Clayton Emery: Whispering woods

There's one, thought Gull, already swinging. Five left.

One soldier kept backing away from the fallen one, ready to run. Perhaps this one didn't like axes. Without delay, Gull hoisted his rain-slick axe and charged the knot of four soldiers. But now they were prepared. They'd assumed their double rank without crowding, as Gull hoped they might. They swung their shields into place, a wall of steel.

I'm going to die here, Gull thought. But at least my family is safe. I hope they find Greensleeves.

Changing tactics, he braked in the mud, stopping just out of sword range, croaked another war cry, and switched his swing overhead as if splitting cordwood. He had some advantage. They'd expected a sideways swing they could deflect with their shields. And at the end of his axe haft, he had the longer reach.

The sun-bronzed men in front grimaced, anticipating pain. They were fast, and strong, and raised their shields to block. But this was no dandy's war axe, a thin blade and lightweight, made for cutting flesh, but an eight pound mallet of sharpened steel made for dropping oaks.

The axe struck like an avalanche. It punched through a wood and iron shield, buckling and twisting, then crushed bones in the arm behind. A veteran hissed.

With a savage grunt, Gull jerked on the haft. The blade tore free. Too fast. The woodcutter lost his balance and slammed on his rump in the mud.

Good thing, too, for the man's partner lunged for Gull's guts with his sword. He missed, pinking Gull's leather tunic. But the other front ranker skipped forward to deliver the deathblow. Gull saw the blade flicker like a snake's tongue, threw up his hands to block it, knowing he'd only lose fingers before being filleted.

But the swordsman staggered back. A stone struck him in the face. Teeth crunched and he howled. More rocks struck the soldiers, who parried with their shields.

Gull kicked the wounded man's knee with his hickory clog, then scurried away on all fours. He scrambled past his father, who directed the attack.

"Get 'em, White Ridgers!" Even half-bent, at half strength, Brown Bear was a powerful man. From the ruins of a house he grabbed a rock in each hand and pitched them against the soldiers' exposed legs. "Seal, hit 'em in the head! Badger, the legs! Bluebell, throw that beam amidst 'em!"

But the advice went unneeded. Cursing, the soldiers backed away, rocks clanging off their shields. Masked by driving rain, they faded around another ruin and were gone.

For now.

And Sparrow Hawk had circled that way, Gull thought. Had his brother met the soldiers?

A muddy hand lifted Gull by his shoulder. His father propped him up, yet half-hunched, had to twist his head to see his tall son's face. The man looked like Gull, just craggier and gray. "Good work, son! Good work! I'd have given them the same could I stand straight! You're-"

"Never mind that!" cut in Bittersweet. "Where did you leave Greensleeves? And have you seen Hawk?"

Gull explained hurriedly about the holes in the thorn hedge, how she'd disappeared, then about Sparrow Hawk-when suddenly the ground rippled underfoot.

A man yelped. "Aftershock!"

"Not again!" his father griped, as if earthquakes were no more trouble than gut rumbles.

Yet the earth did not snap, nor their teeth chatter, as before. One ripple was all. What did that mean?

After people breathed again, the survivors took stock.

They huddled in the rain amidst the wreckage of their homes. Chipmunk's mother, Feverfew, fussed with his forehead gash. People peeked at Seal's belly cut, but the big man only raised his belt and tightened it over the wound. He puffed out his chest, suddenly a hero. Parents calmed children, wiped noses, hushed crying, wrapped soggy shawls around their shoulders. Others gazed over the ruins of the village, seeking the missing, talked of arming and organizing a search party. Cowslip, her bodice pinned with thorns, her hair flat and lips blue with cold, stood close by Gull's family and watched him intently.

The woodcutter trotted the way the soldiers had gone, hunted for signs of his brother, and found none. He called and received no answer. Where had Hawk gone? Probably adventuring, his brother sighed. Well, he'd have to fend for himself-it was Greensleeves needed finding.

First, though, Gull returned to his family. The elders, they argued about how to proceed.

"We won't have any crops at all this year," said one man.

"We'll need to live in the woods like outlaws and savages," said another.

Bittersweet held tiny Cub against her skirts. "We'll have to move on. This devastation will bring plague. It always follows a wizards' duel, the legends say."

"Aye," said Feverfew, "they might's well plow salt into the ground."

Half-listening, Gull climbed the heap of rocks that had been Badger's house and craned for a view. Through layers of rain and gaps in the thorn wall, he could see something of the battlefield the valley had become.

Up in the meadow, the two-headed giant was still foot-caught. He rolled and twitched and moaned piteously, a high, wild keening. His right arm was chewed to an elbow stump, and streaming rain washed away his blood. Three-legged, the clockwork beast clumped along the edge of the forest as if it were a fence. Goblins dragged something like a body across a muddy field, fighting and pushing and arguing every inch of the way. Of the hydra there was no sign. A centaur or a horse flashed past a gap in the hedge. Red soldiers hacked something across the river at the north end of the village. More villagers clustered at the far south, almost to the bogs, as if afraid to set foot in the village again. They didn't respond when he waved an arm, and his shouts were drowned by the rain. Only a family of six, Snowblossom and Hedgehog and their children, skulked from heap to heap, coming slowly. Gull waved them on. But where the blazes were Greensleeves and Sparrow Hawk?

"We'll not leave!" Brown Bear's head waggled from side to side. "We'll rebuild! We'll pack together for the winter. Gull can cut beams, I can saw planks-"

From his perch, Gull gave a shout of surprise. "What…?"

Snowblossom's family had disappeared-down a hole?

Hefting his axe, Gull called for someone to follow, then jogged toward the spot where Snowblossom's family had vanished.

A gaping hole, round as a well, had caved in not far from the river. From the aftershock? Why not a crack?

A head popped into the rainy gloom below, and Gull knelt at the crumbling edge. He couldn't see who it was. "Snowblossom? Hedgehog? Grab my hand!" He leaned as far as he dared. Seal grabbed his belt behind.

His hand was ignored. A head covered with dirt rose from the hole as someone climbed with strong fingers sunk in the dirt. The head waggled, shedding dirt, revealing a blue dome with tufts of wiry hair.

Gull snatched his hand back. What…?

The hole boiled. A dozen, two dozen, fifty little goomers spouted from the depths like rats from a flour bin.

It was hard to see them clearly for the mud. They were knee-high, naked, blue or gray, scaly like snakes. Wiry hair sprouted from shoulders and elbows. Jutting ears, huge noses, bigger mouths. They chanted as they spilled from the hole. "Oi, oi, oi! Watcher! Gonner get 'em, gonner barsh 'em!" Gull couldn't tell if they were true words or not.

Then the things, trolls or whatever, scattered. Gull and the rest shrank back as if from plague rats, but the little goons just swarmed past. Trailing dirt and mud, they flitted everywhere, digging, shifting rocks, burrowing into ruins. Gull saw one troll burst from a ruin with a copper pot, hoisting it like a treasure.

They were scavengers! Conjured by wizards? It must be. The trolls would scour the ruins for valuables. Gull's anger, which he'd thought squelched by the rain, returned hot enough to make his brow steam. Was there nothing sacred to these wizards, that they'd callously destroy a village and then pick the meat from the bones?