He felt its song swell like a climax in his head. The air around him shivered, compressed into a rolling wave of solid wind that lashed out at the cloud of arrows like the crack of a thousand whips with a thousand angry tails. The volley shattered with explosive force, splinters of pulverized arrow shafts drifting lazily down through the air. There was a sound almost like falling hail as broadheads rained down from the sky, splashing harmlessly into the snow around him.
Darien signaled his horse with the pressure of his legs. The gelding swept forward along the crest of the hill, moving quickly up to speed, sprinting with all its great heart to deliver him from the jaws of the closing vice. On his right, the charging soldiers spilling out of the encampment were almost on top of him. And on his left, a thundering wedge of cavalry was bearing down on him, hurling up the hill.
The two jaws of the vise snapped closed behind him. The gelding reared back on its hind legs, spinning around as a twisting rope of flame snaked across the ground, blooming instantly into a crackling wall of fire. Horses screamed, striving to break their momentum. Darien watched calmly as the soldiers pursuing him were forced to fall back, repelled by the acute intensity of the heat.
Slowly, he lowered his outstretched hand and gazed upon his creation with a feeling akin to pride. The roar of the fire drowned out all other noise, waves of heat roiling in the air above licking tongues of flame. There was no smoke; nothing was burning. The fire fed itself, a creature of pure, voracious energy.
Darien compelled his horse toward it.
The gelding wanted to balk, so he wrapped its eyes in shadow and silenced the sound of the blaze in its ears. The heat did not touch them as they moved forward into the flames, but the wind of the fire did. It savaged his cloak and whipped at his hair, rippling his horse’s long mane. Engulfed by the flames and yet unconsumed, Darien leaned his head back and savored the rapturous wonder of the magic field surging like a torrent through his mind.
They passed through the heart of the fire and emerged again on the other side. Releasing his hold on his horse’s senses, Darien let the blaze behind him slowly die. Ahead, the men of Faukravar’s army were standing as if dazed, weapons lowered, staring with mouths slackened. No one moved forward to confront him as Darien directed his mount down the hill and out onto the Field of Tol-Ranier. Men stepped back to make way as he moved past them. Their stares followed him as he rode by, keeping his horse at a swaying trot right up the center of the plain through the very heart of the Black Prince’s army.
When at last he reached the small group of officers on the far side of the field, he drew up beside the man wearing a general’s insignia on his uniform. The soldier’s face was ashen gray, his expression sagging. Darien regarded him for a long, silent moment. Then he informed him:
“You are relieved of your command.”
The general blinked. Casting his gaze around at the others, Darien wondered, “Which one of you is his second?”
A young, aristocratic man with a contemptuous sneer on his face nodded his head sharply at him. “That would be me.”
“You’re relieved, as well.”
The officer’s stare glinted hatred as his hand darted for his blade. Darien’s eyes caught the motion. With a cry, the young officer retracted his hand and stared down in horror at the glowing red hilt of his sword. Bringing his injured hand up before his face, he gaped in shock at the angry burns that covered his fingers.
Confident that there would be no further resistance, Darien backed his horse up until he could take in the small group of mounted men as a whole. He swept his gaze deliberately over their faces, allowing his stare to linger harshly on each man in turn as he told them, “The Enemy is advancing in numbers not seen since the fall of Caladorn. Already the storm breaks over the North, and soon the tide will be turning this way. Which man of you has the courage to lead this army in a battle that will decide the fate of everything you know and everything you love?”
For a long moment, no one moved. Finally, a young man near the back looped the reins of his horse over the pommel of his saddle and dismounted slowly. Stepping forward through the mounted cluster of his peers, the young officer drew up to stand before them, looking up at Darien with wide brown eyes that held no fear.
“I do, Prime Warden.”
The young man dropped to his knees in the snow and leaned forward until his face was pressed up against the loose powder that salted the Field of Tol-Ranier. He remained there, eyes squeezed tightly shut, as his fellows stared down at him from their horses’ backs.
“You may rise,” Darien told him formally. “What is your name?”
“My name is Lieutenant Malcolm Wellingford, Prime Warden,” the young officer said eagerly as he righted himself. Stepping forward, he withdrew his sword from the scabbard at his side and offered it to Darien hilt-first.
Darien received the sword into his hand, holding it up to inspect it. It was a common piece of steel, not elegant or ornamented in any way. Though the blade looked to have seen much use, it still had a keen edge. Extending it forward, he noted that the balance was good.
Offering it back to the young man, Darien nodded. “This blade will serve me well. Do you swear on the honor of this sword to follow wherever my lead should take you, deferring to whatever order I give immediately and without question?”
“I do so swear, Prime Warden,” the young man gasped.
Darien nodded solemnly. “General Wellingford, please issue the command to form ranks.”
He waited as his beaming new general darted back to recover his horse. Darien then turned back to address the remaining officers in front of him. “Any man not wholly committed to me should leave right now. Otherwise, should you choose to desert later, such an act will be considered treason. You shall be hunted down and slain without mercy.”
He waited as the men before him exchanged nervous glances. Faukravar’s former general turned his horse around with a quick jerk of the reins. He was followed by three other men as he withdrew from the field, back stiff with swallowed pride. Darien watched as the man tugged his violet cloak off his shoulders and tossed it down in the snow in his horse’s wake. The remaining officers stared after the departing men, mixed expressions on their faces. But when they turned back to Darien, each man’s stare was hardened with fresh resolve.
As the soldiers spread out across the field drew together and assembled in tightly-ordered ranks, their officers dismounted and knelt silently in the snow. Darien received each man’s offered sword in turn and accepted their oaths gravely. Then he rode out before the ranks of gathered men, to the rise of a low hill, and there drew up his mount. As he did, he sent his mind outward on the tides of air above the field, weaving shadows overhead to cover the face of the sun.
Night fell across the Field of Tol-Ranier, the daylight fading away into darkness. An eerie stillness descended upon the plain as all motion ceased and all eyes were drawn toward him. Darien surveyed the ranks before him from the back of his mount, measuring the mettle of the men. Then he raised his voice to be heard above the compressed, silent tension brought on by the mysterious fall of night:
“Greystone Keep has always held the Pass of Lor-Gamorth, and the pass has ever been all that has held the North against the flood of the Enemy. But Greystone Keep has fallen. The North will soon be swept away unless we make a stand to prevent it. We march to Orien’s Finger, where we will be faced with two of the greatest hosts ever assembled. You do not go friendless and alone; the forces of Emmery will be with you.
“And I will be with you, as well. I am Prime Warden Darien Lauchlin of Amberlie, Grand Master of the Eighth Tier. I am the last surviving Sentinel of Aerysius, and I am also Unbound.”
Darien paused as the men before him slowly grasped the implication of his words. A stir went through the ranks. At first he took their reaction as fear, but then the anxious murmur of thousands of voices swelled, became a thunderous cry. He waited, grimly satisfied, as the clamor of voices and rattling we
apons slowly settled. After long moments, silence gradually returned to grip the Field of Tol-Ranier. Darien continued, raising his voice:
“We are all that stands between our homeland and the fate that befell Caladorn of old. Should we fail, then everything that matters in this world will be swallowed up by the Black Lands. But if we succeed, then all of you will go to your graves knowing that it was by your courage alone that every last nation of the Rhen survives in the light and hope of the sun.”
He released the gathered shadows overhead and allowed the morning to dawn again, the sun emerging to glare brilliantly above in the clear morning sky. A thunderous cheer went up as the ranks before him collapsed. Discipline abandoned, the men swarmed forward around him like a breaking wave.
Darien closed his eyes and, smiling quietly, bowed his head.
The next morning he woke before the break of dawn to the sounds of the encampment already awake and stirring. Darien dressed in the darkness of the tent, not even bothering with simple magelight. It had been hard to awaken; the air of the tent was cold, and his blankets were warm. Sleep crusted his eyes, and he found himself terribly groggy. In the last few days, he had not allowed himself nearly as much rest as his body would have liked. He had been so preoccupied with watching over Naia that he had neglected many things, sleep being just one.
It was still dark when Darien emerged from the tent and stood gazing out across the snowy field. Already, the men had most of the camp broken down around him, his own tent one of the very few still remaining untouched in its place. He had allowed himself to sleep in too late. Walking out across the broken camp, he came across a very young infantryman stirring something in a kettle over a fire pit. Darien knelt down beside the boy and warmed his hands over the heat of the flames. The soldier glanced up at him, startled. But Darien gave him a slight smile of reassurance, and the boy’s wide eyes smiled back.
“May I try some of that?” he asked, reaching out to take the wooden spoon the boy was using. He was starving, and the smell drifting toward him was too enticing. Darien dipped the spoon into the pot, bringing the hot broth up to his lips for a taste.
“Good,” he muttered, though the taste of food seemed strange on his tongue. As it had the night before, as well, when he had broken bread with the officers in the command tent. It was almost as if his palate were off, sending his mind blurry signals of the broth’s true flavor.
The young soldier wordlessly offered him a bowl. Darien accepted it with a mumbled word of gratitude and, filling it, ate as he strolled out into the camp. He looked upon the bustling activity around him with intrigued fascination. Everywhere, men were hastily folding up tents and loading supplies into wagons that had appeared sometime during the night while he slept. The soldiers went about their duties with practiced diligence. Darien found himself impressed, almost regretting his act of sending away the general who had been responsible for the camp’s orderly discipline.
He tilted his head back and drained the remainder of the broth into his mouth. A lump formed in his throat as he swallowed it, making him want to gag. Scowling, he handed the bowl off to a soldier passing by and strode back toward the command tent. There was simply no pleasure to be had in eating anymore, just as in practically everything he had once enjoyed. Ever since Naia had left, the only thing he seemed to take comfort in was the thrill he felt whenever he opened himself to the magic field and let it rage inside his mind. It seemed he was groping for it constantly, for no real reason other than the contentment it brought whenever he touched it. Sometimes he fought with himself, knowing that the allure of the field was starting to become something of an obsession. But often he found himself reaching for it unconsciously, not even aware that he was even doing so until it was too late to stop himself.
Reaching the command tent, he found his young general busily pouring over a list scrawled across a strip of parchment. At least the boy could read; that was more than he had hoped for. He really didn’t care, one way or the other. Darien hadn’t accepted the young man’s oath because he was in need of a strong commander. He had accepted Wellingford because he needed someone biddable. Strolling up behind him, Darien looked over his shoulder and studied the first few lines of the list he was reading.
“I see your king finally came through with the provisions I ordered.”
Wellingford looked back at him, seeming a bit startled. The boy hadn’t noticed Darien’s presence behind him. Handing over the parchment, he said, “We received the wagons in the night. But His Grace only sent enough supplies to last us twelve days. That will do little more than scarcely get us there.”
Darien nodded, scanning down the list appraisingly. “That’s all I requested. We’ll have need to travel swift and light.” Handing the list back, he started to turn away, but Wellingford’s plaintive voice stopped him in his tracks.
“But, Prime Warden, what are we going to do about supplies for the march home?”
Darien shrugged. “We’ll just have to worry about that when the time comes.”
The boy’s brow wrinkled up, a look of troubled doubt moving behind his eyes. He said softly, “You don’t think we’ll be coming home, do you?”
Darien did not respond. Instead, he turned his back on Wellingford and grimly strode away.
He walked over to the edge of the encampment, where he stood silently observing as the last details were being completed. In a very short amount of time, the camp was entirely broken down, the men forming up in a long, thin column for the march.
Movement on the ridge of the hill caught his eye. Turning toward it, he almost could not believe what he was seeing. The Black Prince was riding toward them, surrounded by an entourage of knights with blazoned pennants fluttering from their lances, rippling over their heads. Faukravar himself was suited up for battle, his thin frame covered with black enameled plate that was polished until it fairly gleamed. The king rode with his plumed helm in his hand, his violet cloak fluttering out behind him. Darien saw the king’s eyes fall on him. He stood looking on as the Black Prince angled his horse in his direction. Faukravar’s party drew up in front of him, the king gazing down into his eyes with rigid contempt. After a long moment, Faukravar addressed him in a somber voice:
“Ever have the kings of Auberdale ridden to war with the armies of Chamsbrey.”
Darien nodded weary acceptance; there was little he could do about it. “As you like,” he uttered, then added softly, “Just don’t get in my way.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Dreams
TRAVER AWAKENED TO a sharp, stabbing pain in his hand that was only matched by the throbbing ache in his head. Opening his eyes, he squinted up into the flickering lights of the clouds, wondering how it could be possible that he wasn’t dead. The pain flared back in his hand like a knifethrust. With a cry, Traver raked his hand back to his face. As he did, he saw the beak of the scavenger bird that had mistaken his warm flesh for a piece of rotten meat.
“Go away, damn you!” Traver growled at it, repulsed. The vulture spread its wings and hopped back, bobbing its long red neck at him. The bird should at least have the common decency to wait until he was dead. Picking up a small rock, Traver threw it at the obnoxious thing. The vulture only flapped into the air a few feet before alighting back again, this time even nearer.
Traver wanted to scream in frustration. It wasn’t fair. Here he was, stuffed under the bloated carcass of a perfectly good rotting horse, but this damned bird thought he looked like a tastier morsel. The thing was confused.
“All right,” he told it. “I’ll tell you what. You go snack on somebody else for a while. Come back in a few days, and then if I’m still here you can have as much as you like. I won’t even make a fuss about it.”
When the bird bobbed its head again, Traver took it for a sign of agreement. Turning his face away from the scavenger, he made one last attempt to pull his legs out from under the dead horse’s carcass. But the effort was utterly futile; the weight of the animal was just too
great, and he couldn’t get enough traction in the crumbled dust beneath his hands. All he succeeded in doing was raking sand into his face. He wanted to scream in frustration.
When he felt the bird’s beak again, this time on his shoulder, he did scream.
“I told you to go find somebody else!” he shrieked at the deranged creature.
“There isn’t anyone else,” responded a somber voice. “At least, no one else alive.”
Startled half to death, Traver craned his neck around enough to take in the miracle of Corban Henley’s face. He wanted to laugh; that thick red beard was such a beautiful sight. But instead, he found himself weeping.
“There, lad,” Henley soothed, patting his shoulder. “You’re lucky you like to hear the sound of your own voice so much. Otherwise, I never would have found you.”
Through tears of relief, Traver beamed up at him. His sweet Lady Luck had won through for him again, and this time he’d even forgotten to kiss his blade. But then it occurred to him to wonder what Henley was even still doing here. The skirmish was over, the rest of their fellows fled back to the hastily improvised camp in the canyon, or perhaps even moved on by now.
As he stared harder at Henley’s face, he thought he saw the answer. The big Valeman sitting beside him looked pretty scraped up, and there was a strange tightness around his eyes. The man was in a lot of pain, though he was making a valiant effort not to show it.
“What happened to you?” Traver wondered inelegantly.
Henley scowled, reaching down to pat his leg. “Broken. Snapped right clean. I guess neither one of us will be going anywhere.”
Traver’s cheerful mood took a dramatic plunge as he realized what the man was implying. “But, you can walk, right? You found me, didn’t you?”
Henley shook his head sadly. “I can drag myself a small distance, but that’s about as good as I can do. I’m sorry, lad, but I can’t lift that carcass off you.”
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