Or had Cul always looked this small, and Brig simply had never seen it?
“Cul.”
His chieftain paused, looked back.
“Why is it still so important? Grimnir’s shadow falls across Cimmeria. Gaud is gone. And for some of . . . our kin”—he nodded forward, where the rest of Kern’s pack had nearly reached the lakeshore woods—“this is all they have left. Why take that from them?”
Cul glanced back toward the community he had helped rebuild. Brig saw as well that Maev, Burok Bear-slayer’s daughter, watched from the edge of the commons, her raven-soft hair sweeping to one side while she hugged her midsection with protective arms. “Have you stopped trusting me, Brig Tall-Wood?”
Certainly the answer did not come as easy, or as fast, as either man would have liked. “Nay, Cul Chieftain.”
“Then you only need know that it is necessary. And it shall be done as I command it.” He started to turn away, but then hesitated. “Brig?”
“Yea, Cul Chieftain.”
“Gaud is not gone. Not so long as I live. Do nay forget that, either.”
Brig wouldn’t. That was what worried him.
That he wouldn’t be forgetting that at all. No matter what else it cost.
10
STORM CLOUDS PILED up over Cruaidh, smothering the sky in a greasy, black blanket as they darkened the early afternoon with a false twilight.
Thunder cracked and rolled across the heavens. It hammered at the ground hard enough to knock warriors from their feet. Drowned out the calls and cries of battle.
Sleet fell in desperate, stinging sheets.
Swiping at the long, tangled strands of hair plastered down in front of her eyes, Ros-Crana charged ahead for the valley’s engorged stream, leading forward a thick line of warriors to drive a handful of Vanir swordsmen back into its frothy waters. She held her spear high overhead, the point angled down and forward like the stinging tail of a rock scorpion. To either side of her, kin and kind bellowed with anger; slashing and stabbing as they collapsed around their enemy.
Buying themselves time. Moments, only.
With more corpses clawing their way out of the Cruaidhi funeral grounds, shambling forward with the reek of disease and soured earth, her war host hung on by its fingernails, and she knew it.
The battle for Cruaidh was now in its second day, the first taken up by a series of small, widespread skirmishes as the Callaughnan-led war host fought its way down out of those deep-snow valleys still choking the Pass of Blood. The Vanir’s thin presence had been unable to hold them back. Not even when a pair of mountain yeti stormed into her line with clubs the size of small trees and banshee wails unnerving her warriors did Ros-Crana do much more than pause her rapid march.
It cost her a few good men and women, but the two creatures finally fell beneath a concerted rush, and by evening time her war host had smashed its way through to Cruaidh.
Ros-Crana had never visited this side of the Teeth before, but she’d heard merchant tales of Cruaidh and had thought well enough of Sláine Longtooth to expect a fortified village very similar to Callaugh Glen. Cresting that final ridge, she’d been shocked to look out over the valley below and see that the strongest local clan was hardly more fortified than the weakest village of the northwest territories.
A broken palisade surrounded only three-fourths of the village proper. Kern had mentioned Grimnir’s devastating raid against Cruaidh, how the Great Beast had brought down part of their tall timber wall. Unable to repair it quickly, they had instead built a switchback of overlapping stone walls on that side, the tallest of them hardly more than waist high.
These repairs, plus the large, raging stream that cut through the shallow valley, were hardly a challenge for the Vanir laying siege to Cruaidh. A hundred strong at least, this northern war host, led by at least one sorcerer and a pair of Ymirish warriors.
Pushed ahead of her, now desperate for time, the raiders threw themselves at these defenses with reckless abandon and were turned away only by the determined strength of the Cruaidhi defenders, who dodged out from behind their walls again and again to grapple with the raiders. Fighting back and forth among the stone walls. Throwing the northerners back at a high cost in blood and bravery.
As darkness and black weather finally drove the combatants apart, Ros-Crana had been certain by first light the Vanir would have retreated and her host could easily reinforce Sláine Longtooth’s village. And when the Vanir did not retreat, she’d made her first mistake in attempting to press through from behind.
To be surprised as reinforcements boiled out from the eastern forests.
Made to pay for each stride forward, until finally her momentum ground to a halt on the valley’s floor far, far short of Cruaidh’s protective walls.
“A stand-off,” she complained to Dahr, fighting side by side with the Makha. A counterthrust by the Vanir stopped her line from driving the raiders back into the frothing whitewater. “We can’t break past. The Vanir can’t turn in either direction to finish off one force.”
“Won’t . . . stay that way,” Dahr said, grunting through clenched teeth. “The sorcerer. . . .” He ducked aside, thrusting his shield forward to turn the heavy broadsword of a Vanir berserker and reeling backward as the heavy blade smashed and cut through the target’s thin metal facing.
The sorcerer. Ros-Crana fought back the chill fingers clenching inside her gut. If she tried not to think about it, if she did not look, she could almost ignore the sour odor of graveyard earth and rotting flesh that overpowered everything else. Almost.
Not long before, she had seized high ground at the northern end of the valley, throwing Carrak forward with a full third of her fighting force to try and force a breach in the northern line. For a moment she’d thought they had it, watching as Carrak seized one bridge and led twoscore warriors across, through a wide expanse of muddied earth thinking it was nothing more than a turned field for un-planted crops.
The wind had howled a low and miserable call then, wailing through the valley, and the rains—falling all day in a miserable pour—turned icy. There had been a single flash of lightning, sheeting across the sky, and a terrible thunderclap.
And the first arm burst up through the earth, a hand grasping at the leg of one of Carrak’s men.
A violent swipe cut the arm in two, though its hand continued to flail and grasp at the air. Then the corpse fully unearthed itself. Determined to rise again though swords hacked and beat at it, shambling forward to fall against one of the nearest clansmen, using its teeth and claws to bite, to rend, until finally a blade took its head and sent the horror back into death.
The mud began to boil then, like a thick, evil soup. It caught two men like quicksand, the warriors sinking in up to their waists.
They yelled for help, then they screamed, as below the surface more of the risen dead attacked. An enemy they could not see. Killing them slowly. Ros-Crana’s shaman had deserted her then, wide-eyed and fearful as he hobbled upstream to help as he could against such a ghastly, terrible sorcery.
More corpses lifted out of the roiling earth, covered in muck, their own skin sloughing away to show worms and nesting insects dug into the rotting flesh beneath. They pushed and herded Carrak’s warriors. Ran them back for the safety of their own lines while chasing after in a slow, shuffling walk. A few of the risen dead disappeared into the raging whitewater, swept downstream to be beaten against sharp-edged rocks, finally clawing their way out on the far side. Most had the mental capability to at least use the bridge.
Carrak re-formed his line, using spears and swords to hold back the shambling corpses and Vanir warriors, but again, it was a matter of time. For every corpse they sent back to the grave, another clawed its way from the funeral grounds where the Ymirish sorcerer now waited, digging his hands into the foul earth.
“Sure and here’s one more!” Ros-Crana yelled, swinging her spear around in an arc to club the nearby berserker over the head. It stunned the Vanir, long eno
ugh for Dahr to slip forward and push three feet of broadsword through the man’s gut.
With a violent cheer, the nearest warriors surged forward as Dahr kicked the dead man from his blade. Ros-Crana led them forward, once again pushing at the small knot of Vanir defending this side of the raging stream. A dozen of her best against nine—eight now!—northern raiders.
Seven! As another Callaughnan came overhead with a greatsword, crashing it down into a skull, splitting it in two as blood and gray matter splattered against her arm, wet and warm.
Like a flash flood the tight knot swarmed forward, breaking over the Vanir in a cascade of flesh and steel. Ros-Crana kicked one man square between the legs, doubling him over and leaving him for someone else’s blade.
Spear raised high, she cut another raider away from the group, chasing him into the shallows. When the man slipped on mossy rocks and went splashing down into the whitewater, she thrust forward and down, spearing him through the chest and pinning him beneath the torrent. The frothing water ran pink, then red. Then pink again as the raider’s heart gave out.
She wrenched the spearhead free and let the body get swept out into the flooded current. Wading back to shore, she dug the sopping hair from her eyes again and counted her men in a practiced glance. Two of her own were down, one missing his arm with the last of his life’s blood spraying out dark and glistening over the ground, but no Vanir remained standing. She had ten strong warriors, and could throw them north to reinforce Carrak’s line against the risen dead, or south where a full score assaulted a bridgehead held by just as many Vanir. Another dozen rallied to a line farther downstream; but she could see from the way their middle bent, they would be retreating soon.
Across the flood, one of the risen dead ambled along the bank, passed quickly by a half dozen raiders running downstream to join the fight at the bridgehead. Ros-Crana wanted to call for archers, but knew their bowstrings were too wet now to be of any use. The day had started with that truth and gone quickly downhill from there.
Dahr stumbled forward, also dividing his glances between the walking dead and the bridge. Blood coated the side of his head. His, a Vanir raider’s—nay matter. He was alive, and so many others were not. “Cold death or warm?” he asked.
Was that her only choice? How she would die? Ros-Crana used the back of her hand to wipe blood away from the corner of her mouth. Grinned. It might very well be, she decided. But Crom’s gift be damned if she’d not find a more glorious end!
“Wet enough as is,” she said. And growled at the heavy skies as thunder shook the earth. Icy rain stung at her face, her arms. Her traveling cloak was a sodden weight on her back. Driving her spearhead into the earth, she grabbed out her knife and slit the cloak’s leather ties, letting it puddle at her feet. Slipped the knife back into its scabbard, took back up her spear.
“Can nay get much worse.”
Dahr blinked water and blood from his eyes. Followed Ros-Crana’s gaze. “Wet enough? To go . . . By Crom it can, Ros-Crana! You saw the beating those corpses took. Should have killed them again.”
Everyone was watching her now. She held her spear across her body, breathing rapid and deep. Eyeing the distance across the flood-charged stream. Her best jump would land her right in the worst of the frothing waters. Even if she splashed out to one of the larger, wet black rocks, and took the extra help, she’d be lucky to clear the raging flood without a twisted ankle or busted arm.
“You mean to try it,” Dahr said, watching her. He swiped one hand across his face, smearing the blood and muck. “By Crom, you do.”
That dark rock sticking partway out of the water. A shatter of white spray one step farther out, where there had to be another stone just beneath the surface. Might work.
“They aren’t ready for us to try and cross,” she pointed out.
“We aren’t ready for us to try and cross.”
“Carrak!” Her first bellow was lost in a heavy peal of thunder that exploded over Cruaidh, nearly driving them all to their knees. She shouted again, as it rolled off in the distance. Saw a vague form stand back from the line, wave a sword overhead.
“Kill me that sorcerer!” she commanded him, not knowing if he heard her or not.
“Ros-Crana!” Dahr reached a hand out, but she swatted it away and sprinted for the river’s edge. “Damn woman.”
Spear held crosswise, knees reaching high as her legs pumped, splashing through the water, Ros-Crana worked her balance into a forward lean. Jumped up, her foot slipped dangerously on the first black rock. It was a long stride to her second foothold, and that one a guess, but she’d committed herself. Her boot kicked through the spray, came down hard on the sharp edge of second rock. Then she leaped! As hard and as far as she could.
Still not far enough, but close. Another length, and she’d have come down safely, if wet, in the far shallows.
Ros-Crana leaned into her jump, bending forward as she struck down with the butt end of her spear. Putting her weight behind it as the shaft plunged into the raging stream, started to get pulled beneath her but then caught behind another underwater rock. Her muscles strained against the sudden force, but she held into it, vaulted across the worst of the rapids, and fell heavily onto her side into the shallows. Rolling and splashing forward, she tumbled up onto the far shore, barking her head against a mostly round stone, and finally ended up in a clattering pile.
Dizzy. Bright points of light swimming at the edge of her vision. Ros-Crana untangled herself, pushed up onto her hands and knees. She looked back across the waters at a mad, dancing group of warriors who shouted and waved and pointed, while Dahr launched himself at the water’s edge to follow in her footsteps. Or die trying.
Lots of commotion, she decided. Pressed a hand to the egg-sized knot on the side of her head. For such an awkward landing.
Which was when she smelled it. The sour earth and rotting flesh. Sitting at the back of her throat with a slick, rancid taste.
A heavy footfall, a shuffling scrape.
Right behind her!
Pitching herself forward, Ros-Crana ducked beneath the hand that brushed at the back of her head and nearly scraped her with its diseased claws. Sprawling full length beside the stream, she rolled over with her spear in both hands, flipping it end for end to point back at her feet. At the walking corpse she’d seen just a moment before, shambling alongside the stream. Which loomed above. Leaning forward. Falling at her.
With a yell she punched the spearhead into its chest. Impaling the corpse, holding it off her. It gargled, something between a growl and a moan. Its breath was fetid and warm and smelled of the grave.
The dead clansman flailed with its hands, still trying to reach her but not quite able to figure out what prevented it. Until one hand struck the spear’s shaft and fastened on by reflex. Then it pulled. Burying the spear point farther into its chest, wrenching the tip out through its back as it fought its way down the shaft, intent on its victim.
Still trying to reach her when Dahr finally waded out of the flood, several dozen paces downstream, and sprinted to her aid. Ros-Crana set the butt end of her spear against the ground by her shoulder and rolled out from beneath the corpse’s grasp.
Getting out of the way as Dahr came up fast and took the thing’s head with one hard, violent cut.
“Told you it would work,” she said, struggling to her feet.
Not for everyone. Not quite so easily. One after another her warriors came at the raging stream. The third man across made it about the same way she did, splashing into the shallows and quickly wading ashore. The next few ended up caught by the frothing waters, battered against a few rocks before they managed to pull themselves out of the water’s grasp farther down.
The next warrior slipped on the second foothold, or missed it altogether. He went headfirst into the whitewater, was spun about in its merciless grip, smashed into several underwater boulders before he went under and did not come up again.
Her only loss. One of the women was
pulled from the waters with a gashed head. A man with a broken wrist.
“Nay my sword arm,” was all he said, rasping his broadsword free from its sheath.
There were cries of victory and dismay from the bridgehead, as Ros-Crana’s warriors realized their chieftain had crossed the stream and the Vanir were forced to peel away several warriors in an attempt to get after her quickly. Beyond her position, between the stream and the rock walls leading in at Cruaidh’s defenses, the large Vanir host had come to that realization as well. One of the mighty Ymirish warriors quickly pulled a dozen raiders to him and split away from his fellow to stage a hasty rearguard action.
“North!” Ros-Crana ordered.
Throwing her bedraggled group upstream, into the path of two more of the risen dead, she looked ahead and across the still-raging waters. There, Carrack led forward a much larger force into the teeth of a stronger resistance. But the pressure on them eased as they trampled the closest corpses, and fewer were left to take their place.
Because the sorcerer flung them into Ros-Crana’s path instead.
It was a race she could nay win, she knew. Her small band struggled toward the funeral grounds, chased from behind by a small Vanir patrol while a larger force moved in from the side to pin her back against the frothing flood-waters.
Carrak, battling his way to the upper bridge. Too many Vanir holding their ground at the water’s edge.
Her forces downstream might break free, with her distracting the Vanir. But they could hardly catch up in time to help.
What she did not count on was Sláine Longtooth.
A roar of challenge rose from the palisade and stone walls. The gates, reinforced against the battering they’d taken in the last two days, suddenly flew open. Like dogs unleashed, the Cruaidhi defenders rallied, surged forward, and swept aside the nearest Vanir. These raiders died quickly, hardly knowing how or why the battle had so suddenly turned against them.
Age of Conan: Songs of Victory: Legends of Kern, Volume IIl Page 11