Wood talked with Brod, and in the course of this discussion he formally enlisted the Sarge as one of his followers.
Brod groveled in gratitude.
“You may demonstrate your thankfulness by performing a certain mission for me. Do this job well, and I will give you something more important.”
“Anything my Master commands!”
“I want you to seek out a certain woman—you will be given her approximate location, and magical means by which you will be able to certainly identify her—and bring her back here, to me, for my personal attention. You need not be too concerned about her sensibilities while she is in your charge.”
“I take your meaning, Master.”
“I think I made it plain enough.”
* * *
Ben, forced to seek shelter almost continually, had been able to make little or no progress to the north. But he kept trying.
On rounding a bend in a path that wound its way through scrubby forest, he suddenly came upon a vision that stopped him in his tracks—he was confronting a young woman, tall and strong, with clear blue eyes and bright red hair, who stood regarding him steadily.
It was Ariane, his long-lost love.
Intellectually, Ben knew better. He realized almost at once that he had really encountered Mark, carrying the Sword Sightblinder, so that the Prince must appear to his old friend, as to anyone else he met, as some object of overwhelming love or fear.
Knowing well the powers of Sightblinder, and also that Mark would almost certainly have armed himself with the Sword of Stealth, Ben had braced himself mentally for such a moment. Still the shock was almost overwhelming.
* * *
Mark, on seeing his friend turn pale, and sit down as if his knees had betrayed him, sheathed Sightblinder, and advanced to offer words of greeting and reassurance.
In a minute Ben had pulled himself together, had given Mark the bad news about the loss of Zoltan and the Sword of Healing, and was ready for whatever had to be done next.
* * *
The Prince took a turn at walking, loaning weary Ben his riding-beast for an hour or two. In this manner the pair headed south again. Mark told Ben that he had been for some time reasonably certain that an enemy camp was not far, because he had observed the converging reptile flight-paths.
Ben confirmed that the lost Sword of Healing had been carried that way too.
At dusk, advancing cautiously, the two men observed sparks of firelight ahead, suggesting the presence of a camp.
Taking counsel together, the two experienced warriors decided that, armed as they were with Swords, they stood an excellent chance of being able to launch a successful raid without waiting for the arrival of the Tasavaltan troop and Karel.
Mark emphasized: “If Wood is indeed in this camp, I want to get my hands on him before he has a chance to fly off with the Sword I need.”
Ben raised a hand to silence him. Someone was approaching.
* * *
Valdemar had been forced to leave the injured Delia in an abandoned hut, which at least offered shelter against the intermittent cold rain, while he sought help.
Even in the gathering dusk, he quickly recognized Ben’s hulking figure.
But standing beside Ben … in that first moment … was an almost-forgotten horror out of Valdemar’s own childhood, a faceless figure of which he could be certain only that it was frightful.
And in the next moment, even as he recoiled in horror, the young giant beheld the image of horror replaced by one of his beautiful wife to be … and then that form faded too. Beside Ben there was only a tall man, sheathing what appeared to be a Sword.
In a few moments introductions had been made, and explanations begun. From Valdemar Mark soon heard, in a drastically condensed version, the story of how the woman who had been Tigris was now lying in an abandoned hut, reformed and injured, in dire need of help.
Valdemar in the course of this relation reported how Tigris had abducted him from this site, and mentioned the loss of Wayfinder.
Ben expressed his doubts. “You think she’s reformed, young one? Maybe her magic’s been taken away, but I’ll shed no tears for that. It’s some kind of trickery she’s worked upon you.”
“It’s not!”
Quickly and firmly the Prince squelched this argument. There was no time for quarreling now. Even if the situation was in fact just as Valdemar described it, he, Mark, could not, would not, go off on a tangent now to help some woman in distress, however deserving she might be.
And then the Prince made a plea of his own. “Help me now, Valdemar. Help Ben to guard me against attackers when we invade this camp, and I swear that I in turn will help you as soon as I can. With all the power of Tasavalta, and of the Swords, that I can bring to bear.”
The towering youth let out a sound of frustration, something between a sigh and a snort. “I must accept your offer, Prince. It seems I have no choice.”
Mark decided that they would not attack the camp till dawn, giving them all a chance to eat and rest. He shared out the food from his saddlebags. Before bedding down for the night, Mark and Ben discussed tactics with the inexperienced Valdemar. The two veterans made the point that the only enemy tactic they really had to worry about, whatever forces might oppose them here, was that of people deliberately disarming themselves and then hurling themselves on the Prince who carried Shieldbreaker.
Valdemar nodded; the theory of the situation was easy enough to comprehend. As for putting it into practice: “I will do the best I can.”
“Can’t ask for any more than that.”
* * *
In the first gray light of dawn, the three men soon came close enough to Wood’s encampment to hear the sounds of people stirring, and smell the smoke of campfires.
Evidently the Ancient One, confident in his strength, had made no particular effort to conceal his position.
Mark, made wary by this lack of concealment, wondered whether Wood was more or less expecting him, perhaps even trying to lure him into making a solo attack.
It turned out that Wood’s camp was magically protected against casual discovery, but with Shieldbreaker in one hand and Sightblinder in the other the Prince crossed the invisible boundary unharmed and unimpeded. Had it not been for a softly augmented thudding from the Sword of Force, he would not even have realized that he had encountered any defenses.
Matters were different for the two men who formed his escort. Ben, despite his experience and alertness, was unaware of the magical protection until unnatural light flared around him and Valdemar, and immaterial weapons slashed at their minds and bodies.
Shields and snares of magic closed on the three intruders, only to recoil an instant later like snapped bowstrings, broken by the unyielding central presence of the Sword of Force. Shieldbreaker’s voice beat loudly, light flared across the early morning dimness, and the claws of magic lashing out at it were instantly blunted and beaten back. Valdemar and Ben were staggered momentarily, but the power that might otherwise have destroyed them was quenched before it could have serious effect.
Hoarse cries in human voices went up from near the center of the camp. Ben thought that perhaps the backlash of the broken spells had taken toll among the minor wizards there. Certainly by now the entire enemy camp was aware of an intrusion. Soldiers in blue and silver, magicians, and others came pouring out of their tents. The trio of invaders stood in plain sight of most of them, and Sightblinder immediately provoked primary confusion among the defenders, human and inhuman.
The first human sentry to get a clear look at Mark, near the edge of camp, ran forward hesitantly, sword half-raised by an arm that jerked uncertainly, as if the man himself did not know whether he meant to salute or strike. Evidently this man perceived the invading Prince as Wood himself, or as some hideous demonic power.
An instant later, a real demon came hurtling down out of the lowering morning sky. Even had Mark been lacking Shieldbreaker, he would have confronted the foul thing with
a wary respect, but not with terror. As the Emperor’s son, he had always possessed the power, without understanding why or how he had it, to drive away even the most powerful of those evil creatures, simply by commanding them to depart. In the past the Prince had been forced to demonstrate this ability several times, often enough to give him confidence in it now.
And the Sword of Force, he felt sure, added another impenetrable layer of protection against demons. Such beings, as old Karel had once explained to Mark, were creatures of magic and pure malevolence, born of great explosions at the time of the Old World’s dying. They could will nothing but evil, and Karel thought that they could take no action of any kind except by means of magic.
Magic employed to inflict injury was by definition a weapon, and Shieldbreaker was proof against all weapons, material or otherwise. A human being abandoning all weapons could win barehanded against the Sword of Force—but a demon could hardly disarm itself without ceasing to exist.
Perhaps, Sightblinder notwithstanding, this morning’s demon understood at once just what antagonist it must be facing. Because the thing vanished out of the air again, as quickly as it had appeared, and of its own volition.
And now—inevitably but foolishly—a few material weapons were deployed directly against the holder of the Sword of Force. Mark’s body, no longer under full control of his own will, stretched back and forth with magical celerity, darted to right and left, executing parry, cut, and thrust with ruinous violence and precision—but all under cover of Sightblinder’s cloak of deception. The visible counterfeit of Mark—some image of terror or love—beheld by each friend or enemy, more often than not appeared weaponless and unmoving, a single enigmatic figure standing immobile in the midst of causeless carnage.
Enemy swords, spears, missiles and shields were hacked and harvested in a spray of fragments. Shieldbreaker chopped up human flesh and body armor with ruthlessly complete indifference. The Sword in Mark’s right hand—in those moments when that weapon could be glimpsed—became a silver blur. The hammer-sound blurred also with its speed, and swelled up to a steady thunder-roll.
Valdemar had never seen or dreamed of anything like this before. Few people had. There was, there could be, in the whole world nothing else like this to see. The young man was momentarily stunned into immobility.
One man, Mark, advancing with his weapons, sent the first wave of blue and silver opposition reeling back in confusion.
So far the Prince’s double bodyguard had not been required to do anything but stay close to him. If they stayed close enough, they remained within the aegis of protection of the Sword of Force. Shieldbreaker flashed invisibly between their bodies and around them, smashing slung stones and arrows out of the air.
But now, sooner than either Val or Ben had expected, some of the enemy began to come against Mark unarmed.
Val saw the first one, a squat, strong soldier in silver and blue, come charging barehanded between two of his fellows armed with short spears. The Sword of Force put out its flickering tongue of power, and both spearshafts were severed in a blink. The unarmed enemy who would have charged between the spears to grapple with the Prince instead encountered the battle-hatchet swung accurately at the end of Val’s long right arm. The vineyardist had never killed before; but he was left with no time now to meditate upon the fact. Another unarmed foe was coming.
Ben and Val, stepping forward one on the Prince’s right hand and one on his left, acquitted themselves well in the first fight with the initially disorganized foe.
There came a brief lull. Panting, Mark gave his orders: “We go forward again. I must find Wood! Whatever Swords are here will be with him.”
Advancing boldly, pressing their initial advantage, he and his escort penetrated to one of the central tents. Ripping open fabric with a Blade, the Prince cursed on realizing that his chief antagonist was not here either.
But a moment later, to their joy, the three attackers discovered in this tent a pair of important prisoners. Zoltan and Yambu were both stretched out on narrow beds, eyes staring and bodies rigid, obviously under some magical constraint. Any humans who might have been stationed to guard them had already taken to their heels. In only moments the Prince and his flankers were able to set the pair free.
Into the right hand of each prisoner, briefly and in turn, Mark pressed the hilt of the Sword Shieldbreaker. This instantly and permanently broke the grip of the magic Wood had bound them with.
Zoltan, on being released from imprisonment, sat up with a strangled gasp of relief, to see Valdemar and Ben before him, standing one on each side of a black-eyed mermaid. Zoltan understood that he was facing the Sword of Stealth, when a moment later the mermaid’s image turned into that of Wood himself, and then into a nameless, shrouded figure of horror, a memory from nightmares of his childhood.
Whatever horror the Lady Yambu might have experienced in her captivity, or on waking to see Mark wielding Sightblinder, she bore the burden well.
* * * * * *
Less than a kilometer away, the young woman who had once been Tigris was still lying injured, half delirious, inside some peasant’s half-roofless and long abandoned hut.
Fearing equally for her own survival and for her lover’s safety, Delia drifted in and out of feverish sleep. In her lucid moments the young woman hoped and prayed to all the gods that the two of them would be able to get away from this seemingly endless conflict, to the peaceful vineyard Val had so proudly described to her.
Almost Delia felt that she already knew that place, that she and Valdemar had already lived there together. In dreams she saw the little house, the garden, a green and summery vision of delight, a paradise once possessed, now gone again and unattainable.
In her pain and distress she had lost track of how much time had passed since Val had left her here alone. Many hours, certainly. She was afraid it had been days. She feared, in her state of suffering, that the man she loved had suffered some horrible fate. Or, worse, that he had cruelly deserted her.
* * *
Zoltan, still suffering somewhat from Wood’s maltreatment, could provide little relevant information about Wood, nor could he guess what Swords the Ancient One might hold. But Yambu was able to confirm that Wayfinder had been here, in this camp, and in Wood’s hands.
Where the Ancient One was now, or whether he had with him that Sword, or any other, she did not know.
Mark assumed that Wood had carried the Sword of Wisdom away.
* * *
Now, in the center of the camp, Mark and his augmented bodyguard faced a development the Prince had not really expected—a carefully prepared series of enemy counterattacks by a surrounding composite force of armed and unarmed men, specially trained to fight against Shieldbreaker.
At the next pause in the action, Mark suspected, and his panting friends agreed, that the Ancient One must be somewhere near at hand, directing these attacks.
The beleaguered handful craned their necks, trying to spot their enemy in the clouded sky. The Prince grunted: “He’ll be riding on a griffin, or I’m surprised. He’ll be too shrewd to mount a demon, when he expects me to be present.”
Before anyone could answer him, there sounded from somewhere in the distance what Mark and his compatriots could recognize as a Tasavaltan horn.
“That’s Karel, thank all the gods.”
“Let us hope some cavalry is with him.”
* * *
Karel himself, riding forward with a courage matched only by his physical clumsiness, doing his best to keep up with the cavalry, had been able to determine with fair accuracy, despite Wood’s attempts at concealment, just where the enemy camp had been established. Some of the Tasavaltan scouting birds had been deceived by enemy magic, and others temporarily outfought by reptiles. But the uncle of the Prince and Princess could also determine, even without much help from feathered friends, that Mark was now in the vicinity.
He signalled to the cavalry commander to sound the charge.
* *
*
In moments the Tasavaltan mounted troopers, supporting and supported by a truly formidable magician, were heavily engaged with the forces surrounding Prince Mark and his small bodyguard.
Drawing a deep breath, Mark commanded an advance, toward their allies.
There were plenty of fallen weapons about with which the former prisoners could arm themselves.
They advanced.
Meanwhile Wood, still carrying Wayfinder, was airborne. Mounted on his own especially large and vicious griffin, he circled above the fighting, dispatching relays of reptiles with urgent messages to his officers below. He sent other winged couriers with orders to speed the advance of his additional ground forces already marching to the scene.
What had once been an orderly camp was now a ruined, trampled field of mud, fallen bodies and ruined and discarded weapons, and collapsed tents. Time and again, the Prince’s personal bodyguard saved his life by beating off unarmed attack. He, and the unmatchable power in his right hand, rescued them in turn. The onslaught of the Tasavaltan cavalry had relieved some of the pressure from surrounding forces, but still Mark and his handful in the center had all that they could handle. So far, thanks to skill and luck and the weapons of the gods, none of them were more than slightly wounded.
Wood, hovering on his chosen griffin, darting away and coming back, now and then swooping low enough to get a good look at the figure he knew must really be Mark, sometimes perceived instead a man he recognized as the Emperor. Again the Ancient One beheld a shadowy figure, insubstantial yet angular, somehow almost mechanical, something out of the Old World. He knew that the Sword of Stealth was tricking him into seeing Ardneh.
Though Shieldbreaker had prevented Wood from using Wayfinder effectively to plan his counterattack on Mark, the Sword of Wisdom continued to be effective against Mark’s allies, Karel and the Tasavaltan cavalry. The trouble was, as long as Mark himself was on the scene, Wood could not spare the time to accomplish their destruction.
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