Thornbear (Book 1)

by Michael G. Manning

  Gram struck back but his sword found only air and then he was off-balance. T’lar’s sword struck him in the face, but it was the flat of the blade that hit. Bruised and dazed Gram fell backward. From the corner of his eye he saw Grace sidling closer to where Irene was tied to the donkey.

  Gram rolled as he hit the ground, attempting to gain some space to recover, but T’lar was on him again. Gram’s sword went flying as T’lar disarmed him. Gram’s knife hand almost found a home in T’lar’s belly but the bald man caught it and twisted his arm around and back. Seconds later Gram was in a tight grapple, with one arm locked painfully behind him.

  T’lar applied firm pressure, until Gram felt sure his arm would break and he cried out in pain. Then he saw Jasmine had risen from the ground, dagger in hand.

  “Come here, girl,” said T’lar. “Kill this fool.” He pulled back on Gram’s head, forcing his chest outward to expose his unguarded stomach. “Stick that knife in him and all will be forgiven.”

  Jasmine stared into Gram’s eyes, and he saw something there. Not fear, as he had thought before, but love, and resignation. Knowing T’lar couldn’t see his face he mouthed his last words silently to her. I trust you.

  She turned and ran for Irene, while everyone watched her in shock. Slashing with the blade she cut the girl’s bindings and helped her to the ground as Grace ran toward them.

  T’lar was the first to react. “Shoot!” he screamed. “Shoot the girl! Shoot them both!” The archers loosed and both arrows flew toward Irene Illeniel.

  “No!” cried Grace, but she was still ten feet away.

  The world seemed to freeze as the arrows struck home, not into their intended target, but into Jasmine instead. She had knocked Irene prone and thrown herself between the girl and the archers. Two arrows stood out from her, one in her back and another from her ribs. She fell forward, wrapping Irene within her arms, hoping to shield her from any more arrows.

  The small bear exploded, and where it had been emerged a raging beast, a bear formed seemingly out of red and blue coruscating energy. Grace roared as she ran, passing the fallen woman and girl and flinging herself at the closest of the two archers. The man’s scream was short-lived as glowing jaws clamped down, crushing his shoulder.

  Gram had closed his eyes. Please, Matt, please tell me you put it back, he thought. T’lar’s grip on him had loosened as Jasmine had run for Irene.

  “Klardit,” whispered Gram, willing the sword to appear as he pitched forward, pulling his adversary off balance. The two men fell forward, Gram on his stomach while T’lar landed on his back, crushing him to the ground.

  “What?” said T’lar, confused. He released Gram and rolled off, his stomach tearing open as he pulled away from the broken sword. Gram held Thorn reversed in his hand, with its broken end pointing upward. He stood slowly, looking down on his enemy. T’lar was struggling to hold his entrails in with both hands, and then he looked up at Gram in horror, “How?”

  Gram swept Thorn across, using the foreshortened blade to sweep T’lar’s head from his shoulders. “You don’t deserve an explanation,” he said coldly.

  Chapter 36

  Gram wasted no time on the man he had just slain.

  Grace had finished the second archer and now stood protectively over Jasmine and Irene and her appearance was a shock. Her form was that of a massive bear, but one that had been constructed of brilliant red and blue energies, as though the light itself had taken solid form.

  What lay under her watchful eyes concerned him more.

  Jasmine held Irene tightly in her arms, but the arrows that had pierced her looked bad. One was protruding from the right side of her back, just beneath the shoulder blade, while the other had lodged between her ribs about six inches under her left arm. There was surprisingly little blood visible, but Gram knew that was not necessarily a good sign.

  “I’m sorry,” said the woman he had loved.

  Irene looked over her shoulder, “She’s hurt bad, Gram.” The girl had tears in her eyes. “She’s not like the others. She took care of me… before this.”

  “I know, Rennie,” said Gram. “Can you breathe?” he asked the wounded woman.

  “I think my lungs are intact,” she replied, cutting directly to his concern. “But…that just means I’ll live a little longer.”

  “Jasmine,” he said, experimenting with the sound of her name in his mouth.

  “No,” she protested. “I don’t want that name, not anymore. I want to be Alyssa. That other name, it belonged to a life that I regret. If you remember me as anyone…”

  “I won’t be remembering you,” insisted Gram. “You’re coming with us. The wizards can fix this. You just have to hold on long enough.”

  She smiled sadly, “You still want to save me? After everything I’ve done to you?”

  Gram knelt beside her. “Yes. I’m a fool, just like my grandfather, but I still love you.”

  “I was going to kill you,” she replied. “I hated myself, but I would have done it.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “Your eyes,” she said softly. “Those beautiful eyes—when T’lar held you, when he told me to kill you, and you looked at me with those eyes. How could you say that you trusted me?”

  “I don’t know,” he told her. “But it was the truth, and if it wasn’t, then I didn’t want to live any longer.”

  “My heart broke when you looked at me and said that, and I knew I couldn’t be the woman I had been. Jasmine died. I want to be Alyssa for what little time I have left, though I don’t deserve even that.”

  “You can spend your life making it up to me,” said Gram. Dismissing Thorn, he reached out to her.

  “What are you doing?” asked Alyssa.

  “I’m going to carry you away from here,” he answered.

  “Gram,” said Grace, “We have to move quickly. The riders will be here soon.”

  “Can you carry Irene on your back?” he asked the bear. He carefully broke the larger portion of each arrow off as he spoke, leaving only the point inside Alyssa, along with an inch of the shaft protruding from her.

  “Of course,” said Grace. “You’ll have to hold on tightly, Rennie. Can you do that?”

  Irene nodded, climbing onto the bear’s broad back.

  Gram slipped one arm beneath Alyssa’s right arm, sliding it around her shoulders, careful to avoid the arrows. The other he slipped under her legs, and then he began to lift.

  “Stop, Gram,” she protested. “You can’t run with me. I’m too heavy…” Her words ended in a painful hiss as he took her weight. “I’m dead already. Just leave me,” she finished.

  “Shut up,” he told her gently, and then he began to walk.

  Grace watched him worriedly, but said nothing. She moved at a rapid pace and Gram struggled to keep up. After a hundred yards he was falling behind. She stopped and waited. “How far away are they?” she asked.

  Glancing over his shoulder Gram gauged the distance. “Maybe a mile.”

  “We aren’t going to make it,” stated the bear.

  “Put me down,” begged Alyssa.

  “Go on,” Gram told Grace. “Run. Get Irene back home.”

  “I can’t do it without you, Gram,” said Grace.

  “I won’t leave her!” he said desperately. “Save Irene. You can move faster without me.”

  “I can’t,” said Grace. “I don’t have long. The journey back will take days.”

  “You’ve got five days left, right?”

  The bear shook her head in a strangely human gesture, “Not anymore. My transformation used up the last of my aythar—in a few hours I will fade.” Her voice held a sad sense of finality.

  “Dammit Grace! Don’t make me choose!” he shouted in frustration.

  “I’m dying, Gram. Let me go,” said Alyssa.

  Looking down he could see that he was covered in blood. The motion and strain of being carried had caused her wounds to bleed freely. His vision grew blurry and finally he
accepted the inevitable. Setting her down carefully, he felt hot tears streaking the dirt on his cheeks.

  “Leave me a sword,” said Alyssa. “If I am able, I will delay them.”

  He nodded wordlessly and drew out the cheap blade he had stolen, placing it in her hands. “I love you.”

  “And I you,” she answered. “If such things are possible, I will find you in the next life.”

  He kissed her and stood, putting his back to her. Irene watched them from Grace’s back, and her face was a terrible thing to behold. If she looks like that, what must I look like? Gram wondered.

  Grace began to run and Gram followed, letting his long legs stretch out as he tried to match her pace. Looking back he could see Alyssa sitting up, a lonely figure in the stony desert. The sword was point down in the ground in front of her and she held the hilt with both hands, using it to keep herself upright.

  They ran on, trying for as much speed as was possible. Gram suspected that Grace was restraining herself, loping easily along on her four legs. He tried not to think about what she had said before. Losing Alyssa was hard enough; losing Grace would be too much to bear.

  Glancing over his shoulder again he saw that the riders were only a quarter mile away now. They would reach Alyssa soon, but she was no longer sitting up. Her body had slumped, and she lay awkwardly on the hard ground. She had lost consciousness—or worse.

  Gritting his teeth, Gram ran on. The wind stung his eyes but he hardly cared.

  Five minutes passed and they reached the gap in the mountains where they had emerged originally, but they could feel the thunder of the horses behind them. “Run, Grace! Give it everything you have!” he shouted.

  “You run faster!” she growled back.

  “This is everything I’ve got! Keep going!” The effort of his sprint made it difficult to talk.

  “Take Rennie,” she shouted, “I’ll hold them at that outcropping.”

  She was talking about a spot some twenty yards ahead. It wasn’t a true choke point, the rocks blocked the right hand side with a steep overhang while the rough ground sloped upward to the left, but it would make it possible to delay the riders some. They could ride around the place, but it would force them to cover more difficult terrain. It was far more likely they would choose to simply ride down whoever tried to hold the open gap at the bottom.

  “I can’t run fast enough,” he told her.

  “Worst sidekick ever,” she yelled back. “You win Gram, but I won’t forgive you for this.” Grace’s body stretched out and her loping run sped up. As Gram has suspected, she could run much faster than she had been.

  Gram slowed and came to a stop at the narrow spot, staying close to the overhanging boulder. The horsemen were close, no more than twenty yards behind and he could see their leering grins as they closed on him, riding at a full gallop. There were at least fifty riders, some with spears while others carried sabers and small bucklers.

  He thought of Dorian one last time. I won’t disappoint you Father. They’ll soon know what a Thornbear can do.

  He faced them open-handed and unarmed as the lead rider barreled down on him, spear pointed at his chest. When the onrushing horse was no more than fifteen feet distant he called Thorn, this time in its full form, a six foot great sword, with a massive ruby set in its hilt. He noted the ruby with some surprise. Nice touch, Matt, but he had no time to appreciate it.

  With a surge of strength Gram dodged to the right at the last second, taking the side the rider was least likely to expect. A right hander would normally have gone left, to be able to swing more effectively with such a large weapon, not that the rider had been given a chance to realize his prey was now armed.

  The spear missed him and Thorn’s blade neatly removed the horse’s forelegs, sending the rider into a deadly crashing fall, but Gram didn’t pause. Sweeping forward with the great blade again he whirled to strike upward, taking the second rider’s mount in the throat. The steel passed cleanly through the right side of the horse’s neck before continuing on to take its rider in the chest.

  Within seconds the area had become an abattoir of blood and screaming horses. The riders behind had slowed, to avoid plowing into their now dying comrades. Gram didn’t need such restraint—he was just getting started.

  Running among them he lashed out with Thorn, cutting man and beast, hewing a bloody carcass-strewn path as he went. Spears stabbed at him but he dodged each with uncanny grace and when a buckler was raised to stop his sword, he ignored it. Thorn sliced through flesh, bone, and even steel shields with equal ease.

  Thorn burned in his grip and the longer Gram fought, the more powerful he became. Feverish energy coursed from the red stone in its hilt and soon he was moving with unbelievable speed. Gram strode through enemies that seemed to move far too slowly, and he carried death in his hands.

  Time passed slowly as he walked among them. Men wept and died while the ground was soaked with their blood. He shattered swords, battered men from their saddles, and when they cried for mercy their words fell on deaf ears.

  After an unknown period the battle halted. The riders that remained were withdrawing, pulling away in fear and terror from the demon that had slaughtered so many. Behind them, some fifty yards distant rode an armored man, picking his way casually forward.

  Their leader’s aspect was black, not just in the color of his mount, or his armor, but as though the light of the sun itself could not touch him. He was a dark stain against the horizon, and he exuded an ominous power that seemed to weigh on Gram’s shoulders.

  The dark rider held a black staff and he leveled it at Gram as if it were a spear. Something unseen flowed from it, pressing down on him. His knees grew weak and he felt the rider’s will, like a heavy blanket, smothering his defiance. Still thirty yards away, the rider whispered, but Gram heard his voice clearly, “Kneel.”

  Trembling, Gram struggled to stay on his feet, but his strength was waning.

  Thorn blazed in his hand and he heard his father’s voice, “No.” In his mind’s eye Gram saw his father once more, standing behind him, large hands clasped over his own, supporting the blade and giving him strength—embracing him. “Stand, Son.”

  He lifted his chin and straightened his back. The pressure remained, but he held himself upright.

  The rider watched him for a moment, and then lifted his staff higher, pointing it at something above Gram’s head. A burst of amaranthine light emerged, ripping through the air to pass above him. It left a vivid afterimage and Gram wondered for a second why the stranger had deliberately aimed to miss. Looking back over his shoulder he immediately realized why.

  A dragon was falling from the sky.

  Could it be the Queen? Gram dismissed that thought; it was too small to be Ariadne’s dragon, Carwyn. That creature had grown to enormous proportions in the years after she had received it, while this one looked to be no more than ten feet in length, from nose to tail-tip. It carried a rider, and the two of them were spiraling downward. If their fall wasn’t checked, they would soon hit the ground within a short distance of where Gram stood.

  The Countess had been given a dragon, Gram knew that because it had gifted her with strength and speed, but no one had yet seen it. He didn’t think this was it, though, the rider was a man.

  The dark rider was aiming again, preparing to finish them.

  Gram sprang forward, charging at his unknown enemy. Whoever rode the dragon was a friend; of that much he was certain.

  His foe glanced at him, marking his advance, and then dismissed him. Despite his speed Gram couldn’t reach him in time, nor did the rider seem particularly worried. Knowing he would be too late, Gram ran for a large rock that interrupted the ground before him and with a short hop he was atop it. Using his considerable momentum he leapt again, putting as much strength into the jump as he could.

  A second bolt of amaranthine power blazed forth, and Gram intersected its path, holding Thorn before him as though he would cut light itself.


  Gram’s world fractured and he was flung back. The purple beam had struck Thorn and detonated, shattering the sword and sending him tumbling backward in a parabolic arc. He still held the sword’s hilt, but a shimmering cloud of spinning steel fragments surrounded him.

  No!

  Gram didn’t have the breath to scream, but his heart cried at the sight of his ruined weapon. He hit the ground hard, pain erupting in his side from the impact, but the damage to Thorn mattered more to him than his bruised and battered ribs. He struggled to rise, but his body refused to cooperate. Gram’s clothing was scorched and burned but the blast had done remarkably little damage to him personally.

  As he watched, the sword began to reform. The pieces that had flown apart now coalesced again, fitting together like pieces of some insanely complex puzzle and where they joined, he could see no lines to indicate they had ever been separate. Gram stared at Thorn in wonder, managing to sit up even as he gasped to draw air into his battered chest.

  Boots crunched in the gravel behind him. Matthew Illeniel stood close at hand.

  “Cool isn’t it,” he said mildly, indicating the sword with his hand.

  Gram gaped at him, but he didn’t have enough wind to speak.

  The dark rider dismounted and began to walk toward them, “So the spawn of Illeniel has come at last. Your father will regret sending children to fight his battles for him.”

  The pressure that Gram had felt before intensified, and Matthew grimaced, a look of concentration on his face. Reaching into a pouch, he withdrew a handful of something that looked like salt and then tossed it into the air. The small crystals spread in the air, floating and spreading out around them. The pressure vanished and the young wizard’s face relaxed, “That’s better.”

  The dragon stood behind them, standing unsteadily on three legs. It held one of its forelegs away from the ground, and Gram could see that it was bleeding. “Fly Desacus,” said Matthew. “You’ve done enough.”

  The beast didn’t move and though Gram heard no response it must have made one, for his friend replied.