More sounds of screaming and of battle drew his eyes toward the main camp, and he saw hundreds of men, women and children running in his direction. Some were fleeing into the woods, and most of them were as ill-dressed for the cold as he was. Behind the fleeing people he saw first only the mist and falling snow, but then a figure materialized, and beside it other figures, huge and swift moving giants clad in armor. Each of these giants was larger than the Earthspeaker, and he was the largest man Marein had ever seen.
When the people stumbled or fell the giants struck them down with spears, swords or axes much larger than any a Cthochi would use. Some of those running past his tent had blood in their hair or were cradling injured limbs.
Marein watched for a moment as Hurls Lightning, one of the Ghaill’s picked warriors, ran toward the line of giants with spear in hand. The warrior’s spear struck the giant in the chest, but the haft snapped and the spear seemed to do it no hurt. A moment later the giant swung a giant flail, and the iron ball at the end of its chain smashed into Hurls Lightning’s skull. There was a horrible splash of blood and brains, and Marein clearly heard the pock sound of the impact.
If such a warrior as Hurls Lightning could not stand against such a giant, Marein certainly could not, so he did what he thought was the next best thing. Gathering his courage, he sprinted across the line of giants, narrowly avoiding the swing of a gigantic sword, and threw himself into the drumspeaker’s station, an open-walled space over which a roof of hide had been pitched to keep the drumhead dry. Desperately he snatched up the talking mallet and began rattling out a message. He only managed a few desperate lines before he heard the sound of titanic footsteps crushing the snow behind him.
He did not feel the blade that cut off his head.
“You sheepheaded fool!” Splitnose shouted at Graydog, the ogre who had let the half-naked boy get past him and bang on the drum for so long. “That will bring all of their warriors.”
“Hah!” Shouted Mansmasher beside him. “Leave Graydog alone. Let the pigsuckers come. That is the whole idea. We came to kill the warriors.”
Graydog cringed and skulked away, looking for more Auligs to kill. Splitnose looked at the camp, and in every direction ogres were knocking down tents, catching runners and killing them, or throwing things in the central fire. Hammers came running up, and both of his stone hammers were covered with blood, as was most of his armor. He was grinning.
“A fine bloody day.” He said cheerfully. “Fresh meat and slags for all.” The screaming had not died down behind the ogre advance, for they were taking some of the women captive, but only the nice fat ones. They would have their pick of slags after this battle.
Gutcrusher came striding up, and Balls was beside him as usual. “What are you lot standing around for?” The king demanded. “They’re running east. We run east after them. I mean to clear the lot of them, so get cracking!”
The ogres leaped to obey, the line reformed, and they began moving eastward, carried on pumping legs with the cold wind behind them. In their wake was death and ruin, and the snow was trampled into the black earth where it wasn’t stained red with blood.
In the great tent of the Ghaill of Ghaills the Earthspeaker held up his hand, and all fell silent. A distant drum spoke rapid and panicked words in the Cthochi drum, for Marein had not mastered the common, and when the drumming stopped, Maltam of the Red Water Cthochi leaped to his feet. “Treachery!” He shouted. “While we sit at parley the butcher general attacks!”
“It’s not him!” Tuchek shouted, leaping to his feet. “It’s something else. Those drums came from the west. Think, Maltam. There’s no way he could have a force west of here.”
“The west.” The Earthspeaker said. “That is the Gold Creek Camp.” He turned quickly to his warriors, who were scrambling to their feet and reaching for weapons. “Assemble all of the warriors who are near. We must see to this attack.”
“It is the doom of which I warned you!” Jecha said suddenly, having risen herself at his first words. “You must take your people across the Redwater.”
The Earthspeaker looked at her for a moment, then shook his head. “I am in the midst of a war camp with a mighty host of warriors at my call. I will not flee from one drumspeaker’s half message.”
Even as he finished speaking another series of drumbeats sounded, and these seemed closer. “It is the common drum.” Tuchek said. “It is a camp of the Faith Islanders. They are attacked.”
“Ghaill, please.” Jecha said, her voice imploring. “Tell your people to flee.”
“We cannot flee, Jecha.” He replied. “We must offer battle. If it is the son of the griffin he will regret this.” His warning was directed at Tuchek, but the man was not listening. He was listening instead to the drums.
“It is not the Mortentians.” He declared flatly.
“What is it?” Jecha demanded. “I don’t know your drums.”
“Monsters.” Tuchek replied, and every eye was on him. “They say it is monsters.”
Jecha watched in panic as the Earthspeaker and his picked war leaders gathered their weapons and one by one left the tent. Before the Ghaill of Ghaills could leave she grabbed his arm. “Listen to me, Earthspeaker. If you will not flee, tell Eskeriel to take the women and children and go. A precaution, if you like. Let us flee across the river.”
“He smashed my boats, woman.” The Ghaill said impatiently, nodding toward Tuchek. “We could never get them all over, even if the son of the griffin would allow it. But get them ready and go if I do not return.” Then he hefted his great axe and smiled, and his voice became a bit warmer. “I’ll be back, Jecha. I fear no monsters.”
“Fool.” Jecha muttered after he had left, but her voice was sad, not bitter. “Allein, help me to gather the people. It is your doing that they are not ready for this. Help us to cross the river.”
Tuchek spoke up then. “The Earthspeaker is right. We cannot get them across the river here. But I know a way. We must cross at Redwater Town.”
“Redwater Town is a day’s march from here.” Allein complained. “Including the time needed to break camp, we cannot hope to get there before tomorrow night. There is a blizzard, and many may not survive the passage.”
“Tell them to gather only what they can carry.” Jecha said firmly. “They are running for their lives. They cannot take more. Allein, hurry. They will listen to you!”
“I am not fearing of monsters myself.” Derbas-Al-Dhulma said, and his voice sounded almost cheerful. “I have seen many in my time. Rashad and I will go and see what manner of monsters this strange land offers.”
“Then you are also a fool.” Jecha said to the Araqueshi wizard. “But go. And with the help of your foreign gods come back alive so that you can tell us what you see.”
“Are you sure we must run?” Tuchek asked Jecha, but then, as if in answer, another series of drumbeats sounded. Tuchek turned pale, to the extent that was possible for the swarthy Aulig. “It is the Faith Island drummer again. Their camp has fallen.”
“Do you believe me now, Eskeriel? It is the augury. The true one. Now is the time you must lead your people.” After a moment Tuchek nodded.
“To Redwater Town, then.” He said. “But not you, Jecha. There are still a few boats on this shore. Go with your assassins to Northcraven, and don’t tell me that’s not what they are. We don’t have time for lies. Talk to Aelfric. Explain what is happening. You will need to get his permission for the crossing of the Redwater.” When she hesitated his voice became firm. “Go, woman! Now!”
She scurried from the tent and found Yeg and Derry. “Come boys, we have a mission.”
Derbas-Al-Dhulma walked beside Rashad, and they were bundled up tight against the cold. They kept a casual pace, for they knew that whatever the drums portended would wait for them. Their two bodyguards, the ones Jecha had called ‘the moustaches’, trailed them at a respectful distance, but moved up from time to time when danger seemed to offer. “What do you suppose it is?” Ras
had asked, once Derbas had explained in Araqueshi all that had transpired in the tent. “Dragons?”
“Hmmph.” Derbas grunted. “Dragons indeed. There are no dragons in this country. They need to breathe the Art to live. There is not power enough here to sustain them. No, more likely it is trolls or goblins or some such.” More drums were rattling in the distance, sending messages that neither of them could understand. Warriors were running past them toward the west, kilts swirling and armor gleaming dully in the falling snow.
“Do you have sufficient of the Art to sustain us?” Rashad asked nervously.
“I have been practicing, Rashad. There is sufficient of the realm of Seeing that I may be of some use. We shall see. Besides, as the Earthspeaker said, they have a mighty host here.” It was bitter cold, but for the first time since coming to this primitive and beknighted land, Derbas didn’t seem to notice it. With the snow falling and swirling now in thick gusts, it was hard to see more than a hundred paces ahead, and snow was trickling down between his cloak and his jacket, and some was melting and dripping down his back.
“This reminds of a windstorm in the Sea of Sand. I can’t see more than a few yards.” Rashad said. More drums, now coming from both the left and the right of them. Women and children were now coming toward them, fleeing in the opposite direction from theirs, running toward the Redwater River and the Earthspeaker’s camp, now a quarter of a league behind them. They had been walking for some time.
“It is like that, but unlike also.” Derbas mused. “At least there is not grit in my nose. I just wish it weren’t so cold. Imagine all of this water falling in Araquesh. They would think it the end of the world.”
Rashad was about to laugh, but he had noticed a change in the composition of those fleeing from whatever lay ahead. Warriors were now among those fleeing, and some of them were wounded. The moustaches now moved up in front of them, looking wary. Perhaps half a league ahead, although it was hard to tell in all of this snow, the sound of the clash of arms reached them. Then the shouts and screams of men in battle. Still they could not see what was ahead.
A large Cthochi with his hair in braids staggered by them, and only a bloody stump remained of his right arm. He was bleeding profusely, and his blood left a trail in the snow that was very straight. Rashad tried to stop him to offer first aid, but there was no stopping the Aulig. His eyes were panicked as he shrugged away from Rashad’s reaching arms, and he stumbled past them. He was wearing a leather tunic that had been dyed purple and a leather headband.
“You think this is a good idea, Derbas? This is as close to battle as I would like to go.”
“I want to get a look at these monsters, Rashad.” Derbas’ voice was infuriatingly calm. Then he turned to Rashad and winked. “Don’t worry cousin. I will take care of you.”
When finally they reached a place where they could look over the fighting, Rashad was shocked at what they saw. Less than two hundred paces below the little hill upon which they stood was a broad draw, wide enough for great armies to clash in, and there the battle, to the extent you could call it that, was taking place.
They had expected to see the Earthspeaker’s men arrayed in formal battle lines, but there were no lines. It was plain that the Cthochi had attempted to make shield walls, but every place where it appeared they had tried to make a stand, the armored giants that waded among them had simply plowed over them, leaving shattered shields and wounded and dead Cthochi lying. Rashad quickly realized that there was no battle line, and that in no place were the Cthochi holding.
Instead a great milling mass of brown and white that was the Cthochi was, through sheer force of numbers, holding back a much thinner line of black that was the ogres. Rashad and Derbas recognized them for what they were, of course, having seen them before in the great land west of here, but never so many, and certainly never so well armed. The gigantic ogres were patiently plowing into the mass of the Cthochi, and everywhere they went they drove wedges through that mass, leaving a blood spattered wake of slaughtered warriors behind them.
Cthochi archers lined the battlefield, and they shot into the ogres at will, using iron tipped arrows and thick kraken bone bows or long and deadly Cthochi ones, but the ogres ignored the missiles, and very rarely did they seem to have any effect at all. Rashad saw one ogre shaking his head and pawing at the front of his open-faced helmet, for he had an arrow in his eye, but for every ogre that seemed wounded on the field there were at least a score of dead Cthochi.
“They cannot hold.” Derbas very quickly determined. “They have no chance.”
“No.” Rashad replied. “But they won’t stop fighting. They know that only they stand between these monsters and their women and the camp. We should go. We have seen what we needed to.”
“I think they could use my help.” Derbas said. “I cannot stop them, but I might be able to buy them some time.”
Just then Rashad saw a mighty figure rise up from among the Cthochi, a giant of a man wearing a plate mail gorget and skirt of steel scales. He was carrying a massive two-handed axe, and his helmet was round with a faceplate. It was the Ghaill Earthspeaker, and he was in a fury, desperate to halt the inexorable advance of the ogres.
Gutcrusher did not know it, but the place where they did battle was called Big Elk Draw by the Cthochi, and even their elders did not remember why. When the armor clad figure ran forward from the mass of Cthochi and offered battle, Gutcrusher roared aloud in his mighty voice. “King’s Band!” He yelled. “Hold!”
After a few desultory blows the ogres stopped their remorseless slaughter and stood, mindless of the Chtochi arrows which were still pinging and bouncing off of their armor. Even the Cthochi archers stopped firing to watch the encounter between the Ghaill of Ghaills and the two ogres who strode forth to meet him.
“I have him.” Ironspike said, but Gutcrusher growled.
“He’s mine, Spike.” When Ironspike took another step forward Gutcrusher turned to him and shouted. “I said MINE. Stop!” Ironspike reluctantly stopped walking, and Gutcrusher walked forward into the gap that had formed between the two armies.
“Are you some kind of chief?” Gutcrusher demanded of the armored man, who stood nearly as tall as a Vesthan. Still Gutcrusher towered over him.
“I am the Ghaill Earthspeaker.” The man replied, and a quiet fell over the two armies, and his voice could be clearly heard. “Why have you attacked my people?”
“Forfeit.” Gutcrusher replied, for they spoke nearly the same language. “This land is forfeit for trespass. You pigsuckers crossed the Bone and kilt whelps. That is forbid since ancient days, chief. I come to take forfeit for the Muharl you wronged.”
“We have not attacked your people.” The Earthspeaker replied, for he did not know of the efforts his men had made to bring in the autumn herds.
“LIAR!” Gutcrusher roared back at the man. “You lie. Two times you pigsuckers has crossed the Bone and done murder in my lands, and I warned you of it. I come for justice, and the penalty is forfeit. I claim all this land that was yours for the Muharl, and I claim death for all of your people. You run now and some of you might live.”
But the Ghaill did not know of the wrongs that his people had done to the Muharl, nor would he have found the penalty proportionate to the harm if he had. What he did know was that his beleaguered army was all that stood between these monsters from the abyss and his camp. In answer he slapped down the faceguard of the helmet his men had taken from Sir Munith Vanketer, had he known, and he hefted his axe. Many were the enemies this axe had claimed, for both his father and grandfather had used it. Kerrick the Sword saw what his chief intended and moved up to guard his flank.
With a roar the Ghaill of Ghaills leapt forward, and he swung his mighty axe once, twice, and then three times. Gutcrusher deflected the first blow with his shield, parried the second with his blacksteel mace and took the third blow on his heavily armored left shoulder. The axe blow surprised him with its force, but the weapon was not made to cut thr
ough steel that was forged in the smithies of the Black God.
His answering blow crushed the Earthspeaker’s ribcage and stopped his heart, and when the Ghaill of Ghaills fell Gutcrusher jumped on top of him, screamed a bloody war cry, and the ogres crashed into the reformed Cthochi line. He ripped the helmet from the Earthspeaker’s head, and then used the Ghaill’s own axe to cut the head from the body. A storm of arrows bounced off of his armor.
The Cthochi line had been thrown back, and Kerrick was swept back with it. He was powerless to prevent the despoliation of his Ghaill. Kerrick was simultaneously weeping and fighting when Wolf’s gladius punched through his chainmail and disemboweled him.
Suddenly a mist arose around the Cthochi, and there were monsters in the mist, a great host of ghastly trolls with bloody dripping fangs and claws. Their eyes were as dark as pits. These trolls leaped forward into the ogres, and Gutcrusher watched his front line crumble before the assault, and the Cthochi took heart.
For several minutes the trolls had their way with Gutcrusher’s forces, and an even dozen of his front line warriors fell. He saw Hammers fall, and the troll above him seemed to ignore the blade even of Wolf, who jumped to Hammers’ defense. Gutcrusher squinted and shook his head in disbelief. What could stand to a blade that had killed a god? Then he saw.
“Lies!” He shouted. “More lies. There’s no snow on them fornicating trolls.” When those around him heard, they saw that what he said was true, and the spell that had created the trolls was broken. With a roar of fury at having been tricked, the ogres redoubled their assault, and the snow ran black with blood and spattered Cthochi brains and offal. The trolls faded into the misty curtain of falling snow.
“It was a good effort.” Rashad told Derbas. “Trolls from the Black Mountains?”
“I saw some once in the Ghoul Pass.” Derbas replied. “I did not think of the snow. We have no snow in Araquesh.” His voice was apologetic.
War of the Misread Augury: Book One of the Black Griffin Rising Trilogy Page 139
