by Robert Brady
Clash
Princess Lee Mordetur sat the stone throne of Galnesh Eldador, watching Tartan Stowe stride up the red carpet toward her. Courtiers to her left whispered and speculated. Shem Hannen to her right stood grim-faced, waiting. She’d wanted to avoid this meeting, but her advisors had informed her she had to receive so important a Duke personally and formally.
Tartan was smiling, but she knew him well enough to recognize it wasn’t real. He’d decided he had to mollify her, and that meant he wanted to tell her something she didn’t want to hear. Duke Hectar Gelgelden had taken a seat in the gallery moments before Tartan’s arrival. That didn’t take much guessing.
Tartan stood in the open space at the foot of the throne. He inclined his head, and said, “Your Highness.”
“Your Grace,” she answered him, inclining her head as well.
There were 100 Wolf Soldier guards concealed around the throne room. One of them was Hectaro. Suddenly she wished she could see him, staring forward, pretending not to care what was going on around him, but actually listening to it all.
“I am come on advice of the Dukes Hectar and Ceberro,” he informed her. “We are concerned of goings on in Galnesh Eldador, and of difficulties you’re having, and wish to let you know we will help you in any way we can.”
Wish to take it over for you, in your father’s name, he meant. Lee straightened her back and forced herself to smile, as she’d seen her mother do. Shela did this when something had been said to anger her. Lee didn’t expect they would take that meaning with her.
“Your help is, of course, appreciated,” she informed Tartan. The Shem Hannen had informed her she could tell him nothing else. Send him away and it would be very easy for Tartan Stowe and his Angadorian horses to make trouble for the empire.
“Perhaps we shall meet in my father’s advisory,” she offered innocently. “You and Hectar could instruct me—much as my mother and father have?”
She kept that sweet smile pasted on her face. She’d been told to be more chatty with him, to flirt with and disarm him, before she made this offer. She couldn’t, though. Suddenly, she couldn’t stand this. She wanted to be out of here. She wanted to see Hectaro.
She wanted her mom.
Tartan smiled and inclined his head again. “Of course, your Highness,” he informed her, “I don’t mean to instruct you—”
“Don’t be so modest, Duke Stowe,” she said, the smile almost aching now. “You are of Eldador’s highest and most respected house. My father regularly refers to you. I’m eager for your opinions.”
Her father would have used that funny word, ‘schmaltzy,’ to describe this way of flattering him, but it had worked on Tartan before.
He grinned ear-to-ear, then got himself back under control and straightened. “If I may be excused to settle my men and take a little rest from a long journey, then, your Highness?”
She almost told him, ‘Of course, Galnesh Eldador is yours,’ as she’d heard her father say. In this case, she’d been warned such an offer would see Angadorian Knights relieving Wolf Soldier guards throughout the palace. Her father had done so with as many warriors at his first opportunity. Instead, she used one of her father’s funny phrases, “Take your time, your Grace. I await thee.”
He bowed out of her presence and finally turned to stride back out of the throne room. In the gallery, Hectar’s expression betrayed both shock and indignation. Lee had to guess he’d expected something angrier and more forceful from Tartan.
When they met again, Hectar would be mean and pushy. Lee had been there with him, and she knew how to handle that.
She’d done it before.
* * *
Zarshar watched their Volkhydran warriors as they assembled a huge structure on the plains east of Medya. They carried timbers, dug holes, lashed them with strong rope and, in less time than he’d have thought possible, were assembling a platform which would rise fifty feet in the air. Raven would stand atop it with their other casters, and from there the spell casters would support their army.
Normally suicide for a caster to stand out so unsupported, but this was Raven, and Raven wanted to be attacked.
Slurn stepped up next to Zarshar. The two of them were inseparable now—if this song of Glynn’s had done nothing else, it had accomplished that. They stood together, watching, waiting. The sun crossed the sky and the summer breeze blew in from the north. Zarshar had something to say, but he wanted Slurn to talk first.
Slurn hissed and the Swamp Devil finally nodded. “You know Jack, or the Mountain, or whatever it calls itself these days, is with them, don’t you?” he asked.
“We all saw him at the Battle of the Vice,” Zarshar answered, not turning away from the platform. He’d discussed this with Karl.
“If one of those mentioned in the song can turn against us, then either we don’t understand it, or it means nothing,” the Devil added.
Slurn’s forked tongue flicked out to taste the air as he considered that. For months now, the song had been a central part of their lives. To say that it meant nothing…
“As well,” the Swamp Devil continued, “Raven has convinced Glynn a dog is the One Who Fights as Does the Sun. What kind of prophecy relies on a dog?”
“Then why can’t anyone sing it?” Slurn hissed. “Why can only certain people hear it? If it is treachery, then why not spread it far and wide?”
Zarshar bared his red fangs. “If just anyone can hear it, then it’s just a song,” he said. Slurn hissed and Zarshar nodded. “This makes it seem more like a prophecy.”
Slurn shook his head. “But who would tell the lie?” he asked. “The Uman-Chi? Men? Who is trying to trick us into thinking we were following a prophecy?
“Magic strong enough to pull you from your Swamp, to draw me, to pull Jahunga from Toor and Karl from Volkhydro and Jack and Raven from another world—that is strong.
“That is the power of a god.”
Slurn hissed, looked like he would leave and then turned back to him. He hissed the words:
“They will fall, who walk with her
They will fall, who oppose her
They will fall, for the power
Of the goddess, who chose her.”
Zarshar said, “Not a very good omen, if you want to believe.
“We have a saying in the Swamp of Devils, Slurn. Death is the only promise Life keeps. A baby screams as he leaves his mother, because the first thing he realizes is that he’s doomed.”
“Fitting from a Swamp Devil,” Slurn added dryly.
“The worst fear is of the unknown,” Zarshar said. “What you can’t face, what you can’t admit to yourself. When you embrace your fate, you aren’t afraid of it anymore. That doesn’t mean you throw yourself on your spear. It means you know there is likely a spear out there, on its way to you.
“No—I don’t believe in the song anymore, Slurn,” he said. “I’m fighting this now because I’ve come to find faith in what we’re doing.”
* * *
Jack sat Little Storm next to Vulpe on Marauder, Nina of the Aschire sitting behind the Prince in his saddle.
The girl never let him out of her sight now. If Vulpe actually were his grandson, he’d be advising the boy there were things girls did based on opportunity.
Vulpe called him ‘grandfather.’ Warriors called Vulpe Lord General or by his first name, and meant it like when they called his father Lupus. Tough enough on an eleven-year-old.
“Why build a platform?” Vulpe asked him.
“So you’ll attack it,” Karel of Stone answered, from his pony. He sat on the other side of the Prince, and Jack could barely see him.
“Why else?”
“So…don’t attack it?” Vulpe asked.
Jack shook his head. “You have to attack it,” he said. “If you don’t, they’ll have a strong point to rally around that you can’t affect. What we really need to know is how to attack it.”
“To know that, you have to know what it’s for,” Ka
rel informed them.
“I sense strong magic from it now,” Nina informed them. “It wasn’t there before. Wards of some kind. I wish Shela were here—she’d know.”
“Aren’t we facing Uman-Chi kind of light for spell casters?” Jack asked them. All heads turned. “I mean, I know Nina’s trained with Shela, but—”
Vulpe raised his hand. “Nina won’t be fighting Uman-Chi,” he said. “She’s here to protect me. She’s been doing it all my life.”
She wrapped her arms around him and gave him a squeeze.
“Well, then— “
“When we need spell casters, we’ll have them,” Karel said. “We aren’t stupid, Jack. We are Daff Kanaar. We know how to make war.”
“But not about this platform thing,” Jack said.
That shut them all up. They knew they were up against the Uman-Chi, and the Uman-Chi had the wisdom of centuries. Lupus had beaten them in the past, and repeatedly, but his secret had always been to take them by surprise, and he also wasn’t here.
Jack sighed. “If they know about us, and they seem to, then the faster we hit them, the better our chances. They’re still bigger than we are—we can’t let them dig in, too.”
Vulpe looked up at him, and suddenly reminded him of the kid telling on his sister for stealing plums almost five months ago.
“It’s your army, Vulpe” Karel said. “So you can do with it what you want. Seems to me they have a lot of mouths to feed, after a pretty mediocre harvest this year. If we just hold ‘em here, we have a good chance of them turning on each other and just going home.”
“Will they do that?” Jack asked.
Jack couldn’t really see Karel of Stone nodding, but he sensed it. Underneath him, Little Storm stood stock-still. “If there’s one thing the Fovean nations have in common its mutual hatred of each other. The Volkhydrans hate the Confluni; the Andarans hate them, too. Dorkans don’t get along with Sentalans, Toorians don’t trust anyone. Neither do Confluni. There’s only one person I know who could keep them all together like this, and Nina claims to have killed him.”
She had, Jack knew, because he’d seen it.
“My father doesn’t want us to just hold them here,” Vulpe said, not looking at the Scitai. “My father wants this army beaten, and that’s what we’ll do.”
Jack’s eyebrows shot up. For a second he heard Lupus’ voice in the boy.
“At dawn?” he asked, also not turning.
“That worked for us before,” he said.
Jack pointed out the outer buildings on the north end of Medya. “We’ll move back west, then come at them right from there, use that as our anchor. Take those buildings tonight and set up protection for our archers, from the height advantage.”
“Anchor on the right side?” Karel challenged him.
Wolf Soldiers usually tried to get some sort of anchor on the left, where their shields faced and their weapons didn’t. For a Wolf soldier on the front line to hold off a warrior to his left, he had to break ranks with the shieldman to his right and open up their line.
“They’ll see what they expect to see,” Jack said. “When they come at us with almost three times our numbers and we don’t run away, they’ll be suspicious enough.”
* * *
Angron Aurelias sat alone in the pathetic pavilion that represented the best that Volkhydrans could provide for him as a royal suite. In Outpost IX, they’d offered the Emperor several rooms, a sitting room, a library, art and a staff. Here, he was reconciled to an old bed in a single tent that served as meeting room and sleeping chamber, and a small wooden conservatory for his personal prayers.
The place wasn’t even blessed to Adriam.
Ever the stoic, the King of Trenbon overcame all of these distractions and he focused his mind.
This ruse had been necessary if uncharacteristic for an Uman-Chi. He’d heard Glynn’s song, and he’d known exactly what to do.
“They will fall, who walk with her
They will fall, who oppose her
They will fall, for the power
Of the goddess, who chose her.”
Pick either side, and one is doomed. Pick no side, and be overrun. A word puzzle, one worthy of the superior Uman-Chi mind.
Pick both sides and survive.
Angron couldn’t count the number of times the Emperor had been described as a force of nature. Get him moving in one direction, and he’d destroy everything in his path. Many had sought to stand in that path and weather the storm, and all had failed.
Angron had gotten the storm moving. He’d whipped up the anger, he’d put the Emperor on a path, and now he appeared to stand right in front of it.
But that wasn’t the way to beat the Emperor. The Emperor, in the end of it all, would have some inconceivable surprise, and it would explode in all of their faces. Angron didn’t need to know what it was to know it existed.
So instead he wouldn’t stand in that path. In the end, he wouldn’t weather the storm.
He would come in from behind.
* * *
Morning dawned red on 17th day of Chaos’ month, coloring the spires of Galnesh Eldador for a Princess who couldn’t sleep, cuddling another who simply missed her mother.
“Maaa maaaa!” little Chawny whined, knuckling her eyes. Lee could sympathize with her—she wanted mama, too.
She had to go to see Duke Stowe in the tower where she could speak with her mother. She’d already been informed the Empress needed her, so this made for a perfect time to bring Tartan back in on her father’s side. Shela could talk to him, and to Hectar, as she had before, and assure them of whatever they needed to be assured of.
She stood and handed Chawny off to the wet nurse. She needed changing anyway. Chawny reached for her, making gripping motions with her fingers, tears on her cheeks. Lee’s heart melted for her, but she couldn’t stay. Mother didn’t like to be kept waiting.
She almost brought the baby, but Hectar and Tartan would be there. She didn’t want to look like a little girl with her baby sister.
She turned her back to the baby crying, D’leer and her personal squad falling in behind her, Hectaro at its center. The tick of Wolf Soldier heels filled the hallways around her as she crossed the palace for the royal tower where Central Communications had been established.
She didn’t speak the whole time. She had nothing to say. Her mind played over the words she might speak to Hectar and Tartan, but they all rang hollow in her ears.
She hadn’t come up with anything by the time she’d climbed the steps and stood face-to-face with Tartan Stowe and Hectar Gelgelden. They exchanged pleasantries and Hectar nodded to his son, who of course ignored him. Together, they entered the chamber to face the image of the Empress.
* * *
Gharf Bendenson stood nearly as tall as the Emperor, and had more scars. He wore shaggy fur leggings and left his meaty forearms, breast and shaggy belly bare. He sat a gigantic horse nearly as big as Little Storm, with a retinue of warriors behind him, proud Volkhydrans.
Karl could have been one of them if he’d wanted, but now he thought they just looked stupid. From his own Angadorian warhorse, he regarded his King, then turned his head and spat on the ground.
Geeguh Digatish smiled wide next to him. Others didn’t.
“This is my land, and I command this army,” Gharf insisted.
He faced Karl directly, the rising sun putting Karl’s shadow on him. Behind Karl, Geeguh Digatish, his own cousin Dragor, Ulminar of Sental and Zarshar backed him.
In Wolf Soldier formation, 10,000 Confluni warriors, another 20,000 Sentalans and 15,000 Volkhydrans and 10,000 Dorkans stood behind them, 10,000 Andaran horse with lances to their north.
Bendenson had brought 1,000, and his title.
“In battle, the Warlord of Teher leads,” Dragor said, backing Karl. “That’s him, not you.”
“They took my city,” Gharf roared, shaking his fist, spit flecking his red beard. Beneath him, his horses bobbed his head and to
ok a few steps. “My warriors want blood.”
“They’ll have it,” Karl promised. “But I’ve trained these warriors, and I’ve commanded them, and I’m not going to have you undo everything I’ve done.”
“I’m your King,” Bendenson informed him. “It’s my right—”
“Bite his head off?” Zarshar asked, unusually calmly.
All of them went quiet.
Zarshar stepped forward. He could still look Gharf right in the eye, atop his horse. “One word from him, and I swallow your throat.”
The red eyes flashed. Bendenson swallowed, then looked for support from Karl.
“I’m sworn to defend him,” Karl said. “I think you’ll find Angron Aurelias and a Chairman from Sental, along with some Ymir from Conflu by the platform. I think you need to talk to them.”
“I’ll talk to them,” Gharf said. “And then to you, Karl son of Henekh, and you best be quite a hero when you face me without that.”
Zarshar bared his red teeth, and Gharf shot him a look as he passed. None of them spoke until his warriors were out of earshot.
Karl stayed focused to the west. The Eldadorian Regulars formed up north of Medya, using the city to anchor their right side. If Vulpe followed his father’s tactics then he wouldn’t charge, he’d wait, and Karl knew every tall building would be loaded with archers.
If he charged them, he’d run right into the teeth of it, and if he didn’t, then this army would tear itself apart. He knew Gharf Bendenson wouldn’t stay afraid of Zarshar forever. Eventually he’d just demand the Volkhydrans flock to him, and most would.
Karl knew his brothers, and they wanted a fight. Those troops stood on Volkhydran soil.
“We’ll march in five hundred squads across,” Karl said, finally. “I don’t see barricades—they expect a straight fight. I want to keep close ranks until we’re right on them, then we’ll break up and circle to the north—let them be surprised when they can’t run.”
“Arrow fire?” Ulminar asked him.
“Have the last row sling shields and pikes and walk firing as soon as we’re in range,” Karl said. “We have our shields—we’ll get some protection from them until we can pin their archers down with ours.”