Crusader s-4

by Robert J. Crane

  With a last shrug, the healer pulled loose of her, and she stood there, sword in her hand as the sound of horns blew in the distance, somewhere far over the wall, and she did everything she could to keep her face straight.

  Chapter 66

  Cyrus

  The retreat was long, aided by the wizards and druids. Fires burned through the night behind them, giving them a rear guard as they retreated, long flaming rows that stretched out along the plain in an infinite line, with only a gap for the river, as the flames burned in a curve to follow the bank. Cyrus didn’t feel the heat, not at the distance he was at; he watched a haggard Nyad keeping her eyes on the fire as they rode into the distance, trying for escape. After a few hours, the dim, distant noises of the scourge army faded, not to reoccur when the fire line came down. By morning, they were not even in sight as the sun came up.

  “Where do you reckon they are?” Partus asked Cyrus, atop a small horse that Cyrus believed had been Ryin Ayend’s.

  “Spread out along the plains,” Cyrus said, numb. The wind came from the north today, and it was all rot and death, cold and chill. The end of summer is most assuredly at hand and winter is well on its way. “Giving up on us to hit all the ripe, tender villages that are east and west of here. Gone to give some other poor bastards hell.”

  “Those things …” Partus said, shaking his craggy, bearded head, “those things are the legends of torment come to life. They truly are Mortus’s works. I’ve been in his Realm, many times, but these … these are staggering, those things. Monstrous works. They look like-”

  “Wendigos, a little bit,” Cyrus said. “But four legged, no arms. No hair. I’ve met wendigos that could talk, that seemed like they had a soul. None of that here, just a raw, feral savagery you don’t even see in wild wolves.”

  “Aye,” Partus said. “So many, they cover the whole ground and could cover the land like locusts in the harvest. They’ll eat Luukessia whole and everything on it.”

  “No,” Cyrus said with a fierce shake of the head. “No, they won’t.” He urged Windrider forward, toward the front of the column, and they rode on until midday.

  At midday they stopped by a stream; the armies of Actaluere and Syloreas had marched with them, their darker armor and distinctive flourishes marking them clearly-the Actaluereans had livery and surcoats, like Longwell’s, though they almost all were dirty and stained with the black blood of the scourge. The Syloreans, on the other hand, wore no such livery but their armors carried fur padding that stuck out of the neck and at the shoulders, to give it a different appearance than most kinds of armor Cyrus had seen, and a distinct look that fit the northmen well. There was no tent pitched, and Cyrus knew it was because this was to be a fast convocation. Somewhere to the north, he knew, somewhere below the mountains that stared down from the horizon, was an army that was as relentless as it was unmerciful.

  Cyrus took the cloth seat that was offered him again, his officers at his back. Tiernan was quiet, fingers caressing his unshaven chin, the first time Cyrus had seen a hint the man could grow whiskers. In Tiernan’s hangdog look, Cyrus caught just a hint of Cattrine, but he brushed that thought away with all the ease of scouring the remains of baking from a pan. Unger, on the other hand, stared straight ahead, his eyes flicking to and fro from the small, quiet circle to the horizon, as though at any moment the enemy would burst over it and he might have his revenge.

  “They’re going to keep coming,” Cyrus said after a moment of silence. Tiernan looked up at him as though Cyrus had drawn a sword; the King of Actaluere’s eyes were wide yet vacant, watching as though he were a child, bereft of understanding for what was transpiring. “We lack the numbers to stop them. We lack the punch.”

  “We killed at least ten thousand of them last night,” Briyce Unger said. The King of Syloreas appeared to have no desire to exit his seat, the usual twitch of his left leg muted, exhaustion heavy on the King’s frame. “And more still came. More than could be imagined, I think, though it would be hard to tell in the dark.”

  “Yes,” Cyrus said. “My elves tell me that they still filled the ground to the horizon, even after all we did. But there cannot be an endless supply of them.”

  “Whether there is an endless supply of them or not is wholly irrelevant,” Tiernan said with an exasperated chuckle that lacked any humor at all, “what matters is whether there are enough to block us from sealing that damnable gate through which they invade our land. There seems no way to be able to pull that one off, as they don’t break or back off even when confronted with overwhelming losses. As he said,” Tiernan raised a hand and gestured to Unger, “we killed numbers of them so staggering it would make any of our armies break and scatter from the loss. We lost few enough ourselves, and yet we were the ones who broke. Still they came on and would have kept pressing on us until we were finished had it not been for the western magic that saved us. Ancestors!” Tiernan said it as though it were a curse. “How do you fight an enemy that will stand before you and let you pound on his face and not even blanch whilst you do so?”

  “You pound away at him until he does blanch,” Cyrus said.

  “That might hearten me, if we were by some chance facing a human adversary with a human reaction,” Tiernan said. Unger watched, silent, while the King of Actaluere spoke. “These things show no sign that we may ever push them back, that we might ever reach the end of their will.” Tiernan threw up his hands. “They’re purest evil. There is no soul, no essence in these things, just an all-consuming hunger to take life.”

  “Aye,” Briyce Unger said at last, “and that is why we must face them again. Why we must hit them until we find their breaking point. You say yourself, you know-they are evil. They are consuming my Kingdom, eating it whole. Yours will be next, and Longwell’s, until there is nothing left of Luukessia.” Unger shook his head. “At this point, even if we went into the teeth of these beasts again, we stand only the chance to hold them back, not to win. We need more, Tiernan. We need more men. We need every man in the land with an able body. We need every army, every soldier, every farmboy who can wield a pitchfork and stand in a line.” Unger waved a hand toward the mountains. “This isn’t a fight to save Syloreas anymore, not that you were here for that anyway, but I say it because Syloreas is lost. It’s gone. I’m sending my soldiers right now, today, to the corners of my Kingdom and I’m telling them to let everyone know-Get out. Go south. Come to Enrant Monge, flee to Galbadien or Actaluere. Buy time because anyone who stays in the north is lost. They’ll all die, every last one.”

  “You paint a grim picture,” Tiernan said, his complexion ashen. “Yet you speak the whole truth, no exaggeration. So you would leave your lands behind, have your people flee into the south. What then? Not that they’ll be greeted unkindly by mine own or Aron Longwell’s-”

  “They’ll not be greeted at all by Aron Longwell’s armies,” came the voice of Samwen Longwell, and Cyrus turned to see him standing just at his shoulder. Longwell was tall enough already, but he seemed to have gained a solid five inches of height. “I am riding today for Vernadam.” His jaw was squared, straightened, and he spoke from a well deep within. Cyrus could feel the emotion crackling off the man he had known for over two years now but never in this way. “I will ride to Vernadam, right now, today, and I will bring back all the army I can to oppose these beasts. I will turn out every man who is able, and I will come back at the head of them to stand with you in beating back this threat to our land.”

  Unger traded a look with Tiernan then cautiously looked back to Longwell. “And if … when … your father opposes you?”

  Cyrus watched Longwell’s face carefully, saw the slight trace that came and went before the younger Longwell let slip a slight smile, a false one, to be sure. “Then he will be the King of Galbadien no longer. I will see to it.”

  There was a quiet that settled over the convocation. “Well,” Milos Tiernan said, breaking the silence that had settled on them as surely as the first snow, “this sha
ll certainly be a winter for the ages.”

  “Aye,” Briyce Unger said, “and perhaps the last one the men of Luukessia will ever see.”

  Chapter 67

  After the meeting broke a few minutes later, Cyrus found himself walking beside Longwell back to the Sanctuary army. The lines of march had dissolved and men and women were lying about, scattered, some asleep and some not, all of them grizzled veterans now. How unlike they were when we left out the Sanctuary gates … when was that? Nine months ago? Ten? He shook his head in disbelief. How different were they when we left? Like newborns. Now they’re not new anymore, and they’ve seen more of war in this time than even most guilds have.

  “Sir.” Longwell spoke, jarring Cyrus out of his meditation. “I’ll need to be leaving soon, as soon as possible.”

  “I won’t have you go alone,” Cyrus said. “You’re talking about deposing your father. You’ll need some help.”

  “And I’ll have it,” Longwell said, tense, “but it must be from within Galbadien, not without. If I come to Vernadam at the head of the Sanctuary army, it won’t have the proper effect. It’ll be seen as an invasion. It will be an invasion, the west to the east, the conquering lord of Arkaria come to destroy the peaceful traditions of Luukessia. Of power over peace, of domination and control rather than what this is supposed to be-me taking my birthright to save the land that I love.”

  “You cannot possibly expect me to let you do this alone,” Cyrus said. “To go into the heart of the Kingdom of Galbadien as you are, without a single person to aid you? You’ll take an escort-not an army, an escort, so that you’ll at least have a healer and a wizard in case things become truly sticky. An enchanter seems useless against the scourge, so we’ll bring J’anda with us.” Cyrus gave it a moment’s thought. “Nyad, Martaina, Aisling and I will accompany you also, along with a healer and a couple warriors and rangers. Less than ten, total. That could hardly be mistaken for an army by most eyes.”

  “Yet to the eyes who know,” Longwell said, narrowing his, “that is more army than most of Luukessia could put together.”

  “Yeah, well, not everyone has to know that,” Cyrus said. “It’s a war of perception, not of force. Coming to Vernadam at the head of a foreign army doesn’t sit well with me, either. It’s when you come out that you need to be at the head of an army.”

  “Aye,” Longwell said. “What are your intentions for the Sanctuary army, then, while we’re away?”

  “Odellan will lead them,” Cyrus said, “and Curatio will take overall command. They’ll move with the armies of Actaluere and Syloreas as they continue a fighting retreat across the steppes trying to winnow down the scourge’s numbers while we’re absent. Perhaps they’ll get lucky and strike the great victory we’re looking for.”

  “Sir,” Longwell stopped his walk and laid a gauntleted hand on Cyrus’s shoulder. “You need not come with me. You are an army unto yourself, and more valuable here at the front than as an escort to me.”

  “I doubt it,” Cyrus said and felt a sharp pain within. “The army will fight here to hold back the tide, but they won’t actually be able to do it, not without more men. Actaluere is sending more, but having me at the center of the line is useful insofar as I can hold it better than perhaps anyone else, can kill more than any other soldier, but I can’t win the battle by myself, and I can’t make up for the weakness inherent in this army. We lack men. We lack mobility. We needed ten thousand of your dragoons in that last fight, and a wider front to press up against without the weak men that Syloreas stretched to shore up our formation. We need soldiers, real soldiers, not farmers and field hands. We need men who can swing a blade and throw an axe, and the men who can’t, who don’t have the experience, are nothing but chaff.”

  “Why, then, do you come to Vernadam?” Longwell asked. “Even if it is as you say, and you believe that there is no hope to beat them here, only to delay them, what possible greater good could you do at Vernadam that you could not do more effectively here?”

  Cyrus let out a long breath, and with it felt the emotions ground up within pass, as if he could expunge a plague of doubt all at once. “Your father is obtuse, we both know that. He won’t come around, he won’t listen to reason. But there is one man in that castle that will, one man who could command the legions of Galbadien with or without your father’s blessing.”

  “Count Ranson,” Longwell said with cool acknowledgment.

  “Ewen Ranson is no fool,” Cyrus said. “If both of us come to tell him what he already knows, then I think we can convince him to move the army. No coup necessary, because your father’s will is irrelevant without an army to back it. Let him have Vernadam because we’ll have the army, and that is what we need to beat these enemies back.” Cyrus took another breath, and this one felt as though all his doubts and fears came back unto him, like he inhaled a lungful of death. “If we can beat these enemies back.”

  “I thank you,” Longwell said, and bowed his head. “This was never your fight, not when we came here to battle the Syloreans, not when we ran afoul of Baron Hoygraf, not when we had to adjust and face the possibility of war with Actaluere. You have never once tried to bow out when things became more difficult than we had anticipated, and I think that would have been the first thought of most men, to run from such an unstoppable and implacable a foe as we now face.”

  “Implacable foes are the only kind I’ve ever known,” Cyrus said without mirth.

  Longwell nodded, but there was confusion hinted at on his young face, the lines that had just started to show expressing those emotions. “I thank you, regardless. I owe you more than I can possibly repay, yet still I shall endeavor to square the debt at some point.”

  “I wouldn’t consider you too indebted to me,” Cyrus said, “after all, we did unleash this scourge by our own actions-by my own actions.”

  “No one could have predicted that,” Longwell said quickly. Too quickly. “We need to leave soon. Perhaps after a short rest?”

  “Early evening, I think,” Cyrus said. “A few hours of sleep if possible, and then we’ll be on our way. Tell the others, will you? I’ll speak with Curatio and gather us a healer.” He looked around. “They’re pitching tents,” he pointed to a few of Actaluere’s men, already hammering the first stakes into the ground, and the Syloreans across the camp were doing the same, “We’ll rest, then we’ll leave. I’ll need to send a wizard to Sanctuary to request aid again, if they haven’t already sent it. If they have, I’ll still request more.”

  “Aye, sir,” Longwell said. “I’ll inform the others.”

  “Don’t worry about Aisling,” Cyrus said carefully, drawing Longwell to turn back to him, just as a cool gust blew through. “I’ll tell her myself.”

  “Aye,” Longwell said with care of his own, not revealing anything he might be thinking, masklike.

  Cyrus watched the dragoon walk away. Does he know? Everyone knew about Cattrine, at least everyone in the castle. I wonder if my soldiers knew? Rumors spread faster than wildfire, faster than the scourge. Even if the others didn’t care, it’s still … unseemly. Isn’t it? He felt the urge fill him, even as he thought about her. Two days of battle? You’d think that would have drained me …

  He walked across the campsite, the smell of weary and war all around him. He could hear faint snores from some of the men, light talking from others but in hushed voices, the quiet maintained, as though any sound above a whisper might bring the dread monsters down upon them again. He could feel the light touch of the north wind again that told him winter was coming, was not as far off as he wanted it to be, here at the end of summer. Autumn would surely come first but would be the only buffer between them and the snows that would likely bury these plains in only a few months. The taste of snowflakes on Cyrus’s tongue was something he could almost sense now, and he longed for water to wash it off, as there were another taste he could remember, one from the last retreat he’d ordered, not quite a year ago, in Termina, where the ash fell from the
burning city across the river.

  Cyrus’s feet carried him along, a short walk to a tree that rested in the middle of the plains. There were men all around, in every direction, and horses beyond them. Even in the quiet of the camp there was activity, though subtle, understated. He could see Windrider where he’d left him, working on conjured oats that a wizard had made for him and the rest of the animals. Cyrus looked over the small knot of Sanctuary officers nearby and then to Mendicant, who sat next to Terian, still bound in chains and watching him.

  Cyrus edged closer to the dark knight and the goblin wizard; Mendicant’s back was turned, paying him no mind, but Terian kept an eye on Cyrus, his mouth covered by a rag that was tied in a thick knot. Cyrus could see that there was a rock stuffed between his lips by the tilt of the dark elf’s jaw. His eyes blazed as he watched Cyrus approach, and when the warrior was only steps away, Mendicant stirred and turned to see him there.

  “Lord Davidon, sir,” Mendicant said, rushing to his short legs. The goblin came only to mid-chest on Cyrus and seemed nervous in his presence.