Duncan muttered a quick prayer that the lance had not further splintered in the wound and that the natural taper of the tip would allow it to come out clean. With a great effort and merciful quickness, Duncan grabbed hold of the splintered lance point and wrenched it free from Gideon’s left shoulder.
Gideon jerked in agony at the shooting pain ripping through his body, but the tension in him only lasted a moment as he mercifully passed into unconsciousness. Blood shot from the exposed wound and Duncan prayed he could seal it before the paladin bled to death. He immediately pressed his hands to the wound to staunch the flow of blood and began chanting the prayer for the strongest healing oth he knew.
Thatcher stared in amazement as the flow of blood from Gideon’s chest rapidly slowed and then stopped. A soft glow surrounded Duncan’s hands. Moments later, he raised his hands from Gideon’s body, and the flesh below them was covered in blood but was otherwise whole. The paladin’s labored and weakened breathing steadied. He seemed to be resting peacefully with a sea of chaos swirling all around them.
“Are we done?” Thatcher asked.
“As done as we can be, lad. He is in the One Lord’s hands now. I have done all I can.”
Thatcher quickly grabbed his crossbow again just in time to take down two Orcs advancing toward them. They had taken a particular interest in the fallen captain and were scampering over to investigate.
“Nice shot, lad,” Duncan said with an accompanying pat on the boy’s shoulder. “Maybe that pea-shooter is a worthy toy to have after all.”
Things were getting hairy for Jeslyn. Bardrick was at least twenty-five yards away now, hewing and hacking his way ecstatically through the hoard on the ramp and working his way toward the Ogre commander. His distance from Jeslyn and their disabled wagon, combined with the fear of his ferocity evidenced in the Orcs near him, had many of the goblinoids giving Bardrick a wide berth and looking for easier targets behind him. Unfortunately one of the most conspicuous of these easier targets was Jeslyn.
The young Rajiki archer was down to her last two arrows when half a dozen Orcs began advancing rapidly toward her. She doubted, even if she could have lined them up perfectly, that her short bow could have made two consecutive three-in-one kill shots. She had practiced such trick shooting, as had every Rajiki hunter hopeful, but ideal trick shots on a target range was a far cry from the moving chaos of a live battle. Whatever else was about to happen, she knew the first two closing on the wagon would learn the deadly bite of Rajiki arrows.
Jeslyn loosed her last two shafts at the two closest enemies—one into the eye of the first Orc and the other into bare chest of the second. Hopefully whatever passed for an Orcish heart was located in the same place as an Adami one. She was not disappointed as both foes dropped instantly to the ground never to move again. She was in for it now though. Four Orcs were still closing in, and she was out of arrows.
Jeslyn drew a small knife from her belt. It was the kind carried by all Rajiki hunters and used for skinning game. She knew how to use this blade to peel the hides off dead Orcs carefully enough to make the world’s ugliest coats out of them. It would be another thing altogether to use this weapon to fight. This was not something she had practiced. With a bow in hand and arrows in her quiver, she was as confident as any member of the company was. Now, however, with only a skinning knife between her and four trained Orc fighters, her confidence waivered.
Most Rajiki hunters carried strong, reinforced bows with blades attached to the tops and bottoms of the bow arms. The same weapon that made them deadly at a distance could become a double-bladed sword in close combat. Hers, however, was just a practice bow and might be useful for spanking a disobedient child but would not last two moments against the steel blades of the Orcs. For all her bravado, she was in trouble. She felt her heart pound in her chest and her breaths grow shallow. For the first time she could remember, she was afraid.
Suddenly, from the mouth of the ramp came charging Reyas, the trooper who had been assigned to protect her.
“Looks like there is something to do here after all, little miss.”
He brought his sword down on the back of the skull of one of the Orcs felling him with a single blow. The others stopped advancing on the wagon and spun to face this new threat. Three to one odds was a lot to ask of even a veteran trooper, and Reyas was still quite young.
He fought bravely, hacking and thrusting with his sword and using the main gauche in his left hand to parry and block. The troops Tropham had brought were duelists, all specialized in the sword and-dagger-fighting style. They were fast, and all wore light chain armor to allow maximum movement and reduce fatigue in an extended fight. These duelists were trained for one-on-one duels, counting on outmaneuvering and outlasting opponents. Fighting three-to-one was too much for the brave trooper.
He managed to drop another of the Orcs with a quick parry and thrust, but as he delivered the deadly puncture to the Orc’s chest, the others attacked him simultaneously and managed to inflict a gaping wound on his upper left thigh and a wicked gash to his right side. Reyas fell to the ground and the two remaining Orcs cleaved at the downed trooper until he was covered in bloody slashes and ceased trying to struggle to his feet to fulfill his order to defend Jeslyn.
“Reyas!” Jeslyn screamed and forgot all about the danger to herself.
She leapt, knife in hand, from the crippled wagon and rushed toward the two Orcs hacking at the downed trooper. They spun, alert and expecting an attack from some howling amazon warrior but bellowed in amusement at the skinny-limbed, freckle-faced girl charging them holding a small skinning knife in a most unsure manner.
“Hah,” One scoffed in guttural and heavily accented Adami. “How desperate must the ‘dami army be if they are sending their children against us? Da’ Blue M’stic was right. Vict’ry come soon.”
Their amusement was short lived as, from Jeslyn’s left, came a blur of forest green, charging up and silencing one Orc with a thin, curved sword cutting deep into its throat. The other turned to face the verdant-clad menace only to have that same well-wielded scimitar draw a deep gash across its belly. As the dying Orc hit its knees, it saw its entrails spill out higgledy-piggledy upon the ground. The green-cloaked Kylor spun and shot an encouraging smile toward the young archer.
“Looked like you might have needed a hand, Jes.”
The girl was in no mood for a witty reply. She rushed to the fallen trooper, Reyas, and put her hands on either side of his face. He was critically wounded but somehow still clinging to life.
“Don’t you leave me, trooper,” she screamed to the half-conscious Reyas. “You promised to protect me, and this fight ain’t done yet. You can’t die until I or Captain Tropham gives you permission. You hear me?”
A half-hearted smirk came to Reyas’s mouth.
“Kid, I think the mayor of Aton-Ri can hear you. Could you yell at me a little quieter?”
With that, Jeslyn, her face streaked with tears, looked up and saw that toward the front of the caravan, about thirty yards away, Duncan had finished ministering to Captain Gideon. The girl yelled at the top of her lungs.
“Duncan, please hurry! We need you.”
Duncan’s head snapped around at the sound of his shouted name, and with a whisper of encouragement to Thatcher to guard their captain well, he took off running toward Jeslyn and the fallen trooper. As he ran, however, he watched with horror as another half-dozen goblinoids broke away from the battle at the bottom of the ramp and rushed toward Kylor and Jeslyn. They clearly had learned that once one of the caravaneers was isolated, get a group and take them down fast. Jeslyn’s cry for help had sounded like a homing beacon to the opportunistic Orcs.
The squad of Orcs quickly wrestled Kylor to the ground. He managed to kill 0nly one of the six goblinoids charging him before they tackled him. Neither bow nor sword, no matter how expertly wielded, was any use when five enemies grab any part of you they can reach and bear you to the ground under their weight.
Four Orc
s were desperately pinning each of Kylor’s limbs to the ground. The fifth one, actually a Hobgoblin sergeant rather than a regular Orc trooper, sent Jeslyn flying with a vicious backhand as she desperately tried to free Kylor by stabbing one of the Orcs in the shoulder with her skinning knife. The small blade still protruded from the Orc’s left shoulder, but the beast seemed so focused on maintaining his grip on Kylor’s left arm that he didn’t bother to pull it out.
Duncan was still at least ten yards away. Jeslyn lay stunned. Kylor was hopelessly pinned. The Hobgoblin sergeant drew his short sword and drove it into the chest of the downed ranger. Whether from fatigued aim, uncanny luck, or the studs adorning Kylor’s leather armor turning the blade, the wound, while very serious, failed to take the ranger’s life. He cried out in pain at the thrust, but the weight of the collected Orcs was too much for even his adrenaline-filled body to wrestle free. The Hobgoblin, realizing the serious blow was not fatal, pulled his blade out with a spray of blood and raised it for a second killing blow, a blow that never landed.
The Hobgoblin’s head toppled forward separated from his body by the swinging battle-axe of Kylor’s brother, Bardrick. The warrior waded into the Orcs pinning his brother to the ground and was joined moments later by the war hammer of Duncan. The priest’s hammer sunk deeply into the skull of the Orc holding Kylor’s right arm. Jeslyn too had regained her feet and, although she wobbled on shaky legs from the crushing backhand of the now headless Hobgoblin sergeant, she pounced on the back of the Orc whose shoulder still held her skinning knife.
She withdrew it and plunged it repeatedly into the Orc’s neck until he slumped to the ground, learning too late that even a small blade can prove deadly if it strikes true enough or often enough. Between the three of them, they soon dispatched the Orcs on top of Kylor and it seemed, for the moment, no other enemies were interested in engaging the trio. Bardrick looked down at his wounded brother.
“How many times I gotta keep peeling the playground bullies off of you, brother? You really need to learn to fight or something. I ain’t always gonna be around, you know. I got plans.”
Kylor managed a smile through his pain and replied weakly.
“What can I say. I gotta build your self-confidence somehow.”
Duncan assessed, by the fact that he still could manage witty banter with his brother that Kylor’s condition was less serious than it looked.
“Hang tight, lad. I’ll be right back.”
Duncan rushed to attend to the downed trooper, Reyas. His trained eyes knew that Reyas was clinging to life by a thread. He summoned his concentration and fell into a prayer to summon the same powerful oth he used to save Gideon’s life just minutes before. The glow from his hands, which were sweeping over Reyas’s body, was sealing the cuts and gashes that decorated the fallen form of the trooper. Soon he was as stable as Duncan could make him and was out of danger for the moment. That was of course barring any new injuries from the still raging battle around them. Duncan was tiring though and was not sure how much more power was left in him today. He returned to Kylor and began to minister to his wounds.
As Duncan had been healing Reyas and Bardrick stood guard over his brother, Jeslyn retrieved her short bow and began to run around to the many Orcs scattered nearby, which had fallen to her arrows. She gathered up ten of them, and as Duncan stabilized Kylor, Bardrick spoke to Jeslyn.
“Hey, kiddo, can you babysit my brother for a while with those arrows? I got a beef with those Ogres and would hate to miss the chance to bring one of them down.”
Without waiting for an answer or even so much as a look back Bardrick charged toward the ramp and began once again to cleave a path to one of the Ogre commanders he so desperately sought to engage.
At the foot of the ramp Ohanzee had been wreaking havoc with his deadly throwing daggers. His speed and accuracy was unmatched, and each dagger claimed one life. Melizar, who had been watching the deadly dance of the Shade upon the battlefield, did not doubt that if Ohanzee had several more belts of throwing knives, he might have single-handedly dispatched the advancing hoard. Unfortunately, after dropping two dozen of their foes, Ohanzee had emptied his crossed belts of throwing daggers. He then reached for the straight, single-edged short sword swinging from his hip and advanced toward the Ogre shaman who was now only feet in front of the Shade.
The deadliness of the Shade was not lost on the shaman, who began summoning his kashaph powers. The very mountain itself answered his call as tongues of stone erupted beneath Ohanzee’s feet and bound his legs in a deadly grip. At a barked order from the Ogre sub-commander standing near the shaman, a crowd of Orcs and Hobgoblins descended upon the Shade.
He flailed about with his short sword and managed to bring down a Hobgoblin and two Orcs charging him, but being pinned in place by the power of the shaman’s control over the stone, he was soon surrounded and cut down by the vicious goblinoids.
Melizar let out a cry of anger at the felling of his former wagon-mate and began to close on the shaman. Off to the west, he heard a bellowed command from the Cyrian captain, which drew the mage’s attention back to the deadly duel between Xyer Garan and the Qarahni Goldain.
Goldain found himself hard pressed in his duel with the Cyrian. The northerner had always been far and away the better fighter in every battle he fought. Xyer Garan, however, was no average warrior. He was the best Goldain had ever faced, and for the first time in his life, the Qarahni prince was not certain of the outcome of this battle.
Garan was mightier in power than Caleb, Goldain’s third and strongest brother, and yet his quickness with a blade was faster than Dahey, Goldain’s fifth and most nimble brother. Xyer Garan seemed tireless in battle, and while Goldain was already feeling his breath heaving in his chest from the exertion of their duel, the Cyrian was hardly winded at all. It was as though he could fight all day and never tire.
Goldain knew if the battle continued like this that eventually, even with his great strength and stamina, he would become fatigued and slow. Then the giant of a man he faced would end his life. Despite this realization, there was nothing in the northerner’s heart that even understood the meaning of quit, retreat, or surrender. He would fight until the last measure of his strength was expended and he breathed his last.
There was one thing going for him, however. The twisting melody of the bardsong, which continued to ring out over the field of battle, was bolstering his strength and the strength of the caravaneers even as it drained the will and might of the attacking goblinoids. Although Xyer personally, either through strength of will or some other protective magic, seemed unaffected by the bardsong, its effects on the battle were not lost on the Cyrian knight. Xyer Garan looked particularly vexed at the bard’s contribution to the battle. He momentarily pulled his attention away from the northerner and barked an order in the direction of the Ogre commander.
“Gorgag, kill the singer now!”
The Ogre commander answered Xyer’s barked order by turning toward the bard, still sitting on the shattered remains of the supply wagon, and lifted his huge spear in the direction of Rarib. With a mighty throw and grunt from the commander, the large spear hurtled toward the bard. In another moment, the twisting melody, which had graced the battle thus far, came to a grisly and abrupt halt as the Ogre commander’s spear pinned the spindly, homely bard to the remains of the wagon upon which he sat.
The Ogre’s victory was fleeting, however, as he now stood weaponless upon the ramp just as Bardrick and Kohana, both of whom had been deliberately cutting their way toward the commander, set upon the Ogre with flashing steel and hate-filled eyes. The nimble islander used the Ogre’s own bent thigh as a launching platform and sprung upon the commander’s huge shoulders, with his skillfully wielded twin kukri carving their way up the chest and throat of the giant goblinoid. As Kohana went high, Bardrick went low and took the Ogre’s right leg out from under him with a vicious swing of his axe into the bent knee of the commander. The Ogre screamed, half in pain half
in fury, as he tumbled to the ground beneath the determined onslaught of the two fierce warriors. In moments, the commander was on the ground, and seconds later, his life ended. The remaining horde paused and glared in stunned silence as their mighty commander fell before their eyes.
The momentary distraction of the Cyrian was exactly the break Goldain had been waiting for. His mind raced with the implications of Garan having called the Ogre commander by name, but he could not allow this question to delay him seizing the opportunity of this moment. With all the speed and strength he could summon, he took a two-handed grip on his mighty blade and thrust with all his strength straight at the middle of Xyer Garan’s steel-covered chest.
The finely crafted and folded steel of the Qarahni blade, driven by the power and rage of the northern prince, opened a hole in the armor of the huge Cyrian knight. Garan turned his head to face the Qarahni with a look of genuine surprise at the speed of the strike that would end his life. He managed a final scowl of contempt directed at the northerner before he fell with Goldain’s sword still firmly lodged in his chest.
Melizar, seeing Garan fall, reached into his belt pouch and called forth another handful of the small white crystals. He let out a desperate sounding scream as he rushed toward the fallen Cyrian. As he passed the Ogre shaman, who was nearly in a line between himself and the fallen knight, he mumbled under his breath and blew the crystals toward the shaman, whose kashaph had facilitated the death of Ohanzee.
The shaman had no time to react as he froze in his place beneath the powerful kashaph of the half-D’zarik mage. Melizar gave the large, frozen brute a shove with all his strength as he passed, continuing on his way toward the fallen Cyrian. The shaman, tipped off balance by Melizar’s onrush, teetered, tottered, and finally toppled off the western edge of the stone ramp. The Ogre shaman’s ice-encased form shattered into a thousand pieces on the rocky ground below.
Fool's Errand Page 19
