David Dalglish - Blood Of Gods

“You know this place?” asked Tristan.

“I do,” he nodded. “That cave has been there for as long as I’ve been alive. . though it didn’t always run as long as it does now. I spent a lot of time in there as a child, exploring all the odd things that lived in the darkness. Good times.”

“You loved spending time in caves?” Joff asked.

“Of course,” Patrick told him. “When one looks like me, the darkness can be liberating.”

Big Flick scrunched up his face. “What’s that mean?”

“It means I was teased a lot as a child. Children can be cruel, as I’m sure you know.”

“But you were a child of a First Family,” said Ragnar. “Doesn’t that mean something?”

“Only if your mother wishes for it to have that influence.” Patrick grunted. “Alas, the great Isabel wished for me to learn to deal with the japes on my own.”

They rode for an hour, the sun slowly inching higher into the sky. An eerie feeling crept up Patrick’s spine. Despite the relative quietness of the day, he could hear odd sounds below the howling of the wind. It sounded like the far-off caw of an eagle combined with the rumble of a grayhorn stampede. He knew what it meant. Guilt at his decision to go on this vengeful quest formed a lump in the back of his throat. He had left his people behind. His armor suddenly felt too constricting, the furs on top too heavy.

“You hear that, don’t you?” asked Preston.

Patrick nodded.

“Hear what?” asked Edward, a bit too loudly.

“Shut up ,” Patrick snapped before Denton could clout the young soldier. He turned to Preston, who stared in annoyance at his son. “The attack began. Sounds like it’s for real this time. We should have stayed.”

Preston chuckled to himself and shook his head. “We are twenty-three men, Patrick. If Karak has begun a full assault, what difference would we make against fifteen thousand trained soldiers?” A grin stretched across his wrinkled mouth, pulling up the sides of his beard. “But out here , away from Mordeina, we might do some good. I would wager Karak will attack with all he has, all at once, without the slightest possibility of defeat entering his head. If he does that, then only a sparse force will remain behind to guard his supply wagons.”

“So this might not be a suicide mission after all,” Patrick said. His guilt subsided slightly, replaced by the nervous excitement that he had felt in Haven when Karak’s Army first attacked.

“We’ll have surprise on our side.” Preston peered over his shoulder. “So long as no idiot gives away our approach.”

Edward hung his head. Ragnar, his brother, trotted up to him and placed a comforting hand on his back. They are seasoned men in battle, yet sensitive boys when not thus engaged. Patrick almost burst out laughing at the absurdity of it all. His humor, however, lasted only until Ryann spoke up.

“If Karak takes Mordeina, what’s the point of torching a few wagons?” Ryann asked. “Won’t the war be over?”

Patrick swallowed down a massive lump in his throat.

“You can’t think like that,” he said. “We do what we can, to the best of our ability. Let the gods deal with the rest.”

He led his troupe into the wood, following a winding path he still remembered, even though it had been more than fifty years since he’d stepped foot on it. Snow crunched under their horses’ hooves; ice fell from the leafless branches overhead; and the clamor of war grew ever louder. The farther into the forest they went, however, the more stumps of felled trees they found. It looked like the center of the woods had been clear-cut-no doubt the result of hundreds of campfires and the numerous siege weapons Karak’s Army had built. Patrick’s heart began to race, and he reached behind his head, pulling Winterbone from its sheath. Having a weapon at hand seemed to help, at least a little.

The trees again rose up, the closer to Mordeina they drew, these ones brittle, their trunks hollowed out and devoid of life from when Ashhur had drained them of their essence to create the grayhorn-men. Patrick halted his mare, and those following did the same. He climbed out of the saddle, as did Preston, and together they trudged through the dead wood. They were at the edge now, and with no foliage to conceal them, he felt naked. If anyone looked their way, they would be spotted immediately.

“Looks like I was right,” Preston said.

Patrick squinted, rising up on his toes and straightening out as much as he could with his humped back. He saw countless tents populating the valley’s ridge, and behind them were a seemingly never-ending row of covered wagons. “I don’t see any soldiers,” he whispered.

Preston chortled lightly. “The soldiers are there,” he said, pointing. Patrick followed his finger and saw a line of perhaps sixty of them, small as figurines as they stood in a line farther out in the snowy valley, facing Mordeina’s walls.

“But what about other people?” Patrick asked. “Those who, you know, service the camp. Wouldn’t they be needed?”

“Not here, not in Karak’s Army,” said Preston. “When Karak started this war, he pulled from their lives nearly all the men old enough to fight. Need a blacksmith? There are a hundred soldiers who have been blacksmiths all their lives. The same with chefs, tailors, and horsemasters-any profession that would be of use to a traveling army is here. If something needs doing, there is a man to do it, one who can still pick up his sword and run into battle when the time comes.”

“But all men?”

Preston nodded. “You will find few women here, perhaps none at all. Our regiment in the Delta had only seven, not counting the Lord Commander, and all of those seven were sent away early on.”

“Why? Would they not be useful in battle as well? After all, Moira and Rachida were two of the best fighters I’ve ever seen. By gods, a quarter of our warriors in Haven were women. Many of the archers in Mordeina are too.”

“Neldar holds a. . different view of the fairer sex,” said Preston with a nod. “I assume Karak feels that having women on the battlefield will be nothing but a distraction. It is simply the way life is in Karak’s Army, and also yet another reason why Ashhur must win. Should Karak come out the victor. . and to the victor goes the spoils. . with all those men who have not lain with a woman for more than a year. . ”

“I get it,” Patrick grumbled. “No need to spell it out.”

“Very well.”

They turned around and headed back to their awaiting compatriots, who had remained deeper in the dead wood. “What do we do?” asked Little Flick when they both climbed back atop their horses.

Tristan shifted eagerly in his saddle, his hands flexing. “Yeah, what’s the plan?”

“We charge,” said Preston. “The soldiers are all lined in a row, though there may be more inside the tents. Their attention is on the siege, so be quick, be brutal, and ride fast. No yelling, no talking. Let the horse’s hooves be the only warning. The tents are arranged into rows, like we had in the delta. Ride between them, so your horses don’t trip. For those of you new to this, each of you follows behind one of my boys. They’ll show you the way.”

Denton and the fourteen others went white as fallen snow, but they nodded nonetheless.

With that, Patrick led them out of the forest a little farther back on the Gods’ Road. When they emerged they spread out five wide, with each of the young Turncloaks leading one or two of the new warriors brought by Denton Noonan. They sat in place for a few moments, Patrick allowing the nerves of all present to harden before offering a brisk nod and bringing his horse to gallop. Preston fell in beside him, with Ragnar, Edward, Tristan, and Joff forming the first line. The repetitive sound of hooves beating the frozen earth was like the endless rumble of thunder.