“Form the infantry in the usual manner,” he said to the officers that accompanied him. “Tehmad, take three companies of armored horse to our right flank. When our archers begin to shoot, sweep away their cavalry and cut down the enemy mages. Athenon, command our left. Use your horse to drive the enemy into the river. I will command two companies in reserve and bring them to support the first success. Mage King or no, we attack as soon as this accursed fog burns off.”
The sun rose restless and hot as the Syrnte army assembled on the field of battle. Vapor lifted off the grassy earth, rising toward the heavens, forming white billows that sailed eastward in silence. Wind gusted across the field, stirring up aromas of wet grass and flowering chamomile.
Mechnes inhaled the sweet fragrance, invigorated by the thought that it would soon be salted with blood and death. It was here on the verge of battle that he always felt the most alive, overlooking the abyss where thousands of fates would intersect. No amount of Syrnte magic could unmask the future that waited on the other side.
The ground was damp but tractable, sloping gently up toward a ridge occupied by a scattered line of mage warriors, with companies of horse on either flank. The numbers were few, but more men might well be hiding behind the ridge.
The Mage King appeared at the crest, mounted on a large destrier and accompanied by a small contingent of knights. At his side, a woman in burgundy robes, the crystal head of her staff glinting in the newly revealed sun. Mechnes narrowed his eyes, remembering Rishona’s warning.
The Mage King’s power is complete only with the maga at his side; and the full potential her magic realized only in his presence. She is the one we must slay first, before all others.
“That one,” he said to his officers, “is dangerous.”
“The woman?” Tehmad did not bother to hide his doubt.
“She is the last of the High Magas. It may well have been her magic that vanquished the Naether Demons last night. A sack of gold for the man who brings her to me, dead or alive.”
The maga separated from her liege, taking a small number of mages with her. They, in turn, divided into two groups that took positions at the rear of the cavalry on each flank. The King and his guard rode down slope, flags lowered in an appeal for parley.
“Come,” Mechnes said to his men. “Let us indulge this young warrior with a friendly chat before we deliver him to his doom. Perhaps the ground will dry a little more as we speak.”
They met in the center of the field. For all Mechnes had heard about the Mage King, he found the regent unimpressive. Not a single scar marked his bearded face, and his level gaze appeared untested by the harsh choices of campaigning.
Mechnes had skewered countless young commanders like this one, men who believed they fought for honor, not for blood and glory; innocents brought down in short order, and sentenced to slow, agonizing deaths as the Syrnte prince took possession of all they held dear.
“If you have words for me, Prince Akmael, then be quick with them. The day has begun, and my men are impatient for the kill.”
The young King blunted the sting of Mechnes’s taunt by holding his silence. He studied the officers who accompanied the Syrnte commander, then scanned the troops assembled behind them.
“You are not welcome here, Prince Mechnes,” he said. “I bid you to return with your army to the land of the Syrnte, and leave the people and provinces of Moisehén in peace.”
Mechnes lifted his arm in a conciliatory gesture that was not without a hint of mockery. “Peace is what we intend to bring. This kingdom has been at war with itself for two generations because your father, the usurper, murdered his siblings and took that which was not his. Today we will put an end to this struggle. Tamara-Rishona, grand daughter to Joturi-Nur and daughter to Prince Feroden, San’iloman of the Syrnte and rightful Queen of Moisehén, has returned to assume the throne that is hers and become a true steward of her people.”
“A woman cannot claim the Crown of Vortingen.”
“This woman will claim whatever she pleases.”
The Mage King nodded to one of the men at his side, who produced a blood-stained bundle and unfurled its cloth, allowing the contents to tumble to the ground.
Mechnes faltered when he recognized Rishona’s severed head. Her blackened eyes stared blankly at the sky. Her fair skin was transformed into a sickly gray. Blood-matted hair splayed against the pale green grass.
The Syrnte horses whinnied. Several of Mechnes’s men reined back a few steps before the prince halted their startled retreat with an angry shout and a lift of his hand.
Mechnes’s vision blurred.
There was another woman with my Queen. Her eyes as blue as the sun-lit sea. Did she…?
Laughter tumbled from Rishona’s lifeless lips, and Mechnes heard Adiana mocking him.
No one is beautiful when they are dead.
The Syrnte prince ground his teeth.
If she survived, I will find her.
He shifted in his saddle, lips twitching with barely suppressed rage, fingers curling into tight fists.
“Tehmad,” he barked, “retrieve our Queen.”
The officer dismounted, gathered Rishona’s remains, and wrapped them with reverence in his own cloak.
Mechnes turned to the Mage King.
“You are not worthy of the crown you wear, Prince Akmael. Only the most depraved of men would so defile a creature of such beauty. I do not know by what black arts you slew the San’iloman, but the arm of her vengeance still lives.
“You and your men will die here today. The women of Moisehén will become our slaves and their children will be given in sacrifice to the goddess Mikata. Your queen,” Mechnes glanced toward the red-clad figure on the ridge, “and your maga will be mine to use as I please before delivering them to the cruder appetites of my men. Your daughter, the Princess Eliasara, will be thrown from the ramparts of your fathers’ fortress. Your lands will be ravaged, your people destroyed, and the last of your seed obliterated for this crime you have committed against my people and my blood.”
Mechnes spat on the ground, turned and unsheathed his sword.
“For the Queen!” he roared to the army that awaited his command. “For Tamara-Rishona, the San’iloman. For the glory and vengeance of her people!”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Sacred Circle
Thunder rose from the ranks of the Syrnte as Eolyn dismounted. The army’s shouts were rabid, their swords raised. Spears beat against shields. Feet stomped on the earth. The very heavens seemed to tremble with wrath.
“Maga Eolyn,” Echior prompted quietly, “it is time.”
Eolyn nodded and took her place at the center of the circle. She had never witnessed such a great and terrible army. Men stood under flags of burgundy and gold, shoulder to shoulder like the stones of Faernvorn. What she remembered of her brother’s troops seemed ragged by comparison, and the forces Akmael had organized to defeat Ernan in that time, small and inconsequential.
Akmael’s army is larger now, but not as large as this.
Eight High Mages marked the edge of the circle, each man twelve paces away from her. From here they could see the entire the battlefield, illuminated in the gold-green hues of the rising sun, the massed forces of the Syrnte a black shadow across its face.
Eolyn wrapped her hand firmly around Tzeremond’s staff and connected to the steady pulse of magic that lived in its heart.
Ehekaht, she said, and the High Mages joined in the chant,
Ehekahtu
Naeom avignaes aenthe
Sepenom avignaes soeh
Renenom ukaht maen
Evenahm faeom reohoert
Ehekaht, Ehukae
Each staff emitted a low hum as its crystal head ignited with the sacred fire of Dragon. Maga and mages synchronized their staves before sending tendrils of their spirits toward the heart of the mountain. From here, they wove a net that bound all the warriors of Moisehén: spearmen and archers, knights and mage warriors,
that latter adding strength to the spell with their own magic.
At the center of their collective stood the Mage King. His spirit intertwined with Eolyn’s, the magic of each feeding into the other, building like a sapphire flame that illuminated the very portals of death, driving the Lost Souls and their terrible hunger further into the shadows of imagination.
Eolyn drew a sharp breath, understanding for the first time that this was why Akmael had summoned her: to invoke the magic they had discovered when Tzeremond banished her spirit from the world of the living, a power that bound them and kept the Underworld at bay. Akmael intended to use it as a barrier between now and the hereafter, between life and death, between victory and defeat.
A long, low blast sounded from the horns of the enemy.
Eolyn opened her eyes to see the Syrnte advancing up slope, an aggressive march that unsettled the bowels of the earth. The net woven by the circle of mages shivered under the weight of their march. Eolyn drew on the mage’s power to strengthen the links between each of Akmael’s men, most of whom were positioned behind the rise, hidden from the sight of the Syrnte.
The Mage King’s army tensed as a single entity: a dragon perched upon a cliff ready to strike, its scales forged from mail and metal; its fiery breath held in the staves of mage warriors; its serpentine gaze delivered through Akmael’s eyes, sharp and calculating, attentive to experience, reliant upon instinct.
In silence they waited, their focus absolute, until all Eolyn could hear was the fall of the enemy’s feet, the calls of their officers, the labored breath of each man.
Akmael chose his moment. The trumpeters threw open the gates of war. Mage warriors sent bellows of fire against the Syrnte, searing shields and flesh, forcing them to halt. Shouts of panic and pain afflicted the enemy ranks. Lines wavered despite the harried reprimands of officers and the repeated wail of their horns.
Again Akmael’s trumpets sounded, and the men of Moisehén rose as one. Foot soldiers sprang over the ridge and plummeted toward the Syrnte lines, their voices synchronized in a single roar, spears extended like claws as they descended upon their prey.
The Syrnte fired volleys of arrows into the mass of attacking men. Bodkin points pierced mail. The cries of the fallen were silenced as the soldiers who followed trampled them down. Opposing lines clashed with a deafening force that reverberated across the field, metal singing against metal, splintering wood, hewing limbs.
Eolyn felt vortices of the Underworld blossom underfoot, dragging the fatally wounded toward cold, silent depths. Every soul that slipped away was like a splinter driven into her spirit.
How much of this brutal torrent she could bear, Eolyn did not know. But she had Tzeremond’s staff in her hand and his mages in her circle. She held the Mage King in her heart and the South Woods in her soul. She had the memory of her coven and her stubborn dreams of peace.
What power she could draw from all this she resolved to give to her people today, to stand or die with these men-at-arms, defending until her last breath the heritage of Moisehén and the magic that made them whole.
Chapter Forty
Will of the Gods
Like a wolf hard upon the scent of his prey, Mechnes tracked Prince Akmael as he rode behind the lines, along the crest and toward the river. The Syrnte infantry were driven down slope, but the Mage King’s weaker flank had begun to cede ground under the pressure of Barathamor’s horse near the river. The destruction of Akmael’s cavalry on their right flank could expose his foot soldiers and turn the battle back in Mechnes’s favor.
Seizing the opportunity, Mechnes unsheathed his sword and spurred his reserve into action.
“I want the Mage King’s head,” he cried, “and the maga’s corpse. All other plunder is yours. To victory!”
His men echoed the shout, their canter gathering into a gallop.
Mechnes pulled ahead to lead a wedge that drove hard into the melee, seeking to separate the Mage King’s horse from his infantry. He split the skull of a stray foot soldier, releasing a warm spray of blood before bearing down on one of the mounted men.
Sword met sword in a vicious song as Mechnes forced his opponent back. The horse whinnied in protest under its besieged rider, who struggled to repel each savage stroke. His shield splintered under Mechnes’s relentless pounding, his blade failed to penetrate the Syrnte’s rapid counters. When the man’s strength gave way and his guard faltered, Mechnes plunged the blade into his torso, relishing in the sound of metal parting mail and ripping through flesh.
The wounded rider tumbled from his mount.
Mechnes spat, wheeled his horse around, and chose his next kill, a sallow-faced youth who had lost his helmet. Blood streamed down the boy’s face from a cut over his eye, but he was quick with the sword, deflecting a blow meant to sever his neck, and counterattacking with skillfully delivered strokes. When the blade slipped from the youth’s hand, he seized Mechnes’s sword arm, muscles bulging on his neck as he struggled to keep the Syrnte Lord’s blade from slicing open his face.
Mechnes grinned at the youth. “First battle, lad?”
“Your last, milord.” The boy spoke between breathless grunts.
He shoved his shield at Mechnes in an attempt to throw him off balance. Knocking aside the attack, Mechnes released his knife and drove it into the boy’s throat, twisting until blood spurted hot from the wound. The young knight managed a few feeble blows before succumbing to a fit of choking. Mechnes watched him fall with disdain.
Do they have nothing better then this?
The grass was now slick with blood. An invigorating taste of salt and iron hovered about the field. Mechnes saw flames exploding amidst his men, and heard furious roars as Akmael’s Mage Warriors shapeshifted into bears.
Yet the Syrnte had been prepared for these tricks, and the cries of his men rang out in relentless chords of triumph, while the silver and purple banners of the Mage King fluttered and fell back, their hold increasingly uncertain against the renewed determination of the Syrnte army.
The horns of Moisehén blasted again from the ridge.
“Form ranks!” Mechnes thundered, indicating the crest where a fresh flood of spearmen appeared, led by the Mage King. “Form ranks!”
His trumpeters repeated the call as Mechnes disengaged from the melee. Other riders gathered to him, but too few and too slowly.
The new line of enemy warriors pounded forward, thrusting spears at rider and horse, shouting threats of death as they stabbed both men and mounts.
Mechnes parried their wooden shafts, and injured any soldier that came within reach, but the Mage King’s reserves were skilled and pressed forward relentlessly. The Syrnte horses whinnied in protest, nostrils flared and eyes crazed with fear. They shied away from the spearmen, rearing and prancing in circles.
“Curse this madness!” Mechnes reined in his mount, anger running hot through his veins. The horses were useless against these foot soldiers, and the battle was slipping from his grasp. “Hold your ground, men! The Mage King is within reach.”
He spotted Prince Akmael just beyond the line of spears, mounted on his horse and galvanizing the soldiers. Hungry for the royal bastard’s blood, Mechnes spurred his horse back into the fray, coming head to head with spearmen and taunting their front line.
“You think you are soldiers? You are nothing! Cowards and women, all! I am Mechnes, Prince of the Syrnte and Lord General of the San’iloman. I will have your heads, all of you, and the entrails of your king!”
A soldier with a weathered face and steady hands lunged toward Mechnes, separating himself from his comrades, ignoring the reprimands of his officer. Bloodlust and ambition burned in the man’s eyes as he thrust his spear at the Syrnte commander.
Mechnes laughed and drew back as his quarry followed, spinning on his horse, sweeping aside the spearhead with his shield. “You think yourself the Mage King’s hero? Every army has a fool like you.”
The man lunged again, slipping on the bloody remains of an u
nfortunate soldier. Mechnes responded with lightning speed, sword slicing through leather and mail to tear open his opponent’s chest. The man stumbled back, determination overcoming surprise as he tried to regain his stance. Adjusting the grip on his spear, he attacked once more, but the thrust was weak. Mechnes struck, cleaving the man’s skull and snatching his spear as he fell.
Sheathing his sword, Mechnes let the dead man’s weapon settle in his grip as his mounted warriors continued to cede ground to the Mage King. The spear was not balanced for throwing, but no matter. The Syrnte prince had made use of poorer weapons under more difficult circumstances.
He eyed his target, now pulling to the front of the line, urging the men forward with vigorous shouts and raised sword.
The Mage King spotted Mechnes and spurred his horse to close the distance between them.
Mechnes stood in his stirrups, drew back his spear arm, and breathed a short prayer to the silent heavens.
“If there be Gods, let them favor me now.”
He released the spear. It sailed in a smooth arc toward the Mage King, hit the regent, and toppled him from his horse.
Shouts of consternation overtook the ranks of Moisehén. Their lines buckled at last.
Chapter Forty-One
Fallen
Pain seared through Eolyn. She clutched her shoulder, dizzy and fighting for each breath, arm numb from shock.
The mages who had been holding the circle ceased their chanting.
“No.” Eolyn blinked back an icy haze of dread. “Akmael…”
She abandoned the circle and ran down slope. A mage warrior intercepted her.
“Milady!” He caught Eolyn’s arm, bringing her momentum to a sudden, painful halt. “You can go no further.”
She shook him off, eyes fixed on the battle. “Where is he? Where is the King?”
Below, chaos was taking hold. There was no sign of Akmael, only his rearing horse, frightened and trapped inside a mass of fighting men. The two armies writhed like giant serpents in their death throes. Triumphant howls echoed across the field.
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