"That's not true. You're the toughest fighter I've ever seen."
"Yes, but—" she broke off. She hadn't had a chance to tell him about the brand or the spreading black stain. He didn't know what had happened to Hazan. "I have my reasons to worry."
He cupped her cheek in his hand. "If there's anybody who can take on these bastards, it's you."
She threw her arms around him, squeezing him hard. "Take care of my boy. And for the gods' sake, don't let yourself get hurt." She stared into his brown eyes, memorizing the gold tones in their depths, the little dark flecks around the pupil. "I'd never forgive myself if something happened to you."
A loud booming sounded outside. The warning drums from the watchtower at the edge of town, sounding the alarm. Jendara kissed Vorrin's cheek and Kran's forehead, then darted outside.
Behind her, someone slammed home the door bolt. The reinforcing timbers made a comforting thud. The meeting hall was secure.
Jendara eased her sword out of its scabbard, listening hard. Her eyebrows drew together. "Do you hear hooves?"
Morul swore. "The stolen stock."
"To the stockade, and take spears," she barked.
"My hunting spears," he grunted. "They're on the front steps."
She raced up the stairs, grabbing the bundle of weapons. Their iron points gleamed in the lamplight. She paused a moment as an idea struck her.
"Morul!" She rushed back toward him. "Get someone to light the lamps you placed. I want this place so bright it burns the eyes of any wolf or cougar in her party. Let's make her regret choosing night predators."
"I'll help."
Jendara hadn't noticed Gerda among the fighters, but the wisewoman stepped forward now. She had dressed herself in hunter's leathers, the blue tattoos on her cheeks the only hint of her status. Twenty years seemed to have slid off her, and she carried a sturdy-looking staff. "I can light lamps as well as anyone."
Jendara gave her a tight smile. "Thanks." She moved toward the gate, calling for her men: "Tam! Yul! Sven!"
She tossed them spears. "This gate's the weakest stretch of the stockade. Kalira's people are going to drive the stampede straight into it. We've only got a few spears, so make them count. I don't want anything getting past us to the meeting hall."
Morul hurried to the gate. "We're bringing reinforcing timbers around, but rebuilding isn't going to be an option once those barbarians hit."
She grinned. "I'll try to keep them busy." Her eyes flashed with sudden excitement.
"You mad woman," he muttered, but he was already hurrying away.
The open space behind Jendara had filled up with lights as Gerda and her fellow lamplighters planted torches and lit lanterns. The light should have been welcome, but Jendara cupped her hands around her eyes, hoping to keep a little of her night vision. She peered between the narrow gaps in the stockade wall, but it was impossible to see into the darkness beyond.
The ground shook beneath her boots.
A tremendous shudder shook the wall as the animals hit it. A horse screamed in pain. Hooves thudded against the wall. The Kalvamen urged the stampede forward.
The timbers in front of Jendara creaked. She dug her heels into the ground and braced her spear against the first wave.
The gate toppled down, a tide of horses and cows surging forward. A bay horse lost traction and slid sideways, slamming into Jendara's spear and knocking her backward. The horse shrieked and leaped up, wrenching the spear out of her hand. Blood ran from its side and pink foam burst from its mouth.
It reared up, flailing its hooves.
"Calm!"
The horse stumbled back to all fours. Jendara scrambled away from it. A hand on her shoulder stopped her.
"You've got to get that gate back up!" Gerda's voice was urgent. Sweat shone on her forehead, and her lips were tight. Jendara realized, with a start, that the animals around her were standing still, trembling but silent.
"You did this," she realized.
Gerda nodded. "It won't last long. Hurry!"
Jendara ran toward the gate. The opening in the stockade was jammed with fallen cows and horses and sheep, some dead, some injured, some standing calmly. Her boots skidded and squelched.
"Jendara!" Sven shoved a dead sheep aside and caught up with her. "What happened?"
"Gerda did something, calmed the animals. But I don't know how we'll fix the stockade with all this livestock in the wa—"
A clatter of lumber cut her off. With a grunt, Morul plunged a shovel into the bloody ground. "We'll build right through them if we have to. Just hope the archers keep picking 'em off."
Bowstrings sang overhead. The Kalvamen had arrived.
A howling figure sprang up on top of the mound of fallen livestock. A Kalvaman, his voice raised in the pure shriek of barbarian battle lust.
Laughter bubbled up inside Jendara. She drew her sword and charged forward. The Kalvaman raced forward to meet her. Her steel struck his coarse blade and sent it flying. With a snarl, he charged at her, barehanded. Her sword caught the side of his neck and bit down through it. Blood sprayed into the air.
The scream she heard came from beside him and she glanced aside to see another man leaping across the barricade of cow corpses. His mace gleamed in the torchlight. She yanked on her sword, but it had caught in the other man's collarbone. A hand shoved into her back. Tam's own sword flickered, skewering the mace-slinger.
"Fall back!" Tam bellowed.
She kicked the dead Kalvaman off her sword and hurried backward, her weapon at the ready. Morul shoved her aside as his team pushed the body of a heavy wagon into the space where the gate had been. Men and women scurried to plant more stockade timbers around the unwheeled wagon and pile wood and debris on top of it.
Jendara shook out her fingers and breathed deep. She couldn't tell if the roaring, screaming, and howling on the other side of the barricade came from the throats of beasts or men. The first wash of adrenaline was fading, but that sound spurred a new burst of fear-powered energy.
The first wisps of fog trickled through the stockade. Her hopes to keep the skinwalkers blinded by lamplight were going to be challenged.
The bowstrings sang out again. The archers were the village's best hope. Her fighters could do a lot of damage to a ground force, but not if Kalira's troops overran them.
"Got to bring down their numbers," she growled to herself. Above her, a man screamed.
With a horrible screech and scrape, an archer tumbled down from the scaffolding, gripped in the claws of a creature Jendara almost couldn't identify. A cougar, she realized, as she caught the beast's long silken tail and yanked hard.
The cougar snarled and slashed at her with its long claws. Jendara struck out with her sword, but missed. Claws screeched against metal as the cat slapped the blade out of her hand. Jendara hissed as a claw ripped open the side of her hand. The cat lunged forward. Jendara's fist struck out, slamming into the space between its golden eyes. It shook its head, stunned, but she was already striking at its ribs. She grabbed at her belt knife. The archer was still screaming. He could possibly live.
The cougar's claws slashed again. Jendara ducked just in time, rolling under the sweep of its huge paw to come up under its chest, driving her knife into its side. She felt the archer's leg snap under her boot and winced, but she didn't fall back.
The cougar wrapped both forelegs around her and squeezed her tight. It bit at her shoulder, its teeth grinding on the studs in her leather vest. A quick uppercut to its jaw snapped its head backward. It grunted.
Her knife struck the exposed throat. Blood sprayed. The big cat's mouth opened and closed, like someone straining for last words. Its body went limp against Jendara's.
She pushed it away.
The creature slid to the ground, the fur fading off the cheeks and forehead of an ordinary-looking woman. Her pale eyes glassed over.
The adrenaline washed out of Jendara's system. She sagged against the wall of the meetinghouse, her stomach churn
ing.
"Dara?"
She blinked at the archer the cougar had brought down. She couldn't believe she hadn't recognized him earlier. "Glayn?" She shook her head, trying to make her brain work again. "I didn't know you could shoot."
"Little hobby. Picked up a lot of them over the years." The gnome struggled to smile. "By all that's holy, I hurt."
She moved to his side. Deep gashes ran down the sides of his scalp: she could see the bone beneath. "Don't move. It'll only hurt worse." She wouldn't tell him how badly injured he was.
"Man down!" she shouted. "I need help!"
"I've got him." Tam knelt beside the caulker. "Oh, Glayn, what have you done to yourself?"
"I can't believe I fell," the gnome said. "I've been sailing all these years, and I let a little kitty knock me off a perch that wasn't even moving!"
"You'll be fine," another voice said. It was Gerda, a roll of bandages already in her hands. "Tam, help me get him inside."
Tam lifted the gnome gently, cradling him against his chest. He moved toward the door, taking the steps with great care.
"He will be all right, won't he?" Jendara asked Gerda.
Gerda narrowed her eyes. "You doubting my word?"
There was something so ferocious about the old woman's expression that Jendara shook her head. Death itself would be afraid of that face. "You I believe."
Something caught Jendara's eye—the glossy wood of Glayn's bow, miraculously undamaged. She picked it up and tugged its string. The bow was small, but the draw was stout. She reached for the last bundle of arrows. Behind her, wood crackled, the ominous sounds of a large creature rushing the stockade. "Get inside now. It's going to get ugly."
Gerda nodded and raced toward the meeting hall. Jendara swallowed down sudden concern for the old woman. She didn't want to like Gerda, but the old bird was admirably tough.
Jendara turned to face the wall. A group of fighters held the barricade, but the rest of the wall sagged. Something threw its weight against the timbers and it shook. It couldn't hold much longer.
Her hand spasmed, and she nearly dropped the bow. Jendara hissed at the pain in her arm, a thousand times worse than the burning and prickling she'd felt back at the library. Heat seared up her forearm, stinging the flesh at her elbows.
Jendara breathed deep. She wasn't about to let Kalira's beasts walk in here just because this brand was hurting her hand. With a grunt, she pushed the pain to the back of her mind and charged the wall.
Gaps showed between the sharpened timbers, just large enough for Jendara to dig her toes and fingers into. She scrambled up the inside of the wall and took an awkward stance near the top. Up here, it was easy to make out the three bears just to the side of the demolished gate, throwing their weight against the wall. She nocked an arrow and let fly.
The arrow sliced through the bear's ear.
Cursing, she drew another arrow and forced herself to take her time. She let it fly. The arrow soared, outlined for a second in the powerful light of the many torches and lamps.
It struck the bear's cheek and sank up to its fletching. The bear screamed.
From behind her, another volley of arrows streaked. Jendara saw an arrow pierce a wolf's skull. She watched in glee as a shapeshifter stopped in mid-transformation and raced away from the gate, his golden cougar tail disappearing as he ran.
An owl flew at her face and she threw up an arm, nearly falling over the wall. She swatted at the bird, launching it into the spiked logs. It hung from a pinned wing a moment before falling to the ground.
Another owl circled overhead, hooting louder than any owl Jendara had ever heard. She went cold as the glowing eyes of a dozen creatures turned up at her. She was the perfect target up here. A single cougar could take her down—let alone an enemy marksman. She hadn't seen any archers in the attack, but that didn't mean there weren't any to come.
She shot several quick arrows into the huddle of bears and jumped down to the ground, giving a tight smile at the shrieks of pain outside the wall. At least one of her arrows had hit home.
"They're retreating!" someone shouted.
She cheered, and voices joined her. The men and women of the defensive line shouted with jubilation.
And then, from behind her, up in the archers' scaffolds: "Oh no."
paizo.com #3236236, Corry Douglas
Chapter Eighteen
Searing Flesh
They've got fire!" an archer shouted.
"Lift me up," Jendara snapped at the nearest man, and he boosted her up on his shoulders. She cursed. The archer was right. Out of the mist, a flaming brand soared and landed on the barricade blocking the gate. A woman stamped it out, but others flew down to join it.
Fambra raced up, her empty quiver bouncing on her back. "They've got shields now! And a battering ram!"
"That wall can't hold against a battering ram," Jendara said. "We need to rush the ram bearers."
"Send good people over the barricade to face those things? I don't think so."
"We don't have a choice, Morul! We're going to run out of arrows soon."
"Some of us are out already," Fambra agreed. "If we go out there, we can collect our fallen arrows while Jendara leads a team to attack those carrying the battering ram."
But at that moment, something hit the gate with a resounding thud. The whole structure rippled.
"We're too late," Jendara said.
Smoke billowed up over the top of the wall. Kalira's torchmen had reached their targets despite the archers' work. Jendara threw aside Glayn's bow and drew her sword. Her fingers spasmed around the hilt. Her gut cramped hard enough to make her double over.
Fambra caught her elbow. "Are you all right?"
"I'd better be," Jendara snapped. She managed to straighten up. "I want you to find some arrows and go into the meeting hall. Get Leyla to show you out the escape tunnel so you can cover the exit. If they have to use it—"
"I won't let those bastards get our people while they're running," Fambra said, voice grim. "Take care of yourself, Jendara. If you can't fight, you should run."
"I can fight," Jendara said. She took a deep breath and sank into a fighting crouch. "They're going to wish I couldn't."
The gate burst inward with a blast of splinters. A shard of wood caught Jendara in the cheek. She yanked it out. "To me!"
She charged forward.
The battering ram had caught in the remains of the wall, its bearers exposed. She plunged to the right side of it, her sword driving into one man's chest. She didn't bother wrenching it free. She kept running, spearing the next man. He screamed. She twisted sideways as the battering ram, no longer supported on the right side, crashed down.
With a crunch, the massive log shattered the still-screaming man's legs. Jendara's breath caught in her throat a second. That could have been her under that log. Her mind faltered, but her arm knew what to do. It was already pulling her sword free of the two skewered men.
But she wasn't ready for the shield that smashed into her face. She toppled backward, tripped over a snapped timber, and fell into the mud. Her nose throbbed with agony. She grabbed it and squeezed it back into alignment, ignoring the streaming blood. She could feel her face swelling as she pulled herself to her feet.
A Kalvaman pushed past her, knocking her aside with an elbow. The runners carried torches beneath their shields, protecting the flames with their bodies. They were headed straight for the meetinghouse.
Jendara swayed on her feet. Her head spun and she had to spit blood to keep from choking on it. Her sword fell from her aching fingers.
She lashed out with her toe and kicked up the hilt. She caught it in her left hand. Despite hours of practice using her left hand, the weapon didn't feel right. But nothing felt right. Her body resisted her every attempt to spur it forward.
"To me!" she managed to croak. "To me!"
A swordsman spun toward her. She raised her sword to protect herself.
"Jendara!" Morul's voice shook some of the strangeness out of her head, and she recognized him just before she swung.
"Morul. The meetinghouse." She managed to wave at the runners with their torches, now gathered at the corner of the building.
"You stay here. I'll stop them!" He raced forward even as Jendara slid down against the wall. Her legs wouldn't pick her up again.
Flame flared on the side of the meetinghouse, but Morul was there, his sword flashing in the firelight. Both the runners fell. Morul ripped off one of the men's fur cloaks and pounded at the flames.
Jendara's head fell back against the stockade. She was glad the whole thing hadn't fallen. It made a good place to rest her spinning head. The skin of her upper arm crawled and stung. Maybe someone would find her resting here and cut the damn thing off.
"More torches!"
The voice sounded right in Jendara's ear. She lifted her head, turning so she could peer between the logs of the wall. A fire glowered in the street beyond, its orange light filtering through the fog. A horse and rider stood in silhouette beside the fire, the rider's top half strangely elongated and misshapen.
A crow suddenly landed on the rider's shoulder, and then Jendara understood why the rider looked so odd. It was Kalira, wearing her horrible crow-winged headdress. Jendara's right hand opened and closed spasmodically. She squeezed it into a tight fist within her left hand.
"Rip them to pieces, my walkers!"
Jendara gasped. This was it. This was the moment. Kalira had rode in with the next wave of skinwalkers, and Morul was still busy putting out that fire. The stockade had broken open. There were no more arrows. Jendara pushed herself upright. She had to fight.
She stumbled forward, outside the protective wall. A few of her fighters had gathered out there, driving back Kalvamen. "You!" she shouted. "With me!"
The group pushed forward. Tam kicked a twitching wolf's corpse aside.
"We've got to get to Kalira," she said. She winced as her hand spasmed again.
Tam noticed. "You're hurt."
Pathfinder Tales: Skinwalkers Page 21