by Jeff Grubb
Toede spent the remainder of the evening looking into the flames of the rebuilt fire, throwing on another branch or log whenever Renders reached the end of a parable. It seemed that the former highmaster was only half listening, but rather searching for something that could only be read in the dancing tongues of the flame.
Chapter 25
In which the battle is joined, and the diverse elements of the rebellion demonstrate their weaknesses and strengths, both physical and ethical, and Our Protagonist confronts his former ally. Then the Abyssal Plane breaks loose.
By the time dawn crested the overcast bay to the east, Toede had his unified Allied Rebellion entrenched in the last hedgerow, about a hundred yards from the broken-toothed south wall. Toede had no doubt that the Flotsam defenders had seen his men (really, gnolls and kender), for there was a massing movement along the walls and in the gaps, both southern gates had been hastily closed and shuttered, and no wains or other traffic were visible on either road.
Beyond the walls, the Rock rose on the far side of the city, and from the Rock a new architectural monstrosity. It looked like something out of an elven tale of old, for it glittered like a ruby in the ruddy dawn. On the site of Toede's old manor there was now a castle of classic proportions, with tall, needle-thin spires that seemed to bob and weave in the wind like woozy drunkards. Toede wondered if the swaying spires had been erected as watch-towers, and chuckled at the thought of the constitutions of the poor fools who were obliged to man them.
The clouds broke for a moment. A single ray of light crossed the skies, glancing against the topmost spire and refracting it like a beacon across the surrounding farmland.
Toede covered his eyes for a moment from the intensity of the red-hued beam, and when he refocused them, saw that there was a growing consternation across the field. Some soldiers were moving away, others digging into more defensible positions. Then the first shouts reached his ears, and he saw columns of smoke rising from his left, on the north and west sides of the city.
The necromancer's troops had made their assault against the most heavily protected section of the city, the part lined with solid walls. Toede had to admit he was impressed by the undead horde engaged in what was fated to be a suicidal charge. Toede would have to pick up some of the unusual warriors for himself for his next war.
And thinking of suicidal charges, he had his own to direct. He spurred Bunniswof s mount, a coal-black gelding named Smoker, to the front of the hedgerow, and spun the horse around, facing the troops.
He had half a hundred good speeches stored up, invigorating words he'd heard proclaimed by dragon high-lords in order to goad their terrified troops into battle. Glory, loot, the advancement of their way of life, threats, the entire gamut. But as he spun about to face the troops- the gnolls in their war paint and the suddenly somber kender-the lines of communication between his mind and mouth were suddenly cut, the conversational bridges vanished, and the mental cues seemed to scatter on the cold dawn breeze.
Toede's mind went blank.
He sat on his horse, regarding the troops, and could have heard the proverbial pin drop along the entire line. He could feel the strain of the gnolls, as if they were swimmers preparing for a diving start, and he could sense the pent-up eagerness of the kender.
"For…" said Toede, his thin voice cracking. "For glory! And for good government!"
He was welcomed with a resounding "Huzzah!" as the
gnoll troops boiled out from the hedgerow, and the kender, bent forward, their hoopaks slung over their backs, began a scurrying flanking maneuver to the right.
The gnolls' charge broke in front of Toede and reformed beyond him. Rogate was in the vanguard, waving a sword in one hand, a crudely painted green banner in the other, a bow and quiver of green-feathered arrows on his back. The banner read "TOEDAIC KNIGHTS" and sported a picture of a frog.
Renders clopped up on one of his small horses. "Ah, good speech," he said dryly. "One for the ages."
Toede ignored the review. "Did Bunniswot slip away?" Renders shrugged and said, "I assume so. Shall we join the battle?"
Toede scowled and wheeled Smoker around. "Right. Stay a comfortable distance behind the main body, and keep up. I don't want to have to explain to an irate Charka how I let you die."
The hobgoblin dug his heels into Smoker's flanks, and the gelding broke into a brisk, uneven trot behind the screaming gnolls.
They were halfway across the field before the enemy responded with a hail of missiles. Toede had instructed Charka to have the gnolls raise their heavy shields over their heads, since the arrows would have to take high arcs at this range. Those that survived the first volley were the ones that remembered to do so, but one of every ten gnolls fell to the ground and did not rise.
The charge continued to within forty yards. Toede could make out the colored uniforms of the foe-colors not found among Toede's livery or those of his successors. Mercenaries then, as he had guessed. A front line of spearmen, grim-faced and at the ready, with a row of bowmen behind. The walls were sprinkled with city guards and the odd crossbowman. Most seem to have been pulled away by the diversion.
The kender, moving faster and wider than the gnolls, were in flanking position on Toede's right, and already were laying down a fire of small stones against the archers. Although the militia were driven from the walls, the meres were well trained and did not break under the rain of pellets. Instead, the enemy troops repositioned their aim at the kender, while the remaining archers fired straight ahead at the advancing gnolls.
The kender scattered under the returned volleys. They would reassemble quickly, but time would be lost. The effect on the gnolls was pronounced, as many of the swamp gnolls forgot to hold their shields aloft. Another one out of ten collapsed, wounded or dying.
More importantly, the charge ground to a stop thirty yards from the walls, and the surviving gnolls had to take cover behind their shields, their fallen comrades, and whatever low brush they could find. Toede bellowed» orders, but they could not hear him, and the mercenary bowmen returned to their primary targets, hammering the grounded gnoll offensive.
Toede felt a presence close to his right, and heard Renders say, "Ah…"
Toede cut him off, interrupting. "We're being cut to ribbons, be prepared to…"
The next word was going to be "run," or perhaps "flee," or even "surrender." However, at that moment, the gelding whinnied and rose on its hind legs, almost tossing Toede from his saddle, then bolted.
Forward, toward the withering arrow fire. Toede pulled his sword with one hand, clinging to the horse's neck for as much protection as possible. He was over the front line now, Smoker clearing it in a single bound.
Directly behind him, Toede heard the roar of the gnolls as they regained their courage and rose to follow their leader in his impromptu charge. There was another cheer, this one of childlike voices, as the kender also joined in.
Toede turned in his saddle, motioning for the kender to hold their ground. Without decent cover-fire, they would all be cut to shreds. He realized that Smoker was wounded, a long red smear of blood dripping from the animal's flank.
What the kender thought they saw, however, was the general of the Allied Rebellion waving them on, his sword glistening in the dawn. Those who survived the day would speak of the valiant spirit of the hobgoblin.
He was right on top of the enemy line, the gnolls behind him, the spearmen in front of him, when Smoker hit a chuckhole at high velocity. The horse cartwheeled forward, pitching Toede over its head.
And over the heads of the spearmen in the front line. The archers loosed one more volley at the gnolls (and at Toede's mount that screamed as the arrows riddled its broken, twitching body). Those closest to Toede dropped their bows and drew their swords, short wide blades that could gut a hog with one swipe.
Then the stones struck among them, and two out of ten archers fell to hoopak accuracy. The remainder moved back a few paces, and Toede scrambled among retreaters and t
he bodies. Pain gripped his shoulder-the same one Rogate had shot over a year ago-but he was otherwise unharmed. He touched his breast pocket, and found his secret weapon still intact.
The mercenaries wavered but did not panic as the gnolls slammed into their lines. Toede had to scramble again to avoid being trampled by the human troops falling back. The archers had mostly abandoned their missile weapons and were slashing at those gnolls who had pierced the line of mercenaries.
Still, Groag's mercenaries did not break, and Toede had to wonder exactly what the smaller hobgoblin had promised in exchange for their services.
A particularly burly mercenary swaggered toward him and was rewarded with death as Toede cut the man off at the ankles. The hobgoblin then spun and sunk his blade into another mere. Apparently the missile troops were better with bow than with sword, and lightly armored to boot.
A cry went up, this time from human throats, and Toede could see fresh enemy troops pour into the fray. At least fresh in that they had not yet fought Toede's kender/gnoll army. Many of them were bloodied and had the look of men who had fought the undead, and were now glad to battle flesh-and-blood opponents who have the sense to lie down and die.
Slowly, the mercenary line stiffened, then began to drive the combined gnolls and kender backward, away from the wall. Toede was still trapped on the wrong side of the lines.
And then the dead whale appeared, and everything changed.
It was even larger than in Toede's memory. Most of the skin had peeled away, and the rotting blubber had turned a sickly yellow-green. The ribs poked out one of its sides, and its massive eye was a runny pustule of white ichor.
It had erupted from the beach, where Toede's men had buried it long ago, leaping about two hundred feet in a high arc toward the battlefield. Alas, it would not clear the entire distance, but the airborne necro-whale did cause three things to happen:
Some (not all, but enough) gnolls gawked at the great mass of animated cetacean flesh in midleap.
Some (not all, but enough) humans turned to see what the gnolls were looking at with such fascination and awe.
And some (not all, but enough) kender took advantage of those humans with their backs turned.
The spearmen's line crumbled in a dozen places as the humans toppled, either from daggers set squarely in their backs or calf tendons severed, bringing their unprotected necks closer to the ground (and nearer to kender swords).
Toede was pressed to the ground by a toppling human.
He rolled with the body, struggled, and pushed it off him at last. He rose to find himself alone in the gap of the wall. Alone in the sense that he was the only one present who wasn't dead or close enough to death to deceive the casual observer. He did not recognize any of the dead except Smoker, who had sprouted a double‹lozen arrows in a deadly bouquet and lay there, open eyes staring at Toede accusingly.
Toede cocked an ear and heard distance shouts, battle cries, and the clash of metal against metal. It was all around him, throughout the city, the battlefront broken into a hundred clashes, fought in alleys and plazas and storefronts. The kender would be in their element here, an entire terrain of places in which to run and hide.
The gnolls would make for the Rock Wall, and Renders and the other battle leaders with them. Toede picked through the bodies and moved toward the headland, noting in passing that none of the mercenaries wore the gold disks he had seen in his last incarnation.
He had to double back twice as his path was blocked by intense fighting, and once had to redirect a bloodstained unit of kender to a likely battle scene, but at last he made it. He had no idea how long it took him, but Toede reached the headland wall.
The wall was undefended, the gates to the Rock open. It was comparatively quiet, the battle raging elsewhere in the city. The defenders had abandoned their posts, but had they fled out of fear of flying whales, or plunged into the heat of battle? Or were they lurking in ambush?
Toede strode cautiously up to the gate as a large shadow appeared on the other side. It was gnoll-sized, but had the head of a great ox, and carried a massive, double-headed axe.
It was a minotaur, but this one's skin was the color of paper left in the sun too long, its eyes as sightless as Smoker's or, for that matter, the dead whale's.
Toede sighed and stepped forward. "Hi, Bob," he said.
"Greetings, Toede," said the undead mix of human and bovine traits. "You seem to have expected me."
"Sooner or later," said Toede in a conversational voice, slowly closing the distance between them. He reached back and slid his bloodied sword back into its scabbard. "How long have you planned this, working for both sides?"
The minotaur zombie managed a shrug. "Since before your return. And while it would have been easier had I captured you before the kender did, fortune allowed me to turn that happenstance to my advantage."
Toede smiled. "So you appeared to Groag and offered to protect him in exchange for…"
"For the dead," said the minotaur zombie, "same as you. And of course, everyone will be the dead soon."
"So you wanted Flotsam for yourself, eh?" said Toede, now standing all of five feet away from his opponent.
"As a start," said the zombie. "Even now the first of your battlefield dead are twitching as the bones reknit and the flesh empties. They will be my new army, to slay the survivors of the city and further swell my legions. Then, when I have sufficient ships, I will launch raids along the entire coast, until I have a small nation of undead humans, kender, ogres, hobgoblins, and even dragons under my control!"
Toede sighed again, reaching into his short jacket as if trying to physically slow his beating heart. "Dream no small dreams," he said. "Well I have news for you, Necromancer. Murrurrurume!" His voice had dropped to an unintelligible mumble.
The minotaur zombie cocked its head for a moment, then said, "You said something?"
"I said…" Toede again dropped his voice. "Murrurrurume!"
The minotaur zombie managed a smile and dropped to one knee to hear better. It kept its axe in one hand, to gut the hobgoblin should he try to pull anything. "Once more," it chided.
"I said have some perfume!" said Toede, and pulled Tay-win's atomizer from his jacket. Before the minotaur zombie could react, he sprayed the contents full-force into the undead creature's face.
The minotaur zombie screamed as the holy water, prepared by the kender priest, boiled away what remained of its face, revealing the skull beneath the flesh. Toede's sword flew from his scabbard as he brought it in a neat line across the minotaur's shoulders, separating its head from its body.
Toede smiled, but the smile was short-lived, as the now-headless creature tottered to its feet and hefted its axe.
"Oh, come now," gurgled the remains of the minotaur-zombie skull, "you of all people should know that death is not a career-ending injury around here."
The zombie brought its axe down, hard, and splintered the pavement as Toede jumped to one side. The minotaur was still mighty dangerous, albeit blind.
Blind? No, Toede corrected himself. Rather the minotaur's skull was still relaying orders, although at a disadvantage due to its lowered vantage point.
Toede lunged out and kicked the skull, hard. It went flipping end-over-end to one side of the gate. Maybe that will slow down its reaction time, he hoped.
Or not, as Toede's left side exploded in a flash of pain. Not the axe, but a kick from the minotaur zombie had caught him fully in the side. He dropped the spray bottle and heard it smash. Toede flew five feet and hit the wall, not far from the decapitated head.
"Gotcha," gurgled the zombie.
Small stars novaed in front of Toede, but he could make out the shadow of the headless necromantic puppet towering over him. He heard the necromancer's laugh as the minotaur zombie lifted its axe above his head. Then the minotaur stiffened, jerked three times, and fell at Toede's feet.
There were four green-feathered arrows jutting from the minotaur's back. Rogate ran into Toede's v
iew. "Milord!" he shouted. "Are you all right?"
Toede nodded and rose painfully, pointing to the fallen axe. "Hand me that, will you?"
Rogate gave Toede the axe. The hobgoblin limped over to where the minotaur skull gurgled. Bob the necromancer had apparently abandoned it for some other body, since it had no last words as he chopped the skull into pieces.
Toede turned. Rogate had replaced his bow and arrows and picked up his tattered banner that now only read: "TOE KNIG."
"You can't conquer the world," said Toede to the skull pieces. "You don't even have your own book." To Rogate he said, "How's the battle going?"
Rogate nodded. "Better than expected. The kender are excellent in house-to-house ambushes-Kronin calls this 'a stonework forest' and you know how good they are in the woods. The gnolls are at a slight disadvantage due to their size, but make up for it with their strength. We've also had some natives join in, though most are in hiding. And we've had some reports of the necromancer's undead in combat with our own troops, but that might be a mix-up."
Toede pointed at the minotaur's arrow-dotted corpse. "No mix-up. The necromancer's playing both sides against the middle. Get back into the battle, spread the word that all corpses should be burned immediately, on both sides. And see if you can get word to the human meres as well. They may lose their will to fight if they know their deaths guarantee them eternal bondage as revenants and zombies."
Rogate grunted agreement. "And you, milord? What are you going to do?"
Toede walked shakily toward the crystalline palace sprawled on the site of his home.
"Me?" said Toede, sighing. "I'm going to end this, once and for all."
The headland was empty as Toede stalked through the streets, the guards engaged in battle elsewhere, the bourgeoisie and burghers either hiding in their basements or hightailing it to the hinterland. Occasionally, from the Lower City there would be the shouts of men and gnolls rallying for battle, or the crash or explosion of a house caving in on itself. But that seemed half a world away, for the breeze from the sea swept the smells of battle inland and far from Toede's mind.
