The Order War (12 page)

“Strike!”

Whhhssttt…

“…strike…”

“Whhssttt…

“Strike…strike…”

How long the marine lit off rockets and Justen smoothed their path to destruction and chaos, the engineer was unsure, only that the pattern ended.

“Ser! We have only a handful of rockets left.”

Justen studied the valley, noting the greasy black splotches across the entire eastern end and the seemingly endless lines of white and gray troops marshaled below the red rocks.

The sun hung barely above the western lip of the canyon valley. Had that much time passed?

A double drum-roll rumbled into the late afternoon, and now the gray-clad Iron Guard foot marched forward toward the concentrated knot of Sarronnese foot, backed with the
remaining archers and perhaps two squads of cavalry.

The Sarronnese held only the two central hillocks and the ground between.

“Why don’t they go around?” Justen asked no one in particular. “We couldn’t stop them now.”

“Once they start to fight, Engineer, they leave no survivors.”

Justen’s stomach tightened. All he was supposed to have done was to watch and learn. Instead, he had been killing, and he was just about to be killed.

“Might as well try the rest of the rockets.” Firbek’s voice was hoarse.

Justen helped depress the launcher once more and waited for the woman to squeeze the striker. And Justen again smoothed the flows and forces around the rocket. The black iron missile flared into the advancing Iron Guards. A handful fell like leaden dummies or disjointed marionettes, but there were no flares and explosions—not as with the White lancers.

And still more troops seemed to pour from the defile in the eastern end of Middlevale.

Justen glanced to his left and right. More than half of the Sarronnese forces seemed to be down, burned to ashes, or missing.

“Strike another one!” Firbek demanded.

Justen concentrated once more on supplying order to the rocket. And once more another set of Iron Guards toppled as they strode toward the scattered Sarronnese forces. But the Iron Guards advanced as slowly and steadily as the tide.

Three more firebolts flared from the line of boulders just beyond the eastern entrance to Middlevale. Two dashed themselves against stony hillocks. Screams followed the third, which had struck two mounted troopers on the edge of the command post where Dyessa and Gunnar remained, still mounted. A scraggly fir began to burn.

“Get that light-fired rocket in the launcher!” Firbek glanced toward the white banners at the end of the valley. “Aim it toward those white banners.”

The woman marine slipped the rocket into place and
looked up, striker in hand. “You like to help us, Ser?”

Firbek scowled, but he walked over to the remaining case of rockets.

The marine ranker squeezed the striker.

Justen belatedly focused his attention on the rocket, enough so that it wobbled only slightly before plowing through a line of foot soldiers under a crimson-fringed gray banner. Another wave of whiteness flowing back from the destruction swept around Justen, and he put out a hand to the launcher frame to steady himself.

“You all right, Engineer?” The woman marine looked at him.

“Sort of.”

Firbek levered out another rocket.

“Shouldn’t we save a few?” asked Justen.

“For what? Wait, and they’ll all be at our necks. Will be anyway before long, unless the wizard pulls out a miracle.” Firbek slid the rocket into the tube.

A heavy drum-roll sounded, and a wave of dark-gray mounted troops swept forward, riding through the foot in dark gray to take the charge.

A woman in Sarronnese blue scrambled up the hill toward them.

“The commander wants another barrage on the Iron Guards.” The messenger conveyed the order to Firbek calmly.

“We’re almost out of rockets. We’ll fire until we’re done.”

“I will so inform her.” The messenger hurried back downhill, ducking calmly as another firebolt flared past her.

“Strike!”

Whssttt…

“Strike…”

“Whsstt…”

“That’s it, Ser. That was the last rocket.”

Justen slumped against the hot metal of the launcher frame, not sure which was worst—the dizziness, the nausea, or the splitting headache. He straightened and staggered back down toward the gray, where he grasped for his black staff.

“We needed more rockets, Engineer. I asked for more.”

Justen touched the black staff before speaking. “We made what we could, Firbek. They’re darkness-hard to forge.”

“Hard to forge? Is it easier to die?” After glancing toward the Iron Guards headed uphill, Firbek unsheathed his sword.

Justen gripped his staff.

A rumble of thunder—thunder, not drums—echoed across Middlevale, and a chill sense of blackness followed. Justen scrambled back toward the launcher and stared.

Like a black tower, Gunnar stood on a low hillock to the right of the one where Firbek, Justen, and the marines had labored with the rockets.

A second dull rumble filled the sky, and the thin clouds overhead seemed to thicken even as Justen watched. A third, longer, rumble echoed through the skies, and darkness fell like an early twilight as cold gusts of wind whipped across the burned battle plain.

Even the Iron Guard slowed, and the white banners at the east end of Middlevale seemed to droop, despite the wind.

Rain began to fall, first with scattered droplets, then more heavily, like a flight of cold arrows, and finally, as the afternoon skipped abruptly to late twilight, in sheets that flayed like whips.

Justen clutched his staff and staggered toward the gray, untying his own reins and Firbek’s. He thrust the marine officer’s reins at him, then mounted the gray and spurred her toward the other hillock, where Gunnar still stood like a short, dark tower.

Unable to see more than a few cubits beyond the gray’s mane, Justen used his order-senses to guide him toward Gunnar’s profligate squandering of order, lowering his head against the rush of wind and water.

Were the Whites having as much trouble as he was? Did it matter? He spurred the gray across the space between the hills and up the slope.

“Get back!” ordered Gunnar, his voice cutting through the tumult like lightning. “Get everyone out of here!” He struggled into the saddle of the bay.

“But they’ll drown in the gorge if you’ve called rain!” yelled Dyessa over the whistling of the wind.

Justen eased the gray closer to where Gunnar wobbled in his saddle.

“They won’t. But they’ll die here for certain.” Gunnar steadied himself, grasping the edge of the saddle.

Dyessa gestured to the woman with the trumpet. Three short double blasts sounded against the storm. The ensign swirled and dipped three times.

“Again! Keep it up!” Dyessa spurred her mount toward the bottom of the hill.

Justen forced a sense of order into the black staff, then extended it to Gunnar, who shook his head.

“Touch it!”

Gunnar shook his head again.

“Damn it! Don’t be so frigging proud! You need it, and we need you to get out of here! Touch it!”

Gunnar reached toward the staff, and Justen thrust it against his brother’s palm. The Air Wizard straightened even as Justen could sense his thoughts departing. Justen eased the gray next to the bay and began guiding his brother’s mount toward the inn, toward the west end of the narrow valley, vaguely aware that the single remaining marine rode the rocket cart not more than a score of cubits ahead and that Firbek held the harness of the cart horse. He tried to ignore the shaking in his knees, not certain whether it was exhaustion or fear, or some of each.

The thunder rolled like massive drums beating through his skull, and the rain raised welts across his unprotected face, but Justen kept both horses moving, ignoring Dyessa as she chivied her troops in their retreat.

The wind whistled, the thunder drummed, and Justen rode slowly past the bare roof beams of the inn, its thatch torn loose by the force of the storm.

Behind him, the trumpet wavered.

The rain pounded through his black jacket as if he were bare-backed, and with each step, the gray slowed as red mud began to form.

Before him, the sheer red rocks loomed like a wall. He
edged the horses to his left and through the narrow gap. Once inside the canyon, the force of the wind and rain dropped, although the volume of the deluge did not abate.”

Perhaps a dozen Sarronnese foot straggled down and around the switchback, just behind Firbek and the empty rocket cart.

The dull rumbling of the thunder echoed over Middlevale and down into the canyon. To Justen’s left, the narrow cascade had become a rushing torrent, rising to within a handful of cubits below the road. How long would it continue to rise?

“That should do it for the storm.” Gunnar straightened in the saddle, looking over his shoulder.

Justen followed his brother’s eyes, catching sight of the Sarronnese commander as she guided her chestnut around and through the retreating forces until she caught up with Gunnar and Justen.

“Now what? The storm won’t hold them long.” Dyessa shouted to make herself heard above the wind and rain.

“Is everyone out of the valley?”

“Those that are alive.”

Gunnar lifted his shoulders and let them drop, then closed his eyes.

Justen reached over to keep his brother from falling.

A ripping, rushing, and drumming sound rose over the rain, and the sky grew darker. Even from the depths of the canyon, Justen could see the whirling black tower that swept upward.

“Light!”

Even Dyessa’s face paled as she gazed back.

The roaring increased, as if the stone walls were being beaten like drums.

Thuunnk…unnkk…uinnkk…

A series of impacts rocked the roadbed itself, but the roaring dropped to a whisper, and the sky began to lighten. The rain kept falling, subsiding to a normal heavy downpour.

Gunnar slumped across the neck of his mount.

“You!” snapped Dyessa. “The Recluce marine!”

Both Firbek and the woman marine turned.

“Hold there.” The Sarronnese commander jabbed toward the unconscious Storm Wizard. “Get him on the cart. He can’t ride.”

Dyessa watched as Justen and Firbek carried Gunnar onto the cart.

As he covered Gunnar with the Air Wizard’s own waterproof and stepped back to remount the gray, Justen glanced to the gorge, where the water level had suddenly dropped back toward its earlier level.

“What happened?” Dyessa asked.

“I need to ride back a little. I think Gunnar dammed the valley.”

“Good. The damned Whites can’t handle water.”

“What if the dam gives before we get out?”

Dyessa glanced back up the canyon, toward the unseen wall of stone and rubble behind her. “It had better not.”

Justen had already turned. He let the gray pick her way through the last of the Sarronnese stragglers trudging downhill through the mud and rain. By the time he reached the straight section of the canyon below the switchback, he could sense the mass of stone and brush that Gunnar’s whirlwind had thrown into the stream and gorge. Still, he rode almost to the switchback.

Dark water oozed through the gaps in the stones and cascaded from dozens of points into the gorge, half-filling it in its rush toward the distant River Sarron.

Justen forced his abused order-senses to enfold the storm-built barrier Gunnar had created. After studying the barrier for a time, he shook his head. His brother wasn’t a bad engineer for a Storm Wizard. He wiped yet more water out of his face and turned the gray back down the canyon. Cold rivulets ran down inside his blacks, chilling him through and through. Even the inside of his boots felt soaked.

Dyessa was still waiting, but Firbek and the rocket cart—and Gunnar—were out of sight farther down the canyon, the creaking of the cart masked by the dull swishing of the continuing rain.

The Sarronnese leader looked at Justen. “Will whatever he did hold?”

Justen wiped more rain from his face, a useless task, and
shook himself. “Forever…or until there’s a drought and several Chaos Wizards.” Seeing the doubtful look on Dyessa’s face, he added, “There’s a lake building up in Middlevale, or what was Middlevale. That much water carries a lot of order. A good Chaos Wizard or two could blast away the stones there, except for the order of the water. The lake has to be drained or dried up before wizards can do much. And they won’t be doing anything until this rain ends, and I think that’s not going to be for a long time—days anyway—and then if any of them survived, which I doubt many did.”

“Good. We can reinforce Zerlana somewhere.” Dyessa touched the reins and raised her voice. “Let’s get moving.”

Before she could start, Justen lifted his hand. “Wait. Have you seen Yonada?”

“She fell in the first attack, Engineer. She bought you wizards the time to save the rest of us.”

Justen swallowed.
Yonada gone? Just like that?

“I don’t think I’ll ever understand you wizards.” Dyessa shook her head. “You devise black weapons that destroy whole squads and call storms that turn valleys into lakes and drown entire armies, and then you’re surprised that someone dies.”

Justen dumbly flicked the reins. He needed to find Gunnar…at least.

Dyessa picked her away ahead, encouraging, organizing, as the remnants of two forces shambled back toward Sarron. Clutching the black staff, Justen rode slowly to catch up with his brother, hoping he could do something, but scarcely knowing what.

A jolt rocked the cart as it rumbled off the even pavement of the pink stone bridge and onto the packed clay ruts of the road. Gunnar moaned, but did not open his eyes. From his
saddle on the still-placid gray, Justen lifted his left hand, reaching out instinctively, but the cart settled back into its faintly swaying roll and Gunnar lapsed back into a deeper sleep.

Even from where he rode beside the cart, Justen could sense the depletion of the order-forces within his brother. He glanced up at the marine in black riding near the front of the column beside Dyessa. Firbek rode with his knees, both hands gesturing. From the movements, Justen suspected he was explaining once again the limited range and shortcomings of the ships’ rockets.

Justen snorted. Part of the problem was Firbek’s lack of guts. When a weapon’s accuracy was limited by range, you either moved up to get in range or you let the enemy get close enough to use it. Firbek had done neither. He’d just fired rockets almost for the sake of firing them, and had forced Justen to squander his limited abilities on getting a handful to go somewhere close to where they had been aimed. And that had meant Gunnar had damned near killed himself calling a huge storm.

So…now…while Firbek was explaining away his shortcomings, Justen was worrying about his brother, laying the black staff next to him when he could, and hoping the proximity of that order would help Gunnar.

Ahead, the clay road leading from what had been Middlevale merged with the main road to Sarron. Soon they would be traveling the last section of the road that had brought Justen from Rulyarth to Sarron, since Middlevale was north and east of Sarron.

Dyessa rode past, headed toward the rear of the column, her eyes ignoring the marine driving the cart and the unconscious man under the worn, blue wool blanket. Justen’s eyes followed her as she circled the short column and headed back to its head.

As Dyessa completed the circuit, the column turned onto the main road. Justen looked to the northwest, back along the route toward Lornth, but the river town was lost beyond the rolling hills.

Gunnar moaned again, and Justen tried to reach out, not
only physically, but with his order-senses…only to find the same gentle barrier that had blocked him ever since the fight. How could one call the mess at Middlevale a battle?

After wiping his forehead, Justen shifted his weight in the saddle again and tried to ignore Firbek’s continuing conversation with the Sarronnese commander. The rocket cart creaked, Gunnar occasionally moaned, and the gray carried Justen toward Sarron.

Well before the column trudged up the final section of the road, a single figure in green galloped downhill on a bay mare, pausing but momentarily beside Firbek and Dyessa. Krytella reined up next to the cart, dismounted, and without speaking, handed the bay’s reins to Justen.

Only after she had spent some time with Gunnar, infusing enough order into the restless Air Wizard that her face had paled even under the afternoon clouds; did she slip off the still-moving cart, reclaim the reins, and remount. Her voice was cold. “You let him do this…why did you let him? He’s your brother.”

“I did what I could. I did give him some order before he called the storm, but once he collapsed, I really couldn’t reach him.” Justen wiped his forehead again. Since summer had come to Sarronnyn, it seemed like all he did was sweat. “I tried.”

Krytella frowned. “You transferred a little order. How, I don’t know.” Her eyes flicked back to the unconscious figure.

“I tried using the staff.” Justen cleared his throat, wondering if the clouds rolling in from the east were the result of Gunnar’s storms and if they would bring more rain. “He’ll be all right, won’t he?”

“He’ll live. Whether he’ll see or think is another question.”

“Like Creslin?”

“I don’t know. I just don’t know.”

Dyessa eased her mount up beside Krytella’s bay. “Greetings, Healer.”

Justen glanced past her to see that Firbek had remained near the head of the column.

“Greetings.”

The Sarronnese commander gestured vaguely toward the rocket cart. “I hope he will recover.”

“So do I.” Krytella paused, then the words burst out as if she could no longer hold them. “What good were all Gunnar’s efforts? They clearly weren’t enough to win the battle, were they?” Krytella’s eyes flashed across the bedraggled column, perhaps a third of its original strength.

“No, Healer. It was just the only time we happened to have stopped the White devils in more than a season.” Dyessa looked down from her mount. “Victories against the Whites are not exactly cheap. I thought that you of Recluce understood that. This one only cost me two-thirds of my forces—and to stop just a small body of the White devils.”

Krytella’s eyes turned to the still figure on the rocket cart. “Do you really care?”

“Healer, I am glad that your Air Wizard will survive. He and the engineer saved us. They more than deserve…our gratitude.” Dyessa took a deep breath. “Whether that gratitude will mean much in the seasons ahead, I question, given our inability to hold the White devils back.”

“I…was too hasty…”

“No.” The dark-haired commander smiled sadly. “You are probably correct. But we all do what we must.”

Krytella and Justen watched as Dyessa guided her mount back toward the front of the riders. The column turned eastward onto the last uphill stretch toward Sarron.

The clouds thickened, and low rumbles of thunder punctuated the growing gloom.

“He really did it…” murmured the healer.

As the raindrops began to fall, Justen eased the gray closer to the bay on which Krytella rode, her eyes focused somewhere beyond the road.

“Krytella…you have to show me something.”

“What?”

“How to transfer order-force from me to someone…”

“That’s a healer’s—”

“I tried, and I couldn’t do it. And Gunnar almost died.”

Krytella looked steadily at Justen. “As much as you’re jealous of Gunnar, you love him, don’t you?”

Justen looked at the ground. “He needed help, and I couldn’t give it.”

“Oh, Justen…” The healer’s hand brushed Justen’s for a moment, so gently that he could not be sure that it had happened, but a warmth flowed from her to him. “That’s how it feels.”

Justen tried to ignore her closeness and to concentrate on the order-patterns. Pushing aside her warmth and sweet scent, he focused his thoughts. Ignoring the might-have-beens, he let his senses grasp the flow of order. He owed Gunnar that, if not much more.