Read The Dragon Hammer (Wulf's Saga Book 1) Online
Authors: Tony Daniel
Tags: #Fables, #Legends, #Action & Adventure, #Juvenile Fiction, #Norse, #Fantasy & Magic, #General, #Myths
The Dragon Hammer (Wulf's Saga Book 1) (30 page)
Chapter Thirty-Seven:
The Nettles
His wrists ached. They’d marched him very fast after the capture with his hands tied behind his back. The spear butts of the buffalo men prodded him forward, and when it wasn’t that it was the bear-man claws digging into his shoulder blades, turning him to the right or left. He cried out, but that didn’t stop them.
He knew they were bear
people
and not bears, but what did that mean? They still had claws and big teeth. Now he was not only surrounded by Tier, he was in their power. They’d marched him without letup, and when he’d given out, they’d picked him up like a sack of grain and carried him.
Now here he was and something had just happened to him, something terrible, but he couldn’t remember
what.
He had strange memories of eating bloody flesh. Of a cut made across his own arm and his blood draining. That was the most terrifying thing of all. Had they killed him? Was he a ghost? Where was Helheim?
You are not a ghost, man from the east.
The voice came from everywhere around him. It was a female voice, but deeper, somehow more velvety than any he’d ever heard.
That’s the voice I imagine a spider having, he thought. A black widow spider.
Ravenelle stood in a dark, flat landscape. It wasn’t perfectly level but was more like the floor of one of the great deserts she’d heard existed in the west of the world. There were no stars. What light there was came from the horizon. It looked like early dawn, but Ravenelle knew that in this place there would be no sunrise. Yet the light was enough to see by.
The captain lay several paces away.
He was pulling himself up from the ground. He struggled to a knee. His hands were not tied here, but he rubbed one of his wrists where the rope had cut into it in the real world. Then he saw her. He quickly reached back down to the ground nearby and picked up a large rock. He weighed it in his hand, tossed it away, and picked up another rock, slightly bigger.
He charged at her. He held the rock high, ready to bash her head in when he reached her.
He was the type that fear made brave.
Should have guessed it, Ravenelle thought. A captain, a man of war. He’d have learned to turn his fear into something useful.
Ravenelle looked quickly about.
Stinging nettles, Ravenelle thought, and these were duskies, the nastiest kind of all. She had been to this dream desert. This was where new bloodservants were brought to be punished.
She reached for a handful of leaves and was rewarded with a burning pain in her right palm. She bit her lip and managed not to shriek with the agony she felt.
Then she felt something smack into the small of her back. Hurt shot through her from the blow, more intense and sudden than the nettles’ stinging resin.
She turned and saw that the man was only a few steps away. He’d thrown the rock at her and hit her with it, hard. He had another stone in his hand.
Should have expected him to figure out what to do here to survive, Ravenelle thought.
Then he attacked her. Before he could bash her with the other rock, she turned and thrust the stinging nettles into his face.
He dropped the rock and screamed in pain, as she’d known he would. He clawed at his face for a moment, then fell to the desert floor, holding his face and weeping.
She sat down beside him in the patch of duskies.
All right
, she thought to the other bloodservant who had been hiding nearby.
You can come out now.
I have something to tell you.
Shut up.
Your brother is here.
You lie.
He raised the stone, stepped closer.
But I’m not lying. Tell him.
Harrald?
His brother had not been present before. He was sure of it. But there he was standing less than a ten-pace away. Alvis walked toward Rask, stepping through the nettles. But he wore heavy boots here, and the nettles didn’t seem to affect him.
Alvis? What are you…this is a trick.
It’s me, Harrald. I left the Legion. The talking animals found me. I was dying from the ater. They brought me to her.
Rask looked at his attacker, the smallish woman who had conquered him with leaves.
She was a Roman, obviously. Ebony-brown skin. A cascade of curly black hair. She seemed so frail. Clearly that was not the case.
She saved me.
This doesn’t make any sense.
Harrald, listen to her. She can save you from that thing. It’s burning out your mind like it was burning out mine. She gave me back myself.
Rask sat up. His eyes were watering, and his face felt like he’d been attacked by an entire beehive. But the pain was starting to go away.
He had no idea where he was. If this wasn’t Helheim or a land of ghosts, what was it? Then he saw the stone he’d dropped. He reached over and picked it up. The nettle trick wouldn’t work again. If the dark woman tried to hurt him again, he would bash her. But for the moment he had to figure out where he was—and how to get away. So he would keep his brother, or whoever this was, talking.
So what? I’d just be a slave to her instead of it. No thanks.
It’s not like that. She’s not like that.
What
is
she like?
Good.
But you’re still her slave.
It’s not like that. She’s…I’m part of something. It’s better than before. I was dying.
The small, dark woman spoke.
I’ll take care of him. Always. I promise. But first you have to do what we want.
We?
Me.
How can I know you’ll keep your promise?
You know the draugar.
Yes.
Do you enjoy hurting children?
No.
Then what do you have to lose?
He sat for a while, considering. Alvis started to say something, but Rask motioned him to silence. Finally, Rask dropped the stone.
All right. What do you want me to do?
For the first time, the dark woman smiled. And she was not so frightening to look at anymore, despite her wild hair. She was actually quite pretty.
First, answer all my questions
, said the woman.
Then we’ll send you back.
No! The thing. He will know what’s happened. He’ll strip it out of my mind.
She held out a handful of the nettles.
No,
she said.
After we’ve finished, you’ll eat these and forget.
Ravenelle shook her head. She was back in the clearing near the army camp. The Sandhaven captain lay unconscious on the grass beside her. “Better take him to the wise woman to tend to his wrists,” Ravenelle said to the bear-man guards. She smiled wickedly. “Then get him back to Raukenrose. Tonight if possible.”
After that, she sent for Wulf and Keiler. Alvis Torsson, her new bloodservant, brought her a cup of tea. He’d also found a buffalo skin, and she sat on this and waited.
She had learned a great deal. Some was useful. Some was terrible news.
Otto was dead.
Wulf arrived first. He put a hand on her shoulder. When she looked up, he must have seen the red tears glistening in her eyes.
“What is it?” Wulf asked.
She shook her head sadly.
“I’m sorry,” she told him. “Wulf, I’m so sorry.”
Then the blood tears flowed.
Chapter Thirty-Eight:
The Plan
Nine days, Wulf thought. It had been only nine days. It seemed like a lifetime ago that he’d left Raukenrose on the hunting trip with his father. Nine days ago he’d wanted no part in ruling the mark. He’d wished the dragon-trance would go away forever. He’d wanted to leave it all to Otto and Adelbert, to Ulla and Anya, and go to the university. Go to the ranger border patrol. Or work in a library. Get out of the castle for a long, long time.
Well, he was out of the castle, all right.
He was the rallying point for the mark’s army. He no longer felt like running from the responsibility. He didn’t feel lost anymore, or unable to figure out what was required of him.
He had a place. He knew where he belonged. It wasn’t about ruling or status. It wasn’t about whether or not you felt up to the job.
It was what it was. He had Keiler, who had forgotten more about war than most warriors had learned.
He had troops. More coming in almost every hour.
He was part of the plan, and the plan partly belonged to him, and partly to a thousand others.
Wulf was all right with that.
Now finally they were making definite plans to go back.
In force.
Taking Raukenrose township should be impossible without a large army. Raukenrose was a town surrounded by a wall. Sieges took huge resources and many, many troops.
Everyone at the war council meeting knew this, and it hung over them like a dismal cloud during their planning.
They had met in Earl Keiler’s private chambers. There were several chairs, but most of those present, including Wulf, were pacing back and forth or leaned over a central table with a map of Raukenrose and its surrounding area laid out on top.
A fire burned in a large fireplace and the centaur Ahorn was warming himself there. Across the room and as far away from the fire as possible was the Lindenfolk leader, Lady Meinir Fruling.
In addition to Wulf and Earl Keiler, there was Count Davos Bara, the wolf-man leader, Tupakkalaatu of the buffalo people, Bamber Esserholz, who was a beaver-people leader—as well as, Wulf had been told, a legendary riverboat trader—and the raccoon-man head of Keiler’s intelligence, Roland Washbear.
Baron Smallwolf, the fox man, had declined to attend but had sent a representative fox whose name was Aldrich.
Washbear laid out the facts while some smoked pipes and others sipped mugs of Keiler’s mead.
According to Washbear, the biggest advantage they had was that the Sandhaveners had not moved into the town proper yet. Most of the troops were camped outside the northern, southern, and eastern gates, with some also clumped along the eastern bank of the Shenandoah River, which lay on the townships’ western side. Inside the town, it seemed that some kind of furious search was going on, and there were only a few hundred troops allowed in at a time.
Otherwise, why the Sandhaveners were keeping the bulk of their troops outside the walls was not known.
“But we believe it’s because they are looking for the Dragon Hammer,” said Earl Keiler. “They need the place clear for search parties. They need to roust the populace little by little, not all at once. To comb through the place.”
“How do they know it’s even there?” asked Wulf.
“We believe the draugar you fought might be drawn to it, though we aren’t sure if that is possible.”
“Nobody really understands the draug,” Wulf said. “Not even the lore masters.”
“Or they hope to find someone who knows where the thing is and torture it out of them,” said Count Bara, the leader of the wolf men. He blew out a stream of cloud smoke for emphasis.
“In any case, we must take advantage of the situation,” Keiler continued. “We need to attack at a weak point.”
“The only weak point I can see is one of the gates,” Wulf said. “And the Sandhaveners will have reinforced themselves there.”
“Yes, but although there are a lot of them, Raukenrose is a fairly big place. They can’t be everywhere.”
“So we need to find the least guarded gate,” Wulf said.
“That is exactly what we’ve been doing,” Washbear replied. “We’ve used the otherfolk, particularly the trees. They have an extensive network, rapid communication, and are excellent spies.”
“What do they say?” Wulf asked.
“That the Sandhaveners least fear an attack from the east. They assume we are gathering somewhere to the south or perhaps Bear Valley. They do not have a spy network, and we have been deliberately misleading what cavalry reconnaissance they send out.”
“What about Kohlsted, though?” Wulf asked. “It’s the second biggest town in the mark after Raukenrose.”
“Yes, this is why they’ve also reinforced the north gate. Those additional troops have had to be taken from somewhere else, and where they’ve come from is the eastern gate, where they believe they are least vulnerable. The eastern forces that remain are camped on a meadow and wheat fields there between the town and a small rise called Bone Hill. The road then leads into the forest and across a creek.”
“Leach Creek,” Wulf said. “I know it. And that flat area in front of the eastern gate is called Raukenrose Meadow, even though it isn’t really a meadow anymore. Mostly wheat and barley fields.”
Earl Keiler nodded. “The area to the south of Dornstadt Road, the road heading east, is hilly, the forest dense. The best place to emerge is from just north of the road.”
“Alerdalan Woods.”
“Yes,” said Washbear, consulting his map. “We have a strong network of otherfolk settled there as well.” He looked toward Fruling, who was seated nearby sipping a glass of water.
“The Lindenfolk will make the path easier,” Fruling said. “You may depend on it.”
Keiler turned toward Esserholz. “Do you have the diversion ready?”
“Planned out,” said Esserholz. “Whether it’ll work or not is anyone’s guess.”
“Well, be ready with it.”
“Yes, m’lord.”
Keiler turned his gaze to Wulf. “The idea, Lord Wulf, is to lure a number of the Sandhavener troops away when we attack. We’ll then have a smaller, more confused force to deal with. We will kill a great many of them before the soldiers we trick come back, and then we can take on that force.” Keiler coughed into a blood-spattered handkerchief, then continued. “At least that’s the plan. I
don’t
expect it to go that way. We’ve planned for several other possibilities.”
“Like what?” asked Wulf.
“What if the gate force is
reinforced
instead of being weakened? We may have to withdraw then, lead them after us into the woods where the otherfolk will harry them. That way we can live to fight another day.”
“Retreat,” Wulf said.
“We have to avoid being completely destroyed as a fighting force,” Keiler said. “Sometimes there is no other way.”
Wulf nodded. “What else?”
“We wonder what will happen if the draugar you have reported personally generals the battle,” said Washbear in a low voice, as if merely bringing up the creature’s name might draw its attention. “We must be ready to face magic.”
“How do we do that?”
“It will be difficult,” Keiler conceded. “Our best hope would be to isolate that danger, whatever form it may take, and throw everything we have against it.”
“
If
you know where to find him,” Wulf said. “
If
he stays there.”
“There are unpredictable drawbacks to this plan,” Washbear said. “We simply do not know what we’re dealing with when it comes to this menace. But thanks to Princess Ravenelle, we now know
much
more.”
“There isn’t a whole lot in the lore about Draugar Wuten,” Wulf said. “What there is, Ahorn and his people know. They’re as good as any scholar at the university, Tolas has always said.”
“Thank you, m’lord. And yes, Tolas is right,” said Ahorn from across the hall. He was standing near the fire, warming his human torso. He turned and walked back toward them, speaking as he clopped over the flagstone floor. “Since my people have arrived at Bear Hall, we have been practicing our archery. There is a certain sort of arrow that is reported in some ancient texts to be useful against the draug, perhaps fatal.”
“We have to use it, then!”
“Alas, we cannot,” replied the centaur. “We do not have it. It is made of dragon amber. It is known to my people as the Sageata Aur, the Amber Arrow. It is said to reside in the Most Westerly West. Where that might be is up for dispute among the scholars.”
“Is there anything else that might work against a draugar?” asked Esserholz, the beaver man.
Keiler hesitated, then seemed to come to a decision and answered. “We believe Princess Ravenelle may be a weapon we can use against him.”
“What do you mean?”
“We decided we must use her presence here to our advantage. We kidnapped and provided her with a Sandhavener captain to dominate using her Roman ways,” Keiler said. “Not just any captain, either, but the leader of the personal company of the draugar. He has been sent back to Raukenrose, his mind wiped of any knowledge of his own domination.”
“Under the proper circumstance,” Washbear said, “this man might be used as a dagger in the back of the draugar or Prince Trigvi.”
“She must be protected at all costs, then,” said Count Bara. “I will provide her with a personal guard.”
Keiler nodded. “Thank you, Count Bara. That would be welcome.”
“And when do we attack?” asked Aldrich, the fox man. “My people are getting restless with nothing to do but chase rabbits in the forest.”
Keiler nodded gravely. “We must gather more forces and wait as long as we can for—”
“—the gnomes?” said Aldrich. He sniffed contemptuously. “A false hope. They won’t come. That gussied-up charlatan stole a horse and ran away, never to be seen again, I’ll wager. The mud rats only care for themselves. You’ll see. They won’t come.” His voice was filled with doubt.
And maybe something more sinister, Wulf thought. Something dangerously close to treason.
“I gave Master Tolas that horse,” growled Keiler in a low voice. “I’ll thank you to keep your conspiracies to yourself, Manly Aldrich.”
The fox man crinkled his nose and sniffed loudly. He didn’t answer.
“We postpone as long as we can for the gnomes,” Keiler said. “They will be a huge boost to our chance of victory.”
Aldrich pretended to stifle a scornful laugh.
“How long are we to give them, m’lord,” asked Count Bara.
“Two more days.”
“Is that wise? Master Washbear has pointed out that our advantage is that they have remained in their encampment. What if they move inside the town walls?”
“It is a chance I believe we must take,” Keiler replied. “Lord Wulf?”
“You seem very sure of this, Earl Keiler,” Wulf said, trying to keep the doubt he felt from his voice.
“That is because I have seen gnomes make war.”
“Then I agree. Two days.”
Keiler nodded. “Very well. We’ll begin the march in two days and attack at dawn the following morning. The sun will be at our backs,” he said. “That will make only eleven days from the fall of the township. I know it seems both a long time—and also too short a time, in its way—to hold off. Yet I still hope to catch the Sandhaveners by surprise and kill a great many before they know what hit them.” Keiler had a coughing spasm, then tried to continue as if nothing had happened, although Wulf could see he was trembling. “We will use both centaur and fox-man, er, smallwolf, archers on our right and left flanks. This will be more than harassment. Our middle may remain weaker than their force, even if it is smaller. But if they push us back, they’ll be walking into crossfire.”
“At least that is the plan,” Ahorn said. “We have come with a great many arrows, and are preparing more.”
“And we smallwolf have our crossbows,” said Aldrich.
“Then, by the will and might of the Allfather,” Keiler said, “we will destroy the invaders.”
And if we don’t? Rather than voicing his doubt, Wulf only thought it.
There are so many of them. We gain more every day, but we are still so few. And we cannot wait any longer.
He thought of Anya. His family.
Saeunn.
Whatever the tactics and strategy, his goal was always the same.
Rescue his friends and family.
Or die trying.
But there was something he had to do first. He hadn’t believed it when the feeling had returned, but now he was certain.
The dragon was calling him once again.
