The Path of Flames (Chronicles of the Black Gate Book 1) (2 page)

Terrible, deep screams echoed across the valley to reach Asho where he sat. The Agerastians? No. These bellows were inhuman, more akin to roars than yells. Yet they were rich with horror, pain, panic. Now Asho did gulp and raise his hand, frowning as he made out huge figures racing back down the slopes in disordered ranks, clawing and leaping as they fought to get away.

Asho glanced up at Ser Haug and froze. He’d never seen the old knight look so stunned. Lord Kyferin looked like somebody had stabbed him in the back, his brow deeply furrowed, lips pale, eyes slitted with fury and amazement.
What is it?
The question almost passed Asho’s lips.
What’s going on?

Asho rose in his stirrups to get a better look just as a brazen yell sounded as clearly as any trumpet from the center of the army. A richly appointed knight in blazing steel armor rode forth, a gleaming sword raised high. “Ride down the cowardly kragh! Ride down the traitors!”

“Madness,” said Ser Eckel. “What’s he doing?” But others along the line began to eagerly ride forth, following the errant lord who led them down the slope. The orderly battle line began to break down. Trumpets sounded belatedly from the Grace’s white pavilion ordering the charge. A roar of defiance flashed up and down the great wall of waiting knights, and then the errant lord urged his horse into a gallop, and the assembled might of the Ascendant Empire howled and followed after.

“For the Black Wolves,” bellowed Lord Kyferin, urging his destrier on, and his thirty-three knights roared their response, “For Lord Kyferin!” They broke forth into a canter, passing by Asho on all sides. The thunder of their hooves filled the air and Crook stopped trying to turn and instead began to race forward alongside them. A hundred war cries echoed up and down the line, and everywhere knights were galloping, lances pointing skyward, pennants fluttering, the world shaking as the destriers pounded it to pieces.

Asho resisted the urge to yell and instead clung tightly to Crook, who was jostled by Ser Hankel on the left and Ser Merboth on the right. The host poured down the hill in glittering splendor, picking up speed until everyone was galloping, the line breaking apart as the swiftest and most powerful steeds pulled ahead. One Black Wolf after another galloped past him, and Asho was happy to let them pass; he could see the kragh gaining the valley floor just below, see their black eyes widening in horror as they saw the wall of glittering steel pounding down toward them.

Lances lowered and the forward edge of the knights sliced through the broken ranks of the kragh, shattering and colliding with them, horses going down with shrill screams and men cursing and shrieking as the enraged kragh swung their axes and curved blades up at them in self-defense. The momentum of the line was unstoppable, however, and like a wave crashing over a rock the host surged through and around the retreating kragh and gained the far slope.

Ser Haug’s squire, Alardus, inched up beside Asho on one side, while Cunot rode up on the other. Glancing back, Asho saw the other squires grinning and yelling right behind them, spare swords and maces strapped to their saddles, eager for war, eager for blood, eager to prove themselves in the eyes of their masters. Asho tucked his chin and urged Crook on. He wouldn’t be left behind. He’d be there when Lord Kyferin needed a replacement weapon; he’d be there to block the fatal stroke when it came toward his Lord’s back. The euphoria and fear of the charge gave him wings, and Asho drew his sword, exhilarated by the terror and power of their attack.

From the late afternoon sky fell a rain of impossible bolts of black flame. Hissing like water cast into a red-hot pan, they scythed through the riders to Asho’s left. Horses tumbled and fell as if their legs had been sliced out from under them. Asho looked back and saw an entire second wave of charging knights collide with the fallen, some leaping clear in a magnificent display of horsemanship, but most crashing to the ground.

Crook was flagging. The slope was too steep. The Agerastians had chosen their last stand well. Asho dug his heels in once more, but the Black Wolves were beginning to leave him behind.

Another hissing rain of bolts fell from the sky, slamming into a phalanx of knights riding under the azure and yellow banners of the Lord Zeydel. The bolts cut through their armor with the sound of bacon fat burning on a skillet, and with shrieks and cries they fell. Magic? Asho felt his stomach clench. Impossible. Looking past the other squires, he saw that entire swathes of the charge had crumbled under the ebon assault. The acrid stench of burned horseflesh and the cries of wounded men mixed with the battle cries and the sweet scent of torn earth.

“For the Black Wolf!” Lord Kyferin’s cry was a bellow of defiance, a summons, but Crook could go no faster. The charge had been sounded too soon. Instead of approaching the enemy at a controlled trot, shoulder to shoulder, so as to break out into a devastating charge at the very last, they’d impetuously thrown themselves into a charge at the base of the hill, and now some knights streamed ahead of the pack, while others fell behind, with no order or unity to the attack. Asho felt fear grip him by the throat. This had had all the makings of a disaster—and then the black fire fell amongst his Lord’s knights.

Horses collapsed, men were punched from their saddles, and right before him Ser Hankel’s helm burst into molten metal and brains as a bolt caught him straight across the brow. The large man toppled off his saddle, dragging his reins with him such that his horse reared and fell right across Asho’s path. Crook leaped, but he lacked the speed and the incline was too steep. With an outraged whinny Crook landed on the heaving flanks of Ser Hankel’s mount and fell in turn. Asho threw himself clear, hit the raw earth with his shoulder and tucked himself into a roll. The world spun. Screams deafened him, and by reflex more than wit he rose to his knees.

His sword was gone. The fallen knights were acting like a breakwater, causing the attack to split around them. There—his blade. He scrambled forward on all fours and scooped it up. Where was Crook? Again that hated sizzling black fire fell from the skies. Magic! Used in battle! Impossible. Asho rose into a crouch, ignoring the pain in his wrenched shoulder. Where was his Lord? There! Only twenty yards farther up the hill, the remaining knights of the Black Wolf were embroiled in battle with Agerastian men-at-arms. Their horses reared and kicked as the Black Wolves laid about them with their swords, lances discarded or abandoned in the bodies of their enemies.

“For the Black Wolf!” Asho ran forward, exhilaration giving him wings. He leaped over a body, ran around a fallen horse, and then all his training abandoned him as he simply raised his sword overhead with both arms and brought it in a sweeping cut down upon the helm of a Agerastian foot soldier who was thrusting at Ser Sidel with a spear.

His sword screeched off the helm’s curvature and chopped into the man’s shoulder. The Agerastian screamed and dropped his spear, turning in time to receive an elbow to the face. He toppled to the earth, his fall pulling his body free of Asho’s blade. Before Asho could finish him off, a horse sidestepped into him, sending him sprawling. His own steel cap fell from his head. Asho went to rise, and a blow nearly stove in his side. He cried out and fell again.

“For the Black Wolf! For the Ascendant!” The cry was muffled and seemed to come from a mile away. Asho took deep, ragged breaths. Around him plunged warhorses, massive Ennoians, accompanied by the hack and slash of blades. He’d never believed the tales told by the bards, but this was even worse than he’d imagined. The enemy should have melted like mist before the Black Wolves’ charge. And magic! The Sin Casters were supposed to be centuries dead and gone.

Reeling, blinking away mud, Asho forced himself upright. There—the Black Wolf himself. His Lord stood, wounded, a space having opened about him, bodies at his feet. Only five knights yet stood by his side. Asho couldn’t understand that number. Only five?

Asho stood and scooped up his sword. He turned to join his Lord and then froze as the enemy ranks parted to admit a man who stepped to the fore. He was dressed in purple and yellow silks, his hatchet face thinly bearded, a grimace of distaste twisting his lips. The air around him seemed to crackle with barely suppressed energy. He was slight, yet the Agerastian soldiers pressed back from him as if in fear.

Asho knew he should move. Should yell a war cry and charge. Yet he stood rooted to the spot as the enemy placed a black rock in his mouth, swallowed, and then raised a hand. His nails suddenly writhed and grew longer and twisted like ancient roots. Lord Kyferin raised his ancient family blade and bellowed his defiance, Ser Haug and his four other knights charging right after him. They didn’t take more than three steps. The stranger whispered something beneath his breath, and black flame shot out from his fingertips. It scythed through the charging men, cutting through their armor and flesh like a heated knife through tallow.

Lord Kyferin and his remaining knights toppled to the ground. Asho stood there, stunned. The cacophony of battle faded away as he stared at Lord Kyferin’s fallen body. Hatred, resentment, loathing, disgust, fury—all those emotions were smoothed away by shock. It was impossible that Lord Kyferin should be dead. He was a force of nature, the hub around which Asho’s miserable life turned. To see him fall made no sense.

The strangely dressed Agerastian didn’t even pause to gloat, but stumbled, nearly collapsed, and then gathered himself and turned to walk away.

“For the Black Wolf!” Asho raised his sword, not understanding his grief, his outrage, his furious denial.
Lord Kyferin was dead
.

The stranger paused and looked over his shoulder at Asho. The Sin Caster’s eyes seemed to expand so as to swallow Asho whole, dark as the bottom of a well, and within them lay a single promise:
Charge me and die
.

“For the Black Wolf,” whispered Asho, his arms shaking. The Sin Caster strode away, and as he did so he placed another black rock in his mouth, cried out a fell string of words, and bolts of magic flew from both palms to arc up into the sky and lance down somewhere else on the battlefield.

Asho lowered his blade. He was shaking so hard he could barely stand. He turned to regard the battle and saw the impossible. The forces of the Empire lay wrecked and ruined upon the slope that led up to the Agerastian position. A few knights had managed to reach the summit and engage the enemy in combat, but most had foundered long before, and either lay dead or were retreating down the slope, back to where the second wave of the Ascendant’s great army was waiting to charge.

The wind stirred Asho’s white hair. His sword was a dead weight in his hand. Streaks of ebon fire erupted from the Agerastian line here and there to fall upon knots of resistance. How many of those strange men were there? A dozen? Screams drifted with the wind. Horror caused his skin to crawl. Sin Casters, emerging from the most dreadful legends to walk the earth once more.

The Agerastian line was beginning to move down the hill. One of the soldiers ran at him, followed by three others.
I’m a coward
, thought Asho as he raised his sword, tip angled obliquely at the ground. At the last moment he stepped aside, and the man’s downward chop slid down the length of his blade and buried itself in the dirt. His momentum carried the soldier on, and as he ran by Asho pivoted and brought his own sword up and around and down to cut through the man’s neck.
I stood still as my liege Lord died
. He felt numb. The second soldier stabbed his blade straight at Asho’s chest, but Asho parried and stepped forward, spinning up the length of the man’s outstretched arm to crack his elbow into the back of the man’s head and send him staggering to his knees.
But why should I have died for that monster?
The third man dropped his sword as Asho’s blade sliced open his forearm and died when Asho ducked under the fourth man’s swing, allowing it to catch the third full in the throat.

Shaya, I didn’t avenge you. Kyferin died without knowing my hate.

The fourth man screamed a curse as he wrenched his blade free and spat at Asho. “Bythian scum! I’ll send you back to the Black Gate!”

The numbness cracked and shattered. Asho blinked, seeing the man for the first time, and into the void of horror blossomed fury.

He stepped in, gripping his sword’s hilt with both hands so that he could place all his strength behind his blows. The Agerastian was taller than he, of course, lean and whipcord strong, but Asho’s fury was cold and total and he attacked the man’s very blade, smashing it aside again and again, driving the bigger man before him, causing him to stumble back on his heels. Each time the soldier tried to raise his sword Asho smacked it aside, until finally the man dropped it and Asho speared his sword through the man’s throat.

The man fell, gurgling and scrabbling at the wound. Asho stood over him, his rage sluicing away as quickly as it had come. Death was everywhere, given voice in hoarse screams and pleas for mercy. He thought of Shaya as he’d seen her last, her white hair plastered to her head, turning to smile brokenly at him before she rode through the castle gate and to Ennoia, to pass back once more into the depths of Bythos and a life of slavery. Asho shuddered and looked around him. He recognized one body after another. Ser Eckel. Ser Orban. Ser Merboth. Each as lethal and brutal a knight as could be found throughout Ennoia, and all cut down by a Sin Caster.

Asho looked up. They’d lost the battle. It was unheard of; the Ascendant Empire had lost. Around him as far as he could see, the flower of the Empire’s chivalry lay wasted and ruined. The greatest knights of the age had been massacred.