“They’re toying with us now,” Daniel said. “They’re trying to rattle us, and Gods, they’re doing a good job of it.”
Calen rubbed tears from his eyes and surprised himself by laughing. “It’s about to get worse, too. Another
thousand
of them are about to be upon us. Curse my Elven hearing—good sometimes, but bad others.”“Ready the charge!” Rorrick shouted. “Let’s show these Elves how the hawk’s army—”
There was a shrill, ear-splitting cry, followed by the chaotic shouts of close to two thousand men. “Captain Rorrick!” they shouted. “Captain Rorrick!”
Calen again looked outside, and why wouldn’t he? What difference did it make if he died now or later? What he saw shocked him. Captain Rorrick was on the ground, an arrow through his neck. Every soldier now had their back turned to the cave where Calen hid with his men, and instead faced the thousand riders approaching at a trot.
What in the Gods was going on? Why was Captain Rorrick executed? Did commander Ghell send out yet another search party, but one more loyal? Perhaps this was some sort of punishment for the Captain’s disobedience. But then why was Leon still alive?
The riders pulled up before Captain Leon. The lead rider dismounted, with a thousand men trailing behind him, and Calen felt the air leave his lungs when he saw who it was. The boy landed on the ground. A sword far too large for him was slung across his back. The boy—who was no older than thirteen—stood face to face with Leon while the soldiers watched. He too, spoke with a voice that carried loudly enough for all to hear.
“My name is Kellar,” the boy said. “And Alan Marshall was right yet again.”
There were murmurs and whispers at the commander’s name, but the boy continued. “Douglas. Are these the men?”
It was hard to see through the sea of black-armored men, but Calen was able to spot the army the boy brought with him. None were armored and most carried little more than pitchforks and crossbows. A man dismounted and stepped forward. His eyes were bloodshot, and his entire body shook as if he was being continually shocked by electricity. Burn marks covered his face. “It’s them…It’s them!”
Leon waved a hand at the farmers. “What is the meaning of this?” he asked. “Have you lot come here to commit suicide by impaling yourself on our blades?”
“Answer me something,” Kellar said, disregarding the remark. “Do those emblems on your uniforms mean you’re a member of the scouting parties?”
Leon laughed. “I don’t know why I’m answering you, child, but yes they do. Now I don’t know what you’ve come here for, but I’m in a forgiving mood since you’ve killed this idiot Captain. Now, leave your women behind and get on out of here, or I’ll have my men slaughter you all. If I weren’t so busy with a pack of tree huggers, I’d have killed you already.”
Ten farmers dismounted behind Kellar. One stepped forward carrying a pitchfork. He trembled worse than the one called Douglas did. He fell to his knees, shaking, and then he bit his lips hard enough that blood was drawn. He stood back to his feet and screamed. “This is them for sure!” He turned his back to Leon and addressed the other farmers. “I swear to you all, I swear on our Gods, that this is them.”
Another farmer stepped forward. He was bulky, with muscles born from years of tending to unforgiving land. “You come into our homes…you slaughter our babies. You take our women, and then you burn everything we’ve ever loved to the ground. Do you see these ten men? These ten men are all that remains of villages you destroyed. Do you think you can do this to us? We stick together, all of us. commander Marshall told us that one day, you’d come to our home, too. Well, my friend, we’re here to see that never happens.” The farmer helped Douglas back to his feet. “Do you think you can do this?”
“I…I do,” he said.
Kellar nodded, and Douglas removed a white document from his pocket. “My name is Douglas O’Fennery, and I’m a farmer from the borders of Hahl. I once had a family, and you took them from me. I once had a home, and you took that from me, too.”
The man sobbed as he continued to read. “For the first time in all of Kingdom history, I, a common citizen, will now read you a summons in place of a noble. Prince Patrick has granted me exclusive permission to do what no commoner has ever done before.”
Douglas took a breath. “You are all identified as members of the scouting parties that have been raiding and destroying Kingdom villages. Because of the nature of your crimes, you are no longer considered enemy soldiers, but instead, war criminals. I, Douglas O’Fennery, acting on behalf of Prince Patrick of the Kingdom of the Seven Pillars, demand you drop your weapons and submit to arrest, where upon you will be put on trial and held accountable for your actions. If you refuse, then you will be slain. All of you.”
There was a short period of silence, followed by an uproarious laughter from the enemy soldiers. “A bunch of farmers…demand our surrender?” Leon choked as he spoke, forcing the words through his laughter. He pointed at Douglas. “Tell me, Douglas, what was it I or my men did to you?”
Douglas spoke without emotion—his face became blank. “You came into my home one night and killed my boy, and raped my wife. I lived only because I was knocked unconscious, far enough away from the flames to be burned, but not die.”
“Was it me, personally, or one of my men? This kind of thing happens a lot, you see.”
“It was you.”
Leon shrugged. “Is that all? You had it coming, then. Hah! I bet she begged for me to stop, didn’t she? No, I won’t surrender to a bunch of lowly farmers. Did you idiots actually think I would? And as for you,” he said to Douglas. “Tell me, was your wife the brunette? I think I remember her. Oh, yes, I do. I remember how she—”
“REMMOS MAHR
!” Kellar shouted.With those words, everything changed. Captain Leon did not die. No, he certainly didn’t. Calen had seen men die in battle. Dying meant being shot with an arrow or having a sword run through you. Captain Leon did none of these things. He didn’t so much die as he did explode. His head, which only moments before rested on top of his shoulders, simply evaporated into a ball of flame, followed by the rest of his body, as did ten of the men standing next to him.
“MAGE!” the black-armored men shouted. “Gods, they’ve got a mage! THEY HAVE A MAGE!”
“Kill them all!” Kellar cried. “Don’t leave a single one of these monsters alive to tread your ground with their subhuman feet.”
Caught off guard, the men watched in horror as nearly a thousand farmers ran them through with pitchforks, knives, daggers, and an assortment of other unlikely weapons. Calen’s spirits lifted. So, Alan Marshall hadn’t let them down after all?
How much did he know?
Calen wondered.
How much did he predict?Kellar led the assault, now surrounded in a cocoon of bright flame, bringing death to any that got too close or risked attacking him. The young boy clashed blades with the finesse of a master swordsman. Every time his blade moved, another life was ended.
The rage and resolve on the faces of the farmers was unlike any Calen had ever seen. They were fighting for their very right to exist, to avenge their friends and family that had been slain for no other reason than being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
“Daniel, Lira,” Calen said. “And the rest of you. What do you say we join our friends?”
There was a cheer from the Elves. Daniel raised his fist high into the air. “Say those three words for us, Calen. Say those words we long to hear.”
Calen nodded. “Ready…Aim…And fire!”
With their backs turned, and their attention focused on the unexpected arrival of a mage, Calen’s men exited their shelter and dealt death with the grace of Tehra, the death God. Every single time an arrow was fired, another soldier died.
Kellar and his men, to the surprise and humiliation of the enemy soldiers, cut through them with relative ease. The farmers had no armor—they had barely passable weapons. And yet, Calen knew, that they were fueled with the rage of an exploding star. It made him wonder to what extend a person could be wronged before lashing out at those who’d cause them such torment.
Pitchforks were sent in and out of enemy soldiers. Men shouted in their final throes of death, while Kellar, with his blade burning and lighting up the battlefield, lobbed off heads and limbs.
“Fire!” Calen ordered. Arrows were let loose and more men fell dead to the ground. With both Captains no longer among the living, and none remaining to lead them properly, the enemy soldiers fell into complete disarray. Some turned and charged at Calen’s men, while others ran around in circles. In either case, the result was the same. Dead, black-armored forms piled up along the ground, until the floor resembled scorched earth.
The swordsmen that charged at Calen’s men were dispatched in great numbers. Calen’s Elves loaded and reloaded with a speed that ensured nearly all of them were cut down before closing the distance. When the enemy was almost upon them, and less than a hundred remained, Calen waved his hand. “Ready daggers!”
The sound of sliding metal could be heard even among the mass cries of death, and Calen charged forward, with Lira to his side. Calen was a decent enough fighter, but Lira impressed him.
A soldier tried to decapitate her with the swing of his sword. She ducked, and moved in for a series of three attacks in succession. First, she plunged her dagger into the man’s stomach, and then—so fast as to be a blur—she removed the dagger, spun around to face the man’s back, and then cut the tendons behind his feet. Before he could even fall to the ground, she was already running the dagger across his throat.
Calen came close to losing his head, distracted by Lira’s skill which rivaled even Cah’lia’s. He’d seen her perform at one of the summer festivals held annually in Elvar, and Lira now displayed the same grace. Calen stepped to the side and dodged the soldier’s attack and then plunged his dagger into the man’s neck.
Surprisingly, none of his Elves fell in combat. One by one the black-armored men died, until finally, when Calen realized he hadn’t breathed for almost a minute, he looked around the quieting landscape.
“Did we…How is this possible?” he whispered.
It was a massacre. Nearly all the farmers remained standing, but the same couldn’t be said for the invaders. No, they most certainly were not. When the rush of battle madness had cleared from Calen’s mind, he fell to his knees while he looked on at the destruction.
“I’ve trained for this my entire life,” Calen said. “But this is just…it’s awful.”
There was noise in the distance. Several hundred men ran for their lives, but Kellar was having none of it. Despite his age, a chill ran through Calen’s spine while he watched the mage rain fire down on top of them. The farmers were once again horseback, stabbing downward with their pitchforks, slaughtering the black-armored men like animals, like cattle.
They are animals,
Calen reminded himself.“We actually survived this.” Calen tilted his head back and laughed. “We actually survived this! Daniel, my good man. We can go to Hahl now. We can go and help Patrick, and then…Hey, where’s Daniel?”
The other Elves didn’t speak. Several wiped their blood-stained daggers off on their pants, but none met his eyes. One merely shifted her gaze and inched her head. She then stepped to the side.
“What…what’s wrong?”
Then Calen saw it. Lira, huddled over Daniel, cradling his head in her arms, while tears from her eyes fell over his. “Oh, Calen. My Daniel. They killed him, Calen. They killed my Daniel.”
This isn’t real,
Calen prayed.
Please, Helena, let this be but a dream.“My Daniel,” she whispered. “My sweet, sweet Daniel.”
It took Calen some time to fully register what he was seeing. To assure himself that by no means were his eyes deceiving him. Yet upon closer inspection it was undeniable. Somehow, the Human had gotten himself killed. Daniel, the unappreciated man—dead, and without a final word.