The Archer From Kipleth (Book 2)

by K. J. Hargan

  Stralain, the first captain of the Weald army, organized a system whereby the first and third rows were for traversing from north to south, and the second and fourth rows for traversing the opposite direction. With the system in place, they had a constant stream of the hardier men and women moving goods and weapons over to the south bank of the Bairn River.

  On the south bank of the Bairn River, Alrhett stopped two young ladies.

  “Kindoll! Prensy!” Alrhett cried. “I haven’t seen you in moonths. How have you fared?”

  “We have been well, My Queen,” Kindoll curtsied.

  “It is good to see you, My Queen,” Prensy curtsied.

  “The matters of the court have been too much for me,” Alrhett said. “I have neglected those who have helped and been kind to me.” Alrhett looked into the faces of the two young women whose husbands gave their lives to protect her.

  “Every day I am grateful for the sacrifice and protection your husbands gave to me in a dire time of need. Drepaw and Matclew are ever in my thoughts. But what of your mother by marriage, Meybonne? Where is she?”

  Kindoll and Prensy lowered their eyes.

  “She barely lasted two moonths after the death of her sons,” Kindoll quietly said.

  “And I was never told?” Alrhett said with polite anger. Then, Alrhett gathered herself. “I have need of good, honest wealdkin such as yourselves.” Alrhett took an ornate bracelet from her wrist and gave it to Kindoll. “See here, this is the signet of the crown, a house borne in the arms of an oak. This makes you both Ladies of the Court, and the equal to any Lord. I need you to go south into Harvestley as quickly as you can and organize the wealdkin there. The elderly, infant, and infirm keep furthest to the west. Send those who can fight to Byland in the east, and those who are strong but unable to fight must be behind the warriors, for support. Can you do this for me?”

  Kindoll and Prensy both curtsied.

  “It will be done, My Queen,” Kindoll said. And, the two young Ladies of the Court hurried south to carry out their queen’s wishes.

  Alrhett looked back out on the swollen Bairn River with the four, long, precarious chains of boats and the soldiers creeping along the makeshift bridges. She felt a desperation even more hopeless than when the humans defended Wealdland at the Battle of the Eastern Meadowland.

  Halldora wearily led the elderly, infirm and orphaned of Reia along the road on the northern banks of the Bairn River. The motley group of humans would soon reach New Rogar Li late in the day. The few remaining humans of Alfhich had joined them. Their numbers swelled as they trudged eastward. Stray humans from all over Wealdland continued to join the trek to New Rogar Li. Word had gotten out. It seemed every human in Wealdland was now headed east, every human except the people of Reia. Halldora frowned to herself. She had failed miserably. She had gone to Reia to enlist the warriors of the Green Hills, and instead she had witnessed their king killed, and their great city deserted in fear.

  Halldora wiped the mud from her cheek. Trudging through the banks of melting snow was just disheartening. She hoped her daughter, Frea, was safe. She wanted to sit and have a good cry, but the swelling throng of humans looked to her for guidance, and she would be strong for them, if not for herself.

  Halldora thought about the events of the morning, the strange, frightening garonds the Archer and the elf had killed, how the elf had acted so strangely, suddenly shoving through the growing mob of humans, searching for someone.

  The Archer had warned her that New Rogar Li was evacuating and she pushed her slow parade of humans as fast as she could.

  Someone shouted, and the roofs of New Rogar Li could be seen in the fading light of the winter day. The long line of refugees picked up their pace, hopes of welcoming hearths in the city foremost in their minds.

  The city was eerily silent. The mud filled streets of the sprawling new town were caked with numerous tracks of the inhabitants who had fled the city with haste.

  “Hello!?” Halldora cried out. There was no answer, but the soft, cold wind.

  The mass of people who followed her began to fill up the main street.

  “They’ve already left,” an elderly woman said.

  “Then we follow them,” Halldora said with determination. “South, everyone. South to the river!”

  The quiet shuffling of the refugees echoed off the walls of the houses and halls of New Rogar Li. No one spoke, their hopes dashed and nearly gone.

  The sun had nearly set when Halldora arrived at the north bank of the Bairn River, leading hundreds of humans.

  The soldiers of the Weald were nearly finished transporting the last of their food and weapons across their makeshift bridge.

  Halldora saw a person who she thought was Alrhett on the far bank, waving at her.

  The wealdkin grumbled a bit, but were resigned to helping the new multitude of stragglers from all over Wealdland cross the Bairn River.

  With the traffic on all four makeshift bridges now flowing to the south, the crush of people were soon almost completely carried safely across.

  Halldora had waited until the last, helping the weakest make their way onto the chain of lashed boats. She could see Alrhett, understanding, but impatient to greet her on the other side.

  The last of the refugees made their way onto the rocking lines of boats. Relieved, Halldora climbed onto a boat and began climbing over the gunwales of the lashed boats. It was tiring climbing over the edges of the bumping boats, climbing over fittings and rigging to climb over the far gunwale into the next boat.

  Halfway across, the men in the farthest east line of boats began shouting. Halldora looked from the north bank to the south bank, expecting to see garonds attacking, breaking from the trees. Then she realized they were pointing down into the water.

  Three long, dark shapes swam just underneath the water, wriggling, undulating like huge, rotund serpents. The shadows moved quickly, powerfully against the current.

  Halldora knew, instantly, what they were.

  “Vyreeoten,” Halldora gasped in horror. “Get out of the boats!” Halldora cried. “Get to either shore, whichever is quickest! Just get off the water! Now!”

  The humans began scrambling for the south shore. Halldora saw it would be best for her to go back to the north shore, with at least thirty men in front of her. She desperately clawed her way over boat after boat, as the increasing shouts and cries of terror filled her ears.

  She was two boats away from making it back to the northern shore when she felt the water spray her back. The surge of the beast rising, violently out of the water pitched the boat she was in hard to its side. Halldora went down to the floorboards of the small boat. She heard the shrieks of a man being rent to death as she raised her head.

  A horse headed vyreeoten coiled out of the water and had shattered the lashed line of boats. The vyreeoten was chewing a man it had snatched from the makeshift bridge. He was the man who was just before her. If she hadn’t turned back, she would have been in the vyreeoten’s jaws.

  Halldora overcame her shock and clambered over the last two boats, back to the rocks and pebbles of the northern shore.

  Halldora watched in horror as the long, sinewy arms of the vyreeoten pulled at the legs and arms of the man in its bloody mouth.

  Halldora looked around. She was the only one who climbed back to the northern shore. She was alone. All the other humans had fought their way to the southern shore.

  Halldora knew the vyreeoten could easily snake their way onto dry land, but she watched in numbness as the other two vyreeoten smashed the other lines of boats, making it impossible for her to cross the Bairn River here.

  Halldora roused herself and ran as fast as she could to the west.

  Ravensdred woke with a snarl and whipped his way out of the modest leather tent he had been assigned.

  A guard outside his tent gibbered in garondish that he was to immediately meet with the council of generals.

  Council of Generals.

  Council o
f Idiots was more like it, Ravensdred thought as he stretched his massive body. The guard was insistent, so Ravensdred backhanded him hard enough to leave him unconscious.

  Ravensdred picked up his club. Club. It was a huge, oak tree branch, only slightly shaped to accommodate his expansive claws. The club felt good in his hands as he leisurely strode towards the tall, ornate tents which were once his, the tents that housed the Council of Generals.

  Ravensdred looked out on the army of garonds massed on the furthest western edge of the Far Grasslands. Much of the army spilled onto Byland. There were three times the number of garonds as he had at the Battle of the Eastern Meadowland. There had been a great push to recruit and train every garond that could be found.

  If I had this army, Ravensdred thought to himself, the Battle of the Eastern Meadowland would have turned out much, much differently.

  It was estimated that they had close to a million garonds. Their best guess was that there was barely two hundred thousand humans left to defend Byland.

  The reians, numbering possibly in the hundreds of thousands, had chosen to flee to the western most shore of their land.

  Wise, Ravensdred thought to himself, considering the slaughter to come. They only needed the order from the Dark Lord of All Evil Magic.

  Ravensdred smirked to himself. He knew Deifol Hroth. He knew what darkness truly dwelt in his heart.

  We serve him out of fear, masked as love, Ravensdred thought as he approached the stern faced garond generals dressed in their black and silver armor.

  The center most garond general began to berate Ravensdred for his lateness.

  “I will not be schooled,” Ravensdred muttered to himself as he hefted the heavy tree branch club off his shoulder.

  “I am Ravensdred!” He bellowed as he swung the club with all his might.

  Ravensdred was twice the size of any garond, and stood a head taller than most humans, who were, on the average taller than any garond. Ravensdred was in the prime of his years, there was not an ounce of fat on his muscle ripped body. Ravensdred’s arms were the size of most humans' legs, his shoulders wide enough for a human to comfortably stand on either side of his enormous head.

  The monolith of a club splattered the first three garonds in a shower of dark blood and pulverized tissue.

  The other two garond generals stared in shock, and so had no time to defend themselves.

  Ravensdred dropped his club and simply reached out for the head of the next garond general. A laughing sneer played across his face as he crushed the general’s skull beneath his closing right claw.

  The last general had the sense to try to draw his sword. But, he only got it halfway out of his scabbard as Ravensdred snatched his throat with his left paw. The last garond general continued to futilely try to draw his sword as Ravensdred put his right hand on the general’s shoulder. Then with a quick rip, the last garond general’s head came off like a flower bulb.

  Blood spattered, Ravensdred turned to face the rest of the garond army’s captains and warriors.

  The faces of the army were shock, then vicious delight and happiness, as the garond army shrieked their approval of the return of their bloody War General, Ravensdred.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The Archer From Kipleth

  The Archer and the elf rode hard to the west all day. They rode on the trail that followed the northern banks of the Bairn River. The Westernway Road would have been easier and smoother. But that road was south of the Bairn, and impossible to get to unless you had a boat that could carry a horse.

  To their right, and to the north, the Eastern Meadowland stretched out flat in a wide expanse of snow and dead grasses. The backs of grazing animals could be seen in the distance, scratching through the thin crust of snow for the fodder needed to help them survive until spring. It was said on a night with no moonlight, the ghosts of human soldiers and garond warriors played out the bloody battle fought here in the vast meadow only a year ago.

  As they came over a rise, the elf stood up on her horse to get a better look at the trail ahead. The Archer caught his breath. He hated when she did that. A fall from this speed would break her neck. The elf balanced easily on the horse’s rocking back.

  “There’s a great mass of humans ahead!” The elf shouted over to the Archer. Derragen grimly nodded. He didn’t expect trouble from humans. He hoped it was the warriors of Reia come to aid the human defense of Byland.

  “I see Halldora!” The elf said as she shaded her keen eyes.

  Hope swelled even greater in the Archer’s breast until they rode close enough to see the sad congregation of refugees numbering in the hundreds.

  The Archer and the elf stopped before Halldora.

  “Sogi’an!” The elf called as she leapt from her horse, and landed light as a feather.

  “Greetings,” Halldora said, “from the left behind and outcast of Reia.”

  “Then the soldiers of Reia will not help us?” The Archer asked.

  Halldora simply shook her head.

  “Where do you lead these people?” The elf asked.

  “To New Rogar Li,” Halldora replied.

  “You’d best move quickly,” the Archer said. “They mean to evacuate the whole city, to the south, to Harvestley.”

  “If only we had crossed the Bairn where it was passable,” Halldora frowned.

  “Do not spend any time tracing back your steps,” the Archer said. “Besides, your path would lead you once again close to the citadel of Deifol Hroth.”

  “Where was it?” Halldora asked with fear.

  “Do you remember a valley filled with unnatural mists that never cleared?” The elf asked.

  “Yes,” Halldora said. “Not too far from Alfhich, between the Burnie and Madronwy rivers.”

  “Near the Syrenf River, His citadel lies hidden in those mists,” the Archer said. “Count yourself fortunate you were not attacked.”

  The elf froze as if she had seen a ghost. She then began pushing into the crowd of humans.

  “Iounelle!” The Archer cried. “What is it? What do you seek?”

  The elf paused searching the faces of the throng.

  “I thought I saw Apghilis,” the elf whispered to the Archer. Then the elf approached Halldora. “It’s best to push as fast as you can to New Rogar Li.” Then, the elf whispered to Halldora, ”be wary of those who travel too close behind.”

  Halldora nodded and raised her hand to continue the march, but a shrieking stopped her.

  The murmurs of horror ran through the crowd like wild fire.

  “Those are garonds,” the Archer said.

  The Archer and the elf quickly mounted their horses. Halldora ran behind them to see if she could help.

  From the south, dripping wet from having somehow swam across the Bairn River, three monstrous garonds loped towards the mass of refugees.

  Halldora was horrified to see that the garonds were misshapen into weird forms.

  The elf, standing on her galloping horse’s back, drew the Moon Sword of Berand Torler.

  “Síod,” the elf whispered to herself. “Be careful,” she called over to the Archer. “These garonds are deformed by black magic.”

  The Archer and the elf dismounted and sent their horses back for safety. They shifted their feet in the earth, readying their stances for battle.

  One of the garonds appeared to have two torsos, one connected on top of the other, that swiveled wildly in the middle.

  The middle garond had five arms sprouting from all around its mid section, three in the front, two in the back.

  The last garond had unnaturally long legs. This garond also had what appeared to be large bird talons instead of hands.

  All three swung metal maces, more refined and deadlier than the usual wooden club of the garond.

  The Archer peppered the garond with the long legs three times in the face, with bronze arrows. The creature was still able to spring a long distance before it fell dead at the Archer’s feet. Its weird, dying
talons clutched at the Archer, as it bubbled black blood.

  The garond with five arms, each holding a club, spun at the elf, a barrage of lethal strokes. The elf whirled the Moon Sword, slicing off arm after arm as they rotated towards her. The many armed garond stood, helpless bleeding from five gushing stumps.

  The elf turned just in time to see the double torsoed garond tower over her, it’s club poised for an overhand death smash. The creature shrieked and shrugged with the start of the strike, but suddenly froze as an arrow jutted out from between its eyes. The Archer had shot it in the back of the head.

  The garond with the articulated torso sputtered and gurgled, still trying to kill. The elf jumped, spinning, and cut the creature exactly between the connected torsos with one slice. The top and bottom halves kicked and clutched with awful dying spasms.

  The Archer and the elf looked at each other. They walked back to get their horses, being held by Halldora.

  “Make for New Rogar Li, as fast as you can,” the Archer said between heavy breaths.

  Halldora didn’t need any other convincing.

  “To New Rogar Li!” She bellowed and the march resumed double time behind her.

  The Archer looked to the elf.

  “We can cross the Bairn, just a short ride to the east,” he said.

  “Are you asking me if I want to go?” The elf calmly said. “Are you suggesting we will find more of these evil things and worse?”

  The Archer slowly nodded.

  “Since the death of all my people,” the elf quietly said, “I have devoted myself to vengeance. Now I see my fight is more than that. I have more skill and strength than any human. I must use what I am to fight the darkness. I must be a beacon in the night. This monstrous evil will not continue, not while I still draw breath.”

  The Archer smiled, his love for the last elf of Lanis was never greater in this moment. He mounted his horse. She leapt up on hers.

  They were about to spur their horses on when a shouting from behind stopped them.

  “Wait! Wait!” Stavolebe cried riding furiously up to the elf and the Archer. “Wait for me. I am ever by your side.”