The mare flicked an ear in Ashayna’s direction, then snapped it back towards the trail. A shadow the size of a small horse glided between the trunks of two large evergreens. Her stomach flipped when another twig snapped much closer to her position. Snuffling sounds to her left set her heart racing.
She stood and reached for the reins. Her mare nickered, dancing in the mud as Ashayna settled into the saddle. At her quiet word, Swiftrunner broke into a trot. There was a sharp bend in the trail ahead, and then a straight, level run. They approached the bend. Twenty paces, ten paces, less than five and she urged the mare into a canter. She chanced a glance back. Three lupwyns—reminiscent of giant wolves—loped into the open, abandoning the shelter of the trees for the better footing of the path. Ashayna bent low to Swiftrunner’s neck and the mare broke into a ground-eating gallop.
Chapter Two
Swiftrunner picked her way up the ravine’s rock-strewn eastern slope. The difficult ascent forced the mare to slow, but there was nothing Ashayna could do but grit her teeth and call encouragement to her mare, while silently praying the lupwyns didn’t catch up. In a cloud of dust and a cascade of small stone fragments, her mount scrambled over the summit and onto hard-packed lane once more.
The three lupwyns had yet to cross the rain-swollen river. With luck, the river would make the wolf-beasts’ crossing as harsh as her mare’s had been. Veering off the trail and crossing the ravine had been a risk, but her mare’s surefootedness shaved a candlemark off their journey.
“Thank you, Swiftrunner.” Her mare pranced in place, ears flattened and nostrils flared, flanks heaving with each labored breath. Ashayna patted her war-steed’s damp neck. “What is it, girl?”
Swiftrunner trembled. Fighting the bit, the mare trotted a few strides, then came to a stiff-legged halt. Ashayna’s instincts screamed a warning. Following the mare’s gaze, she turned her attention west.
Pasture land stretched out before her, green with young spring grass. A small flock of sheep ran towards her, bleating in terror. Well behind the panicked herd, an endless tide of lupwyns poured out of a distant tree line. Even over the expanse, she saw each member of this horde was encased in shining plate armor, wore a helm, and had pole arms strapped to their sides. They ran on all fours, surging across the field in a wave.
She turned Swiftrunner east. Fear overrode guilt, and Ashayna dug her boot heels into her mount’s sides, urging her into a gallop. “Good girl. Let’s not become some lupwyn’s next meal.”
The few sparse, windswept trees lining the road offered little cover. No way could the lupwyns miss seeing them flee. If the beasts shed their heavy armor and weapons, they could quickly outrun her tired mare...
Her last hope was the old growth forest. If she could reach shelter before the lupwyns ran them down, Ashayna hoped to lose the wolf-beasts in the forest. At the very least, thick trees and dense undergrowth would slow the vast army.
Foam dotted Swiftrunner’s coat, and only Ashayna’s spurs kept the mare at a gallop. The forest wasn’t far, but as long moments crawled by, a trace of fear clamped her jaw tight. Thirty horse lengths ahead, the narrow road entered forest once again.
“That’s a girl!” Ashayna called encouragement over the wind as she chanced a glance behind. None of the lupwyns had broken formation to give chase.
Swiftrunner raced on, the forest drawing nearer, until at last, cool shadows and the familiar loamy scent surrounded them as old, broad-branched trees embraced the road. While Ashayna no longer saw the vast horde, she could imagine it well enough.
***
A candlemark later, Ashayna guided Swiftrunner around a sharp turn. Ahead, the path was unexpectedly blocked by a company of heavy cavalry and horse archers led by her father. She buried her surprise an instant later.
“Lupwyns,” she yelled, drawing nearer. “Hundreds of them.”
At Ashayna’s urging, Swiftrunner came to a stumbling halt in the mud a few horse lengths away from the leader, her head hanging low, flanks heaving.
“Light’s mercy! You shouldn’t be here.” Lines of strain showed around her father’s eyes and the down-turned corners of his mouth. He looked her up and down, his expression softening a bit. “You’re unharmed?”
“General Stonemantle.” Ashayna addressed her father, dread heavy in her middle. “I’m unharmed, but we’ll all be dead by sunset if you don’t get these men out of this forest. There’s a meadow a quarter league back, we should be able to make it before the lupwyns reach us.”
“I know which one you mean. Not the most favorable land. It’ll have to do.” Her father signaled a nearby captain. “Make for the meadow.” Her father’s words hadn’t echoed into silence before the captains were mobilizing the men.
“You need a fresh horse.” Her father issued a few quick orders and a soldier ran off to do the general’s bidding.
Ashayna dismounted, handing Swiftrunner’s reins to a groom. Her heart broke as the tired mare shuffled off, Swiftrunner’s heaving, foam-covered flanks a testament to her loyalty. Ashayna’s father glanced at her, his expression somber. Sixty men against six hundred lupwyn—he left unsaid the harshness of truth. It would be a slaughter no matter where they fought.
“Months we’ve been waiting for some hint the lupwyns were going to do something other than raid.” His toned sharpened with a bitter helplessness he didn’t try to hide. “Now, in one day’s time, every scout under my command has reported signs of them. We were coming to investigate when a patrol with prisoners happened upon us. One prisoner is the lupwyn queen.”
The lupwyn queen. Shock emptied her mind of all useful thought. “No wonder there’s an army snapping at my mare’s tail.”
“I sent the lupwyn and her two phoenix companions ahead of us with half of the light horse archers.”
Ashayna held her tongue as her father glanced behind him, back toward human-held lands. Fury ripped through her—why hadn’t he gone with the queen? Her knuckles tightened on the reins—she already knew the answer. The heavy cavalry were slower than the horse archers. He wouldn’t leave his men behind to face the enemy alone.
Fierce pride stirred in her heart.
“Messengers confirmed they made it safely to our encampment.”
“That’s something, at least.” Ashayna watched as another horse was led towards her father’s charger.
“Dusk is the fastest of the geldings. Take him. My men and I will hold the lupwyns back long enough for you to warn Captain Nurrowford.” His voice held such a note of finality that Ashayna’s stomach churned.
***
Dappled sunlight glinted off the polished surfaces of soldiers’ helmets and hauberks. The forest looked almost warm, inviting under the glow of late afternoon light. It might as well have been midwinter by the chill in her soul. Somber gazes, downcast eyes, and thin-lipped resignation in every direction. A few men adjusted harnesses and buckles, or needlessly checked their weapons. Her throat tightened. Many good comrades were going to shed blood to stall the lupwyn army.
Ashayna unbuckled packs from her new horse and discarded anything resembling useless weight. While adjusting the gelding’s tack, she listened to her father.
“Take my written orders, pendant, and ring to Captain Nurrowford.” He handed each to her. “He will lead in my absence. Make sure he gets the lupwyn queen and her phoenix companions to River’s Divide and onto a boat as quickly as possible. Let the lupwyns attempt to run down a boat under full sail.” He hesitated, and a muscle in his jaw twitched. “There’s a chance if I’m captured alive, the lupwyns will try to trade me and the surviving men for their queen. Tell Nurrowford under no circumstance is he to agree to a hostage trade. The threat to their queen’s life might be the only thing keeping these beasts from ravaging River’s Divide.” He fisted his hand and brought it against his heart. “Duty First.”
Ashayna echoed his gesture and feared her heart would shatter. “Duty First.”
“Ash.” His voice broke.
Her
vision blurred with tears at his use of her childhood name.
He cleared his throat and then barked out in a gruff voice, “Survive. Get your mother and sisters to safety.”
Ashayna ignored the lump in her throat and burning eyes. She spurred her gelding into a trot. Once she was several strides away, she indulged in one last look behind. The sun sank behind the trees, casting long shadows across the meadow and giving her father’s grey-streaked hair the gold glow of youth once again. He looked alert, almost energetic, even after a day in the saddle. Out of loyalty and duty, the men would follow his strong silhouette into death and beyond. She would have given almost anything to be one of them. Duty, and her father’s command ringing in her ears, forced her away from the coming battle.
***
Ashayna maintained her gelding’s pace for over two candlemarks, until a wooden palisade became visible in the distance. Even sensing there were no lupwyns following, she still couldn’t relax. She fidgeted while she waited for the guards to open the encampment’s gate. Those few moments of inactivity allowed her worry and guilt to creep in. When the gate swung open, Ashayna spurred her mount through. They trotted by a half-built barracks and a newly-finished healer’s compound, then angled towards camp’s center, where the largest cluster of tents stood.
Outside her father’s command tent, Ashayna dismounted and hailed a nearby guard to walk her horse. In almost the same motion, she waved over the first messenger she spotted and ordered him to follow. Inside, Ashayna found several senior officers gathered around a map-strewn table. Captain Nurrowford stood with his back to her, his head bent over a map while an officer briefed him on events.
“Captain.” She addressed Nurrowford in a somber tone. “I have your orders from General Stonemantle.”
When he turned, his haggard expression was serious, more so than she’d ever seen it. Nurrowford was a few years younger than her father, but time and battles had been less kind to him. Time had left his cheeks gaunt, almost wasted, and war had given him a mass of scar tissue, which knotted the skin along his jaw, drawing one side of his lip down. Most days she never noticed his scars, but today his countenance reminded her of a skull. Perhaps it was just her imagination.
“What do you have to report, scout?” Nurrowford held out his hand for the general’s letter.
She handed him her message satchel. “It’s too late to send help. The general is captured…or dead.” Her voice sounded hollow to her own ears. The younger officers murmured in shock and grief. The oldest ones remained silent—they’d already known what the general’s delay could mean.
“How?” Captain Nurrowford asked as he broke the seal on the letter.
Thankful for the years of training she’d received in a military family, she recited all she knew. “A small group of lupwyns was chasing me. While fleeing I spotted a much larger mass flowing out of the woods northwest of the city, six hundred strong, in full plate armor. I wouldn’t have believed the wolf-beasts possessed such weaponry if I hadn’t seen it myself.”
Nurrowford digested the contents of the general’s letter with a grunt. “How fast do they travel?”
“I can’t say. It depends on how much of a distraction General Stonemantle and his men created. Even with full body armor, the lupwyns were traveling fast. If my father hadn’t slowed them, they would already be swarming this camp.”
He swore. “We march for River’s Divide. We must get to the port city before the lupwyn beasts do. Ready the men.” In an abrupt motion, he rolled the map and shoved it in a travel satchel, then handed it to the messenger. “Take the fastest horse, get this to River’s Divide. Tell the garrison Ashayna’s news.”
The messenger nodded, then left at a run.
“Captain Nurrowford, my father wanted me to give you these.” Ashayna handed him her father’s pendant and ring of office. “He wants the prisoners on a boat and sailing out to sea within a candlemark’s time. Perhaps, with their queen out of reach and still in danger, they will hesitate to attack.”
“Doubtful. They’ll try to force our hand.” After scooping up his sheathed sword from where it hung on a folding wooden camp chair, he slung it around his waist. He was still belting it in place as he made his way from the tent, calling out orders. He glanced sideways at her. “If they take Stonemantle alive, they’ll want to trade him and his men for their queen.”
“The general strictly forbade that.”
“Well, he left me in charge. Poor judgment on his part. I will not allow my commander to be consumed by the enemy.” Nurrowford’s lips twisted into a lopsided grin.
Ashayna could have hugged him. Instead, she gave a half-hearted reminder about her father’s command. “He gave a direct order.”
“Never could read his hen scratch.” He held up his hand, palm out, to stop any retort. “While we make ready to ride for River’s Divide, I want you to meet the prisoners. They told us their names and titles before claiming they’d only talk to a woman—some religious custom. Find out what they want.”
“Yes, sir.” Ashayna wished she was as confident as she sounded.
***
Ashayna’s heart raced and her fingers trembled. Hesitating outside a nondescript tent, like any other in the encampment, she rested a hand on the lump of the necklace beneath her vest. Somehow, the morning’s events and this meeting were connected. But would it be the doom of her people or the revelations she so desperately sought awaiting her within the tent? No matter how much she wanted to run away, she would find out why these strangers were here. Catching a lieutenant’s eye, she jerked her chin towards the entrance.
At his barked order, a set of guards entered the tent. Ashayna followed. Three steps in, her eyes adjusted to the flickering of oil lamps, but it was the burning metallic scent of magic, overwhelming in the tent’s confines, which hindered her concentration. Even breathing through her mouth didn’t help. Her magic awoke, flooding throughout her body. Not now, please not now.
Perhaps taking pity, her magic remained, thankfully, below her skin.
She turned her attention to the strangers where they stood around the tent’s lone table. Two oil lamps at either end of the long table offered dim illumination. The vision of the phoenix hadn’t given her perspective to gauge his height, and she was amazed at the sheer size of the two bronze-skinned, winged beings occupying the tent. Her head might come to the shorter one’s shoulders.
Both females were dressed in short robes, ornate sword-belts slung across their hips. Gold and jewels shone in their crests and circled their wrists. The lupwyn was similarly garbed.
With a start, Ashayna realized the three strangers were free to roam with no signs of rope or shackles. She turned to one of the guards with a questioning look.
“It’s their dark magic.” He made a quick sign to ward off the evil. “One moment they’re wearing shackles, the next their restraints vanished. Three sets gone without a trace, milady. Never seen the like in all my days. The captain says not to provoke them.”
Eying the prisoners’ height and talons, Ashayna was inclined to agree. The lupwyn could walk upright like a human, but any other similarities ended there. Her thick coat of fur and legs that bent at a strange angle were markedly non-human, but her pointed muzzle and large mobile ears completed the wolf look.
Stepping away from the table, the lupwyn approached. Both sets of guards stationed at Ashayna’s back circled around in front, swords drawn, and their legs braced apart in silent challenge.
The lupwyn queen dropped to all fours, a growl rumbling up from her chest. Both phoenixes flanked the lupwyn, their hands on their swords in obvious threat. Each emitted a rattling hiss, gazes fixing upon the guards with the sharp intensity of predatory birds.
“Easy.” At Ashayna’s soothing tone, three sets of eyes narrowed on her again. When she eased between raised swords, the soldiers grudgingly stepped back and the prisoners relaxed.
“I am Ashayna Stonemantle, scout for the River’s Divide garrison.” If the
se strangers hadn’t held her peoples’ survival in their hands, diplomacy could have waved in the wind for all she cared. Instead, she wrestled for a polite tone. “Why did you come?”
Silence stretched by. Ashayna fought an urge to scream at them. She dragged in two deep breaths and prayed for calm. The churning of her own magic gave Ashayna an idea. It had to be good for something, after all.
She reached inward, determined to harness her magic. It swirled up from the depths of her bones. “I like this no better than you, but we must talk.” Ashayna formed words in her mind while trying to impress upon the magic her wish the prisoners might hear. “If you can understand, show me in some way.”
The shorter phoenix bobbed her head, her eyes sparkling with a hint of mirth. “How would you like to be shown, Stonemantle? My name is Kandarra.”
Rage, desperation, hatred—Ashayna had expected any of those emotions accompanying the silent voice. Humor was a surprise. “Very well, since you can understand me, why are you here?” Ashayna glanced at her father’s soldiers out of the corner of her eye. She noted the way they shifted, the fear evident in the pallor of their faces, in the tightening of their fingers on their weapons.
“You command magic, unlike these others.” The new mind-voice sounded different, stronger, more disciplined. “I am Marsolwyn, Queen of the Lupwyns.”
Straightening to an imposing height, Queen Marsolwyn gestured for Ashayna to take a seat. Her long, shiny claws tapped out a rhythm against her thigh.
Ashayna swallowed. There would be no escaping their claws and talons at such a short distance. Refusing to be intimidated, she held her ground. Whatever their motives, they might be the only ones who could save her father. After deliberating for a moment, Ashayna bowed low, as she’d learned as a child.
Power radiated off them, filling the tent’s narrow confines. She waited. Her magic hummed louder in her mind. Sweat beaded along her neck, lower back, and under her arms. Her pounding heart jumped up a notch and her breathing increased.
In Deception's Shadow Box Set: Book 1-3 Page 2