Age of Conan: Songs of Victory: Legends of Kern, Volume IIl

by Loren Coleman

  But then Grimnir hesitated, with lightning striking all around him, burning the ground with glassy scars, still not completely certain.

  He needed eyes on the battle. Lodur understood this, and so hurried forward with the men and women of his own war host surrounding him. It took some time, crossing the length of a long, low rise, but there saw it for himself.

  Below and far ahead, a troop of Cimmerians had smashed into one of the larger Vanir mobs. The fighting was far enough along, had spread itself out over a wide area with dozens of warriors having at each other with blade and spear, axe and hammer, that it was hard to tell at a glance how many. But Lodur guessed at forty to sixty fighting men and women . . . a few horses . . .

  And the wolves!

  Yea, they were there. A thrill of warmth crawled up Lodur’s spine, to set eyes on the battlefield and know Kern was, at least, within his reach.

  But not Cailt Stonefist’s Grand War Host. Not even close to all the strength of Cimmeria was here. Tricked! Lodur heard Grimnir’s maddened bellow. And knew that it was the bulk of Stonefist’s war host that had slammed in behind the horde’s far flank. This was a diversion.

  Well, if so, it was Lodur’s to deal with, now that Kern had arrived. No way to tell which one was his false brother, not among the high emotions and thoughts of rage that littered the landscape like scattered gems to his senses. But Kern was here. Here, not to the south.

  “We’ll just have to find him among his mongrel warriors,” Lodur said. Barely more than a whisper. “One, by one, by one.”

  He waved his men forward. Then tugged hard on the mental leash anchored at the back of his mind, and was rewarded with a hate-filled shriek from high overhead.

  “Feast,” he commanded it, and sent the wyvern rushing forward on a sweep of leathery wings.

  “Kill them all.”

  23

  EHMISH HAD NEVER seen so much spilled blood and death at one place before this day. And that surprised him.

  Battle had seemed to be his life for the past several months. If not fighting, the pack was always healing up from wounds or preparing for its next scrap. But in truth those were simply a very few, violent moments. It was actually during the long, hard runs between battles where the Men of the Wolves had lived their lives. Those were the times when lovers were taken, or mourned. Friendships begun. When the real sacrifices were made to set aside one’s own health and life for the good of the pack or to walk the razor’s edge of honor versus duty.

  And when boys truly grew into men.

  Even so, what he had seen on the field had not come close to preparing him for this. Ehmish had missed the battle above Conarch last winter, and stories did not compare. The shouts of rage and the screams of dying men, the crash of lightning and the ringing clash of steel against steel, these all echoed in Ehmish’s ears until he barely understood anything out of the din of combat. Not even a yell to ware!

  It was all he could do to set his stance, thrust forward with his broadsword, or turn a blow against the buckler strapped to his arm. A mindless haze, hypnotizing him into automatic, soulless response.

  Not even one that could be broken by an earsplitting shriek of hatred and hunger.

  A large weight hit him from behind, smashing him flat toward the ground. It was all Ehmish could do to get his sword out to one side, blade flat, to prevent himself from falling on the steel’s sharp edge. He tasted blood and dirt in his mouth. Heard the pounding of many, many feet against the earth.

  And felt the beat of leathery wings stirring the air over him as a set of wide, outstretched claws came within an arm’s length of where he had stood not a heartbeat before. He wrenched his head to one side to follow the wyvern’s stooping dive. Saw it snatch up another man farther along, then rise again with wide, leathery wings grabbing for air.

  “Keep your head, boy. Or lose it.”

  Gard Foehammer rolled off Ehmish, saw a Vanir rushing up, and stabbed from the ground to run the raider through the gut.

  Gard had lost his pike. Left it stuck earlier through the eye of a wooly mammoth, Ehmish remembered, digging into the brain. He had two long, shallow cuts across his chest, and a deep one against the side of his leg that had slashed away one of his leggings as well.

  “Didn’t . . . couldn’t . . .”

  “Battle blindness. You stop thinking, then you stop caring. Well, even if you don’t care, Ehmish, consider the rest of us who do. Stay alive!”

  It seemed a long way to come back, but Gard’s harsh words broke the spell and washed away the numbing haze he’d let crawl across his mind. Ehmish picked himself up from the ground. Saw that Gard and Garret Blackpatch had both come upon him and were holding off raiders on either side. And Mogh, on a third. The Taurin had cut away his leggings as well, and snapped off the arrow that had taken him in the thigh. Part of the shaft still poked out of a bloody wound.

  His silver-chased blade was still a mite too heavy for him, though he was growing into it fast. Gard tripped a Vanir, who sprawled roughly at Ehmish’s feet. One hard, overhand chop, and the man’s head rolled free. Blood sprayed in a warm jet, soaking Ehmish’s boots and kilt in gore and crimson.

  Another moment to breathe. Another glance. They still fought along the northern fringe, more west than they had ever wanted to be. Driven there by the tides of battle, the four of them. Six! He found Ossian and Desagrena also nearby, fighting side by side against a Ymirish warrior.

  “Others?” he asked.

  He’d not seen Kern or anyone else since their last push to link up with Cailt Stonefist, the Lacheishi chieftain holding a solid but bending line to the south. Every push, though, had ended up with the Vanir rallying more men, shoving them farther north, farther west, as the wolves gave up ground for time.

  How long ago had that been? Half a flask of water. Time for a stolen bite of meat from the small leather pouch tied to his belt.

  “Kern?” he asked again. “Daol?”

  “Nay.” Mogh said. “Not any of ’em. Dead or scattered now.”

  Ehmish doubted Kern was dead. The man seemed indestructible, though he’d pushed the edge many times. He glanced around wildly, intent on finding their way back through the widespread fight.

  Then was half-blinded when a strike of forked lightning hammered down into the earth only a stone’s throw from him. Ehmish immediately dropped down, beneath any sword cuts he hoped. Blinking rapidly to clear his gaze.

  Saw the blurry outline of a man approaching. A big man.

  A very, very big man.

  Grimnir was his first thought. The size. The bestial face twisted in a snarl of animal rage. But Grimnir did not have a hide of snow-gray fur and would never have settled for a simple oak branch for a club. And he knew what this was. Valleymen had tangled with such creatures before, when hunger drove them down out of the mountains.

  “Yeti!” Ehmish shouted, leaping forward. He raised his buckler high overhead, getting it between Gard Foehammer’s back and the mountain creature.

  Taking the hard blow against his target, he heard the snap of breaking bones. Felt himself being hurled back, to slam up against Gard and knock the larger man sprawling. At least his warning gave Garret a chance to get turned around, his shield ready as the yeti clubbed him aside as well.

  Mogh had moved to help Ossian and Desa finish off the Ymirish warrior, the three of them rushing forward to tackle him to the ground and slice his throat in a wide, bloody gash. Now Mogh scrambled back, though far too late. “Ehmish!”

  Dizzy with pain, Ehmish rolled to one side to avoid the giant club. It smashed into the ground right where his head had been. But he struck his broken arm against the ground doing so and nearly blacked out. Growling, snarling, he struggled against the smothering darkness and clawed his way back to life. Refusing to lie down and die, he’d at least face his death like the man the pack had helped him become.

  Except that it wasn’t him, growling and snarling.

  His vision clearing, Ehmish saw a wolf c
rouched in front of him. A large one, as big as . . . Frostpaw! Crom take him now if Kern’s dire wolf hadn’t leaped in front of Ehmish, driving the yeti back several steps. Being a mountain creature, the yeti knew the danger of such an animal. It took a moment’s pause, and Ehmish could not have blamed it. The wolf weighed easily as much as he did, with ivory fangs like a mouthful of tiny daggers.

  It was enough. The first arrow whistled in, embedding itself in the yeti’s chest. It roared in pain and anger. A second and third, into its arm, and the creature lost the club. Two more in the gut folded it over, and the dire wolf leaped to get its powerful jaws around a thick-muscled throat, dragging the mountain creature down to the ground, tearing its life from it.

  Then the wolf leaped back, and paced from side to side as if trapped.

  Ehmish had not looked behind him. Had not considered it while death stared him in the face and the wolf had shown itself his sudden defender. But then he realized the wolf would never have charged a battlefield of its own will. The animal knew better. It would have come only if driven onto it . . .

  “All right, boy?”

  People should really stop calling him “boy.”

  But the voice! He knew it. And at that moment she could have called him anything and never been slapped back for it.

  Ehmish leaned back, cradling his broken arm to his chest. Stared up at the woman standing next to Gard Foehammer, with the dozen archers that surrounded them and half a hundred men behind them. She had pale skin and dark smudges under both eyes, and looked about ready to fall over herself and just about as beautiful as Ehmish had ever thought.

  “Where’s Kern Wolf-Eye?” she asked.

  Ros-Crana and her western war host had finally arrived!

  OLD FINN WAS the first of Kern’s wolves to fall.

  The battle, stretching between the last of the holdouts in the north and Cailt’s hard-hitting attack from the south, had thinned itself out on this stretch of the field—About midway between the northern holdouts and southern offensive, where the storm seemed to lull, and the tempest winds battered them not quite so heavily. Here, the Vanir and what few Ymirish they’d come against had not been able to summon anywhere near their real strength.

  It allowed Kern and Reave to lead a push against the raiders. Old Finn and Nahud’r were with them, Daol nearby; there were no more than that. Kern had lost his men to the tides of battle. All but these.

  Even so, they knew how to fight as a pack where the raiders merely fought for themselves. Together the four drove a half dozen Vanir right back to the side of a gentle slope, where Daol had sneaked up through the grass and created for himself a hunter’s blind. The archer’s last three arrows dropped two of those raiders, then a Vanir war dog, which had struck his scent and charged him, jaws snapping.

  Reave, having finally given up his weighty, full-body shield, came overhead with his greatsword and took the arm of another warrior. Blood sprayed in a warm geyser, splashing Kern across the face even as he rammed his short blade through the chest of the next man in line. Salty on his lips, stinging his eyes, he backed off a pace and let Hydallan step up to trade ringing blows with another.

  He wiped his eyes clear with the heel of his hand, smearing the blood across his face like a bandit’s mask. And had barely moved forward again when Finn’s leg took a violent kick against the knee from Reave’s victim, whom he had left, thrashing about on the ground, to help Hydallan.

  Finn’s leg caved. He dropped to one knee.

  The last Vanir easily beat a hesitant sword aside.

  Then shoved an arm’s length of steel through Finn’s chest.

  Kern leaped forward, but too late, too late. He smashed his shield into the other man’s arm, came overhead with his sword, and rained terrible, chopping blows across the raider’s neck and shoulder, caving in through the man’s chest and driving him away from Finn as if such a violent death might bring the old man back.

  Wanting to hurt, and kill.

  And destroy.

  The power sang through Kern’s blood, and darkness stirred. He felt a rush of power cleanse through him, driving away the fatigue of such a long and bloody battle. Called down the skies to aid him. And in the back of his mind, he heard Grimnir’s roar of hatred.

  That might have been the end of Kern’s resistance if he hadn’t kept raining blows against the dead man. He did it even as a forked tongue of lightning snaked its way down from the heavens, smashing into the body, as if the gods had decided to deliver the final blow.

  And was thrown backward by the concussive blast and the smash of Crom’s own thunder.

  “Kern!” Hydallan and Daol were at him in an instant. And Nahud’r, who suddenly rejoined them.

  Kern heard the heavy beat of his own heart pounding in his head and the roar of blood in his ears. He tasted blood in his mouth, and couldn’t be certain it wasn’t his. It felt as if he’d been beaten again, on the floor of Morag’s tent. Opening his eyes, he saw only vague outlines through the violet flares sheeting across his vision.

  Daol, the closer of them all, reeled away in pain. “Crom’s sweet curses,” Hydallan swore.

  Nahud’r slapped his hand down across Kern’s eyes, burying him in sudden darkness. “Your friends, Kern. Fight it!”

  “Pull it back,” Kern muttered, realizing the power had slipped away from him. “Pull it in. Smother it.” He gave himself a pair of deep breaths, then knocked Nahud’r’s hand away and tried his sight again.

  Normal. As normal as he could call it with violet sparks still jumping at the edges.

  In control. If just.

  Daol had his hands pressed against his temples, eyes squinted closed. Kern sat up swiftly, rising to his friend’s side. “Pain?” he asked.

  “Like my head is splitting in two. And my eyes are burning.” Daol was obviously reaching for words to explain it. “Hard to say,” he said.

  “Nay. I’ve a very good idea. Try to look again.”

  He did. His eyes were red-rimmed and tearing, but he could see. He looked at Kern. And there was something like understanding on his face. “Ymirish,” he said. Not as an accusation—Kern wasn’t sure he could have taken that—but a simple fact. “Nearly happened that night with Cul, is that it?” He waited for Kern’s nod. “I should have guessed.”

  “I should have told you.” But then Kern remembered, looked beyond Daol. “Damn.”

  Old Finn lay stretched out on the ground. Sword still stuck through his chest. Eyes open. Aodh knelt on the ground next to him, as if looking for something he could do. Together, Reave and Nahud’r took down another raider, then returned quickly.

  “Vanir.” Reave stuck the end of his greatsword into the earth. Rested forward against the heavy crossbar. “Running hard our way.”

  Kern nodded. He walked over to Finn, pulled the sword from his chest, and hurled it aside. Daol also stepped near.

  “My fault, Kern. I had the extra arrow. Shot the Crom-cursed dog with it instead. I saw Aodh and Nahud’r running up from behind. Knew you’d take the raiders down and thought . . . I thought . . .”

  Laying a hand on his friend’s arm, Kern shook his head. “You did what you thought best. Old Finn, so did he.” He reached down and closed the man’s eyes. Aodh found Finn’s broadsword and laid it across the old man’s frail body, folded his hands over the hilt. “He died well.” There were few greater compliments to pay a fallen warrior.

  “Kern.” Reave said, glancing from the small group and back over his shoulder. “Vanir. Coming.”

  “Yea, Reave. I hear you.”

  He shuffled a few steps up the hill’s slope. Just enough to see over some of the nearby fighting. Saw a pair of war dogs drag a clansman down. And a pack of Vanir running east, chasing after a limping horse and its slumped-over rider. Not Valerus. No saddle.

  He also saw a Ymirish warrior in flight, chased by a half dozen men who had also broken through the Vanir lines form the north. Lightning struck to either side of them. Then took one man d
own when the arc of violet-white energy smashed down and into his back. But still the Ymirish had no chance.

  They caught him. Dragged him down. Hacked him to pieces.

  And yea. Kern saw them now. Twenty . . . thirty warriors streaming their way. Vanir. The long-horned helms made it easy to recognize them, even at a hundred paces or better. Even in the gloom beneath the storm. Then a break, and another fifty or better chasing behind them. Swords waving overhead. Howling their own desperate battle cries.

  “Plan?” Reave asked. The large man sounded tired. After losing Desa when the press of fighting had broken them apart, he’d worked in a tireless frenzy to cut down any Vanir who got in their way. Not that it had helped.

  Kern found his sword. His shield. He took up a wide-legged stance on the slope. He had nothing more. Grimnir was too far away. There were too many warriors between them and the Great Beast for six men to fight their way through. Especially with a second host running up after them.

  But still he nodded. “Take as many with us as we can.”

  Reave smiled. He had blood staining his teeth and the spatter of more gore across one side of his face. “S’a good plan,” he said. And moved to put himself to one side of Kern.

  Then Nahud’r. Aodh. Hydallan started up the slope as well. But not Daol. He stared back along the way the Vanir charged at them. Hesitant. As if not sure of his eyes.

  Of his ears.

  “I’m not so sure,” he began. Then slashed his sword overhead in victory. “Listen!”

  Kern wasn’t certain what he should be listening for. Over the clash of swords and the roar of the storm’s wind and smashing thunder, he heard men shouting and dying, and the howls of distant battle cries.

  Howls?

  Hydallan had stopped as well. But rather than look back, he nodded past them all. “Kern.”

  Kern looked. So did the others. And saw the wolf—their wolf—bounding up the slope not a stone’s throw away. Gaining the top of the hill, pacing a moment, then looking back down as if presiding over the entire battle. Even in the gray and waning light, Kern saw that the animal’s fur was matted with sweat and blood. But not its own, it seemed. The wolf’s golden eyes burned in the dim light, staring back down the slope at Kern. Then it threw back its head and howled.