David Drake: The Gods Return

Garric-King Carus-thrust. His long arm gave him an angle over the top of the rat's little circular shield. The beast gurgled and vaulted backward. Garric couldn't tell whether the jump was the rat's death throes or a vain attempt to escape. It was gouting blood from severed arteries. A rat came in from Garric's left while he was extended for the lunge. He had his long dagger ready to defend-Carus preferred to use two blades rather than a shield in this sort of melee-but a Blood Eagle in the second rank had kept his javelin. He jabbed, taking the rat through the chest just below the shoulders. The initial rush was over. There'd been about a hundred rats in the company, but they'd rattled against the wedge like hail on a slate roof. A few men were down, but human discipline and close ranks had told. More rats-judging from the sound, half a dozen similar companies-had attacked at about the same time, but with no greater effect. The army marched forward, maintaining its formation. More rats bounded onto the ranks of swordsmen, yipping and clicking. They threw themselves against the front of the wedge like a wave hitting a seawall. Their swords had short broad blades and square tips. Garric used his sword's length, thrusting for the beasts' wrists before they were able to strike. The dagger was a help, but Blood Eagles saved him repeatedly by forcing themselves in front of the rats' weapons. Some of the bodyguards went down or fell out of line, cursing and trying to bandage their own injuries, but the army trampled forward over a carpet of quivering Palomir corpses. Carus had been right when he directed his descendent to wear the winged helmet and silvered cuirass: by drawing the rats' sole attention to him, he left a broad swath of the beasts open to slaughter by the disciplined soldiers surrounding. It would only work for as long as the glittering prince remained standing, but so far, so good. Garric's left thigh was bleeding, his dagger was badly notched-he'd have to replace it, but when?-there was a dent in the back of his cuirass, and a sword spinning from the wielder's dead paw had lopped off part of his helmet's right wing. That was nothing at all in a battle of this magnitude, but the battle was scarcely begun.

Carus, in his element, laughed in Garric's mind. As for Garric himself- Garric was tired and knew he'd be more tired. He disliked slaughter, even slaughtering beasts, and the stench was even worse-far worse-than that of a human battlefield. It didn't matter. The rats wouldn't surrender, but they died. Garric would stride forward and kill for as long as there was an enemy to kill. It had to be done. The rats swept in a third time, separate war bands spreading themselves like a sticky fluid across the front of the wedge. Lord Waldron commanded the army. Prince Garric was the champion, the warrior, and the Isles had never known a greater warrior than the ghost who now controlled the prince's body. Garric's eyes saw only movement: a whiskered face-dimpling before a sword tip; a sword swinging in from the left-blocked but the bloody dagger broke, left leg kicking the rat's feet from under it, right heel flattening the pointed helmet and crunching the narrow skull; rats on three sides-lurching forward, powerful human body shoving the lighter beasts away, slash, stab, fur spouting bright blood in arterial arcs, grabbing a sword in the air and blocking a stroke with it despite the rat's severed paw locked on the grip. The rush was over, drowned in its own blood. Garric stood on top of a hill, looking down into a swale and still another mass of rats tramping forward. The green-and-white Palomir standard fluttered on the ridge opposite. Beneath it stood a human warrior in black armor, his sword drawn. Below him was another human, a wizard in blue robes of some thin fabric. He gestured with a wand and chanted words lost in the intervening distance. "Your highness!" Attaper said, gasping with effort. His shield had been hacked so often and deeply that part of the outer layer of wood had sprung away. "Your highness, Ican't follow you if you run into the middle of them that way. I can't, nobody can!" "I didn't…," Garric said, looking around dully. His every muscle ached or stung. His arms were red to the shoulders, and some of that blood had to be his own. "Did I…?" He tried to remember what had just happened in a connected sequence. He had-Carus had, wearing the body of his descendent Garric or-Reise-burst into the tight Palomir ranks, cutting a path ahead of himself and largely ignoring the rats he'd left behind. He'd actually ripped through the wave-and survived, because the rats hadn't expected what was happening any more than the Blood Eagles had. Attaper and his men had had to butcher their way forward, taking reckless wounds as they tried to save the prince they were sure had committed suicide in front of their eyes. Men fell in beside Garric as the wedge reformed.

Half of those in the ranks were dismounted cavalrymen who'd formed the reserve in the center of the triangle. Waldron had ordered a troop to the front to replace the Blood Eagles who'd fallen in their desperate haste. The sky to the south throbbed with black clouds. Lightning crackled from thunderhead to thunderhead, and the rising wind hissed with waiting violence. Garric looked at the slope behind them. The ground was as thick with bodies as a wheat field with stubble after the harvest, and hundreds of those lying still or moaning were human.

The ancient king viewed the scene through Garric's eyes. "We're just tools, now, lad," he said in a tone of cold appraisal. "You and me and them. Tools break, but only the work matters." Briefly taking control of Garric's body again, he threw down the clumsy Palomir sword. "Give me your dagger," he said harshly to the cavalryman beside him. "Your highness," the man said. He already held his shield and his drawn sword, so he lifted his elbow. Garric pulled the dagger from his right-side sheath. Tenoctris sat in her cart as it trundled forward.

From the pentacle before her, a mist of wizardlight spurted upward like smoke. Scarlet and azure strands mixed in a delicate netting. She paid no attention to the carnage about her. Garric smiled at his friend with gentle affection and returned to his own business.

"They're coming," muttered Attaper. The sword he now carried was of infantry pattern, not his own horseman's sword. Waldron's trumpeter blewPrepare to engage! The rats bounded up from the swale. As they did so, the Palomir wizard pointed his wand into the sky. A bolt of wizardlight crashed upward, turning all the clouds the sullen red of a banked furnace. The storm struck, lashing the faces of the human army with hail the size of pigeon's eggs among the icy rain. Men cried in surprise and the fear of wizardry, and the chittering rats raced upward. *** The Tree walked south, out of the ruins of its enclosure.

Dust from mortar and the broken bricks swirled in a rusty blanket; every time another pile of rubble settled, more choking powder spurted up. Cashel turned his head slightly to breathe through the sleeve of his tunic. He expected the Tree to smash a path through Dariada the same way as the Worm would, though of course the Worm wouldn't stop with making the one track. Instead Gorand picked his way along like an octopus walking across the sea bottom on the tips of its arms, only he had more legs thananybody could count. The gnarled trunks, dangling roots, and vines furred with green mosses reached and placed themselves with rippling ease. Cashel could tell there was a pattern, though it wasn't something he saw with his eyes; it was more the way he judged the swirl of a fight with quarterstaffs, but a lot more complicated. Chimney pots fell and shards of roof tiles rained off the eaves as the Tree passed, but the only real destruction was what happened to the enclosure itself. Though Gorand now was a whole forest walking, he chose where he put his legs. The cobblestone streets took most of his weight, and though they twisted like sheep tracks, the roots/stems/vines spared the houses from any but brushing contact however the streets turned. Cashel grinned in delight. It was always a pleasure to watch somebody who really understood craftsmanship, whatever his craft happened to be. What Gorand was doing now was beyond the slickest dancer Cashel expected to see ever. The Tree passed out of sight. It hadn't been tall as trees went, and even lifted up on its roots the houses blocked the view by the time it had gone more than maybe halfway to the city walls. Cashel turned, wondering which direction this Archas was going to come from. He didn't doubt the piratewould come; not because Gorand was an oracle, but because he wasn't the sort of man who'd say something he wasn't sure of. Rasile was chanting. To Cashel she sounded like a pair of screech owls courting, but she knew what she was doing. Liane stood beside the wizard, looking alert and ready to help if she needed to.