We had already been through several discussions about the meaning of radio bands and wavelength, so I understood the gist of his statement, but I wasn’t sure what it might imply. “Does this help us?”
“Yes and no,” said Gary. “It means I have a good reference for detecting their local communications, the signals they use to communicate within a few hundred feet. Unfortunately, I don’t think there’s any way we can easily build devices that can do that for us, not with the technology and materials you have available.”
Matthew chimed in, “So the only way we can detect them at close range is if you yourself are within the vicinity.”
The android nodded affirmatively.
I ground my teeth. Great. Before I could verbalize my frustration, I heard the distinctive sound of the alarm I had created years before, during what scholars had retroactively labeled the God-Stone War.
Chapter 23
The bell tower was ringing. Rushing out into the courtyard, I looked up at the nearest tower. A vivid blue light shone there, emanating from the enchanted crystal mounted atop it. A similar light was shining from all the wall towers, as well as the smaller towers protecting Washbrook.
Everyone in the yard—stable grooms, men-at-arms, washerwomen, craftsmen—they all stood still, staring at the towers. It was as though the world was holding its breath. After a second someone yelled, and they all began to run at once, heading in various directions.
In the sky above, I could see the shield was up, visible only to my magesight, a faintly glowing dome that covered the entirety of Castle Cameron and Washbrook. The people around me were heading for their assigned positions, which for most of them in the courtyard meant the keep itself. The castle denizens were supposed to muster in the great hall. In Washbrook a similar process should be taking place, though it was likely a bit more chaotic. Most of the townsfolk would be heading for the tavern, the Muddy Pig, to take sanctuary in the hidden shelter built beneath it.
There was an anxious feeling in the air, but it stopped short of panic. Since the time of my battle with the Shining Gods, we hadn’t needed to use the defenses, but I had insisted in keeping up the practice of having a yearly drill, usually right before our mid-winter festival. Thanks to that the people knew how to respond.
What I couldn’t fathom, though, was why the alarm had been sounded. Was it ANSIS? Had Tyrion decided to make war on us with the She’Har? Neither seemed likely, at least not yet.
Matthew started to run past me, but I stopped him with a yell, “Where are you going?”
“The control room,” he answered immediately.
I shook my head. “No, that’s my job. You take position at the main gate.”
“What about me, Your Excellency?” asked Gary.
“You head to the great—no, scratch that. You stay with my son. If this is ANSIS, you might have some insight to offer him,” I ordered. Without waiting to hear their responses, I lifted myself into the air and shot toward the doors to the main keep. They had already been thrown wide to accept the influx of castle servants and rather than mingle with them, I flew over their heads.
It was a short trip down the hall and around a corner before I reached the hidden door to the secret chamber that controlled the castle’s defenses. Pressing my hand against a certain spot on the wall, I stepped through the door that opened in front of me. Elaine was already inside, which meant she was the one who had activated the castle’s shield.
“What’s happening?” I asked.
“We’re under attack,” she replied immediately.
“Who?”
Elaine waved her hand at the wall. “You tell me. I don’t recognize them.”
The wall she indicated was covered in large panes of enchanted glass. The enchantment on the glass was just to protect it, making it incredibly strong and hard to break. The glass covered small portals that opened on the exterior walls of the towers around Castle Cameron and Washbrook. Without the glass, an enemy could fire projectiles directly into the control chamber through the viewing portals when they were active.
Most of the portals showed nothing unusual, but those on the towers flanking the gate of Washbrook showed what appeared at first glance to be a small army.
On second glance, I decided it was definitely an army, but it didn’t look like any army I had seen before. Heavyset men in some sort of strange plate stood in vague lines in front of the gate. Their heads and chests were covered in some sort of metal plate, but their legs and arms were less protected, covered only in some kind of heavy leather. Or was that their skin?
I revised my initial impression. They weren’t men, at least none I had ever seen before. They were short, perhaps only four and a half feet in height and close to being as wide as they were tall. Judging by their thick arms and legs, they were probably very strong. Most of them carried steel-rimmed square shields. Those in the front ranks had one-handed axes while those behind had some sort of polearm similar to a halberd. No, more like a bardiche, I corrected myself. The weapons were mounted on long hafts eight or nine feet in length, with a long blade with a wicked tip at the end, making them suitable for both chopping and thrusting. The rear ranks carried crossbows, though they were far heavier than any I had seen troops carry before.
They looked dangerously brutal. Having faced an army at the gates before and being familiar with the distances between the wall towers, I was able to do a rough calculation of the enemy’s numbers. Seven, maybe eight hundred men, or whatever they are, I thought. Certainly, they far outnumbered the men guarding Cameron and Washbrook.
People often made the mistake of thinking that lords kept small private armies within their castle walls, while nothing could be further from the truth. Castles usually had only the staff required to keep them running and a relatively small force of guards. Men-at-arms were expensive to feed and maintain. The real point of a fortified castle was that it didn’t take that many men to defend. Ten or twenty men with strong walls could hold off a force of hundreds for long periods of time.
In fact, I had nearly sixty guards within the walls of Castle Cameron, but only because we had made our recent expedition. Otherwise half of those would have been elsewhere, tending to their homes and families. In times of war I could muster perhaps two hundred levies, peasant soldiers, but that took at least a week’s advance notice.
With over fifty men, we could defend the castle from a force this size, even without a magical shield and wizards, but it was unlikely we could keep them out of Washbrook. Fortunately, that wasn’t a concern. The magical shield protecting the village as well as the castle was designed to withstand even the forces and powers of a god.
But I didn’t intend to wait within our perfect defenses. The enemy at our gates would soon realize they couldn’t breach the shield. What would they do then? Historically, the answer was that they would then burn and pillage everything that they could reach. The mill, herders, and tenant farmers, all would pay the price for our neglect. Most of them were still in the surrounding countryside, and even those that had retreated into Washbrook would lose their homes, crops, and property.
No human army, local or otherwise, would have dared present themselves before my gates. The last army to do so, a force of nearly thirty thousand from Gododdin, had been burned, crushed, and then drowned. In my overzealous desire to make certain no one forgot the lesson, I had killed them all to nearly the last man. The only reason I wasn’t called the ‘Butcher of Battle Cameron’ was because I had committed more memorable atrocities in the years that followed.
“What will you do?” asked Elaine, interrupting my thoughts.
I shrugged. “What else? Parley. If that doesn’t work, I’ll get rid of them.” Before I stepped out the door I added, “Watch for my signal at the Washbrook gate. When you see it let me through, then close it behind me.”
“But—,” she started to protest, but I ignored her, closing the door after me.
A variety of people yelled for my attention as I hea
ded toward the keep entrance. Sir Gram and Captain Draper were the first I addressed, “Gram, you’re coming with me. Captain Draper, assemble all but the sentries near the Washbrook gate. I’ll be going out to parley.”
Penny was next. She stood by the door, already in her armor. The empty sleeve of her mail hauberk pulled tight and tied in front of her. “You aren’t going out there,” she said firmly. “Someone else can talk to them.”
I met her brown eyes, staring into the dark depths of her resolve. How many times had we faced similar situations together? Every case had been different. Sometimes she had been my guardian, and other times she had been forced to take other roles. If I didn’t take her with me, there would be hell to pay later. In my youth I had often agonized over my decisions.
I was not that man anymore.
“Organize those sheltering in the keep, reassure them,” I told her. “I don’t think there is any real danger to them, but a panic would be dangerous. If something does go wrong, I trust you to do whatever is necessary.”
She started to argue, but I held up one hand, cutting her off. Penny’s face blanched at my brusqueness. I will definitely pay for that, I sighed inwardly.
“Matthew, Moira, you will come with me to the gate in Washbrook. Conall and Irene, you will take positions at the castle gatehouse. Captain Draper, make sure they have at least two guardsmen with each of them. They will be responsible for managing any threat that gets through Washbrook,” I commanded. With those words, I began walking again.
Gram and my two children fell in behind me.
“Thank you,” said Moira.
I assumed she meant because I had brought the two of them along. “Don’t,” I told her. “You’ll both be staying inside the walls, acting as reserves in case I do something stupid and get myself killed or incapacitated. Only Gram and Myra will accompany me outside.”
“What about the dragons?” prompted Matthew.
I glanced up and over my shoulder, toward the eyrie that lay in the mountains behind us. The dragons were currently up there, outside the protection of the shield over Cameron. “They’re safe where they are,” I noted. “I don’t intend to drop the shield to bring them in.”
“They could strafe the enemy with dragonfire,” suggested Gram.
“Our guests have rather formidable looking crossbows,” I informed him, since he hadn’t seen the enemy yet. “The damn things are like small ballistae. I’m sure the dragons could inflict serious harm, perhaps even rout them, but I’d rather not risk them being injured.”
Five minutes later we stood in front of the town gate. Several nervous-looking town militiamen stood close by. The first to approach me was Simon MacAllistair. Technically, he was in charge of Washbrook’s small citizen guard, but he was a cobbler by trade. “Milord,” he addressed me, bobbing his head respectfully. “Washbrook stands ready.”
His serious tone almost made me chuckle. The Washbrook militia was made up of older men, those too old to serve as soldiers if I had to call up my levies. Many of them had some past military experience, but all of them were long past their prime. They were intended as auxiliaries, in the event that my actual soldiers were absent or if they had been overwhelmed.
I knew better than to dismiss him, though. However old he might be, Simon meant business. “Have your men hold their positions in the towers,” I ordered. “Keep your bows ready. Let Captain Draper’s men handle the walls and gate if it comes to a melee.”
Stepping up to the gate, I raised my voice, “Open it, and be sure to close it tightly after we’re through.”
They did, and seconds later the massive oaken timbers of the gate began to move, swinging inward. Moira had already released her alter-ego, Myra, and she and Gram followed me closely, one on either side. Matthew and Moira followed a short distance behind. When we had reached the shield, which stood some five feet from the walls, I turned back to them. “When I signal Elaine to open the shield gate, stay here. Do not have her open it again until we return. If things go wrong, don’t open it unless we’re close and you think you can get us back safely. Remember, there are hundreds of people in Washbrook. Their lives are more important than ours.”
Neither of the twins looked happy. Matthew’s expression was one of disappointment, while Moira’s face spoke clearly of her opinions. She thinks I’m an idiot, I noted. At least she had the sense to hold her tongue.
“I think you’re an idiot,” she said aloud, echoing my thoughts.
“Captain Draper should be the one to do this,” added Matthew, agreeing with his sister for a change.
Already full of tension, I found myself unable to muster any anger at their verbal mutiny. “Your objections are noted. Now, do as I say.” Then I held up my hand and made a vertical slash in the air. Elaine was watching through the window portals, and that was my signal to open the shield.
A second later, I felt an opening appear in the air in front of me, twenty feet wide and twenty feet high. I stepped forward, leading Gram and Myra.
The first thing I noticed was the wind on my cheeks. It had been conspicuously absent before, since the protective dome had enforced a calm over Washbrook. There weren’t many clouds, and the sun warmed the side of my face that wasn’t being buffeted by the breeze. It felt good.
It was always like that during these moments. Anxiety and adrenaline drive the mind and body into a state of hyperawareness, and often the things one notices most, are the small impressions that are frequently ignored during everyday life. In the air I could smell the trees from across the field, as well as a hint of sheep dung.
The enemy was less than a hundred yards away, watching us carefully. I began walking toward them as the shield closed once more behind us. Gram was silent as he walked by my side, a moving statue of shining metal. Speaking to Myra, I asked, “Can you get anything from here?”
Being a spell-twin of Moira, she possessed the same gift of the Centyr that my daughter did. “Their minds are strange,” she responded. “They don’t speak our language, and there’s an odd resistance, as though they are shielding their minds. I can feel their wariness, but little else. They think this might be a trap.”
That was pretty much what I’d expected, though the language problem was a new twist. We kept moving until we had reached the midway point, and then stopped. Since the strangers hadn’t attacked yet, I held up a hand and waved at them.
“We should have brought a white flag,” observed Gram.
“They aren’t even human,” I replied. “They probably wouldn’t recognize it. We don’t even know what their custom for parleys might involve, or if they have one.”
A rapid-fire series of metallic clicks rang out from the enemy, as though all of them had tapped on their armor in quick succession.
Myra answered my unspoken question, “That was some sort of signal, an order to stand ready but not to attack—yet.”
“Can you tell where their leader is?” I asked. Standing at ground level, I could only see their front rank, and even that was largely covered by their shields. With my magesight, I searched through the ranks behind that, but I couldn’t detect any obvious movement or arrangement that indicated who their commander was.
“There are around twenty of them that radiate some degree of authority, scattered throughout,” said Myra. “Near the left of the center there are three that stand close together. One of them seems to be directing the other two.”
Try as I might, I couldn’t figure out which three she meant.
“Let me link with you,” said Myra helpfully. “I can show you.” She reached out toward me with her hand.
Slowly, I took it. Moira had given her enough of her power to allow Myra to create a form with physical substance. Her hand felt real in my grasp, though my magesight could easily detect that it was merely a construct of aythar. Lowering my mental shield, I touched her mind and images began flowing between us.
There, she told me. Those three.
Magesight was a thing of form, almos
t touch. There was no true color in it, and when there was, it was a product of the human mind interpreting different ‘flavors’ of aythar. The three Myra was indicating lit up with mental colors, two of them red while the one between them seemed golden.
Studying them for a moment, I made a note of their aythar, ensuring I could recognize them in the future, then I broke the link between Myra and myself. “Thank you,” I told her.
Seconds later there was movement. One of the three began to make his way forward, and two others bearing shields and axes followed on either side of him. “That’s the second in command,” relayed Myra. “The leader and third in command are staying behind while he comes to meet us. He’s bringing a small honor guard with him.”
I could have guessed as much, but I nodded my thanks to her, keeping my eyes on the soldiers in front of us. A gap opened in the front rank and their sub-commander and his two guards strode toward us.
“Any instructions?” asked Gram.
“Try to look intimidating,” I replied.
Gram straightened, tightening his grip on Thorn. “Yes, my lord.”
“That was for Myra,” I said with a smirk. “I only brought you to look pretty, Gram.”
He gave me a bewildered look that reminded me so much of Dorian it made me want to hug him, while Myra stifled a laugh.
Mentally, I reached out to Myra, creating a new link without taking her hand. You’re much better at reading thoughts. Since we don’t share their language, I’ll need you to try and interpret for me.
Her reply was a warm glow—I could feel her love and trust. Of course. Though I had only recently learned of her existence, I realized she truly considered me her father. It was a humbling sensation, and I began to doubt my decision to bring her with me. My intention had been to use her for this in order to protect my ‘real’ daughter. Now I felt as though I had just substituted one family member for another.
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