Jaina Proudmoore: Tides of War (25 page)

The battle had only lasted a few seconds, and already more than two dozen were dead or dying.

“Ambush! Attack!” cried Malkorok. He suited action to word, charging at a huge brown bear with painted markings ripping into an undead warlock who was frantically trying to drain the druid’s life to power his own magical abilities. The twin axes whirred, biting through the bear’s protective throat ruff at such an angle that the blades met and the druid’s head was nearly severed.

The cries of pain and rage and bloodlust were augmented by other sounds—the singing of arrows being loosed and the echoing boom of gunfire. The hunters—who were directing the spiders and scorpids, the wolves and the crocolisks and the raptors—were now entering the fight themselves. Malkorok swore beneath his breath as he leaped over the fallen bodies of a goblin and a hyena locked in a fatal embrace, the goblin’s blade in the creature’s eye and the beast’s jaws about the green throat. His eyes were on the cluster of several Horde fighting a single opponent. As Malkorok approached, shouting his battle cry, the crowd about the Alliance warrior parted for a moment. A strong night elf female was at the center. She wielded an almost blindingly radiant sword and moved so swiftly she was a blur. A long blue braid whipped around, looking almost like an azure serpent. Two slender bodies were already at her feet, and a third blood elf clutched his side and crumpled to join them.

For just an instant, she paused and her eyes locked with Malkorok’s. She saw his gray skin and grinned as, with a shout, he sprang toward her.

•   •   •

There was plenty of warning. This was no surprise attack. So when the runner arrived, breathless, with a solid estimate of the numbers
about to descend upon first Sentry Point and then the north gate of Theramore, Captain Wymor merely nodded.

“Take your positions,” he said. Then he added, “I am proud that I am fighting with you, on this day that will be long remembered.” The guards, some of them seeming so young to him, saluted. Few of them had ever engaged in anything other than a brief skirmish with a Horde member before. Most of their fighting was with the Grimtotem or the swamp beasts. Now they could hear the drums in the distance and prepared themselves for true battle.

General Marcus Jonathan personally had come out to Sentry Point to discuss tactics. The term “Sentry Point” itself implied that it was a lookout, not a bastion of defense for Theramore. Yet it was destined to become one if Garrosh’s forces decided to approach from the north.

“And they will,” Jonathan had said. “They will attack from the north, the west, and the harbor. You cannot outfight them. You must outsmart them.”

The runner was given a gulp of water, a moment to catch her breath, then remounted her horse and galloped for Theramore. The rest of the guards under Wymor took their positions and waited.

They did not have to wait long. The lone sentry up at the top of the tower gestured, raising his right arm and bringing it down sharply. The gnome standing next to Wymor, by the name of Adolphus Blastwidget, held a small device in his hands. At the signal from the tower, Blastwidget grinned and pressed a button. The sound of drumbeats was suddenly overwhelmed by a colossal boom. Black smoke curled upward, and the Alliance soldiers cheered. When the noise died down, the drums had fallen silent.

The bombs that had been carefully planted had no doubt eliminated many of the enemy, but the threat remained.

“Draw weapons,” Wymor said. In the eerie silence, the scrape of swords being drawn sounded overly loud. The soldiers stood, taut and ready. The minutes ticked by. All that could be heard were the ceaseless hum of insects, the cry of seabirds, the wash of waves on the shore nearby, and the creaking of their own armor as they shifted uneasily.

And then came the cries of battle, chilling the blood and lifting the
hair of the guards. The drums started again, closer this time, their rhythm faster, more urgent. From out of the shadows of the murky swamp, dozens, perhaps hundreds, charged, all of them screaming, all of them carrying weapons that looked as if they weighed more than an armored human.

“Run, Adolphus!” shouted Wymor to the gnome, who was standing transfixed with horror. Blastwidget started, stared wildly up at Wymor, and then took off as fast as his legs could carry him toward Theramore. He still clutched the detonator. Wymor lifted his sword and stood ready.

An orc, bristling with armor and swinging a great axe that seemed to howl with its own lust for blood, led the wave of orc, troll, tauren, Forsaken, blood elf, and goblin. He charged straight for Wymor. His shoulder armor appeared to be made of giant tusks, and between the shoulders and the gloves covering his hands was an expanse of brown, tattooed skin.

Wymor’s golden beard parted in a smile.

Garrosh Hellscream.

The blade of Wymor’s sword met the shaft of Gorehowl with a clash. Garrosh, vastly stronger than the human, shoved, and Wymor staggered back. He got his blade up just in time to parry a swift downstroke from the axe and darted beneath the warchief’s bulk, pulling the sword with him. Garrosh grunted in surprised pain as the sword sliced across his inner arm.

“My first blood in this battle,” the orc said in Common. “Well done, human. You will die with honor.”

Wymor retreated several steps, brandishing the sword. “You won’t,” he said, taunting the orc. Garrosh growled beneath his breath and charged.

Exactly as Wymor wanted him to.

“Now, Blastwidget!” shouted Wymor. He heard a roaring sound, felt himself being hurled into the air, and then knew no more.

T
he elf was good—Malkorok had to give her that. That she had survived battles before was evident by the single great scar that marred her face. Seeing that their leader wanted her for his own kill, the other Horde members had scattered to take on other foes. Ancestors knew there were plenty of them.

The blue-haired night elf was uncannily fast, even though the sword she wielded had to be slowing her down. Malkorok was swift for an orc, and his weapons were much lighter, but even so the two small axes seemed only to bite thin air. Blue-Hair was there one minute, then gone the next, darting in under his defenses. More than once, it was only his heavy armor that saved him as the blade clanged against his midsection. If the glowing sword tip found the unprotected junction between torso and arm—

He brought one axe down while whirling the other over his head. She dove aside, but not before the blade bit into her thigh. She grunted.

“Ha!” snorted Malkorok. “If you can bleed, you can die.”

Impossibly, she sprang toward him, her mouth open in a snarl that would have done a worgen credit. He lifted the axes and crossed them in front of himself defensively. To his shock, Blue-Hair ignored her wound and
climbed up
the axes, moving as easily as if he had linked his hands together to provide a foothold. The point of her blade drove down toward his neck.

He twisted away at the last second, nearly falling, swinging his left
axe around. Now she was behind him, and Malkorok turned, ready to begin the fight again.

A horn sounded. It was not one of the Horde’s—this was light and musical and sweet. An elven horn. Instantly those Alliance members who had been fighting the Horde began to run for the still-opened gate. Blue-Hair grinned fiercely at Malkorok, and when he swung again at the place she had been, she was not there.

Malkorok roared his frustration and gave chase.

•   •   •

Though it looked like utter chaos, everything was going according to plan. The Horde was, as Jonathan had predicted, attacking on all three fronts. The sounds were deafening and frightening—the nearly constant boom of cannon fire, explosions to the north, and the clash of swords and the shrieking of battle cries to the west.

Jaina and Kinndy were at the top of one of the walkways facing the west. Jaina had struggled with her desire to keep Kinndy shut up safely away from harm but realized that would do the girl a disservice. Kinndy had come to her to learn, and there was no better way to learn about the horrors of war than to experience them firsthand. She kept the gnome close to her, but Kinndy had a front-row seat to the battle that raged below them.

When the horn sounded, Jaina told her apprentice, “Be ready. Do what we talked about, and strike when I do.” Kinndy nodded, swallowing hard. Jaina lifted her hands, waiting for the right moment. Dozens of Alliance fighters were running as fast as they could for the safety of Theramore. The abruptness and speed of the retreat had gained them a precious second or two, but now the Horde was coming after them.

And waiting for the Horde were more than two dozen engines of war.

“Now!” cried Jaina. She, Kinndy, and others who fought with spells instead of swords all attacked at once. Guttural cries filled the air as tauren and orc, goblin and blood elf, Forsaken and troll were set on fire or frozen or peppered with arrows.

“Well done!” Jaina cried. “The war engines will hold them back for a bit, and then we’ll return up here. Come on!”

Quickly they ran down the steps to the door. Almost all the Alliance defenders were safely inside. There were a few stragglers, slowed by their wounds or by carrying others who were wounded.

“They’re not going to make it!” yelped Kinndy, her eyes wide and round.

“Yes, they will,” Jaina said. She prayed she was right. The gates would have to be closed any second now.
Come on, come on…

The last ones stumbled inside, and the gates slammed shut with an echoing boom. Kinndy and Jaina rushed forward, casting protective wards on the gates. They were joined by Thoder Windermere, and as they worked, the air around the gates seemed to shimmer and turn pale blue for a moment.

“Mage Thoder, you and Kinndy stay here. Keep an eye on the gate. Reinforce if it starts to weaken.”

“But—” Kinndy tried to protest. Jaina turned to her and spoke quickly but urgently.

“Kinndy, if that gate comes down, dozens—hundreds—of Horde will pour through. We’ve got to keep it as secure as possible. This might be the single most important thing anyone can do. You could save all our lives.” It was true. If the gates fell, the losses could be staggering.

Kinndy nodded her pink head and turned to look at the gates. She set her mouth determinedly and extended her hands, adding her skills to those of the member of the Kirin Tor.

Jaina realized that the magi were turning out to be very important in perhaps unexpected ways. Not just in the seemingly passive act of reinforcing the gates, but every Alliance vessel in the harbor had at least one mage who had great skill with fire. As Aubrey had pointed out, a single well-placed bolt of flame, on the sails or on the wooden deck, could be enough to sink an entire ship. And it seemed to be doing exactly that.

She turned and hastened to Pained, who had been one of the last to
retreat. Pained was permitting a priestess to tend to a gaping wound in her thigh as Jaina ran up to her.

“Report?” Jaina asked.

“Took them utterly by surprise,” Pained said, her smile genuine but cruel. “Just as Jonathan predicted. We dropped at least a few dozen and only lost a handful. Now they are getting cannons in their faces. That should hold them for a while.”

For a while,
Jaina thought,
but not forever
.

Pained continued, nodding her thanks to the healer and rising to put her armor back on. “There is a Blackrock orc with them. He has the livery that marks him as a member of the Kor’kron. He fights very well.”

“A
Blackrock
orc? Has Garrosh truly fallen so low?”

Pained shrugged. “I do not care if they are green, brown, gray, or orange; as long as they are attacking my lady’s home, I shall slay them.”

“Not this moment, but I fear soon,” Jaina said. “I cannot imagine there will not be more hand-to-hand combat. For now, please go and help with the wounded, Pained.”

“Yes, my lady.”

Jaina turned her attention to the north gate. Blastwidget, the gnome demolitions expert who had detonated so many well-placed bombs, was standing a few feet back from the gate. Jaina went to him and smiled.

“Your work has paid off, Blastwidget,” she said.

He turned a sorrowful face up to her. “It has,” he said, “but it was Captain Wymor and the others who made sure the Horde was standing in the right spot.”

Jaina’s heart sank. “They—they were supposed to retreat! They knew the safe path!”

The white-haired Sunreaver paused in his strengthening of the gate to look at them both. “Wymor and his soldiers stayed,” he said quietly. “It was a truly heroic gesture. Many of our enemies were slain. But still they come.”

“My lady,” a sentry called from the walkway, “mage Songweaver is right. They’re running right over the bodies of their dead!”

“Keep warding the gate!” Jaina cried, and she raced to the top of the nearest walkway. Like a dark wave, the Horde kept coming. The bridge had exploded, and chunks of debris and bodies floated in the water. Some of the Horde swam. Others, as the sentry had grimly reported, crawled over their comrades. Jaina lifted her hands and murmured a spell.