Lord Soth (11 page)

He was a young and handsome man, with all the size and strength of his father. He was dressed in shining plate
armor, dented and scratched in spots in evidence of the fierceness of battles past. He held his sword stiffly before him like a pathfinder, lighting his way in the dark.

Soth ran toward his son, but stopped when he noticed the boy’s eyes. They were two large white spheres absolutely without color. The young man was blind, wandering aimlessly over the mountainside, in search of …

“Father, are you there?”

“Yes!” cried Soth, moving toward the boy.

But the dragon was back, plunging down toward them, so close now that Soth could feel the rush of hot wind against his body as it approached.

He drew his sword to face the beast. It was a red dragon, its head and snout crowned by great spiny horns and its body covered with large red diamond-shaped scales. Such a powerful and evil enemy, even Soth felt a shiver of fear run through him.

“Father, help me!”

The dragon swooped closely overhead, then rose up in a slow, wide arc in preparation for another pass.

Soth turned toward his son, but a rock rolled in front of him and he was forced to jump back …

Directly into the path of another, larger rock. The great stone slammed into him, knocking him down and pinning him to the ground. Desperately he tried to move, but both his legs had been crushed, and the rock—more like a boulder—was far too heavy to move.

“Father? Are you there?”

Soth tried to speak, but the words would not come to his parched throat.

The red dragon had circled back once more, this time coming in to land on the side of the mountain no more than fifty paces from the boy.

“Is that you?” The younger Soth turned his head toward the dragon, listening to the sounds of movement around him.

The dragon moved closer, a wide villainous smile forming
on its hideous snout. It began to inhale, gathering its breath. Then, slowly it opened its mouth wide.

Soth felt the blood drain from his face. His heart fell into the pit of his stomach. He opened his mouth to scream, but could not make a sound.

The red dragon exhaled a cone of white-hot flames.

“Father, please …”

The boy’s sword and shield began to melt in the wash of fire.

“Help me!”

And a moment later the young Soth was also aflame, his armor and body being incinerated by the intense heat of the dragon’s fiery breath.

“No!” Soth cried, this time managing to say the word.

The dragon closed its mouth and turned to face him. Thin white tendrils of smoke wafted up from its nostrils and the corners of its mouth as it took several steps in his direction.

Soth began to thrash from side to side, pulling at his ruined legs, trying to get them free.

The dragon inhaled again, then opened its mouth and …

“Milord!” whispered Caradoc.

Soth’s eyes fluttered open. “What?” he gasped. “What is it?”

“Are you all right? It sounded as if you might be in pain.”

Soth fought to catch his breath. He looked around. It was still dark out. Slowly, he remembered where he was, and realized he’d been having a dream.

A bad dream.

A nightmare.

“No, I’m … I’m fine,” he said. He looked down at his legs, and saw that his feet had become entangled in his cloak. He kicked the cloak away. “Is it my turn to keep watch?” he asked hopefully. Anything to keep him from returning to the nightmare of the dream.

“No, milord,” said Caradoc. “It is time to go. Your turn to keep watch came and went some time ago. You were sleeping so soundly we decided it was best not to wake you.”

Soth said nothing to this. He could reprimand his knights for not waking him, but he knew the fault lay within himself. After all, the squire’s first rule was that knights who slept too deeply did not live very long. It wasn’t like him to forget something like that, but he had. Perhaps it was best not to dwell on it. In fact, the less he reminded himself about his ghastly nightmare the better.

“Very well,” he said at last. “But, don’t let it happen again.”

“Yes, milord.”

Soth rose up off the ground, stiff and sore, his clothes cold and damp with sweat.

The knights were well on their way as the sun broke over the tops of the Dargaard Mountains. After a cold night and its legacy of stiff joints and sore bones, the sun’s warmth was a more than welcome relief for the knights.

Soth took his customary position at the head of the group during the early hours, but as they neared Halton, he allowed the rider who’d come from the village to take the lead position given that he was more familiar with the surrounding terrain.

When the village at last came into sight, Soth moved the knights slightly up the mountain slopes in order to avoid detection as the ogres would no doubt have one or two guards watching the surrounding lands and especially the approach from Dargaard Keep.

As they made their way through a shallow gully, one of the knights let out a birdlike cry. Soth immediately halted the knights with an upraised fist. The procession stopped and went silent as Soth waited for the knight who’d called out the warning to offer a report.

The knight turned out to be Colm Farold, Knight of the Sword. “Voices, milord,” he said. “Coming from over there.” He pointed with a subtle gesture at a thick patch of fireweed growing close to the ground some yards off.

Soth nodded, and listened closely. Indeed there were faint sounds coming from somewhere to his left. He gestured to Farold with his head, then pointed to two other knights. The selected knights immediately dismounted.

“Nothing here, men,” said Soth, moving forward through the gully, leaving the three knights behind. “I think it’s best we be moving on.”

Once they were through the gully, Soth doubled his men back around in a wide arc and minutes later they were once again traversing the gully.

Except this time, Farold and the other knights were there waiting for them, swords drawn and two prisoners in hand.

“Hender and Pike!” exclaimed the rider.

“You know these two?” asked Soth.

“Indeed, milord. One is my cousin, the other his neighbor.”

Soth looked at the men flanked by the trio of knights and recognized them from their manner of dress as being simple farmers.

“We found them cowering in the bushes almost with their heads buried in the ground,” Farold explained.

“We were afraid you might be more ogres,” said the older of the two, the one the rider had identified as Hender. He was a man with thin gray hair, a long white beard, and the red neck and thickly calloused hands of one who tills the land.

If the man hadn’t been so terrified, Soth might have considered his words an insult. And if their task wasn’t so urgent, he might have taken the time to make a comment about them. Instead, he decided to concentrate on the matter at hand. “How long ago did you escape from the village?”

“This morning,” said the other farmer, a somewhat younger man who was obviously the one named Pike. “Before sunup.”

Soth wasn’t surprised by this. It was just like ogres to take over a village, then get careless about keeping it while they indulged on food, ale and wine in celebration. Fortunately for Soth and the people of Halton, it simply meant that the ogres’ celebration would be short-lived.

“Did you get a chance to learn where the ogres are located?” asked Soth.

“Most of them, milord,” said Pike.

“I saw some too,” offered Hender.

“Excellent,” said Soth. Then in a slightly louder voice. “We’ll break for a short rest here. When we mount again, we’ll be riding into battle.”

He dismounted and began studying the map the rider had drawn back at Dargaard Keep. In comparing it to what was known about the ogres by Hender and Pike, it became clear that, despite what the rider had said about them at Dargaard Keep, these ogres preferred to stick close together.

According to Hender, most of the ogres had gathered in the middle of the village around the open meeting place called Center Square. From there, four pathways led out in four basic directions: north, south, west and east. The pathway leading into the village from the north was the largest of the four and could easily be considered a road. It was the village’s main connection to Dargaard Keep to the north and the path most often traveled by villagers. The path heading west was also fairly wide and well maintained. This was the path that hooked up with the trail that led to Vingaard Keep, another stronghold of the Knights of Solamnia. The path south was thin and seldom used, stopping at the edge of Halton Wood, a thick, dark forest that had, up until now, served as a buffer zone between the farmers and the ogres living in Throtyl to the south. The path leading east was also a short one, leading
to a single farmhouse and a trail that led up the side of one of the Dargaard range’s more majestic peaks.

It was this path that the knights decided on utilizing. It was likely that the ogres had posted guards on the main north-south road, so they would gain some measure of surprise by coming at them out of the mountains from the east. It was also a safer plan for the villagers given that most of them were being held up in the two large homes on the west side of the main road. If the knights were successful, they’d be able to overpower the ogres long before they had a chance to harm any of their prisoners.

So, armed with a rough battle plan, they set out around midday, riding halfway up the slopes of the Dargaard Mountains in the hopes of remaining unseen by any scouts or guards the ogres might have stationed around the perimeter of the village. As they got closer to Halton, however, it became more and more apparent that the ogres didn’t perceive there to be much of a threat from outside forces. There were no guards, no sentries, nobody on the rooftops overlooking the countryside. Nevertheless, Soth kept the knights hidden on the mountainside in order to assure they retained the element of surprise.

“Is this the path?” Soth said in a whisper, even though such precautions were proving to be less and less necessary.

“Yes, milord,” said Pike. “It curves a little to the right before joining up with the others in the center of town. There is a farm house on the right of it halfway between here and the center of town. On the left there’s a small creek that feeds into a large pond which is where the farmers get most of their water during the dry summer seasons.”

“Very good,” said Soth. He took a look around him to see if all of the knights were close at hand. They were. “Farold!”

“Yes, milord,” came the curt, matter-of-fact reply.

“You will take your men across the field there,” said Soth, pointing to the open field below. The grain was nearing harvest and stood as tall as a man, if not taller. “Leave your mounts behind and secure the trade post and mercantile before joining me in the center of town.”

Farold nodded and dismounted. The three knights under his command also dismounted, leaving their horses to the villagers. In a minute the knights were out of sight, heading toward the village.

“Caradoc!”

“Milord.”

“You will continued skirting the mountains and come at the village from the south. I don’t expect you’ll come up against much resistance, but you might run into several ogres on the run.”

Caradoc grinned at the thought. “Yes, milord.”

“Take Knight Kern with you,” said Soth. “Be careful through the mountains, but move quickly.”

Caradoc nodded.

Kern followed, nodding to Soth as he passed.

That left Soth and six other knights, including Sword knights Darin Valcic and Zander Vingus, for what would basically be a full-frontal attack.

Soth took a deep breath. After all these years as a knight and the countless battles and adventures he’d been a part of, he still felt the same excitement beginning to build within him. It was a nervous sort of tension, an almost euphoric sensation that would continue to build until it all but disappeared upon the onset of battle. Then, his knightly instincts and years of training would take control and he would fight like a man possessed, not stopping until the last of his foes had been vanquished.

But that would all come later. For now, he savored the sweet feeling of anticipation, struggling with himself to keep it in check lest it overtake him too early. He still had a responsibility to his men to lead them safely into battle, for if one of them should die during the fight, a little piece
of him would die along with that knight.

He drew his sword, held it at the ready and gave his mount a gentle squeeze with his legs. The horse began moving forward.

The rest of the knights followed.

Soon after they set out, the path curved to the right as it followed the bend of the river feeding into the pond. There was a small farmhouse on the right of the road. Soth sent two knights to inspect it, but it proved to be empty of either villagers or ogres.

They continued on, Soth in front and three knights to either side of him in a loose V shape. As the path straightened out, they were able to see Center Square. Apparently, Paladine was smiling favorably on their expedition because they’d arrived just as the ogres were packing up their booty and preparing for the trip back to Throtyl. As the knights watched, several of them were casually inspecting their loads unaware of their impending demise.