Richard Baker - Avenger

“No!” Rhovann screamed. “I will not be defeated by you!” The elf seized Geran by the shirt as the swordmage drew back to finish his blow, dragging him away. Geran struggled to escape his grasp and strike again; in the space of a heartbeat they were grappling fiercely with each other. Geran fought to bring the point or edge of the shadow sword into position for a killing blow, but Rhovann managed to get his left hand on Geran’s sword hand and locked his hand of silver in a viselike grip around Geran’s throat. The metal hand was horribly strong, and the cold fingers ground into his neck, seeking to crush his windpipe. Swaying and stumbling in their desperate grapple, they blundered into a rune circle marked out on the floor.

A few feet away, the master stone’s mortal fracture split, and split again. Now the whole thing was shot through with white cracks, and the lambent flame flickering in its depths guttered and went out. In the instant the stone went dark, it shattered in a tremendous explosion of dark energy, rocking the shadow-Griffonwatch and devastating the wizard’s sanctum. The magical diagram under Geran’s straining feet pulsed to life, activated by the sudden release of shadow magic from the broken stone; even as he gasped for breath and his sight narrowed into a tunnel stretching longer and darker by the moment, he felt the jolt of magic at work.

Then all went dark as he and Rhovann were catapulted out of the Shadowfell.

15 Ches, the Year of Deep Water Drifting (1480 DR)

Thunder rumbled away to the north over the moorlands of Thar as Kara Hulmaster peered through the cold, steady rain at the lines of Marstel’s army encircling the barren hill where she was trapped. The thick clouds overhead hid the approaching dawn, but the night wasn’t completely dark; hooded lanterns and watchfires here and there gave a dim orange glow to the battlefield. The Shieldsworn were drawn up along the edge of the short, steep bluff ringing the hilltop; a half mile or so off, she could make out the jagged outline of Rosestone Abbey against the faint lightening of the coming dawn. In the smoke and gloom below her, Marstel’s mercenary army gathered to make its last assault against the Shieldsworn, spearheaded by almost one hundred of Rhovann’s great gray-skinned guardians. From time to time, when the rain slackened, Kara could hear the distant clash of arms or the roar of angry voices rising from some skirmish or another farther around the hill.

“Where are you, Geran?” Kara murmured to herself. She was supposed to be marching into Hulburg by now, Rhovann’s construct warriors dead or incapacitated, the Council Guard broken and fleeing ahead of her. Instead, she’d spent the last eight or nine hours fighting furiously to avoid annihilation as Marstel’s commanders threw wave after wave at her improvised redoubt. Only the steep scramble up to the rounded, boulder-strewn top had kept the runehelms from destroying what was left of her army; as the creatures sought to climb the last few feet of the bluff, they could be dislodged by heavy rocks rolled down from above or pushed off by a couple of strong men using a big pole. The constructs took little harm from the fall, but each time the creatures had to pick themselves up and clamber up again. Marstel had allowed his tireless automatons to attempt the task for hours before finally sending living human soldiers against the Shieldsworn at the same time-but Kara’s archers had shot Council Guards down by the score, breaking the first general assault. Now Marstel was preparing to try it again.

She glanced back at the Shieldsworn’s uneven lines. The Icehammers and the Third Shield had managed to fall back from Rosestone relatively intact, but she’d lost a good third of Wester’s First Shield in the runehelms’ assault, and only a handful of Larken’s Second Shield had reached the rallying point after serving as rearguard for the rest of the army. Larken himself was missing-dead or captured, Kara supposed. Most of the five hundred or so soldiers left to her huddled under cloaks or their own shields, catching a little rest after their night of fighting.

A jingle of mail and a muttered oath in Dwarvish announced Kendurkkel Ironthane’s arrival. The dwarf clumped up the rounded jumble of rocks she stood on, surefooted in his heavy boots. His ever-present pipe glowed softly in the darkness, in spite of the rain. “They’ll be havin’ another go at us soon,” he said.

“So they will.” She stared down at the enemy companies forming up on the lower hillside. She could see better than most in darkness, and she could see how much the Shieldsworn had hurt the Council Guard. They’d even managed to destroy a dozen or so of the runehelms. But they’d been hurt worse, and the numbers favored Marstel’s army all the more now. “They’re going to storm the hill from several sides at once, and try to overwhelm us.”

“It’s no’ a bad plan,” Kendurkkel admitted.

In the earlier attacks Marstel’s captains had concentrated on a narrow, notchlike draw in the hill’s eastern face that formed a ramp to the hilltop, but the Shieldsworn had choked it with boulders and overturned wagons, and Kara had naturally concentrated her forces there. Now the threat of a general escalade forced her to spread her soldiers all around the edge of the hill. Kara doubted that she’d be able to stop Marstel this time. Her archers were almost out of arrows, and her soldiers had denuded the hilltop of any boulders small enough to lever over the bluff at the runehelms.

“Have ye any word from Laird Hulmaster?” the dwarf asked her quietly.

“Not yet,” Kara admitted. “I should have heard from him hours ago. I fear that something’s gone wrong.”

“What d’ye mean t’do if he’s failed?”

“Fight my way off this hilltop and draw back to Thentia until we find a way to deal with the wizard’s gray warriors.” Given time to reorganize and prepare, Kara thought she might be able to come up with a few ways to deal with the runehelms even if Geran failed to defeat them. But she knew that it was a thin hope she was clinging to. If she retreated from this place-assuming she could retreat, which was no certain thing-there would be no second campaign to liberate Hulburg, not unless another Moonsea power chose to involve itself in their troubles.

The dwarf nodded. “That might not be up to ye,” he observed. “Marstel’s got no reason t’ let ye go. Have ye given thought t’ requestin’ terms?”

“Yes, I’ve thought of requesting terms. My life is forfeit, of course, but I’d do it if I thought my Shieldsworn would be spared. Unfortunately, I don’t trust Marstel. I think he’d accept our surrender, and then execute every Hulburgan soldier who took up arms against him. It’s been done before.” She hesitated, and then added. “On the other hand, your Icehammers might be allowed to surrender. I can see if they’ll let you leave the field.”

“You might’ve forgotten, Lady Kara, but Marstel said no quarter, asked or given.”

“Mercenaries aren’t usually dealt with like that.”

“Aye, but as you said, I don’t trust Marstel or his captains. Besides, you’ve dealt fairly wi’ me and mine. It wouldn’t be right to leave ye now.”

“You’re becoming sentimental, Master Ironthane.”

“It’s good business t’ burnish a reputation for loyalty,” the dwarf said. “Unless, of course, it gets ye killed in a lost cause, in which case it’s no’ so good for business. I suppose I’m not yet convinced that your cause is lost. I’ve never seen a battlefield leader t’ equal ye, Lady Kara.”

She smiled grimly at him. “I wish I had just three more companies to match the Icehammers, Master Ironthane. I’d fear nothing from Phlan to Mulmaster.”