Soul of Sorcery (Book 5) (12 page)

And through it all Ragnachar’s calm expression never changed.

“The Guardian is fond of you,” said Ragnachar. “She can always find another pet. I think I’ll enjoy watching you die.”

Riothamus tried to summon power for a spell, but his vision was going black, a horrible rushing noise filling his ears…

The world white went as a lightning blast screamed out of the sky and exploded against the ground. 

When his sight cleared, Riothamus found himself on the ground, coughing and wheezing. The orcragars likewise lay scattered like dry leaves. Only Ragnachar remained standing, his greatsword in his right hand.

Aegidia stood facing him, the staff of the Guardian extended. 

“You will let him go, Ragnachar,” said Aegidia.

“Will I, old woman?” said Ragnachar. 

“You will,” said Aegidia.

Ragnachar smiled. “Or?”

“You know what will happen,” said Aegidia. 

“Are you so certain you can defeat me?” said Ragnachar. “I have grown stronger, while you have become old and feeble.”

“I am not at all certain I could defeat you,” said Aegidia. “Nevertheless. If you don’t let him go, you will face me. So the question is whether or not you are certain that you can defeat me.”

For a long moment they stared at each other, the Guardian and the hrould.

“Take him and go,” said Ragnachar. 

“Riothamus,” said Aegidia. “Get up.”

Riothamus scrambled to his feet and joined Aegidia. 

“Let’s go,” she said. 

“Riothamus son of Rigotharic,” said Ragnachar, voice quiet.

Riothamus hesitated, turned. Ragnachar gazed at him, face expressionless.

“Remember what I said about threats,” said Ragnachar. 

Riothamus shivered and followed Aegidia out of the camp.

###

“Your courage shames me,” said Aegidia, voice quiet. 

They stood halfway between Ragnachar’s and Athanaric’s camps. Riothamus had expected the orcragars to attack them, but no one had followed. 

Even the orcragars knew better than to challenge the Guardian. 

“I do not question Ragnachar as much as I should,” said Aegidia.

“Why not?” said Riothamus, rubbing his sore throat. Aegidia had recited one of her healing spells over him, repairing the damage Ragnachar had done. He suspected the ache would take days to fade, though. 

“Perhaps it is time,” said Aegidia. “There are secrets that only the Guardian knows, secrets that you must know, one day, when you take up my staff.” She leaned against the staff for a moment, gazing at the night sky. “Tell me of the Urdmoloch.”

“The Urdmoloch?” Riothamus shrugged. “I know only what you have told me. He was the ancient demon who destroyed the realm of the High Elderborn. He still wanders the world today, working evil. Or so the stories say. Ragnachar and his thugs worship him, believing that he will bestow power upon them if they work his will.” 

“The stories say it true,” said Aegidia. “The Urdmoloch does wander the world, sowing evil as a farmer sows seeds. And Ragnachar is of his blood.”

Riothamus blinked. “You mean…Ragnachar has a demon’s blood?”

“He does,” said Aegidia. “He is the Urdmoloch’s son. His strength, his speed, his prowess in battle, all come from the demon’s blood that fills his veins.”

“Why do you not denounce him to the moot?” said Riothamus. “Some of the greatest heroes of the Tervingi have had demon’s blood, aye. But so have some of our blackest villains.”

“Because no one would believe me,” said Aegidia. “Or, rather, the Tervingi who follow the old gods would not believe that Ragnachar has demon’s blood. Those who worship the Urdmoloch would hold it a point in his favor. And if I pushed the matter, it would come to civil war among the Tervingi. That would destroy us, especially now.” 

“And if it came to a fight,” said Riothamus, thinking it over, “you don’t think you could win against him.” He shook his head. “Even with all your power?”

“I am the Guaridan, and I will not use my power to kill. I might be able to overcome him,” said Aegidia. “But his demon blood grants him tremendous speed and power, and the ability to heal even fatal wounds almost instantaneously.” She sighed. “How I have failed. Even more than you know, boy. Even more that you know.”

“What do you mean?” said Riothamus.

“What is the purpose of the Guardian?” said Aegidia.

“To defend the Tervingi from dark magic,” said Riothamus.

“Yes,” said Aegidia. “But that is secondary. The main duty of the Guardian is twofold. To defend against the Urdmoloch.” She hefted her staff. “And to hold this staff in trust, until the Guardian finds the one destined to face the Urdmoloch.”

“I don’t understand,” said Riothamus.

“This staff,” said Aegidia, “is ancient. The Tervingi nation is only a few centuries old, after all, born when Tervingar freed the slaves and led them north. The High Elderborn who opposed the Urdmoloch made this staff and created the office of Guardian. And so the staff has been passed down from Guardian to Guardian for centuries beyond count.” 

“Until you find the one destined to defeat the Urdmoloch,” said Riothamus. A flash of insight came to him. “The man in golden armor with the sword of blue flame! He is the one destined to defeat the Urdmoloch?”

“Yes,” said Aegidia. “But he is destined to face the Urdmoloch. Whether he defeats the Urdmoloch or not…that is in his hands, not ours.”

“This man is in the Grim Marches?” said Riothamus.

“Yes,” said Aegidia. “The destiny of the Tervingi rests in the Grim Marches, in the hands of the man in golden armor. We must find him. We must keep the Tervingi safe, both from our enemies and from Ragnachar.” Her thin hands clutched the bronze staff. “I have made many failures, Riothamus. But in this…in this we must not fail.” 

###

A skythain landed at dawn the next morning. 

Both Athanaric’s and Ragnchar’s skythains had flown all over the Grim Marches, scouting and mapping the land. 

And the skythains bore dire news. 

The Tervingi had taken the Grim Marches by surprise, but the lords had gathered for war. Great masses of horsemen and infantry had assembled, and marched east to face the invaders. 

“They are coming for us,” said Athanaric. “This battle shall decide our fate. We shall either claim a new homeland here, or they shall destroy us.”

Both he and Ragnachar sent out messages with the skythains, ordering the host of the Tervingi to assemble for war.

Chapter 12 – Swordthains

The day after the tournament, Mazael rode east. 

Most of his knights and vassals had gathered for the tournament, so it had been easy enough to prepare them for war. He rode at the head of four hundred knights and armsmen, all them armored in chain or plate and equipped with maces and swords and lances. Behind them rode four hundred mounted archers from Cravenlock Town’s militia, equipped with swords and short bows. Sir Tanam Crowley’s two hundred raiders screened the main column, scouting for the enemy. Every last man had fought against the Malrags, and many wore necklaces made of Malrag fangs. 

Romaria rode at Mazael’s side, bastard sword slung over her back. Behind her came Timothy and Lucan, wrapped in their black wizards’ coats, and Molly, a black shadow in her own dark clothing. Sir Hagen commanded the armsmen, and Sir Aulus Hirtan, Mazael’s herald, carried the black Cravenlock banner with its three crossed swords. 

A strong force, veteran and well-equipped, capable of dealing with most enemies. Though Mazael didn't know what sort of enemy they faced. Some scouts spoke of black-armored raiders, killing everything in their path. Others described ragged barbarians who stole food and moved on to the next target. Still others claimed to have seen giant beasts that crushed anything in their path. 

The barbarian invaders must have split into multiple groups, rampaging through the countryside. Mazael planned to hit them one by one, overwhelming the warbands before they could regroup. Sooner or later word would spread, and the barbarian attackers would gather their forces.

And then Lord Richard would crush them. 

The lords of the Grim Marches had rushed back to their castles, calling out their knights. The assembled host of the Grim Marches would gather at Swordgrim and march forth to smash the barbarians. 

Until then, Mazael would hunt their warbands one by one. 

He found himself looking forward to it.

The Demonsouled rage burned his chest, pulsing in his temples. He had yearned for a fight, and one had come to him. And here, at last, he could pour out his Demonsouled wrath. In this fight to defend his people and his lands, just as in the struggle against the Malrags, he would need not hold back.

He would make these barbarians wish they had never set foot upon the Grim Marches.

###

The next morning they arrived at the village of Bloody Ridge.

The village had once been the manor of Sir Roger Gravesend. Yet Sir Roger had been a proselyte of the San-keth, a worshipper of the serpent god, so Mazael had dispossessed him and claimed Bloody Ridge for himself. He had left a peasant bailiff, a man named Wat, in charge of the village. Wat had proven to be a good choice – his militia had held against the Malrag raiders, and looked as if they had done the same against the barbarians. 

“Aye,” said Wat, a stout man in leather armor, “we’ve seen the barbarians, my lord.”

Mazael met with Wat outside the stockade encircling Bloody Ridge. A few arrow-ridden corpses lay outside the walls, all that remained of the barbarian party that had attacked the village. 

“A band of about a hundred,” said Wat, gesturing at the corpses. “They tried rushing the walls with grappling hooks. Well, my lads stood fast against Malrags, so it will take more than mob of savages to scare us. We greeted them with a few volleys of arrows, and the rest ran off.” 

“You did well,” said Mazael.

“We were lucky, my lord,” said Wat. “We have some refugees from the other villages the barbarians hit. They say the barbarians have great hulking beasts that can batter down gates and trample spearmen. We didn't see any here.”

"Any horsemen?" said Mazael.

Wat shook his head. 

“Good,” said Mazael. “If we catch them in the open, we can ride them down. And the horse archers can pepper these ‘great beasts’ with arrows, as we did with the Ogrags.” 

He turned Hauberk around and rode to the barbarian corpses. Romaria stooped over them, examining the dead. From time to time she bent close and sniffed. 

“Do you recognize them?” said Mazael.

Romaria straightened up. “No. They could belong to any one of a dozen different barbarian nations from the other side of the Great Mountains. Sometimes barbarian warbands raid over the mountains, but not often. The Malrags and the dragons make the journey too dangerous. And Castle Highgate seals off the northern pass.”

“And the southern pass opens into the Great Southern Forest,” said Mazael. “Except the Malrags decimated the Elderborn tribes of the Forest. So any number of barbarians could have reached the Grim Marches undetected.” 

“Most likely,” said Romaria.

Mazael nodded. “Timothy!”

Timothy approached, holding a wire-wrapped quartz crystal in his hand. His eyelids fluttered, and the crystal flickered with pale light. “There are no enemies within five miles, my lord.”

Mazael turned back to Romaria. “Can you track the warband?”

Romaria laughed. “Easily. They left a trail a blind man could follow.” 

“Then let’s find them,” said Mazael.

###

“Look,” said Romaria.

Mazael looked up, wondering if Romaria had spotted the barbarians. But he saw nothing but the rolling plains and Sir Tanam's distant outriders.

“There,” said Romaria, pointing up.

Mazael squinted into the blue sky. Far overhead, he glimpsed two dark specks circling.

“Griffins,” said Romaria. “With riders.”

Mazael grunted. “Barbarian scouts.” He thought for a moment. “Can you shoot them down?”

“No. They’re at least three hundred yards up, maybe more. Not even an Elderborn bow can shoot that high.”  

“Timothy?” said Mazael.

Timothy shook his head.

“I could try to strike them,” said Lucan, voice quiet. He seemed distracted, as if his mind were somewhere else. “But not with any degree of accuracy, not at this distance. And if I miss, they’ll have a better idea of our capabilities. Better to save my spells for the actual battle, when they will have the greatest impact.” 

“Molly?” said Mazael.

Molly looked up at the griffins and laughed. “I could try. Two or three strides through the shadows might get me up there. But if I lose my concentration, I’ll make quite a mess when I hit the ground.”

“So,” said Mazael. “They know we're coming. Best to use that to our advantage, then.” He scratched his beard, thinking. “Timothy. Lucan. How much effort would it be to maintain some spells of illusion?”

Timothy blinked. “Not hard, my lord.”

“Could you create the image of a few hundred extra horsemen?” said Mazael.

“Easily enough,” said Timothy, “but we could not maintain the necessary level of detail long enough to fool the riders.”

“We don't need to,” said Lucan. “They’re a thousand feet up, and I doubt they have Lady Romaria’s keen eyes. All we need do is throw up some images of dust clouds and silhouetted horsemen.”

“And if you change the number from time to time,” said Hagen, “it will throw the enemy into confusion, and they may make an error we can exploit.”

“Do it,” said Mazael. 

Timothy and Lucan nodded and got to work.

“Which way is this warband going?” said Mazael.

“North,” said Romaria. 

Mazael grunted. “The nearest village that way is Redcrest. Stone wall around it. I doubt the barbarians will be able to take it.”

“There may be others,” said Romaria. “This trail links up with the path of another warband. At least five or six hundred strong, with some strange footprints. Mazael, I think these ‘great beasts’ we’ve heard about are mammoths.”

“Mammoths?” said Mazael. To his right the air shimmered, and the pale images of horsemen appeared, wreathed in billowing dust. “What the devil is a mammoth?” 

“Like an elephant, but much larger,” said Romaria, “and covered in thick fur. The barbarians use them as beasts of burden, and some of them train their mammoths for battle.”

“Like a war elephant,” said Mazael. “I suppose you could use the thing as a living siege tower, too.” Romaria nodded. “Well, a mammoth is flesh and blood, which means it can be killed like anything else. How far are we behind them?”

“No more than three or four hours. Five at the most,” said Romaria.

Mazael cursed. “They’ll reach Redcrest before we do. Sir Aulus!” 

Aulus nodded and blew his horn. Mazael’s men formed up and rode for Redcrest, Lucan’s and Timothy’s illusions surrounding them. 

###

Romaria straightened up in her saddle, sniffing at the air.

A dozen different odors filled her nostrils. The smell of the horses, and the men sweating inside their armor. The oil coating both sword blades and chain mail. The bruised grass beneath the horses’ steel-shod hooves. The smoke from a distant fire. 

And a musky, oily smell. It had not touched her nose for years, but she remembered it well enough.

Mammoth fur.

“They’re not far ahead,” she said.

Beside her, Mazael nodded. One hand gripped the reins of his ill-tempered horse, while the other dropped to the hilt of Lion. “We’re almost to Redcrest. We’ll see them soon.”

They saw the village before the enemy.

Few hills stood in this part of the Grim Marches, and Redcrest filled the crown of one. Walls of red sandstone surrounded the village, strong enough to keep out the Malrags during Ultorin's invasion. 

The barbarians waited against the south slope of the hill.

There were at least eight hundred men, maybe nine hundred, lined up in a shield wall bristling with spears. Most of the barbarians had ragged red or blond hair, and wore chain mail or black armor taken from slain Malrags. They had put their backs to the hill, keeping Mazael’s men from circling behind them.

And to guard their flanks, they had the mammoths.

Four of the massive beasts stood on either side of the barbarian shield wall. The creatures looked like massive, misshapen elephants, each one standing about twenty feet tall. Massive curling tusks rose from their brown-furred heads. Wooden platforms rested upon their backs, and a dozen barbarian archers stood on each platform, bows in hand. 

Mazael called for a halt. He gazed at the barbarian ranks, his expression grim. 

“Our horsemen can sweep aside their footmen, once we break their lines,” said Hagen.

“Aye,” said Mazael, “and then we’ll find ourselves trapped between those mammoths.”

“The beasts aren’t armored,” said Hagen. “If get close enough, we can hew their legs out from under them.”

“Perhaps not,” said Mazael. “I doubt the horses are used to the smell of those things. If we get too close, the horses might panic. And if the horses panic, the mammoths can smash through us.”

“Wouldn’t that be lovely?” said Molly. “To survive the San-keth, the Malrags, a dragon, and my brother, only to get squashed like an ant underneath some great damn ugly elephant.” 

Lucan gave her a dark look.

“It would hardly be a death worthy of song,” said Tanam. “But better not to die at all, whether upon a sword or beneath a great damn ugly elephant.”

“So, Father,” said Molly. “You’re the great general who threw down the Dominiars and drove back the Malrags. How do we fight those things?” 

Mazael said nothing, his head bowed. On another man, such a posture would have meant despair, or perhaps panic, but Romaria knew better. Her husband waged war, commanded men in battle, the way a masterful painter wielded a brush. 

It was a thing both beautiful and horrifying to watch. 

“This is what we’ll do,” said Mazael, and he told them.

###

Mazael drew Lion.

The blade glimmered in the afternoon sun, but did not burst into blue flames. Whatever else these barbarians were, they were not creatures of dark magic. They were only men.

And if his plan worked, he was going to kill quite a lot of them in the next few minutes. 

Part of his mind recoiled in horror at the thought. 

But his Demonsouled blood sang in anticipation, yearning to see the men die beneath his blade, to see their blood spill in crimson arcs upon the ground…

He forced aside the thought. He had a battle to win.

“Aulus,” said Mazael, his voice calm. “Now.” 

Aulus lifted his horn to his lips and blew a series of blasts.

The barbarians stirred, bracing themselves for the attack.

Thee militia archers galloped forward. Many peasants of the Grim Marches were herdsmen, and learned how to ride and wield a horse bow from a young age, lest lions make off with the sheep. Those herdsmen had honed their skills in the peasant militias during the Malrag war, and Mazael had made sure that they continued to drill. 

Now two groups of horse archers rode for the barbarians, heading for the mammoths on the shield wall's wings. 

As one they drew their bows and fired.

A storm of arrows flew at the mammoths. The beasts’ thick coats of fur deflected most of the missiles, but some struck home. One of the barbarian archers fell with a gurgling shriek, and the mammoths growled and stamped their feet, their long trunks lashing the air.

The horse archers wheeled and galloped away. Mazael saw a wave of relief go through the barbarians. He realized they were not used to fighting horsemen, and would not know how to handle what came next.

A wicked grin crossed his face.

The horse archers began to gallop in a wheel before the shield wall and the mammoths. And as they did, they loosed arrow after arrow. The mammoths roared in annoyance, and a pair of archers fell screaming from the platforms. One of the barbarians in the shield wall began roaring out a song in a hoarse voice, and the rest of the spearmen and swordsmen followed suit. Soon all of them sang, striking their weapons against their shields in an ominous drumbeat. 

Mazael didn’t recognize the language, but he saw Romaria frown.

“You know what they’re saying?” said Mazael.

“Aye,” said Romaria. “They’re speaking a dialect of Dark Elderborn. I think…”

With a roar the mammoths surged forward. 

“Molly!” said Mazael. “Now!”

###