Shadow Prowler (57 page)

“Come on, Fox!”

But the old war dog knew well enough what to do.

Forty crossbows suddenly appeared before the eyes of the startled orcs who had already begun climbing over the wall.

Thwack!

A massive, invisible chain crashed into the ranks of the Firstborn, sending them flying backward so that they knocked their own comrades off their feet and dragged them back down to the bottom of the ravine.

The soldiers slung their crossbows behind their backs and dashed toward that secure wall of shields and swords. The first orc climbed over the fortifications and immediately collapsed with an arrow in his neck. He was quickly followed by another two, then another four . . . and then there were dozens of the Firstborn jumping down onto the ground.

“Swordsmen! On one knee!” Hargan barked.

The sergeants repeated their commander’s order and the front line went down on their right knees.

“Fire, you whores!”

The bowmen standing in the second row didn’t need to be reminded of the basic rules of war—if the front line gives you the chance, then lash away at the enemy until your arm is exhausted or he manages to reach you! The arrows whizzed over the heads of the swordsmen and halted the running orcs.

“Will you look at that!” someone beside Hargan said with a whistle. “Stubborn, aren’t they, the mangy dogs!”

The orcs weren’t bothered at all by the death of their comrades. There were at least a hundred of the enemy facing the ranks of humans now. And more and more of them kept climbing over the wall of the fortifications. Then the orcs’ bowmen appeared on the fortifications constructed with such care by Hargan’s soldiers.

Before the two forces clashed, Blidkhard’s men fired for a second time. And while the bowmen mostly tried to pick off the orcs’ archers, Fox’s lads, who had already reloaded their crossbows, aimed them at the advancing mass of Firstborn.

“Stand firm! Lock shields! Lower spears! Maintain formation! Stand fiiirm . . .”

Impact. Shield struck against shield with a deafening, indescribable clatter. Uproar, shouts, the clash of weapons. For an instant the spears halted the avalanche of orcs, then they sank down under the weight of the bodies, and the surviving Firstborn came within striking distance for a yataghan.

The men withheld the pressure of the enemy for just a few seconds, and then their line snapped under the ferocity of the attack like a flawed string.

Now there were only scattered groups of soldiers fighting to hold back the pressure: in the best case ten or fifteen soldiers opposing the enemy, and in the worst case only isolated individuals. Somehow they beat the orcs back, somehow the men had successfully weathered the first, most dangerous rush, and they were slowly but surely forcing the orcs back toward the wall.

An arrow glinted in the air, then another. Hargan swore, assuming that the orcs had managed to send in more archers, but when he looked, he spotted thirty bowmen led by Blidkhard right at the back of his brigade. The bowmen had created space for themselves by moving back to a safe distance, and now they were firing at the attackers, choosing their targets. Several of the Firstborn tried to reach the bowmen, but their way was blocked by Wencher’s swordsmen, who shielded the Wind Jugglers.

Bolts of lightning began raining down from the dark clouds with a dry crackling sound, striking down the orcs one after another. Armor was no protection against Siena’s magic. Before Hargan’s very eyes a bolt of lightning appeared from somewhere up in the sky, divided into branches, and felled seven orcs at once, leaving behind nothing but black earth and charred armor.

The Firstborn flinched and faltered, unable to withstand the rain of lightning and hail of arrows. From somewhere behind the enemy, the war drums sounded, calling the retreat. The orcs withdrew tidily, in good order, leaving behind a small detachment to cover the main forces. But the men had taken fresh heart and they struck a crushing blow against the wall of shields, beating down the enemy to right and left, while those bowmen who had not changed their bows for swords in the course of the battle ran up, ignoring the battle raging around them, and began showering arrows on the Firstborn who were crossing the ravine.

Not one of the detachment of orcs covering the retreat was left alive.

Blidkhard spat, then he looked his commander in the eye and said: “Don’t you go thinking that we’ve beaten them off. This is only the advance force of the orcs’ army. The main forces haven’t arrived yet; this lot just tried to take us in a rush. It didn’t work. They didn’t even have a single shaman with them, otherwise our enchantress wouldn’t have got away with much magic. But when the Bloody Axes or the Gruun Ear-Gougers get here, they’ll brush us aside like a feather. We won’t even last an hour against those clans.”

“By the way, how is our enchantress?
”

“
I’m alive,” Siena replied.

“I’m glad your health is in good order, and thank you for the help.
”

“
It wasn’t me,” the girl said, embarrassed.

“How’s that?” asked Hargan, raising one eyebrow. “Then who was it?
”

“
I mean, it wasn’t just me.” The enchantress became even more embarrassed. “The amulet helped.”

Hargan glanced at the magical drop of silvery metal.

“My teacher said it would protect me against the shamanism of the orcs. The amulet neutralizes that magic, if it is directed at me. And it turned out that it also restores my strength. This time I tried to use it in a slightly different way, and it gave me so much power I was almost crushed.”

The rumble of war drums drifted above a world soaked in blood. During the night the orcs had attacked the humans’ fortifications eight times. They had managed to force their way past the wall three times, despite the hail of arrows from the bowmen and the determination of soldiers who stood to the death. Every time the orcs were thrown back the losses had been greater. The Firstborn simply went on and on testing the mettle of the Dog Swallows. The ravine was half full of bodies. There were almost no arrows left and the bowmen had to pick up what the orcs had sent them in order to manage to return the fire from the wave of attackers.

Hargan’s brigade had done the impossible—it had held out against the enemy for almost four days, giving Grok’s army a huge start. The commander glanced round at the few survivors. Thirty-nine men. Thirty-nine tired, bandaged, bloodstained men. The only ones who had survived this far, who had endured.

Blidkhard was gone. The young Borderman protecting the enchantress was gone. And the girl herself had been killed. After Siena destroyed one of the enemy’s shamans, the orcs had set out specifically to hunt her down, and during the last sally they had eventually succeeded, managing to surround her and her bodyguards.

But meanwhile, at the cost of catastrophic losses, the men had forced the orcs to show them respect. They had forced a race that despised everyone else living in Siala to act with caution and not simply come dashing headlong across that cursed ravine.

The soldiers would not survive the ninth attack. Everyone who was still alive knew that.

“We’ll show the Firstborn how soldiers ought to die!” said Fox, picking up his beloved flails and listening to the rumble of the approaching drums.

“Yes, we’ll show them,” said Hargan, getting up off the ground. “Look, Fox, it’s stopped raining!”

“That’s a good sign.
”

“
Raise the banner! Bugler, sound the alert. Bowmen to the battle line! Kill the enemy, show no mercy!”

And the orcs advancing on those cursed fortifications that would not surrender heard the cry that others before them had heard and feared each time they retreated from the walls of the ravine.

“NO MERCY!”

H
arold!” said someone, cautiously touching my shoulder. “Harold, get up.”

I opened my eyes and looked at the jester, who was leaning down over me.

“Kli-Kli!” I groaned in desperation. “Now why aren’t you asleep?”

He looked at me reproachfully and made himself comfortable on a saddlebag.

“You were shouting last night,” said Kli-Kli. “What was it, nightmares?”

“It was all your fault,” I muttered.

“Eh?”

“You tell us all those stories, and then they give me no peace all night long.”

“What stories? You mean Hargan’s Brigade?”

“Yes, I was dreaming all night about them fighting the orcs.”

“Oho!” Kli-Kli exclaimed admiringly.

“By the way, Alistan and the lads arrived during the night,” the goblin threw out casually.

“Why didn’t you say so straightaway?” I asked, jumping to my feet.

“Shhh!” the joker hissed, opening his eyes wide. “Don’t yell like that. Can’t you see everyone’s asleep?”

It was true. Even though it was already light, everyone was still lying wrapped up in their traveling blankets. Only Deler and Hallas were walking round the border of the camp, keeping watch over our rest.

The jester had not lied about our comrades’ return. I spotted Markauz’s huge steed and the horses of the Wild Hearts who had arrived with him.

“Then why did you wake me up?”

“I told you, you were shouting. And I wanted to tell you before the others what it was that our Tomcat sniffed out.”

“Then tell me.”

“He was right all along. There was something going on behind our backs. He and Egrassa got there just in time. The tracker’s instincts led him to a small forest glade quite a long way off the highway. And there were three fellows there, every one of them exactly like the sorcerers who sneaked into Stalkon’s palace. Tomcat says they all had rings like the attackers that night.”

“What rings do you mean?”

“Ooooooh . . . ,” the goblin gasped disappointedly. “I can see you just slept through the whole thing. All the men who attacked the palace had rings made like ivy. That’s one of the Nameless One’s emblems. So that they could recognize each other. Anyway, these lads in the glade had got a fire going and put a pot over it. I don’t know what they were planning to cook up, but it certainly wasn’t a fancy cake. As soon as the purple smoke started rising out of the pot—”

“Purple?” I asked.

I hated that color ever since Miralissa had sent me off to that incredible vision when I was being introduced to the key. Besides, it’s a color for the rich and privileged.

“I was surprised, too, but that’s exactly the way Tomcat tells it. And don’t you interrupt! Well, then . . . You’ve put me off now, Harold!” Kli-Kli whispered furiously.

“Purple smoke,” I prompted him.

“Ah, right! Well then, as soon as the purple smoke started rising out of the pot, Egrassa took his bow and killed the two shamans so fast, they never even knew what was happening. Tomcat overturned the pot and stamped out the fire, and then the creature that had been following all the way appeared out of thin air. Tomcat sensed it a long time ago, only it was invisible. It was some kind of tracker dog. Anyway, they killed it and set off to catch up with us—”

“And it took them all this time to do it,” I said acidly, completing the goblin’s story.

“Just wait, will you!” Kli-Kli said exasperatedly, jumping to his feet.
“Now look, you’ve put me off again. I’m not going to tell you anything.”

“They set off back to catch us up,” I said hastily.

“Only they didn’t get very far,” said the goblin, sitting back down beside me again. “Either Tomcat and Egrassa missed one of those skunks, or the elf didn’t shoot fast enough, but one of the shamans must have managed to raise the alarm. Anyway, the road was blocked off in front of them and behind them by several squads of men who appeared out of nowhere. And Tomcat sensed that they’d started working their sorcery again somewhere close to the place where he’d just been. There must have been another group of sorcerers in the forest, but so far they’d been keeping quiet, and that was why Tomcat hadn’t sensed them. The Nameless One’s followers had our lads caught in a trap, so Tomcat and Egrassa had to turn off into the forest to get away from them, and that’s why it took them so long to get here. Their pursuers dropped back, there was no point in hunting the two of them through the undergrowth and fallen trees—the elf’s too good at confusing his tracks. And a day later, when Tomcat and Egrassa came out onto the road, they ran into Alistan and Eel. And that basically is the whole story.”