By the time they stop for the night, the keep has long since disappeared behind them. All they can see in every direction now is plains, with the river cutting its way through them to the west.
They decide upon not lighting a fire so as not to alert anyone in the area where they are. Cold rations are the fare this evening, they still have some cooked meat strips from the previous nights to fill them up. James is still feeling the need for more than just meat, but will have to wait on that.
During Miko’s shift in the middle of the night, he hears horses racing past off in the distance. In the moonlight, he can make out a group of perhaps ten riders. He almost wakes the others but then doesn’t when he realizes they’re not coming their way.
When he wakes Jiron for his turn at watch, he tells him of the riders.
“It might have been that warrior priest,” suggests Jiron once he’s heard.
“Do you think so?” Miko asks, worried.
“Don’t be too worried, remember, we’re in the land of the Clans,” he tells him. “It could very well have just been a group of riders moving from one place to another. Nothing says it has to do anything with us.”
As Miko lies down to sleep, Jiron continues, “Just try to get some sleep, we’ll need our rest tomorrow.”
“Alright,” says Miko.
Soon, Jiron can hear the soft sound of his snores in the night. He spends much of his watch staring out across the moonlit plains, searching for riders. He’s much more worried about the riders Miko had told him of than he’d made out, just didn’t want Miko to fret about them.
In the morning when James awakens he tells him of what Miko saw last night. “I wish I had been awake,” he says to Jiron. “Then I might have felt if Abula-Mazki had been among the group.”
“If that was him,” Jiron says, “then he’s ahead of us.”
Nodding his head, James replies, “I know, that could make things difficult to say the least.”
“He’ll probably enlist the aid of the nearest garrison, as well as send for reinforcements,” Jiron guesses. “We haven’t any time to waste sitting around here.”
“I agree,” James says as he goes over and wakes up Miko.
They mount and quickly make their way toward the north, still following the river from a distance. The river continues almost due north as it flows to the south and James finds it odd that there are no villages along the riverbank.
“I would think there would be someone living along the river,” he states during their travel.
“Why?” Miko asks.
“It’s a good place to live,” he tells him. “You have access to fish and fresh water, plus transportation south as needed. It’s just odd is all.”
“Maybe the clansmen don’t allow anyone to live there?” Jiron guesses.
“Perhaps,” says James as he reflects upon it. “You may be right, this could be the border area between the Clans’ land and the Empire as agreed upon in that Treaty they’d mentioned. If that’s the case, then there most likely will be minimal people inhabiting this area.”
“Which could prove beneficial to us,” Jiron says with optimism.
An hour or two past noon, Jiron points to the west and then hollers out, “James!”
James looks over to the west and sees a band of riders on the other side of the river. One rider has broken from the others as he races to the north, the others pace them as they move north. He can see the riders casting glances their way.
“Damn!” James curses. “They’ve seen us.”
“And it looks like one is going for help,” adds Jiron.
James begins to angle his horse to the east and the others follow his lead. “Need to put some distance between us, fast.”
“It won’t take them long to find us now that they know about where we are,” Jiron says as he gallops along beside James.
“Let’s put off that meeting as long as we can,” James replies as they race through the tall grass. He’s worried that at their speed, one of their horses might put a hoof in a gopher hole or something that will break its leg. That would prove disastrous.
Glancing behind, he sees that the river and the riders are no longer visible. They turn to a more northerly course and push their horses as hard as they can.
A horn sounding to the southeast causes them to glance over their shoulders. There behind them are several dozen riders coming fast. They look to be clansmen, but which ones they can’t tell from this distance.
They continue racing north, maintaining their lead from the approaching riders. Hills begin to appear to the northwest. James begins to angle toward them, the hills would give them a better chance than open plains.
“But what about the riders we saw there earlier?” Miko shouts to James.
“There’re less of them than what’s behind us,” he replies. “Besides, we stand a better chance among the hills.”
They continue racing toward the hills, Miko keeps glancing behind them at the pursuing riders. Though they’re not closing the gap, they’re not falling behind either. Worried, he does his best to keep up with the others.
As they near the hills, they can once more see the river as it flows around the hills to the west. The riders who had been over on the other side are nowhere to be seen.
“James!” hollers Jiron. “The horses can’t keep this up, we’re going to have to do something about those riders behind us.”
“I know,” James tells him.
The first hill they come to rises thirty or more feet above the plains. James steers his horse toward it and begins to climb to the top, the others move to follow him.
At the top, he gets down from his horse and hands the reins to Miko. “Just don’t let him get away,” he tells him.
Miko nods his head as he takes the reins.
Jiron and Miko just stand there as they watch James. He faces the oncoming riders and suddenly brings his hands together and then after holding them closed for a moment quickly flings them open. A dozen small blobs appear to be thrown from his hands and land on the ground.
When they hit the ground, they begin rolling toward the riders. As they roll through the tall grass, the grass they touch begins to wilt and die, leaving a trail behind them as they continue on toward the riders.
“What’s he doing?” Miko asks Jiron.
“I don’t know,” he replies. “Just be glad he’s on our side.”
James breaks into a slight smile when he overhears that, but otherwise continues his concentration as the blobs roll ever onward.
The further they roll through the grass the greater in size they become. Where they had started out the size of golf balls, now they’re the size of a bowling ball. It almost seems that the larger they grow, the faster they grow as does the swath of withered grass they leave behind them.
When the first riders reach the blobs rolling toward them, the lead ball explodes, spraying a sticky goo which envelopes several riders and horses. The others immediately move to pass by their affected comrades, but other blobs explode as they come in close proximity to them.
One after another, the blobs explode, coating more of the riders in the goo, making it impossible for them or their horses to move. They fall to the ground and struggle to free themselves from sticky mass, but are unable to.
After the last blob explodes, all but one of the riders has been trapped. James turns back to the others and says, “Let’s go.” He gets on his horse and to the amazement of Jiron and Miko, turns toward the entrapped riders.
“What are you doing?” asks Jiron.
“We should leave!” yells Miko.
Paying them no head, he continues on to the entrapped riders. Having little choice, the other two fall in behind as he heads toward them.
The lone rider who’s free sees them coming and draws his sword. Turning his horse toward them, he charges, a war cry escaping him.
James takes a rock he had acquired some time earlier from his pouch and throws it. The rock sails toward the r
ider and strikes him through the chest, knocking him from his horse.
When they come closer to the entrapped riders, they can see the markings of the Grey Wolf Clan. James notices with relief that neither Abula-Mazki nor the Clan Chief is among those entrapped.
As he approaches them, he says, “Can anyone understand me?”
One of the riders says, “I can.”
“I didn’t kill you, this time,” he tells him. “Continue to follow me and I will the next time.”
The rider translates for his comrades and a growl can be heard coming from several of them.
“You violated the Pact!” the rider accuses them. “For that, you must die!”
“No!” James shouts back. “Your clan broke it first when they took my friend from the Windriders’ tent. I merely came and reclaimed him.”
“You lie!” one of them shouts.
“We already had assurances of safe conduct through your lands,” he tells them. “What possible reason would we have to break the Pact?”
When his words are translated, muttering can be heard coming from more than one. “Anyway, we’re leaving this area and are not coming back.” He turns his horse toward the north and then says before he leaves, “Follow us at your own peril.”
“What about us?” cries the rider.
“This stuff should disappear in a little bit,” he replies. Kicking his horse, he gallops away to the north, Jiron and Miko following.
“You should have killed them,” Jiron tells him.
“I don’t kill unless I have to,” he replies. “That may be hard for you to understand, but that is the way I am.”
“You killed that rider easily enough,” he states.
“True, but he was attacking and I didn’t believe he’d listen to reason,” he counters.
“No,” he agrees, “I’m sure he wouldn’t have. Think they’ll stop following?”
“I don’t know, maybe,” he says. “I did give them something to think about though. Once we’re out of their territory, I’m hoping they’ll stop.”
“Then all we’ll have to worry about is the Empire’s forces and Abula-Mazki,” he says. Grinning, he continues, “That should be easy enough.”
James grins back, “I like your optimism.”
They continue on to the north, again keeping the river at a distance as they move along the eastern edge of the hills. James is still concerned with the disappearance of the riders they’d seen earlier to the west, across the river. He’s sure they haven’t given up the chase, but just where are they?
He direly needs something to use as a reflective surface so he can scan the area for hostiles. But the only place would be near the river and that area could prove unhealthy right now. When he brings his water bottle to his lips for a drink and discovers it’s empty, he realizes they’re going to have to chance the river anyway.
They begin moving toward the river, keeping to the area between the hills. Jiron takes the lead as they move through the hills, keeping his eyes out for anyone in the vicinity.
When they reach the edge of the river, Miko begins watering the horses as Jiron continues keeping a lookout.
James finds a suitable rock and begins to dig out a hole at the river’s edge. Once he has a hole two feet across, he digs a channel to let in some of the water from the river. When he has enough and the ground has saturated to the point where it won’t immediately drain back into the dirt, he closes off the channel so the small pool can maintain a still surface.
He concentrates as the image in the pool shimmers and then sees an aerial view of them at the riverbank. Scrolling the image in a wider arc, he sees the entrapped riders. He grins when he sees several of them have managed to extricate themselves from the goo. It will still be some time before they all get free. Despite what he’d told them, he really doesn’t know how long that stuff will stick around. ‘Stick around’, he lets out a chuckle at his pun.
Getting back to the job at hand, he scrolls to the south and finds the riders they’d seen across the river. Somehow, they’re on this side now and just entering the hills to the south, maybe an hour or two away. He scrolls the image further down but doesn’t see any sort of bridge. Must be a ford in the river.
Scrolling north, he fails to see any sign of the rider that had been riding hard to the north. He scrolls even further but only sees more of the river and plains. The draw of magic to scroll so far is becoming quite strong, seems the farther he scrolls the image away from him, the more magic it takes to sustain it.
He brings it back to the immediate area and sees no one else. Canceling the spell, he gets up and comes over to where Jiron is keeping watch.
“The riders we left in the goop are still stuck,” he says with a slight grin. “Behind us, the riders we saw on the other side of the river managed to cross and are now entering the foothills.”
“How far behind us?” he asks.
“Couple of hours, I would think,” he replies.
“And ahead of us?” Jiron asks.
“It looks clear for quite a ways,” he tells him. “I couldn’t see more than about five miles but didn’t see anyone there.”
“What should we do about the ones behind us?” he asks.
“Someone’s behind us?” asks Miko as he joins the discussion.
“Yeah,” James informs him and then quickly relates what he just told Jiron. “Maybe I need to give them a little surprise when they get here,” he muses. “We have time.”
Ever since leaving the Gathering of the Clans, Sub-leader Ragni of the Grey Wolf Clan has had serious doubts about following these men. After witnessing what had happened back at the camp, he soon realized that maybe they should just let them go.
But Abula-Mazki would not be denied. Their chief was too much under his influence and so when he went after them when they fled, Ragni and several other Sub-leaders took their men with him.
When the pass exploded in front of them, he thought the rage of Abula-Mazki would kill them all. Somehow the warrior priest had survived the rocks. All the men around him had been crushed but none of the rocks had even so much as touched him. Somehow, he’d reined in his rage at those who they were pursuing escaped. When told that the only other way to follow would be to backtrack to the eastern pass, his rage again erupted.
Riding like to kill the horses, he pushed them on until they were through the pass. Once on the other side, Abula-Mazki had sent the Sub-leaders and their groups in different directions in an attempt to locate them, while keeping two of the groups with him. Ragni was glad that his was not one of the groups that had stayed with the unpredictable man.
He had moved his men across the river to patrol the western bank. Earlier they spied their quarry and sent a man north to raise the alarm while the rest of them backtracked to the ford.
Once across, they continued the pursuit halfheartedly. Ragni had no desire to confront a mage who could bring down mountains, but dare not show this to his men. They entered the foothills, moving quickly for a little over an hour.
One of his men cries out from a hilltop where he’d been scouting. “I see their campfire.”
“They took the time to camp when they knew we were giving chase?” Ragni muses to a nearby rider.
“Either they’re sure of themselves, or stupid,” the rider replies.
Nodding his head, Ragni motions for the scout to return to the group. Once he’s returned, Ragni says, “Use bows and take them unawares, we cannot let the mage have time to cast a spell.”
His men all nod and get their bows out and ready. When all are set, they move as one around the hill toward where their quarry has their camp.
As the camp comes into view ahead of them, he sees their quarry sitting there relaxed around the fire, meat sizzling as it cooks over the fire. Off to one side are their horses tied in a picket line.
He signals his men to quietly surround the camp, using animal calls to one another, letting him know they’re in position.
Once he’s
heard the last call, telling him all are in place, he gives out with the call to signal the attack. Arrows fly into the camp as they simultaneously fire at the enemy. They drop their bows as they draw their swords and follow the volley of arrows into the camp.
Suddenly, a light encircles them and golden bands arc toward the sky where they meet above the center of the camp.
His men cry out and try to leave but soon realize they are trapped in a cage they can’t escape. That’s when Ragni realizes the mage is facing them. He’s shocked to see all their arrows in the ground, each one having missed their mark.
The mage says, “To follow is to die. Turn around and go home!”
Then the mage, his companions and the horses all begin to change. Their features turn into demonic visages and their hands become claws with long, sharp nails. They begin howling and growling as they advance upon them.
His men cry out with fear, pressing themselves as far away from the demonic creatures as they can. Two of them, warriors tested through many battles, faint dead away as the creatures come closer. Then suddenly, the creatures swell to twice their original size as they let out a roar of ear shattering intensity.
Then with a blinding flash of light, the creatures, the camp, and the cage disappear.
From a nearby hill, Jiron gives a quiet chuckle as he sees what’s going on over there. “Man you’re good,” he tells James.
James doesn’t respond, just continues watching, hoping it’ll be enough to dissuade them from continuing.
When the light flashes and all becomes still, he holds his breath, hoping it worked. Then suddenly the men down there erupt in a flurry of motion as they wake up the ones who fainted and run back to their horses. They mount quickly and he sighs with relief when they turn and race south just as fast as their horses will go. For these men, the chase is over.
Once the riders have moved through the hills and are once again out of sight, James stands up and makes his way with the others back down to where their horses are picketed.
“That should discourage any pursuit from them for awhile I would think,” announces James.
Warrior priest of Dmon-Li ms-3 Page 17
