David Farland - Brotherhood of the Wolf

Raj Ahten could only wonder. It had been sixteen centuries since her kind last attacked. He imagined that she was enamored of her new spells, sought to learn which was most effective.

The fell mage’s dark wind struck. Atop the walls, men cried out and covered their noses, and Raj Ahten could not immediately see any effect.

It was not until the scent hit him that he understood. His mouth went dry, and as one, every pore in his skin began to exude sweat. Tears streamed from his eyes. He fought an overwhelming urge to urinate, and around him he saw weaker men lose control of their bladders.

He felt her command, even as he fought it: “Be thou dry as dust.”

A hundred yards behind Raj Ahten, Feykaald stood behind the battle lines on the steps of an inn and croaked, “O Great One, a word!”

Raj Ahten called to his Invincibles to close ranks and raced out of the battle, across the green, to the steps of the inn.

He glanced back. Reavers had crawled atop the mound of their dead, and now one prepared to slide into battle. Raj Ahten glanced at the walls, estimated that three quarters of his Invincibles had already died in this slaughter. He had fewer than four hundred left.

Atop the walls, reavers were battling men. Raj Ahten pulled out a file and began to sharpen his axe blade. He needed no oil for his file. Reaver’s blood worked well enough.

“Speak,” Raj Ahten said to Feykaald.

The old counselor worked his mouth, as if fighting back a choking dust. A sheen of sweat dripped from him as he spoke furtively in Raj Ahten’s ear. “Boat arrived. East shore...secure. Our men found reavers, but slew them.”

Raj Ahten wiped the sweat from his brow. It was pouring from him, making a sop of his tunic, slicking his hands. Rivulets threaded down his cheeks and into his beard. He drew the file over his axe blade, top to bottom, half a dozen times. As he worked, he studied his crumbling defenses on the walls.

His vassals fought in vain.

The rent in the wall was growing quickly. Half of his artillery outposts were gone. Reavers fought atop the wall. One flameweaver was dead, the others were dwindling from exhaustion despite the fact that Carris was in flames.

His tawny-furred giants fought savagely, but only thirty had survived the retreat from Longmot. They were dying fast. Even as he watched, a blow from a reaver’s blade split the skull of one giant, caught another in the back above his stubby tail.

And as the reavers battered the walls of Carris, they widened the breach, so that Raj Ahten’s forces were now spread too thin to effectively block the reavers’ efforts. Few of Paladane’s lords had enough endowments left to fight a reaver. They struggled beside Raj Ahten’s men, but their feeble efforts availed little.

Carris would fall despite all that he could do. It was not a matter of hours—it was a matter of moments.

Commoners cried out as the black wind wrung tears and sweat from them. Some fainted.

Ten minutes of this might leave a man dead, Raj Ahten feared. In only one way had his luck held. A light wind was blowing from the east, across the lake, and it seemed to Raj Ahten to ameliorate the effects of the fell mage’s spells.

Raj Ahten finished sharpening his axe. A reaver came barreling down, sliding over the slope of carnage. A frowth giant nearby bellowed as the reaver’s greatsword struck through its neck. The giant lurched sideways and collapsed on a pair of Invincibles, and the reaver leapt into battle, the first swing of its blade striking through four men.

Raj Ahten made his grim choice. His men were dying. He had fewer than four hundred Invincibles left with which to fight, and fighting at all was in vain.

This battle would be lost, but he dared not lose the remnants of his army with it.

There would be other battles, other days.

It was not cowardice that drove him to the decision, but the cold certainty that he did what—in the long term—was best. He’d not sacrifice his men to save the lives of his enemies.

“Prepare the flotilla,” Raj Ahten told Feykaald. “My flameweavers and Invincibles will take the first boats, my archers next. Spread the word.”

Raj Ahten sprinted back into the fray.

How can I save them all? Gaborn wondered for what seemed the hundredth time that afternoon as he rode for Carris. He galloped fast now. A cool drizzle fell from leaden skies. Few lords rode horses that were able to keep pace: the wizard Binnesman, Queen Herin the Red her daughter, Sir Langley, and two dozen others.

He felt the fist of doom closing upon the messengers he’d sent to Carris. The Earth warned Gaborn of danger not just for himself, but for everyone who rode to Carris.

The force horses had thundered across the green fields of Beldinook. Gaborn made excellent time—he’d traveled nearly three hundred miles in six hours. But not everyone was able to follow at Gaborn’s pace. He’d ridden into Beldinook with hundreds of lords at his back. Now, many of them had dropped from the race. His troops were strung out for hundreds of miles behind. The few who remained close rode horses that were spent. Some mounts were dead on their feet, but Gaborn dared not slow. His own Days had fallen behind hours ago, and Gaborn wondered if the man’s horse had wearied, or if he feared to travel where Gaborn was heading.

The overwhelming aura of death that surrounded so many of Gaborn’s people was suffocating. Gaborn had ridden over the battlefield at Longmot a week ago, seen thousands of good men that Raj Ahten had killed. He’d smelled the charred corpses, the blood and bile. He’d found his own father dead, cold as the snow he’d clutched in his empty hands.

Yet he’d not felt those deaths waiting to happen. He’d not been aware of the final moments of those men in the way he now felt the final moments of those around him.

How can I save them all? he wondered.

He felt Borenson riding into danger now, and Gaborn spoke a warning for Borenson’s ears. “Flee!”

As he rode fifteen miles north of Carris, the wizard Binnesman raced beside him and shouted, “A moment’s rest, milord. It won’t do us any good to reach Carris on mounts that cannot fight.”

Gaborn could hardly hear the man over the thundering of horses’ hooves.

“Milord!” Langley shouted, adding his plea to Binnesman’s. “Five minutes, please!”

Ahead, a pond beckoned to the right of the road. Fish were rising, snapping at mosquitoes. Cattle had come here to drink often, had churned the bank to mud near the road.

Gaborn reined in his horse, let it go to the water.

A pair of mallards began quacking and flew up from some cattails, circled Gaborn and the pond, then winged to the east. In no time at all, mosquitoes were gathering around Gaborn and he slapped them away from his face.

Sir Langley let his horse drink not twenty paces off, on the far side of Binnesman. Langley grinned at Gaborn. “By the Powers,” he said. “If I’d known that I’d have to contend with so many mosquitoes, I’d have worn plate!”

Gaborn was in no mood for jests. He looked back as a few lords straggled to a stop, made a quick count.

Gaborn had no army at his back. Just twenty knights. Worthy lords out of Orwynne, Fleeds, and Heredon. Gaborn’s Days was nowhere to be seen.

He did not have an army—just a few people brave enough and foolish enough to follow him to their deaths.

Gaborn felt certain that Castle Carris and its inhabitants could not stand another hour.

Gone were the troops he’d hoped to gain from King Lowicker. The men behind him would be of no use. He’d hoped to find one of his own armies, or perhaps the Knights Equitable that High Marshal Skalbairn had promised.