by Gage Lee
"I don't like the idea of retreating," Sutari grumbled, "but I suppose it's best to be cautious. Agreed."
"This sounds ridiculously dangerous," Kam said with a lopsided grin, "so I'm all in. There are some tricks I've learned that I haven't tried out against real opponents. This should be fun. Even if we all die, it will be an experience."
Taun rolled his eyes at the occultist. "I really wish you wouldn't say things like that."
Taun stood and headed back to the window in the cargo hatch. He opened it up and looked down on a wide, gray plain. Crumbling spires of black stone stabbed up at purple thunderheads on the horizon. Gusts of wind kicked up clouds of fine dust, obscuring large sections beneath them. As the ship dropped lower, Taun saw figures emerging from the blowing grit. They were scrawny and too tall. Their limbs moved in jerky, erratic fits and starts, as if their bodies weren't entirely under their own control. Those long legs carried them forward in perfect unison. It was eerie to watch the things, and Taun wasn't sure what fighting them would be like.
You will learn much this day, man-child. Clear your thoughts and focus your mind. Battle is a meditation all its own, the rhythm of violence must come as naturally to you as the flow of your breathing. This is the crucible that will transform you into the warrior you were meant to be.
Taun appreciated the dragon's encouragement, but he didn't like the turn of phrase. More than once, he'd seen metal fail in the crucible, the impurities rising to the surface and ruining an entire project.
"That won't happen to me," he whispered.
It couldn't. The dragon kingdoms relied on Taun's success here. If he was successful in his battle today, he’d save them all.
He tried not to think about what would happen if he failed.
Voices bellowed orders on the decks above the cargo hold. The soaring tombship was near the ground, now. Great anchors fell to the ground, thick chains hissing behind them. It only took a few seconds for the crew to secure the vessel. Then hatches crashed open and mercenaries leaped clear, their weapons bared, war cries erupting from their throats.
"It's time," Lira said. She no longer bothered to whisper. No one would hear them over the howling winds and shouts of the mercenaries. "Put these on. It will help us blend in."
The scout handed each of them a heavy cloak, a pair of blue axes embroidered on its back. They looked well worn and clearly hadn't been cleaned in a long, long time. Taun was sure he saw bloodstains on the cloak in his hands.
"Where did these come from?" Sutari asked.
"Never ask the scout where she finds her gifts," Lira said with a grin. "Let's just say the Frozen Axes donated them to a good cause while the rest of you were sleeping."
With that, the scout stepped up to the cargo hatch and yanked the lever beside it. The barrier swung open on screeching metal hinges to reveal the battlefield beyond. She gave Taun an "after you" gesture and a wolfish grin.
Taun paused at the threshold. The mercenaries had formed a shield wall to protect the ship's port side. The men in front had buried the lower ends of their tower shields in the ashen ground and braced the top half against their shoulders. The second rank held spears at the ready to stab at any tombkin who got near the shield wall. A third rank, all archers, had taken a position twenty feet behind the wall. They raised their weapons toward the sky and drew back the strings.
A handful of commanders moved back and forth between the second and third ranks, barking orders that Taun couldn't decipher over the moaning of the wind and the rattle of weapons and armor.
The young knight didn't have time to count all the mercenaries. A quick estimate told him there were at least three hundred fighters down there, already to destroy any tombkin who got near. He'd never be safer in a battle than he was right now.
What could go wrong?
THE MEMBERS OF THE Broken Blade lodge hit the ground running. Taun stayed in the shadow of the soaring tombship and led his team toward the vessel's aft side. They were behind the roaming leaders who shouted orders at the mercenaries, commanding the archers to fire volley after volley of burning arrows into the swarm of tombkin racing at the shield wall. It took the team a few minutes to reach the far end of the shield wall, and Taun hunkered down below the tombship at that point.
He waited, sure someone would shout and point at them, but the mercenaries all had more to worry about than four stowaways.
"We'll go after anything that comes around this end of the battle line," he said. "Whatever you do, don't get close to the soldiers. Their leaders will pick us out easily enough, and then we're done for. When the fighting winds down, we'll head back onto the ship. Ready?"
Sutari nodded enthusiastically, her eyes gleaming with excitement. Lira seemed calmer and more sedate, but there was an eagerness in her posture that was impossible to miss. Kam, too, looked ready for a fight. Sparks danced between his fingertips as he guided strands of pneuma into complex structures that hissed and crackled with eerie life. This would be interesting.
The tombkin slammed into the shield wall like a crashing wave of locusts. There were no shouts or battle cries from their slack-jawed mouths, no threats or promises of violent death. The only sounds from the enemy were the faint sounds of their leathery limbs moving against each other and the jangling straps and buckles of their tattered armor. Taun watched with morbid curiosity as the mercenaries tore the first wave of dead things apart. Enchantments around the heads of their spears burst into flame on impact with the tombkin, blasting great, crumbling wounds into the creatures. Brittle bones shattered, scraps of wrinkled skin fluttered in the air, and the monsters crumbled into the ashy dust that covered the ground.
But the tombkin kept coming. Another wave slammed into the wall a split second after the first, and a third plowed into their backs. The gaunt monsters had no battle plan or tactics. Despite their lack of skill, though, the creatures were dangerous, if only from sheer numbers.
The Frozen Axes held their ground, and though their shields did not waver, Taun heard a change in the commanders' shouts. There was tension in their words, as if they'd underestimated just how many tombkin they'd face.
"Here they come," Sutari called. She thrust her soul steel longsword toward a cluster of tombkin who'd spilled out around the edge of the battle line. "Let's see how your work holds up, Taun."
A dozen of the creatures, mouths hanging open, arms slack at their sides, rushed toward the Broken Blades with long, synchronize strides. It was unnerving how still their upper bodies were, even as their lower limbs scissored back and forth in a frenetic rush. Dust kicked up around the monsters' feet into a long plume that trailed in their wake like smoke from a windblown fire.
"Let's even the odds," Kam said with a wild grin. He thrust both hands toward the approaching enemies, and the matrix of pneuma wrapped around his fingers shot through the air like a miniature comet. The spell plowed into the dusty ground a few yards ahead of the rushing tombkin. Its sparking aura sputtering for a moment before it vanished beneath the ash.
"That was interesting," Sutari said.
"Wait for it," Kam said, raising a finger.
The dead creatures scrambled forward, heedless of the spell that had fallen short of their ranks. They only had eyes for the Broken Blades, and nothing would stop their advance.
"I don't see—" Lira began.
The ground beneath the rushing horde exploded. A burst of fire rocketed up through their midst, burning away legs and obliterating torsos. Severed heads and disembodied arms twirled through the air in every direction, then crashed into the dust like the husks of shooting stars. When the dust cleared, half of the tombkin were gone.
The others didn't slacken their pace. They were oblivious to the fate of their fallen brothers and sisters. Driven by an inhuman hunger, they feared neither death nor dismemberment.
"Stay close," Sutari said. "Don't let them scatter us."
Taun drew his dragon blade saber and took up a position on Sutari's right. Lira twirled daggers a
round her fingers on the warrior's left, and Kam remained behind them as he worked on another spell.
The tombkin were on them far faster than Taun had expected. Sutari cleaved one of them in half with a two-handed, diagonal slash of her longsword. She recovered from the stroke and bashed the pommel of her weapon through the face of a second creature with so much force the tombkin's neck snapped. It fell to the ground with its skull shattered.
Lira twirled around the tombkin nearest her, blinking out of sight only to reappear behind her foes. The soul steel daggers Taun had gifted to her sank into the backs of the desiccated heads, instantly finishing two tombkin. The black scales flickered around the scout again, and she vanished without a trace.
Taun's saber training kicked in as a tombkin rushed in from the right side, and he unleashed a powerful strike that took the top half of the monster's head off in a spray of black, gritty dust. He twisted the blade around to block the dry, cracked talons of the last remaining tombkin. The knight unleashed a solid kick into the creature's chest, shattering its ribs and driving it to the ground. A quick stab up through the roof of its open gaping maw obliterated the creature's head and ended the fight.
"Nice work," Taun said.
"Not much of a challenge," Sutari complained. "You sure you don't want us to move up to the front line? Looks like the mercenaries are having a rough go of it."
"Positive," Taun said. "Let's gather up their talismans."
"Already on it," Lira said. She reappeared from the shadows, a dozen blackened necklaces hanging from the fingers of her left hand. A thin metal rectangle dangled from each of the chains, strange symbols stamped into their surfaces. "I'll hang onto these until they start to weigh me down."
"Looks like another wave's coming," Kam said. "This'll be fun."
Taun felt Axaranth's growing pleasure like a warm wave inside of him. The ancient dragon loved the thrill of battle. It reveled in the cracks and roars of spells unleashed by the mercenaries' occultists. It savored the smell of burnt meat and old graves released when the tombkin exploded under the fiery weight of those mystic powers. It admired the precision and order of the shield wall and the attackers behind it, and the mechanical regularity of the archers who nocked enchanted arrows and hurled arrows like a rain of meteors from the heavens. There was a beauty in battle, at least according to Axaranth, and the old dragon drank it all in.
When there is death all around. When the grave yawns before you. That is when dragons find what they are made of. On the brink of death, you are most alive.
Taun wasn't so sure that was true, but it was hard to deny the blood pumping excitement that filled the air. Though his team fought only a fraction of the tombkin horde, they soon found themselves in what seemed like an endless cycle of destruction. Kam's spells plunged from the sky and erupted from the ashes. Sutari moved with an easy agility despite her labored breathing. Pneuma flared around her, and the armor Taun had given her absorbed blow after blow. Her soul steel sword flickered and hummed, seemingly alive, and tore through their enemies with shocking ease. Lira became a deadly ghost, vanishing from the battlefield only to reappear moments later to destroy her enemies.
And the young knight himself fell into the rhythm of battle. Axaranth was right. There was a peace among the war, a space in his mind where the rhythm of battle was almost hypnotic. Taun's motions became synchronized with his breathing, and his thoughts were as calm and clear as a mirror. Every stroke of his sword deepened the battle trance. He felt as if he were a spectator watching the combat play out around him. There was no pain, no panic, only the endless destruction of a mindless enemy. But there was something missing, and as his awareness spread out across the battlefield, Taun realized what it was.
Auris was nowhere to be seen.
While his mercenaries hacked away at his enemies, gathering rewards that the crown prince didn't deserve, Auris was absent from the field. In a gap between waves of tombkin, Taun looked back at the soaring tombship. He wasn't surprised to see a familiar figure, outfitted in golden armor that scattered the purple light of this world into scintillating shards, standing on the vessel's deck.
But the young knight was surprised to see who stood beside him.
Karsi.
The princess was motionless next to the prince. She stood rigid and unmoving as a prisoner.
Taun couldn't figure out why she was there at all. She should have been back at the school. Her parents would not be pleased that their daughter had gone off to a tombworld.
Marriages of convenience are often arranged at the sage. Her family are minor nobles. Tying her to the prince would be a coup for them. She can do more for her family this way than in any number of years of study.
"Shut up," Taun growled. He didn't want to hear that, and he was surprised by the well of emotion that stirred within him. It had disrupted his meditation and disrupted the flow of battle. He narrowly avoided the scything claws of a tombkin and used too much force when he lashed out at it with his sword. His blow sliced the monster in half, but threw him off balance and lowered his guard.
The closest tombkin took advantage of Taun's clumsiness. They surged forward, one dead hand wrapping around his shoulder, another catching the stolen Frozen Axes cloak around his neck. Their weight pulled the knight off balance, forcing him to drive his saber into the ground to brace himself.
"Down!" Kam shouted.
Taun didn't have to be told twice. He ducked low, extending his left leg out to the side to lower his center of balance while he kept both hands wrapped around the sword's hilt. Twin streaks of heat ripped through the air just above his head, close enough to raise the stink of burnt hair.
A pair of red spheres, each the size of a lotus pod, slammed into the tombkin with brutal force. The fiery missiles burned the creatures to ash, and their talismans fell into their gritty remains. The black chains glowed red with the heat of the attack, and the metal rectangles sizzled and popped with pneuma.
"Nice work," Taun said as he stood. "I owe you one."
"Two," Kam corrected him.
For the moment, the Broken Blades were in the clear. The four of them moved quickly to gather the talismans, scraping their feet through the ashes to find any they might've missed. They all handed their trophies to Lira, who quickly counted them and dropped them into a pouch dangling from her belt.
"That's fifty," she said. "I wonder how many the mercenaries have."
Taun pointed at men and women carting baskets back from the front lines. He saw at least five out there, and they struggled as if their burdens were heavy. If those baskets were all full, that meant at least several hundred necklaces claimed. And there was no way for Taun to tell how many had already been dragged back aboard the ship. He felt a pang of anger at the stolen valor, but pushed it away. Let Auris think he'd won. The real victory would come when the airship was high above this dead world and the Broken Blades dumped all that ill-gotten loot overboard.
"What is that?" Kam asked, pointing off to the right side of the mercenaries' battle line. He blew the dust off his glasses and put them back on the bridge of his nose. "I've never felt anything like it."
"I see nothing," Sutari said, wheezing with every breath. She was still on her feet, but the dusty air and rigors of battle had taken their toll.
Taun cursed under his breath. If Moglan had only had a little more time, he could have cured the crudlung. Thanks to Auris's lackeys, though, the shaman never got the opportunity. Now Sutari was on her last legs. If she couldn't keep the pneuma flowing into her lungs, she'd end up breathless on the ground.
Easy prey for the tombkin.
You cannot think of what might be. Focus on the problem in front of you. It is quite large.
Taun shook his head to clear his thoughts and followed Kam's pointing finger. A wall of billowing dust rushed toward the right side of the battle line. It loomed above the battlefield like a gray wave about to crash onto a desolate shore. The young knight caught glimpses of figures moving in
the storm of ash. Long, elegant limbs. Antlers that stretched toward the sky. Some creatures were no larger than dogs, while others towered as high as the ironpine trees outside the Ruby Blade Keep.
No, not like the trees.
They were trees.
"Eldwyr," Taun shouted. "Back to the ship, now!"
Even as he grabbed Sutari by the arm and hauled her toward the still-open cargo hatch, Taun knew it was too late.
The enemies he'd tried to warn the dragons about were already here.
Chapter 25
THE ELDWYR POURED ACROSS the ashen plain far faster than Taun had imagined possible. Not only did the wind obscure the bizarre creatures, it carried them forward in an unwholesome storm. Even the largest of them soared on the stiff wind like a child's kite, limbs outstretched like skeletal sails. Though they were much farther away from the battle than the Broken Blades were from the cargo hatch, Taun knew his friends would never reach the safety of the ship before the horrible foe was upon them. But he couldn't just stand there. He had to do something.
"Stick with me," he shouted to be heard over the wailing winds.
Lira and Kam each grabbed one of Sutari's arms and draped them over their shoulders. The proud warrior resisted their efforts, at first, but soon nodded wearily and accepted their help. The four friends pushed through the gritty storm, Taun in the lead. None of them questioned the knight as he headed straight for one of the mercenary commanders.
"Hey!" Taun yelled, grabbing the woman's cloak. "Hey!"
The woman whirled on Taun, her lips twisted into an angry sneer. A trio of parallel scars stretched the left side of her face into a fearsome grimace, made even more terrifying by a fresh wound on her forehead that wept blood through a thick layer of black scales.
"Get off me, soldier, and back to your post!" She tried to pull free of Taun's grip, but the knight refused to let go.
"There's another enemy on your right," Taun hollered over the clash of battle. "Pull back to the tombship before it's too late!"