L. Modesitt - Wellspring of Chaos

“Yes, ser.” The undercaptain turned his mount. Two riders galloped back up the causeway toward the gates, less than half a kay away.

To the right of the causeway, a squad of lancers had formed up, facing northeast, toward the chaos of battle that Kharl could sense all too clearly.

As they waited, Kharl looked down at his jacket and gray trousers, both streaked with blood, then at Hagen. “A word, Lord Hagen?”

Hagen eased his mount closer to Kharl, and the carpenter wondered how he could explain what he needed to do. Finally, he cleared his throat. “I would not see Austra become as Nordla, nor as Hamor. I would like your leave to depart for a time.”

Hagen’s eyes widened. “You don’t owe me that. You don’t owe-”

“No. This is another kind of debt. I will go, one way or another. I would like your leave.”

“You may have it. You know that if Lord Ilteron’s forces come to the harbor, we will depart?”

“I know.” Even as he said the words, Kharl had to wonder if he were being a fool, searching for an act of meaning because no matter how hard he had tried, he had been unable to find one, not one that turned out well, at least.

“There is one thing that may help you,” Hagen said quickly. “None have fought well or recently in Austra. Ilteron’s armsmen and lancers will not act quickly. If you act decisively, events will favor you.”

Kharl nodded. He had already seen that, and he was not even an armsman.

Hagen gestured, and one of the lancers, perhaps a serjeant, rode over and reined up. “The mage needs to get as close to the ridge as you can take him.”

The serjeant looked at Kharl skeptically.

Kharl ignored the skepticism. “The closer I can get, the more I may be able to do to help Lord Ghrant.”

“We’ll get you closer than you’d like,” came the grim reply. “You want to ride all the way?”

“The last part, if it’s not too far…on foot, I think.”

“You could use bushes for cover going up the ridge. You all right with that?”

“That would be better. So long as it’s not too far.”

“Thought as much. Ilteron’s lancers can’t ride you down in the bushes.” There was a pause. “What are you going to do?”

“What I can.” That was the only truthful answer Kharl had.

“Best we go.” The serjeant motioned, and another rider joined them, grim-faced, and without saying a word.

The two lancers flanked Kharl as the three rode eastward past the front of the keep and turned northward down a narrow gravel path that slowly curved back eastward around the base of the ridge. Less than half a kay onward, still near the base of a long slope, the serjeant reined up. To Kharl’s right was a mass of bushes, yet with an edge as clean as if laid out with a rule.

“This part of the ridge is mostly berry bushes. Been there since before there was a town, my grandsire said. Can’t ride a horse through it, but it’d be slow going unless you stay on the edges.”

“I’ll stay beside them.” Kharl dismounted and handed the reins to the serjeant. “I won’t be needing the horse.”

“Good luck, ser.”

From the lancer’s tone, Kharl could tell that the man thought him a dead man-or mad, or perhaps both.

“Thank you.” Kharl took the staff and started uphill. He did not look back as the two lancers rode off.

From the feeling of lessened chaos emanating from the top of the ridge, Kharl could sense that the battle was winding down. He could only hope that he was not too late, that something could be salvaged. And from what he had observed of white wizards, he had to see if he couldn’t at least stop them, and Ilteron, even if they had already slain the less-than-wise Lord Ghrant.

Kharl moved uphill more swiftly, staying beside the bushes, but not using his light shield, not yet, and not wanting to until he had to.

Within moments, he could see figures ahead-lancers in green and black and in yellow and black riding downhill, avoiding the berry bushes. Behind them came armsmen on foot. Some were pursued by lancers in blue and gray, and others stumbled, as if they had trouble walking or seeing. Some were splattered with blood, but most were not.

The carpenter tried to sense the chaos ahead, but there were two pillars of unseen white, one not all that far away, but uphill and to his right, out among the more open grassy stretches where there were but few trees. The other-and stronger focus-was close to the top of the ridge, if not at the very top.

Kharl drew back into the bushes as mounts thundered down in his direction.

“Someone’s in the bushes! Could be an archer!”

Kharl dropped to his knees and willed the light to flow around him as the rebel lancers neared.

“Gone now…swore he was right there…”

A laugh followed. “They’re all running, like scared coneys.”

“…won’t matter…not in the end…”

“…make sure we get to the end…”

Kharl barely waited until the lancers were past before he dropped the light shield and scrambled uphill. The rush of men fleeing and those pursuing seemed to dissipate, and he began to hurry across the hill.

Less than ten rods away, he could see a band of armsmen in yellow and black, using a stone pavilion as a makeshift redoubt and shield against a white wizard and a company of rebel lancers. There were bodies in blue and gray strewn before the amber stone structure, as well as many in yellow and black; but this group of armsmen loyal to Lord Ghrant had neither broken nor run, and the attackers had pulled back.

Kharl could see that no one was even looking in his direction as he crossed the slope.

Hsssstt! A reddish white firebolt arced from the wizard and flew between two stone pillars. Flame flared, and one of the defenders staggered forward, screaming, his entire body a mass of fire.

Kharl gathered the light shield around himself, forcing himself to keep moving, not to think, but to get closer to the wizard. Even from within the darkness of his light shield, he could easily sense the white energy of the wizard as yet one more firebolt flared into the stone pavilion. Another set of screams echoed across the morning.

Kharl winced but kept walking, until he was less than a rod behind the rear of the rebels.

“…turn ’em to torches!”

“…southern weaklings…”

Kharl was still a good fifty cubits from the swirling of chaos and whiteness. He could only hope that his idea would work. It should…but one never knew.

He took a slow and deep breath, then visualized the air around the wizard, then reached out and twisted all the order-and-chaos hooks, so that the air touching the wizard’s body turned solid.

There was not even a sound, except the wizard pitched forward, frozen as though he had been turned into stone.

“What happened!”

“Must be another mage!”

“Where?”

Despite the other’s immobility, Kharl could sense the gathering bolt of chaos, and he forced himself to wait until the last moment-even as the reddish white fireball was flaring toward him-before hardening a shield of air between him and the chaos-bolt.

Still, heat and fire flamed past him, so close and so hot he could feel the ends of his hair and beard crisp and smell the burning hair.

The second fireball was weaker. That was good, because Kharl doubted he could hold the shields for too long.

He could sense the chaos folding in upon itself, and he let go of the shield before him, but not the one imprisoning the white wizard.

The entrapped wizard continued to struggle, but the last firebolt was but a tiny eruption of flame. Then, there was a reddish emptiness, and Kharl could feel the absoluteness of death, releasing the confinement that had destroyed the wizard.