Mag saw it at the same time. “North!” she cried. “Move north!”
We ran up and over the lip of the hill, coming down the other side. But a murmur was on the air, coming towards us from the east. More Shades, advancing quickly.
“Dark take them,” I said.
“Retreat to the west!” said Mag.
“Hold that order!”
Mag’s gaze snapped to me, and I pointed to the hilltop east of us.
“We should deliver one volley as they come over the top. It should pin them for a moment, at least, and give us more time to flee.”
“Very well,” said Mag. “Green Squadron, line up behind the archers. Watch for a flank.”
“Ser!” barked her squadron.
“Black Squadron, draw!” I cried.
Arrows flew to strings and drew back. We held for a long, tense moment as the murmur of voices grew louder on the air. Oku was beside me, bristling and growling.
I saw a helmeted head appear over the eastern hill.
“Loose!”
A dozen arrows darted through the air, slamming into the first line of Shades. Nearly every one found its mark.
“Again!” I roared, drawing and firing my arrow.
My squadron joined me, and another hail of death fell among our foes. The Shades fell back with cries of dismay. In a moment, they were out of sight behind the crest of the hill.
Mag and I motioned our soldiers west with sharp hand movements. We did not want to cry a retreat and let the Shades know we were fleeing. Silent as shadows, we fled across the mud, looping around the hill on its western side.
“We have to draw them back closer to the trail,” I said to Mag in a low voice. “Otherwise Chausiku will never be able to lead the captain to us.”
She only shrugged and raised her brows. “You are the ranger. Lead on.”
“I am not a ranger,” I growled. “Squadrons, follow me!”
“Certainly acts like a ranger, though, doesn’t he?” said Hallan to Jian, who barely restrained a smile.
The sun broke the eastern horizon at last, peeking its shining face above the tops of the hills. And its light came just in time to illuminate a party of Shades ahead of us. It was the archers who had fired upon us only moments ago. They pulled up short, shock on their faces. They had not expected us to loop around the hills and meet them so soon. I counted no more than a dozen, and they were scant paces away.
Mag leaped forwards, silent in her battle-trance. Her squadron drew their blades and roared with anger as they rushed the archers. Oku charged beside them, baying with all his might. The Shades loosed a ragged volley before trying to turn and flee, but my archers riddled them with arrows. Only three managed to get away by splitting up and vanishing into the hills. The rest fell dead, pierced with arrows or hacked apart with swords or Mag’s spear. Oku brought one down, jaws clamped around her ankle and then her throat. But Mag lost another soldier in the skirmish, and the Shades’ desperate bowfire took two of my archers and wounded another. We each had a dozen fighters left, including ourselves.
“South,” I gasped, as I hauled my wounded archer to her feet. She gritted her teeth as she leaned on me and tried to run as best she could.
The murmur grew louder to the north. And as we drew near to the Shades’ trail once more, the murmur became a roar. I risked a look back and saw the Shades emerge over the hills behind us. There were at least a hundred and a half of them, and they came charging across the mud at us with bared steel. At their head was the brute woman, and above them swooped Kaita in her raven form. She was drawing closer, and I knew it could not be long before she would take the field in one of her animal forms.
Mayhap we can at least kill her before the end, I thought.
“Keep going!” I cried. “Run! As long as you can! We have to give the captain time to—”
Another roar filled the air, hundreds of voices screaming in bloodlust and fury.
The Shades ground to a confused halt, even as I turned my gaze to the east. The rising sun fell into my eyes, and I had to shield them with a hand. When I could see again, the sight nearly made me weep.
Three hundreds of soldiers swept down from the eastern hills. At the head of the charge were the redcloaks, with Kun himself holding a sword high in the air. Their fury shook the ground as they swept down upon the Shades.
“Retreat!” roared Tagata. “Get back to the hills! Retreat to our siblings!”
Kaita watched from the sky as the Shades turned and fled. Tagata waited until the last, holding the rear of the formation as they ran into the hills. The Mystics’ militia were coming right towards her forces, and they outnumbered the Shades two to one.
Kaita cursed in her mind. She had been too focused on Mag and me and had forgotten to watch out for the rest of our allies. Now the Shades were going to fall—mayhap even Tagata would fall—and it would all be Kaita’s fault.
But no. She had to cast such thoughts aside, for they would not help her fix anything. Kaita swooped low, looking for any way the Shades could escape. They made their way north through a narrow gap between two hills. It was the closest thing to a defensible position that Kaita could see. Tagata formed up squadrons of spears before the opening, to hold it against the Mystics as they attempted an offense. But it would not last long—soon, the Mystics would simply move up the hills and around the sides of the Shade formation.
Kaita swung wider, looping in the air and looking for anything to help. There seemed no hope of escape in these cursed hills, and a last stand would serve little purpose. But there had to be a way. Her hunt could not end like this. Tagata’s tale could not end like this.
She tilted her wings to bank left, and she felt the odd bulge in her chest.
Kaita’s heart nearly stopped.
The magestones. They would give her the strength of hellskin. Kaita had never seen it, of course, but it was supposed to be terrible. What use would the Mystics’ weapons be against her hide? How could their shields withstand her claws?
Even if they managed to bring her down, she should at least be able to kill Mag and me before the end.
It was not the promise she had made to Rogan, but darkness take that vow. Rogan was the one who had sent her on this pointless march, promising she would have her chance. That was clearly false, whether or not Rogan had meant to lie to her. If she would never have a better opportunity, then she would take what she could. Who cared if she died in the end if she fulfilled the purpose that had sustained her all these years?
But then her eyes fell upon the fiery wyrm.
She recognized it in a flash, though she had not been searching for it. It was a blazing trail of fire down a hill to the northeast of the Shades’ position. My fallen archer had dropped a torch, and it had tumbled back and forth as it rolled down the hill. The grass had caught fire, and tongues of flame had licked the turf as though an artist had painted it with a great brush. It looked for all the world like the shape of a flaming wyrm stretched out upon the hillside.
The Lord had told Tagata that they would see this sign. And that the sign would lead to escape. Was it possible?
Kaita swooped lower, feeling lightheaded. The blazing trail ended behind a cluster of grey boulders pressed up against the side of the hill. But there was nothing there, not that Kaita could see.
Wait. There.
Kaita could not see it until she landed on the boulder. It was a cave entrance, though it could only be seen from among the rocks. Anyone walking by the hill, or even on it, would not see the tunnel until they were nearly inside it.
In an instant, she was winging her way back to Tagata.
“Charge!” cried Kun. He wore his smile still, but it was fierce, alive with the thrill of battle. He and his Mystics pressed towards the gap between the hills. It was their third charge against the Shades, and I knew it would be the last one.
“Loose!” I cried. Our arrows flew over the Mystics’ heads, landing among the enemy and casting many of them to the grou
nd. The rest of the Shades wavered, and they broke almost the instant Kun’s Mystics slammed into them. As one, they turned and scattered, blue cloaks fluttering in the air behind them as they ran north in the mud.
Mag and I guided our squadrons close behind Kun’s as he ran in pursuit. But almost from the moment I pressed through the hills, I felt that something was wrong. There were a paltry few dozen of the Shades in front of us.
Then I forgot such thoughts as another roar filled the air.
Zhen, Kun’s nephew, cried aloud as he led his company from the east. Kun had sent him east to loop around behind our foe. Now they were flanked and cut off. Four hundreds of our soldiers met in the center of the battlefield.
The Shades turned back and forth, wavering. They did not know whether to face the charge from the south or the one from the east. In the end, it did not matter. They died to a one, their blood staining the muddy ground beneath them as it pooled.
The battlefield fell to silence—that sudden, shocking stillness that comes after the worst violence, the most brutal carnage. It was broken only by a ragged cheer from our forces before everything fell to quiet again. I fell on my back in the mud, panting heavily. I felt like I had run many leagues in our flight from the Shades, and every step had felt even worse with the sucking mud clutching at our feet.
“Oh no, you great idiot,” came Yue’s voice. “Come here.”
I heard her heavy footsteps approaching. I groaned, but I smiled and raised a hand. Yue seized it and hauled me to my feet. Her arms wrapped around me and mine around her. We shared a kiss, which was both poisoned by and sweeter for the death all around us.
“Why, Sergeant Baolan,” I said in mock surprise. “Were you worried about me?”
“Dark take you for a fool,” she said. “You are not running off and risking your life like that again, and the captain’s orders be damned.”
“Careful,” I said. “That is dangerously close to mutiny.”
“Then I am a mutineer,” she said, and kissed me again.
But as the thrill of the fight left me, and our little army began to collect itself and take our toll of the dead, my thoughts grew dour. I remembered what I had noticed when we had first run into this killing field.
And it seemed I was not the only one.
“Where did they go?”
The battle-trance was gone. Mag’s voice was quiet. Almost fearful.
Yue looked over at her. “What was that?” she said.
“The Shades,” said Mag. “We had them surrounded, yet there cannot be more than two scores of them here. I see neither the brute nor Kaita. Where did all of them go?”
I studied the ground. Tracks led into the field from the south, where Kun had attacked. There were tracks from the north, where the Shades had come in the first place. And tracks came in from the east, where Zhen had led his company in the final charge. But there were no tracks leading out of the little dell at all.
A darkness came over my heart, but I tried to shake it off. This was a victory. I was determined to treat it as such.
“We do not know,” I said. “But we have time. Time to figure it out, and to finish the rest of them. I have not forgotten Kaita.”
Mag did not look convinced. She shuddered as though a sudden fear had seized her. But at last, she nodded and turned to attend to her squadron.
My grip on Yue tightened.
Kaita collapsed against the rock wall of the cavern, her whole body heaving in deep, shaking breaths. All around her, Shades seized their chance to rest after their desperate flight.
When Tagata learned of the tunnel, she had asked for volunteers to serve as a rear guard while the rest escaped. So many had volunteered that Tagata had been forced to choose thirty of them. The heartbreak it caused her was still plain on her face.
Kaita had guided them all to the tunnel entrance, and they had pushed their way in as quickly as they could. They had vanished beneath the ground mere moments before Zhen’s flanking company would have seen them. Filled with battle fury, Zhen missed spotting the Shades’ tracks leading to the tunnel. Then his troops had trampled over the signs, obscuring any hint of how the Shades had seemed to vanish into thin air.
The tunnel had turned west and continued beneath the hills for a long way, plunging deep into the earth before leading to a massive cavern. The Shades had torches, but the ceiling was so high their light did not reach it. Stalagmites thrust up from the ground everywhere, like a vampire’s twisted, pitted fangs. But the space was drier than the soaking outside, and hidden, and surprisingly warm compared to early spring’s chill.
Just over a hundred Shades remained—less than half of those who had started the march. And there were nearly four hundreds of their foes outside, searching for them and ready to cut them down.
Kaita looked over to where Tagata stood. The shadeborn seemed indefatigable. She had not fallen to the floor gasping, like her siblings. She stood solid in their midst, head bowed in mourning. Kaita knew her well. Tagata would blame herself for every soldier who had fallen on this long trek. The Lord had foretold the outcome, and he held her blameless for it, but that did not matter to her.
Slowly Kaita forced herself to her feet and went to the shadeborn’s side, placing a hand on her arm, which burned like an oven.
“Tagata,” said Kaita quietly. “You saved everyone you could.”
“Not enough of them,” said Tagata. She lifted her head at last, still avoiding Kaita’s gaze, and took a deep breath. “But now we must look forwards. Help me see to everyone’s arrangements. I want fires if we can find the fuel. None of us should have to sit in the dark, alone with our thoughts.”
“I think I should scout the caves,” said Kaita. “We do not have endless supplies. We have to find a way out of here, and I doubt we will be able to leave the same way we came in. The redcloaks will likely make camp in the same dell where they—” She bit off her words.
Tagata’s expression darkened. “Where they slaughtered our kindred,” she rumbled.
“Yes,” said Kaita. “But we will avenge them. I swear it. Let me take my mountain lion form and search for a way out of this place, and then we can plan our retaliation. The Lord told you this place was an escape. There must be a way.”
Tagata gave her a small smile. “Who ever thought you would be the one coaxing me to have faith in our father? But you are right, of course. Go then, dear one. I will care for our kindred.”
They shared a brief embrace, and then a glow filled Kaita’s eyes as she took her mountain lion form. The caves seemed to fill with light in her vision, the sparse torches letting her see almost as well as if it were day. She remained standing there by Tagata for a moment, drinking in the warm air. Her nose filled with the scents of the Shades behind her, and a thousand other smells as well: long-stale dung from animals who had passed through, and fresher deposits from bats. There was no sign of any larger animals having been here recently, which was a relief.
Soon there was nothing more to be learned without setting off to explore. She rubbed her lion head against Tagata’s waist and received a gentle caress along the throat. Then she loped off into the darkness.
There were three tunnels other than the one they had used to enter. Picking the first one to her right, she ran down it, eyes and nose open. The passage twisted this way and that. Sometimes it dropped sharply down, and sometimes it rose so steeply that she had to climb, her claws digging into the limestone of the walls.
For a half hour she crept along the passage, her hopes high. The tunnel did not dive deeper into the earth, which was a good sign. If it did not finish in a dead end, then there was a good chance Kaita would find an exit.
And then, slowly, several strong scents began to creep into her nose. The first was fresh air, thick with snow, and her heart leaped. But then she smelled other things. Wood, but with an acrid and bitter undertone. That would be the pycnandra trees.
And she smelled people: a great many of them, and their horses, and wagons
, and goods of all sorts.
It was Kun’s force. Kaita had little sense of direction beneath the earth, but this tunnel must have looped around to the southwest. It emerged into another hidden place in the hills, right beside where Kun and his army had made camp.
Kaita’s heart sank to her paws. But she pressed forwards anyway, just to be sure. The tunnel ended just as the other one had, behind a pile of boulders that blocked sight. Scrambling and scrabbling with her claws, Kaita climbed up, poking her head over the top of the boulders.
There. The Mystics and their allies were barely more than a span away, off to the east. She could see the redcloaks massed towards the north end of the camp, while the army’s train was to the south, closer to the caves where Kaita now stood.
Once again, she could almost feel Mag and me close by. We were there, right there. If she only took one of the magestones, she could plunge into the heart of the camp, find us, and …
But no. There was still her promise to Rogan. Kaita growled, and the sound rumbled thick in her chest.
This tunnel was useless for escape unless the Mystics eventually left—in which case, the Shades could more easily leave through the same passage they had first found.
Discouraged, she trotted the long path back to the large central cavern. By the time she reached them, they had set up their camp, tents all in neat rows as they had done above ground. Kaita came trotting up to Tagata and resumed her human form.
“That tunnel is no use,” she said, pointing south. “It leads straight to our enemies, like the first. At least they have not discovered its entrance, or not that I could smell.”
“In dark circumstances, we must cherish small blessings all the more,” said Tagata. “Thank you, Kaita.”
“I will go explore the other passages.”
She turned to go, but Tagata held up a hand. “Wait,” she said. “You should rest. The others tell me you were wakeful through much of the night, and you have run far and overused your magic since before dawn.”
The Tales of the Wanderer Volume One: A Book of Underrealm (The Underrealm Volumes 4) Page 77