The Chronicles of the Eirish: Book 1: The Lich's Horde

by Doug Dandridge

  That came moments later, when he spotted the other wing through the nomads, coming on at the same speed as his own, crushing the enemy between them. The Turks, what was left of them, were in the last stages of panic. The enemy was killing them, for many there was no escape, and they had never asked or granted quarter. Those who still could spurred their horses out of the press, while the rest died in their saddles.

  “Count Brian,” shouted Duke Connor, riding up to Borai and reaching out a hand.

  Count Brian quickly sheathed his sword, still dripping with gore, and reached out his gauntleted right hand, clasping the armored one of the duke. Brian glanced to the east, where the nomads that had escaped the trap were riding away, too fast for the heavy cavalry to chase. The light horse was taking care of that task, firing arrows or carbines into the backs of the remains of the retreating horde.

  “Your Grace,” said Brian, looking back at the duke. “I think that ends their army.”

  “There might be ten thousand or so who weren’t here,” said the duke, shaking his head. “Plus that rabble on the run. But yes, I do believe they are through as an invasion force. Which leaves only the zombies.”

  Brian looked to his right, across the half mile that separated them from the infantry force. That force was reorganizing, facing the other way, preparing for the zombie horde that was turning around and coming back at them. The infantry was taking their time, many of the musketmen helping the artillerymen to move the guns. It would be at least ten minutes before the first of the undead made their way back to attack, a half an hour before the main mass arrived. And they would run into the prepared army.

  “I wish we could ride those damned things down as well,” said Connor, a smile on his face.

  Brian nodded. Half of their heavy force were walking their horses toward the infantry, where they would set on the flanks to do just the riding down Connor was talking about, if the chance came. Their now combined force would stay where they were, ready to deal with those ten thousand or so nomads if they came back, or to ride to cover the retreat of the infantry if that became necessary.

  “Hopefully the walking gods will take care of the necromancers,” said Brian, looking at the field covered with the bodies of nomads and their beasts. “If not, and we lose here, we will be facing all of these bastards again, only they won’t be drawing breath.”

  Connor nodded. Men were climbing down from their horses to begin the nasty task of gathering the bodies so they could be burned. Many of the knights had complained when told of that task, but the king hadn’t wanted to hear it. The foot soldiers would be busy for the next couple of hours, and afterwards, if they were victorious, they would be too damned tired. And the bodies needed to be disposed of before the stench of their rot permeated the area and sickened the soldiers.

  A gun went off from the infantry line, then another, and both nobles knew that the third part of the battle was on.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Marcus felt the presence of the lich beating down on him, sapping his will, stealing his energy. He tried to look away, to switch his vision to one of his team, but the lich was not allowing it. From the groan he heard to his left he could tell that the priestess was undergoing the same attack. The evil creature was actually sucking the life force out of their bodies, and there was nothing they could do about it. Their only hope was the demigods. One of them stumbled into view, Tengri, going down on one knee, obviously also feeling the effects of the spell. Perun entered his field of vision, stumbling, raising a hand and releasing a bolt of lightning that lacked the power of his earlier blasts.

  We can’t fail now, thought the wizard, knowing as he thought it that it was a lie. They could fail, they were going to fail, unless someone did something. And the only one whose something he could control was himself.

  Marcus mumbled the spell under his breath, barely able to get the words out as his vision started to blur, soon to fail. His fingers went through the gestures in clumsy motions, but formed them nonetheless. He felt the heat form in his palm, slight at first, growing until the pain forced him to grit his teeth. At that point he needed to release, or the spell would blow up in his hand, and he would become a flaming pyre, soon turned to ash.

  The young wizard used the last of his strength to raise his arm and toss the ball of fire up toward the top of the hill. It left his fingers as a small pellet, blindingly bright, moving in a lazy path that covered distance with deceptive speed. The ball grew by the moment, until it encompassed an area three yards across.

  The lich threw its hands out at the fireball, a shimmering shield forming just before the ball impacted. Fire flashed around the shield, obscuring the lich for a moment. Marcus couldn't tell if the spell had any effect on the lich, but the fire washed over the necromancers to the sides, outside of the coverage of the shield.

  Four of the dark wizard/priests went from wearing black robes to wearing flames as they turned into torches. One tried to shout out a spell to extinguish the fire, but the words turned into a scream. The fireball was much hotter than any mere fire, and it took only moments to turn living flesh into dead meat. Moments more before they were ash statues that soon fell to the ground as heaps of powder and flakes.

  Kalli started into her own spell, gasping out the words as she tried to catch her breath. Her hands glowed for a moment, matched immediately by a glow over the lich. Nothing else seemed to happen, and Marcus wondered if the spell had fizzled. The fireball was in the process of fading, the lich became visible again, as the creature tried to send another blast of negative energy down the hill. The lich looked at its hands after it made the gesture, a confused expression on its skeletal face.

  “It’s an antimagic field,” said Kalli, trying to smile through the pain that was almost overwhelming her.

  “How long will it last?” asked Marcus, bending over and putting his hands on his knees, trying to make the pain go away. The negative energy had done damage, of that he was sure. Hopefully not enough to be permanent, but at the moment there was no way to be sure. Besides, he really didn’t have time to worry about that now, not if he wanted to still be around to consider the problem later.

  “I don’t know,” gasped the priestess. “It will only hold for a short time. And that thing is very powerful.”

  The lich tried another spell, resulting into another fizzle. The demigods stared up at the lich, looked at each other, and started running up the hill. The mage thought they had recovered well, faster than any human could. But then, they weren’t completely human, were they? Freya came close behind, her tall, slender figure contrasting with those of the heavily muscled males.

  They had almost reached the top when the lich tried to cast its spell once again, this time the negative energy breaking through the antimagic field and blasting down the hill. The walking gods staggered, and Kalli quickly cast another spell, this time over herself and Marcus.

  “The demigods will have to take care of themselves,” she told the wizard as she moved her hands into the motions of a reinforcing spell. “We wouldn’t have survived another taste of that.”

  Marcus was sure he and the priestess would be dead by now if the lich’s spell had hit them. He wasn’t so sure about the demigods, who were fighting through it, plodding up the hill. But not fast enough, and the lich up above was also sucking the life force from them. It was killing them. Maybe not as quickly as a true mortal, but it would put them down eventually if they couldn’t get to it.

  Marcus picked up a rock, then sent it toward the lich. The creature raised a hand and deflected the rock, but by that time Marcus was sending another his way. He couldn’t hurt the lich with his momentum enhanced rocks, but maybe he could break its concentration. It worked, and the negative energy flow stopped for a moment. The demigods staggered back to their feet, looking weak and uncertain. And Marcus used the last of his kinetic energy to send a last stone toward the lich, all he could do at the moment, hoping that it would be enough.

  * * *
>
  Tengri shook his head as he tried to focus on the top of the hill and the enemy that waited there. He was no longer a god, no longer divine. When he had ruled the sky over the steppes he could have reached down and crushed this creature with a thought. As could the other two with him. But they were no longer gods, if still more than men.

  The demigod felt his rage growing as he thought about the thing that was striking at him and his fellows. This thing was a servant of his brother, Erlic, the god of death. The being that had killed his worshippers and subverted the rest of the people to his cause. The death god had spread misery across the world, killing millions and causing the fall of civilizations as his presence flowed over the earth. And this lich, this man who had traded his soul for the semblance of immortality, was its primary servant. And so, it must be destroyed.

  Tengri took a step forward, then another, then more as he started to build up some momentum. The negative energy returned, sapping his strength, but this time he would not allow it to stop him. His rage fueled him, made him unstoppable, and forced the lich to turn its entire attention toward him.

  Perun staggered past, then Freya, each attracting the attention of the lich in turn. The trio forged up the hillside, while the three remaining necromancers stood beside their master and funneled their own power into him.

  Freya was the first to reach the top, swinging her sword to slice one of the necromancers through at the waist. The upper half of the woman fell to one side, her legs to the other. Perun brought his blade down on the head of another, splitting the skull and smashing all the way down into his sternum. Tengri pushed his blade through the last, lifting him from his feet and throwing the dying man through the air to land a hundred yards from the hilltop. That took care of the last of the assistants, leaving only the leader to worry about.

  And now they all faced that lich, an evil creature, an undead monster of power beyond even the vampires. It didn’t breathe, its heart didn’t beat, it truly couldn’t be killed, since its essence actually resided somewhere else, in its phylactery. But its body could be destroyed, rendering it helpless for months, and it was up to the three demigods to do it. If they could.

  The lich raised a hand, rotting palm pointing their way, and all three of the walking gods felt their muscles freeze. The grinning skull, now surrounded in flame, stared at them, its fiery eye sockets looking out at them like the god of death staring at his next kills.

  “Erlic will reward me for snuffing out your life, Tengri,” said the lich in the language of the Turks. “Thank you for coming to me. And these will bring a bonus.”

  The lich waved his hand at Freya, and the demigoddess screamed out in agony. She fell to her knees, then tilted forward, her palms catching her just before she hit the ground.

  “Bastard,” yelled out Perun, his muscles straining as he attempted to strike. Muscles stood out on his arms and face, sweat poured down his forehead, and his body moved not an inch. The lich turned his attention on the Slavic walking god and drove him to his knees as well.

  “And now for you,” hissed the lich. “You will, of course, die last, so that I may take pleasure in the pain you feel at seeing your compatriots cease to exist. What happens to you when your mortal bodies die? There is no heaven for you. Is there a hell? They will go to wherever your destination is first and prepare the way.”

  Tengri fought to stay on his feet. He tried to stay upright, exerting all of his will. If will had been enough it would have worked. But will was not enough, and he fell to his knees, but refused to continue down to his hands. He locked his muscles in place, gritting his teeth. He could hear the groans of the other two demigods as they too struggled to get to their feet, without success.

  The demigod could hear chanting in the background. He couldn’t make out the words, but it sounded like the voice of the priestess. He wasn’t sure what she could do. The lich was beyond her power. Her and the wizard both. We should have brought more priests and wizards, thought Tengri, knowing as it went through his mind that they had been needed back at the main fight.

  “I think I will take her life force first,” said the lich. “I can taste her fear, and it is delicious. Her strength will become mine, then the other, and then yours.”

  Tengri felt a presence at that moment. A presence he had felt in the recent past, when he had talked with the goddess Morrigan. A presence with the power that he had possessed when he was in his heaven.

  I cannot fight your brother, Erlic, said the voice of Morrigan in his mind. But I can give you the power to destroy this servant of his. Destroy the beast, the abomination.

  Tengri felt the strength return to his limbs, his mind became clear once again, the pain left his body. He pushed himself off the ground, reaching for the hilt of his sword and lifting it before he straightened to a standing position.

  “What?” hissed the lich, his red eyes turning on Tengri, increasing in intensity as he tried to push his negative energy back into the rebelling demigod.

  Tengri brought his blade back, then swung it down at an angle, striking the creature’s robe at the juncture of neck and shoulder. The lich’s robe was the consistency of plate armor, the body underneath as hard as stone. And the divine blade, swung with more than human strength, cut through both, slicing the armored fabric and breaking through the bones underneath, coming to a stop at midchest.

  The lich opened its mouth as if to scream, but without lungs, without air, it had no way to utter that sound. Its skeletal hands reached up for the blade, trying to pull it out. The demigod pulled as well, jerking it through the left hand of the lich, bringing the blade back up and tensing his body for the next strike. It came in before the lich could react, this time hitting the neck above the last cut, coming in at a horizontal plane that sliced completely through and flung the head from its shoulders.

  The head lay on the ground, burning orbs still looking out of it, mouth moving. The body bent down, the hands reaching for the head.

  “Oh no you don’t,” roared Tengri. He jumped into the air and came down on the skull, crushing it, then spun around and sliced an arm off the undead monster. The arm hit the ground and started to crawl along, back toward the body, which took a step toward it. Tengri grabbed the front of the robe and flung the body away, then kicked once again at the skull, before bringing his sword down on the arm.

  Perun, now back on his feet, weak and disoriented, still had the strength to attack the body, slicing in and crushing ribs, while Freya swung her blade into a leg, shattering the bone in the thigh.

  “Get all the parts together,” said Tengri, the idea coming to him. He looked down the hill to the young wizard. “Marcus, we need you here.”

  Moments later the mage was looking down on the broken bones of the lich, still moving, trying to come back together. The flames came from his hands, playing over the robes, bones and rotted flesh, turning all to ash as he kept the fire going for minutes.

  “It’s destroyed,” said Marcus, pulling back on his spell, looking as if he were about to collapse from the exertion.

  “It will take more than that to kill it,” said Tengri, scowling down at the ash that was starting to blow away in the wind. “His essence will be thousands of miles from here, and eventually his body will reform. Months from now.”

  “But he’s not here, not now,” said Kalli, a tight smile on her face. She too looked exhausted. Everyone was exhausted, and they all would fall into a deep sleep once they reached a place where that would be safe.

  “I will have to fight him again,” said Tengri, looking over at the priestess. “I will have to return to my land, to fight my brother, and his servant.”

  “But you will be destroyed,” said Freya, putting a hand on his arm.

  “Then I will be destroyed,” said the demigod. “But I cannot allow my people to be led along such an evil path. They deserve better.”

  “And King Rory is still fighting the zombies,” said Perun, his eyes looking across the miles separating them from the m
onarch’s army. “First things first.”

  * * *

  Rory was beginning to wonder if this plan had been so brilliant after all. Sure, they had routed the Turks, with limited losses to his own force. He had lost just over a thousand men, infantry and cavalry. He had a couple of thousand wounded, and everyone was worn out in the way that only a battle could bring. And now they were facing several hundred thousand undead, maybe up to just under a million. However many there were, there seemed to be no end to them.

  They had hit his line first as small groups, even singles. Those had been easy to crush. Then they built up until the horde was coming at them in a compacted mass. Even cutting down a zombie didn’t remove it from the fight, since they were crushed up against the shields and pushed from behind. Rory saw one that had lost its head, then an arm, but was pushed forward, its one working arm still trying to strike. The way it was going the front line would fight through the day, only to destroy some score of ranks of zombies while the others pushed on.

  And the damned things didn’t seem to tire. They weren’t strong, they weren’t fast, they weren’t agile. But they didn’t run out of the little bit of capability they had, and there seemed to be no end to them. Rory wasn’t sure what they were going to do if this thing went on all day.

  “What can you do?” he asked the former Aegyptian princess who stood next to him.

  The princess closed her eyes for several moments, then opened them to look back at the king. “None of us have a lot of energy left, but what we have, we will now use.”

  Hemetre raised her staff of power, energy crackling through the length of the stave. She chanted some words, pointed the staff over the heads of the men in front of her, and squeezed her hand on the wood. A flare of fire left the end of the staff, flying out over the men and about fifty yards into the horde of zombies. The flare dropped into the mass, then exploded outward in circle of fire that burned down everything in its way. It moved out twenty yards in every direction, leaving a mass of burning bodies falling to the ground, their rotted muscles incinerated, only the bones remaining. In many cases those bones also fell apart as the decayed tendons that held them together shriveled and snapped. For a moment a circle forty yards in diameter existed free of intact zombies, before those outside the circle staggered in under the pressure of the rest. Many stumbled, some also caught on fire as they stepped onto the still burning bodies. They were too stupid to try to put the fire out, and eventually they also fell. The circle turned into a bonfire, fed by more of the zombies as they were pushed in by others.