The Curse in the Gift (The Last Whisper of the Gods Book 2)

by Berardinelli, James

  As best as Carannan could tell, the attackers had neither towers nor catapults. Beyond an initial volley, the enemy archers had been rendered ineffective as a result of the terrain. They were as likely to hit friend as foe, so bows had been shouldered in favor of close-combat arms. Short swords and scimitars ruled the day. And somewhere, there might be a wizard, biding his time for the perfect opportunity to launch a storm of fire.

  Alicia was using her own brand of magic. Lethal jets of water arced from the nearby river and, where they struck, armor was no protection against the force of tons of water. Each one of Alicia’s attacks caused devastation equal to that of a siege engine, but Carannan wondered how long her energy would hold up, especially considering how drained she had appeared after her pre-dawn activities. As for Sorial…wherever he was and whatever he was doing, he wasn’t participating in the battle.

  “Looks like it won’t be long till we see some action, eh sir?” Rotgut gave a lopsided grin that revealed how few teeth he had left. The duke had noted that many men who never before participated in a battle were approaching this experience with relish. War’s siren song, using the illusion of honor to camouflage the bloody truth. Rotgut’s enthusiasm was genuine and born of experience not ignorance - he had spent twenty years fighting in the northern border skirmishes before seeking warmer and sunnier terrain. He was emblematic of a rare breed: the grizzled old veteran who would rather die in battle with a sword in the gizzard than in bed with a warm woman.

  “Too bad Vagrum ain’t here. He’da loved this, he woulda. Odds against us. Wizards fightin’ on both sides. Buckets and buckets of blood spilt. What a day t’die! But there’s no arguin’ with the way he went. Only hope I gets to go in a sim’lar way.”

  “Keep an eye out behind. It wouldn’t surprise me if The Lord of Fire tries to outflank us.”

  Rotgut sniffed. “He don’t have enough men. Not with this flat ground and so many soldiers standin’ against him. Might be different if there was hills, but we’d see him coming from too far away. No, sir, this’ll be as pure a clash of arms and armor as you’re ever like to see. Not much help from archers or cavalry. Brute force.”

  Azarak’s strategists had claimed that the enemy outnumbered the defenders by about two thousand (perhaps a thousand five hundred after the flood) but to Carannan, things looked significantly more lopsided. Of course, the king was keeping a large contingent in reserve and it appeared that The Lord of Fire was throwing all his men into the fray.

  “Is this winnable?”

  “Aye, sir, it’s winnable. Any battle is winnable. There’s no doubtin’ the odds are ’gainst us, but if we make all the right moves and they make a few wrong ones, we’ll claim the day. And there’s a question of how many men they’re willin’ to lose. If The Lord of Fire fancies throwin’ away his whole army, he’ll probably take the city. But if he wants to keep a few thousand left to fight another day, he might have to retreat before declaring victory.”

  Carannan considered Rotgut’s words. He was right. If Vantok fought hard enough and cost The Lord of Fire too dearly, he might retreat to lick his wounds and look for easier prey. Basingham in particular was vulnerable, with a small unskilled army that could probably be defeated by a force half its size. Maybe hope lay in that direction.

  The enemy was growing closer to the duke’s current position as the front line spread out to engage Vantok’s army across the full width of the battlefield. Carannan caught a whiff of the stench of war: of blood and viscera and voided bowels. Soon, he would be in the midst of that chaotic melee, dealing out death and perhaps receiving it. In the press of bodies that accompanied close combat, the best soldier could fall and the most incompetent could survive. On a large scale, battles might be predictable but, on the front lines, few things went as expected.

  “How long, do you think?”

  “Not more’n five minutes ’til we engage. Maybe less.”

  “Ready the archers. I want to release as many volleys as possible before we go hand-to-hand. And pass the word to the regiments to our left and right so we can coordinate the attack. We’re the flank and we have to hold. If they get past us, they have a free path into the city.”

  * * *

  From his vantage point of nearly a thousand feet above the battle, Azarak found it difficult to discern individuals. The armies looked like great masses of undulating sand surging toward one another and crashing together. It was horrific to consider how many lives were being lost with each minute change in position. Ten feet across the entire battle line would be bought at a cost of hundreds of lives. If pressed, Azarak’s troops could afford to yield ground rather than lose men, but there was a limit to how far they could retreat.

  A steady stream of messengers rode up the path to the top of Mount Vantok and down again. The command tent remained below, situated on the city’s side of the river but within a short distance of the battlefield and the mountain. Azarak’s observation point was shared by Chancellor Gorton, Alicia, and a dozen of the king’s personal guards. Overcommander Vikon had made several forays to the summit for quick overviews of the situation, but he was running the war from the command tent.

  Of the nearly eight thousand men at Azarak’s disposal, more than a third were deployed in the combat zone. The first list of casualties was stark: four-hundred dead and two-hundred seriously wounded and no longer fit for battle. To fill the gaps, ten percent of his reserves had to be moved forward before the fight was an hour old. Azarak wasn’t making those calls; he had delegated that responsibility to Vikon, but he still bore the ultimate accountability.

  From here, the clash sounded more like distant thunder; individual sounds were difficult to discern above the general din. The clanging of swords against swords, armor deflecting blades, and maces crashing against shields were intermingled with the battle cries of warriors and the screams and moans of the dying and dead. In his mind’s eye, Azarak could imagine what it was like down there. Of course, with his weak arm, he would have been of limited use in any combat situation. Despite Alicia’s healing skills, his duel with Grushik had left him unfit to wield a weapon in any circumstance except dire self-defense. Not that a king would be expected to join his men on the front lines. Although that sort of thing happened often in stories, most kings who attempted something so brave and foolhardy died early in the engagement.

  If the battle continued at its current pace, it wouldn’t be over before nightfall. Then what would happen? Azarak had heard tell of wars where, by mutual agreement, fighting stopped when the last ray of sunlight shrunk from the battlefield. But that presupposed communication between the warring sides - something not evident here. The Lord of Fire hadn’t even sent an envoy demanding surrender before launching his attack. Azarak suspected combat would continue into the darkness and that would introduce another potential hazard into an already dangerous situation. In order to fight during the night, huge bonfires would be lit, and fire was the domain of the enemy. There was therefore pressure on the defenders of Vantok to be aggressive in their tactics while the light held. The risks of a prolonged night engagement were great, especially if The Lord of Fire returned quickly from his encounter with Sorial.

  Azarak took a moment to look back toward the city his army was struggling to protect. It was a reminder, as if one was needed, of the reason for all this carnage. From here, Vantok appeared quaint and peaceful, almost deserted. He could see all the buildings - the tightly clustered peasants’ dwellings, crammed together near the city’s center and extending into the western quarters; the more generously spaced nobles’ mansions to the east; the palace, where Myselene waited impatiently, chewing on a fingernail; the temple with its white-robed priests; and, farther out toward the city’s perimeter, the farms that provided Vantok with its vital agriculture. There was no hustle and bustle in the streets, no men and women hurrying on their way. The outdoor market was closed. Those who hadn’t left the city were huddled inside, awaiting word to evacuate or emerge. One of the continen
t’s six great cities was holding its breath. History would recognize this moment.

  A messenger was standing by, waiting to be acknowledged. Azarak nodded to him and he delivered his report. The news was neither good nor bad. The army was holding at all the key points but was taking heavy losses, especially near the center where the enemy was pushing the hardest. The archer towers had been withdrawn - constructed of wood, they were vulnerable to enflamed arrows shot by the enemy. The trebuchets were anchored and ready to begin their assault using the huge rocks Sorial had extracted from beneath the ground in the days prior to his departure.

  “Send to Overcommander Vikon and tell him I require his presence as soon as his duties allow,” said Azarak. He needed to impress upon Vikon the importance of advancing the battle, and perhaps even ending it, before dusk. It was late morning now. The sun set late at this time of year in the early weeks of Summer, but that allowed only eight or nine hours before bonfires were lit.

  Azarak spared a look at Alicia, who was resting and drinking from a water skin. She appeared drained, with limp, sweat-darkened hair framing her face and thin, light garments stained by perspiration. The king wondered how long her stamina would hold. Thus far, excepting what she had accomplished at the ford, her contributions had been helpful but not indispensable. Each time she launched one of her water attacks, it killed several of the enemy and caused mass confusion in the impacted area. But her strikes, which had been forceful and frequent an hour ago, had become more sporadic with the passage of time. Soon, he would have to order her to go below to the command tent and rest. He could ill afford for his most valuable weapon to be drained and helpless if a crucial need arose. His faith in Sorial only went so far. It would be foolish not to recognize that The Lord of Fire might well enter the fray before the battle was done.

  Alicia felt the king’s gaze on her. She locked eyes with his and offered a wan smile. He looked the way she felt: exhausted. And the battle was barely an hour old. Using water scooped from the river to attack the enemy was proving to be more difficult and less effective than she had envisioned. She knew she was bearing too much of the water’s mass and the effort was wearing her down. Sorial had tried to teach her tricks of how to better distribute large amounts of weight but they weren’t lessons she had learned well. And, while her imagination crafted images of huge explosions of water killing dozens and scattering hundreds, the reality was less impressive. She suspected that the trebuchets, once brought into action, would do more damage and sow more discord. Her sole advantage over them was that she could target specific individuals; her accuracy was impeccable.

  She knew how to amplify her senses by using the water that was all around, regardless of its form - vapor in the air, streams and rivers on the surface, and sources under the ground. This provided her with a vivid portrait of what was occurring one thousand feet below. At the forefront of the conflict, where men from the two sides clashed, it was chaotic and brutal. The quarters were so close that in many cases the only weapons usable were knives and dirks. Those who slipped in the churned-up mud were trampled. Bodies were beginning to pile up, creating obstacles as men tried to hack and slash at each other. In that environment, every additional minute survived was a victory. Unfortunately, for all but the strongest and the luckiest, defeat was inevitable. One man fell and someone from behind took his place. The cycle was repeated everywhere along the line, over and over again. The pointlessness of so much butchery for so little tangible gain sickened Alicia. Only now was she beginning to understand the difference between war as planned in a clean, windowless room and war as enacted on the battlefield. It was incomprehensible to her that Justin could provide a justification for this.

  Her father was down there, standing alongside the men of his militia and engaging the enemy. His sword sang its deadly song. He was already responsible for two deaths and would get an opportunity to bring down many more or lose his life in the attempt. Die or kill - those were the only choices now open to thousands, Carannan among them. During the days leading up to the battle, Alicia had often contemplated how she would cope with Sorial’s death. Until now, she hadn’t considered the possibility of losing her father. But it was real and immediate. At any moment, he might mistime a strike, slip on uncertain ground, or fail to parry a decisive blow.

  She scanned the enemy’s ranks, hunting for a target of value. There was no point in randomly hurling water comets into the vast mass of people below. A better approach was to eliminate men who were important to the war effort and too far from the front lines to be engaged. Alicia tried to locate the enemy’s equivalent of an overcommander but her vision was disappointingly limited. It was as if a fog had settled over the rear portion of Justin’s army, preventing her from peering too far.

  She identified a man who was directing others toward various positions along the front. He barked orders and was obeyed without question or hesitation. He was one of only a few doing this sort of thing and obviously held a rank higher than that of the average foot soldier. His death might mean something, even if it was only a momentary period of confusion.

  Alicia focused her will on river. She longed to immerse herself in its cooling, cleansing currents but there was no time for such indulgence. She scooped out an immense ball of water and compressed it to a size no larger than her fist. It was impossibly heavy. Ten strong men couldn’t have hefted it. But Alicia’s magic was stronger than ten, or twenty, or even a hundred men. She hurled it at the enemy lieutenant; it exploded on impact, seeking to regain its natural size and form. The force of the blast reduced the target and those in his immediate vicinity to bloody pulp. Eight dead, more than a dozen seriously injured - it was Alicia’s most damaging attack yet, but it left her drained. She must have staggered a little because one of Azarak’s soldiers rushed to her side to keep her upright.

  Incongruously, her thoughts turned to Sorial, almost as if pulled by some unknown force. Was he calling out to her? Where was he? Was he even alive? Had he encountered The Lord of Fire or was he still hunting? She cursed her inability to use her powers to reach out to him, but she had neither the experience nor the endurance to cross such long distances. There was water all around him. She should be able to see or hear or feel something, but how?

  Her attention snapped back to the present as an arrow thudded to the ground not four feet from where she stood. Considering the distance it had traveled, it was an amazing shot, but it reminded her that, even here, a thousand feet up and an equal distance away on the ground, any sense of safety was an illusion. Azarak might be a more visible target but that wouldn’t matter if an arrow split her skull.

  Seeing her near-miss, the king barked an order to another of his men to join the first one guarding her. Their duty was to use their shields to make sure no projectile reached her. Hers was to continue her assault on Justin’s troops and quest with her senses for any hint or echo of Sorial’s location and condition. Yet for the stillness she found every time she tried, he might as well have been dead, another casualty among hundreds.

  * * *

  Justin watched and waited. Impatience was his greatest enemy now. He sat on the floor of his tent, ringed and warded by a circle of fire he had ignited. Only Gerthak was permitted entrance to the tent, and he came only in cases of absolute necessity. Right now, Justin’s standing command to his men was for them to fight and kill and die. Hopefully more of the first two than the other. He had come to Vantok with host of twelve thousand, or which ten thousand were fighting men. If he lost more than a quarter of those, this battle would be deemed a failure.

  Gazing into the fire, he could see the entire battlefield spread before him. All around his army, men carried torches and, through the flicker of five hundred widely dispersed flames, he could witness everything. For a brief period, he had also been able to survey the area where the efreet lay in wait for its prey, but Sorial had been shrewd enough to douse that fire and blind Justin to a first-hand view of the encounter. Although he was curious about what wa
s transpiring on the plains to the northwest, he wasn’t concerned about the outcome and knew his servant would contact him once the deed was done. It was only a matter of time.

  Sorial had gone alone. Justin’s hope had been for both wizards to depart together even though that made little tactical sense. Instead, the weaker Alicia had remained behind to aid in Vantok’s defense. Assuming she had the same kind of connection with Sorial that Justin had with Ariel, he expected Alicia to flee to her mate’s side once the bond was severed. He had intentionally placed the efreet in an area close to water to allow Alicia the fastest possible access. The sooner she got there, the sooner she could die.

  The possibility existed that, upon recognizing Sorial’s demise, she would have the fortitude to stand her ground. After all, there would be nothing she could do. If that happened, Justin would confront her directly. He didn’t expect her to be a formidable foe, but any confrontation with a wizard, even a weak and inexperienced one, carried hazards, and water was potent against fire. Fighting Alicia wasn’t desirable but he would do it if necessary as a prelude to joining the assault.

  There was still one last surprise that Justin was ready to unleash. It was a matter of the timing being perfect. The defenders of Vantok were foolhardy enough to believe they had a chance. They would soon learn what it meant to face The Lord of Fire.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX: THE BATTLE OF VANTOK

  Carannan would have dearly liked to wipe away the splatter of blood partially obscuring his left eye’s vision but he didn’t have the time. The warm sticky substance coating half his face - it was in his nostrils and mouth as well - wasn’t his; it was a gift from a craggy-jawed mercenary he had beheaded. Thus far, Carannan had three kills to his name and, in return, had received only a superficial cut to the forehead and a slightly more serious gash on his right thigh. Neither was likely to hamper him as much as the blood dripping into his eye.