Vykers, the Battlefield
He’d never admit it, but the Shaper had impressed him this time. The swarm of Svarren raging towards his position was among the largest he’d ever seen. Vykers – the big, ruthless warrior, the ultimate basher – almost giggled like a child in his glee. And the funniest part was, the End had fallen for the same gambit twice! For an evil tyrant, the man was ridiculously overconfident – a mistake Vykers vowed for the millionth time to avoid himself. “Lads,” he told his chimeras, “we’d best start running!”
And so they did. The four of them sprinted at the End’s host (with Arune, as ever, along for the ride), struggling to remain in view of the Svarren, but just out of reach. In minutes, they knew, the savages behind them would shift their focus to the slower, more plentiful prey.
Explosions of fire and ice rocked the area around Vykers and his companions, but Arune, 17, and the sword somehow managed to keep them at bay. If the arcane barrage bothered the Svarren, it wasn’t apparent: they came on like a storm, not to be delayed, diverted or avoided. Vykers viewed this as a potential weakness on the End-of-All-Things’ part: if he truly believed in the overwhelming strength of his host, wouldn’t he focus fire on the front lines and leave his thralls to deal with the Svarren? Interesting. In no time, the howling and shrieking behind him escalated in volume and urgency. The enemy’s host had been spotted. Time to disappear.
Burner?
Done! She answered.
Vykers realized he could no longer see the chimeras. “To my voice. We’ll clump together and let ‘em run past. Once they’re engaged, we’re free to follow,” he said.
“As you say,” one of the chimeras – Number 3, Vykers thought – replied in hushed tones.
The air grew close and warmed up noticeably; they’d done as he asked. The Svarren came on in the only way they knew how: gibbering, jabbering, screeching and snarling. The carrion fowl would never eat better than what today’s actions promised to produce. And still the Svarren ran by.
How many you figure? Vykers asked of Arune.
Fifteen, twenty thousand? At this rate, you’re like to drive them to extinction.
Me? If they’re too stupid to turn back, that’s their own fault. I’m just standin’ here, watching.
You’d better hope there are no truly intelligent Svarren out there somewhere. They won’t forget this any time soon.
Bah! They’ve taken enough of ours over the years. You of all people should appreciate that.
She wouldn’t say so, but Arune thought this a brilliant strategy and loved every second of it. Brouton’s Bind. Her mood instantly darkened.
*****
The End’s thralls and their tenders were lethargic in responding to their master’s pyrotechnical display against the onrushing Svarren. After all, the mercs and generals at the back of the host had not been expecting to see action so soon. And, some reckoned, the End would have warned them of any approaching threat. Whatever the mad sorcerer may or may not have failed to do, his soldiers knew to a man they’d be the ones punished for it. Their initial lassitude rapidly evolved into frantic determination: but five minutes earlier, they had been bored. Now, their lives were at stake. It was wake-up-or-die time.
The Svarren and thralls smashed into one another like opposing battering rams. The slaughter was instantaneous. Viscera flew through the air, bodies and parts of bodies fell to the ground with a dull thumping sound, which, sickening as it may have been was nothing compared to the constant noise of ripping flesh, snapping tendons and crunching bone. Not a few of the mercs vomited all over themselves, despite their years of battle-hardened experience.
Here, an enthralled young man ferociously gnawed on the shoulder of a Svarra who completed the loop by returning the favor on his assailant’s opposite shoulder; there, two thralls attempted to tear the arms off a Svarra nearly twice their size. Elsewhere, a mob of Svarren pulled a merc from his saddle, whilst scores of thralls jumped on them from behind. In one spot, a Svarra with two heads shoved pieces of thralls into both his mouths as fast as his three hands could manage; in another, a fallen thrall chewed at the legs of a Svarra too busy clawing the eyes from an enemy to notice. It was all gruesome, senseless, insane. Even a pack of starved wolves or hyenas has more reserve, more respect for the sanctity of life. Whips cracked, teeth gnashed, combatants died by the thousands.
The world edged ever closer to the End’s grand design.
*****
Janks and Company, In Battle
Was there nothing in the world but his axe, his long knife, and those he fought with them? There’d been a break, he remembered, a time when the End-of-All-Things had been stumped by Pellas’ actions. But he couldn’t for the life of him recall what that break felt like, the sensation of laying his weapons down and stretching his sore and overly-tested muscles. The world was a palette of darkness, black shapes spurting blacker blood against an even blacker background. Occasional glimpses of torchlight ahead or behind did nothing to alleviate Janks’ hopelessness and dread. Hack, slash, stab, duck, smash, duck, stab, bash. He’d become some sort of machine, a clockwork soldier of the sort he’d seen at festivals in his youth. Hack, slash, stab. He’d been injured, he knew, and tended to by the nearest A’Shea. Was that why he still stood, still battled? A toothless old man charged across the dead piled up in the second trench and lunged at Janks. Hack, slash, stab. It was clear: if nothing else, the Queen’s men would die of exhaustion fighting such a monstrous horde. These thralls were ferocious, to be sure, but lacked finesse. Perhaps that was the only reason Janks still breathed. And how many had he killed, he wondered. More than in every other battle he’d ever been in, combined. The old man wasn’t quite finished, yet, and two younger thralls approached. Janks worked a kink out of his neck, set his feet and resigned himself to more – more attacking, more defending, more death.
Sometime during the last hour, Bash had gone to it. Janks wouldn’t have known but for Spirk’s forlorn howl. When Janks looked over, a large mound of thralls lay atop the warrior and was greedily tearing into his abdomen. Kittins scattered them like crows on a rat carcass, but the damage was done. How had it happened? Janks was aware to his bones that Bash had been the better fighter, the better man. How had these feral imbeciles overcome the big man, while Janks remained more or less unscathed? But ‘how’ and ‘why’ were the worst enemies in war. They taunted, left a man internally crippled for life. You’d have more luck squeezing stout from a cow, than wrangling with such questions.
Janks was always a little unsettled when his mind wandered during a fight. While he appreciated the brief escape from the horrors confronting him, he feared inattention might get him killed. He returned his full focus to the foes in front of him and redoubled his efforts to annihilate them. Hack, slash, stab. Mahnus-be-damned monsters! Evil fucking bastards! To the hells with each and every one of them! Let the worms have their fill of ‘em! Hack, slash, stab.
A short ways off, he could hear the boy, Spirk, sobbing. Damn, but it was hard to stay focused! He risked a glance over at the kid. Like him, Spirk continued to flail away, despite the odds, despite his terror, despite the utter and absolute destruction of his innocence. Once in a while, a pike would thrust out of the darkness on either side of the lad, impaling a would-be attacker. Janks wondered where his own pikemen had got to. Ah, well. Why should anything be easy?
He realized of a sudden that Rem no longer spoke in verse when chopping his way through waves of attackers. A while ago, he’d’ve said that was a blessing. Now, he kinda missed it.
*****
The woods on either side were pregnant with malice – not the sort he enjoyed, either, but something clearly directed at him. There was an eerily familiar tang to the energies seeping from their boundaries, too, that reminded the End of his destruction of the Forest of Nar. But he had reduced that place and all its denizens to ash. How was it, then, that he felt its ghosts nearby, almost poised?
He considered his options. At the rea
r of the host, his thralls grappled tooth-and-nail with Vykers’ Svarren. The End had added a little surprise since the Reaper had last pulled this trick and, sooner than his overconfident foe expected, this new skirmish would come to a close in the sorcerer’s favor. So, the action behind him was a short term annoyance, at worst. At the front, his numbers were slowly, inexorably wearing the Queen’s forces down, pushing them back, despite Pellas’ interference. Thus, the front offered no immediate concern. Back to the woods, then. He’d sent scores of men in, knowing full well they might never return, and he’d been proven correct. How would these little forests respond to thousands upon thousands of thrall, though? Could a brief, overpowering action sufficiently stun whatever-it-was that awaited him in those woods, cause it to lose hope, abandon its plans? The End ruminated. If he temporarily withdrew from the front in order to assault the enemy – or enemies – on either side, might that not provoke the Queen’s men to stage an ill-fated counterattack? Once they emerged from their network of bulwarks, trenches and the like, his thrall could swarm over them in numbers too large to be resisted. Anders smiled, leaned back in his chair, put his feet up. This mysterious threat in the woods might actually help him break the Queen’s forces! What delicious irony.
*****
Vykers, the Queen’s Army
The last of the Svarren had finally run past, leaving Vykers and company again well behind the action. Nevertheless, the Reaper could clearly see something had changed since the last time he’d employed this strategy: now, whenever a Svarra successfully consumed any part of a thrall, the creature briefly became somnambulant before suddenly turning on its brethren. Eating the thralls was turning the Svarren into thralls, as well.
We need to get out of here, Vykers thought grimly.
Funny you should say that…Arune interjected.
The world turned inside out, along with Vykers’ stomach, and he landed hard on a wooden platform, high above the battlefield. He’d joined the Queen’s army, at last. A nearby brazier cast a ruddy light on Vykers’ immediate surroundings. He noted that the Three were as befuddled as he. And visible, of course. Not ten feet away stood an older man in Shaper’s robes. The stranger was surprisingly unsurprised at Vykers’ sudden appearance, as if the Reaper had been standing there all evening. When the man finally spoke, his voice sent strange ripples through Vykers’ mind, as of a stone tossed into a pond.
“For the longest time, I actually believed you were the greatest threat to this world,” he said wryly. “And here we are.” He indicated to the conflict below.
In Vykers’ mind, Arune gasped.
What? Vykers asked.
Arune did not respond.
“And you are?” the Reaper asked the stranger.
“My name is D’Kem.”
It’s Pellas! Arune hissed in a frantic whisper.
“Or Pellas, yes. If you must.” Pellas said, just as if Arune had spoken aloud. He placed his elbows on the platform railing and stared into the night.
Vykers grunted, “I’ve heard ‘o you.”
“And I, you.”
“I thought you were dead.”
Pellas chuckled, mirthlessly. “And I, you. Fine couple of ghosts, we are.” He turned his gaze on the Three. “I must say, you keep interesting company.”
Vykers put a hand on Number 3’s shoulder. “That’s puttin’ it mildly.”
“And your Shaper?”
“She ain’t mine,” Vykers huffed. “It’s a temporary thing.”
Pellas smiled enigmatically, nodded almost imperceptibly.
“So,” the Reaper said, for want of anything more clever.
“So,” Pellas agreed. “This End-of-All-Things means to crush the Queen’s army by this time tomorrow.”
“Things don’t always work out like we plan.”
“No, indeed. Your little ploy to the north, along with whatever’s brewing in the forest…”
“Oh,” Vykers interrupted, “you know about that, then?”
Pellas simply regarded him in silence.
“’Course you do,” Vykers muttered. “You were saying?”
“Those two actions and the impressive resilience of the Queen’s men have made this battle considerably more challenging than our enemy expected.”
“And your presence don’t help him, either, I’m guessing.”
“Nor yours. But we can’t simply stand here all night exchanging pleasantries.”
“Nah. I’m better at hostilities, anyway. What’ve you got in mind?”
Pellas pulled at his beard for a moment. “I believe the End-of-All-Things will have to address the threat to his flanks before he can fully commit to taking this hill.”
“Makes sense.”
“And I believe that will take him longer than he thinks. Which will give you the chance, at last, to reveal yourself and address the troops at dawn.”
“And then, what? I’m not big on defensive actions.”
“I don’t believe it will come to that. I expect our enemy will not be able to resist confronting you – or both of us – directly. If he does, we’ll oblige him. If he surprises us, however, and maintains his distance, I may be able to distract him long enough to get you through his defenses and within arm’s reach. Then…you do what you were made for.”
He’s got a lot of confidence in you, Arune whispered.
Pellas turned directly toward the Reaper. “By yourself, you are, of course, formidable. But you also carry a gifted Shaper and a legendary sword. Yes, I have great confidence in you.”
Vykers couldn’t help himself. “And what of you?”
Pellas looked back towards the battle; his face became lost in shadow. “I do not expect to survive this conflict,” he said quietly. “Like you, the sorcerer is more than he seems, whereas I am only – have only ever been – human. This old Burner will likely spend the last of his fire in this fight.”
Was that…? Had he just heard Arune weeping?
“Maybe,” Vykers said aloud. “Maybe not. You speak flatteringly of me, but no one alive’s ever seen the full scope of my…talent. You put me within arm’s reach o’ that bastard and even the maggots won’t want what’s left of him when I’m done.”
Perhaps it was just the dance of light and shadow on the platform’s top, but it seemed Pellas’ posture straightened a bit, that he grew imperceptibly taller.
“I’ve never been a great lover of violence,” he admitted, “but in this case…”
*****
The End, In his Host
Thick-headed and brutish savages though they were, the Svarren were not entirely witless. Of the original group that attacked the End’s host, only two or three hundred had turned before the remaining fifteen-to-twenty thousand grasped the problem and murdered their rebellious kin before taking one thrall more. When they resumed their attack on the thralls, it was with increased rage and bloodlust. Somehow, they understood what had been done to them; they meant for someone – anyone – to suffer for that treachery.
What had seemed certain victory became a worrisome, lingering problem from the End’s perspective. And, weirdly, more Svarren continued to trickle in all the time, as if answering a summons only they could hear. If that was the case, the End knew its origin: Tarmun Vykers. The only thing he hadn’t quite worked out was how to isolate the man so he could be dealt with. Anders shook off his scrying trance and walked outside his tent to clear his head. It was snowing. Lightly, but snowing nonetheless. He considered that for a moment, decided it made no immediate difference, either way. It was time to attack the presence in the woods.
“Omeyo!” the End yelled into the night.
“Master?” the general inquired, from a mere three feet away. The man had an uncanny knack for being in the right place at the right time, a gift which had surely kept him alive longer than almost anyone else in the End’s service. But…it was also somewhat embarrassing. The End did not like to be surprised, would like to have thought himself incapable of it.
&nbs
p; “What am I going to say next?” the sorcerer asked his general.
Omeyo bent slightly at the waist, the barest hint of submissiveness. “I wouldn’t presume to guess.”
“Wouldn’t you?” the End asked, dryly. “I’m sure you’ve realized there’s a threat to our host, lurking in the woods on either side of this meadow.” Statement.
“I suspected something was amiss, but had every confidence that you would instruct me when the time was right.”
The man’s subtlety made the End more than a little paranoid. On the surface, Anders showed nothing. “Organize the third and fifth armies for an attack on both the right and left. We’ll proceed as we did at Nar: flame arrows and flaming pitch into the trees, assisted by a few of my more aggressive Shapers. If it becomes necessary, I’ll step in and insure those woods catch fire. At that point, I expect a response from our hidden foes, and all your mercenaries and thralls must needs be ready for a fight.”
Steel, Blood & Fire (Immortal Treachery Book 1) Page 44
