Then it slumped motionless to the ground, its yellow eyes still staring at me, its massive wings twitching a bit.
For a moment no one spoke.
I got to my feet, picking up my sword.
“Optio,” said Primus, breathing hard. “You are uninjured?”
“Just a bit bruised, sir,” I said, my frozen mind starting to work again. “You, you, you.” I pointed at three of the new recruits. “Get our horses. The damned wyvern spooked them off.” I pointed at two of the veterans. “You two. Check the wounded. Magistrius Mallister, if you can do anything for them…”
But he couldn’t. The wyvern had left poisoned men, headless men, and the one poor fellow who had been opened from throat to groin, but it had not left us with any wounded men.
I put the recruits to work getting the horses organized and preparing the slain men for transport back to Castra Durius for burial. They’d had a nasty shock, but work was the cure for that.
Hell, I’d had a nasty shock. I wanted a stiff drink, but that wasn’t happening for a while, so I went to work.
“A bad business, sir,” I said to Primus as the men went about their tasks.
“It could have been worse,” said Primus, shaking his head. “A wyvern. God and the saints! If I’d even suspected, I would have set out with a stronger force. A wyvern hasn’t been since this far south of the Wilderland since Ardrhythain founded the Two Orders. Still, it could have been worse. When I was a young man, I rode with some knights of Coldinium in a hunt for a wyvern. The beast turned the tables on us, and slew half our party before Sir Corbanic could land the killing blow upon the creature. Speaking of that. Romilius!”
The young man hurried over. “Sir Primus.”
“What on earth possessed you to start hacking at the damned thing’s head like that?” said Primus.
Romilius hesitated. “It…seemed the thing to do at the moment, sir. I figured the beast might not be able to lift its head if I pinned its neck, and it was about to bite off the Optio’s head, sir.”
“Indeed it was,” I said. “You did well.”
“Aye,” said Primus. “We’ve lost good men today, but we would have lost more of them if not for your quick thinking, Romilius. Well done!”
A cheer rang out, and to my surprise the men-at-arms had been listening to us. Romilius looked around, embarrassed. It was the first time the boy had earned the accolades of his peers, but I suspected it would not be the last.
My head still hurt, and getting knocked over had not helped. God, but I wanted a drink.
###
We returned to Castra Durius, and the slain men were interred in the catacombs below the fortress with full honors, the Dux’s own priests presiding over the burial rites as we commended the men to the Dominus Christus. The day after that, Dux Kors held a feast to celebrate the wyvern’s defeat. Sir Primus Tulvan had been in command, so he received a reward. Romilius, as the man who had struck down the wyvern, received a purse of gold. Romilius insisted that the gold go to the widows and families of the dead men, which so pleased the Dux that he gave the gold to the widows and the orphans and instead rewarded Romilius with a new set of armor, a new sword, and his choice of horses from the stable.
After, I retreated to my favorite watch tower to drink, and this time both Mallister and Romilius came with me.
“Have a drink on the Optio, lad,” I said, passing him a wooden cup. “God knows you earned it. If you had been a little slower, I would be asking St. Peter for admission to the kingdom of heaven.”
Romilius gave the cup of whiskey a dubious glance, shrugged, and lifted it to his lips.
“Don’t drink it all at…” I started.
Romilius swallowed the entire thing in one gulp. Mallister winced. About a heartbeat later, Romilius’s face turned bright red and he started coughing, and I gave him a few slaps on the back.
“Mother of God and all the saints!” he wheezed at last. “That’s strong.”
“I’m friends with the miller in the town,” I said. “Man has his own still, lets me buy direct from him.”
“I think the monks could have used this to strip the paint off their walls,” said Romilius, blinking tears from his eyes.
“Probably,” I said.
“And you drink this every night?” said Romilius, astonished.
“No, not every night,” I said. “Never in the field. Only on nights when I don’t have duty the next day.”
“Is it because…” said Romilius, and then he shook his head.
“What?” I said.
“Nothing, sir,” said Romilius.
“Lad,” I said, “you saved my life. No, don’t be modest. The wyvern would have bit off my head if you hadn’t acted, and that’s that. If you don’t screw up, Sir Primus will probably make you a Tessario by the end of the year. So that means you can ask me questions.” I waved a hand at Mallister. “In private, anyway. The Magistrius and I drink together, but in front of the men I always defer to him, and he always defers to Sir Primus. In front of the men, you’d damned well better hop when I say jump. In private, though…well, we can be frank with each other.”
“If you say so, sir,” said Romilius, taking a deep breath. “Is it true what they say about you?”
I shared an amused look with Mallister. “I can imagine what the men say about their Optio. Probably said the same things myself when I was your age.” I expected him to say something about the drinking or my foul temper.
“That you became a man-at-arms to avenge your wife and child,” said Romilius, “who were slain by the Mhorites?”
For a moment I was so surprised that I couldn’t think of anything to say. I looked at Mallister, and he seemed just as taken aback. Romilius shrank back a little, fearful that I would explode.
Then Mallister and I burst out laughing.
“No, no,” I said, once I got myself under control, “no, it’s not like that. My wife died of plague, not the Mhorites.” How she would have laughed at the thought. It made me sound like some grim avenging champion from the old days, like a Swordbearer going on a quest to rescue his lady love from an urdmordar or an orcish warlock or something like that.
“Oh,” said Romilius. “I’m sorry, sir.”
I snorted. “Wasn’t your fault. Wasn’t anyone’s fault.” I had tried to save her. I had galloped to Castra Durius to fetch a Magistrius, killing my horse in the process. Mallister had come with me, and we had ridden for the village in haste. We had arrived a day too late. The fever had claimed both her and my baby daughter. “I would have saved her, if I could. But I couldn’t. I…”
We stood in silence for a moment. I poured myself another cup and drained it in one swallow, my head buzzing. It didn’t help my headache.
“So what do they really say?” I said at last.
“They said the Mhorites slew your family,” said Romilius, “and that you joined the Dux’s service to avenge them.”
“No,” I said. “I’d been in the Dux’s service for three years before I even met Judith.”
“Why did you join the Dux’s service, sir?” said Romilius.
I shrugged. “My father was a tavern keeper, and I hated scrubbing the vomit off the floor when the guests drank too much. So I took service with the Dux…and then I wound up scrubbing the barracks floor.”
Romilius burst out laughing, looked embarrassed, and fell silent.
“What brought you here?” I said.
Romilius shrugged. “The monks at St. Matthew raised me. I thought I would join their order, and then a group of dvargir attacked one of the nearby villages. I realized I could not spend my life behind monastery walls when I could fight, not in good conscience. So I asked the abbot to write a letter to the Dux…and here I am.”
“Noble,” I said.
“Also,” said Romilius. “I didn’t want to become a monk because…uh…"
Mallister smiled. “A life of celibacy did not appeal?”
“I think he’s trying to say he wants
a tumble with a pretty girl,” I said.
Romilius turned even redder. “Uh…if you’re not waging vengeance upon the Mhorites, why do you stay, sir?”
I considered that. “Because it is my duty. I took the Dux's oath. I will not betray it.”
Mallister nodded. “A good answer.”
I lifted my cup. “To duty, then.”
We toasted and drank. Romilius coughed quite a bit, but managed to get all of his drink down. The young man had many virtues, but holding his liquor was not one of them.
###
Two weeks after that, the Dux himself came with Sir Primus to speak with us in the courtyard.
I had a bad, bad headache. It was almost enough to make me ask Sir Primus for a day of sick leave, but I kept going. Drinking had not made me abandon my duty, and a damned headache wasn’t going to do it, either.
Though I hadn’t drunk anything for three days. Whatever was wrong with me, it wasn’t a hangover.
“Optio Camorak,” boomed Dux Kors Durius. He was a huge man, built like a blacksmith, his face half-hidden beneath a shaggy gray beard. “How fare the men?”
“Well enough, my lord,” I said, bowing. The recruits hastily followed suit. Though they acted less and less like recruits these days. They had seen firsthand how training and discipline saved lives in battle, just as old Vegetius had said. Had they panicked and scattered when facing the wyvern, the beast would have picked us off one by one. Fear had always made them obey my orders before, but now a heathy bit of self-preservation motivated them as well.
“Splendid,” said Sir Primus, “for the Dux has a task for us.”
“The Three Kingdoms of the dwarven kindred lie beneath the mountains of Kothluusk,” said Kors, “and the King of Khald Tormen is sending a taalvar – ah, their word for emissary – to the Prince of Cintarra. To reach Cintarra, the taalvar and his men must cross the lands of Durandis. Therefore, to uphold the honor of Durandis, you shall escort the taalvar to Castra Durius before he continues on his way to Cintarra.”
“We may face foes,” said Primus. “The enmity between the dwarves of the Three Kingdoms and the orcs of Kothluusk is ancient and deep, and predates the foundation of the High Kingdom by centuries. If the Mhorites learn that a taalvar is leaving Khald Tormen, they shall almost certainly try to kill him. Of course, the taalvar shall have his own escort of dwarven soldiers, but if the Mhorites try to attack him, we shall assist in his defense.”
“Hence the escort,” said the Dux. “The taalvar shall march along the main road from Castra Durius to the Great Gate of Khald Tormen. Sir Primus, your company will ride out and meet him along the road.”
“Optio,” said Primus. “Prepare for departure. I wish to be on the road within the hour.”
“Sir,” I said, and I started giving orders, trying to ignore my unending headache.
###
Just under an hour later, we rode west, Sir Primus at the head of sixty men-at-arms. For this task, we had a mix of veterans and new recruits, which was a relief. The new lads were shaping up, but the Mhorites were vicious fighters, and I wanted steady men with us. Magistrius Mallister had also been sent, just in case one a Mhorite shaman decided to show his ugly face. As bad as the Kothluuskan orcs were, the shamans of the blood god Mhor were worse, and even the Mhorite warriors were afraid of them.
We rode west along the broad, wide road the dwarves had cut from the foothills. Of old, when the High King had first made alliance with the dwarves, the Three Kingdoms had constructed the road to Castra Durius as a gesture of friendship. It had weathered the centuries with the stubborn defiance of dwarven engineering, and so was still flat and level. The Dux’s men patrolled it often, so the Mhorites usually avoided it, preferring instead to creep through the maze of gullies and valleys in the foothills, even using the caverns of the Deeps to mask their movements. So it seemed safe enough to assume we would not encounter any trouble, but I had been a soldier too long to be an optimist.
The corpses we saw a few hours after leaving Castra Durius proved that correct.
Sir Primus called a halt, and we reined up. A dozen orcish men in leather armor and chain mail lay scattered across the road, all of them dead from sword or axe wounds. Their faces had been tattooed red and marked with ritual scars, giving their features the looks of hideous crimson skulls behind their tusks. The crimson skull was the sigil of Mhor, the old orcish blood god of death and murder, and in his honor the Mhorites carved his symbol into their flesh.
“Looks like there was a sharp fight here, sir,” I said, looking over the corpses.
One of the veteran men-at-arms, a wiry old man named Philip, dropped from his saddle and considered the ground. “I would say about a hundred Mhorites, Sir Primus, maybe a hundred and fifty. It looks as if they ambushed a group of fifty dwarves. Struck from either side of the road.”
“Cowardly, as befits the Mhorites,” said Primus.
“Seems the dwarves had the better of it,” I said. God and the saints, but my head hurt. “I don’t see any dwarven dead.”
“Nor do I, sir,” said Philip. “I think…wait!”
He pointed at the hills rising over the road. Pine trees cloaked the sides of the hills, and a short figure staggered from the trees, weaving back and forth as if drunk. It was a dwarven man, standing just about five feet tall, broad and strong and tough. He wore armor of bronze-colored dwarven steel, a battered shield upon his left arm and a bloody sword in his right fist. His helmet was missing, revealing his gray, granite-colored skin, his black hair and beard, and his eyes like orbs of green marble. The dwarven man staggered to the edge of the road and fell to one knee, blood dripping down his cuirass.
“Magistrius,” said Primus. Mallister dropped from his saddle, knelt next to the dwarven warrior, and cast a spell, white fire flaring around his hands. The dwarf flinched, and Mallister went rigid, his eyes widening, his teeth clenched in a rictus. He had told me once that to heal wounds he had to take the pain of the injury into himself, that he felt the wound as if the sword had pierced his own flesh. It didn’t sound like a pleasant experience, but I envied him that. Perhaps if I had possessed that ability, I could have saved Judith and the baby, maybe…
I shook my head. My thoughts were wandering, and that was dangerous in a crisis. Maybe I should have asked for sick leave after all.
The dwarf straightened up, his green eyes wide. He looked tired and worn, but better than he had a moment earlier. Mallister let out a long breath and straightened up, wiping sweat from his forehead.
“He should live, Sir Primus,” said Mallister.
The dwarven warrior said something in the strange, jagged language of his kindred.
Primus frowned. “Do you speak Latin?”
“He does not, sir knight,” said Mallister, “but I speak some dwarven.” He listened for a moment as the dwarven warrior spoke, his bronze-colored gauntlets flashing in the sun as he gestured. “They were attacked. Ah…Mhorite orcs, a large warband. Hit from both sides. The taalvar…the taalvar’s name is Azandran. He defeated the Mhorites in a battle in the Deeps, and they have come for revenge. Some of the taalvar’s warriors were slain. The remaining dwarves have formed a shield wall and fallen back, trying to hold off the Mhorites.” Mallister listened to the warrior’s narration for a moment, nodding here and there. “Sir Primus, the fighting was recent, nor more than a few moments ago. If we hasten, we might be able to attack the Mhorites while they focus upon the dwarves…”
“And then catch them between the hammer and the anvil,” I said.
Mallister nodded. “Precisely.”
“Then let us hasten,” said Primus. “Optio, make sure our guest gets a horse.”
###
We found the battle about a mile further into the hills.
A score of dead Mhorites and a half a dozen dead dwarves lay upon the road, the blood pooling beneath their bodies. The battle had moved off the road, the dwarves falling back towards the hills. They had formed an interlocking shi
eld wall, stabbing with spears and swords through the gaps in their shields.
Nearly a hundred Mhorite warriors faced them. The Kothluuskan orcs threw themselves at the dwarven shields in a frenzy, hammering at their foes with axes and maces. The dwarves had superior armor and better discipline, but the Mhorites fought with a bloodthirsty madness, screaming cries to their bloody god of murder. They were pushing the dwarves back, and the dwarven warriors were running out of space. Once they reached the base of the hill, their formation would collapse, and the Mhorites would carry the day.
Unless the dwarves had help.
“Men of Durandis!” shouted Primus, raising his spear. “Charge! Charge now!”
The men-at-arms, veterans and recruits both, shouted and kicked their horses to a gallop, racing for the Mhorites in a wall of swords and spears and stamping hooves. The veterans moved smoothly, keeping to a solid line, but to my surprise the recruits kept up, staying more or less in formation. Romilius kept in formation next to some of the veterans, lowering his spear with easy grace.
We smashed into the Mhorites. Infantry can withstand a charge of horsemen, but only if they are properly arrayed and prepared, with spears braced to receive the enemy. The Mhorites had no spears, and encircled the dwarven formation in a ragged half-circle. It was one of the worst formations possible for meeting a charge of heavy horse, and we proved it as we trampled the Mhorites like wheat. A dozen of the orcish warriors went down beneath stamping, steel-shod hooves, and a dozen more perished upon the tips of our spears. I drove my spear through a Mhorite, the steel head punching through his leather armor and burying itself in his heart. The impact ripped the spear from my hand, and I drew my sword with a steely rasp. I whipped the blade around and it sank halfway into a Mhorite’s neck. Another warrior came at me, brandishing an axe, and I managed to get my shield up in time to block. Splinters flew from the impact, and I staggered back in the saddle, but I raised my sword and brought it down with a shout.
The Soldier's Tale Page 3
