The Lion Returns f-3

by John Dalmas

  Then a great throbbing began, like some monstrous drum-or heartbeat!-growing nearer. It filled the air, and the cloud in the sky dimmed to its earlier ruddy glow. Before the general's eyes, monsters took gradual shape among the ships, as if coalescing from some other reality. Like the cloud of light, they were the color of embers, and they exuded evil. They stood taller by half than the masts… and began striding upright over the water, reaching the docks through a cloud of arrows. In their hands they held great chains, like whips, and swung them crashing down among the soldiers.

  Lord Felstroin stared transfixed. There were screams, a ragged chorus of them from the wall and the docks. To his eyes, the monsters were foul, but they were also ethereal. And their chains appeared no more solid than the abominations that wielded them. Yet when they struck among the foot troops on the docks, the carnage was horrific, with men transformed to bloody pulp.

  He became aware that the mangonel crews on the walls had broken, scrambling for the stairs while their ylvin crew chiefs shouted curses at them. In their panic, some fell or were pushed from the wall or the steps, plunging into the stone-paved bailey. Before the wall a monster loomed. Its chain swung up, then down, and despite himself, his lordship flinched. It slammed the wall beside him, smashing men to paste, rose again, struck down again, coated with blood and mashed flesh.

  Yet it had no effect on wall or floor!

  Felstroin's fear flashed off as he realized: while the human mangonel crews were being killed, their ylvin chiefs were not. Unlike the lightnings, he realized, the monsters were not physical in any earthly sense. They were effective only on those who couldn't see through them.

  Meanwhile the walls were nearly unmanned now, cleared of mangonel crews by the apparitions.

  From where he stood, on the fortress wall above the harbor, Kethin couldn't see into the broader city. But he saw the torsos and heads of monsters passing the fortress on both sides, flogging with their chains.

  Compassionate All Soul, he thought, save us from this evil.

  He hadn't prayed for years.

  ***

  The very tall, slender, red-haired officer saluted sharply. "Your Highness, the enemy's commanding general has been brought here as ordered. He is in the bailey."

  "Thank you, Captain. Bring him up."

  It was near midday, and Crown Prince Kurqosz stood on the fortress wall. Not on the harbor side, but overlooking what had been the city. He hadn't slept yet; he was too exhilarated. He'd removed his helmet; his fine-haired, six-inch-long ears stood out conspicuously. A fresh breeze cooled his sweaty, red-haired scalp.

  The breeze reeked of smoke and char. After intensive, systematic looting, he'd torched the city outside the fortress walls, as an object lesson. Little remained but smoking rubble. Perhaps a third of the population, mostly women, had survived the initial massacre and fire. Of those, most were enclosed in rope corrals outside the city margins, guarded by his human troops. Some had escaped, of course. That was inevitable and desirable; he'd ordered his commanders not to hunt them down. They would spread word that an ylvin army had been crushed by sorcery and arms, and the city destroyed. He'd also ordered that the ten most attractive ylvin female prisoners be held unmolested, for his inspection. He'd been without unconscionably long, and he'd never seen, let alone had, an ylf woman.

  A scuffing of boot soles on stone steps turned his head. It was Captain Jorvits and an enlisted man, with the prisoner.

  Again Jorvits saluted. "Your Highness," he said, "here is their general."

  From his seven-foot-eight-inch height, the crown prince gazed coldly down at an ylvin lord, who stood disheveled and proud, his hands tied behind him. Kurqosz spoke in accented Vismearcisc. "You have a name, I suppose."

  "I am General Kethin, Lord Felstroin."

  "Ah. That is an abundance of names. If I decide to keep you, you will be called simply Dog. To reflect your status."

  "In Yuulith," the general said stiffly, "we have civilized rules for the treatment of prisoners."

  Kurqosz turned his face to the captain, who spoke to the soldier in words foreign to Felstroin. The soldier, a heavy-shouldered human, struck Felstroin hard in the belly. Whoofing, the general doubled over and sank to his knees.

  "This land is no longer Yuulith," Kurqosz said mildly. "It is now Vismearc, a province of the voitik Empire. And we have civilized rules for addressing one's betters. I am Crown Prince Kurqosz; I am your better. Captain Torvits is your better." He gestured. "This human, this common soldier, is your better."

  He paused. "But you were not brought to me for training in courtesy. I am considering you as a possible-carrier? Courier! A courier to the ylf dog who claims to rule this land." He paused. "Tell me how you were captured."

  Felstroin got slowly to his feet, and spoke with difficulty through his pain. "I was captured while trying to leave the fortress."

  "Ah! Then what?"

  "My hands were tied. I was taken from the city before it was torched, and put in a rope pen with other captured soldiers. Then, my rank being recognized, I was removed." He stopped, lips tight, eyes on the voitu's aura, gathering what insights he could.

  "Yes?"

  "Then my comrades in arms, all with their hands tied, were lined up by your soldiers and used for spear practice. Mostly not killed outright. They were played with, stabbed, struck with spear shafts. Many were mutilated."

  The voituk eyebrows rose mockingly. "Really! Then what?"

  "I was held separately until someone decided to put me with the civilians."

  "Civilians? I thought I'd ordered them killed too. Ah! They must have put you with the captive women."

  His lordship's face worked, but he did not speak.

  "That must have been enlightening. Well." The crown prince turned to his aide. "Trilosz, write a safe conduct for our friend Dog. Using his former name. And give him the sealed message I signed earlier, for the person who no doubt still claims to be emperor here. Then put Dog on a good horse. Have him escorted beyond our outposts, and released with his hands freed."

  He turned back to Felstroin. "Take good care of my message. In it I tell your emperor what he must do if he wants to prevent the kind of things you witnessed after your capture."

  With that, he turned his back in dismissal, and the general was taken away.

  ***

  Kurqosz made no firm decision on his next actions till he'd received a review and recommendation from his high admiral. He had more confidence in Vellinghuus than in any other human.

  Nine of his ships had been rammed and sunk, though some of their men had been fished from the water. Eleven others needed rerigging and other repairs, due to fire damage. Of the remainder, the hasty storm-damage repairs on thirty-eight had proven inadequate, and they'd taken water faster than their pumps could deal with. It had been necessary to transfer additional pumps to them, from other ships.

  All told, only eighty-nine ships were deemed still serviceable, and they were more or less marginal.

  There were three shipyards on the Ralligh River, close upstream of the city, with ship materials of all sorts including tall, white pine masts. The high admiral wanted to make use of them, to refit his fleet as rapidly as possible.

  The crown prince decided to send the best seventy ships south, to bring as many of Chithqosz's troops north as they could carry. It would relieve the pressure on the dwindling food supplies of the Scrub Coast. The rest of the ships were to begin refitting at once. Meanwhile he'd give his staff seven days to gather further provisions from the countryside and prepare to march. Then he'd leave an infantry brigade at Balralligh to protect his base, and some engineer companies to assist in refitting ships. The rest of his army he'd march to Colroi, sixty-eight miles northwest, and capture the imperial palace.

  ***

  Two mornings later, the seventy serviceable ships left the harbor and started south. They carried no sorcerers. On the second day, a storm struck, with strong winds and heavy seas. A number of ships lost spar
s, canvas, even makeshift masts. Three foundered. Nine others went aground while the fleet attempted to take shelter in the mouth of a large river. Of those driven aground, five were broken up by storm waves.

  There was a minor town, a port, a short distance up the river, and an enemy garrison nearby. On the first night, the garrison sent some twenty fire boats down the river into the voitik ships at anchor. Fortunately for the fleet, the fire boats were mostly ineffective. They tended to deflect off the ships they struck, without setting them afire. Also, the layer of sand put in the bottoms of the fire boats hadn't prevented some of them from burning and sinking before they reached the fleet. Still, the storm wind whipped the fires that were started, and several ships took significant damage.

  The vice admiral in charge of the expedition felt seriously at risk there. Surely the ylver would try other ploys. The patrols of marines he sent to reconnoiter and harass were attacked, and routed with casualties. But not before one of them had watched large rafts being built, and firewood piled. And there were carrels on the river bank, presumably of tar, and butchers' cauldrons for melting it. The admiral could imagine a string of fire rafts chained or roped together, floating down to hang up on his ships. That would be catastrophe.

  So when the storm abated the next day, he took his whole fleet out of the river, and labored back northward through still heavy seas toward Balralligh.

  When they arrived, Kurqosz had already left with his army, to capture Colroi.

  26 The Willing and the Unwilling

  The late summer evening was cool, hazy, and autumnal, and Macurdy was on foot, giving Vulkan a half-hour break, more or less. Something he did several times a day. He'd decided to get in better shape, and had taken to trotting instead of walking during the breaks.

  This was good farmland, somewhat more cleared than wooded. And as much improved as roads had been in the river kingdoms, in the Marches they were better. Certainly the Imperial Highway was. It even had reliable and fairly frequent mileage signs. The last had read BLACK GUM 2, and Macurdy and Vulkan had decided to spend the night there.

  To the west, across a pasture, was a sunset that reminded Macurdy of murky red sunsets he'd seen in Oregon, in the '30s. There'd been a series of them lately. He slowed to a walk. "That's quite a sky," he said, "I'd think it was forest fires somewhere, but if it was, we'd smell smoke." He laughed. "There are people who'd take skies like that for an omen."

  ‹As it may be.›

  "People will make it out one, that's for sure. And afterward choose something that happened, and say that proves it."

  ‹True.›

  "Got a candidate?"

  ‹The cause of these vivid sunsets is a natural event that will affect many vectors more or less importantly.›

  Vulkan's bland certainty took Macurdy's interest. "Really? What else do you know about it?"

  Vulkan gazed westward, and he didn't answer for half a minute. ‹Weather will be the mechanism,› he said at last. ‹Definitely the weather. Over an extended period.›

  Macurdy looked at that without responding. Floods, he wondered? Blizzards? Heat waves? He'd know in good time, he supposed.

  They arrived at the village of Black Gum, and stopped at its crossroads inn. Word had already arrived that they were on the highway headed north, and the stableman wasn't spooked in the least to see a man ride up on a great boar. He was, though, ill at ease about being left alone with it. "I'll send out a roast for him," Macurdy told the man. "He outeats me twenty to one."

  ‹An exaggeration,› Vulkan replied, making the thought perceptible to the stableman. ‹Ten to one would be more accurate.› The man blinked in surprise.

  Macurdy went into the inn and ordered supper-roast beef, a large roast potato, boiled cabbage, a quarter-loaf of dark bread with butter and honey, and a mug of buttermilk. And an uncooked pork shoulder for Vulkan, which a pot boy took warily out to him.

  Only after he'd ordered did Macurdy pay any attention to the conversation in the taproom. It involved some half dozen men-all who were there except for himself and the innkeeper. One man had the information; the others provided questions and interest.

  The sentence that snagged Macurdy's attention was: "What do they look like, these voita somethings?"

  "Too tall to go through doors without ducking. Red hair, great long ears like a goat… And they're sorcerers. That's the main thing."

  My God! Macurdy thought. It's happened!

  "Ears like a goat? Not likely," another man said. "Someone's put you on."

  "Ears like a goat," Macurdy interjected. "I guarantee it." Then he turned to the message bearer. "How did you hear of them?"

  "I stopped at the post station at Venderton. An express rider had just stopped for a remount and a bite to eat. He'd given the station keeper a bulletin on it, to post there. The keeper asked him questions while he ate, and I listened. Before I left, I read the bulletin. You can too, if you stop there."

  Quickly Macurdy got the principal points: A voitik army had captured first the Eastern Empire's main seaport, then its capital. Messengers had been sent hurrying west to Duinarog.

  He restrained the impulse to run out, jump on Vulkan, and gallop off northward. Instead he finished his meal, then went outside and told Vulkan. Five minutes later they were on the road again, invisible now. They'd go till midnight or so, then sleep by the road and be off again at dawn. If they pushed it, they could be in Duinarog in four days.

  ***

  They arrived at the imperial palace early on the fifth. The gate guards didn't hesitate to let them inside. In fact, the stableboy who took charge of Vulkan told them, "They're expecting you in there. Word came yesterday that you were in the Marches on your way north."

  Macurdy had scarcely left the stable when a page came pelting across the courtyard and took him to His Majesty's audience chamber. Cyncaidh was there with the emperor. Both ylver were on their feet, and shook Macurdy's hand. "I knew you'd come," Cyncaidh said. "As soon as you heard the Voitusotar had arrived."

  "I didn't hear about it till I got to Black Gum. A little place in-Broglium, I think it is."

  Gavriel nodded. "Broglium. Correct. How much do you know about what happened?"

  Macurdy summarized the little he'd heard and read.

  Gavriel nodded. "The best thing to do next," he said, "is have you hear Lord Felstroin, who commanded the Balralligh Legion, and Lord Naerrasil, Morguil's military advisor."

  "Morguil?"

  "The eastern emperor. Naerrasil is here seeking an alliance against the Voitusotar." Gavriel gestured toward Cyncaidh. "Raien's job is to bring in the Marches. We hope you can bring in the Rude Lands. And mine-is more basic. I must convince the Council."

  Macurdy frowned. "Convince the Council?"

  "Quaie's infamous incursion into Kormehr, and your own armed… retaliation, resulted in new law. Which requires approval by the Council to send the Throne Army outside the empire. I need eight of the twelve votes."

  "Eight votes? Will that be hard?"

  "I have discussed it with them already, without requesting a vote; their formal rejection would block reconsideration for a month. The members have serious questions about the wisdom of it. Their feeling is, the Eastern Empire is already lost."

  Macurdy pursed his lips. "If your council won't agree to send an army," he said, "what do you suppose the kings of the Rude Lands will say when I ask them to?"

  "That is precisely what I will ask my council before it votes. But their reluctance is not without grounds. Hold your judgement until you've heard the battles described, and the current tactical situation. I've sent for Lord Naerrasil and his aide, and Lord Felstroin, to brief you. Brief you and my war minister, Lord Gaerimor, who like yourself has just arrived. And an old friend of yours who was there."

  "A friend of mine? At the battle?"

  "The chief of a dwarvish trade mission from the Diamond Flues: Tossi Pellersson Rich Lode. He was at Colroi when it was captured. The voitik leader, Crown Prince Kurqos
z, took one look at the dwarves, then had them courteously escorted clear of the voitik lines, and released." Gavriel chuckled mirthlessly. "I suppose the crown prince has read the mythical description of Vismearc's terrors, and decided to take no chances with dwarves."

  ***

  At Cyncaidh's suggestion, they met after lunch. In one of His Majesty's gardens, in order that Vulkan could attend. Naerrasil had brought more than an aide and Lord Felstroin with him. He came with half a dozen other east ylvin officers. There, against the quiet background of wind chimes and splashing fountains, Macurdy was briefed. Felstroin led off with his observations of both battles, and as a prisoner at Balralligh. And described his experience with the voitik crown prince. Lord Naerrasil described the tactical situation as it had been when he'd left, and his estimate of the voitik resources.

  "Apparently their enlisted personnel are all humans," he said. "Voitar make up the command levels above some undetermined grade." He paused, then added glumly, "We do not know how many troops we faced. But judging from an estimate of the ships that brought them, they numbered between thirty and fifty thousand.

  "Which actually is only half their army, though half was quite enough. And their losses were minor."

  "Half their army?"

  "The other half sits stranded on the Scrub Coast. A great storm destroyed or crippled many of their ships."

  "How did you find that out?"

  "Of the ships that brought them to Balralligh, most were then sent back to bring the rest of the army north, or as many as they had room for. But on their way south, they were struck by another storm, which destroyed some of them and drove the rest to shelter in the river Seorroch. We had a garrison there, which then attacked the fleet with fire boats-unfortunately to little avail. Meanwhile the voitik fleet sent marine patrols out. There was fighting. Three wounded marines were captured, and questioned separately.

  "They were human, of course, and assumed they'd be tortured if they were not forthcoming. So they spoke earnestly and, from their auras, honestly. And their stories matched quite well. Our commander in Port Seorroch reported it to us by messenger pigeons. The messages were numbered, and all but two arrived."