Jaleigh Johnson - Unbroken Chain - The Darker Road

“We’ll take the bowmen,” Skagi yelled as he and Cree took cover behind the closest wagons. “Let your pony have the riders.”

Ashok felt the blood sing in his veins as the nightmare surged ahead. The sellswords had a head start on him, but they were still outnumbered. Ashok picked his target so he’d have the fullest effect on the rest.

The shadar-kai and the brigands came together in a ringing clash of metal, horse screams, and sucking mud. Ashok saw Kaibeth bury her dagger in the neck of one of the beasts. The animal gave a piercing scream and went down, pinning its rider underneath it. She turned and slid off her own horse to attack the leg of another that was fighting her comrade, the burn-scarred man. More than once the clustered horses came close to trampling her, but each time she danced aside and finally teleported out of the melee.

Ashok hauled the nightmare’s reins to the left, sending them out wide of the death circle and flashing blades. A crossbow quarrel skipped off his bone scale breastplate and flew wide. Ashok spared a glance at the camp and saw a second group of five crossbowmen riding in to support the first. Between them, they’d effectively pinned down the caravan for at least the next few minutes. Confident, perhaps, that they had the caravan surrounded, one of the crossbowmen had pulled off and was firing at Ashok.

Well enough, Ashok thought. You want to flank me, let’s see how you like firing through your own men.

He switched the spiked chain to his left hand and slid off the side of the nightmare, putting its thick body between him and the crossbow quarrels. He slung his right arm over the beast’s neck to keep from falling.

“What do you think?” he shouted to the nightmare. “Can you outrun their stings?”

In response, the nightmare let out its own fierce scream. Though dampened by Neimal’s magic, the cry echoed across the plain for miles and made the combatants falter in their attacks. Several of the brigands turned to see where the sound had come from.

All they see, Ashok thought, is a charging horse. But as the nightmare’s scream died away, perhaps they heard the sound of Ashok’s wild laughter.

A second crossbow bolt whistled overhead. In its wake, Ashok hauled himself back up straight on the nightmare and brought the chain over his head. He switched hands again and wrapped the spikes around the neck of a brigand on the outer edge of the circle. The brigand choked, his hands reaching automatically for the spikes. His hands came away bloody. Ashok rode right by the man and kept going. The chain pulled taut and jerked the brigand off his horse.

Ashok let go of his end and braced himself with both hands as the nightmare slammed into a second horse’s body. The animal’s legs folded, and it, too, dumped its rider. Ashok tensed, expecting Neimal’s illusion to fail, but the spell stayed in place, linked to the bone spur necklace.

A sword tip flashed in the pale dawn light and cut a slash in his armor. Burning pain erupted in his flank, and Ashok could spare no more thoughts for the nightmare. He slapped the beast’s flank and teleported just as the nightmare bolted.

Skagi yanked a crossbow bolt out of his arm and experienced a momentary dizziness when he realized the quarrel had multiple barbs that had torn through his flesh all at once. He drew in a slow breath and shook himself. The pain spread outward in silky waves. Falchion in hand, he stood up and screamed, waving the weapon in his hands.

“Come over here, dogs, and let me take a bite out of you!”

No one took the bait, but Skagi dodged the two bolts that hurtled at his face. He ran forward and dived for cover next to one of the wagon wheels. Cree was in the back with Vlahna, who had her shortbow going as fast as she could get arrows nocked. The rest of the caravan guards either returned fire or, like Skagi, made their way from cover to cover until they could get in sword range of the bowmen.

A lot of them died in the process.

“They’re not quite the bad shots we thought they were,” Cree called down to Skagi.

“Who ever said that?” Skagi shot back.

“Oh, I don’t know-the corpse over there maybe, or that one, or …”

“He’s right,” Vlahna said. She yelled out, “Don’t waste yourselves by charging one at a time. You’ll only swallow a bolt. Oh, godsdamn it!” Her bowstring snapped. “Never mind, just give me some cover, Cree. Tymora!”

Vaulting over the side of the wagon, Vlahna charged. She screamed to her goddess and batted aside crossbow quarrels as she went.

“Cover her?” Cree sputtered. “With what?”

“Your body, Brother.” Skagi stood up and ran to follow Vlahna. “Or you can hide behind us and-”

Cree jumped down from the wagon and ran alongside Skagi. Either the brigands were running low on ammunition or they never expected an outright assault, because suddenly Skagi was out of the black rain and staring down at a brigand frantically trying to reload his weapon. He didn’t become aware of Skagi until the man was on top of him.

Skagi kicked aside the crossbow and followed up with his falchion. He slashed the man’s armor, which was not quite as fine as his weaponry. The leather parted easily for Skagi’s blade, forged in Ikemmu’s fires by the greatest smiths in Faerun, as far as the big man was concerned. But Skagi was not sentimental about his killing. He put his blade into the brigand’s chest and moved on to help his brother and Vlahna.

He caught Cree just as his brother slashed a brigand’s throat with his katar. As if they sensed the tide had turned, the crossbowmen rapidly dropped their weapons and came into the fray among the wagons where they could engage the human guards in smaller groups. Skagi heard Vlahna shouting to some of them to break off and help the shadar-kai riders down by the river.

Skagi glanced that way, but he couldn’t pick out Ashok among the flashes of steel and the shadar-kai teleporting about for better positions. Anyway, Ashok would be fine on his own, Skagi thought, unless he did something deliberately reckless and tried to get himself killed. Which was also a distinct possibility, given that Skagi would probably do the same thing in his place. Still, he could at least wait and share some of the fun.

“We need to check on Ilvani,” Cree said from just behind him. “She was sleeping in the wagon.”

“Better hope she stayed there and took cover.” Skagi met a charging brigand and absorbed the impact of an axe against his falchion. His teeth rattled, but he held on and thrust the man back a pace. He spared a glance at Cree and felt a tremor go through his body.

“Behind you!” he shouted.

Cree turned just in time to see a brigand come up on his blind side with a club. He ducked-thank Tempus he was still faster than all of them, Skagi thought-and slashed at the man from the groin up. Skagi winced as the blow landed.

“My thanks,” Cree said gravely after the man had fallen.

Skagi nodded. They fought on, but Skagi noticed a tremor in his hands. He dismissed the shakes as battle frenzy and gripped his blade harder. Still, he found himself staying close to Cree and watching his brother’s back, a thing he’d rarely had to do in the past. It was always the other way around.

Ilvani awoke to the sound of crossbow fire and heavy breathing. A weight slammed into the side of her wagon, which caused her to hit her head on the floorboards. She was grateful for this, in a way, because it assured her she wasn’t dreaming.

In fact, she’d not dreamed at all last night.

Ilvani was still pondering this when the weight that had slammed into her wagon threw itself over the side and landed among the crates and barrels near the front. He was human and small-bony arms and legs stuck out at all angles. When he turned his face toward her, Ilvani saw the innocence of youth and the terror of the battle reflected back at her. She noticed all these things before she realized the boy was speaking to her, his lips moving frantically. He wanted help.