” said Perun, putting a hand on Tengri’s wound.
“It will heal,” replied Tengri, already feeling the divine energy flowing into the affected area, not only healing the flesh, but purging him of the negative energy carried by the undead. “How is the king?”
“He will live,” said Freya, laying the monarch onto his sleeping mat and checking him with soft hands. “It may take him a bit of time to recover completely, but he will live.”
The sounds of men coming to the tent grew in volume, and guards came through the flap, weapons in hand, lowering them when they saw that the demigods were with the king.
“Your Majesty,” yelled one of the guard sergeants. He raised and pointed his sword at Tengri. “What have you done to him?”
“He was attacked by vampires,” replied Tengri. “But we got to him in time.”
“Vampires?” grunted the disbelieving sergeant. “What in the hells are you talking about?”
“You need to see this, Sergeant McGillicuddy,” yelled one of the soldiers outside the tent.
“Watch them,” said the sergeant to the two men with him.
The two men stared at the sergeant, then at the demigods, eyes wide. They knew about this trio, and had to be wondering how they would stop them from doing anything they wanted to do.
Tengri followed the sergeant out of the tent, the men inside not making a move to stop him.
“Something ripped out this man’s throat, Sergeant,” said the soldier kneeling by the body. “The other one had his neck broken. And I don’t know what in the hells happened to that.” The soldier pointed at the mummified remains laying on the ground several yards from the dead guards.
“That is one of the vampires,” said Tengri as more men gathered, soldiers who had left their fires, unarmored but carrying their blades at the ready. A priest ran up, her eyes widening as she looked at the mummy, then the pile of dust that was starting to blow away in the night breeze.
The Chronicles of the Eirish: Book 1: The Lich's Horde Page 27
