White Hall (The High King: A Tale of Alus Book 10)

by Donald Wigboldy

  Hoods and dark cloths over their faces implied evil intentions, so Piotr said in a hushed tone from his body, “Three men approaching from straight ahead.”

  A sudden shift in the brush revealed five more in a group.

  “Five more!” he hissed in surprise.

  Impressions came from his other sentries at the same time. Letting go of the owl, the boy turned to lock his eyes on Zieran and barely contained the nervous energy he felt as he panned his hand across the trees, “More coming from all around now. The lead handful must be their scouts.”

  Suddenly the camp heard strange new sounds that veterans were familiar with in particular. The hisses of arrows in the darkness brought chills and they all raised shields blindly hoping that they guessed the direction correctly.

  A cry as a soldier was struck to his right meant that at least someone had gotten it wrong. As for Piotr and the wizards, plants appeared from the earth. Vines and grass rose instantly as their quick spells made the earth come alive to protect them. Several arrows struck their barriers with thunks as they drove into the plants.

  Hoping to soften up their prey, the arrows continued to fly. Uliya cried out to his left as she was hit in the leg.

  Piotr sent a vine with his left arm from his barrier towards the girl. Wrapping quickly around her waist, the novice pulled her to the relative safety of his barrier. The surprise of his magic had elicited a quieter squeak as she was lifted from the ground enough to avoid being dragged in the earth. The girl looked at him in relief as the boy looked at her leg. Brown pants made any blood hard to see in the light of the red moon, but the arrow stood out from the girl’s thigh and he could see pain in her eyes.

  “I’m all right, Piotr,” the girl stated in a tight whisper. As she tried to be brave, he could see that tears were already in her eyes.

  While he wasn’t a healer, the human body was part of nature as well. One of the skills that wizards tried to find in the students of the school was that of healing in any form. Piotr wasn’t good enough to do true healing, but he could manipulate flesh enough to mend some wounds.

  Touching the arrow made the girl hiss. His left hand held the shaft and his right was pressed against her leg. Mumbling the spell he had learned, Piotr made the flesh of her leg part enough to release the arrowhead. With it removed, the magic brought the muscle and skin back together quickly knitting back together.

  “There that should...” the boy’s words stopped as he looked at Uliya’s face. Unconscious from the pain of her wound and subsequent removal of the arrow, the cadet couldn’t hear anything he said.

  Zieran noticed the act and chuckled despite the seriousness of their situation. “We’ll need to have you work on that when we get back to White Hall, I guess.”

  “If we live,” Banty complained as he continued to hide from the arrows behind his plant shield.

  Gorum frowned at the boy and stated, “We’ll live. These are just bandits. Once they think we are dead, we’ll spring our trap to wipe them out. As if mere bandits could defeat a platoon of Southwall soldiers, mages and wizards, such audacity.”

  Cries from the night were further off to Piotr’s hearing and Wizard Gorum stated confidently, “That would be our mages springing their trap now.”

  Piotr wished that he was familiar with a creature with armor thick enough to resist arrows. He had heard of crag dogs from the mountains, but he had never seen one. If the novice could shape shift into one, he would have joined the fight; but he was just made of flesh and bone. An arrow could kill him as easily as it had injured Uliya.

  Flashes of fire near the trees erupted as mages used fireballs to attack. It wasn’t a wise use of magic among trees and brush, the nature wizard thought to himself. As a nature wizard, his instinct was to use the forest to fight and not risk burning it away.

  Even as his mind wandered to such thoughts, Piotr watched his mentors and realized that they were uncertain of how to act. Gorum was likely being patient and waiting where he thought that he was safest. Zieran was more confident but seemed both more protective of his novice and was patient in waiting to see what would come.

  A mass of fire erupted to his left. It seemed overly powerful to be a battle mage. Wind tore through the trees from the right and Piotr spied bodies being flung out of the trees into the moonlight of the open field. The earth shook and trees swayed with the movement and even fell.

  Banty asked with wide eyes, “Do they have wizards too?”

  “If they do, it looks like fire, air and earth wizards,” Zieran deduced quickly. Fire wasn’t considered a good match up for a nature wizard in particular, but all three could be troublesome and battle mages were unlikely to be suited to a fight with at least three wizards without backing from their more powerful companions.

  “Shouldn’t we be doing something?” Piotr asked calmly. Their defenses were still in place, but fewer arrows had been heard since the mages joined the fight along with a handful of their soldiers.

  The mage cadets reappeared in the camp with their shields up in case someone should break through, which meant about a dozen men and women had gone to fight the enemy.

  Three people backed out of the forest from the left. Fireballs and other spells were thrown into the darkness as two battle mages flanked a soldier with his shield still ready. Even in the weak light of the moon and blinding flashes of fire, Piotr could tell that they were all limping. Only two of those driven back by the wind had managed to pick themselves up from the ground. An arrow knocked one of those down and Piotr could only hope that it wasn’t a kill shot.

  “We really need to help them,” he stated to Zieran. “They are in our element. Can’t we do something?”

  Banty was huddled behind the tent looking more afraid as he hid behind his nature shield, a shield that seemed more fragile when facing the elements of the enemy wizards. The elder wizards looked willing to wait, but Piotr added, “They’re in our forest and destroying the trees. Doesn’t that make you angry enough to try?”

  Gorum complained, “We can’t see the enemy and can be killed just as easily by an arrow as by these hidden wizards or whatever.”

  “How can they have wizards?” Banty asked as he covered his head with his hands as if they could protect him. Used for casting spells, the other novice’s hands might protect him, but in the face of the enemy he was useless as well.

  “Hedge wizards or wilders most likely,” Gorum spat in disgust.

  “Even so they can be just as dangerous as fully trained wizards,” Zieran confirmed.

  Piotr sat cross legged and warned Zieran, “If you are all afraid to fight because you can’t see our enemy, maybe I can do something about that.”

  Touching his mentor’s hand, the novice shifted his mind to one of his night birds. One of two lark owls, Zieran was seeing through the bird’s eyes. “Can you direct it to move and find a target without me now?” Piotr asked from his body and hoped that his master could still hear him as well. If the connection was similar to when he had brought Niklaus and Job along, the wizard should be able to see clearly only when he closed his eyes and still hear him as well.

  “I think so. Gorum let Piotr give you control of one of his birds. We can use them to target the enemy and use our magic to win the day.”

  The elder wizard moved quickly to within reach of Piotr and grasped his wrist. Piotr had thought that the wizard would fight him on it, but instead they joined together to whisk their minds to another bird.

  Once fixed, Gorum and Zieran began to take control of the avian sentries. They flew to find targets and suddenly the forest came alive. Assassins were bound by vines or crushed by branches. Neither wizard held back and cared little if the enemy lived or died after this night. All they wanted was to defeat the enemy and keep the rest of their people safe.

  Piotr found the first lark owl and took possession of the creature. While he hated controlling the owl fully, this was an emergency and other lives, human lives, depended on it. The boy found three men
moving with bows in their hands. The assassins had survived the mages intervention, but as Piotr called on a spell to manipulate vines, the men were quickly restrained and taken out of the fight.

  Taking wing to move deeper looking for the wizards and other brigands hidden in the forest, Piotr first spotted a handful of men. In the darkness, the owl’s vision was still perfect and he noticed that their skin looked odd. Wondering if they had used a version of a hardened skin spell, the novice wished that he could sense the power of a wizard through the otherwise observant bird’s eyes.

  Repeating his first spell, the novice figured that resistant skin or not, being bound by vines and branches would still keep them out of the fight. Imprisoning them in the abundant supply of forest materials was easy for a nature wizard. Roots opened up the ground beneath their feet. Powerful tree roots wrapped around one man’s ankle holding him in place. Another root whipped into the air catching a wrist to yank him down onto his face in the dirt.

  One of his fellow brigands used his sword to hack at the roots holding him. It was a dangerous cut near the arm, but it split the dirty wood even with magic hardening it beyond nature’s usual strength. Piotr didn’t give up as bushes pulled at arms and legs of the other men. A tree branch swung for their heads and was narrowly avoided by one of the men in particular. The brush snared his limbs as he dodged one attack to fall into another.

  Three more men appeared and one held a metal staff. Stamping it into the ground, the earth moved disrupting the plants. Stone cut through roots and branches revealing that Piotr needed to be rid of this threat first or the other men would be free to attack again soon.

  Piotr pulled his mind back and looked at Bo. His worry that the animal might be injured was outweighed by the need once more. Magic made the lock release the back of the cage. Another spell added strength to her fur and skin. Creating natural armor from the bear’s flesh and fur, the boy took over her mind.

  Inside Bo’s head, the novice hurried the bear from the cage and out into the forest. The owl was sending dim messages to his mind watching the men trying to finish freeing those ensnared by Piotr’s magic.

  He spotted an assassin before the man was ready to fire his arrow. Claws struck at his head. The creature’s ears heard the crack of bone, but Piotr tried to block the sickening sound from his mind. All the control needed to manipulate so much magic was beginning to wear at him anyway, so the man would live or die in the middle of the chaos of the threads holding onto his sentries and that of the magic directed to strike the other soldiers.

  The second group of men was free and advancing with the wizard there to help. With Piotr’s mind centered on Bo, he couldn’t make the forest strike again. With the other wizard’s ability to disrupt his constructs with earth and stone, Piotr knew that the earth wizard needed to be dealt with first before the other men could be restrained.

  Concentrating on freeing the three men scouting ahead of them, they missed Bo's advance as the bear navigated stealthily past them while other magic warred around the forest covering the rustle of bushes and the snapping of sticks on the ground. When the bear struck out at the earth wizard, it was nearly perfect; but at the last moment the men noticed the bulky threat.

  An earth wall sprung up as the wizard fell back. Shouts went up from the other men. The bear was struck by another assassin as he swung his sword. Like hitting steel, the weapon did nothing to Bo’s magical armor. Her claws were strengthened by the spell and cut like daggers through the hardened skin of the man in return creating four bloody cuts from shoulder to waist. The power knocked him to the ground where his screams drowned out the cries of the others.

  Willing the bear to ignore the cries and using his focus to guide her, Piotr struck the stone wall shattering the defense and sending shards into the faces of those behind it. The wizard was surprised at the bear’s power and was too slow to call up a second spell.

  Teeth sunk into the man’s shoulder before Bo shook him like a rag doll. He screamed and Piotr could taste the blood in her mouth. His screams suddenly stopped and the bear threw his body into another man behind him. Claws tore at the men knocking two more to the ground before those who could ran screaming into the darkness.

  Having disabled the earth wizard and his men, Piotr guided Bo towards the wind wizard to the south of his position. Piotr refused to risk her against a fire wizard, but he hoped that the air wizard wasn’t able to create spears like he had been shown at the school. Air lances had been common in the air school's past, but Katya’s brother had created wind spears capable of piercing stone and armor. A wizard with knowledge of the revised spell could kill the animal and Piotr feared for her safety almost as much as those he was trying to save with her strength.

  Another man was struck down on the way. Separated from any others, the brigand saw her too late. Left bleeding on the ground, Bo ignored him heading towards the sound of wind and battle. Piotr moved deeper into the forest to catch the enemy from behind if possible.

  To his surprise, the bear was too late. As he finished sneaking towards the men flanking the air wizard who was driving the mages back. Two black shields absorbed much of his attack, but they couldn’t slip past the push of wind keeping them outside the forest and making them easier targets for both arrows and wind spells.

  As Piotr slipped closer, a large dark form pounced on the wizard from behind. A hound, if he was correct, leaped on the man knocking him to the ground. Teeth dug deep into the wizard’s arm. The power of the creature broke the arm with a loud crack and it leaped back into the brush before the other men could move to save their wizard or get revenge.

  It was Niklaus, he thought, as Bo crashed into the first of the flanking line. The man was knocked down with broken ribs most likely along with other broken bones. Before he could move, the forest leaped up grasping the other men. Without the wind wizard to use his magic to keep the plants from holding his guardian assassins, Gorum could focus his magic on incapacitating the other brigands. He made sure to bind the air wizard as well, but the man looked nearly unconscious from the pain of the broken bones and torn flesh.

  Listening for the sound of battle, Piotr was surprised that even the last group to the north seemed to have gone silent. Perhaps Zieran had taken them out already.

  Pulling back most of his consciousness, the novice asked, “Do you need any help Zieran?”

  The mentor shook his head. His eyes were completely lucid and he appeared to have pulled his mind back from the owl lent to him. “No, I caught the fire wizard first and the others went down easily after him.”

  Calling the bear back to the campsite, Piotr watched as Bo returned looking wary of the humans around her for the first time. She had been used unlike any time before. When they had tried to set her free in the past, even using similar mind control hadn’t left a lasting impression on the bear. Humans and the food they provided were too convenient so she would wander back no matter what they did.

  Piotr felt guilty for using the bear like he had and he could see it in her eyes, that this had felt wrong to her as well. Maybe he was placing his own feelings on the animal, but the novice thought maybe this time, Bo would decide that she had enough of humans for awhile.

  The group from White Hall took awhile to finally take full control of the area. There were injuries on both sides and sadly deaths as well.

  Three veteran soldiers had been killed fighting in the forest. Falcon Qeras was found broken and bleeding where the air wizard from the enemy had first caught them off guard. He died before the battle was over and without a healer among them, his injuries would have been impossible to heal for the trip back to the white city.

  In camp, not only Uliya had been hit by the arrows. An unfortunate cadet from the soldiers died from an arrow through the throat. Two more had been hit, one to an arm and the other a leg; but their wounds were simple enough that the nature wizards could take care of them, even if they weren’t able to relieve the pain that a healer could.

  Their
injuries extended to others as well. Most of the veteran mages were banged up. The wizards had nearly killed them, but their defenses had proven enough to save all except Qeras. Trienne needed mending from the nature wizards before she could bleed out from a pair of nasty wounds, but they got to her in time.

  The night was spent without anymore sleep, but by the time the sun was cresting the horizon, the prisoners were all bound and the wounded healed as far as they could be. That only left making the brigands tell them what had happened to the remainder of the villagers.

  Elijah, Zieran and two of the soldiers rode out to find a small fort early enough to catch the few guards by surprise. Nearly twenty villagers had survived, but they had little to return to in their village. The soldiers escorted them to their village to find only a few homes left intact enough to live in, but they would be enough temporarily. Help was coming from both White Hall and Blackwall already. Provisions were taken from the fort and help in rebuilding would be there soon enough that the four parted to return to the camp with the news and the three brigands they had caught as well.

  More horses had been found in the fort and food had been brought on some pack animals. Though the brigands were criminals and deserved death in all their minds, they weren’t the judge and jury. They were soldiers and as such were the arms of the law at times, but not the law itself.

  Falcon Eyrk had discovered that the earth wizard was the leader. His shirt was still bloody from Bo's attack, but he has survived thanks to his stone skin spell. The three wizards had been pulled away from their men and the mages had questions for them. Piotr remained close enough to hear. His brother had returned covered in blood from the men he had injured. Even shape changing didn’t hide what he had done.

  Eyrk led the questioning as he demanded, “What were you thinking in attacking that village?”