The Black Sword Trilogy: The Poacher

by VanMeter, Jeffery

  He sat down in the very back of the cave; which was still dark and rested his head against the stone wall. Suddenly he was tired; more tired than he’d ever remembered feeling before. Sleep began to come over him and, at first he tried to fight it. When he dozed, he could hear the screams of the men dying and he could see the awful vision of the General with the axe. Soon he could fight it no more and his heavy eyes closed on their own.

  He didn’t know how long he had slept, but looking out the cave opening, he saw that it looked to be afternoon. He was still tired, but he made himself wake and began examining the cave more closely. On the floor around him were, what looked like Army packs. There were weapons, including short swords, spears and maces. There were suits of armor with dust all over them. He looked inside one of the packs and found it filled it with the same equipment he’d been issued at Kallesh. Then he heard the sound of someone or something coming towards the cave opening. He drew his weapon, and then saw the silhouette of; what looked like a man standing at the opening.

  “Is anyone here” The voice said quietly. Even though it was only a whisper, he could tell it was Terri’s voice.

  “Terri.” He called out, also in a whisper. “Is that you?”

  When she stepped into the cave, his eyes adjusted and saw that it was, indeed her. She looked at him and smiled.

  “By the lady,” She said. “You made it.”

  She then stepped up to him and embraced him.

  “If you were a woman, I’d kiss you.”

  “If you were a man, I’d punch you for even thinking about it.”

  They both laughed.

  “Have you seen anyone else?” She asked him. He shook his head sadly. She closed her eyes in a painful expression and nodded simply. She looked around as if searching the cave.

  “How did you find this place?” She asked, breaking the tense silence.

  “I didn’t.” He answered and she looked at him as if puzzled.

  “Shela did.” He added.

  She looked puzzled again, and then smiled broadly.

  “Did she really?” She asked, almost laughing. Kenner simply smiled and nodded. “I guess she likes you after all.”

  She sat down on the dirt floor of the cave, breathing heavily.

  “What is this place?” Kenner asked.

  “It’s a hide,” she answered. “When the Wall was built, the builders figured that there was a possibility of the garrison being overrun. They found this cave and stocked it with food and supplies in case anyone survived.”

  “Food?” Kenner questioned.

  “Yes, in those barrels along the wall. Every few weeks or so, we trade out the old food for new. There should be some dried meats and maybe some fruit, if we’re lucky.”

  Kenner opened several of the barrels and found the dried meats along with some apples. The two of them ate some, but didn’t talk. Neither one of them could really think of anything to say.

  “How did you escape?” Kenner finally asked her.

  She took a deep breath as if preparing herself for the answer.

  “After the platform collapsed, I found myself surrounded by Wolfen. I managed to kill a couple of them, but they surrounded me. Just as they were about to descend on me, a couple of them caught fire and began to run away from me. I guess the others just panicked and ran. That’s when I heard the Captain order us to break cover and run. So I ran.”

  She paused for a moment and looked as if she were in pain.

  “I saw what was happening to them. All those men running in the same direction; running for their lives. The Wolfen just ran them down and tore them apart.”

  Her voice began to break.

  “I couldn’t move. It was like I was stuck to the ground and I watched all those brave men being slaughtered. It was terrible.”

  She lowered her head and wiped tears out of her eyes.

  “Eventually,” she sniffed. “I noticed that the animals apparently hadn’t seen me and I guess the smell of the fire was so strong they couldn’t smell anything else. I knew where the hide was and I started running, but not towards the river like all the rest. I ran along the Wall for about a mile, then stopped and waited. I don’t know what I was waiting for. Maybe I was waiting for the beasts to come for me and for my turn to die. I just sat there and waited.”

  She paused for a moment and looked as she was looking far off into a distance. Her eyes were colder and harder than Kenner had yet seen. Then they softened and she continued.

  “Anyway…after daybreak, I saw that the creatures were massing just past the fire and I took my chance. I knew where this place was and I just ran for it. Every now and then, I would look behind me to see if I was being followed and saw nothing. A little while longer and here I am.”

  “You must be exhausted.” Kenner told her.

  She nodded and smiled.

  “I could do with a rest.”

  They were both quiet for a few moments, neither feeling sure of anything to say. And although neither would speak of it, they both felt guilty for having survived when so many had not.

  “Do you think we did it?” Kenner asked her.

  “Did what?”

  “Slowed them down?”

  “I think so,” she said nodding her head again. “By my reckoning, less than half of the them got to this side before the fort started burning.”

  An hour later, the sky started to darken outside. Kenner looked outside the cave opening and saw dark clouds rolling over the sky.

  “Looks like rain.” He said.

  “Of course it does.” Terri said dryly.

  They both knew that rain was a bad sign. The rain would likely douse the fire, allowing more of the creatures to pass through the gate. Before too long, they heard thunder and a steady rain began to fall.

  Trying to ease his own thoughts, Kenner set about searching through the rest of the provisions in the cave. He shook the barrels listening for some clue as to their contents. From one of them, he heard a swishing sound, like water and it was sealed tightly. Using a mace he cracked open the top of hit and the familiar scent of ale accompanied a shower of frothy liquid.

  “Look what we have here.” He said brightly.

  Terri turned and her smile returned.

  “I definitely think we could do with a drink.” She said.

  For a while longer, they sat, ate and drank quietly. Terri felt tired and sore from running for almost half the day. Kenner was still haunted by the battle he’d just fought and still disturbed by the vision of the General with the axe. Why had he seen that in a dream, he asked himself? Why was that important to him of all the soldiers who fought in that battle?

  Then through the steady rain, they heard footsteps approaching. Kenner bolted upright and drew his short sword and Terri scrambled to her feet. Out of the rain and into the cave stepped Captain Krall. He walked in, looked at the two of them but said nothing. Terri greeted him and took a step towards him, but there was something in his expression that stopped her. He looked older and tired. His eyes seemed to have sunken farther back into his face and his mouth had a scowl of a hundred defeats.

  “Are you the only ones who made it here?” He finally asked them. His voice sounded like a low moan.

  “Yes sir.” Kenner answered him.

  At this, the Captain only nodded sadly.

  He looked around in the cave, and then found one of the packs on the ground. He searched through it and then pulled a tin cup out of it. Without saying another word to the two of them, he filled the cup with ale and then walked back out into the rain.

  Kenner watched him for a while. The Captain simply sat on a rock staring off towards the fort. The fire eventually died from the hard and steady rain. Kenner thought about calling out to him, but decided against it. He had the feeling that the best thing to do at the time was to leave the Captain alone.

  Staring off into the distance, Captain Krall contemplated his first defeat. In his thirty years in the Army, he’d never tasted a loss bef
ore. Even in some of the most desperate battles he’d ever fought; somehow he and his comrades always emerged victorious. Not this time.

  He tried to console himself with the knowledge that it was never a battle he could have won; not with what he had to work with. But there was no consolation with the knowledge that so many good men had died. Watching the fire in the distance die from the rain made the loss seem even more useless.

  Questions haunted his mind. Why didn’t I simply evacuate the garrison? Why not simply burn the fort and then escape with all his soldiers alive? They could have escaped across the bridge, burned it and evacuated along with the civilians, he thought to himself. The logical part of his mind reminded him that had he done that at any time before the new moon, the enemy would have just waited the fire out then passed to the other side of the Wall with no delay to their plan. By simply evacuating, it might have actually aided his brother’s plan.

  Reminded that his enemy was his own brother, he felt a stab of pain in his chest like a dagger thrust into his heart. Why, he asked himself? What had turned his brother to leading an army of foul beasts against the nation they had both once served? His brother was a good man, he tried to remind himself. What could turn him to evil? Suddenly a terrible truth returned to him. Not only did his brother lead an army of animals in a campaign that could kill thousands of innocents; somehow, his brother now had the Silver Axe; one of the legendary weapons from The Great War. It was this thought above all others that brought him out of his melancholy.

  He stepped inside the cave, now lit by a single torch and looked at the two soldiers sitting on the dirt floor.

  “You are still soldiers of Walechia,” he announced to them, “and I am still your captain.”

  They both stood up and responded strongly, “yes sir!”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Captain Krall drew himself another cup full of ale and began to look through a box on the floor of the cave. From inside the box, he pulled out a map and placed it on the floor. Kenner and Terri kneeled down on opposite sides of the map.

  “One of the most important weapons in war,” Captain Krall began, “is information. And right now, the three of us have information that is very important in the war that has now started.”

  “First of all,” he continued, “we know, or at least I know and you’re about to discover that Grail, a former Captain of Walechia is the Commanding General of that army. He’s highly intelligent, highly efficient and a brilliant tactician. It is his intention to move his army as quickly as possible behind the wall and attack Mobrey before the next new moon. I also believe it is likely that he will have even more troops move behind his army and mass them at Mobrey for another attack across the plain, cutting off Kallesh from supplies and reinforcements. Having accomplished that, he can choke and starve the White City into submission. The Iron Gates have never been breached, but he wouldn’t need to. All he’d have to do is position his troops around the city and wait for people to start starving.”

  Kenner and Terri both contemplated this looking at the map. The Captain was right, they both thought. They also both understood that if they could get this information to Kallesh before Grail’s army reached Mobrey, the King may be able to raise a force to counter this attack.

  “Unless, I’m wrong and I don’t believe I am,” Krall continued, “Grail’s entire plan depends on timing and the taking of Mobrey. He has to move his army to Mobrey before the next new moon. If he can’t do that, he can’t control the river and he can’t mass more troops. He has to take Mobrey and it must be done before the next new moon.”

  Kenner knew little about military tactics; only fighting. However, what Krall was saying did make sense. He understood at an almost instinctive level that if General Grail were to accomplish what Captain Krall was explaining, he could potentially take the entire nation. He began to think to himself of other scenarios, including the army of monsters moving across the plains, through villages and cities, killing and destroying with little or no opposition. If Grail accomplished this first task, he thought it very unlikely that Walechia, even with all of its Grand Army could win this kind of war. But first, he understood, Grail had to take Mobrey. If this army could be stopped before then, this war may still go a different direction.

  Terri saw a different problem. She looked at the map on the ground and saw her own small village. The Wolfen army would reach that tiny point on the map before reaching Mobrey. The creatures could destroy the village and kill everyone she knew and nothing could potentially stop them.

  “We also know one more thing,” Krall went on gravely. “General Grail has the Silver Axe.”

  Terri couldn’t stop a slight cough of a laugh from coming out.

  “Something funny?” Krall asked with a hint of anger in his voice.

  “I thought the four weapons was just a legend.” She answered.

  “You did see what happened didn’t you?” Krall asked her directly.

  “Oh yeah, I saw.” She said. “I was sort of hoping I was merely hallucinating.”

  Krall nodded and understood her better.

  “I found myself hoping the same,” He said in a softer voice. “Unfortunately, we were both wrong. The Silver Axe is real and Grail has it.”

  “What can anyone do to stop that?” Kenner asked in an almost defeated voice.

  Captain Krall took a deep breath and scratched his head nervously.

  “Even with that weapon,” he answered trying to sound hopeful, “he is still only one man. He may be able to kill hundreds by himself, but there may still be hope if a large enough force can be gathered against his army.”

  Terri then found herself understanding something more in what the Captain was telling them.

  “So what you’re saying,” she said, “is that somehow we need to get this information to Kallesh.”

  “That is precisely what I’m saying.” Krall answered her.

  Kenner found himself needing another cup full of ale. As he stood up and turned towards the barrel, Terri said to him, “While you’re up…” and then held her cup to him.

  “I hope you haven’t been hitting that stuff too hard.” Captain Krall told them both.

  “Considering what we’ve just been through and what you’re about to ask us to do; how would you define ‘too hard’?” Terri asked.

  Krall wanted to bark at her for that comment, but then his thoughts eased.

  “It would be helpful if you could both remember this conversation in the morning.” He said.

  “We haven’t been hitting the stuff that hard.” Kenner tried to reassure him.

  “Well, in that case you can get me another cup too.” Krall ordered him.

  They sat quietly around the map for a few moments drinking their ale. Feeling more comfortable in the silence, Kenner found himself drinking more slowly; as if finishing his cup full would bring back the now uncomfortable conversation. Terri couldn’t stop looking at the same point on the map representing her village, her family and her friends. She was fighting the urge to simply get up and start running to the village and warn them. Even though she knew, consciously that this was foolishness, she still had the urge to do so.

  “Ordinarily,” Krall said, finally breaking the tense silence, “I would say that we need to stick together.” He paused for a moment to let that sink in to his two soldiers. “However, I cannot overstate how important this information is. As Grail is no fool, he will have some of his animals looking for potential survivors and if we travel together, there is the very real possibility that we will be caught together. If we’re all killed at the same time, the information will die with us. In addition, the three of us traveling together will give out a stronger scent than one person traveling alone. Our greatest chance for success in getting this information to Kallesh is for us to take different routes.”

  Krall then pointed to the map again.

  “The most dangerous route; “ he began, “is the direct route following the river. I’ll take that one
myself.”

  “Forgive me for saying this Captain,” Kenner interrupted. “But that route looks a little more than just ‘dangerous’. It looks more like suicide.”

  “I agree Captain.” Terri added. “By sunrise, there will be roughly five thousand Wolfen between you and Mobrey.”

  “I do concur that it has its challenges. However, I think I can manage it if I stay at least a mile behind the beast army until I reach the bridge at Serace. I can cross over there and then move more quickly.”

  “Won’t Grail move his army over that same bridge?” Kenner asked.

  “No. That would be a waste of time. His strategy is a dagger thrust from here, through Post One and on to Mobrey. He has no interest in crossing that bridge.”

  “That bridge is still twenty miles,” Kenner included.

  “Yes, and with that army moving at about three miles a day, I should be able to get there in seven. Once I cross the bridge, I can move even faster.”

  Now,” he said facing both of them. “Which one of you is the better runner?”

  Both raised their hands.

  “I had a feeling this would happen,” Krall said frustrated. “Pick a number between one and ten.” He ordered Kenner.

  He thought for a second.

  “Eight.” He said. Krall then pointed at Terri.

  “Five.” She answered.

  “I’m sorry, Terri but you were closest. You’ll have to take the route through the Blackwoods.”