The Devil's Deuce (The Barrier War) (46 page)

“You know, I wonder if maybe she knew she could only stay
for a little while,” Hoil said after a moment. “She sometimes had a very sad
look about her. She had this tone sometimes when she said my name in return,
like there was something she couldn’t tell me. Something poignant and
important. I think maybe she knew.”

“She’s probably not dead,” Marc said, startling them all.
They stared at him, making him shift uncomfortably, but he continued. “Assuming
we’re all correct, as everything seems to indicate, and she was in fact an
immortal, she’s just that…
immortal
. She could no more
die
than
the moons or the world itself. Perhaps she only had a limited time allowed here
on Lokka, but she wouldn’t have died. She’s probably still up in Heaven, unable
for whatever reason to return.”

Hoil regarded Marc soberly.

“Lad, I’ve grown too used to thinking of my wife as dead to hold
any hopes of seeing her again,” Hoil said sadly. “I pray nightly that when I
die, I’ll get to see her again, if only for a moment. I’m fairly certain where
my soul’s bound, and I may be too late already to change it anyway, but I’d
welcome any eternity I’m given for the simple chance to be with her for another
second.”

“Well, look at it this way, dad,” Danner said with a smile,
trying to lighten the mood. “If you
do
make it to Heaven, she’ll be
there waiting for you, and you get more than a moment. You get an eternity.”

Hoil looked at Danner and smiled again.

“Well, when you put it like that, I guess I’ll have to do
whatever it takes to get to Heaven,” Hoil said. He looked significantly at
Birch, who smiled silently and nodded.

“And since I’m planning on going to Heaven,” Danner said
whimsically, “many,
many
years from now, I hope, I’ll finally have the
chance to meet my mother.”

“I’m going to Heaven, too,” Flasch chimed in, “even if I
have to pick the locks to get in.”

Danner looked at his friend, decided the comment didn’t
quite warrant a head-slap, and turned back to the discussion at hand.

- 3 -

Gerard and the others returned later that night, after their
discussion of Danner’s mother had finally concluded. He looked tired, but
pleased ─ or perhaps, more appropriately,
triumphant
. For perhaps
the first time since Danner had met the Red paladin, the red scars on his face
did not make him look terrifying or horrible. They seemed to stand out less,
especially without Gerard’s customary anger pulsing through them.

“Congratulations are in order, gentlemen, we may have just
saved the world,” Gerard said as he grasped Birch’s hand in greeting. “The
Merishank officers have just joined the forces of what I like to call, ‘the
good guys.’”

“They’re going to help us?” Birch asked, surprised.

“Indeed,” Gerard replied. “We’ll be entering Nocka tomorrow,
once I have a chance to inform the Prismatic Council of their change in
allegiance.”

“How did you manage this particular miracle?” Nuse asked.

“Well, having a demon appear in the midst of your camp has a
tendency to shake up even the most seasoned of officers,” Gerard said, “and
once the demon was dead, the officers realized they’d been under its influence
and were willing to talk terms. Many of the ranking officers apparently died
last night,” he added with a guilt-free face. Danner remembered the men in the
demon’s tent, most of whom were crushed by the demon in its oversized rampage.

Gerard continued, “They recognized immediately
Nocka’s
state as a non-assailable city, because of the
Barrier, and were already planning on returning to Merishank. When I explained
the situation, the officers pledged themselves to help. I give them the benefit
of the doubt in saying they would have helped solely for the sake of the world’s
safety, but just to be sure, I made it quite clear that the Prismatic Council
would look with displeasure upon their entire nation if they didn’t help.”

“He also offered to forcibly remove teeth and several vital
organs from anyone who tried to refuse,” Garnet said, smiling.

“Bah,” Gerard said, waving Garnet’s comment aside. “Whatever
the methods, it worked.”

“Good,” Birch said, “because it’s about time we got back
into that city. Danner told us about the crossing of the demons, and I have a
feeling we’re going to need every available man to keep these unholy fiends at
bay.”

Governing is an imperfect balance between dictatorship and mob rule.

- Orange Paladin
Janek
jo’Baerth
,

“A History of War” (969 AM)

- 1 -

When Shadow Company entered the city of Nocka with the elves
and the immense Merishank army in formation behind them, it was to the
thundering sound of silence.

No one stood in the streets to cheer them. No one leaned out
their windows to spit on them or call them filthy denarae. There was no one on
their way to the market or loitering in a neighbor’s doorway to chat. Not a
single living creature walked the streets, with the exception of a few rats
that skittered noiselessly across the stone road.

The footsteps of marching soldiers echoed hauntingly in the
empty streets, and what otherwise might have been mistaken for a parade instead
resembled an elaborate funeral procession of some fallen general or emperor.
The solemn silence did not fail to impress a single member of any race, and
denarae, elves, and humans alike stared with apprehension at the forlorn
windows around them. Gerard rode on his dakkan at the head of the flock,
feeling like a shepherd leading his charges to their doom.

“It is Penday, right?” Flasch asked, looking around
apprehensively. “I mean, we didn’t suddenly skip ahead to Niday and we’re
missing some city-wide chapel service, right?”

“At least it’s not destroyed,” Garnet remarked, ignoring his
friend’s nervous comments. The command group of Shadow Company trotted on
either side of Gerard’s stalking dakkan. The fire-red scales gleamed Hellishly
in the brilliant dawn light, and Danner had to block the reflection from
shining in his eyes. Birch, Nuse, and Perklet rode their mounts in the same
group. Danner looked over at his uncle and was suddenly struck by the fact that
his cloak was almost the exact shade of gray as Selti’s scales. The dark dakkan
looked over and regarded Danner with gleaming eyes for a moment, then returned
his gaze to the road ahead.

“That means the fighting is still confined to the Barrier,”
Gerard said, “or at least it hasn’t reached this far if they
have
breached the Barrier. But I wonder where everyone is.”

“They’re in hiding,” Marc answered.

“I gathered that, young Orange,” Gerard said caustically.
“But where? I haven’t seen a single face peeking out of a window.”

“There are cellars under nearly every building, and tunnels
between many of them,” Marc replied, unperturbed by Gerard’s manner. “You were
raised in
Sella
, so it’s not something you’d be
expected to know, sir,” he said.

Danner grimaced, expecting Gerard to react angrily toward
Marc’s unintended insolence. Gerard surprised him, however.

“No, I don’t know, Marc,” Gerard said with a flat voice.
“Educate me in what I seem to be lacking.”

“Nocka is the dwarven word for anvil, yes?” Marc said. “This
city was designed and built by dwarves originally – hence the perfectly
straight, evenly spaced streets – and dwarves like to dig. So they built
cellars and tunnels into all the original buildings, including the Prism’s
chapterhouse,” he added. “It seems natural to their way of thinking, I suppose.
Most of the houses added since then have cellars as well, but they aren’t
linked up to the tunnel network. It’s almost like a second road down there, if
you know how to navigate it. It even links to the sewer system in a few out of
the way places.”

“Marc, you’re a sinkhole of useless information,” Gerard
said, “but you answered my question. Flasch, take a squad and try to get in
touch with someone in one of the houses ahead. See what you can learn.”

“Yes, sir.”

Flasch hurried ahead with a dozen men and began trying
doors. They entered several houses and stayed a minute or so in each, but by
the time the main body caught up with him, they had little to report.

“The only responses we got were from frightened people who
haven’t left their homes in at least a day,” Flasch reported. “Everyone’s
stockpiled food and water, and they’re just going to try and sit it out.”

“They’re not going to fight?” Michael asked, incredulous.

“All the men with any training at all have already left to
join the guard, as did men and boys who probably shouldn’t have gone,” Flasch
said.

“Then we continue straight to the Barrier,” Gerard said.

“Why were there only a few guards at the gates when we
entered?” Marc asked.

“That, at least, I expected,” Gerard said. “I sent word
ahead at dawn with a Merishank soldier under a white flag. He carried a signed
and sealed message for the Prismatic Council with word of our success and the
conversion of the Merishank army. The runner brought back word that the
soldiers on the wall were being immediately reassigned to the Barrier, since
this army was no longer a threat. The gates there will probably be manned by
civilians by the end of the day.”

“How come I didn’t know about this?” Marc demanded.

“You were still in your bedroll,” Garnet answered for
Gerard. “We know you need your beauty sleep.”

Marc grumbled as they chuckled, but the mirth died away
almost immediately.

They heard the battle at the Barrier long before they
reached the fighting itself. There was little to nothing in the way of clanging
metal that most of them associated with a normal battle. The occasional sound
of a sword chopping against stone or wood reached their ears, but by far the
overwhelming noise of the cacophony was the screaming. Human cries of pain and
terror mingled with demonic howls of triumph and destruction. With these sounds
in their ears, Gerard motioned and the entire force stretched out behind him
began to move forward more quickly. Soon, they were running.

They burst onto a scene of chaos.

The inner wall of the Barrier stretched to either side as
far as the eye could see, its slightly convex curve making it seem to melt into
the buildings of the city itself. All along the inner wall, humans, elves,
dwarves, and gnomes stood waiting to rush forward and take their place among
the ever-dwindling numbers of the defenders. Beyond them, where the Shadow
Company paladins could not yet see, Hell-spawned mutations fought with demonic
ferocity and strength, their numbers seemingly inexhaustible.

“We’re shnieked, aren’t we?” Flasch murmured.

“Yeah, pretty much,” Danner replied.

The Barrier was a long, shallow arc that stretched the width
of the land jutting into the EarthForge.
 
Seven gates led from the land outside into seven courtyards, with walls
dividing each courtyard so the Barrier was cut into seven segments concatenated
along its length, and each segment was able to be closed off and isolated from
those adjoining it. The back edge of each courtyard was the broad inner wall,
which was now choked with mortal defenders awaiting their turn to fight and
perhaps die.

The inner, outer, and dividing walls of each courtyard were
set with large turrets, wide catwalks, and spaces where gigantic ballistae were
positioned ─ these last defenses were only on the outermost wall, where
they could be fired with devastating force into the oncoming army. The window
spacing in each wall and in the turrets were no thicker than the width of
Danner’s fist, and he knew each would be designed to allow archers a wide range
of fire while minimizing the chances of the archers getting shot themselves.
Many of the slits in the inner courtyard were shaped like the
Tricrus
to
be more aesthetically pleasing to the citizens, but they sacrificed none of
their lethal function and defensive capabilities.

The inner wall also had seven gates, which led from each
courtyard to the rest of the city on the east side of the Barrier. Soldiers
teemed here also, either milling about in apprehension or waiting to climb the
stairs that led to the walls.

In the center of each courtyard stood a megalith jutting up
from the ground as if it had not been built, but rather ripped up through the
ground itself. The Stones were irregularly shaped, approximately seven feet
tall, and most men could easily wrap their arms about one and touch their
fingertips together on the far side. They were made from
angelstone
– a substance found only in Heaven – and they each gleamed like diamond in a
different color, one for each Facet of the Prism.

Green. Orange. Blue. Yellow. Red. Violet. And in the center
courtyard, between blue and yellow, stood the iridescent white Stone.

This centermost courtyard was the closest when they reached
the Barrier. Gerard gave the order to halt, and looked on the chaotic scene
with a critical eye.

“You there,” he called to the nearest defender, an elf, “how
do things stand?”

The elf glanced at him briefly, but ignored Gerard. Danner
frowned.

Gerard moved his dakkan forward a few more steps until the
muscular legs were pushing against the recalcitrant demi-human. The elf let out
an protesting expletive which was abruptly cut off as Gerard reached down and
picked him up by the scruff of his neck. The elf immediately pulled a dagger
and tried to stab Gerard in the hand, but he knocked the weapon free and shook
the elf until his teeth rattled. The dagger clattered on the stone street, the
noise almost lost amid the din of battle.

“Don’t,” Gerard said as he shook the thin demi-human. “Now,
answer my question before I send your teeth the way of that knife.”