Embers of an Age (Blood War Trilogy) (15 page)

Feragh glanced out over the battle to see the Pathra had joined the fight
as he had hoped
. Wooden javelins flew from a sea of furred warriors. Distracted by the ambush at the rear, the Korme failed to meet the volley and hundreds of
furless
soldiers sunk to the earth with wooden shafts protruding from their flesh. Another wave of missiles followed and the Korme ranks
began to collapse
under the assault. The commander laughed. The advancing Pathran warriors were spread across the field, but their numbers couldn’t have been more than a thousand. The Korme were too frightened to notice
they still held numerical superiority by an easy five thousand men
.

“Cowards!” Feragh shouted at them as he leapt from his mount. His
forces
had kept the brunt of the enemy from his steel and he wanted to fight.
He gave the signal for his
men
to split ranks and engage in close. They savored a battle as much as he did.

Pressed between the two
spearheads
, the Korme broke. There was no longer a pretense of tactics to their efforts. Their ranks scattered and turned from the jungle only to meet their death under a sharp hail of javelins. The Korme cavalry had met the first wave of Tolen and had been routed. Those left with horses kicked them ruthlessly to flee the field. Feragh wasted no time chasing them
down
.

He strode between the muddle of confused Korme and put his blade to work. An older soldier, dressed in battered leather armor singled him out and charged. The soldier fell away after attempting just one slash, his blade parried and the point of Feragh’s broadsword driven into his lungs. The commander cleared his sword with a kick to the Korme’s chest, sending the dead man tumbling into a pile of companions. Feragh sighed as two more soldiers fell beneath his steel, the field clearing before him
as clouds after a summer rain
.
The Korme resistance was pathetic.

He glanced across the battle once more to see th
e Pathra keeping their distance
but still
spearing the Korme as they fled
. Javelins rained down on retreating
backs.
Feragh’s
men continued to skirt the flanks and trample those who strayed too close
to the lines
. Feragh growled his disappointment as he saw masses of the Korme fleeing in the direction of the Dead Lands, too far along the line of his men to be contained. Wulvren rode up a moment later, pointing them out to the commander.

“Let them go and rein in the troops
. The Grol won’t be near
as easy to rout. I won’t waste risk
forces
chasing this rabble down.”

Wulvren acknowledged the order and rode off, his voice carrying it across the ranks. He turned back to the front to see the Pathran warriors pulling back to the covering jungle. They’d fought smart, risking little to repel the enemy at their border. Feragh
slipped from his mount. He
cleaned his sword on the corpse that lay mangled
nearby
, and sheathed it. He called out to his standard bearer and strode toward the jungle.

Feragh would need to
the talk to the Pathra
and see what terms they could come to.
The Korme had only been a taste of the fighting to come.

He wanted the whole feast.

The thunderous rumble of the Hull only grew louder as Arrin followed Jerul to his homeland of Y’Vel.
It seemed to fade at their back
s
only to well up before them. Arrin knew what that meant. He ran alongside the Yviri warrior and saw the man’s clenched teeth and the throb of his temples pulsing.
Jerul
knew,
too
.

The enemy lay ahead as well as behind. They were running into the middle of them.

To Jerul’s credit, he had steered them clear of the fonts that sprung up in the Dead Land
s
near his home. They had come across no Hull in their journey, but Arrin began to think it was more because the
creatures
had reached their destination rather than
due
to any action on their part. As they drew closer to Y’Vel, his belief was validated.

The
guardian
bramble walls set to mark the Yviri land were mostly in shambles, crushed and scattered across the open fields beyond. There was no blood or flesh clinging to the sharpened vines; nothing to show they had been any use at all.
The Yvir hadn’t defended the line.

Jerul darted over their ruins
, Kirah at his heels. Arrin was glad he ha
d returned her sword, but he felt they were
ill-equipped to battle an army of Hull.
The strange warrior woman
ran alongside him, keeping pace with obvious ease. Her O’hra shimmered with gentle light. He could tell by looking at the array of relics she wore she would be a fierce fighter, but even with her along he did not like their chances. Arrin glanced back at Cael and saw the worry straining his face. He caught Arrin looking at him and forced a smile, but there was no truth to its sallow flicker.

Arrin heard Jerul cry out and looked to see what had distressed the warrior. It was apparent immediately. The shattered remnants of a small village filled his vision. Wooden huts had been crushed beneath the stomping feet of the Hull, their walls and thatched roofs scattered in splintered pieces across the ground. Clothes and personal effects littered the ruins. Everything that had once stood in the village had been trampled and torn down
as though by a rampaging herd of great beast. The truth was quite similar.

Jerul fluttered about the wreckage, lifting pieces of wood and casting them aside with growing fury. He snarled and cursed, finally grunting in approval at finding what he was looking for amidst the detritus. Flickers of steel reflected the sunlight as he pulled several swords loose of the clutter. He examined the quickly and settled on two.

“Where is everyone?” Cael asked
. H
is question
sounded
quiet against the distant thunder.

“My people have gone to defend the Velen,” Jerul answered, having started to run once more before the words had left his mouth.

The group ran on behind him. The truth of his statement became apparent a short while later. A village rose up in the distance, clouds of dust swirling into the air around it. The clash of steel and stone rang out. The sound set Arrin’s heart racing. A wall of Hull encircled the village, their massive forms pawing at the swirl of pale bodies before them. Much to Arrin’s surprise, the Hull line seemed to be
stuck in place. The Yviri warriors were holding.

As they drew closer, he realized why. A large ditch, perhaps
fifteen
feet across, had been dug before the approaching army, its depths
appearing to encircle
the village. Brown earth lay in scattered piles about the huts behind as Yviri fighters held the line with hewn tree trunks. The Hull pressed forward and tumbled into the ditch. Those that managed to remain on their feet pressed to the edge of the ditch and tried to climb out. Yviri warriors shoved them back inside with the trunks while others rained down blows with their swords.

For all the brilliance of the defense, Arrin knew it was only a matter of time until the Hull filled the ditch to overflowing with their bodies
and then advanced again. There were simply too many of them.

“They can’t hold forever,” he said, calling the group to a halt a short distance behind the Hull ranks.

“There are too many on this side for us to defeat,” Braelyn added. Jerul growled as though he disagreed, but he held his impatience.

Arrin nodded to her. “We need to clear a hole so we can get across, but we can’t get caught up in fighting them.” He looked to Jerul as he said the last, raising an eyebrow. He looked to Cael after. “When we open a space, you run through and get to the other side. We’ll be right behind you.”

The boy nodded without expression. Arrin looked back to the Hull and surveyed their lines. He found what he was looking for. “Follow me.” He started off, angling toward an area that appeared to have less of the creatures clustered about the edge of the ditch.

He ran full speed at the backs of the Hull and flung himself into the air.
His sword in the lead, he landed on the back of the
closest creature and drove his blade
into its neck, kicking his feet out with all his might. The Hull tumbled forward from the collision smashing into its companions before him. The impact scattered a number of them, casting several into the ditch.

Jerul screamed something Arrin
didn’t
understand as he followed behind to do the same maneuver. More stone beasts crashed into the line and were knocked about. The Yviri warriors tightened their ranks across the ditch and put their tree trunks to work pinning the down the Hull that had fallen into the trench
, helping to clear the way
.

Kirah ran behind the men and struck at the Hull that had been knocked over. Her sword flickered silver and thrust over and over into the skulls of the Hull, stilling them where they struggled to rise.

Arrin watched as Braelyn dismantled a row of the creatures that turned and tried to fill the gap. She
darted in at their flanks and let her swords loose. Shards of ice glistened as they formed on the stone hides, Braelyn’s blackened sword cleaving through the frozen exterior to send stone and frost flying. The advancing Hull
slowed
as she carved her way through their ranks. Massive arms and legs were severed, piling up around her as the blur of her form danced and lashed out.
But d
espite her skill, the Hull still closed on her.

Arrin waved to Cael and the boy charged without hesitation. He stepped on the backs of fallen Hull and jumped at the edge of the trench. He flew over it easily, the warriors on the other side making way and grabbing him when he landed to keep him steady.

Arrin spun to Kirah. “You next.”

She didn’t bother to argue. With feline grace, she jumped from where she stood and landed on the
far
side. Arrin waved Jerul over next. The warrior slammed his swords into the head of a struggling Hull, and then leapt onto the shoulders of
another
inside the ditch and sprung across. His fellow warriors knocked the creature down right after he crossed.

Arrin turned to Braelyn. She waggled a finger at him and he gave in without argument. He was on the other side a moment later, Braelyn right behind him. They moved away from the ditch so the fighters could continue their work of repelling the Hull. Another
Yviri
warrior ran to greet them.

“Hail,
brother.”

Jerul embraced the other quickly. “Good to see you, Hardin.” He glanced about. “The Velen?”

“They are gathered in the hall.”

“Why have they not fled to Ah Uto Ree?”

Hardin shook his head. “The Hull press us from all
sides
. The Sha’ree land is where they have mustered the greatest of their numbers.”

Arrin glanced back at the line they had just crossed and marveled at how many of the creatures loomed just beyond the ditch.
If this were but a small portion of the Hull army, there was little hope they could break through to the Sha’ree.
“They hold Ah Uto Ree?”

“They do,” Hardin answered, doing nothing to hide his surprise. “There are thousands of them gathered there and blocking the border as far as we can see.”

Jerul’s shoulder slumped as he heard the news.

“
If Ah Uto Ree is inaccessible, where do we go?” Kirah asked.

Arrin shrugged as he let his gaze roam the village edge, sickened by the number of Hull that surrounded them. “We caught them off guard and only took down maybe ten of their number.” He motioned toward the enemy. “We stand no chance against such a force.”

Braelyn nodded her agreement.

“What of the O’hra?” Cael asked. “If we cannot reach the Sha’ree, we have no O’hra to challenge the Grol.”

All eyes turned to look at the boy. Arrin growled. “He’s right. Damn the Hull.” Arrin stomped and cursed the stone creatures.

“Not true,” Braelyn said, d
rawing their attention. “I don’
t believe your Sha’ree companion, Uthul, intended you to gather the O’hra from his homeland.”

Arrin
spun to face Braelyn and
urged her to continue.

She motioned to the O’hra she wore. “These were found in a mausoleum deep in the desert south of here.”

“The Funeral Sands?” Jerul drew in a deep breath and shook his head. “There is nothing but death there.”

“There is that, but there is also enough O’hra to field an army,” she answered.
“Uthul spoke of it when we crossed paths
, and I have seen it with my own eyes
.”