Annbell recoiled at the name, but settled herself quickly so as not to offend her host. She had heard of the hag before, and there were as many stories about her as there was wonder at what she really was. Some said she was a fairy turned hag. Others said she was a giant, and still more said she was an angel. The story that stuck out most in her mind was of the great forest hag who traversed the night in a giant mortar with a pestle as an oar, gathering children to take back to her hut and turn into stew.
“I see from the look on your face that you don’t know the truth of our Great Stone Mother. I would like to tell you all of it now, but there is simply too much to pass on in this time of need. But there are three of her: Baba Yaga of the Forest, of the Mountains, and of the Swamps. Our Great Stone Mother is of the Mountain, though her sisters have had many terrible tales told of them too, all untrue.
“Our mystics have dreamed of her lately. She is urging us to help the half-angels at your keep,” he told her. “For this reason, more than Sara’s pleading, we’ve agreed to help you, even going to war with our wayward brothers, the trolls.”
Annbell studied her fingers, not sure what to say. Family was a strong bond with the giants: they didn’t harm one they thought of as family, it was against their deepest beliefs. If they thought the trolls were their long-lost brothers, then it spoke volumes of their dedication to Baba Yaga that they would do battle with them.
“But the battle draws to a close, and we are ready to help you,” Torchef said, draining his cup, and resting it lightly on the floor beside him.
At his words, Annbell’s gaze flitted up to the screen, and the bloody battle ending. There were bodies lying all around, so many that Annbell had a hard time figuring out which were giant and which were trolls. Blood and gore covered them all. The thin, wispy figures of giants blended in with lumbering tusked ones of the trolls. The one thing she noted was there were no trolls standing any longer, and there were many giants standing victorious.
“As the Great Stone Mother told us would happen, we have been victorious. Her wyrd blessed us. I would wager we even have the same number of survivors that she dictated we would. And as she has ordered, we prepare to march at sunset.”
“But don’t you need sleep?” Annbell said. “Rest the night; you have just won a great battle.”
“Those who fought the trolls will stay to guard our rear, but the rest of us will go with you.”
Early the second day Joya stood on a balcony in the Guardian’s Tower, peering down at the courtyard. The dwarves had retreated to a safe distance from the keep, but there were still a good number of them, mixed with trolls. Joya figured they would mount another attack, but she couldn’t be certain. They had been set back pretty good, pushed back at every attack. But there was still the concern that with every attack they made, the humans too were pushed farther and farther back. It wasn’t out of the realm of possibility to think another attack might see them breach the keep itself.
But Joya was uncertain. She suspected the enemy had used up all their resources getting this far. All that was likely left to them was force of arm. They had used the stone, and Angelica and Jovian had neutralized that. They had used their rojo, and Grace had broken that. Now she wasn’t sure they had anything else up their sleeves.
In her mind, there might not even have been a reason to call her people.
She gave a sigh and went back to watching the soldiers and staff cleaning up the dead bodies and clearing away snow. Now that the wyrders were better, the snow removal was going faster. There still wasn’t any news on when, or how they were going to honor their dead. There were just so many of them. The human population of the Realm of Earth was very depleted, and if the dwarves did make another attack, Joya couldn’t be certain the humans would survive.
They had lost a lot of wyrders to the alarist, and a lot of archers too. They hadn’t had much of either before. Joya had been told a root of the military often contained near a thousand soldiers, sometimes more. But the wyrders’ root had little more than two hundred; they were their own root because no one else knew how to command them properly.
In total, Joya imagined there was about one root left. Thousands of humans had lost their lives. The dwarves might not have won, but they’d struck a devastating blow.
Sara would be better off destroying the chaos dwarves, Joya thought. But she understood why Sara couldn’t. To do such a thing could have grave consequences.
That’s when she heard a rumble, like a vibration in the earth. Joya was instantly alert, looking around her. Certainly not another avalanche? How much snow can come down this damn mountain?
The people in the courtyard heard it too. And so did the dwarves. She could see movement in their camps, or what was left of them. The dwarves were turning, looking behind them.
And then she realized it wasn’t an avalanche.
Off in the distance a great white cloud arose from the ground, and Joya knew that it was snow churned up from the wheels of the frement mechanical wagons.
She startled. A smile spread across her face. They were there, at last! Joya sped through the door behind her. It was missing its glass like most windows and balcony doors were now, thanks to the darklight attack. She turned left, and her feet found their way up the rest of the tower.
She knocked once on Sara’s door, barely waiting for the welcome, and stepped through. Mag leaned over Sara’s shoulder, looking at a map spread out on her desk.
“If she’s taking this pass down through the mountains,” Mag said, “she should be here within the day. When did you say she contacted you?”
“Last night,” Sara responded. She held up a finger to Joya.
“Then she should be here today,” Mag said. “Depending how much debris is in the way from the two avalanches.”
Sara nodded, and looked up.
“Are you ready to end this?” Joya asked. “The Shadow Realm approaches.”
Sara pushed to her feet, and Mag stepped back. There was an eager look on her face. The look quickly turned to apprehension. She grabbed her cane, and rounded the desk.
“Alright, you need to command them. We have giants that are going to spill out of the mountains at any moment, and they will drive the dwarves toward your forces. Then your realm needs to clean up. Those machines you’ve told me about, will they scare the dwarves?”
Joya was nodding before Sara had finished speaking. “The sound alone was enough to scare me when I first heard them, not to mention how strange the vehicles look without any horses to draw it. If the dwarves are terrified of wyrd, they will be petrified of these beasts.”
“Good. You need to instruct your people to clean up. Cripple, but don’t destroy. There need to be enough dwarves left to continue the race, of that the Realm is certain.”
Joya nodded.
“Come, you can make contact through my room.” Sara placed her arm gently on Joya’s shoulder, and led the other sorceress into her bed chamber. There wasn’t a window in her frame any longer, and the cold cut through the room, warring with the heat of the fireplace. It was an odd mix of heat wave and cold front.
Heavy drapes had been placed over the empty hole where the window had once been. It was these red drapes that Sara pulled back and tied to the side, allowing Joya a great visual of sweeping white plains at the base of the mountains.
“Now, remember how I told you to do the orb,” Sara said gently, sitting in a large chair by the fire. Mag stood in the doorway, her hands folded over her green wool robe.
In moments, Joya was speaking into a pink orb, and then released it to travel to her people.
“HALT!” Pushta yelled. The darkwood dryads drew to a stop. The large mechanical wagons had come to a halt some time before; the sudden silence after their constant rumbling and racket left a ringing in Uthia’s ears.
The hecklin and their riders had stopped soon after that, and now that the dryads had made their way to the gathering of frement and ooslebed, Uthia could see why. All three race
s stood in a circle around something. In the center of a clearing bobbed a pink orb she instinctively knew to be Joya’s even before she could see the face of the Shadow Guardian inside. Words swirled across the surface, but Uthia was too far away to read them.
“Alright,” a white frement with black hands said, stepping forward. The orb popped into a shower of colors. “This is what we’ve been told.”
Dark elves and dryads formed in groups around him. It wasn’t all of the races — some had stayed behind in their homes, to watch and upkeep — but the three races joined together against the chaos dwarves were formidable in size.
“Guardian Joya wants us to wait until she gives the signal. There are giants coming out of the mountains today, and they are to drive the dwarves this way. Us frement will go in with our wagons, rile them up and scare them, since they’re apparently terrified of wyrd. They will start to scatter, and the ooslebed can pick them off from long range. When they get closer, then we need to switch to melee.
“We have ten wagons, and almost a hundred frement. It takes one operator per wagon — the rest of them will be on the ground helping with guns, and then swords when the melee starts.
“Dryads, we need you to stay behind and wait until the melee starts. You will probably be the main front in this fight, since you are better with close-range combat.
“The only thing I see being a problem is the trolls. They aren’t as worried about wyrd as the dwarves are, so the Guardian says. But even then, she thinks they’ll be busy with the giants. We’ve been ordered to cripple their forces, not drive them extinct.
“Any questions?” His golden eyes took them all in, searching the faces of those gathered around him. There were a series of questions, but Uthia didn’t listen. She knew what she had to do.
The three races broke from their formations, and waited for the giants to drive the enemy toward them.
It was midday when the pink orb visited them again. The message was brief, with only a couple of words flitting around the surface of the orb. “Prepare yourselves.”
The frement started their engines, checked their guns, and unloaded their men from the wagons, leaving only one frement per machine. The wagons rumbled out, heading in a fan toward the enemy camps.
“Alright, here we go!” a thin female elf shouted. Her skin was bluer than the rest, and her blush of green darker. Uthia figured she was the leader. The dark elves checked their arrows, tested their bows, and unhooked their rapiers, readying them to be drawn. They mounted their hecklin, and took off after the retreating forms of the wagons, now a dull roar in the distance.
“We strike,” Pushta said. All around Uthia, arms lengthened until leechblades were clutched in ebon hands. Her own arm disjointed, lengthened, and then formed into her Cataresh, its forward blade sharp, the back of it jagged teeth.
The waiting was brutal. She heard the shouts from ahead, the clash of weapons, the drifts of snow fluffing up into the air as the giants met the trolls and waged war. She shifted the wooden sword in her hand, waiting for the enemy to near, dazed, confused, crazed.
Still the sounds of battle drifted to her ears.
“Sisters, move in!” Pushta said. “My blade is hungry, and all of its food is being spilled across the ground.”
Uthia didn’t want to protest. They had been told to wait, but the dryads had also been promised their payment in blood.
The ebonwood dryads, with Uthia in tow, surged forward.
And then they were in battle. One dwarf ran toward them, casting worried glances behind him. His feet shifted in the snow, slipping in his misshapen boots. He was terrified, his weapon lost far behind him.
Just as he neared the line of dryads, however, an arrow burst through his throat, and he fell, gurgling and drowning on his own blood in the snow. A crimson pool spread out beneath him, melting snow and perverting the serenity of the whiteness.
It was the first of many. A wave of dwarves had broken from the attack and fled toward them.
“Ready!” Pushta said, lifting her sword. The dwarves were in range. The line of dryads swung their leechblades. They connected.
Uthia watched in horror as the blades connected with the dwarves. The dwarves must have known dryads were coming. They must have counted on the woodland dryads to aid their Twin Guardians. She could see the weaving of wood in the mail shirts over lumpy bodies.
“NO!” Uthia screamed. But it was too late.
The line of dryads before her exploded in a deafening roar. Black splinters rained down around her. Uthia collapsed, her hands to her ears. She tried to blot out the noise, but she could hear the inhuman scream of her darkwood sisters in the very fiber of her being.
The snow was cold beneath her knees. It seeped into the wood of her joints. She cried tears of sap, dripping down the white bark of her skin.
Dwarves ran unheeded around her. In fear of the giant machines and what wyrd drove them, the dwarves fled. Time seemed to stand still around her. Uthia’s eyes were rooted on the snow churning up under the feet of the dwarves.
In the distance she heard the roar of trolls, the thumping of their bodies landing dead in the plains.
She wept for them, she cried for the races of the Realm that she could feel weakening with every blow, with every death.
Then she understood why the gnomes and woodland dryads hadn’t wanted to help. The races of the Realm of Earth were bound in the earth. She could feel it now, though she had never felt it before. She could feel the weakening of the troll race. She could feel the deaths of the dwarves. It was almost a physical blow to her.
But what if they’d won? she wondered, wiping sticky sap from her black eyes. What if they had killed the Guardians?
Slowly Uthia stood. She gathered Cataresh to her, and waited for another dwarf to run past her. She had let enough go. She had made her decision long before now, she had cast her lot in with the humans. Was there any going back to her sisters? She wasn’t sure, but she also couldn’t stand by and let tyranny rule the realm, and that’s what her sisters and brethren gnomes were doing by not defending the Realm Guardians in their time of need.
It was horrible to think that the Twin Guardians had done so much for the races, yet the races wouldn’t do anything for them.
Cripple, Uthia thought, not kill.
But she wouldn’t have a chance to cripple anything. She stood in the center of the field of battle. Around her, like a circle of destruction, black splinters and red, churned up snow was all she could see. She could smell the ebonwood in the air, sweet and thick like cloves. The scent of blood came to her, but she pushed the iron smell away.
She tried not to look at the few remaining dryads, crouched in the snow, lifting frozen scarlet handfuls to their blackened mouths, eating it, grunting with each bite as if it were the finest meal they had ever eaten. Their swords lay on the ground, and even the wooden threads were stiffened into the snow, feasting on the blood that resided there.
But then it was over. Giants roamed around the battlefield, massive wisps of sentinels, checking for life in their fallen comrades, ending the suffering of their enemies with a giant smash of stone.
The frement eased their wagons back, the rumble shaking the very fibers of Uthia’s being. The ones on land were holstering guns; they hadn’t gotten close enough to use their swords. Still they came, the dark elves cleaning their blades as the hecklin sauntered forth, easing to a halt by the dryads.
Uthia was sure by the looks on their faces, if the dryads hadn’t been nearly decimated by the armor woven with wood that the dwarves wore, they would have hunted the chaos dwarves to extinction. But since only a handful of dryads remained of what had come, they ambled around the battlefield, gathering the splinters of their sisters to take back to the Haunted Forest and burn in their funeral pyres.
But what was left for Uthia? She looked to the east, toward the Sacred Forest. Uthia thought she could almost see the peaks of the trees rising out of the haze of snow, but she knew it was only
her imagination. She had broken away from the race, gone against the ruling of the gnomes, the unspoken leaders of the dryads. For her, there might be no home to return to.
“How did they do?” Joya asked.
Sara lowered the drape from its binding, settling it into place before the window. She used her cane to press the bottom of the drape tight against where wall met floor.
“Perfect. The trolls are thinner than I would like. I don’t know yet if they will make it. I might have to make sure they aren’t hunted, and see to their breeding. The dwarves escaped with more than I wanted, but they are dwindled enough that they won’t mount another attack for a long time, if ever.”
“Success?” Joya said.
Sara nodded. The truth was, she didn’t feel very successful. She had seen to the decimation of two races of her realm. Though it wasn’t something she could’ve escaped, she didn’t like that her hand had been forced.
“What now?” Joya asked, her hands clasped in front of her, mirroring Mag’s stance on the other side of where Sara sat on her bed, her mind in turmoil.
“Now we gather our dead,” Sara said, her voice a rasp of emotion. “And then we burn them.”
Jovian remembered all the funerals he had ever been to, and for that reason alone, he didn’t want to go. Their lives were becoming nothing but death, and while he believed in honoring the dead, he hated the act of it. It reminded him that all they had left to their name was a list of dead relatives, past memories, ghosts of smells to remind them of happier times.
The courtyard had been equipped with various chairs; enough to seat all who attended, and after the attacks, that wasn’t many. A high votary ran the services, standing on a stage before an altar, the gloomy winter sky adding to the somber atmosphere of what was taking place.
In the distance, behind the high votary, Jovian saw the dead on the plains below. The place where there had been so much death. The snow was still tainted red, and he was sure there were bodies under the flow of snow that wouldn’t be uncovered until it melted in the late spring.
On Wings of Chaos (Revenant Wyrd Book 5) Page 23