Arrows knifed down more of the thralls, but nothing stopped the press: forward, forward. Fire and explosions lit up the ever-brightening sky both before and in back of Long’s position. The Shapers were at it, again. The familiar sounds of trebuchets, ballistae and catapults assaulted Long’s ears. He knew in his gut this was truly it, the make-or-break battle of this little war. He would not live to see it, he knew, but by this time tomorrow, the world would either be free of the End-of-All-Things or completely fucked. Looking up, Long saw that he’d somehow managed to approach the first trench – yesterday’s conquest – without injury or incident. Still, his horse was bullied, buffeted and bounced forward.
The first trench was entirely filled with the dead from both sides. How deep it went, Long dared not guess, but there were, undeniably, thousands of bodies here, a gelid stew of human remains. A less-experienced man might have puked. He wondered how the boy, Spirk, was faring, if he was still alive. Just beyond the trench, a huge crevasse split the hillside from west to east. The End-of-All-Things had clashed with the Queen’s Shapers over this chasm; tragically, it appeared the sorcerer had prevailed. In spots, the chasm’s rim had collapsed inward, creating earthen bridges that the thralls were only too eager to use. Long was nowhere near as anxious to cross, but cross he must if he hoped to avoid being pushed into the fissure. On the far side, a veritable wall of thralls grappled with the Queen’s men in furious action. Well, shit, Long thought, fall into an abyss or attack my friends? Small choice in rotten apples, he’d heard a poet say once. Small choice, indeed. Long spurred his horse across a stony ridge and achieved the southern side.
*****
Back it at. His arms felt like they weighed a thousand pounds apiece and ached like all hells. Funny how it all blurred together, to make separate shifts seem one endless nightmare. Janks was beyond hack, slash, stab. He was more like a windmill, arms turning mechanically, gears grinding the enemy to…what? Nothing worthwhile. He doubted they’d even make good fertilizer. Swing, swing, swing. Chop, chop, chop. Like threshing wheat, ‘cept wheat didn’t try to eat yer face off.
“Get that bastard on horseback!” Kittins shouted. “He’s the one drives ‘em. Take him out, they’ll slow down!”
Janks caught a glimpse of Kittins, nearly buried in thralls. Obviously, his comment was meant for Janks. He stole a quick look-see past his immediate opponent and saw the horseman in question. Fuckin’ coward with a sword at his hip and a whip in his hands. “Hey, shithead!” Janks yelled at the man. “Wanna fight someone who fights back?”
The horseman rode closer, recoiled.
*****
Good fortune, at last! In all the teeming thousands, to run into his old friend Janks was nothing short of a miracle. Long shouted greetings to his friend, only to be reminded that the End had taken his voice. Nothing came out of his throat, no matter how hard he tried. No matter. Long waved his arms and jumped down from his horse, rapidly closing the distance between himself and his friend.
*****
Plucky son-of-a-whore! The man charged him, and it was all Janks could do to get his weapons up in time. He must have been a coward in truth, too, for the stranger pulled back and dropped his arms. Janks spat in contempt and climbed up to meet him. Still, the stranger had his arms up and silently mouthed something the corporal was sure had to be magic. Fuck him! Janks rushed in, swinging both long knife and axe. The other man leapt back, a look of shock on his face. That’s right, fucker! Janks thought. I’m going to kill you!
*****
What new madness was this? Janks attacking him without pause or quarter? Was the man angry that Long had been captured? Did he somehow blame his old friend for all that had happened since? Pure lunacy. Over and over, Long entreated his long-time companion to drop his weapons, stop his assault. It made no difference. Janks came on like a man possessed. Like a thrall, Long realized.
At first, he thought to parry his friend’s blows until Janks realized his error or spent himself. But it soon became clear Janks meant to kill him. Long dropped his whip and drew his sword. Maybe he could knock the man unconscious and make amends later. In came his friend, with long knife and axe. Long was afraid.
*****
This was the first man in control of his own wits that Janks had fought since this little war started, and even this one seemed a bit demented. Even as Janks pressed the action, his foe parried, deferred and otherwise surrendered all advantage. Unless it was a ruse of some sort. Quickly, Janks swapped his weapons from left to right and vice versa and went for the man’s legs. If he could take the fellow down, he should be able to gut him rather easily.
*****
Long made a two-handed sweep across Janks’ mid-section with his sword, dropping his right hand at the start and punching his friend in the face. Janks didn’t go down, but he did back up a step. Long gestured to his face, hoping to penetrate the fog of war that surrounded Janks’ brain. No such luck. Janks redoubled his efforts to overwhelm his friend, pinwheeling his arms in a frenzy of blows that Long found increasingly hard to counter. Not knowing what else to do, he gave ground.
*****
He had the bastard on the run at last! A feeling of euphoria seized Janks as he continued to press the other man. Janks was the better fighter! It was only a matter of time until he –
The other man’s sword punched through his mail and tore into his chest. Janks slowed up, stared down at the sword that had killed him. For some odd reason, it looked familiar.
*****
It was an instinctive move. Long hadn’t meant to connect, only drive his friend back. Now, Janks froze halfway down his sword, a look of complete bewilderment on his face. Long shared his confusion.
*****
He thought about cursing the man, but he hadn’t the breath or the will. He was done, worm’s meat. He struggled to stay alert. Bollocks. He wondered if his old friend Long was still alive, somewhere…
*****
Long watched the light go out of his friend’s eyes, saw his face go slack, heard the sound of his weapons hitting the ground. Janks seemed to be struggling to form words, to say something with his final breath. And then he was gone, the words unspoken. Long let go of his own sword, fell to the earth, and pulled his friend’s head into his lap. “Janks,” he yelled in silence. “Janks!”
Nobody heard him.
~ THIRTEEN ~
Vykers, the Queen’s Army
Snow continued to fall, and the combatants continued to die – by the hundreds, by the thousands. Fire and noxious gasses bloomed in the heart of each army. Arrows flew in numbers too great to track. Great boulders crashed down on one side or the other. Gradually, inexorably, the End’s host pushed its way uphill.
Looking down on the action from the Shapers’ platform, the Reaper scowled. Too many good men were dying while he waited for his moment. At his side, Pellas was entirely focused on countering the End and his Shapers’ efforts to decimate the Queen’s bowmen. Vykers pounded the railing with his fist. He wouldn’t have long to wait once the cavalry attacked.
What are you doing right now? He asked Arune.
Conserving my energy, she answered curtly.
What could he say to that? He was doing the same. To his left, two of the Three leaned, like him, over the railing. Only 17 engaged the enemy, launching arcane salvo after salvo into the advancing thralls.
He’ll burn out, eventually, Arune said.
What do you mean, ‘burn out?’
Exhaust himself. Utterly and completely. Die.
“Take it easy!” Vykers commanded the chimera. “I don’t want you killing yourself over a few thralls at the front.”
17 paused, shook his head as if emerging from a daydream. He looked Vykers’ way.
“I will need you later,” was all the Reaper said in response.
Number 3 spoke up. “Master, do you truly believe we can survive such odds?”
Yes, Vykers bobbed his head. “Kill the brain and the body dies.”
*****
The End, In Battle
He should have done this from the beginning, as he had everywhere else he’d been. The all-out assault was undeniably his host’s strongest tactic. Yard by yard, his thralls and mercenaries advanced, drawing ever closer to the heart of the Queen’s army. It was only a matter of time and patience – a lesson he’d almost forgotten over the last day or so, but which he swore to himself he’d never again ignore. To be sure, he’d had unexpected distractions, but such things only made him sharper, more powerful.
The End-of-All-Things watched the carnage from high above the meadow, where he fluttered and floated like a hummingbird. He might have been in some danger if the Queen’s Shapers had been capable of seeing him. As it was, he enjoyed the best possible view of the action. Every now and then and at intentionally unpredictable intervals, he blasted a random section of the Queen’s front with pestilence, fire, or lightening and then darted to a new location. He felt giddy as a child with a new-found toy, so addictive were the screams of his victims.
Something unseen smashed into him and turned reality inside-out. A fleeting hint of ozone bedeviled the sorcerer. For a split second, the End was overcome with dizziness and nausea. Damn that Pellas! The man was an irritating burr, stuck to the End’s leggings, a nuisance that would not go away. The End sought him out, smirked in satisfaction and hurled him right off his Shapers’ platform, tumbling out into darkness. It was too much to hope the man would fall to his death; the End gave him an ample dose of humility, though. Out in the snow, Pellas picked himself up with delightful difficulty and dragged himself back towards his perch. It would be some time before he attempted another attack on the End-of-All-Things.
Shifting to a new position, he sought out his sister. He did not, could not find her. But the hostile presence in the forest had grown considerably. Once more, Anders weighed the advantages and disadvantages of fighting two enemies simultaneously. He believed it could be done, was certain he’d win, eventually. Crushing the Queen’s forces as quickly as possible and then turning again to those in the woods still seemed the better choice, however, so the End opted to stay the course.
And where, General Long? The End did not want to miss the pathetic fool’s demise. After all, he’d invested so much time and energy in tormenting the man, it would be a shame not to see the grand finale. Ah, yes…there, cradling the head of a fallen comrade! Wonderful, wonderful. The bathos of the moment was fantastically ridiculous. The End exulted in his ability to debase these humans in evermore imaginative and subtle ways. Truly, the sorcerer was an artist – the artist – of a new age. Too bad none lived who could appreciate his genius.
And now, to draw this so-called Reaper out of hiding! He thought, as he dropped towards the front and drew his sword. The hummingbird dipped down into spot after spot along the line, killing scores of men in short flurries of violence and then moving on. Let the word of his presence spread. Let it pull the Reaper into the center of his host. The End’s victory was a foregone conclusion.
*****
Looking out from the arboreal shadows, Aoife champed at the bit. “Will we never join the fray?”
“We will fight.”
“Yes, but when? It appears the Queen’s men are losing!”
“We shall see,” Toomt’-La smiled, inscrutably.
The A’Shea huffed in impatience.
*****
Long, In Battle
When the snowflakes began settling on Janks’ face without melting, Long knew his friend was well and truly gone. He lifted his eyes to the battle swirling around him. Amongst the myriad things he could not understand was how it happened that he, himself, had not been killed in the last several minutes. No one on either side seemed willing to acknowledge his presence. He felt like the boy, Spirk Nessno, except that, unlike the boy, Long wanted to die and no one would oblige him. Fine. If that’s how it had to be, the old soldier would force the issue. With a final pang of regret, he retrieved his sword, now encased in a thin sheath of Janks’ frozen blood, and howled at the thralls pressing towards him. “You wanna fuckin’ die? Come to me, then: I’ll fuckin’ kill you!” As he made no sound in screaming this, they ignored him.
Long had never been anything like a master swordsman, but he whirled and danced through the mindless thralls like a thing possessed. He aimed for legs more than anything else, but would gladly take arms or heads if they presented themselves. His fury powered him with an almost inexhaustible supply of energy. Soon, he had cleared a space perhaps ten yards square. The ground was covered with mewling, crippled thralls, but none presented any further threat to Long or the Queen’s army. Still, Long punished the End’s troops for everything that had happened to him since the death of Short Pete, made them pay for every indignity, every lost or wasted moment.
“Here, what the fuck d’you think you’re doin’?” Someone yelled at him.
Long spun, lashing out blindly with his sword and caught nothing but air. Some distance away, another of the End’s “generals” sat astride his horse, a look of extreme displeasure on his face.
“Gone battle mad, have you?” the general asked. “Then you’ll need to be put down!” Abruptly, he spurred his horse into a gallop and charged at Long.
This was it, the chance Long had been waiting for, the chance to die. It would have been easier to drop his sword at the last moment. For some reason, he raised it instead and braced himself for the general’s attack. The other man had stowed his whip and came barreling towards him, a large mace held high over his head. Long laughed and nothing came out. Just as well. He suspected he’d be frightened by the sound of his own laughter at this point. Crash! Long parried the man’s first blow, a bone-jarring hit, and was grinding his way down the haft of the man’s mace when the other fellow’s momentum carried him out of reach. In the infinity of time between the man’s departure and his wheeling back around into position, Long slashed at a few more thralls, sending each to the ground with damaged legs.
The snow was accumulating in earnest now, Long realized. Part of him wanted to ponder that, as if it were somehow important. A rumbling noise brought him back to the present, in which a horse bore down on him. Oh, yes: the other general. This time, it seemed his opponent intended to trample him and perhaps swing in the aftermath. Long was at a distinct disadvantage. He raised his sword again, uncertainly, and a crossbow bolt sprang from his assailant’s shoulder, causing the other man to veer to one side at the last moment. Long followed the man’s gaze as he searched out his new attacker and a second bolt punctured his skull, sending him from the saddle like a large sack of onions thrown to the earth. The man’s horse skittered awkwardly off to the right several yards and began wandering. Within moments, the beast was pulled to the ground by ravenous thralls. What in all hells? Long wondered. And then he thought of his own horse: nowhere to be seen.
He did, however, see a huge, bloody-faced warrior in Queen’s armor, holding a crossbow on him. Next to this stranger was a more-familiar face: Rem, who also held a crossbow he’d apparently just finished reloading. A ways behind these two, over at Janks’ body, Long could just make out Spirk, sprawled across his old friend, sobbing like a lost toddler.
“Drop your weapon, mate,” the big man ordered.
Long dropped it.
The big man muttered something to Rem and then turned back to Long. “Walk this way, and don’t do anything stupid. I got no reason to let you live and plenty to kill you.”
Long shuffled forwards. As he did so, Rem arced away from him and circled around to retrieve his sword. Then, the actor gasped.
“What?” the big man asked, irritably.
“I know this sword, Sergeant” Rem yelled back.
The unnamed sergeant suddenly fired his crossbow and Long heard a dull thump off to his left. A thrall fell to the ground. “Don’t get any ideas. I can still kill you with this thing, loaded or not,” the sergeant warned. “Keep coming.” At ten feet, the man stopped him. “That’s good, r
ight there. Who are you?”
It was futile, but Long told him. Unfortunately, the sergeant didn’t speak mute.
“Got no voice, eh?” the man observed. “Now, I really got no reason to let you live…”
“This is my old sergeant’s sword!” Rem said, finally returning to his new sergeant’s side.
The man looked down at the weapon. “That a fact? And what about this fellow?” he asked, pointing to Long. “You recognize him?”
Rem scrutinized Long’s face, his attire. “No,” he said, sadly. “I’d love to know how he came by Long’s sword, though.”
Steel, Blood & Fire (Immortal Treachery Book 1) Page 47
