Frostborn: The Gray Knight (Frostborn #1)

by Jonathan Moeller

“Go, with this blessing,” said Caius, “and put your trust in God.”

  The men started to rise, and again Ridmark saw a flicker of motion at the edge of the battlements. A small black shape appeared there, and Ridmark realized what it was.

  A kobold’s claw.

  “Stay down!” he shouted as Peter and the nearby militiamen started to rise.

  Three kobold warriors appeared atop the battlements, short bows in hand, and released. The arrows buzzed over the heads of the kneeling men, missing them by inches. Ridmark surged forward, his staff coming up, and swung with all his strength. He caught the nearest kobold in the stomach, and the power of his blow knocked the warrior off the battlements. The remaining kobolds hissed and lunged at him with clubs, their crests flaring. Ridmark parried the blows, reversed his staff, and drove the butt into a kobold’s chest. He heard ribs crack, and his next blow knocked the kobold from the wall.

  The last kobold flew at Ridmark, shrieking, only to land upon the spearheads of Peter and his men. The kobold fell to the rampart, twitching, and Peter finished off the warrior with a quick stab and twist.

  “Kobolds!” said Peter. “Creeping up on us in the dark. Why…”

  “To the northern gate,” said Ridmark, “quickly.” He pointed at one of the militiamen. “Run to the southern gate as fast as you can and put them on alert. Then find Sir Joram and tell him what is happening. He’s likely at the keep.”

  “What is happening, sir?” said the militiaman, blinking in surprise.

  “The kobolds are trying to creep into the town and open the gates,” said Ridmark. “Go!”

  The militiaman ran for the stairs, and Ridmark raced along the ramparts, Caius, Peter, and several militiamen following. He doubted those three kobolds had been the only infiltration party. Qazarl would have sent several, all heading for either the northern or southern gates.

  The northern gate came into sight, the twin octagonal towers dark against the star-strewn sky. Ridmark saw the guards standing atop the towers, watching the Mhalekite host to the north.

  Then he saw one of the watchmen fall limp from the tower to crash against the ramparts.

  “Foes!” roared Ridmark at the top of his lungs. “Foes are in the towers! To arms! To arms!”

  He raced for the door to the tower and found it standing half-open. A dim light came from the guttering fire in the hearth, throwing light over two dead militiamen upon the floor, kobold spears jutting from their backs.

  Three kobold warriors stood over the dead men, moving to the steel windlass that operated the gate.

  Ridmark fell upon them like a storm. His first blow landed with terrific force against the side of a kobold warrior’s head. Bone cracked, and the warrior fell motionless to the ground. The other two turned to attack him, only to meet the charge of Peter and his men. Steel spearheads stabbed, and the kobolds fell back, retreating up the stairs.

  “Peter,” said Ridmark. “Stay here and guard the windlass. If the kobolds get the gate open, the orcs will charge the town.”

  Peter nodded, and Ridmark raced up the stairs, Caius following.

  He heard the creak of a bow and shouted a warning, throwing himself against the wall. An obsidian-tipped arrow skipped off the stairs, and Ridmark hurried forward. The next turn around the stairs revealed the kobold archer, crest flared in challenge. Ridmark’s staff crushed both the crest and the kobold’s skull, and the archer tumbled limp down the stairs.

  He reached the turret and found a pair of kobolds standing over the signal fire. One of the kobolds held a pouch of blue powder. Ridmark suspected the powder would turn the fire blue, giving the Mhalekites the signal they needed to charge the gate.

  He rammed into the first kobold, knocking the warrior to the ground and sending the pouch flying away. The second kobold sprang at Ridmark with a shriek, claws and fangs reaching, only to meet Caius’s mace. Bone cracked and broken fangs flew, and the kobold fell dead to the turret.

  Caius let out a long breath. “Clever of them.”

  “Aye,” said Ridmark, “and this isn’t over yet. Follow me.”

  He hurried back down the stairs to the guard room, where Peter and his sons still defended the windlass.

  “Stay here,” said Ridmark, “and keep anyone from opening the gates.”

  Peter nodded. “Gray Knight…if you had not come when you did, those kobolds would have shot us before we even saw them.”

  Ridmark clapped Peter on the shoulder. “It seems Brother Caius’s blessing was indeed effective.”

  He hurried into the night, the dwarven friar following.

  ###

  An hour later, Ridmark stood with Brother Caius and Sir Joram in the street below the northern gate. A steady stream of men-at-arms and militiamen came to Sir Joram to offer reports.

  Qazarl had been thorough.

  A dozen small groups of kobold warriors had crept up to the town’s walls, using the darkness to mask their movements. Four men had died at the northern gate, three at the southern, and six more at various points along the walls.

  “A grim night,” said Sir Joram, shaking his head.

  “And it could have been much worse,” said Ridmark. “If the kobolds had gotten even one of the gates open, the Mhalekites would be butchering us in the streets now.”

  “Aye,” said Joram. “I’ve given strict commands for the men not to burn torches upon the walls, to preserve their night vision, and for a dozen men to guard the windlasses. The doors are to be locked and barred, and only opened with the proper passwords.”

  “Those are good precautions,” said Ridmark. “I would also suggest putting some of the women and children to work patrolling the streets. If the kobolds can’t get into the gatehouses, they might think to slip into the town and start fires.”

  “The women and children will be able to fight,” said Joram.

  “Perhaps not,” said Ridmark, “but they could warn the reserves.”

  “Very well,” said Joram. “It will be done.” He took a deep breath. “Three days.”

  “To what?” said Ridmark.

  “Until aid arrives,” said Joram. “It takes a week for a man on foot to reach Castra Marcaine from here, but men on horseback can make the journey in three days. We have three days to hold until aid arrives.”

  “Perhaps four,” said Ridmark, “if the Dux’s men face any difficulty getting here.”

  “I know,” said Joram. “So. Three days at the earliest and five days at the latest. Do you think we can hold that long, Ridmark?”

  Ridmark looked at the walls.

  “I suppose,” he said, “that we are going to find out.”

  ###

  Again Calliande tried to summon power.

  And again nothing happened.

  The sounds of fighting from the wall faded. She suspected that Qazarl had launched a raid to seize the gates, just as Ridmark had predicted. Fortunately, it sounded as if the attack had been repulsed.

  Her mouth twisted in a scowl. Men were fighting and dying on the walls…and here she sat, battering her mind against her faded memory.

  Useless, so useless.

  She tried again, but exhaustion took her, and she sank into a black and dreamless sleep.

  Chapter 19 - Assault

  The next morning, Ridmark awoke to the sound of drums.

  He stood, working through the stiffness in his cold arms and legs. The town was full to overflowing with refugees from the nearby freeholds, and there were no beds left. So he had simply wrapped himself in his elven cloak and gone to sleep in a doorway near the northern gate. He had spent years camping in the wilds, and the doorway was more comfortable than many nights he had spent in the forests and hills of the Wilderland.

  The drums boomed over the walls.

  Had Qazarl launched an all-out assault?

  Ridmark took his staff and hurried to the ramparts. The men-at-arms and militiamen on the walls stirred, pointing over the battlements. Ridmark saw Qazarl’s army drawn up at the edge
of the trees, sorted into columns around their siege ladders. Yet so far the orcs remained motionless.

  He crossed to the rampart between the gate towers and found Sir Joram and Brother Caius. Joram did not look as if he had slept at all, his heavy-set face shaded with red stubble. Caius remained calm as ever, his lips working in a silent prayer as his right hand rested on the handle of his heavy mace.

  “Ridmark,” said Joram. “I take it the drumming woke you?”

  “Aye,” said Ridmark. “It just began?”

  “Only a few minutes ago,” said Joram. “They are trying to intimidate us, plainly.” He struck his fist against the pommel of his sword with a scowl. “Would that I had more horsemen. Then we could sally forth and teach these Mhalekites some respect!”

  “Let them drum until their arms fall off,” said Ridmark. “Delay is our ally, and their foe.”

  The drumming stopped.

  “It seems they figured that out,” said Caius.

  “Sir Joram!” shouted a militiamen. “Look!”

  Joram moved to the battlements, Ridmark and Caius following.

  A group of thirty orcs moved towards the northern gate. The lead orc carried a spear with a white banner.

  “A parley?” said Joram.

  “Likely they want to demand our surrender,” said Caius.

  Ridmark pointed. “Qazarl is with them.”

  The orcish shaman strode in the midst of his guards. Ridmark had last seen him five years ago, just before Mhalek’s defeat, and Qazarl had changed little in that time. The shaman still had white hair and a long white beard, his tusks rising from his jaw like twin jagged daggers. He wore trousers and a loose vest, and tattoos and scars in the shape of arcane sigils marked his arms. Even from a distance, Ridmark sensed the aura of confidence around the shaman. Qazarl had always been one of Mhalek’s most powerful disciples, and the past five years had only increased his strength.

  “One good bow shot,” said one of the men-at-arms, “and we could rid our foes of their leader.”

  “No,” said Joram. “I am a knight of the realm of Andomhaim, and I will not murder a man under a white banner of truce.”

  Caius nodded. “Honorable.”

  “It is,” said Ridmark. Galearus had been honorable as well, and Mhalek had used that to murder him and all his lieutenants. “And even if we were not honorable, it would not matter. Mhalek was powerful enough to shield himself from weapons of steel and wood. It would not surprise me if Qazarl had learned the spell as well.”

  The orcs stopped just out of bowshot of the walls.

  “Hear me, human dogs!” roared the hulking orc in chain mail carrying the banner, speaking in accented Latin. “I am Mzalacht, warrior of Vhaluusk, and I speak for this host! Qazarl, the most faithful disciple of the living god Mhalek, demands your surrender. Lay down your arms, open your gates, and your lives shall be spared! Resist, and you shall all perish!” The orc herald glared up the walls, while Qazarl himself remained impassive. “Who speaks for Dun Licinia?”

  “I speak for the town!” said Joram, putting one foot upon the battlements. “I am Sir Joram Agramore, the Comes of Dun Licinia. By the authority of Gareth Licinius, Dux of Northerland, and by the High King Arthurain Pendragon, the seventh of his name, I command you to leave our lands and return to your homes at once! For you have trespassed upon the lands of the High King and brought fire and sword unlawfully and unjustly against his people.”

  Mzalacht laughed. “Cringe behind your walls and invoke the name of your precious High King, Joram of Andomhaim, but your High King will not save you. Your Dux cannot save you. You are at our mercy, and cannot escape.”

  “Bold words,” said Joram, “considering that you are outside our walls, and your one attempt to break in failed miserably.”

  “You might have repulsed one attack,” said Mzalacht, “but can you repulse another? And those that will follow? We have greater numbers, and even the weakest orc warrior has the fierceness and strength of seven crawling humans.”

  “We shall put that to the test, will we not?” said Joram.

  Mzalacht launched into a string of roaring, rambling threats. Ridmark’s eyes scanned the embassy, and settled upon Qazarl. Why bother with a herald? Qazarl was not a fool. He knew that aid was almost certainly on the way from Castra Marcaine. Why take the risk of attacking the town now? Shadowbearer might have promised the orcs victory, but there was no sign of the renegade wizard…

  Then Ridmark understood.

  Qazarl was launching the attack because Vlazar had failed to kill Calliande…and Calliande and the soulstone were within the town’s walls.

  The orcish shaman lifted his head, as if he felt Ridmark’s gaze…and Ridmark saw the shock of recognition as Qazarl’s black eyes widened.

  The shaman stepped forward, raising his hand, and Mzalacht fell silent.

  “Ridmark Arban!” said Qazarl, his rasping voice rolling over the field.

  Joram looked at Ridmark and nodded.

  Ridmark climbed onto the battlements, his gray cloak snapping behind him in the breeze.

  “Qazarl of the Mhalekites,” said Ridmark. “Making a pilgrimage to the site of your master’s greatest and final defeat?”

  Qazarl laughed. “Mhalek fell at Castra Marcaine, Ridmark Arban. As you know full well.”

  Ridmark said nothing.

  “So you became the famed Gray Knight?” said Qazarl. “Surprising. I heard that Swordbearers severed from their precious Soulblades lay down to die. And after what happened at Castra Marcaine, I thought you would have curled up in a corner to weep until death took you.”

  “As you can plainly see, I did not,” said Ridmark. “Or has your mind grown so addled with age that you can no longer discern truth from delusion?” The men near him laughed. “Or given that you followed Mhalek to his defeat, perhaps your judgment was never sound.”

  “What is happening now is none of your concern,” said Qazarl. “Run off, and I shall let you live with your misery and dishonor.”

  “And then you would have one less man to kill,” said Ridmark. “Since you have so far failed to take Dun Licinia, your threats do not worry me.”

  Qazarl sneered. “Do you truly think this is about Dun Licinia? This wretched little town is nothing. Are you so blind that you cannot see what is happening? The shape of the world is about to change. A new order is arising, and a new power will rule the earth. The wise, the strong, will align themselves with the new power. The weak will be crushed and swept aside like chaff.”

  Ridmark felt a chill. The urdmordar he had slain ten years ago, the urdmordar who had first predicted the return of the Frostborn, had said much the same thing.

  “This new power. Shadowbearer, I assume?” said Ridmark. “A poor choice. Given that he has abandoned you here to die.”

  Qazarl laughed. “Blind, pitiful fool. Vast powers are in motion, powers that you cannot possibly comprehend. Your realm of Andomhaim is riddled with corruption, and your High King’s throne sits upon a dais of rotten wood. Very soon now it shall all come crashing down.”

  Ridmark decided to take a gamble. “Perhaps all that is true…but it’s not going to happen. Not yet, anyway.”

  “And just why not?” said Qazarl.

  “Because,” said Ridmark, “I have Shadowbearer’s empty soulstone and you do not.”

  Qazarl said nothing.

  “And I would wager every gold coin in Andomhaim,” said Ridmark, “that your precious new order is not going to arise without that soulstone.”

  “Perhaps,” said Qazarl, “you are more perceptive than I thought. Ridmark Arban, the Swordbearer without a sword. Instead of a Swordbearer, you have become the Gray Knight. And the Gray Knight loves to save people, does he not? Defend them from the monsters of the wild, the creatures of dark magic? Like a broken, pale shadow of a true Knight of the Soulblade.”

  “Does this have a point?” said Ridmark. “Surely you did not come all this way to weary my ears with your feeble attemp
ts at poetry.”

  “I will make you a simple bargain,” said Qazarl. “The soulstone and the woman both. Hand them over to me, and I will leave Dun Licinia in peace.”

  “And if I do not?” said Ridmark.

  Qazarl grinned. “Then I will take Dun Licinia by storm and put its people to the sword. I will butcher every last defender upon its walls. I will take the children, and kill them in front of their mothers. Then I will hand the women over to my warriors, and once they have taken their pleasure, I will have the women killed. Dun Licinia will be ashes, and its people will be butchered meat.”

  A murmur went up from the defenders of the wall. Ridmark saw Qazarl’s game well enough. None of the men upon the wall desired to fight, and most simply wanted to tend their farms and workshops in peace. By giving them a way to buy peace, Qazarl had a chance to get everything he wanted without a fight.

  And then he would likely kill everyone in Dun Licinia anyway, once he claimed whatever strange power resulted from Calliande’s death upon the stone altar.

  Ridmark opened his mouth to answer, but Joram spoke first.

  “You insult us with this offer!” said Joram, sweeping his arm over the battlements. “These are the men of Andomhaim, valiant and true! Do you think they will buy their safety with the blood of an innocent woman? Perhaps such things are common among the followers of the blood gods, but we will not debase ourselves so. If you wish to claim this woman, brigand, then throw your men against our walls. Justice and honor are with our cause, and God shall lend our arms strength!”

  The men cheered in response. Qazarl remained silent until the echoes died away.

  “So be it!” he said. “We shall settle this through force of arms. Pray to your God, and see if he will deliver you.”

  Qazarl snarled an order to his escort, and the warriors turned and marched back towards the waiting army.

  “Nicely spoken,” said Caius.

  “Thank you,” said Joram, wiping sweat from his brow. “I feared our men might lose heart at his offer. Perhaps I should have guards put around Calliande, just in case one of our men…loses faith.”