“And this one?” The squirrel gestured down at Jon-Tom.
“Love is always the second casualty. He will be all right in a while. He needs to rest and not remember. There is a tent behind the headquarters. Take him and put him in there.”
The noncom’s tail switched the air. “Will he be dangerous when he regains consciousness?”
Clothahump regarded the softly breathing body. “I do not think so, not even to himself.”
The squirrel saluted. “It will be done, sir.”
There are few drugs, Clothahump mused, that can numb both the heart and the mind. Among them grief is the most powerful. He watched while the soldiers bore the lanky, youthful Jon-Tom away, then forced himself to turn to more serious matters. Talea was gone and Jon-Tom damaged. Well, he was sorry as sorry could be for the boy, but they would do without his erratic talents if they had to. He could not cool the boy’s hate.
Let him hate me, then, if he wishes. It will focus his thoughts away from his loss. He will be forever suspicious of me hereafter, but in that he will have the company of most creatures. People always fear what they cannot understand.
Makes it lonely though, old fellow. Very lonely. You knew that when you took the vows and made the oaths. He sighed, waddled off to locate Aveticus. Now there was a rational mind, he thought pleasantly. Unimaginative, but sound. He will accept my advice and act upon it. I can help him.
Perhaps in return he can help me. Two hundred and how many years, old fellow?
Tired, dammit. I’m so tired. Pity I took an oath of responsibility along with the others. But this evil of Eejakrat’s has got to be stopped.
Clothahump was wise in many things, but even he would not admit that what really kept him going wasn’t his oath of responsibility. It was curiosity… .
Red fog filled Jon-Tom’s vision. Blood mist. It faded to gray when he blinked. It was not the ever present mist of the awful Greendowns, but instead a dull glaze that faded rapidly.
Looking up, he discovered multicolored fabric in place of blue sky. As he lay on his back he heard a familiar voice say, “I’ll watch him now.”
He pushed himself up on his elbows, his head still swimming from the effects of Clothahump’s incantation. Several armed warmlanders were exiting the tent.
“Ya feeling better now?”
He raised his sight once more. An upside-down face stared anxiously into his own. Pog was hanging from one of the crosspoles, wrapped in his wings. He spread them, stretching, and yawned.
“How long have I been out?”
“‘Bout since dis time yesterday.”
“Where’s everyone else?”
The bat grinned. “Relaxing, trying ta enjoy themselves. Orgy before da storm.”
“Talea?” He tried to sit all the way up. A squat, hairy form fluttered down from the ceiling to land on his chest.
“Talea’s as dead as she was yesterday when you tried ta attack da master. As dead as she was when dat knife went into her t’roat back in Cugluch, an dat’s a fact ya’d better get used ta, man!”
Jon-Tom winced, looked away from the little gargoyle face confronting him. “I’ll never accept it. Never.”
Pog hopped off his chest, landed on a chair nearby, and leaned against the back. It was designed for a small mammalian body, but it still fit him uncomfortably. He always preferred hanging to sitting but given Jon-Tom’s present disorientation, he knew it would be better if he didn’t have to stare at a topsy-turvy face just now.
“Ya slay me, ya know?” Pog said disgustedly. “Ya really think you’re something special.”
“What?” Confused, Jon-Tom frowned at the bat.
“You heard me. I said dat ya tink you’re something special, don’t ya? Ya tink you’re da only one wid problems? At least you’ve got da satisfaction of knowing dat someone loved ya. I ain’t even got dat.
“How would ya like it if Talea were alive and every time ya looked at her, so much as smiled in her direction, she turned away from ya in disgust?”
“I don’t—”
The bat cut him off, raised a wing. “No, hear me out. Dat’s what I have ta go trough every day of my life. Dat’s what I’ve been going trough for years. ‘It don’t make sense,’ da boss keeps tellin’ me.” Pog sniffed disdainfully. “But he don’t have ta experience it, ta live it. ‘Least ya know ya was loved, Jon-Tom. I may never have dat simple ting. I may have ta go trough da rest of my life knowin’ dat da one I love gets the heaves every time I come near her. How would you like ta live wid dat? I’m goin’ ta suffer until I die, or until she does.
“And what’s worse,” he looked away momentarily, sounding so miserable that Jon-Tom forgot his own agony, “she’s here!”
“Who’s here?”
“Da falcon. Uleimee. She’s wid da aerial forces. I tried ta see her once, just one time. She wouldn’t even do dat for me.
“She can’t be much if she acts like that toward you,” said Jon-Tom gently.
“Why not? Because she’s reactin’ to my looks instead of my wondaful personality? Looks are important. Don’t let anybody tell ya otherwise. And I got a real problem. And dere’s smell, and other factors, and I can’t do a damn ting about ’em. Maybe da boss can, eventually. But promises don’t do nuthin’ for me now.” His expression twisted.
“So don’t let me hear any more of your bemoanings. You’re alive an’ healthy, you’re an interesting curiosity to da females around ya, an you’ve got plenty of loving ahead of ya. But not me. I’m cursed because I love only one.”
“It’s kind of funny,” Jon-Tom said softly, tracing a pattern on the blanket covering his cot. “I thought it was Flor I was in love with. She tried to show me otherwise, but I couldn’t… wouldn’t, see.”
“Dat wouldn’t matter anyhow.” Pog fluttered off the chair and headed for the doorway.
“Why not?”
“Blind an’ dumb,” the bat grumbled. “Don’t ya see anyting? She’s had da hots for dat Caz fellow ever since we fished him outa da river Tailaroam.” He was gone before Jon-Tom could comment.
Caz and Flor? That was impossible, he thought wildly. Or was it? What was impossible in a world of impossibilities?
Bringing back Talea, he told himself.
Well, if Clothahump could do nothing, there was still another manipulator of magic who would try: himself.
Troops gave the tent a wide berth during the following days. Inside a tall, strange human sat singing broken love songs to a corpse. The soldiers muttered nervously to themselves and made signs of protection when they were forced to pass near the tent. Its interior glowed at night with a veritable swarm of gneechees.
Jon-Tom’s efforts were finally halted not by personal choice but by outside events. He had succeeded in keeping the body from decomposing, but it remained still as the rock beneath the tent. Then on the tenth day after their hasty retreat from Cugluch, word came down from aerial scouts that the army of the Plated Folk was on the march.
So he slung his duar across his back and went out with staff in hand. Behind he left the body of one who had loved him and whom he could love in return only too late. He strode resolutely through the camp, determined to take a position on the wall. If he could not give life, then by God he would deal out death with equal enthusiasm.
Aveticus met him on the wall.
“It comes, as it must to all creatures,” the general said to him. “The time of choosing.” He peered hard into Jon-Tom’s face. “In your anger, remember that one who fights blindly usually dies quickly.”
Jon-Tom blinked, looked down at him. “Thanks, Aveticus. I’ll keep control of myself.”
“Good.” The general walked away, stood chatting with a couple of subordinates as they looked down the Pass.
A ripple of expectancy passed through the soldiers assembled on the wall. Weapons were raised as their wielders leaned forward. No one spoke. The only noise now came from down the Pass, and it was growing steadily louder.
As a wave th
ey came, a single dark wave of chitin and iron. They filled the Pass from one side to the other, a flood of murder that extended unbroken into the distance.
A last few hundred warmlander troops scrambled higher into the few notches cut into the precipitous canyon. From there they could prevent any Plated Folk from scaling the rocks to either side of the wall. They readied spears and arrows. A rich, musky odor filled the morning air, exuded from the glands of thousands of warmlanders. An aroma of anticipation.
The great wooden gates were slowly parted. There came a shout followed by a thunderous cheer from the soldiers on the ramparts that shook gravel from the mountainsides. Led by a phalanx of a hundred heavily armored wolverines, the warmlander army sallied out into the Pass.
Jon-Tom moved to leave his position on the wall so he could join the main body of troops pouring from the Gate. He was confronted by a pair of familiar faces. Caz and Mudge still disdained the use of armor.
“What’s wrong?” he asked them. “Aren’t you going to join the fight?”
“Eventually,” said Caz.
“If it proves absolutely necessary, mate,” added Mudge. “Right now we’ve a more important task assigned to us, we do.”
“And what’s that?”
“Keepin’ an eye on yourself.”
Jon-Tom looked past them, saw Clothahump watching him speculatively.
“What’s the idea?” He no longer addressed the wizard as “sir.”
The sorcerer walked over to join them. His left hand was holding a thick scroll half open. It was filled with words and symbols.
“In the end your peculiar magic, spellsinger, may be of far more use to us than another sword arm.”
“I’m not interested in fighting with magic,” Jon-Tom countered angrily. “I want to spill some blood.”
Clothahump shook his head, smiled ruefully. “How the passions of youth do alter its nature, if not necessarily maturing it. I seem to recall a somewhat different personality once brought confused and gentle to my Tree.”
“I remember him also,” Jon-Tom replied humorlessly. “He’s dead too.”
“Pity. He was a nice boy. Ah well. You are potentially much more valuable to us here, Jon-Tom. Do not be so anxious. I promise you that as you grow older you will be presented with ample opportunities for participating in self-satisfying slaughter.”
“I’m not interested in—”
Sounding less understanding, Clothahump cut him off testily. “Consider something besides yourself, boy. You are upset because Talea is dead, because her death personally affects you. You’re upset because I deceived you. Now you want to waste a potentially helpful talent to satisfy your personal blood lust.” He regarded the tall youth sternly.
“My boy, I am fond of you. I think that with a little maturation and a little tempering, as with a good sword, you will make a fine person. But for a little while at least, try thinking of something besides you.”
The ready retort died on Jon-Tom’s lips. Nothing penetrates the mind or acts on it so effectively as does truth, that most efficient but foul-tasting of all medicines. Clothahump had only one thing in his favor: he was right. That canceled out anything else Jon-Tom could think of to say.
He leaned back against the rampart, saw Caz and Mudge, friends both, watching him warily. Hesitantly, he smiled.
“It’s okay. The old bastard’s right. I’ll stay.” He turned from them to study the Pass. After a pause and a qualifying nod from Clothahump, Mudge and Caz moved to join him.
The wolverine wedge struck the center of the Plated Folk wave like a knife, leaving contorted, mutilated insect bodies in their wake. The rest of the warmlander soldiers followed close behind.
It was a terrible place for a battle. The majority of both armies could only seethe and shift nervously. They were packed so tightly in the narrow Pass that only a small portion of each force could actually confront one another. It was another advantage for the outnumbered warmlanders.
After an hour or so of combat the battle appeared to be going the way of all such conflicts down through the millennia. Led by the wolverines the warmlanders were literally cutting their way up the Pass. The Plated Folk fought bravely but mechanically, showing no more initiative in individual combat than they did collectively. Also, though they possessed an extra set of limbs, they were stiff-jointed and no match for the more supple, agile enemies they faced. Most of the Plated Folk were no more than three and a half feet tall, while certain of the warmlanders, such as the wolverines and the felines, were considerably more massive and powerful. And none of the insects could match the otters and weasels for sheer speed.
The battle raged all that morning and on into the afternoon. All at once, it seemed to be over. The Plated Folk suddenly threw away their weapons, broke, and ran. This induced considerable chaos in the packed ranks behind the front. The panic spread rapidly, an insidious infection as damaging as any fatal disease.
Soon it appeared that the entire Plated Folk army was in retreat, pursued by yelling, howling warmlanders. The soldiers at the Gate broke out in whoops of joy. A few expressed disappointment at not having been in on the fight.
Only Clothahump stood quietly on his side of the Gate, Aveticus on the other. The wizard was staring with aged eyes at the field of battle, squinting through his glasses and shaking his head slowly.
“Too quick, too easy,” he was murmuring.
Jon-Tom overheard. “What’s wrong… sir?”
Clothahump spoke without looking over at him. “I see no evidence of the power Eejakrat commands. Not a sign of it at work,”
“Maybe he can’t manipulate it properly. Maybe it’s beyond his control.”
“‘Maybes’ kill more individuals than swords, my boy.”
“What kind of magic are you looking for?”
“I don’t know.” The wizard gazed skyward. “The clouds are innocent of storm. Nothing hints at lightning. The earth is silent, and we’ve naught to fear from tremorings. The ether flows silently. I feel no discord in any of the levels of magic. It worries me. I fear what I cannot sense.”
“There’s a possible storm cloud,” said Jon-Tom, pointing. “Boiling over the far southern ridge.”
Clothahump peered in the indicated direction. Yes, there was a dark mass back there, which had materialized suddenly. It was blacker than any of the scattered cumulonimbus that hung in the afternoon sky like winter waifs. The cloud foamed down the face of the ridge, rushing toward the Pass.
“That’s not a cloud,” said Caz, seeking with eyes sharper than those of other creatures. “Plated Folk.”
“What kind?” asked Clothahump, already confident of the reply.
“Dragonflies, a few large beetles. All with subsidiary mounted troops, I fear. Many other large beetles behind them.”
“They should be no trouble,” murmured Clothahump. “But I wonder.”
Aveticus crossed the Gate and joined them.
“What do you make of this, sir?”
“It appears to be the usual aerial assault.”
Aveticus nodded, glanced back toward the plain. “If so, they will fare no better in the air than they have on the ground. Still…”
“Something troubling you then?” said Clothahump.
The marten eyed the approaching cloud confusedly. “It is strange, the way they are grouped. Still, it would be peculiar if they did not at least once try something different.”
Yells sounded from behind the Gate. The warmlanders own aerial forces were massing in a great spiral over the camp. They were of every size and description. Their kilts formed a brilliant quiltwork in the sky.
Then the spiral began to unwind as the line of bats and birds flew over the Gate to meet the coming threat. They intercepted the Plated Folk fliers near the line of combat.
As soon as contact was made, the Plated Folk forces split. Half moved to meet the attack. The second half, consisting primarily of powerful but ponderous beetles, dipped below the fight. With them went a lar
ge number of the more agile dragonflies with their single riders.
“Look there,” said Mudge. “Wot are the bleedin’ buggerers up to?”
“They’re attacking ground troops!” said Aveticus, outraged. “It is not done. Those in the sky do not do battle with those on the ground. They fight only others of their own kind.”
“Well, somebody’s changed the rules,” said Jon-Tom, watching a tall Amazonian figure moving across the wall toward them.
Confusion began to grip the advance ranks of warmlanders. They were not used to fighting attack from above. Most of the outnumbered birds and bats were too busy with their own opponents to render any assistance to those below.
“This is Eejakrat’s work,” muttered Clothahump. “I can sense it. It is magic, but of a most subtle sort.”
“Air-ground support,” said the newly arrived Flor. She was staring tight-lipped at the carnage the insect fliers were wreaking on the startled warmlander infantry.
“What kind of magic is this?” asked Aveticus grimly.
“It’s called tactics,” said Jon-Tom.
The marten turned to Clothahump. “Wizard, can you not counter this kind of magic?”
“I would try,” said Clothahump, “save that I do not know how to begin. I can counter lightning and dissipate fog, but I do not know how to assist the minds of our soldiers. That is what is endangered now.”
While bird and dragonfly tangled in the air above the Pass and other insect fliers swooped again and again on the ranks of puzzled warmlanders, the sky began to rain a different sort of death.
The massive cluster of large beetles remained high out of arrowshot and began to disgorge hundreds, thousands of tiny pale puffs on the rear of the warmlander forces. Arrows fell from the puff shapes as they descended.
Jon-Tom recognized the familiar round cups. So did Flor. But Clothahump could only shake his head in disbelief.
“Impossible! No spell is strong enough to lift so many into the air at once.”
“I’m afraid this one is,” Jon-Tom told him.
“What is this frightening spell called?”
“Parachuting.”
The warmlander troops were as confused by the sight as by the substance of this assault on their rear ranks. At the same time there was a chilling roar from the retreating Plated Folk infantry. Those who’d abandoned their weapons suddenly scrambled for the nearest canyon wall.
The Hour of the Gate: A Spellsinger Adventure (Book Two) (The Spellsinger Saga) Page 23