The fact they were marching forth to attack her forces was an unexpected development, one which threw her plan to await Elyas’s host into doubt.
They must know of my other army. Perhaps they seek a swift victory, to divide and defeat my forces before they unite? She mulled that over as she glided, riding an updraft. The united forces of the mortals still weren’t enough to match her own in numbers, yet the outcome of meeting them head on was far from certain. A defeat of her forces was unlikely, but she had no way of knowing for certain until blood was flowing.
I could pull my troops back, lure them farther away from their city, then crush them between my armies. That would have been the wise strategic move, but the truth was she was impatient with all the waiting and eager to spill more blood. The raid on her camp the prior night was a provocation she couldn’t leave unanswered. Even if her host sustained heavier losses than expected, that was of little concern, for she anticipated the culmination of her plans sooner rather than later. Taananzu was growing nearer to securing the control rod for the Tellurian Engine, and Nesnys knew Taren couldn’t evade her grasp much longer. Once she had either in her possession, the war was inconsequential. Shaol would turn his attention on more meaningful objectives, and Nesnys was ready and eager to be rewarded with a new command to sow blood and chaos across the multiverse.
Will the little mouse grow brave and sneak out of his hiding hole? She had been sorely tempted to ambush and abduct Taren when he emerged to speak with Elyas that day, but she decided against such a rash move. Perhaps he will reveal himself this time.
She banked and soared back toward her own camp, already issuing orders psionically to her officers to march immediately.
This day shall be filled with glorious bloodshed. The sky will be blotted out with smoke, the air filled with the wails of the dying. And once these mortals are crushed on the field, Carran shall stand unprotected.
Chapter 25
Sianna watched the Nebaran force appear in the distance and nodded to herself, relieved their ploy had apparently worked.
“Looks as if you made her good and mad, Master Creel,” she said.
Creel looked quite pleased with himself. “Aye, Your Majesty. And I see very few horsemen among them.”
“Indeed. Well done.” She turned to Lanthas, huddled with the commanders. “Is all in order, Loren?”
“Just so, Your Majesty. As we had hoped, we shall meet them on the ground we have prepared. All that is left now is for us to execute our plans and pray that Sol favors us this day.”
Sianna nodded and looked around for Father Wilhelm, high priest of the temple in Carran and senior cleric since Father Ethert had died during King Clement’s ill-fated campaign. “Will you lead us in prayer, Father?”
Wilhelm was a portly man who seemed a touch too enamored with his own vanity for a man of the cloth. His substantial bulk was robed in the finest white-and-gold brocade and bejeweled like the wealthiest peacock among nobles. He’s evidently not a believer in the virtue of humility. The old, naive Sianna would have been mortified at thinking such thoughts months earlier, but she merely pressed her lips together to restrain an irreverent smile. Despite her reservations, Wilhelm dutifully led them in a short prayer, asking Sol for victory on the field that day.
The elves and dwarves held their own council, and once plans were finalized, Sianna was surprised to see Rukk Stonefist and Sioned Hammerhelm join their units to lead them in battle. She felt something of a coward for staying so far to the rear, well back from the battle lines where she would be protected, with mounts at the ready should they need to flee.
At least Nardual and Shalaera remain here as well. She glanced around for a friendly face but saw that all her friends, save her bodyguards, had retreated away from the crowd of nobles and officers. Even Creel had gone over to speak with Taren, Mira, and Ferret. Sianna felt a pang of envy at their freedom.
“Perhaps we shall see the boy perform some marvelous feats with his talent this day,” Shalaera said suddenly, following Sianna’s gaze. She had a hunger in her disconcerting eyes, which Sianna didn’t care for.
“Perhaps he shall,” she replied coolly. “However, we should all hope that our fate this day doesn’t hinge upon one man’s magical talent.”
Shalaera’s thin lips curled in amusement, and she regarded Sianna intently. “You are right, of course, dear queen.” She rested a hand on Sianna’s shoulder, and her bony fingers tightened. “Although a display of the preternatural talent that freed you from the heart of the enemy camp—that I would greatly desire to behold.”
A horn blast sounded then, sparing her from making a reply, and her army began to advance. She pulled away from the elven witch-queen’s grasp and stepped up beside some of her officers to get an unobstructed view of the battlefield below the low hill they congregated atop. Perhaps a quarter mile distant and marching steadily closer, the Nebaran host stretched out of sight, their numbers indeterminate, though her scouts insisted they had roughly sixteen thousand men. She had seen soldiers on maneuvers before, but the sight of more than fourteen thousand of her own allies moving in formation with the morning sun gleaming on armor and swords was an impressive sight.
She prayed they could win the day in an equally impressive fashion.
***
“What can ye see?” Kulnor asked anxiously. The ground trembled around him from thirty thousand sets of boots marching toward each other.
“Another hundred paces till the front rank o’ those dogs comes even with us,” Harbek reported. “Arrows flyin’ already. See for yerself.” He shifted to the side so Kulnor could see.
The two were tucked inside the bolt-hole along with a contingent of warriors. A section of rock protruding from the ridge had been carefully carved out, providing a viewing slot from the bolt-hole.
Volleys of arrows flew back and forth between the troops, making a buzzing sound like angry swarms of insects when the deadly rains fell. Arrows loosed by elven longbows arced in gracefully from several hundred paces away, the shorter bows of humans taking a flatter arc, while the powerful dwarven heavy crossbows fired in straight-line shots. The Nebarans were closely grouped and numerous enough that all archers had little trouble finding a target.
Nebaran crossbows responded in kind, their frontal ranks of shieldmen parting to allow a volley to fly then swiftly closing up and weathering the next storm from the allies. Yet despite the devastating hail of arrows, the Nebarans steadily closed the distance. Soon, archers would become a liability once the melee was joined, save for picking off stragglers on the fringes. That was when the dwarves would bear the brunt of the combat as the larger force of infantrymen.
The Nebarans ranks came even with their position in the bolt-hole, steadily plowing forward, about a hundred paces separating them from the front ranks of the allied army.
Ah, there’s me queen.
Sioned looked resplendent in her gleaming armor, seated atop her mountain goat. Her great warhammer Fiendcrusher was held aloft, and the Silver Anvil Hall clans bellowed their battle cries at her encouragement. A Nebaran quarrel glanced off a pauldron of Sioned’s armor harmlessly as he watched. Rukk Stonefist could have been a granite statue of some hero of old in the midst of his own men a stone’s throw away, their baritone voices rivaling Kulnor’s kith and kin with their own chants and cries.
“How long should we wait?” Kulnor asked. “We don’t want to get buried once we spear the side o’ this lot.”
Harbek stroked his beard thoughtfully. “’Twould be nice to attack the rear, but I reckon there be too many o’ the bastards. We might have to settle for the middle.”
A cry of alarm went up from the Nebarans as the front two ranks suddenly disappeared into concealed trenches lined with spikes. The trenches were another surprise the dwarven sappers had dug out overnight, the only other preparation they had sufficient time to make besides the bolt-hole.
As if awaiting the disruption in the line of shieldmen, the allied archers b
rought ruin down upon the next few ranks before they could form up their wall of shields again. Several hundred Nebarans in the front ranks lay dead in moments, victims of the pits and archer fire.
A command went out, and Nebarans leapt across the pits, some even walking across the bodies of their own fallen. Before more than a few hundred could gain a foothold on the other side, the allied infantry charged.
Entranced, Kulnor watched as Sioned’s mount tossed men aside, butting them with its massive horns, while others were trampled under hoof. Fiendcrusher split heads apart like ripe melons. Bristling with steel around her, the warriors of Silver Anvil Hall smashed into the front ranks, and Nebarans were cut down as swiftly as a band of goblins. Kulnor’s eyes teared up with pride at the magnificent sight.
Farther to the west, their human allies held the line and made similar progress, and soon the field was covered with bloodstained black-and-gold uniforms, a thousand dead in moments.
Kulnor itched to get out there and fight by his queen’s side, smiting their foes. “They won’t need us for a while, at this rate,” he told Harbek with a sigh.
***
The ground rumbled underfoot from pounding boots, and a dull thunder filled the air from the clash of steel and bodies, along with voices raised in battle cries.
Taren studied the battle before them, watching for an opportunity to make a meaningful contribution. For the time being, the allies had the matter well in hand. The Nebarans were beginning to get past the pits with relative ease as they filled up with bodies, but the defenders held steady. He had hoped they might win a decisive victory after the first few minutes, but eventually the inexorable advantage of the foe’s greater numbers became more telling. They shrugged off the loss of a thousand or more men and doggedly plowed forward. Combat grew more intense, the archers rendered less effective as close melee fighting ensued. Both human and dwarven forces held for the time, while the elven archers picked off targets of opportunity.
He eyed the stony ridge to the left where the dwarves had built a bolt-hole, wondering when they would attack.
“’Ware the right flank,” one of the generals shouted.
Taren looked toward the spot indicated. A couple hundred Nebarans had broken off and were moving toward the cover of a copse of trees. They held shields high to protect them from arrows looping down from archers placed along the front of the hill on which they all stood.
They won’t find any easy path around that way.
As if summoned by his thought, a line of elves rose up from the high grass and unleashed a devastating volley of arrows at the Nebaran flanking force. Arms blurred as the archers drew and loosed faster than the eye could follow. Three quarters of the Nebarans were dead in mere seconds, and then the volley abruptly ceased. He picked out Aninyel’s topknot of hair gleaming like silver as she led a small group of skirmishers into the staggered force. The Blade moved like a dancer among the clumsy soldiers, sword and dagger flowing with grace and precision, and men died in her passing.
The remaining score or so of the probing group sought to flee back to the main host but were brought down with arrows.
Creel suddenly shouted a warning.
Taren whirled to find the air shimmering a few paces away, behind the command group. Shapes solidified as a force of attackers teleported in, seeking to assassinate the royals and commanders. Nesnys’s pale hair and flaring wings were visible above the heads of the foes.
Without hesitation, Creel threw himself into the enemy’s midst. He cut down two men in the blink of an eye but then was quickly surrounded. Ferret charged into the fray at his side, pummeling assassins aside, the blade in her arm slashing wildly. Royal guards and officers drew steel and moved to protect the royals and engage the attackers, but the advantage of surprise had allowed the assassins to gain the upper hand for the moment.
Mira unhurriedly met two attackers who came in Taren’s direction. Swords slashed at her, but she dodged the first and knocked the second man’s sword arm aside with a casual swipe of her hand. A sharp blow broke his arm, then a chop to the throat brought him down. The other stabbed, and she ducked, spinning aside and kicking the man’s knee, which dislocated with a pop. Before he hit the ground, a spinning kick to the head sent him sprawling down the slope.
Assassins were thick among them then, and Taren drew on the earth magic, backing toward Sianna, who had her sword in hand but was shielded by Rafe, Jahn, and Kavia. The barbarian woman, recently added to the queen’s protective detail, sent two men flying backward with arrows to the face and throat before they closed in and she was forced to toss her bow aside. Jahn ran a man through, and Rafe exchanged blows with another.
Taren extended his hand, and a spear of force lanced outward, piercing one man through the chest, then a second, followed by two more. The impaled Nebarans hung there in the air, crying out and bleeding, suspended much like laundry draped on a line. Taren swiped his spear of force sideways, clearing a space as the impaled men collided with more attackers, all going down in a tangle when he dispelled his attack.
“Taren, watch out!” Sianna cried.
He instinctively threw up a protective sphere just as Nesnys dive-bombed him. Her sword crackled and spit energy as she collided with his defensive globe. He tried to launch another spear of force at her, but she tucked and rolled across his sphere, landing on the ground behind him.
Taren whirled just as she touched the sphere with the palm of her free hand and barked words in the fell speech. His sphere abruptly dissipated from a magic-nullifying spell. Her sword might have taken his head in that instant of surprise had not Mira blocked her strike by seizing her forearm.
Nesnys withdrew a dagger radiating negative energy from her waist with her free hand and slashed at Mira, who continued to hold Nesnys’s sword arm. Taren threw a wild blast of force and inadvertently struck both women, sending them stumbling away, but Nesnys’s dagger strike had missed. Mira managed to secure the wrist of Nesnys’s dagger hand during the struggle, momentarily preventing her from striking, but the fiend overpowered the smaller monk and forced Mira down. Then Nesnys raised her armored knee and slammed it into her face. Momentarily stunned by the blow, the monk reeled back, releasing her grasp, her nose broken and face sheeted in blood. Rather than striking with her sword, Nesnys instead lunged at Mira with the deadly dagger.
Taren restrained himself from throwing another wild burst of force and instead hurled Lightslicer. The elven blade spun through the air and pierced Nesnys’s upraised forearm. She snarled at the pain. With her dagger strike disrupted, she instead bulled into Mira. The monk had recovered her senses enough to dip down and catch Nesnys in the midsection with her shoulder, then heaved her up and over in a throw. The fiend might have gone down had she not flared her wings, jabbing the edges into the ground and keeping her upright for a moment. She somehow rolled across her wings and regained her feet, spinning away and carving a deep gash in Mira’s back with her sword.
“No!” Taren ran closer, summoning Lightslicer back to his hand, but feared he would be too late.
Mira fell to one knee, but her blood-streaked face was determined. Nesnys lunged with her sword and might have run Mira through had a bolt of magical fire not struck Nesnys in the chest. She staggered back, and another bolt followed, but she batted it aside with her sword.
Taren saw Queen Shalaera with her hands raised. She unleashed another bolt of fire, but Nesnys turned slightly and her extended wing shielded her.
Then it was Taren’s turn to strike. He reached into the ground and sent a spike of rock ripping upward and spearing through Nesnys’s foot. A second spike followed an instant later, piercing her other foot and momentarily pinning her in place. She shrieked in pain and outrage.
A small figure darted between Nesnys and Mira. Steel flashed as Sianna plunged her short sword into Nesnys’s side. The demoness backhanded the queen and knocked her to the ground, but Sianna’s blade had struck true—dark ichor ebbed from the puncture in Nesny
s’s side and coated the sword.
Taren drew on another, larger spike of stone, thinking to run Nesnys all the way through and end her, but Mira got there first. She took three steps and leveled a powerful flying kick to Nesnys’s chest. Her foot glowed brightly with ki bolstering her kick, and Nesnys’s body seemed to shudder when the blow landed. Her armor flexed and caved in—ichor burst from her mouth as she was launched into the air. The stone spikes tore free of her feet, and she careened off the hillside. Before she could hit the ground, her wings extended and rapidly pumped the air. She gained altitude, though she was flying almost drunkenly, blood spattering the ground in her wake.
Rafe helped Sianna to her feet. The queen’s lip was bloodied, and a bruise was forming on her cheek, but she had a satisfied look on her face at the payback she had delivered.
Nesnys shrieked in fury and hurled a massive fireball down upon them. Taren hurriedly threw up another shield, one large enough to protect the entire group on the hill. Hellfire, black-hearted flames limned in red and orange, exploded and roiled across his shield. The heat grew oppressive in moments, and Taren pushed his shield out farther. After a few moments, the fire finally dissipated.
Nesnys was nowhere to be seen. Taren cast about with his second sight, but for the moment, she was gone from the immediate area—retreated to lick her wounds, he assumed.
Taren didn’t have time for relief. Instead, he ran to Mira, who had sat down heavily on the ground.
“Mira? Are you all right?” He sank to his knees beside his friend.
Mira’s face was pale and covered in blood, her nose crooked and swollen, and a deep gash was bleeding freely from her back. Despite her wounds, she gave him a wan smile.
Trial of the Thaumaturge (Scions of Nexus Book 3) Page 22