Roars of War: The War for the North: Book Two

by Sean Rodden

  Mundar of Dul-darad set a swift pace. Jogging through the jagged jungle of soaring stone the hulking Warder fought down his hot rage, gritted his teeth against his flagrant failure, sought to outrun the shame of his most fatal shortcoming. The Seer of the Fiannar was dead, destroyed, and though he was not her slayer, he was without doubt an accomplice to the crime. He had dismissed Warder Chelyse’s misgivings all too flippantly and all too soon – indeed, in his own churlish way, he had even made light of them. Had he laughed? He did not remember now. He had been preoccupied with ensuring that the pretty young Fiann experience a sun-splashed White Warren in all its brilliance and wonder. And why? Because he liked her hesitant half-smile? Because of the way her red hair framed her fair face just so? Partially, perhaps, but the better reason was his own hubris. His… arrogance. He had become indolent, lackadaisical, overly assured in his sense of security, like the captain of a caravan that had gone without waylay for months, years, attributing such good fortune to his own prowess rather than to the fickle whims of luck and happenstance. The Seer, as competent and as capable as she was in her own right, had been his charge. A charge given him by the uldwar. A charge he had failed. He had failed them. He had failed the Seer. And he had failed the Fiannar.

  An axe-haft clutched in each massive hand, Mundar of the mara Waratur hurried on through the Hard Hills.

  He would not fail them again.

  The Shield Maiden stared at the shadowed slit in the stone. It seemed no different from the dozens of other clefts and crevasses cut into the rock cliffs of the Warren. Nothing singular distinguished it, nothing set it apart. Word had come from the Darad that the fissure led nowhere except the netherearth of Ora Undar. But what peril could have risen from there? Had demons escaped the vigil of the Stone Lords? Unlikely. The spoor in the pale air smelled not of brimstone, but of simple wrongness, of illness and infection. Like the noxious stink of a lepers’ colony, of a healer’s tent in time of plague.

  Or of the corruption of the very Earth.

  Caelle lowered her eyes to the scattered scorch marks on the limestone. I know what happened here. I know what this is. I felt this, fought this before. Her gaze strayed to the pathetic pile of powder that had once been the Seer of the Fiannar, had been the Shield Maiden’s best and dearest friend, the sister of her soul. Ashes now, dust and ashes. And when I fought it, I was not alone. You were there, sister. You were there for me.

  The daughter of Eldurion looked away, found no comfort in the slow dying of day, sighed softly, sadly, closed her eyes.

  But I was not here for you.

  The Shield Maiden opened her eyes, the sapphire specks in them flaring fiercely. The split in the rock remained unchanged, unaltered. Whatever wicked thing had wielded the earthblight so lethally against Sarrane had not come again, might never come again. Nigh upon two knells had passed without incident. The mirarra had alerted to neither sound nor scent. Further delay was unnecessary. Caelle had lagged long enough, perhaps overlong. She would linger no longer.

  Farewell, sister. Would that the Teller had told a different tale.

  “Emanthe. Hyrre. We leave now.”

  The two warders nodded silently, and the Eye of the rearguard followed the Shield Maiden westward and away from the White Warren.

  And in their wake nothing save ash awaiting wind.

  Night had yet to fall when the figure appeared at the maw of the defile. Not tall, but squat and broad, its black shape blended seamlessly with the deep darkness of the crevasse. In that shadow the form was more apparent for the raw power of its presence than for any visible manifestation. All about the thing there throbbed a force of foul abomination, vile and vulgar, an obscene potency pulsing with corruption. Corruption and perversion. The figure paused for a moment, snuffling, sniffing the air, then stepped into the gloom of the Warren.

  The pale stone of the gorge illumined a warrior of frightful malice. Ancient dragon-scale armour plated his hulking body, severe and unshining, from the great gorget that protected his thick neck to the sharp-toed sabatons fending his feet. His beard was a tangled mess of midnight; his malformed pate utterly bald; his nose crushed flat, pushed into his broken face. The slate-like skin of his scalp and cheeks was hideously blemished, a gruesome hide covered with seeping abscesses and pustules threatening to burst. A long pale scar sliced down one cheek into the beard, and from beneath a heavy bulging brow two eyes like infernal hellfire glowed red and hot in the dusk.

  The dwar-Durk looked around, sniffed again, released his massive khurl, a horrific hybrid of axe and sword, from its bindings, then slowly walked across the bedimmed basin of the White Warren. After several strides, something upon the limestone attracted his attention, and he halted, peered down at his feet. The furnace in his eyes flared. His beard split in a grin of spite and spiked yellow fangs. His massive chest heaved a contemptuous chortle.

  Stupid bitch.

  And the Drone kicked the small mound of ash into the darkening air.

  12

  THE BLOODSPAWN

  “Oft have I thought well of someone and been wrong,

  but I have never erred in thinking ill of another –

  would that it were the other way around.”

  Amarien, Eleventh Lord of the Fiannar

  “Are they evil, Prince Kor?”

  The Halflord peered intently upon the dozens of Daradur assembled to defend the shrouded slash of Doomfall. Huge, hulking, clad in steel, the warriors of the Wandering Guard awaited the Blood King’s assault with a calm resembling patience. But Kor ben Dor was not fooled – he was very aware the Daradur were not a patient folk, and that their seeming composure was sourced in neither tolerance nor longsuffering, but in boredom. That he saw several of the warriors actually yawn only strengthened this conviction. And although there appeared to be no martial method to their formation, the Prince knew otherwise. He could see specific patterns, designs hidden in the haphazard configuration, and where he could not see these he could sense them – he was able, with leaps of logic and intuition, to clearly envision the progression of the battle yet to come. And he did not like what he saw.

  “They would not consider themselves so, Shield.”

  Ev lin Dar frowned at the bulky figures in the distance. “Earth spirits with souls of fire, eternally at war, killing with neither mercy nor remorse, going so far as to take great pleasure in the deaths of their victims. That sounds like evil to me, Prince Kor.”

  “Or perhaps they are simply committed to their cause, Shield.”

  Gren del Mor nodded. “Besides, Ev – you just described me, basically, except the whole earth and fire bit – and I’m definitely one of the good guys.”

  The tigress tattoo twisted, snickering in silence.

  “That is just it, Gren del Mor,” said the Halflord, his voice soft, almost wistful. “Perspective. Just as our worlds differ, so too do our perceptions, and by extension, our appraisals of our perceptions. We each assess that which we witness in a manner unique to his individual stream of experiences. And from each assessment arise different actions and reactions, and from these, different consequences. But it all begins with belief systems, or rather the establishment thereof, from which are drawn laws and morals and other precarious notions of what is good and what is ill. Lines are struck in the sand, sides are chosen, labels are attached. One man’s virtue becomes another man’s sin. The same coin with two opposing faces, and no consensus forthcoming as to its true value. Fair versus foul, evil vying against good, and nothing whatsoever to distinguish the twain. Nothing, that is, save a random flip in the air, a hurried call, and the reckless happenstance of fate.”

  Gren del Mor blinked. Scowled. Looked over to Ev lin Dar.

  “The trolls think we are the evil ones, Gren,” she explained, a touch impatiently. “And there is no convincing them otherwise.”

  “Ah. Well, they would be wrong then. Except, of course, about that Sil kin Hesh bastard. He is definitely an evil prick. And as for the rest of what Pr
ince Kor just said, well, would the simple instinct for survival not logically be the deciding factor?”

  Now it was Ev lin Dar who frowned. “Survival, Gren?”

  “Yes, survival. I will elaborate, and I fully expect you to keep up, Ev. Ready? Here we go: That which aids and ensures our survival is good; that which threatens and thwarts our survival is evil. Survival, plain and simple. Everything else is just words and wind.”

  Kor ben Dor smiled. His white eyes shone.

  “Our friend might just have the right of it, Ev lin Dar.”

  Gren del Mor grinned like a lizard that had just snagged a fly.

  “I should hope not, Prince Kor,” replied the beautiful Black Shield, her tigress tattoo darkening, “for that way lies the path to anarchy.”

  The Halflord reached up, spread the black wings of his hair on their hinges, locked them in place. He breathed deeply of the crisp morning air, sighed forth the silvery steam of his existence.

  “All roads lead to anarchy, Shield,” he replied quietly as he nudged his mar render forward. “You need only walk them long enough.”

  “Evil fucks,” growled the Wild One as he watched the obvious leader of the Bloodspawn approach the distant stone tor in the company of two other black-armoured giants. All three rode the backs of beasts ripped from equine nightmares, enormous, powerful, fiery-eyed and blood-maned and frothing at the maw. “Fuckin’ rotten evil fucks. Fuck.”

  His taciturn Chieftain did not immediately respond, but only tracked the movement of the Prince of the Bloodspawn through cool coal-black eyes. Despite the distance separating them – a mile perhaps, maybe more – Drogul could nonetheless perceive the power of the great grey giant, could feel that power pressing upon the leathery flesh of his brow and cheeks like the lick of winter wind on warm skin, or as the prick of a dagger tip at a dilated pupil. He registered rage and reason there in the presence of the one called the Halflord. He sensed pain and patience also, alongside suffering and loathing. Love and hatred and absolute indifference. Strength, courage, even honour. And above all, peril. Tremendous peril. But there was one thing that the Lord of Doomfall did not detect in Kor ben Dor, either for the distance or for the dark energy of war bombinating noiselessly in the air – or for the fact that it simply was not there.

  “I don’t know, brother.”

  The kirun-tar offered nothing further. He but leaned on the haft of his black-bladed war-axe, hot vapour and clouds of ash eddying about him like the lost souls of the thousands upon thousands of foes that had died upon that unsympathetic steel. He might have said more, had his audient been one more receptive to contemplative cogitation. However, any prolonged philosophical ponderance would only be wasted on the Wild One, as effective and as pointless as a pail of water splashed against a stone wall in a rainstorm. Sometimes Drogul’s reticence was more an affection for conservation than an aversion to conversation.

  However, I am not so sure, brother, he might otherwise have said. The servant of a foul master is not, by default, foul himself. Fear, coercion, manipulation and indoctrination, blind loyalty, simple chance of birth – these and more may lure an otherwise innocent soul into the service of an evil master. One might be born beneath a black banner and know nothing but darkness and shadow, thereby unwittingly serving evil out of a perverted sense of loyalty – my Blood King, right or wrong, that sort of thing. It is ever in the nature and interest of irony that Light serve the Dark.

  “You don’t know, and I don’t fuckin’ care,” growled Dulgar. The monstrous muscles of his bare chest rippled. “Just give me something to fuckin’ kill, brother.”

  The Lord of Doomfall grunted.

  And sometimes darkness serves the Light.

  The Halflord and the pair of Black Shields approached the stony rise in a shared and easy silence – this despite the contrary mood of their mounts. The mar rendera snorted and snarled, constantly gnashing the wicked blades of their teeth, globs of slaver dripping from their maws as they clawed their way through the wafting clouds of their own breath. The morning was cold, the sky sunless and drear. The air seemed hard and sharp, lodging in the lungs like an arctic fog formed of countless tiny shards of ice.

  Alerted by the ruckus of the renders, the two disparate figures atop the tor turned. The Liaison’s lips peeled back in an elapid grin, long white fangs glinting in the matutinal gloom. Near to Sil kin Hesh’s knee, Urchin also smiled, but it was a humorless expression akin to the perpetual rictus of an unfleshed skull, sullen and sour.

  “I summoned you at dawn, Halflord,” the little boy snapped, his smile cracking as his cherubic features flushed with ire. “I summoned you, I did, I did, I did.”

  “Yes.”

  Urchin waited in a gathering tempest of silent indignation until it was obvious no further answer was forthcoming. His small hands balled into fists at his sides.

  “Well???”

  A momentary pause, then – “Yes.”

  “Yes? Yes?” The Leech steamed, blue eyes ablaze, fists striking his thin thighs. “Yes what? What, what, what?”

  “Yes, I am well,” Kor ben Dor replied, his voice as flat as a sheet of steel.

  Only by the sheer force of superhuman will did Ev lin Dar refrain from a shriek of laughter. The taut, pinched, almost pained look on her fellow Shield’s face suggested the strangled bestial squeal that had arisen to the left of her Prince had probably not come from Gren del Mor’s mount.

  The little boy sputtered and spurted, stamped his feet, flailed his spindly arms, but no words did he utter, for likely no words could he utter. Darkness bloomed about the demon like a shadowy shrub of black roses, barbed with lightning, and stinking of death and rotting things. Bestowed with a generous sense of self-preservation, the Liaison hissed and wisely backed away a few steps.

  The Prince of the Bloodspawn dismounted and took the rise with long strong strides, the coal-black ribbons of his cloak fanning outward, his talon-tattooed countenance implacable, inscrutable.

  “The army is ready, blutsauger,” announced the Halflord, completely ignoring Urchin’s display of fury and frustration, much as a weary parent might disregard the tantrum of an insolent child. “I suggest you forego skirmishers. Sending them would achieve nothing save fewer mouths to feed. Likewise the bowmen – any barrage of missiles, even a storm of arrows, would be ineffective against this foe.”

  Urchin spumed and seethed himself into eventual silence, his bright blue eyes tinged red with warning as he glared at Kor ben Dor. The Prince met the demon’s gaze, casually rolled a crick from his shoulder.

  “You will lead the charge, Halflord,” commanded the Leech, a puerile grin baring his teeth. “You will lead, yes, lead, lead.”

  “No.”

  The little boy’s jaw flapped open. Even ageless demons can be astonished should one be bold enough to try them.

  “There will be no charge, blutsauger,” Kor ben Dor explained with infuriating calm. “Charging the enemy formation would be as throwing meat into a thresher. They expect us to charge. They want us to charge. We must not give them what they want.”

  Urchin’s mouth opened and closed, opened and closed. Finally, and with difficulty, “Formation? What formation? I see no formation.” Shoulders hunched, head cocked, he stretched one arm out toward Doomfall, palm up, fingers spread wide. “Where is their formation? Where, where, where?”

  But the Halflord did not answer – not, at least, that particular question.

  “Nevertheless, I will lead, blutsauger,” he stated evenly, his eyes gleaming white and glacial. “The Bloodspawn will see battle this day.”

  The little boy made a strange, satisfied sound. Rubbed and wringed his tiny hands together gleefully.

  “Well, it’s about time, Halflord. About time, yes, it is time, time, time!”

  Kor ben Dor seemed to almost smile. Seemed. Almost.

  “We are agreed, then.” Nonchalantly, he rolled his other shoulder. Bones grinded nicely. “Sil kin Hesh. With me. We have much to di
scuss.”

  Urchin blinked. The Liaison flicked his forked tongue.

  And the Halflord turned away.

  The vast mass of the Blood King’s army marched in close order toward the obfuscous crack of Doomfall. Structured squares of Unmen, tight wedges of Urkroks, massive blocks of half-Urks. Titanic Graniants clad in stone armour and wielding weapons wrought of ironwood and flint strode in step at the flanks. Riding the wings and guarding the rear were immaculate lines of Bloodspawn upon ravening mar rendera, baneful and baleful, and little in degree of menace to differentiate the former from the latter.

  No drums boomed. No horns sounded. Neither battle song rose nor war cry soared across the overcast morning sky. Only the telluric tromp-tromp-tromp of thousands upon thousands of callused feet and roughshod boots striking the ground in synchronous unison. Constant, ceaseless, over and over and over again. Tromp-tromp-tromp-tromp. A steady, measured, unhurried descent upon Doomfall beneath the scarlet standard of the Red Wraith and the billowing Killer Krux of the Bloodspawn.

  Approximately one hundred paces from the foremost fighters of the Daradur, the host of the Blood King halted. Silence fell so abruptly, so absolutely, that it seemed as though all sound had instantaneously been sucked from the whole of Second Earth. But memories of thunder shuddered the soul, a martial dirge tromp-tromp-tromping over the beleaguered battleground of being, of consciousness, fading finally into the rhythmic thud-thud-thudding of the indomitable warrior heart.

  “They’ve fuckin’ stopped,” grated Dulgar to no one in particular. “Fuck.”

  The flame-maned Stone Lord stood at the centre of the Daradun front line – a rather munificent description for the jagged, apparently random arrangement of the formidable warriors of the mara Waratur. The nearest Warder was half a dozen yards distant, slightly behind and to the Wild One’s left; the Darad grumbled, hefted his hammer, but did not otherwise respond.