by B. V. Larson
“I don’t know,” said Corbin, examining the straps, “he could have used merlings, or animals…I doubt too many of the marshmen would have ventured this far north, so far past the borders of the Haven.”
“Right,” said Brand, grabbing at this straw to keep his stomach steady, “right! Just merling skin at worst, perhaps even something more wholesome.”
Not speaking, they buckled the rest of their partial armor into place. Still, each time his hands had to touch the supple leather of the straps, Brand’s finger tingled and his stomach churned. He had touched merling skin before, and this felt different, and the tone of it was much too light.
“How are our junior warriors?” asked Modi, coming up to them. He wore a breastplate and a giant shirt of chain that hung down almost to the ground.
“We stand ready to fight for the Haven,” said Brand, reciting a line he had heard from the Riverton Constabulary weekly meetings.
Modi nodded at this answer. “Good,” he said. He paused for a moment, thumbing his axe. “There are things…” he said, and then faltered.
The two river-boys watched him, their faces expressionless.
“There are things that warriors must say to one another before entering battle together,” said Modi at last. “Our personal differences we must set aside. Often, warriors in the very act of a duel will quit their struggles and fight together as brothers against a common enemy. Sometimes, after the battle is done, the duel resumes. Other times, it does not.”
Brand and Corbin looked at one another, and each knew what the other thought. It wasn’t exactly an apology, but it would have to do. “We will fight at your side, Modi,” said Brand.
Modi nodded. He opened his mouth as if to speak again, but nothing came out. He nodded again and turned to stump away.
Brand and Corbin each carried shields now. Brand had given the sword he had found in the armory to Myrrdin, who refused to wear armor. Corbin had a real battleaxe now, to go with his shield. Even Gudrin had armed herself with a jacket of woven steel scales and a heavy crossbow. Telyn kept her familiar bow, but chose a long slim dagger with a very keen edge and attached the sheath to her belt.
Brand, having found no better storage for the axe than the knapsack, kept it there still, riding on his back. It seemed less troublesome when it was kept covered, like a horse that is quieted by wearing blinders.
Telyn shouted down a warning that none of them understood.
“What?” shouted back Brand. She poked her head down from the leafy dome and Brand’s heart was gladdened by the image of her face, surrounded by her dark hanging hair.
“The Riverton Constabulary! They’ve made landfall at the ruins of the southern tower!”
“Perfect!” shouted Brand back. “We must meet them and show them the arms there!”
It was quickly decided that he and Corbin should go and greet the newcomers. They marched proudly out into the daylight. Brand felt glad to be free of the oppressive green gloom of the domed gatehouse. The axe was particularly pleased, it sensed battle was imminent.
“I wonder if your father leads them,” said Brand, puffing a bit as he hurried in the heavy armor. He wondered too, if he could last a whole day’s march in such gear.
“I hope Tylag is with them,” agreed Corbin. “He will be proud to see us armored like lords.”
“Do you think he knows of Clan Rabing’s real history?” asked Brand.
“He might. I find it difficult to believe that the Clan Elders don’t know the truth behind these secrets.”
Brand nodded and was about to say more when a shape bounded up from behind them. He reached for his axe reflexively.
“It’s only Tomkin,” said Corbin, putting a hand on his elbow.
“And a good second you make,” replied Brand quietly. He turned to the manling. “Are you joining us to greet your fellows, Tomkin?”
“My fellows are knaves,” said Tomkin, “I am to bring two wet-nosed warriors back to the gatehouse.”
“Why?” demanded Brand.
“The wench lookout has spied a conflict. The merlings have met with thy army before it could reach safe land. The river is filling with blood even now. I suggest you forget about them and retreat.”
Brand and Corbin looked at one another. They both knew there was only one thing to do. They took off toward the southern tower at a run. As he ran, Brand pulled the anxious axe into the light. It gave him a surge of strength and soon he had outdistanced Corbin. The other shouted to him, but Brand neither heard, nor cared to hear, his words.
Tomkin kept up with him, however.
“Thy feet are like the pounding hooves of a charger,” he remarked.
Brand made no reply.
“Thy pace is a killing one. I wonder at the endurance of thy heart. Will it explode, or simply stop of its own accord?”
Brand felt a flash of irritation. He made a sudden sweep with the axe, and clove Tomkin’s soft fawnskin cap from his head. Tomkin made a squeak of surprise and missed the next log he was bounding over. He tumbled through the air and landed in a heap.
Corbin puffed by a few moments later, hooting at the Tomkin, who growled back at him. Corbin’s chain shirt jingled madly as he followed Brand, hopelessly trying to keep up.
Brand reached the southern tower and paused there. All along the shore raged the first true battle he had ever set eyes upon.
About half the rafts and boats had reached the shoreline. A line of blue and white clad men, armed with every manner of makeshift weapon, faced the swarming merlings. On the land they had the advantage, but in the brown, churning water the merlings roped and plucked them one a time from their boats. Once in the river, the men were made quick work of.
In the center of the conflict a large raft worked its way toward the shore. A banner of blue and white flew from its mast. The men aboard cast lines to the men on the shore, but as often as not the merlings intercepted the casts and yanked the boatsmen into the muddy water. Brand’s eyes fixed upon a large figure at the center of the raft. It was his uncle Tylag, Corbin’s father.
Vaguely, he knew he should wait for Corbin, his second. But the desires of the axe, never greater than when in the face of battle, were too much. He raised both his shield and Ambros high over his head and charged. As he charged he screamed like a madman. Flecks of spittle showered his new grown beard and his eyes all but started from their sockets. Far more noticeable to the combatants, however, were the brilliant flashes of light that Ambros loosed. It was as if lightning struck in their midst. Merlings and men alike were blinded and many were struck dead on both sides after a slight lull in the fighting. The merlings got the worst of it, as they liked bright light less than men and seemed to recover more slowly from the dazzling effects.
As he charged, his scream was drowned out by the rumble of the skies overhead. Thunderclouds billowed and darkened the skies with unnatural speed. Brand knew in his heart that the thunderclouds gathered for the axe and would follow it to the ends of the Earth if battle could be found there.
The men of the Haven, turning to see this armored madman charging their flank, fell back before him. They opened a hole in their lines, and he plunged through it. He splashed into the river and lay about him with the axe, slaying merlings with each stroke. Often, the axe flashed, and the heat of it caused the bloody water to boil away upon its bright surface. The merlings sought to slip close and jab at his legs under the water, but the flashes revealed them and he slew them with swift strokes that threw up clouds of steam and spray. They tried to cast their barbed grapples, but he severed them in midair so that they splashed down harmlessly.
Around him, the men of the Haven took heart. They didn’t know who this knight of olden times was, but they realized he was fighting for their lives and they joined him. They took up bows and boathooks, using both to keep the merlings at bay while they drew in the rafts to shore. Brand’s lips stopped screaming and instead he broke into song. It was a song that he had never heard before, nor could
he later recall the words, but he knew it was a battle song, one that Ambros had perhaps heard centuries before.
Soon, the men of the Haven around him had taken up the song as well. Brand noted with frustration that he could only rarely find a merling now to slay.
“Cowards!” he raged at them, seeing them flip and slither through the water upstream. He shook the axe at them, and the men who had gathered around him quailed at his fury.
“They are gone, Brand,” said a voice at his side, “but we have more enemies now.”
Brand whirled to see Corbin, who pointed back up the rise that led to the southern tower. There, gathering silently from the white mists, were the mounted coursers of the Wild Hunt. A dozen, then two dozen, then three dozen appeared. They seemed to take form out of the mist itself, as if mothered by it.
Chapter Eleven
Voynod’s Challenge
“Brand? Corbin, my son?” roared a familiar voice.
They turned to see Tylag, wading in from his raft, which had all but reached the shores by now. “Could it be that two Rabing boys have become knights of old?” he asked, incredulous.
Brand smiled to see his Uncle safe, and in that instant, he felt much of his sense return. He could think clearly again, even with the axe in his hand and blood coating his face. “We must get everyone into the ruins, Uncle,” he said, “we have a great store of arms in that tower, and a strongpoint built further back.”
“But we have defeated the merlings!” said Tylag, raising his hands high. “I had thought us betrayed by the Wee Folk when they attacked, but now I see that those we came to rescue turned and saved us first!”
Brand pointed up to the rise where the horsemen gathered. “Now we face the Wild Hunt.”
Tylag’s face darkened and fell from elation to dread. “The Wild Hunt,” he said in a haunted voice. “I had hoped they were only horsemen from the north. I had told myself and my men they were nothing more for days now. But how can I doubt you two, who wield such power? Truly, it is a dark day for the Haven when we must face fell legends that should have long since passed on.”
“We are beyond the borders of the Haven, father,” said Corbin. “And I doubt our borders would now provide any barrier to these foul things, in any case.”
Tylag nodded, gazing up the slope with haunted eyes. A subtle piping began then, slipping into their thoughts insidiously. Brand became aware of it and knew it to be the work of the dark bard. It was the song of the dead, the dead that still walked and acted as if they lived. He wondered how long it had been playing.
“You bear the standard of Riverton on your raft, father,” said Corbin. “Does this mean you are their leader?”
Tylag looked startled, as if he had been sleeping. “Yes, yes! I…I was once Chief of the Riverton Constabulary. No one else on the Council had the training to lead the army….I am the general of this army,” he finished vaguely, as if just realizing the truth of his words. He turned to his captains, who had come up around them. Everyone but them seemed to be gazing up the slope, as if sleeping on their feet.
“What are we doing standing in the bloody river!” roared Tylag in sudden rage and disbelief. He slapped the lieutenant nearest him and cuffed a soldier who had sat down in the shallow water and closed his eyes. “Up men! Secure the boats! Form up ranks on the shore!”
While Tylag and his lieutenants spread out, waking up their troops, Corbin and Brand made their way to shore.
“That was frightening,” said Corbin. “I had no idea that the enemy could stop an army with a song.”
“The Dark Bard is entrancing,” agreed Brand, although his voice sounded not in the least entranced. “There must be justice meted out here,” he said. “These cursed creatures used up their lives long ago, and if they won’t die of their own accord, I shall personally finish the lot of them.”
Corbin looked at him in surprise and uneasily eyed the axe that rode Brand’s shoulder. “We should break past them, Brand,” he urged. “We should break through their line and get the army into the protective region of the ruins. There, we can give them better arms and positions.”
Brand paid him no heed. Sloshing out of the river and onto the muddy shore, Brand raised his axe in challenge to the enemy. A scattering of those that sat their dead horses on the rise lifted their weapons in answer.
“We should kill them all now,” he said, “while we have the numbers. Soon the rhinogs that follow their goblin sires will tip the balance in their favor. That is why they wait to attack us! They fear us!”
“I don’t think so, Brand—” began Corbin.
Brand whirled on him and for a moment seemed about to raise the axe to him. He contained himself with visible effort. “They hope we will quail and become weak under the force of the bard’s music!”
“Yes, but look!” said Corbin, pointing. “They are gathering their strength even as we gather ours. More of them appear out of the mist with each passing minute! This must be the work of Herla wielding Osang.”
Brand looked and glowered to see that Corbin was right. He looked back at the army that surrounded him. Already, he had begun to think of it as his army. “They are gathering strength more quickly than we are. Our men are slowed by that irritating piping. I don’t even see Herla yet, nor the bard, but I shall put a stop to that damned piping!”
Brand slowly lifted the axe high into the air. A liquid amber light poured from it, not a single blinding flash as before, but a river of light that reached out to touch every soldier that struggled on the muddy shoreline. He began to march up the slope with long strides.
Corbin followed him, calling to Tylag, who quickly ordered his men to advance. Many of the Riverton troops, seeing the champion who had forced back the merlings advancing on this new threat, had already fallen in behind him. To everyone, especially Brand, this seemed the natural order of things.
“Voynod!” he bellowed, “cease your infernal piping, man! I would rather hear the sounds of a tavern hound sicking up the putrid contents of its stomach!”
At his words, as if a spell had been broken, the piping stopped. A familiar figure pressed its way through the coursers to the fore. It was Voynod upon his unbreathing horse.
“We meet again, river-boy,” said the bard. “This time, you are on the wrong side of these charmed walls. There is nothing to save you.”
Unbidden, the image of Oberon’s daughter came into Brand’s mind. Once again, he cradled her severed head in his arms. He could see the life drain from her whitening face. Rage filled him.
“You face the Axeman now, piper!” he roared. He began to trot forward, getting ahead of his men on the difficult slope. “Where is your master? I wish to slay all your company at once! I will slay each of you in turn!”
At this, Voynod lifted a black-gloved hand. The coursers, who had been readying to charge Brand and the men advancing behind him, halted.
“You seek to challenge me?” hissed Voynod.
“I DO!” Brand shouted back without hesitation. Still climbing the slope steadily, he paused only to sweep the popping sweat from his brow. “As a lord of Rabing Castle, I challenge thee!”
“I accept your challenge, child,” hissed Voynod.
“Brand, no!” cried Corbin from behind him. “Wait for us!”
“Stay back!” roared Brand over his shoulder. “All of you, stay back!”
Tylag had no need to repeat the order. All along the advancing line of men, they halted and watched quietly. None shouted encouragement, nor did any man make a wager. Not even the darkest heart among them could face the Dead with a smile or a thought for anything other than destroying these foul creatures.
Brand, however, was wreathed with smiles. He tossed aside his shield and took up Ambros with both hands as the bard began his charge. He set his feet flat upon the earth and crouched. He planned a low sweep to cut the horse’s legs from beneath it. All he had to do was bring the bard to the ground so that the good sweet earth might finish its long overdue work
.
The bard thundered down the slope at a gallop, heedless of the rough terrain or the treacherously wet slope. His horse’s hooves pounded and tossed up great clots of black dirt behind it, but it didn’t snort, nor make any sound of fear or effort. Despite its charge, the horse’s great, dead lungs were as still as the grave.
Brand swung his blade in a low sweeping cut. The bard was right there, on top of him. He caught sight of malicious lavender eyes, like those he had seen within Herla’s stag head. Brand was shocked when the galloping stopped and became silent at the last instant. His axe cut through nothing. He could only think that the horse had taken flight. Then a great shock went through him, and he was knocked backward with terrific force. He rolled down the slope head over heels. He regained his feet, but slipped in the mud. He looked down to see a great dent struck in his breastplate. The blow would have cut him from belly to throat if he had been unarmored. Behind him, the line of men set up a ragged cheer to see their champion back on his feet.
The axe! The thought was a scream in his mind. Without it he was just Brand, not the Axeman. Without it, everything hurt: his breastplate pressed against his sternum, his legs trembled with the strain of running in heavy armor. He saw Voynod wheel and come around for another charge. His horse tossed its head in a horrible parody of life. If anything, the dead animal was more horrifying than its rider.
Even as Voynod raised his silvery sword and charged again, Brand spotted the axe. It was nearby, lying beside the blackened corpse of a tree that long since given up the struggle to survive in the swamp’s evil soil. Brand scrambled toward it, and a polyp exploded under his feet. He grimaced as a thick acidic liquid sprayed him. His eyes blinked and teared.
His breath came in hoarse gasps as he reached the axe. Behind him the thunder of hooves grew. He turned and raised Ambros even as Voynod’s blade swung for his head. He blocked the cut with the axe and it flashed when the two weapons met. Voynod hissed and the foul smelling vapor that issued from his lungs was like a cold wind in Brand’s face. Walking his horse around Brand in a circle, Voynod rained blows down upon him. Brand managed to block them, staggering under the assault. Each blow caused the axe to flash. Overhead the thunderclouds boiled and rumbled. To the men at the foot of the slope it was as if a dozen strokes of lightning struck the combatants in quick succession.