Lord of the Rose

by Doug Niles

  Watching the barbarian army’s movements, the warrior deduced there would be no battle in the morning—or at least, no battle along the lines Caergoth had planned—but that was not his concern. Jaymes had one more appointment with a duke at nightfall.

  He made his way silently down through the pine forest layering the foothills, thinking about his confrontations with Thelgaard and Solanthus. In each case he had been reasonably certain he was going after the man who had ordered the death of Lorimar. But when each man had faced the swordsman’s vengeance, they had pleaded their innocence convincingly enough.

  That left Duke Crawford of Caergoth, the least likely suspect. Jaymes tried to figure out his motives: a Rose lord ordering the removal of another of his order. The duke was secure in the greatest city-state in the plains, the key link between Palanthas and Sanction. Perhaps he couldn’t tolerate the presence of an independent-minded lord on the periphery of his domain … that might be why he hired assassins to kill a noble, and a beautiful young woman.

  Of course, Duke Crawford, too, had wanted to marry Dara Lorimar, Jaymes recalled.

  Possibly it was a mere matter of money. Jealous of du Chagne’s and Rathskell’s massive fortunes, the Duke of Caergoth simply might have coveted a treasure of his own.

  The periphery of the duke’s camp was well-marked, with pickets and bright campfires posted every fifty feet. Along the north edge was the deep ditch and hastily constructed breastwork, so the warrior elected to approach from the south. There were pickets posted everywhere, and entering the camp on foot was foolhardy. In fact, his feet were tired, and he had another idea.

  He picked out a spot where three men stood around a blazing fire, a single horse tethered nearby. Jaymes walked up to them, waving his hand as he came into the glow from the fire.

  “Ho, knights,” he said calmly, as the three men saw him and reflexively reached for their swords.

  “Who goes?” asked one, a sergeant.

  “A friend,” Jaymes said, still approaching at an easy pace. “I come from yonder Garnet, where those bastards up there burned me out. Looking to join up and fight,” he added.

  The guards relaxed a bit. “Reckon we can use another man. Let me send for Captain Reynaud,” the sergeant said.

  “Sure. Or you can tell me where to find him,” the swordsman replied.

  Something in the suggestion must have aroused suspicion. “Wait right here, stranger,” the knight declared. He gestured at the great hilt of Giantsmiter, jutting into view over Jaymes’ shoulder. “While you’re at it, let me have a look at your blade there.”

  The other two pickets had sensed the leader’s sudden wariness and once again placed their hands on the hilts of their swords. The warrior nodded, starting to reach for his sword.

  Instead, he delivered a sharp kick to the gut of the suspicious sergeant, crumpling the fellow to the ground. With two sharp punches he bloodied the noses of the other two guards, before they could draw their weapons. Then he raced over to the horse, pulled the reins, and vaulted into the saddle.

  By then the three guards were shouting, lunging after him, calling for help. Jaymes kicked his heels, and the animal took off like a shot, streaking into the darkness. The warrior lay low across the animal’s neck and heard the pffft sounds of arrows slicing past his ear. In a few seconds he was out of range but allowed the steed to race south until the night had swallowed them.

  A backward glance confirmed that the knights weren’t mounting any pursuit of a lone horse thief, not when they were near ten thousand warriors of Ankhar’s horde. Jaymes circled back to the ruins of Garnet at a trot, and made a solitary camp in the hollow stone frame of a house that had lost its roof to fire.

  Coryn joined him there, emerging from the darkness in a twinkling of sparkles. Placing her hands on his chest, she looked at him with her eyebrows raised questioningly.

  “It looks hopeless,” he said bitterly. “They have the camp and the duke guarded like a sacred vault. I can’t reach him inside there, but he’s the one we seek. I’m certain of it now.”

  She sat down beside him, took one of his strong hands in both of hers. “Crawford has murdered his own wife, you know.”

  His eyes narrowed. “When?”

  “A fortnight ago, perhaps. Claimed it was you, of course.”

  He spat into the darkness. “Do you have a potion … or something that would let me reach him? Invisibility, or something?”

  Coryn shook her head. “If I did, I’m not sure I would give it to you. Even if you found out the truth, you’d never get away alive.”

  “Well, the duke might die tomorrow anyway—along with a lot of other folks.”

  The white wizard shook her head, black hair cascading across her face, tears welling in her eyes. “There is so much good in the knights,” she said softly. “They’re the hope of the future for Solamnia—perhaps for all the world. Why does their order attract such fools?”

  “I was one of those fools, once,” Jaymes said. “Listen, if you have anything that will help me, you’ve got to give it to me!”

  “I told you—even if you made it to the duke, you’d never get out of there alive!”

  He shrugged. “I don’t much care.”

  “I believe you—I known you don’t care. But I do,” she whispered, pulling his head down, bringing his lips to hers. She was shaking as he held her close. They found solace, as so often before, in each other’s arms. Their embrace lasted much longer than their passion, which carried them intertwined to restful sleep, so that they lay together in the roofless house as the stars paled and dawn slowly brightened the sky.

  “My lord—we must pursue! We cannot let Ankhar get away.”

  The urgent speaker was Captain Marckus. Like everyone else in the camp, he had awakened to see the enemy army had almost completely withdrawn from the battlefield. By now there was only a screen of wolf-riding goblins out there, a half mile away, and a few large regiments still marching northward beyond.

  Duke Crawford shook his head, trying to be patient with the exasperating Marckus. He still trembled from the terrifying dream he had been having—his army routed, destroyed, himself spitted upon a huge, green-glowing spear. That vivid image stuck in his mind. Though his eyes were wide open, it was seared into his consciousness. Still Captain Marckus droned on.

  He couldn’t tell Marckus he was staying put because of a dream. He knew that the veteran Knight of the Rose would expect a more logical military explanation.

  “Captain, the evil ones are fleeing before us, fearful even of our shadows. If we can break his army thus, without even the shedding of blood then is not our victory all the more sweet?”

  “This is no victory, lord! It is an opportunity squandered! Who knows where they will go, what mischief they will wreak?”

  “Well, they will wreak no mischief on my army today!” replied the duke smugly. He found himself wishing for a consultation, a soothing prayer from Patriarch Issel, and he regretted his decision to allow the priest to remain behind in Caergoth.

  Marckus snorted, biting his tongue.

  Crawford shrugged. “We offered battle here, and they declined. Captain Reynaud has scouted the nearby hills and assures me there is no danger from that direction. What more proof of our supremacy do you need? Now, I will thank you to obey your lord in this matter. Perhaps there is some area of training or discipline requiring your attention? Captain Reynaud is busy inspecting the catapults. Maybe you can see the horses are fed.”

  “Aye, Lord,” Marckus agreed. “I am sure they are hungry.”

  The bored sentry climbed toward his lonely perch on top of the rocky ridge, one of the lowest and westernmost of Garnet’s foothills. He didn’t like being stationed so far from his fellows—and their cookfires—but his captain had posted him on this ridge in the unlikely event that the enemy tried to make a flanking maneuver through the rough terrain.

  Not that any army could move very fast or easily down there, he thought, looking at the tangle
of rock and scrub pine in the narrow, carved valleys below, a maze of cliffs and deadfalls. Anyone could see how unlikely it was that an army would take this path.

  But he was used to obeying bad orders. He settled on a sun-warmed rock, noting that it was slightly after noonday, and took out the small flask he carried in his belt pouch. There was one advantage to being out here by himself, he acknowledged. No pesky sergeants or officers were around to see him drink his fill!

  He didn’t hear the slightest rustle, much less the goblin that had climbed the cliff below him, quietly pulling a razor-sharp knife from a leather scabbard. By the time the lone sentry had opened his mouth to shout an alarm, the blade was slicing through his throat.

  The only sound that emerged was a dying gurgle.

  The worg riders came down from the mountains in the middle of the afternoon, sweeping like a summer squall, black as oily smoke, piercing the army of Caergoth. They emerged from a series of valleys that were behind the long ditch, the prepared entrenchments, the carefully measured fields of fire for the catapults. The wolves roared in unison as they charged, with thousands of lupine paws pounding the ground simultaneously, and growls and snarls erupting from fanged, drooling jaws.

  They struck the army in its exposed flank, which was anchored on the foothills of the Garnet Mountains. A secure area; a direction from which no army could attack—Captain Reynaud had assured the duke—after his horse had been unable to make headway into the hills.

  Ankhar’s army had threaded through those hills, and all the more impressive, it had done it silently over only a few hours’ time The goblins and their sleek, powerful wolves bypassed the limited roads and trails that restricted the movement of knights and horses. Ankhar’s army had no wagons, no war machines, no baggage except that carried by each barbaric warrior in his small kit. With that startling tactic, they negated every advantage of Caergoth’s meticulous deployment, his steadfast preparation, and the expectations of his veteran officers and boldest captains.

  The wolf-riders were only the first wave of the attack, but they came so suddenly and fiercely that they had spread through half the ranks before the other half even knew they were under attack. Canine jaws tore the throats of men who were looking up from their afternoon chores. Horses were bitten and hamstrung in their corrals, and the great supply wagons of the baggage train were quickly put to the torch, burned by mounted goblins who didn’t even slow down to admire their destructive handiwork.

  Here and there a company of humans stood armed and ready, and these men formed squares of resistance, weapons and shields turned outward, valiantly defending their ground. The lupine cavalry simply gave them wide berth, leaving them for the second wave. Most of Caergoth’s cavalry had been posted on his left, near the open plain. Now these knights rode toward the sound of the fighting, great waves of charging horsemen—and in the process wreaking even worse chaos through the ranks of infantry who were desperately trying to form up along the whole of the reeling front.

  In the wake of the worg riders came the draconians. The reptilian warriors, more than two thousand of them who had joined at the bidding of Cornellus, appeared along the high crests of the foothills. They howled and barked, making a ghastly song of death—then they launched their assault. Though most are incapable of true flight, all draconians can glide, and they used this ability to great advantage. Spreading leathery wings, they embarked from the high ramparts, descending from the heights with terrifying speed. Even in the air they maintained formation, so that they landed in groups of one hundred or more, spreading out through the increasingly confused ranks of Caergoth’s army.

  They shredded the formations of pike and sword. Even in death they wrought havoc: a kapak glided down to perish on upraised spears and, dying, became a shower of acid spilling across a dozen men, blinding, choking, causing unspeakable pain. When a baaz perished it became a statue, and as it fell the killing weapon was frozen into its petrified flesh, torn from the human’s hands to leave the wielder unarmed in the face of the next brutal assailant.

  Goblins and hobgoblins, the great mass of Ankhar’s army, came as the third wave. They poured out of the mountains in seeming infinite numbers. Their archers halted at the periphery, showering the vast camp with deadly missiles. Droves of arrows filled the sky, spilling downward over great swaths of land. In many places the brave squares of defenders, those who had seized weapon and shield and stood back to back with comrades, holding ground, were slaughtered by this deadly shower. If a few arrows went astray, wounded or killed some goblins, that was no matter—Ankhar’s army had many goblins and a limitless supply of arrows.

  The Thorn Knights assembled and rode forward to aid the onslaught. Sir Hoarst and his two comrades delivered a crushing meteor swarm into the midst of Caergoth’s camp, barely missing the duke and his entourage. They sent hailstorms sweeping across the lines, ignited supplies with blazing fireballs, and sent powerful gusts of wind racing, which kicked up clouds of dust that blinded the defenders and further confused the situation.

  Deep into their charge, the leading goblin regiments converged on the great war machines of Caergoth’s army. Brave artillerists were struggling to bring these big weapons into play, pulling up the stakes that had anchored them facing to the north, wheeling the cumbersome devices around so they could face an enemy that was converging from behind. As often as not, by the time these weapons were oriented toward the east a hundred goblins had overrun the crew, butchering those men who tried to stand by their machines, setting fire to the great structures of timber and steel. One did manage to lob a few big rocks against the enemy, only to be shattered by a well-aimed lightning bolt from Sir Hoarst.

  Much of the right wing of the Caergoth army was annihilated, destroyed before the men could even react to the sudden disaster. A few knights and footmen survived by fleeing south, and they never turned back. The pockets of resistance became fewer and fewer. Those groups too small to be efficiently targeted by archery were overrun by the countless goblins who hurled themselves in a rapturous frenzy at the humans.

  Farther from the foothills, the ranks had had more time—the warning of one or two minutes was enough to save a hundred lives—and here whole companies of armored knights deployed quickly under the commands of their veteran captains and sergeants-major. The duke himself fell back to safety, escorted by Captain Marckus and a small detachment of the Ducal Guard.

  Two score knights rode down a regiment of goblins, leaving hundreds of the attackers dead and dying in their bloody wake. These riders pulled back, and more knights joined the first brave but now depleted unit, their horses surging around the blocks of human infantry, the footmen standing in lines and unbreakable squares while more and more horsemen collected. Gradually the rush of Ankhar’s attack slowed, ebbed, and ground to a halt.

  There was cause for some hope. More than half the army had survived the initial attack and had regrouped magnificently, holding a line at right angles to the position it had originally staked out. Captains shouted themselves hoarse, and as the enemy paused—even hardy goblins knew fatigue—the moment arrived.

  Later, no one would remember which captain organized the decisive charge. Reynaud was there, along with several others. Most likely it was everyone, recognizing the enemy’s faltering and their last opportunity. The mounted knights mustered a stirring charge between the ranks of their own infantry, companies overlapping, hundreds of horses starting at a trot, accelerating to a canter, and finally into a mad gallop.

  They surged over the goblins and draconians as though they were sand formations on a beach—and clashed with the worgs, more than a thousand riders on each side. Horses and men, goblins and wolves, bit and gouged, slew and died. There was no semblance of rank or order—it was a cacophony of death, with every steed trying to keep its feet, every rider lashing out to all sides at any and every enemy who came within reach.

  Inevitably in this fight, the heavy horses and their armored riders prevailed against fleet, but small
er and lighter, opponents. At first only a few worgs broke from the fight, then more of them, until at last the whole mass of Ankhar’s cavalry wheeled and streamed away, racing through the broken camp, past the burning catapults and wrecked wagons. Those who could not run away fast enough were ridden down and trampled by the vengeful knights. Even the knights’ horses seemed caught up in the bloodlust as, nostrils flaring and lungs heaving, they bore forward.

  The three Thorn Knights stood firm for a long time, magic spells blazing and crackling against the riders, knocking Solamnic Knights from their saddles, destroying horses. But they were unable to break the great charge, and when the line of armored cavalry smashed through, Sir Hoarst teleported to a Garnet hilltop. His two fellow mages, however, were trampled and stabbed.

  Now, at last, the tide seemed to have turned. The wolves and their riders fled headlong in a route the knights could not follow for very long, back toward the foothills. They sped into a narrow valley, a steep cut between two frowning cliffs. The wolves bounded and leaped and loped on the rough ground, climbing slowly up from the plain, and the knights, crowded together, came after. The Solamnics hacked at the stragglers, as the rougher ground took its toll on wolves and horses both.

  At last the goblins and their canine steeds turned and made a stand, and the horsemen converged on them, packed so tightly between the two cliffs that they could barely move, they could only press ahead. The goblins dismounted, took up positions on large boulders and in narrow draws. Still the horsemen plodded on, packing into the valley, knights and their horses frantic for vengeance.

  It was then that Ankhar sprang his greatest trap. The half-giant materialized atop one of the highest cliffs, hefting a huge boulder in his hands. Raising the heavy stone over his head, he cast it into the first of the tightly packed ranks of mounted knights. Two men and a horse died under that massive boulder.