Into the Forge hc-1

by Dennis L Mcciernan

  "Someone comes."

  Now Tip stood and strung arrow to bow.

  But soft came a signal: a faint chirrup, and Vail came slipping among the saplings. " 'Tis done. Elon stands watch in place of the lower sentry."

  "Well and good," said Lyra, getting to her feet. "I will return soon." She stepped to her horse and untied the reins and led it northwesterly through the thicket.

  Vail turned to Tipperton. "Art thou secure, Tipperton?"

  Tip nodded.

  "Then I am off to rejoin Elon. Should come a change of guard, we should stop them. Yet if perchance a Rupt comes here first, thou dost know what to do." At Tip's brief nod, Vail slipped away through the night.

  The buccan sat in the edge of the thicket, peering by the light of a nearly half-moon at the sentry post and hoping he would not hesitate and his own aim would be true should Rflcken relief come.

  Finally he heard a faint jingle of armor and the sound of heavy hooves. And shortly Lyra came slipping through the thicket again, a huge man at her side along with a tiny form.

  It was Durul -and Beau.

  "I just came to see how you were doing, Tip."

  "Me, I'm all right," said Tip. "But I say, what about the wagons?"

  "Oh, they're on the move and should be in position well before dawn."

  "Good."

  And they all sat quietly as the night slipped by, while down in the town torchlight and campfires burned.

  At length the moon set, and still no Rucken relief came.

  Just ere dawn and ignoring the blood and grime, Lyra slipped into the Ruck warder's garb and took up the horn. Then she went to the sentry rock and waited.

  Now Tipperton and Beau and Durul moved to where they could see the road as well as the town.

  In the dimness below they could make out the bowed canvas tops of the wagon train standing in a long line athwart the road, fetching up nigh the flank of a hill in the north and running into a grassy mead on the south. And in full view in the southern sward stood several of the great draft horses, though not nearly as many as were needed to draw all of the wagons.

  Durul turned. "I go to prepare."

  "Me too," said Beau.

  Tipperton nodded. "I'll be ready."

  Durul smiled and looked down at the Waldana. "Keep free of our horses, for doubtless with but one great hoof they could squash either of your tiny steeds."

  Beau shook his head. "Not likely, Durul, we're tiny but quick."

  Durul slipped away into the thicket, heading back toward the waiting vanguard.

  "You keep safe, bucco," said Tip.

  "You too," said Beau, and then he followed Durul away.

  And Tip waited as dawn brightened, the day edging toward sunrise.

  And still the wagon train sat quietly with no stir of movement, as if all were yet asleep.

  The rim of the sun broached the horizon.

  Lyra in Ruchen garb stood and blew the horn, the blats slapping and echoing among the crags. And she clambered atop the rock and blew again, frantically leaping up and down, her arms flailing akimbo as she pointed down at the stationary wains.

  Another sentry farther downslope took up the blaring call, a sentry also in Ruchen garb, yet he stood atop the rock where Vail and Elon had gone.

  Down in the shadows of the vanquished town a stir quickened.

  And Spawn took up cudgels and scimitars and tulwars.

  Foul Folk rushed down through the town and out onto the road to see, and some who had espied the standing train ran back to a roadside building and in.

  And from somewhere within the town another horn blew, and Tip could see several of the Foul Folk stalk from the roadside building and mount waiting horses.

  – Nay! Not horses, but Helsteeds instead!

  Oh, no! It's some of those Ghill things!

  And Tip racked his mind for what he could remember of them: Nearly unkillable. Terrible foe. Wood through the heart and beheading and fire. He could remember no more as the maggot-folk below scrambled into a ragged mass on the road.

  Lyra hopped down from her post and came into the thicket and quickly shucked the Ruchen garb, her nose wrinkled as she did so. "I'll be chasing nits and lice and fleas for weeks can I not get a bath."

  Again the horn blew, and the segment boiled westward, churning toward the waiting merchant train, where plunder and spoils were theirs for the taking as well as great horses for the eating.

  "Come, Tipperton, 'tis time to ride." And Lyra and Tip leapt astride their mounts and rode through the coppice and away.

  As they emerged from the thicket, they saw two other riders appear in the morning light and move toward them. And again they heard the Ruptish horn blat in the distance below. "Ah, it goes well," called Lyra to Vail and Elon, "just as Dara Phais planned."

  From behind a wagon Bwen watched as the Wrg came seething down the Landover Road, cudgels and tulwars and scimitars in hand, Helsteeds with Guula astride in the fore with Rutcha and Drokha coming after.

  She touched the morning star hanging from her belt, then took hold of a rope and called, "Bheith arfuirechas!" and her command was relayed down the line, not only in the Baeron tongue but in Sylva as well.

  Now the Rutchen horn blew again, and the segment spread wide in a long line so as to swarm over all the wagons at once.

  "Go maith!" she grunted under her breath and grinned, for two days back Phais had guessed they would do just that. All was going according to plan.

  Once again the Wrg horn sounded, and with howls and squalls of triumph and baying ululations, the segment charged past the Helsteeds, past the Ghuls and their blowing horns, tulwars and scimitars and cudgels raised to smash down stupid merchants.

  "Ullmhaigh, ullmhaig…" Bwen called and gripped the rope all the tighter, "fan, fan…"

  And the long line of Wrg hurtled closer and closer, Helsteeds in their midst…

  "Fan…fan…"

  Howling, shrieking, the Spawn were nearly on top of the train…

  And the ground shook from the hammer of heavy hooves.

  "Anois!" shrieked Bwen, hauling on a rope with all her strength. "Anois!Anois!"

  And everywhere along the line Baeron haled on ropes, and canvas was pulled up and across the arched wagon bows to reveal the Dylvana archers, arrows nocked, bows drawn taut -Ssssss… a sleet of arrows sissed forth all up and down the line, whispering of death in their flight, the trace of their fatal sounds unheard in the cries of the charging foe and lost in the thunder of heavy hooves Waugh! cried a thousand Rupt voices, their shouts of triumph turning to shrieks of fear as arrows slammed into their ranks, hundreds to tumble down, dead as they hit the ground.

  Ssssss… hissed another hail of shafts, and more Spaunen fell as they tried to turn and flee -but then the column of heavy horses running four abreast smashed into and over and past fleeing foe as Baeron on their massive mounts thundered down the length of the ragged file of Spawn, limbs and ribs and spines and skulls smashing under thundering hooves and hammering maces and shearing blades and crushing morning stars, viscera and muscle and bone and brain bursting outward from the whelming blows of hoof and weapon alike And running alongside were two fleet ponies, with shrieking Warrows astride, arrows and sling bullets flying into the foe.

  And racing after the heavy horse column came Dylvana on lighter mounts, swords reaving down those yet standing as the running steeds flew by.

  And in the lead one of the massive horses crashed into and over a Helsteed; the Ghul astride, quilled with arrows, was smashed under, and there came the sound of breaking bones. Yet the corpse-white foe gained his feet, his barbed spear still in hand. And he stepped aside from the next galloping horse and, smiling a yellow-toothed grin, stabbed upward at the rider, the brutal spikes on the spear blade punching through the Baeran's stomach, knocking him back over the saddle cantle, driving the Ghul hindward and wrenching the weapon from the corpse-foe's grasp.

  Yet as the Ghul stepped toward the felled man and took hold of
the haft and stared down in malignant glee, there came a call-"Cha!"-and he looked up to see -Loric's blade flash as he thundered by-Schlak!-the face yet leering as the Ghul's head flew through the air to land in the way and be crushed 'neath smashing hooves, the Ghul's headless corpse yet holding the haft of the cruel barbed spear as it toppled sideways to fall under hammering hooves as well.

  And when the thundering horses and two wee ponies and light Elven steeds had gone past and away-Sssss… – more Dylvana arrows sissed into the surviving Rupt, most to punch through the backs of the fleeing foe.

  And now, led by Bwen, Baeron raced from behind the wagons, their great long legs overhauling the Wrg, shorter Dylvana leaping o'er wagon sideboards and dashing after, some with long-knives in hand, others yet loosing arrows.

  And running easterly fled two Helsteeds, arrow-quilled Ghflls astride.

  Yet riding after came the heavy horses of the Baeron and two fleet ponies. But Dylvana horses were swifter still, and Phais, Loric, Ruar, Eilor, Elon, Lyra, and a host of others raced in grim silence after the fleeing Ghulka, the Elves gaining with every stride, their keen blades glinting lethally in the morning sun.

  Seeing that they could not catch the Guula, the Baeron turned the heavy horses and once again smashed over shrieking bands of the fleeing Rutcha and Drokha.

  There were not many survivors when the Baeron and Dylvana on foot caught the scattered remainder.

  And then there were none.

  Leading horse and pony back toward the train, Ruar and Tipperton passed among the slain foe-bodies smashed, intestines and viscera burst and strewn, dead eyes staring from those faces not crushed, brains leaking from shattered skulls, limbs broken, arrows through throats and hearts and abdomens, gaping slashes yawning wide-a thousand pierced and hacked and crushed and broken corpses.

  Tipperton was numbed by the carnage, for the face of war was hideous.

  "Thou didst say to kill them all, Sir Tipperton, and kill them all we did, and thou canst see what we have done- the wreaking of havoc upon the enemy.

  "Yea, mayhap they deserved this end, yet one cannot be casual about such, for to be so is to be no different from them."

  On they walked, their route bringing them at last to the hospital wains, where among the healers tending the wounded, Beau stitched a tulwar cut on the leg of a Baeran. Nearby lay three cloth-covered bodies: two of them large, as of Baeron; one of them smaller, as of a Dylvana.

  Ruar dropped the reins of his horse and stepped to the corpses and lifted the sheets away from their faces. Tipperton gasped, for although he knew neither of the Baeron, the slain Dylvana was Lerren, the scout who had come into Darda Erynian bearing Ruar's summons for Tipperton and Vail to join the war council, the scout who had relieved them there.

  Ruar turned to the buccan. "And this is the price we paid for killing them all."

  Tipperton burst into tears.

  Chapter 32

  While the Dylvana gathered wood and cut branches from nearby pines to build a pyre for slain Lerren, the Baeron took up their dead and rode northwesterly toward the fringes of Darda Erynian-the Great Greenhall-standing some three leagues away. Loric went with them, for as he had said, "Someone should be present to sing their souls into the sky."

  But it was Vail who came to Tipperton and asked that he play his silver-stringed lute at the Dylvana death rites, and so he did as the flames rose up, tears streaming down his face. And a thousand Elven voices lifted in song out on the meadow that day…

  … while in the quiet green folds of Darda Erynian there sang but a single one.

  Passing the corpses of two beheaded Ghuls lying beside the road, their slain Helsteeds nearby, Coron Ruar and a contingent of Elves and Baeron and two Warrows rode into Braeton nigh midday. And they were appalled by what they found therein-the innocent dead, the mutilation, the wanton destruction and slaughter-the whole wreathed in a foetor of putrefaction.

  Sickened, Tipperton looked up at Phais and declared, "This is ten times over what was done at Stede, at Annory."

  At Tipperton's side, Beau peered 'round. "A city of the dead, that's what this is, a terrible city of the dead."

  Phais nodded, then looked down at the buccen. "Ye will see more of the like or worse ere Modru is laid by the heels."

  From down nigh the road a clarion called. Phais sighed. " 'Tis the signal to assemble."

  They mounted their steeds and rode back down through the streets of the slain, joining with others answering Ruar's summons. And when all had gathered, the Coron said, "We ride back to the wains, for there is little we can do here."

  "Can't we even bury them or burn them?" called Beau.

  Ruar shook his head. "Nay, wee one, except for our own the dead must lie where they are felled until this war is done. Then mayhap kindred or others will come and see unto the slain."

  Ruar turned to Bwen. "Is there aught, Wagonleader, thou canst use among these ruins?"

  "Aye, there's some bales of bush clover we can take for the steeds; a bit of grain, too."

  "Then do so."

  "Are we no better than Rucks and such to rob the dead?" whispered Beau to Tip aside.

  "They have no use for it," sissed Tip back. "Besides, the maggot-folk are the cause of all this, not us."

  Phais looked at the buccen. "Aye, Beau, Tipperton is right. Were we to slaughter merely for plunder, then would we be no better."

  Beau frowned but held his tongue.

  In midafternoon the Baeron came back from the woodland funeral, and they drove the remainder of the great horses with them, horses which had been corralled in Darda Erynian for safekeeping. And among those huge steeds were the lighter horses of the Elves, for their spare mounts had been corralled in the wood as well.

  The next morning, with outriding scouts far in the lead, the vanguard and cavalcade and wagon train moved easterly through Rimmen Gape, leaving behind the field of slaughter, leaving behind the city of the dead, leaving behind two leaf-covered bowers in the fringes of the Great Greenhall and a circle of scorch in the mead.

  And even as they rode, an Elven rider on swift steed and trailing three remounts overtook the train and the cavalcade and galloped past and away, riding in haste for the vanguard a mile or so ahead.

  Tipperton, Beau, Vail, Melor, Loric, and Phais were in the rank following Ruar when the courier rode alongside the Coron's file, her horses lathered and blowing.

  "The Hidden Ones, my Coron," she called, "they've driven the Horde from the ruins of Caer Lindor. The Swarm fled from Darda Erynian and Darda Stor in terror, and ere they won free of the dardas, fully half of the Spaunen were slain, ne'er to answer Modru's bugles again."

  Ruar clenched a fist. "Well and good, Dara Cein. Is there aught else?"

  "Nay, my Coron. Eio Wa Suk report no more."

  "And Caer Lindor, it is in ruins?"

  "Aye, my Coron, or so the Pyska who relayed the message say."

  Ruar shook his head in regret as Cein added, "The caer betrayed is a mighty strongholt no more."

  Phais turned to Tipperton and Beau. "Thy kith are avenged."

  "The Hidden Ones, they should have killed them all, all the Spawn," said Tipperton, his face stormy.

  "But fully five thousand lie dead, Tipperton."

  "Nevertheless, these Hidden Ones, they should have pursued until all the maggot-folk were dead."

  Phais looked at him as if to ask how many dead would it take to satisfy his thirst for revenge, but instead she held out a hand of negation and said, "The Hidden Ones will not go beyond the bounds of their dardas."

  "On occasion one or two will," said Vail.

  Phais nodded. "Aye, even a handful, but not the nation itself."

  Ruar called to Cein, "Ride awhile with us, and this night we will relate all that has happened since we left, and thou canst bear word back unto Birchyll."

  A look of disappointment fell over Cein's features, yet she said, "I was hoping to ride with thee into battle, my Coron. Yet, as thou wilt."
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br />   That night they camped at the far side of the gape, some twenty-five miles away. And Ruar and Eilor called the scouts together and once again laid out the maps. And they were attended by Gara and Bwen as well. Another Baeran was there, too, a tall, dark-haired man. So too was Cein in attendance, to carry word back to those behind in Darda Erynian.

  When all had settled in place, Ruar said, "We are at a point of choosing the route we follow from here. I have called ye all together so that scouts and war leaders alike will know." Ruar turned to the dark-haired Baeran. "Uryc has traveled within the Ring of Riamon, and so has come to give us his advice."

  Eilor handed an arrow to Uryc, and the big man touched the point of the shaft to the map to illustrate: "Mineholt North is some forty leagues northerly along the Rimmen Range. Yet the land 'tween here and there is one of rolling foothills, broken at times by washouts and chasms and gullies. It will be difficult going for the wagons. If that's the way chosen, the task for the outriders will be to find the easiest route through."

  Tipperton and Vail, because of their small stature, had been given places up front, and Tipperton looked up from one of his own sketches to the big map and then raised his hand.

  At Uryc's nod Tip said, "Isn't there an easier way to go? A road or some such? I mean, I thought the Dwarves were crafters and traders, and it would seem unlikely they would isolate themselves without having a road."

  Uryc grunted, and then touched the map with the arrow. "Aye, they are crafters and traders, yet the road they made leads east from the mineholt to Dael, and there another runs southerly to the Landover, where they go east and west to do their trading. Or from Dael they ride the flow of the Ironwater down through Bridgeton and Rhondor and past Hel's Crucible and on to the Avagon Sea."

  Tip glanced at the map and then thumbed through his own scout-book sheaves to a similar sketch. "Well, then, this road up to Dael and the one across, why not use them?"

  Vail reached out and her finger traced a route over Tipperton's sketch. "To do so, Tipperton, we would ride east for thirty or thirty-five leagues thus, and then north another thirty or so, and finally back this way westerly thirty more. That's three sides of a square rather than one should we go straightly north instead."