Authors: Laszlo,Jeremy
Chapter Eight
From atop the newly constructed city wall, Sara watched her husband upon the field of battle. The evening was growing late as smoke curled up from the many fires out on the field like the ghosts of the fallen. Here and there bodies lay strewn about like so much garbage and already the carrion birds had come to begin picking apart the maggot-infested, bloated bodies. All Drakenhurst’s defenders on the wall looked upon their king in silence, waiting and watching for the enemy to return. Sara watched as well, but only halfheartedly. She could see her husband, the field, and all the carnage, but her mind kept returning to the body that lay where her feet now stood upon the wall.
Seth had died.
Again
. Of that she was certain. But she too had witnessed him reborn from the flesh of an old, dying man. Whether her husband believed it himself or not, he was a god. It was the only explanation that made sense. No other being could wield power such as her husband did. He could mold it to his will. He could see life’s inner workings and alter them, destroy them, or even rebuild them. He had been visited by gods and spoken with them. He could feel and see things impossible to conceive of, and yet he was still a man. He was flesh and bone with a heart of a lion. He was caring and loving, yet at the same time powerful and regal. It was true he had done much harm in discovering his path, but he owned it, shouldering the burden of all his failures and soldiering on. He was both mighty and vulnerable and wore both faces well.
Under different circumstances, could she bear a child, Seth would have made the perfect father. She had seen the proof of it in days past, but his interaction with the boy just moments ago made Sara long for that which she knew was impossible. She would never be a mother, and he would never be the perfect father he was meant to be. It was a sad realization, but one she would have to come to terms with.
Trying to put the feelings away, Sara knew the last thing Seth needed was to see the saddened look on her face and burden himself with her own inner turmoil. No. Instead she would be grateful for what she had, as it was more than most. She would use her position to make the lives of her people easier, and do all she could in support of Seth, no matter where it took her. After all, he was the key to everything.
She only hoped that in this new world he planned to create, there would be a chance for him to be happy, and perhaps a time when they could start over.
* * * * *
Borrik stood poised in a crouched position upon the edge of the wall overlooking his master. He’d failed Seth twice now, and been forced to watch him die each time, but it wouldn’t happen again. No blessed warrior or army of assassins would thwart him this time.
As he watched he mulled over Seth’s plan. It did seem logical, no matter how much he wished there was a better option. His king was smart and cunning. It made sense that if his solitary presence had drawn out the assassin once, it might do so again. But what if they were wrong?
If the assassin could move about unseen at will, who was to say he wasn’t among the troops on the wall when Seth announced his plan to Sara and him? Who was to say he wasn’t there now, watching the king with a grin on his face?
Borrik swiveled his thick head around to each side, eyeing the expressions painted on the troops around him. Not far down the wall, Guard Commander Xander stood with a spear poised at the ready, which he could hurl down into the chest of anyone who might suddenly appear. No. There were no treacherous assassins here. Not now anyhow.
Turning his sight back on Seth, Borrik noted his master’s look of absolute concentration. Still, all remained the same. Littering the ground were abandoned weapons, corpses and mud churned up from the thousands of trampling feet. Here and there fires blazed, either from magical blasts, or from strategic locations from which the enemy could see their walls during the night.
Across the field a handful of abandoned pendants still flew in the breeze as smoke was carried away towards the west. Nothing stirred on the field minus the crows that picked at remains, and the insects that were beginning to come out with the setting of the sun. Borrik knew the enemy would return, the only question was when.
* * * * *
Seth stood motionless in the mud and blood-smeared field, neither blinking nor breathing. Beyond the city walls he could see mothers ushering their children into their homes, praying for the safe return of morning. On the walls his brave defenders stood at their posts in defiance of their mortal needs for rest and food. These were good people, loyal people, who had given him their trust.
Atop the wall every eye was focused on him and he could sense the nervousness in the air. All knew that the enemy would return, but there was no telling when. All they could do was wait.
In the field of battle, Seth watched every aura. So far, three hundred and twenty-seven crows had come to the feast beneath which billions of insects crawled both beneath and above the soil. Flies and mosquitos had begun to swarm and even a lonely fox darted about the fringes, likely frightened by the strong scent of men. All was precisely as it should be at such a time in such a place. It felt too right.
It felt all wrong.
Seth knew he was missing something. He could feel it in his bones. Something was not as it seemed.
Swallowing the silence like a horn blast, a great rush of air trumpeted the arrival of the invading army as a deafening roar from both sides erupted and fire, lightning, and ice lanced into the sky. Prepared for the attack this time, Seth siphoned the power from the magical attacks making them vanish just as quickly as they had appeared.
With the world moving in slow motion around him, the king of Drakenhurst reached out to the magical umbilicals of those blessed in the ranks of his foes and prepared to rip them away, as the enemy vanished yet again leaving him with nothing to look upon but trampled gore and mud.
It was as if the world had exhaled them, then they vanished as they were inhaled once more. Then, expecting another lengthy wait, the blast came again, and again an army stood around him.
Reaching out to grasp at those he had located just a fraction of a second before, he found the blessed mages of the enemy missing. Gone. To a man. Extracted.
Reeling in confusion, Seth sought among those on the field for a single man blessed with power and came up empty. A barrage of arrows took flight towards him which he incinerated more or less by reflex. The army around him closed in, charging him from all sides, but gathering his power he released a blast casting them back in a torrent of flailing limbs to land in tangled masses in the mud. This was wrong. It was all wrong. The enemy had figured him out.
Gone were the blessed warriors, because they were Seth’s targets. Whoever led this army knew he would not kill these ordinary men. As such, the invaders were there just to harass him. His plan was folly. He’d have to find another way to lure the assassin out.
* * * * *
“It is done, Father,” young Gulteth informed Wuk Shin.
“You put it on his person?”
“No, Father. I gave it to him as a gift for protection and he placed it on his own person,” Gulteth admitted with a sly grin. He knew his father would be impressed with such a feat. Being a child was a huge benefit in such a line of work. No one ever suspected you.
“That was brilliant thinking, my boy. And the army?”
“As you requested, Father, they will harass the city, wearing out its defenders, and giving the demon prince no reason for mass casualties.”
“Well done. Go and get yourself some food, and by the gods visit your mother. She’s been asking about you for days.”
“I will, Father. Send for me when you’re ready to leave,” Gulteth requested, wanting to witness his father’s victory.
“No, son, you get fed and get some rest. See to your mother and the army. Be certain to keep to the schedule I have set for them. My job will be done in darkness, alone, where I won’t be expected.”
* * * * *
Betrayed. Garret’s closest friend and most trusted ally had betrayed him, and worse, tried to drag Linaya into the deceit as well with a threat. While he roared in rage, a great blade sprang from the king’s metallic wrist as he charged the fallen dwarf. Raising his bladed arm, he swung down, locking eyes with Zorbin in the last instant. “Do you have no honor, dwarf?” the enraged king growled as he was thrown back several feet by the dwarf’s summoned blessing.
Managing to stay upon his feet, Garret grinned at the lesser champion. “You wish to die today, oh mighty Zorbin Ironfist?” taunted the king.
“Nay, but beat some sense into ya, I might!”
Swinging his bladed arm at the dwarf, he watched the bolt of electrical energy extend from his blade and crack like a whip just inches from the dwarf’s ear. Too fast was Zorbin, however, as he ducked to the side and rolled away as Lycans scattered from beneath the behemoths. Swinging again, Garret’s sword arm met the handle of Zorbin’s great hammer in a shower of sparks and the ring of metal. Leaning back, the larger king kicked out, landing a blow to his opponent’s chest before springing forward to catch the dwarf off balance.
Instead of finding his foe off guard, however, the dwarf used the momentum from his kick to spring backwards into a roll before rising to his feet once again. Between them, several dead Lycans lay like crushed insects on the ground. Charging Zorbin yet again, Garret let loose the blade from his off hand, watching it grow and elongate as he crossed the short distance. Raining blows on his smaller foe, he swung again and again as the lightning from his blades crackled, lashing out to grasp ahold of the dwarf’s armor.
His nostrils filled with the scent of singed hair and ozone, Garret feigned a blow from overhead with one arm, and stabbed for the dwarf’s abdomen with the other. Feeling his blade slice through the dwarven steel of his foe, Garret roared in triumph only to find his victory cry matched by a roar of rage as a great gray beast sprang over the wall of the Lycan training grounds.
Retracting his blow before it would be fatal, Garret saw the error in his judgement. Turning to face his new foe as Zorbin stumbled back with blood gushing from beneath his breastplate, Garret squared on the lunging dire wolf. Leaning into the blow that would come with the beast’s pounce, Garret watched the massive creature launch into the air. Reaching up as if to grasp at the beast when they collided, Garret dodged to the side at the last instant and swung the blade from his right arm.
Lightning erupted from the blade, wrapping about the neck of Xanth who sailed past, wrenching the blessed dire wolf backwards to land with a crunch on his back. Kicking the beast in the ribs, Garret quickly grasped the snarling creature by the back of its neck and hefted it into the air with one mighty arm.
Turning to stare into the ashen face of his dwarven rival, Garret held Xanth at arm’s length for the dwarf to witness. “This must be what you want, Zorbin. This is what you have done to me. For your insolence, your lies, and your treason, I hereby sentence your pet to death, as you have done to my own.”
“Noooo!” The dwarf screamed as Garret drove his free, bladed arm up into the back of Xanth, twisting his blade up and through the poor creature to protrude from its throat. Grinning, the wicked king retracted his blade and cast the still twitching corpse of Xanth at Zorbin’s feet.
“Now recall your blessing or die like the beast!” Garret demanded.
“You are no longer my king,” Zorbin shouted. “You be having neither honor nor a heart, and this wicked lot will be the death of you and all of Valdadore!”
Garret expected the lunge, and sidestepped the injured dwarf, swinging his blade around to smash into the back of the charging champion who staggered unevenly past.
“You’re not well, master dwarf. Recall your blessing and I will have my healers attend your wounds. You can live out the rest of your days in my dungeon, cutting up meat to serve to the Lycans you hate so much.”
No reply came other than the dwarf turning on his heel, with both hurt and rage in his eyes. Charging yet again, the dwarven warrior raised his great battle hammer, swinging with all his might in a great arc as his beard trailed behind him. Too sluggish was such a weapon, however, that Garret charged forward, into the dwarf, well before the hammer’s swing reached its apex. Smashing into the dwarf, the smaller man was thrown from his feet to land heavily on his back.
Garret stepped over the fallen knight of Gorandor and pressed one wicked blade to the man’s throat.
“Do you yield?”
“I’d rather die.”
“So be it, old friend. May your god give you everlasting life in his halls,” Garret said as he thrust down on his bladed arm, driving the steel deep into the soil beneath the dwarf’s neck. Watching Zorbin’s eyes bulge, Garret pulled his blade free as blood sprayed from the wound in the dwarf’s neck and trickled from his mouth as he gasped and choked in a sound similar to that of a pig being slaughtered.
Instead of turning and storming away, which was his first inclination, Garret watched as Zorbin shrank with a pop, and stood as witness until the light left the dwarven warrior’s eyes.
“Ashton!” Garret boomed in his blessed form when he was certain the dwarf was no longer living.
“Yes, my king?” came the nearly squeaked reply of the tiny human.
“See to it that he is properly prepared for burial and lay him to rest in the tombs. He may have died a traitor, but his hammer has spared the lives of thousands.”