by Kyle West
“You’ll have to forgive me,” Shen said, apologetically. “This is the first time I’ve done this. I didn’t know if you would understand . . .”
“I understand perfectly well,” I said. “Probably more than a lot of other things you’ve said. You’re probably the most amazing thing humanity has ever created.” And terrifying, but I kept that thought to myself. “Even with that, you’re not capable of knowing everything.”
“I need answers, Shanti. I need them to save my people. That need to save was built into me in a way it never was for you.”
“Maybe so,” I said. “But that creates a fear that can be blinding. The fear of loss is very real, and paralyzing. When we’re afraid, that’s when we make mistakes.”
“I cannot afford mistakes,” Shen said. “I cannot afford to lose Mian.”
“What about Pallos?” I asked. “Is he safe? Is he well?”
“Pallos is safe,” Shen said. “He’s working hard to repair Odin.”
“How’s that going?”
“He is . . . frustrated,” Shen said. “His mind is clever, thinking of fixes that even I couldn’t foresee. It doesn’t appear to me there’s much hope of him repairing the ship, but I believe he should try.” Shen paused. “Would you like me to pass a message along?”
“Yes,” I said. “Tell him that we’re thinking of him. And tell him we believe in him and thank him for all that he’s done for us.”
“I’ll tell him,” Shen said. “I feel much better now. Still afraid. But I’m not alone.”
“I’m not sure how much help I’ve been. But I’m glad you’re feeling better.
“I believe we are about to land,” Shen said.
Indeed, I felt that the ship was going down. “Good luck with everything, Shen.”
“Same with you, Shanti.”
I left the cabin and rejoined Guardian Mian on the bridge, as well as Shara, who had woken up.
Chapter 45
The airship armada landed north of the Plains People camp, while the force of dragons, who had followed from behind, also landed to rest their wings. The horde seemed sizably smaller; by now, the women and children and non-combatants would have left, bound north for Ragnarok Crater.
I stepped off the ship and into the frigid evening. I was approached by the chiefs on horseback almost as soon as I walked down Proudwing’s boarding ramp. They stared at the various vessels with wonder.
After doing his share of gawking, Victor urged his horse forward and raised his right hand. “Hail Elekim, Chief of the Black Hills Tribe. Your people await you.”
I walked down the ramp and walked up to him. “Thank you, Victor. But I have to ask . . . will they hate me for killing Nalam?”
“They will respect you, if anything,” Victor said. “It is well-known that he was the one to challenge you, and you defeated him in a fair contest before witnesses.”
All the same, I felt resistance to the idea. I already had too much on my plate. Maybe I could place them under Victor’s command when the time came. “Where are they?”
“They are waiting at the vanguard,” Victor said. “I’ll take you there.”
I nodded, only to realize I had no mount. They offered me a horse, but I didn’t know how to ride. I was probably the first chief in the history of the Plains People who couldn’t ride a horse.
Finally, Victor offered me a hand. “Hop on. Ryshan can carry us both.”
Before I could think too hard about it, I jumped up and Victor pulled me the rest of the way until I was sitting behind him. It was awkward being so close to him, but there was little else to be done.
Victor, however, didn’t seem to see anything strange in it. “It’s not far. I guess you can’t ride?”
“Well, I’ve ridden dragons.”
Victor just laughed, and I soon found out riding a horse was very different. I didn’t like the jarring and bumpy ride as we weaved in and out of the moored airships.
“Is there a way I can defer my leadership?” I asked. “Give it to someone else?”
The question seemed to confuse Victor. “Why would you want that?”
“They deserve a leader who can be there for them,” I said. “I can’t.”
Victor nodded. “You have a great many responsibilities, Elekim. It wouldn’t be forbidden to appoint a deputy chief, given the circumstances. But a tribe always prefers their rightful leader.”
“I wouldn’t be able to lead them in the way they’re used to,” I said. “They may be more accepting of someone who understands them.”
Victor was silent as he thought for a moment. “It’s a difficult question. Not a question even I can answer, because an outsider has never been a chief. There have been a lot of changes lately. What’s one more, as I see it?”
We were quiet the rest of the journey. I thought about Victor’s question and realized that he was right. These people had already abandoned their old lives and were following Victor on the hope that they might survive. If I told them what we must do, and if they accepted me as their leader, then that would have to be enough.
I had nothing else.
* * *
Victor and I didn’t speak as we rode across the expanse between the ships and the Black Hills Warriors’ camp. The sky was dark now, and the cloud cover meant there were few stars. I could hardly see my hand in front of my face. It gave me an uneasy feeling, but Victor and Ryshan seemed to know the way.
At last, the light of campfires and the silhouettes of tents came into view, and soon after, I could hear men’s voices and the whicker of horses. A long, low note blew, likely from a hollowed animal horn, signaling our arrival.
We drew up outside a circle of tents. It was hard to get a count of them in the darkness, but there were at least a hundred. How many fighters would that be? Two hundred? Three? Given the entire size of the horde, I had expected more people. But perhaps the Black Hills Tribe was smaller than the others.
It took about five minutes for everyone to gather at our arrival. Many nodded with respect toward Victor, which I supposed was his due as First Man. More still watched me, their eyes impossible to decipher in the darkness. They would either accept me or reject me.
“Standing before you is your new chief, Elekim of the Elekai,” Victor said. “She vanquished the old chief, Nalam, in fair combat he proffered. By all the laws of our people, she is the rightful chief of the Black Hills Tribe. If anyone wishes to challenge her ascendancy, then he has the space of however long it takes me to hold a breath to do so.”
Victor then took a deep, dramatic breath, which would have been audible to all present. And then, we waited.
Every face looked at me, and I imagined challenge in their eyes. But as time passed, all remained silent.
After what seemed an impossibly long time, perhaps three minutes, Victor let his breath go and drew deeply in.
“Let it be known that Elekim of the Elekai is now chief of the Black Hills Tribe. None have risen to challenge her rule. Therefore, let all tribesmen obey her in battle, and let the final decisions of the tribal council rest on her head.”
“Let it rest on her head,” the entire tribe intoned.
Now, all watched me, awaiting my speech. I wasn’t exactly sure what to say, but I knew I had to come up with something quick.
“To be honest,” I said, raising my voice for all to hear, “I never asked for this. I didn’t want to kill Nalam. Maybe he is related to some of you, or even a friend. It was a choice forced upon me. It was a close fight. I’m sure most if not all of you were there.”
Several heads nodded at that. They quietly waited for me to continue.
“A very tough road lies ahead of us,” I said. “It is my solemn duty to lead you down that path. Many of us will die. Times are changing, and they are changing too quickly to keep up with. If we do nothing, if we fight each other, then the Radaskim are going to win. As much as our two different peoples dislike each other, we must set aside our differences. Because our enemy hates us
more than we could ever hate each other.”
The only sound to be heard was the wind and the animals. Everyone was completely focused on me.
“We’ll be fighting side-by-side with my people soon, the Elekai. More than that, we’ll also be fighting side-by-side with the Colonians and the Shen. The dragons, too, have joined us, along with Shen’s Air Force, which you’ve probably seen by now. Together, we’ve gathered a force stronger than anything this side of the world has seen since the fall of Ragnarok.
“But our enemy still outnumbers us. He’s come to invade us, to make slaves of us. If we fight together, then there’s a chance that we can stop him.
“It will be the hardest thing we’ve ever had to do. The best we can hope is to beat them back temporarily. Because more are coming from the other side of the Red Mountains, a force that could crush ours easily.
“There’s only one chance for victory; fight fiercely here against this force and beat them back. Give us a chance to pick a better battleground at Ragnarok Crater. We can never let him reach the center of the Crater! If he does, then it will be worse than death. It will mean no future for our world for the rest of time.”
I knew they wouldn’t understand these things, but some people were shouting their agreement and were cheering all the same. Most, however, remained grave, likely contemplating the hard road ahead.
“Our first move is to secure the pass out of Mongar,” I said. “The Radaskim will likely try to reach it first, to cut off reinforcements from the city. So, we’re going to ride ahead of everyone else to make sure it’s kept clear. We will be the forerunners. We will draw the first blood. Victor and the rest of the tribes will join us shortly after.”
“Elekim!” a man called out.
Now others were chanting it, too, along with shouts of Chosen.
“We’re raising camp to ride for the Red Pass. Let’s go!”
Soon after, the men began breaking camp. I called Flame to me, and said my goodbyes to Victor.
“The rest of the horde will not move as quickly as your group,” he said, “but I will join you soon.”
“All right,” I said. “Good luck, Victor.”
“Good luck to you as well.”
It didn’t take longer than a quarter of an hour for the Black Hills Tribe to break camp. During that time, Shara came on Red Tail. As soon as they were on horseback and the camp completely packed, we set off. I rode on Flame at the vanguard of the galloping Plainsmen, flying slightly above ground, with the warriors below yipping and raising their bows on high.
For the next hour as we rode, there was nothing but the thunder of hooves and the cold wind in my face. The foothills of the Red Mountains approached, each step bringing us closer to the Radaskim to the south.
* * *
The Radaskim arrived in the morning.
A black sea was spreading across the plains to the south, a darkness covering the wavy grass and piles of snow. That sea spread in a flood of pure poison, crawling northward at a slow but steady rate. It was about a mile from meeting us at the pass.
I edged Flame southward to get a closer view. There were no Radaskim dragons visible yet, but our own dragons and ships were closing in, all five hundred of them: free dragons, the Colonian Dragonguard, the Dragonriders of Haven and Sylva, almost five hundred in all. Flying behind the dragons were the Shen airships, which for the first time would test themselves in the open, without artillery fire to cover them.
So long as the enemy couldn’t counter our own air forces, we would have free reign to attack the swarm below, which far outnumbered the twenty thousand mounted warriors the Plains People could bring to bear.
The awful shrieks of the swarm were at last unleashed as both our air and ground forces came forward. The great black sea gave a collective roar and broke across the plains at a run.
Let’s go, Flame.
Flame swooped toward the front lines of crawlers, leading the charge of dragons. Those with riders shouted battle cries and extended their long lances. The horsemen charged forward, whooping as their animals streaked across the plains at a gallop.
I aimed Flame for the front of the Radaskim line, which extended for what seemed miles toward the east. The formation was beginning to loosen as the crawlers surged forward. Some even jumped in anticipation of my approach, wanting to be the one who killed Elekim.
Not today, I thought.
The crawlers at the front leaped mightily, but Flame flew just above them, instead coming down on the next row. He raked his long claws on the hapless monsters with a high screech. They scattered like pins as he flapped furiously, rising again before he could lose too much momentum. The rest of the dragon charge was devastating on the Radaskim line, completely slowing their advance and killing many of the shrieking, horrifying creatures.
As the dragons pulled back for another charge, the horsemen approached and began to fire their arrows, each rider wheeling expertly away before falling back north. To my surprise, the crawlers were dropping to the heavy, sustained fire, the horses turning at just the right moment.
A line of crawler dead, hundreds of them, slowed down the next wave, which was forced to jump over the first. They charged forward once again with reckless abandon, but despite their speed, they could not outrun a horse, especially the sturdy steeds of the Plains People. The horsemen kept circling and firing their arrows, falling back for fresh troops who unleashed their own volleys.
The effect was devastating. Most of the arrows found their mark, and probably half of those arrows embedded themselves in a vulnerable spot – inside the mouth, or between a crawler’s chitinous plating at the head and neck, a testament to the Plainsmen’s accuracy.
The dragons came in for another aerial charge, completely shattering the crawler front line yet again, and the tribesmen followed with their own arrows, taking advantage of the following confusion.
Where were these guys in the last battle? I thought.
Flame read my mind. They are in their element, Elekim. This battle may turn out much differently from the last one.
Flame made a sudden dive, clawing at a crawler that had gotten separated from the rest of his pack. The crawlers were now spread out, probably as a defense against the tribesmen’s arrows. But that only made them easier pickings for the Elekai dragons. The Radaskim line was beginning to buckle, their reserve crawlers unable to break through their own dead.
Then, in one eerie movement, the crawlers ran back in the direction from which they had come. The tribesmen below whooped their victory. As the crawlers scattered, they left hundreds upon hundreds of dead, twitching monsters in their wake.
The Black Hills Tribe followed Flame and me toward the line of trees along the western hills, where some of the crawlers were fleeing into the forest. The dragons swooped down and massacred them. Only a few were able to escape into the safety of the trees.
There were some dead for us, too, but very few. Most of the plain was covered with dead crawlers.
We had beaten back the initial advance, but there were still thousands of crawlers hanging back, and I knew this was far from over.
Chapter 46
The Radaskim pulled back further than expected as nighttime fell, which made pursuing them not an option. They would attack again at some point, but for now, we decided to take advantage of the lull, to allow everyone a rest and to prepare for the next confrontation.
As far as the air forces, the airships remained aloft while the dragons rested their wings in the forest. Some of them hunted the crawlers that fled there, picking off the ones who showed themselves on the hilltops and in the clearings.
I caught what sleep I could in a tent some of the tribesmen set up for me. I was awoken the next morning by one of the Black Hills warriors, who gave me some jerky, a cup of coffee, with a dose of news that the swarm was on the move again for another assault.
I ate as I moved, chugged down the coffee, and found Flame waiting outside my tent. The entire camp was already being loa
ded onto the horses and sent north.
I mounted Flame and urged him skyward. Once well above ground, I had a view of the horsemen assembling below – not just mine of the Black Hills Tribe, but the rest of Victor’s tribesmen, who had set up camp not a quarter of a mile away. A steady stream of horses all mustered in the same place, each working in separate groups split by tribes. The victory of the skirmish yesterday had been good for morale; men were laughing and joking. That was good, but I only hoped that wouldn’t lull everyone into a false sense of security.
And the crawlers were oncoming – an entire dark, writhing sea of them. There were so many more than last night. Their line of advance was not two miles away, and they were making steady progress north. And they were no longer alone. Dozens of Radaskim dragons swirled above them. For the first time, our own air force would be challenged.
This would be the real battle. And worse, we were on our own until Lord Harrow and the Elekai arrived. We had to hold out until then and keep the pass open at the same time. If we lost the pass, the soldiers of the Red Wild would be forced to fight through a chokepoint.
I led the dragon force to the head of the airships, which were lined up and ready to engage the flying Radaskim. For the moment, only the crawlers were advancing, slowly and methodically. By now, most of the horsemen had gathered, breaking off into smaller groups. They were their own well-honed force, a controlled chaos. I placed my own tribe in Victor’s hands. His tribe was so large that when the Black Hillsmen joined him, it hardly seemed to swell his numbers. His group of horses was the largest, at the vanguard and the most centrally located. His dragon, Mauler, fought among the free Elekai dragons.
As the two opposing forces approached one another, it was clear that the Radaskim were by far the most numerous. Already their outer flanks were swirling around to entrap our own line. But our horsemen were faster, dropping back and swinging around to catch them from the sides. Again, I marveled at the effectiveness of the Plains People’s tactics. With their horses and bows, not even a crawler could touch them, and the further the crawlers ventured from their main line, the more vulnerable they became to arrows.