The Beginnings Omnibus: Beginnings 1, 2, 3 & Legend of Ashenclaw novella (Realm of Ashenclaw Beginnings Saga) (49 page)

“There is something that we agree upon at least, barbarian,” Rose observed. “Though I’d prefer a mug.”

“We often used hollowed out horns to drink our fill in Chansuk. Elk, cow and those such animals were plentiful,” Saeunn explained.

“There is something or someone atop that hill there,” Elec said, pointing toward a hill on the north side of the caravan. They were currently in a valley and Garius ordered the wagon to stop.

“It might be a good time to stretch our legs,” Garius suggested. “Elec, why don’t you investigate that sighting?”

“Agreed,” Elec replied, as the three of them exited the caravan, followed by the Inquisitor.

Suddenly, a figure appeared atop the hill to their north. Garius realized that they were in a bottlenecked section of the valley and that this was a suitable place for an ambush.

“Surrender your belongings and make haste away from here or suffer your deaths!” echoed a scratchy voice. They could not make out the form of the one who threatened them as the sun hung high in the air, partially blinding the four of them in the valley below.

At the same time, another silhouetted figure, much larger than a human and slightly hunched, appeared on the opposite, southernmost hill. That figure was quickly surrounded by several large shapes, five in total, Elec thought, fighting through the sun’s rays to confirm that number.

Many more humanoid-shaped figures huddled and appeared in the shadows nearest the one who spoke on the northern hilltop. It appeared there would be no more negotiations as the swarm suddenly rumbled down the hill on either side, starting with the humanoids.

“Rose and I will take this side,” Garius instructed. “Elec and Saeunn take the southern side! Quickly, now!”

Elec quaffed his potions and drew his weapons. Saeunn unleashed her great blade and held it at the ready. She wielded the giant weapon as if it were an extension of her own arms, and her muscular arms corded with each tiny movement as the two of them headed to intercept their targets.

Garius began a chant at the foot of the northern hill, where the swarm was heading,
The Repentant
held in his right hand. He and Rose could make their assailants out clearly now and he recognized the group as a pack of green-skinned orcs.

“Hold a moment,” Garius stated as he finished his gestures and incantations. Rose had her daggers drawn, but she heeded his plea and waited.

 Suddenly, a small rift opened and Garius called upon the necromantic power of The Reaper, asking him for access to the degenerative plane once more. The rift grew larger. It seemed like a small black hole was opening at the base of the hill in front of the two of them and the horde headed straight into its path.

Rose surveyed the spectacle in awe.

“Stay here,” Garius warned as the black aura danced and shifted, stealing the life force from any orc that happened to charge into the mass. Garius stayed just outside of it, commanding it and shaping it as he chose.

The vast majority of the orcs were dropping lifelessly to the valley floor as their life force was torn from their bodies. They ran and tumbled into one another, stumbling down the hill, while some of them tried desperately to reverse their momentum to go back up the steep incline. Orcs pushed and shoved and ran over one another in the chaos, some at the rear of the pile not noticing the void until it was too late. It was all for naught.

More than three quarters of the orcs on the north side of the hill had dropped. Garius now strode into the gathering of necromantic gloom, seeming to absorb and devour the darkness, storing it inside him like some sort of parasite.

Only a half-dozen orcs remained by the time the field dissipated, slowly funneling back into rift in the air and disappearing. Rose gathered that it must have returned to the degenerative plane where it originated.

“That was a little disturbing,” Rose admitted as she stood with her daggers crossed over her arms, mouth open still and eyes wide in disbelief. “Any more where that came from?”

Garius merely turned to regard her, looking strangely intoxicated as his body had a deeply purple, almost blackened afterglow that whirled about his armor and seemed to melt into him. He did not have his helmet on and Rose noticed some of that same glow emitting from his eyes that dissolved just as quickly, his pupils becoming visible once more.

He swung his mighty hammer in a wide arc, catching one orc in the face and crushing the life out of it as several others managed to dodge the blow. The runes on
The Repentant
danced magically as the impact caused a burst of bright energy to discharge from the hammer’s head.

“Back to back now,” Garius instructed. Rose followed the command and stood with her back to his, forming a solid defense.

Rose swung her two long daggers faster than the eye could follow as two orcs attempted to rush her at once. Back and forth the daggers went, defying the physics of normal combat and making Rose’s arms ache with the strain in the process.
Avorna
blocked a blade as
Zaedra
countered and then vice-versa. She was starting to get used to the ache in her arms again…it had been many years since she had felt that particular sensation.

She scored hit after hit as they continued their assault. She would force one back, while allowing another to approach, landing deadly blows with each strike. The wounds quickly piled up on the orcs and she had not even a scratch on her. A simple thought of what she wanted to do or how she wanted to react propelled her hands and the daggers into position just as quickly.

Meanwhile, Garius swung
The Repentant
in a measured manner, scoring yet another crushing blow. The runes on the hammer grew brighter with each successive strike. There were only two orcs remaining from the entire raid party that had descended the hill mere moments ago.

Suddenly, an arrow flew past Garius’s ear. He gazed in that direction and spotted two archers perched on top of the northern hill. He looked up to thank a silent prayer to The Dreamer, the goddess of luck, as he released the latch on his belt that held his helmet in place and forced it onto his head.

 
“Go get them while I handle these two,” Garius instructed, kicking one of the orcs to the ground. The blow from his heavily plated boot stunned the orc for a moment. “I’ll be there as soon as I’m done with
this
,” he finished with emphasis, timing that last word with a second kick.

Rose nodded and rolled backward away from the orc that was engaged with her and had gotten within Garius’s reach as she saw him place his boot to the prone orc’s head a third time.

There was not much in the way of shadow as the sun was directly overhead, but she spotted the shadow of the Inquisitor’s outline beside her. The orc archers above were using trees as cover on the hill.

Rose stepped directly into Garius’s shadow, causing the orc opponent that was pursuing her to stop in awe as he witnessed the shadow engulf her. That pause cost him a blow to the back of the head, as
The Repentant
crushed his skull.

Only one left now,
he thought. He looked after Rose to see if he could catch a glimpse of her, but once again, the sun was too bright and blinding light flooded his vision instead.

Elec and Saeunn raced toward the base of the southern hill, where the slope wasn’t quite as steep as the opposite side. Elec observed that there were at least
six
ogres. They stood one and a half times the height of a human, with heavily muscled arms, and bloated bellies. Their skin was an unhealthy yellow, with patches of hair in random places and blemishes all along their skin.

Elec had never seen an ogre before, though he had encountered a creature born of giant-blood. Even so, seeing several of the creatures face to face made him reach a new level of fear. They moved with a speed that belied their disfigured, swollen bodies. He imagined the force with which their mighty blows would strike and it made him wince involuntarily.

Elec uneasily quaffed a potion. He felt he would need every advantage that he could muster if he was to survive this encounter. He knew that if he took the wrong combination, the effects would not overlap properly, but the particular combination he used now he had perfected over many years.

Saeunn charged the nearest ogre bravely and almost slipped on a snow patch, but caught herself and kept going, not even breaking stride. She and an ogre collided and there was a loud thud as her solid form hit its somewhat bulbous frame. The ogre’s head snapped back as Saeunn used the hilt of her sword to slam into it, cracking its skull, while deftly avoiding the ogre’s heavy fist. The creature landed in a heap—it was dead before it even hit the ground.

Saeunn turned on another. Elec watched her fight with a grace and willingness that made him feel more inadequate than usual. She was his complete opposite with regards to self-confidence, he realized, and he could not help but be impressed by the remarkable barbarian woman from Chansuk.

A large rock just missed crushing Elec’s head and he quickly returned his attention to his own role in the battle. He decided to go in the same direction that Saeunn was heading. He wanted to stay close to the barbarian woman for several reasons.

What is that!?
Elec wondered as he caught a glimpse of something across the valley on the northern hill that looked like a murky rift in the planes. He shook his head, dismissing the sight as possibly a side effect of one of his elixirs or a trick of the sunlight. Perhaps even the slow-falling snow was deceiving him….

Whatever it was, he had more pressing issues to deal with. He ran quickly, trying to keep pace with Saeunn. She was forcing the ogres at the top of the hill to refrain from lobbing rocks at the elf momentarily, and at least forcing them to reset their positions. That would buy him some time.

Saeunn had cornered two more ogres now and was forcing them into defensive positions with her well-placed and aggressive swings. There was no subtlety to the barbarian woman it seemed. She simply relied on brute force and innate skill.

The ogres began to maneuver her in between the two of them and Saeunn either didn’t realize it or didn’t care. Just as they were about to complete their move, Elec arrived and forced them to change their strategy. The ogres both sneered and gurgled something unintelligible at him.

The other ogre swung a club at Saeunn that she parried with her greatsword, burying it deep into the wooden weapon in the process and stopping the blow entirely. She immediately kicked out with her left leg into the kneecap of the ogre, knocking its leg back on the slick surface and causing it to fall forward, giving her an opening. Saeunn reared back with her newly-freed greatsword, and struck a killing blow to the back of the ogre’s head, knocking it to the ground and its final resting place.

Elec had taken the attention of the second ogre and he was now madly dashing to and fro, dodging its blows, and trying to avoid the creature’s club as it made divots in the snow around him. He saw a tree behind him and formulated a plan as the ogre swung wildly and with such force, that to connect with a single blow would surely spell death.

He dodged behind the tree as quickly as he could, forcing the ogre around its wide base slowly enough that it did not see Elec climb the low hanging branch on the opposite side.  The ogre peered around the base of the massive tree trunk and realized too late where Elec had disappeared to.

The ogre cried out in anguish as it felt the sharp end of a blade plunge through its back. Elec drove the blade in hard and thrust with all the momentum and might that he could muster. The sword sank deeper into the ogre, through its lungs, and out the front.

Elec rode the beast for several seconds as it fought to remove him, until finally, it collapsed to the ground with a solid thud. Elec dove from its back toward Saeunn who had just disposed of her foe.

And it was a good thing too, as three more ogres had come into view, somehow finding a less treacherous way down the hill than Elec had initially considered.

Three more!
Elec thought in a slight panic as he removed yet another potion from its housing on the bandolier and drained its contents.

Garius could not see where Rose had arrived atop the hill, and so he returned his attention to the stunned orc on the ground, now only a few paces from him. He made a few movements with the hand that still clutched
The Repentant
, rubbed his braided beard and uttered an incantation, asking The Watcher, the god of the skies, for a blessing of aid.

As if the clouds themselves opened up, a massive bolt of lightning exploded out of the sky and landed directly on top of the prone orc, incinerating it and leaving a scorched patch of soil in the snow-soaked ground around the orc’s charred remains. Garius slung his holy warhammer upon his back and searched quickly for a path up the hill in order to aid Rose in dispatching the archers above.

Rose emerged from a shadow directly behind the first archer, using the element of surprise. She precisely slit the green-skinned orc’s throat, dropping it to the ground softly. The second and third orcs noticed her just then, dropping their bows in unison and struggling to draw their swords.

Rose used that opening to kick out at the closest orc, hitting him squarely in the abdomen causing him to double over. Then she hammered down with
Zaedra
in a reverse-grip and skewered the back of the creature’s head, knocking it firmly to the ground.

The third orc had gotten his sword out and she sensed that her end was near if she didn’t move. They were still positioned directly under a tree, so she stepped into its voluminous shade and moved through the shadow realm to end up behind her target.

The orc, however, did not sense her as it looked closely into the shadows trying to discern her whereabouts. She stealthily drove the tips of both daggers into his back in unison, penetrating the lungs and leaving the orc lifeless as he gurgled something in his native tongue.

She removed the daggers and then suddenly felt a sting in her left shoulder that radiated pain down her entire arm. She looked to see what it was and noticed an arrow protruding from her shoulder that passed right through and below her left clavicle. She whipped round to see another orc approximately fifty paces from her that she had not noticed earlier.

She tried to step into the shadows once more, to use the shadow realm to hide her from her enemy, but could not concentrate as another arrow penetrated the flesh on her left thigh. She fell to one knee under the ensuing pain and then there was blackness. Her last thoughts were of failure.

Elec and Saeunn exchanged grim looks as the three ogres bore down on them.

“Any ideas?” Elec asked as he quaffed another potion, drawing a quizzical look from Saeunn, who did not quite understand the elf’s ways.

“Survive,” Saeunn remarked bluntly as she once again charged headlong into the onrushing ogres, wild-eyed and ready. Her shock of long blonde braided hair bounced from side to side behind her as she charged.

Elec nodded in agreement, more to himself than her, as Saeunn had already taken off.

Saeunn jumped feet first into the center of an ogre’s belly, knocking the wind out of it. As her momentum continued, she knocked the ogre to the ground, landing atop it, using her muscular legs and an incredible sense of balance to remain upright upon her fallen opponent, falling to her seat atop its chest.

She got her feet under her again and slashed her greatsword in such an arc as to dismember the second ogre on her right flank in the process. Its head rolled away and its massive body fell to the snowy ground, blood heavily staining the white snow where it landed. She stood atop the other and stabbed at its head, but the ogre managed to wiggle out of the way of her blade. It retrieved its club, striking her in the side, knocking her to the ground this time, and losing the grip on its own club as it followed her trajectory.