The Broken Key (02) - Hunter of the Horde

by Brian S. Pratt

  “How’s the leg?” Tad asked Seth.

  “Hurts a little,” he explained, “but I think nothing serious was done.” Tad glanced at the man whom he had knocked unconscious and saw he was still out cold. “He hasn’t stirred,” Soth told him when he noticed Tad glancing that way.

  “We’re out of here,” Riyan told the twins.

  “Think we’ll make it back in time for morning drills?” Seth asked Tad.

  “I would think your first concern should be if you’ll even be allowed to remain in the Guild after this,” he told them. “Now, let’s get you all back before your situation grows worse.”

  That settled them all down. They grew quiet and somber now that Bart had been freed and they faced the possible consequences of their actions.

  As the others began mounting the horses they rode from Gilbeth, Bart went around back and took one of Durik’s. After what they had put him through, he didn’t mind helping himself to it. By the time he had the saddle on and was mounted, Riyan appeared with Soth riding double behind him to make sure he was okay. The fifth henchman had yet to put in an appearance.

  “I can’t tell you how much I appreciate what you and Chad did,” he said as they rode around the house together to join the others.

  “Hey, don’t worry about it,” Riyan replied. “We couldn’t leave you to be tortured now could we?”

  Bart gave him a sad grin. “I’ll put in a good word for you at your Guild if you think it might help.”

  “Thanks,” Soth replied. “I’m sure it couldn’t hurt.” Back with the others, they quickly set off back down the road towards Gilbeth. With any luck they’ll make it back long before the sun rises in the morning. All the Recruits fervently hoped that they would.

  Chapter Seventeen

  _______________________

  They had ridden for just under an hour when the tell-tale sound of rapidly approaching riders came from the south. “We got company,” Chad announced from his position at the rear.

  It was hard to determine how many were coming up behind them in the darkness.

  During the brief glimpses intermittent breaks in the clouds which allowed moonlight through, they could see there were at least half a dozen.

  “It couldn’t be Durik,” Riyan stated.

  “Who else would be riding hell bent on this road at this time of night?” Tad asked.

  “From the way he looked at you guys just before we left, he wants you dead in a bad way.”

  Turning to the magic user riding behind him, Riyan asked, “Kevik, shouldn’t your spell have kept them there longer?”

  “It should have lasted at least this long,” he replied. Then to Bart he said, “Remember what we found on the men who came to the estate?”

  Bart nodded in the dark. Those men had carried scrolls which could dispel magic.

  “That fifth man we didn’t find could have dispelled the magic holding them.” The others didn’t understand what they were talking about. All they knew was there were possibly half a dozen men approaching who may very well be out for blood.

  Tad brought his horse to a halt. He glanced back just as a break in the clouds allowed the moonlight through. In the brief glimpse the light afforded him, he caught sight of nine men. If it was Durik and his men, then another three had joined with them. Gauging the skill of his Recruits against what the men approaching may possess, he quickly realized they were outmatched. Not only that, but their horses were already tired. Having ridden double all the way from Gilbeth to Kemmet, then all the way back to where they were, there was little possibility of reaching Gilbeth before being overtaken.

  “Shall we make a stand?” Chyfe asked him.

  Tad shook his head. “I don’t think we could prevail,” he replied. “They have us outnumbered and more than likely outskilled.” Not to mention the fact that any spell Kevik might employ may very well be countered should they have more of those magic dispelling scrolls.

  “Then what are we to do?” asked Seth. The riders behind them were coming up fast, now less than a mile away. Whatever they were going to do they had best do it quickly.

  To the west was farmland that stretched for miles until reaching the hills. Tad had lived in this area all his life, he knew that there wouldn’t be much in the way of defensive opportunities to be had that way. A mile or so eastward lay Ki’ Gyrx Forest. Though he dreaded to enter a forest with such a past, he knew they had little choice. Either a fight which he was sure they would lose, or dare the woods. All this he contemplated in the blink of an eye.

  Turning his horse toward the east, he said, “Follow me.” Kicking his horse into a quick gallop, he left the road with the others falling in behind.

  “Where are we going?” Riyan asked as his horse left the road.

  “Ki’ Gyrx Forest,” Tad replied.

  “Are you mad?” exclaimed Chyfe. “That place is cursed!”

  “We have no choice!” he hollered back. Kicking his horse into motion, he sped for the shelter of the forest. When the group of riders altered course to follow, they knew it was Durik.

  As the clouds above again parted, Riyan caught a glimpse of the forest ahead of them.

  A glance to his friend Chyfe showed worry with a touch of fear on his face. “What do you mean cursed?” he asked.

  Chyfe glanced his way. “Few who enter ever come out alive again,” he explained.

  Riyan heard Seth mutter something behind him but couldn’t make it out. “What?” he asked.

  “It would be better to make a stand than to enter the forest of Ki’ Gyrx,” he said.

  “Even if it meant our deaths.”

  “Why?” Riyan asked.

  “Evil lives in these woods,” he explained. “Evil that doesn’t like to be disturbed.”

  “Maybe they won’t follow us,” said Riyan. Then glancing behind, he saw the nine riders coming fast.

  “Looks like they are,” Seth replied.

  Their group raced across the broken fields, closing the gap between them and the cursed forest. In the intermittent moonlight the forest had an ominous aspect, made all the worse by what Seth and Tad had said.

  “Kevik, is there anything you can do to slow them down?” Riyan asked.

  “I’ve been trying,” he replied. “But every time I start to concentrate, my horse alters its gait and breaks my concentration.”

  “The woods,” Riyan heard Seth say in his ear. Looking forward, he could now see the darker shadow of the forest ahead of him. Glancing back to their pursuers, he saw the gap had been closed by half. He gauged the distance between the fringe of the forest and the men behind them, they should gain the trees before being overtaken.

  “Slow it down!” Tad hollered to the rest of them from his position in the lead.

  “But they’ll catch us,” responded Soth.

  Then the others saw why he cautioned them to slow. This area had been forested at some point and stumps rose from the ground. Riyan brought his horse down to a walk as he wended his way through the maze. Not only were there stumps, but piles of cast off branches and other debris had been left behind when the men of Kemmet harvested the trees for the lumber mills.

  Now that they’ve slowed, the gap between them and their pursuers was rapidly diminishing. But when Durik and his men reached the edge of the stump maze, they too were forced to slow.

  “It’s not much further,” Tad announced from the lead. And in fact, another five minutes had them entering the fringe of the ancient forest.

  As soon as he passed the first trees, Riyan immediately felt less at ease. Whether the effect was from the forest itself or the fears generated by what Seth had told him, he wasn’t sure.

  “I wish I would have brought my sling,” he muttered.

  “What?” Seth asked him.

  Turning his head to allow Seth to hear him better, he repeated, “I wish I would have brought my sling. I left it back at the Guild.”

  “Pretty good with it?” Seth asked.

  Riyan nodd
ed. “Better than most.”

  “A ranged weapon would be handy right now, that’s for sure,” he said.

  Riyan and Seth were third in line behind Chad and Soth who in turn were trailing Tad. Bart rode beside Tad. The forest’s canopy blocked the moonlight quite effectively and made it hard for Riyan to keep Chad and Soth’s horse in sight even though he was but feet behind them.

  “Can barely see them,” Riyan commented to Seth.

  “I know,” came the reply from over his shoulder.

  He kept them in sight more by catching movement of shadows as they passed between the trees than with actually seeing them. “Keep an eye out too,” Riyan whispered to Seth. “In case I lose them.”

  “You got it,” he replied.

  As they progressed deeper within the forest, the branches and brush grew thicker.

  Soon they were constantly being struck and scraped by branches as they forged their way through. Fortunately they wore their thick winter jackets so were cushioned from the worst of it. Still, hands and faces continued to be struck painfully from time to time.

  Twenty minutes later Tad brought them to a halt. They did a head check and were relieved to find they were all still together. “I think we may have lost them,” he said quietly. He indicated for them to be quiet and listen for the sound of horses or men making their way through the trees. At first there was silence, then from off to their right they heard branches being moved and the snort of a horse.

  Then all of a sudden, the forest in the vicinity where the sound was coming from erupted with light. Riyan and the others could make out their pursuers moving through the trees in their general direction.

  “Magic,” Kevik said quietly to the others.

  “Great,” murmured Chyfe, “they have a magic user too.”

  “Not necessarily,” stated Kevik. “The light could have come from a scroll.” Bart glanced to him from where he sat behind Tad. “They have someone with scriber abilities,” he told the swordmaster.

  Tad sat there watching the approaching men for a moment then turned his horse away from them. “Come on,” he said. “We need to try and lose them somehow.” Moving off at an angle a little to the right of the direction their pursuers were taking, he led them deeper into the forest.

  After a few minutes Chad said, “Feels like the trees are closing in about us.”

  “Be quiet!” whispered Tad.

  From behind Chad, Soth whispered quietly in his ear, “I feel it too.” Chad nodded, he longed to be out from these woods.

  Behind them, the light maintained its presence. Whenever it would disappear and the woods grew dark again, another light would blossom to life to take its place. Despite Tad’s best efforts at periodically altering their course, their pursuers continued to follow behind them. When Tad altered course, a short time later so too would they.

  At least here in the close confines of the forest, their pursuers weren’t able to close the gap. They were just as hampered by the wildness of the trees and brush as were Riyan and the others.

  They forged through the woods a little bit longer before the sound of flowing water began to be heard ahead. Shortly after that, Tad’s horse broke through the dense treeline and encountered a gently flowing stream. The stream wasn’t much more than ten feet wide.

  “Can we cross it?” asked Riyan when he came to where Tad had stopped. It looked like the trees on the other side were less dense than what they had been going through.

  Tad was quiet for a time. He looked upstream to his left and saw only darkness. To his right wasn’t much better. Are we downstream of where the water forks, or upstream?

  Though he had never been within this forest before, he had heard the tales of it many times. They all centered on an area between the forking of the water.

  Ever since he had entered the forest of Ki’ Gyrx, Tad had worried about finding the Tower. From every account he had ever heard of the evil that permeated these woods, the Tower was always at the heart of it.

  So the story goes, the Tower was the home of a necromancer of the worst sort. Over a century ago, maybe longer he wasn’t sure, farmers living in the area as well as travelers passing through began to go missing. The locals had tracked the disappearances to the Tower.

  With the help of several priests, they stormed the Tower and killed the necromancer.

  Tad was sure most of the horrors that filled the majority of the tales involving the Tower had to be embellished somewhat. I mean, really, was one supposed to believe that demons feasted on the corpses of the necromancer’s victims?

  “Swordmaster?” Riyan asked when he failed to reply to his question.

  “What?” Tad asked, coming back to the here and now. “Oh, uh, I think so.”

  “If we’re going to cross,” Seth said from behind Riyan, “we better hurry.” Behind them the light’s glow that indicated the presence of Durik and his men was steadily drawing closer. “Right,” Tad said. Moving out, he headed directly to the bank of the river and his horse’s hooves were soon splashing in the water as he crossed to the other side with the others following right behind.

  The water as it turned out was only two feet at its deepest which caused no problems.

  Tad’s horse made it to the other side and he prayed he was going in the right direction as he turned to the right. They had to be downstream of the fork in the river. What they had crossed couldn’t be the main flow, it just wasn’t big enough.

  After proceeding alongside the stream for twenty yards, they heard Durik yell from the group of men following them, “Pyck! They’re coming your way!” Then from up ahead further down the stream a second light blossomed into life.

  “Damn!” cursed Tad. “They’ve got our flank.”

  “Let’s just go back the other way,” suggested Bart.

  Tad didn’t like that proposition as it would most likely bring them near the Tower.

  Instead, he turned and led them away from the stream. Pushing deeper into the forest, Tad set as fast a pace as the trees would allow.

  They continued casting glances back to the two lights. The one that had been following them for so long was angling to move directly towards them while the group to the south remained in such a position as to prevent them from fleeing in that direction.

  How many men are back there now? Did the original group split in two or had reinforcements arrived? Tad didn’t care for the latter of the two possibilities, he hoped they had just split.

  “How far to the eastern edge of the forest?” asked Chad after forging their way further into the forest for half an hour.

  “A hundred miles or more,” replied Chyfe.

  “Man,” breathed Chad. The mere prospect of such a journey left him tired.

  They didn’t get much further before they encountered another river flowing from the north. Tad came to a stop at the water’s edge and gauged the chance of making it across.

  Unlike the small stream they had forded earlier, what was before them was much larger.

  “It doesn’t look good,” Bart said from behind him.

  “I know,” he replied. Glancing back over his shoulder, he could see the light to the south was no longer moving parallel to their course. Instead, it was now beginning to head directly towards them as if Pyck and his men were now moving along the riverbank.

  The light behind them which marked Durik’s presence was closing fast.

  Riyan and the others came to a stop beside him. “We don’t have much time,” Seth stated.

  The sense of impending doom was growing. Riyan glanced to the river and was unable to see the far side in the moonlight. What he could see of it gave him grave doubts about the feasibility of crossing. “We better head that way,” Riyan said to Tad as he pointed upstream to the north.

  North was the last place Tad wanted to go. They were between two rivers which could only mean the fork wherein the Tower lay was to the north. And it didn’t take him long to determine that was the only viable route left to them. It wa
s almost as if their pursuers were maneuvering them in that direction.

  “Come on,” he said as he turned his horse to follow the river upstream. If they could move fast enough, they might be able to somehow get around Durik’s group to the west of their position and flee back across the smaller stream. Kicking his horse, he got it up to as quick a trot as the forest would allow. The others fell in behind as he worked his way northward.

  It was soon apparent that Durik’s group was no longer moving to intercept. Rather, they were moving north as well, maintaining the distance between them. The one behind them on the other hand, continued to slowly close the distance, again leaving north the only way to go.

  Herded forward, as that is how Tad had come to interpret what was being done to them, he and the others pressed onward. “Why don’t they hurry up and attack?” asked Chad after another twenty minutes had passed.

  “They’re biding their time,” replied Seth.

  “For what?” asked Chad.

  Then all of a sudden, the river beside which they had been traveling curved westward abruptly. Tad followed the curve and came to a stop. “That,” he told the others. “That’s what they have been waiting for.”

  A clearing began in front of them that extended for some distance. Intermittent beams of moonlight were being reflected from water flowing on both sides. The stream was now close as they drew closer to the forking of the river. Before them rose an imposing tower, the Tower of which Tad had been so afraid they would encounter.

  It was at least twice as large as Kevik’s tower, maybe more as they were unable to adequately see it in its entirety due to the darkness. Each felt something, something that was undeniably wrong.

  “Look,” Riyan said as he pointed to the tower. “The gate’s open.” In truth, the gate to the tower stood open, almost as if it was inviting them inside. “We would be able to defend ourselves better within its walls.”

  Off to the west the light from the main force of pursuers continued moving forward.

  From the looks of it, the group was already on the other side of the stream. “They’re moving into position in case we try to flee that way,” observed Chad.