David Farland - Chaosbound

“So,” Hrath asked, “you hope to kill all of the wyrmlings down in that hole?” The old warlord could not keep the edge of doubt from his voice. For one man to kill so many, tens of thousands, did not seem possible. Even a powerful runelord can make mistakes. Even Raj Ahten himself was bested by lesser men.

“I do,” Aaath Ulber confessed. The giant rose to his feet and paced a bit, deep in thought.

Myrrima peered up at him, her sharp eyes piercing. “Even their children?”

“Every lion grows from a cub,” Aaath Ulber said. “I cannot leave any alive.”

“Are wyrmlings lions?” Myrrima asked. “You told me once that they may have come from human stock—just like you, just like me.”

“They have no love, no sense of honor.”

“Will you slaughter the babes in their cradles?” Myrrima asked. Gorge rose in Draken’s throat at the thought. “Or will you bash in the heads of their toddlers? You want to protect us, and that is good,” Myrrima urged. “But where does protection end and vengeance begin? Where does honor meet dishonor?”

Aaath Ulber stood deep in thought. His face was a mask of revulsion.

He is a ship that has lost its mooring, Draken told himself.

Aaath Ulber looked to Warlord Hrath for counsel. The warlord shrugged.

“Leave the babes and the children,” Hrath advised, “any child smaller than a grown man. Perhaps some folks of Internook can take care of the babes. If any of the older children need to die, we’ll take care of it.”

Aaath Ulber sighed. “All right, I will spare the children that I can— and gladly. But I’d hoped not to do all of the killing with blade work. The wyrmlings often have the makings of smoke or water traps in their warrens. I’d hoped to use their own infernal devices against them.”

“Blade work will be the only way,” Hrath agreed.

Wulfgaard said evenly, “I want to be the one to guard our people in the underworld! My betrothed will be among the Dedicates.”

Aaath Ulber whirled. “If our warriors get killed down there, you understand that you can’t just let the Dedicates live. Our fallback plan must be to kill them all, to strip the wyrmlings of their advantage. Could you do that?”

Wulfgaard gulped, hung his head. “I could kill them all but one,” he protested.

Aaath Ulber peered hard at him and whispered, “That’s not good enough.”

Draken pondered. Could I do it?

Cold reason suggested that he should be able to.

I wish these people no harm, he told himself, but neither do I know them. I would care for no one down there, and I would spare no one. A man who gives an endowment to my enemy is my enemy, and his life is forfeit. Every man, woman, and child down there knows that.

“Perhaps I should be the one guarding the Dedicates,” Draken suggested.

The giant Aaath Ulber stared hard at Draken, his brow furrowed in thought.

“The boy has a good point,” Warlord Hrath put in. “It would be better if it was not one of our people down there, lest pity stay their hands.”

“Draken,” Rain argued, “you can’t do this. You can’t leave me behind. You have promises to keep.”

She was right, of course. He too was betrothed, and he could not just forsake Rain. He didn’t dare take the endowments of metabolism needed.

“I’ll go,” Wulfgaard said. “It’s not your battle. I’ll go, even if it means that I must kill my beloved.”

The wyrmling patrol reached Ox Port at eleven that morning.

They were announced by the town guard, of course. A young man pitching hay from a loft on the hill began to sing:

It was the signal that wyrmlings had arrived, and Rain’s heart began to hammer.

But Aaath Ulber took the news in stride. He glanced up toward the loft, and the young workman jutted his chin to the west, dropped his hand by his side, and held down three fingers.

“Looks like it’s time to earn my keep,” Aaath Ulber said, as he rose from his seat on the steps of the pub. He dusted off his pants and told Warlord Hrath, “I’ll need some rope.”

“You’re going to try to take them alive?” Hrath’s disbelief showed in his eyes.

Aaath Ulber grabbed a rock from the ground. It wasn’t large, perhaps only a pound, but his intent was obvious. “Every time I kill one of those wyrmlings, it frees several Dedicates—and sends them to their deaths. There are better ways to handle our enemies.”

He’d hardly finished speaking when the wyrmlings came round a bend, striding down the cobbled road in full war gear, bone-white armor and helms. Their heads swiveled back and forth as they marched through town. They were obviously searching for the wyrmling guards who were supposed to be watching the village.

Aaath Ulber walked toward them casually, head bowed. Few folks were on the street. They were all down in the bay, catching fish, cleaning them, salting them, preparing them to smoke.

So it was that Aaath Ulber sauntered up to the three. They bridled when they saw him, recognizing him for what he was, and one wyrmling looked as if he might turn and run for help.

Aaath Ulber merely stepped aside so that they could pass. The wyrmlings seemed confused by his actions. They halted, not daring to turn their backs upon him. One glanced ahead, as if fearing that more men of Caer Luciare might bar the way, when Aaath Ulber attacked.

He leapt in a blur, fists raining blows upon his opponents, pummeling them with no weapon greater than a stone.

Aaath Ulber didn’t have his full complement of endowments yet. He wanted twenty of metabolism, but the town had only seven forcibles left. The others had all been used up, and he wasn’t likely to get more soon.

But his endowments proved sufficient. Within two seconds he knocked all three wyrmlings down. One had a split helm, another gushed blood from his eye.

Aaath Ulber relieved the monsters of their weapons. One of them kept struggling to get up, and Aaath Ulber kicked him hard enough to break a few ribs, and put him back down.

It took nearly half a minute for Wulfgaard to fetch some rope from the pub. Then the men bound the wyrmlings and a dozen volunteers helped drag them back to the arena, where Aaath Ulber locked them in cages that had been made to hold bears.

“Shall we kill them?” Warlord Hrath demanded.

Aaath Ulber merely smiled. “Kill them? I’m going to take endowments from them. The brawn of three wyrmlings is not easy to come by.”

A mile upriver from Ox Port, Myrrima climbed into a clear freshet and washed the weapons for the folks of the city. It was early morning still, just past dawn. She’d slept little during the night, yet somehow she felt renewed. The touch of water often lent her strength.

Birds were in the woods around her, flycatchers dipping to catch linnets that erupted like droplets of amber from a fallen alder across the river, and nuthatches and songbirds that chattered in mountain hawthorns.