Shadowbred (33 page)

Cale stood, his request for spells only partially answered, and drew Weaveshear. He pulled the shadows about him until they masked him from sight. He shadowstepped to the south side of the slope, putting himself between the Selgauntans and the mercenaries. There, he crouched in the grass, the power of his god sizzling in his mind.

The mercenaries charged in a crescent formation, blades bare and shields at station. About a spear’s cast from the campsite, one of the riders made a cutting gesture with his hand and the magical silence ended. The thunder of hooves and the battle cries of the mercenaries

filled the air. No doubt they expected the surprised Selgauntans to rush from their tents and be cut down. Had the Selgauntans been in the camp, none of them could have escaped the charge.

The mercenaries barreled into the campsite, shouting challenges. When they found only empty tents, they pulled up and searched about. Curses and questions replaced battle cties. The mercenaries trampled the Selgauntans’ tents and gear. Malkur, the priests, and the wizards appeared at the top of the declivity opposite Cale. The company’s archers held formation behind them.

“They were here not too long ago,” called Othel, atop a horse in the midst of the campsite.

Malkur frowned and looked out over the plains. “They cannot be far.”

One of the priests beside Malkur smashed together two glass spheres and incanted a spell. He turned his horse in a semicircle and stopped when he was facing south, the direction the Selgauntans had fled.

“There,” he said, and pointed past Cale. “Three long bowshots, no more.”

The priest galloped around the declivity in the direction in which he had pointed, toward Cale.

“Form up,” Malkur called to his men, and several sergeants echoed the command.

Cale had hoped to get the mercenaries in a more compact formation, but decided he could not wait any longer.

“I see them!” the lead priest called. He was no more than a dagger toss from Cale, and alone. “Due south. Two bowshots.”

“Form up for pursuit,” Malkur said to the rest of the men. “Archers at the teady.”

Before the men could reassemble, Cale intoned a rapid imprecation to Mask. A cylinder of fire and searing divine power engulfed the entire declivity in flames, heat, and light. The moment Cale completed his spell, the shadows enshrouding him peeled away and left him visible.

The flames caught almost a score of men in the thick of the blast, including Malkur, the mages, and one of the priests at its edge. Men

and horses screamed and the stink of burning flesh filled the air. j The horses not caught in the flames, including those of the archers ; behind Malkur, reared and bucked. *<

The flames whooshed out of existence as fast as they had appeared, leaving burning tents and the bodies of over a dozen men and horses scattered across the campsite. Screams of pain rose into the night. The unwounded men cursed, tried to control their horses, and looked about warily.

“What in the Hells?”

“Where did that come from?”

The priest near Cale, unaffected by the fire, noticed him. “Here!” he shouted, and spurred his horse toward Cale. “He is here!”

The mercenaries responded to the priest’s words with professional speed. Before Cale could pull the concealing shadows back around him, half a score arrows hissed toward him. Four missed and sank to their fletching in the grass. The shadows that sheathed him deflected two arrows, but four buried themselves in his chest, shoulder, arm, and thigh. The impact drove him backward and knocked him to the earth. He hissed with the pain even as his flesh started to spit out the arrows and heal the wounds.

The cleric appeared above him on his horse. His axe and lightning bolt-emblazoned shield hung from his saddle. He pointed a hand at Cale, fingers outstretched.

Cale could not interpose Weaveshear in time and an arc of fire shot from the priest’s fingers and seared Cale’s face and chest. His flesh was not able to repel the priest’s spell and the flesh of his eyes and lower jaw—those parts of his face not protected by the mask— blistered and peeled. The damage sealed his eyes shut.

“There’s fire for your fire, whoreson,” said the priest, and he called back to his fellows with a wild laugh. “He is alone!”

Cale could hear the priest’s horse thumping in the grass near him. He pulled the arrows from his body by touch, grunting with each one.

“Run him down,” Malkur ordered. “Vors, see to the fallen. The rest of you, after the Selgauntans.”

Cale braced himself with his arms and tried to rise but the priest’s horse slammed into him, knocked him flat, and rode over him. The war horse’s hind legs stomped his chest and snapped several ribs. Cale hissed at the pain. The priest laughed maniacally as he galloped off.

Cale felt the ground vibrating as the rest of the horsemen galloped out of the hollow and towatd the Selgauntans. They rode directly at him, he knew. His body was healing itself, and just in time, he could open his eyes and see.

Hooves were all around him, throwing up clods of dirt. He rolled to his side, resisted the instinctive urge to cover up, and did the only thing he could. He moved from the darkness on one side of the declivity to the darkness on the other.

He arrived across the campsite behind Malkur, the wizards, the priest, and the departing archers. He held his silence and rook as deep a breath as his damaged body allowed. He watched the mercenaries speed off after Ren, Tamlin, and the house guards.

He lay on his side, sheathed in shadows, and let his flesh heal for a few moments. In the campsite below, he saw one of the priests moving from one burned corpse to another, presumably looking for signs of life. The priest’s horse followed him, tossing its head at the stink.

Cale winced as his ribs knitted together. He whispered a prayer to Mask and channeled healing energy into his wounded body. He ran his fingers tentatively over his face and found it nearly healed. He rose into a crouch, Weaveshear in hand.

The priest kneeled over another of the fallen. The back of his neck was exposed between helmet and mail. Cale had killed dozens of men in exactly that position. He was about to add another to the number.

He took Weaveshear in a two-handed grip and in a single stride, moved into the darkness directly behind the priest. The priest’s horse snorted at Cale’s sudden appearance but before the priest could turn, Cale slashed downward and decapitated him. The priest never uttered a sound. The blood pumping from the stump of his neck soaked the corpse he had been checking.

Cale sheathed his blade and hurried over to the horse. It backed off and whinnied, throwing its head.

“Steady,” Cale said. “Steady, now.”

The warhorse stood taller than Vos by five hands. Cale took hold of its reins and whispered soothingly as he moved to its side. It backed up, snorting.

“Steady,” Cale said again, and patted its neck. It seemed as calm as he could hope for, so he put his foot to the stirrup and swung himself up. The horse danced under him but he held his perch. The stirrups were too short but he did not have time to adjust them.

He pulled two daggers from his belt and took one in each hand, all while holding the reins. He spurred the horse and it raced after the mercenaries so fast it almost dismounted him. Probably it found him a lighter load than usual. The priest had been shorter but fully armored.

Cale leaned forward and bent low, his head along the horse’s neck, and encouraged it onward. He could see the mercenaries ahead, moving at a full gallop, and ahead of them, the Selgauntans, also at a gallop. The mercenaries’ wizard must have cast a spell on the Selgauntans to mark them, for all were covered in glowing, golden dust. Cale could make out Tamlin and Ren even at his distance.

The mercenaries, arranged in a wide column, were gaining. Stormweather’s horses were bred for strength and endurance, not speed. It was only a matter of time before Tamlin and the house guards were caught. They needed to find favorable terrain to make a stand. Meanwhile, Cale was gaining on the mercenaries, slowly but inexorably.

He saw Ren shouting orders to his men and gesturing, and they cleared out from behind Tamlin. Tamlin turned in his saddle and pointed a finger back at the mercenaries. A bolt of lightning tore through their ranks. Two men and horses fell in tumbling, smoking heaps. The rest veered around the fallen, as did Cale, and continued the pursuit.

“Hyah!” Cale called to his horse, and spurred it harder. It snorted and found a reserve of speed. Cale closed more of the distance.

Shouted orders passed through the mercenary ranks and the group of archers, in the rear of the column, drew their bows.

A flight of arrows arced up and rained down on the Selgauntans. A horse went down and its rider tumbled. Another arrow sank into the shoulder of a house guard. He sagged but held his seat with one hand.

Cale gained a few more strides and figured he was close enough ro walk the shadows. He eyed one of the last men in the formation, an archer. He leaned forward and moved rhrough the darkness from his saddle to that of the archer. He appeared behind the man, on the horse’s backside. Cale did not even try to stay atop the horse. He drove both daggers through the mercenary’s mail and into his kidneys. The man gave an aborted shout and the horse’s motion threw him and Cale.

Cale hit the ground in a roll. The impact drove the air from his lungs and displaced his shoulder. He ignored the pain, jumped to his feet, and started sprinting after the mercenaries. His regenerarive flesh popped his shoulder back into its socket as he ran.

Cale ran a handful of steps, picked another man at the end of the formarion, jumped into the air, and stepped through the shadows to the darkness behind the archer. Cale appeared in midair and wrapped his arms around the throat of the rider. The mercenary uttered a muffled scream for aid as he and Cale fell from the horse. Both grunted as they hit the ground and tumbled. Cale felt a bone crack in his ankle and forearm, but his body quelled the pain as it repaired the break. He gained his feet, located the groaning mercenary, and drove a dagger into his chest and another into his throat.

He stood, prepared to repeat the process, and saw that two of the mercenaries must have heard their comrade shout. They peeled off the formation and charged at Cale, blades high.

Cale held up his shadowhand and intoned a prayer to Mask. An arc of dark energy wenr forth from his palm and struck both men. Wounds opened in their exposed skin—gashes like mouths spitting blood. Their bones twisted and shattered. Both screamed and fell from their horses. One snapped his neck on impact. Cale drew Weaveshear, bounded forward, and drove the blade through the second rider’s chest.

He grabbed the reins of one of the neighing horses, calmed it, swung himself up, and started after the mercenaries once more. He was not close enough to shadowstep, so he spurred the horse on.

He gritted his teeth as another volley of arrows from the mercenaries killed another house guard. The mercenaries’ horses stomped his fallen body into the ground as they pursued. Cale saw five glowing magical darts shoot from the fingers of the wizard riding near Malkur and slam into Tamlin’s back. He arched with pain but held his saddle. Tamlin turned to look back on the mercenaries, moved his hand through a series of intricate gestures, and pointed.

A blinding cloud of sleet and ice formed and swirled around the mercenaries’ center, affecting fully a third of the force. The icy ground sent half a dozen horses down and their riders with them. Men shouted, cursed, railed. Horses neighed, whinnied, bucked.

Cale grinned, thinking the Selgauntans had just improved the odds and might yet escape.

The mercenaries’ wizard answered Tamlin’s spell with one of his own, and a thicket of fat black tentacles squirmed up from the plains in the Selgauntans’ midst. Their horses reared and bucked, and many fell. The house guards shouted, hacked at the tentacles with their blades, all to no avail. The squirming limbs grabbed at everything that moved. Some plucked riders from their mounts, others plucked mount and rider together and lifted them off the earth. In the span of three heartbeats, every Selgauntan was wrapped in a black tentacle. The limbs began to squeeze and the Selgauntans began to scream.

The mercenaries slowed and approached at a more leisurely pace. Cale cursed. He would have to kill the wizard.

He sheathed his daggers and intoned a prayer to Mask. When he finished, dangerous energy charged his hands. He closed the distance to the mercenaries until he was less than a bowshot behind them. He checked the darkness behind the mage and rode the night onto the wizard’s horse.

The moment he appeared, he clamped both hands onto either side of the wizard’s head and discharged the baleful energy. Wounds erupted all over the wizard’s face. Blood spurted from his ears, eyes,

and mouth. Cale felt the man’s skull crack under his fingertips. The wizard managed only a choked, gurgling scream before Cale let him fall, dead, from his horse.

Malkur’s horse and others near Cale whinnied and reared in surprise. The men near him cursed, tried to turn their mounts and bring their blades to bear.

Cale met Malkur’s eyes for a moment before he pulled the shadows around him and stepped through them to the edge of the tentacles, ahead of the mercenaries.

The thick limbs entwined men and horses and both screamed as the tentacles continued to constrict. The glowing dust that had covered the Selgauntans no longer shone. Cale held up his hand and intoned a prayer to Mask, pitting the power of his magic against that of the wizard, attempting to undo the wizard’s constticting magic.

He felt resistance when his magic met the wizard’s spell but Cale’s abjuration prevailed. The tentacles vanished in a blink and the men and their mounts fell to the ground, groaning. The bray of a battle horn sounded behind Cale and he turned to receive rhe mercenaries’ charge. The Selgauntans were all going to die, but he would take Malkur and as many mercenaries with him as he could.

But instead of facing the charging mercenaries, Cale saw a second force of spear-armed horsemen streaking across the plains from his right, directly at the attackers. Cale guessed their number to be about double that of Malkur’s men.