by Shae Ford
Every time he’d asked her when she planned to march on the summit, she would say something about stomping the Man of Wolves. She’d get the wildmen so stirred to roaring that anything Kael tried to say was completely drowned out.
So today, he’d followed her into the woods.
It hadn’t been difficult to find her. Gwen’s heavy, clomping steps made the tracking easy, and she couldn’t outrun him. Now that he finally had her cornered, he was determined to get an answer.
“If you’ll just tell me what you have planned, I might be able to help.”
“We plan to crush him,” she said with a shrug. “And after I’m finished, there’ll be little for you to help with.”
He leapt into her path. “All right, but how are you going to crush him?”
“With my fist.”
The blow she slung into his chest likely would’ve shattered an average man’s ribcage. But Kael had gotten so used to her punches that he hardly flinched. Instead, he grabbed her arm and twisted. “You know what I mean, Gwen. How are you going to fight him? What strategy will you use?”
Red blossomed behind her paint as she fought his grip. Her strength swelled against him, gaining her an inch. “Strategy?”
“Yes. Strategy is how you move an army.” His muscles were shaking. He lost a little more ground as he thought of how to explain it. “Fighting a war is like battling with two enormous beasts: you’ve got to tell your beast where to go, tell it where to bite — ouch!”
She’d slowly taken over while he’d been talking. Now he was the one with his arm twisted back. “I’ll tell my army when to crush him — and that’ll be the end of it.”
“If he beat you once, he can do it again.”
“My army is better equipped, this time. I’ll bring the Man of Wolves to his knees,” she growled — forcing Kael to his.
“Then why don’t you get on with it? What are you waiting for?” he grunted.
“I’ve already told you — the time hasn’t come.”
Kael relaxed. He slumped against her hold and for half a breath, let her think she’d won. Then he pulled himself free with a burst of strength.
He slammed the heel of his hand into her middle. She swung for his head and stumbled forward when he ducked. He took the opportunity to rip her over his shoulder. There was a thud as her back struck the ground. He sprang up and tried to put some distance between them — but somehow, she’d already gotten to her feet.
She tackled him from behind. Her hand wound in his curls and ripped back, forcing his eyes to the trees. He knew he couldn’t wrench his way out of her grasp from that angle. So he tipped backwards and let his body fall to the ground.
Her gasp was strangled at his ear. He knew he’d knocked the wind out of her. By the time he flipped over, her boots were under his chest. She would’ve launched him clear across the woods, had he not thought to turn his skin to stone.
Sweat trickled down the furious lines of her paint. Her breathing was sharp as she struggled to hold him up. Kael knew he’d won — but he wasn’t finished with her, yet.
“Tell me how Titus beat you.”
She managed to raise him a hair’s breadth before he concentrated on making the stone denser, even thicker. Her legs shook as he sagged towards her.
“If you tell me how he beat you the first time, I can make certain it won’t happen again. Just tell me what you know.”
“I can’t!”
“Quit being difficult. Tell me how Titus beat you, or I swear I’ll crush —”
“I don’t know! I don’t know how he beat us!”
Kael’s surprise lifted him an inch. “What do you mean?”
Her face burned scarlet. Sweat rolled down her neck in molten lines as she roared: “I … don’t … know!”
His ears rang with her cry, but it wasn’t the words that shook him: it was her eyes. The angry red veins bled pink into the white. A dangerous film covered them — one that was every bit as clear and fragile as glass. He could sense what was about to happen, but he was no less surprised when it finally came.
He watched in horror as a tear slipped from the edge of her eye.
Gwen clamped down upon it furiously, turning her head away. But the damage had already been done. That single tear coursed down her cheek and onto her jaw, where she wiped it away. “Get off me.”
Kael rolled aside. “I’m sorry … I didn’t kn —”
“Well, now you do. Now you know that I’m a failure and an idiot.”
“You’re not —”
“I’m the only Thane in our history to lose the mountain’s top,” she snapped over him. “And I’ve got no idea how it was even taken from me. All I know is that I’d rather be a blot on my fathers’ throne than risk destroying my people. I hope one day our children’s children will laugh about what a shame I was,” she added with a hard look. “Because at least that’ll mean we lived.”
Kael watched as she clomped away, his chest heavy with her words. He wished he could’ve been there when Titus attacked — he wished he could’ve seen what the wildmen saw. He was certain that if he’d only known how they’d been beaten, he could unravel Titus’s plan …
Wait a moment — perhaps there was a way he could see it. Perhaps there was a way he could watch the battle through their eyes. It was a mad idea, and he would need help.
So he went in search of Griffith.
*******
“You want us to do what?”
Kael thought he would go mad if he had to say it again. “I need you to stand in a circle and —”
“I’m not doing it. We’re warriors, not fairies,” one of the wildmen said, rapping his knuckles on the shining top of his breastplate.
Most of the warriors were gathered outside the forge. They’d just been fitted in their new armor and had fresh edges ground into the steel swords at their belts. There was probably no worse time to ask them to link hands — but then again, there would probably never be a better one.
“All I need is two moments.”
Another wildman snorted loudly. “When was the last time you saw a bunch of warriors standing around holding hands?”
“I only want to help you.”
“You’d do well to listen to him,” Kyleigh said as she strode from the forge. “I can always tell when he’s got something exciting planned.”
She smiled at him from over her shoulder — and Kael had to wonder if she could also tell when his heart was about to burst from his skin. He hoped she couldn’t.
“Do you really have something planned?” Griffith said.
He didn’t. Not yet. But if he could get the warriors to work with him, he was certain he would have one before evening. “I just … need your help,” he said evasively.
A determined red sprang up behind Griffith’s freckles as he held out his hand. “And the rest of you will do it, too — or I’ll tell Gwen about the animals,” he added with a glare.
Now that the village had been rebuilt and all the weapons and armor had been made, the wildmen had run out of things to do — which meant they often got into mischief. A few nights ago, some of the warriors had snuck into the Hall and, with the craftsmen’s help, had wreaked havoc on the many stuffed animals that adorned the back wall.
Gwen had marched into dinner that evening to find that her prized creatures had all been rearranged: the boars had foxtails hanging off their chins, the wolves wore antlers, and most of the deer had sharp, pointed teeth. A few badgers had even been settled into some rather compromising positions.
When Gwen saw her favorite bear shooting her a rude gesture from where it sprawled in her throne, she’d lost her temper — and the wildmen had all fled the Hall rather than risk getting a pair of antlers shoved anywhere they couldn’t reach.
Though the craftsmen had returned the animals to their places, Gwen was still completely livid about it. So the warriors joined hands rather than risk having Griffith out them.
Kael hadn’t circled with the warriors
before. He’d hoped the fact that they didn’t question every little thing might make it a bit easier. But he was wrong.
The warriors’ excitement bubbled up when Kael showed them how his thoughts came alive in the circle. He showed them a memory of one of his caddocs and then stepped back, asking to see their memories of battle.
Things quickly got out of hand.
“Stop it,” Kael growled, breaking the circle. “I don’t care about who’s survived the highest fall, or which of you killed the biggest bear —”
“Especially when mine was clearly biggest,” Griffith said.
One of the warriors snorted. “Oh yeah? Why don’t I show you the wynn I stomped while you were still in nappies —”
“No!” The word burst from Kael’s lungs so loudly that the warriors actually flinched. “We’re not going to waste time bickering back and forth. I need you to focus. Show me what you remember of your battle with Titus.”
The warriors fell silent immediately. They scratched at the tops of their heads, dragged their fingers down the lines of their paint. Not a one of them reached to clasp hands. All wore the same dangerous scowl.
“We were beaten,” one of them finally said. “It’s done. There’s no point in living through it again.”
The others murmured in agreement. They’d turned to leave when Griffith spoke up: “I’ll go first.”
He held out his hands, waiting — and one by one, the warriors crept back in. Griffith’s hand shook furiously as Kael grasped it. But when the circle closed, he kept his word.
Screams raked across their ears. They heard the shriek of splitting wood and saw the Earl’s men burst through the shattered gates. Through Griffith’s eyes, the army was a stone monster: a beast with an impenetrable shell and hundreds of shining, pointed teeth. His gasps filled their lungs as he tried to keep up with the other warriors. He was nearly there when something knocked him off his feet.
They heard the thud as his back struck the wall; saw the great, red shadow that loomed before him — a devil with an iron head and hollow pits for eyes, a beast twisted by Griffith’s nightmares. The world spun as the monster slung him about. They heard him cry, heard the crunching of his bone.
A howl, a sharp thwap, and the monster fell aside. Gwen was there — the tail of an arrow hung from her chest and her tunic was drenched in blood. Even so, she scooped Griffith onto her shoulder.
“Hold tight, Griff! We’re going to make it out. We’re going to make it …”
Her voice trailed away and the middle of the circle went dark. Griffith’s hand trembled so violently now that Kael could feel it through his trance. He was about to break their connection when another image rose in the middle.
The warriors went around the circle, each one offering up his memories of the battle. They showed him everything: the shattering of their dragonsbane weapons, the deaths of their comrades … the bleeding, mangled bodies of the ones they loved. Orange-blue fire burst all around them, adding to their panic.
He felt their fear, their anguish — felt how those unfamiliar edges dragged across their hearts. And slowly, he understood.
For all their strength and chasing monsters about, the wildmen had never warred with a human enemy. They had never known what it meant to fight in a real battle. Through their eyes, Titus was the Man of Wolves — a wicked, grinning nightmare shrouded by a cruel, impenetrable cloak.
The wildmen were like children: terrified of something they didn’t understand, haunted by an enemy they had no idea how to defeat. To them, the battle was hopeless. Each of their visions ended with a crushing blackness — a hood that shuttered their flame. But Kael was determined to bring their fires back.
They needed to see what he saw — they needed a new vision.
So he gave them one.
Their fists would shatter Titus’s walls. Their strength would fill its cracks like ice and stretch until they crumbled. They would peel back the iron shell of his army and batter the soft flesh beneath. They would break the steely points off its teeth. Their hands would wrench the monsters apart by their jaws. And at last, they would crush Titus, himself.
No, they would stomp him — they would drive his body so deeply into the rock that not even the wynns would be able to dig him up. They would own the mountain’s top once more, and it would never again be taken from them.
He knew the moment the warriors started to believe because they added themselves to his vision. They charged through the walls and set upon Titus’s army, fighting through Kael’s imagination. When he was convinced that he had them blazing once more, he let them go.
They leapt around each other; they howled and beat their chests.
“We’re going to stomp him!” Griffith bellowed over the others’ cries. “We’re going to crush the Man of Wolves!”
Their fires were there, but the flames glowed weakly. The warriors needed more than kindling to stay bright. They needed a fierce wind that would stoke them to a roar, as the storm gales had done to Daybreak. They needed to taste the blood of the Man of Wolves — they needed to know that he could be beaten.
“Come with me,” Kael said.
And the warriors followed.
*******
Earl Titus’s fort leered at them from the slopes above Tinnark. It was nearly complete. Another week or two, and it likely would’ve been finished. But Kael wasn’t going to let that happen.
His army was spotted the moment they left the trees. The Earl’s men shouted in warning and began to scurry along the ramparts; the arms of their catapults disappeared as they bent dangerously beneath the wall. A moment later, something small shot into the air.
It was a stocky clay jar — one of the same vessels Kael had seen in the Earl’s camp. There was a rag hanging from its mouth and its tail was ablaze. Kael hurled a rock at it before it could travel too far, exploding it in the air.
“That’s where the Man of Wolves’ fire comes from,” Kael called as the orange-blue flames rained down upon the field between them. “It’s weak while it’s in the air. Knock it down!”
When the next catapult swung, the warriors answered with their own barrage. They ran as they threw — exploding the Earl’s fire and gaining on his fort. Their hands and eyes moved so quickly that they began to strike before the jars could clear the wall. Screams pierced the air as the soldiers’ own fire devoured them.
The wildmen charged up the hill in a single unbroken line. They stepped easily around spear points, ducked beneath a hail of arrows. A cry ripped from Kael’s throat as the first of the wildmen reached the gates. He heard the wood crack beneath the thrusts of their hands — saw it tremble, shudder.
Then finally, it gave way.
“Stomp them!” Griffith roared as he charged inside. “Peel their armor back — crush their flesh!”
The warriors did exactly that: they did everything Kael had showed them. They destroyed the Earl’s men, smashed his catapults, flattened his walls — and then they turned their eyes upon the tower.
Their hands slammed into its sides together. Half of them pushed from the ground, and the other from the ramparts. One, two, three times, they struck. And on the fourth, it toppled.
Howls and whistles filled the air as the warriors roared over their victory. They leapt around each other and beat their chests. It was only when his throat began to burn that Kael realized he’d joined their cries. It was only when he felt the bruises on his chest that he realized he was pounding right along with them.
A tiny voice in the back of his head warned him that he probably looked ridiculous. It shrilled that he was behaving like a wildman, that he ought to calm himself. But Kael didn’t listen.
He howled all the louder. He pounded his chest even harder. And the warriors’ song drowned out that little voice.
Chapter 30
Happy News
“You, Sir Wright, are in very big trouble,” Kyleigh said when he stepped inside the forge.
Kael was well aware of this. Gwen had
made it abundantly clear when she’d ripped the hospital door off its hinges and flung it at him. She likely would’ve beaten him to death with one of his bedposts, had Griffith not stepped in.
“Don’t you see what this means, sister?”
“It means you’ve disobeyed me,” she’d snarled. “I told you to leave that fort alone. Had we not attacked, the Man of Wolves —”
“He would’ve come after us anyways!” Griffith cried.
“Well, he certainly will now. There’s no doubt he’ll call his monsters down upon us again — on our craftsmen, on those children from downmountain. How do you plan to protect them, Griffith?”
The edge in her voice had drained all the red from her brother’s face, but his chin stuck out stubbornly. “Kael will know how to protect them. He knows how to fight the Man of Wolves. You’ve seen what he —”
“Kael.” She’d hardly glanced at him as she spat his name — as if he wasn’t even worth the trouble to scold. “All Kael’s proved today is that he’s a fool as well as a weakling.”
“He’s stronger than you think — he’s strong enough to lead us!” Griffith cried. He’d glared at her back as she marched away, and the blue marble rolled madly between his fingers. “Don’t worry, Kael. I’ll think of something. I’ll prove you’re ready.”
And before Kael had a chance to get a word in edge-wise, Griffith had stalked from the hospital.
By that point, Baird had begun to complain loudly about all of the noise — and warned that if he didn’t have some peace, he’d be forced to do something drastic. So rather than have to find out what that might be, Kael had hung the broken door back into place and jogged straight for the forge.
He didn’t know what Gwen planned to do with him … but he knew there was safety in numbers. “She thinks I forced them into it,” Kael muttered as he paced. “She said I entranced them with my Wright visions.”