Gutcrusher marched the King’s Band through half the night, cursing the snow and the cold with them, and at first light the captains began kicking their gigantic forms awake from beneath their mounds of furs. Ogres could sleep in nearly any weather, and the fact that many of them could barely be seen beneath deep mounds of snow was more an occasion for comedy than concern. This was early winter snow, warm, heavy and moist, and not the fine powder of dead winter, when the cold could kill.
It had snowed through the dark hours, and it was still snowing, a thick and heavy blanket that already had accumulated to the depth of their knees, and in some places was stacked in drifts as tall as they were, and they were very tall. There was some confusion as the ogres searched about in the snow for weapons or gear they had misplaced, but they had good noses for when their eyes failed them, and ultimately everything of importance was found.
The ogres of the Winter Mountain proved invaluable in the management of his army, for they were used to discipline and forced marches, and they were very good in snow. They found and kicked awake any recalcitrant boyos and herded the ogres into the main camp, where the captains gave them their assignments. When all of the boyos knew what was afoot, they eagerly began loping toward the Iron Bridge, all of them except for the few who had been chosen for the special assignment.
Thirty nervous ogres gathered around Wolf, for he had the task of handling them and leading the special assignment, and they waited to move until the day was bright as it would get under the grim and snow laden blizzard. Every bit of their armor was covered with heavy cloaks of black leather, such as the ogres of the Iron Bridge Band wore. In all of that time the wind did not cease its desperate wailing, for this was the first great storm of a terrible winter, and the bitter gods who sent it wanted their victims to fear what was to follow.
Gutcrusher and the host that traveled with him arrived at the Iron Bridge in the hours just before dawn, or what would have been dawn had this been an ordinary day. Under the blizzard the beginning of day was marked by a slight lightening of the sky, but heavy clouds miles deep and swirling snow did all that they could to kill the day, and it was a gloomy and grim morning. They lay their weapons flat in the snow but within easy reach, put their great shields over their heads to serve as roof and windbreak, and huddled beneath. By morning the snow had buried them, cloaking them in its uniform whiteness, almost blue under the dead man’s sky.
Happy Moon Dancing waited at the north foot of the Glass Bridge while the hunters from the Winterhaven herd joined with his. They had heard his horn blowing, for their ears were keen and sensitive, and fifty-seven of them heeded the call. Nearly a hundred and fifty elk-men now awaited his command, for many of his own people had sought to join the great raid. All summer the elk-men had wandered on both sides of the Iron Bridge seeking ogres to kill, but the land south of the Blue River had remained curiously empty, as if their ancient enemies were far away. It was winter now, and this was the elk-men’s favorite time for sport, because they could easily track ogres by their footprints in the snow, even in this blizzard.
Across the river a band of perhaps forty ogres could be seen, no more than a league distant, encamped on a bald hill that rose from the clearing on the south side of the bridge. “Will they never learn?” Summer’s Warm Wind asked his leader. “Have we not slain them on that hill half a hundred times?”
“I think these are not the same ogres.” Happy Moon Dancing opined. “I think the band that used to dwell there has been driven off or slain, perhaps. These are the victors, and they know not their peril. They are bold and stupid, and obviously strangers here.”
“If these are the new tenants, we shall teach them the terms of their lease.” Summer’s Warm Wind shook his spear to clear it of snow and capered a bit, his hooves churning through the thick snow that now nearly reached his withers. He carried no shield, for when had the elk-men ever needed shields to kill ogres?
“Yes, I have heard rumors of large gatherings in their lands. Most likely they have been warring amongst themselves, for that is their evil nature.” Happy Moon Dancing lived up to his name then, skipping among the boles of trees and gathering in his hunters. He raised his voice. “Today we shall take many trophies.” He predicted. “The evil ones will think twice before they come nigh our great bridge again!” Other elk-men laughed or smacked their spears against trees to show their enthusiasm.
The elk-men formed ranks almost exactly the width of the bridge, and they held their long spears with the points upward. Each of these spears was at least five paces long, as thick as an ogre’s wrist and topped with a barbed iron tip designed to penetrate the hide of even the mightiest of beasts, for sometimes the elk-men had to kill trolls, and they had thick skin.
Around the ranks the forest rose, tall and black against the falling snow, but many trees were nearly covered in white. Snow had been falling heavily now for nearly two days, and as the elk-men moved, their flanks parted the drifts like ships through heavy seas. On the other side of the bridge there was a wide clearing in the forest, but ringed with trees so that only the part of the clearing in front of the bridge and the bald hill beyond it could be seen. The elk-men moved among the trees but kept clear of the open passage until just before their charge, for they could see their quarry clearly, and they wanted to give them the gift of surprise.
“They will run.” Happy Moon Dancing told his captains. “They always run. But they have no place to go. On the other side of the hill is a long flat space, and we will run them down well before they reach the trees on the other side.”
When the last of the elk-men crossed the bridge and the thunder of their hoofbeats pounding upon its surface was just a memory, Gutcrusher, who was standing by, gave a mighty shout, and ogres leaped from beneath their shields. They lifted them up and formed a great ring, two ogres deep, encircling the hill upon which Wolf and his little band sat as bait.
Gutcrusher himself led the fifty Winter Mountain ogres who quickly ran in from the sides to take position at the foot of the Iron Bridge, forming into ranks four deep and barring the elk-men’s retreat. Ironspike stood in the front ranks also, eschewing a spear in favor of his great iron pick, despite the fact that he had a blacksteel club at his waist. It was a habit, Gutcrusher supposed. He hefted his long spear and joined the front ranks.
“Advance, my boyos!” He shouted, and the command echoed down the line. Ogres began moving forward, closing and doubling ranks as their great ring began to contract, bristling with spears on all sides.
The elk-men stopped their charge, milling about in confusion as the snow seemed to vomit forth an army of steel-clad giants, now advancing on them with deadly purpose. In every direction they saw massive shield walls and spears, which were not as long or as thick as their lances, but were cast in solid steel and very heavy and sharp.
“It’s an ambush!” Happy Moon Dancing cried. “Form ranks and take the bridge!”
The elk-men moved very swiftly, forming into a thick column like a snake, and their antlers and spears bristled above it. Their field of maneuver was swiftly growing smaller, for the ogres were advancing swiftly, but they were able to complete the maneuver and turn about, lances lowered to break the shield wall at its thickest point, the southern side of what they called the Glass Bridge and the ogres called the Iron Bridge, and their only hope of getting home. Even as they charged, however, the ogres did also, and their heavy iron spears broke upon the flanks of the fleeing column.
Elk-men screamed and died as their sides were pierced and their elegant lines shattered. Still they were very strong and very swift, and they rode like furies into the shield wall blocking them from their homeland, now fully five ranks deep. The lead elk-men hit the first rank cleverly, driving first left and then right, dividing the ogres and creating a path between them, but many elk-men died in the effort, hurling their unarmored bodies against the barely yielding wall of heavy shields. A few lances struck home, and several ogres were killed, for not even their ma
rvelous scales of steel could stand before a couched lance in a full charge, but the cost to the elk-men was very high.
Gutcrusher stabbed one of the elk-men, even as he ducked its lance, and the heavy iron spear was nearly ripped from his hand as it plunged into the thing’s vitals. The elk-men valiantly charged through the gap in the first rank and smashed into the second, knocking shields down and hurling ogres from their path. But beyond the shield wall that was the second rank stood a third, and behind that a fourth and a fifth.
The long and bloody bodies of their brethren and the snow beneath their hooves made the footing treacherous, and so did the fallen shields and weapons and other jetsam of war, slowing their desperate advance. Only a few dozen of the strongest and most valiant elk-men were able to penetrate the third wall of shields and spears, and by the time they reached the fourth, only a handful remained. Not one reached the fifth rank, and Happy Moon Dancing fell to an ogre spear in the space before it.
Wolf had fled at his first sight of the charging elk-men, along with his thirty black-clad companions, drawing the enemy fully into the trap, but when the ogres burst from the snow and the shields came up he turned about, running toward the elk-men even before they had finished forming up for their desperate attempt to break the circle, watching their fleeing backs and looking for his chance.
He saw the back of an elk-man retreating quickly on its way to join in the doomed charge, and he ran behind it as swiftly as he could, and along with his companions, outstripping the line of the shield wall by hundreds of paces. When the elk-man’s legs floundered in the snow and among the bodies of his fellows, Wolf hurled himself onto its back, grabbing the thing’s antlers and pulling them hard. Other ogres joined him, and together they wrestled the beast into the snow, pinning it beneath the weight of two or three tons of armored ogre.
In but a few minutes the bloody battle was over, about as long as it would take a man to walk across the field, and all of the elk-men were down. Eager ogres abandoned their spears and shields and took the field with knives and axes, killing any elk-men who still breathed, finding them among the bodies by the puffs of mist in the air about their heads.
The snow turned red with blood, then pink as more snow accumulated. Gutcrusher ordered the cooks forward with their knives, firewood and kettles, for they had many mouths to feed.
Wolf and the boyos with him had to ward off the attempts of several blood maddened ogres to kill the elk-man they had tackled and pinned, and it came as a relief when Gutcrusher finally arrived and approached it warily, his armor covered in blood, gore and pink snow. He was grinning, and there was blood on his fangs.
He grabbed the prone elk-man’s head by the antlers, forcing it to look at him. “Look around you, you filthy little spawn of goats.” He growled. “I am the ogre king. You see how many boyos I have, and you see the swag they got. The Blue River is our border, and now you know what happens when you cross it. The meets and bounds of this land is from olden days, and you goats has been makin’ free. If I ever hear of another of your stinking kind crossing the Iron Bridge, I will take my army north and burn your fornicating forest to the ground. Every last one of you goats will go into the cookpot, and I’ll forfeit all of your land. So take a good look, on account of this is the last thing you is ever going to see.”
Balls put the elk-man’s eyes out with the broken end of an antler, and they dragged the blind and helpless thing by its antlers with many jeers and curses, all the way across the iron bridge. Gutcrusher gave it a final kick in the ass for good measure. “You go back, if you can find the way, and you tell them what you saw and what I said. I never want to see your stinking kind in the Muharl lands again.”
The talking drums rattled long into the night, and the message they carried was grim. Jumps Leaping listened, and he gathered together his hunters. “The stonecutters have cut the southern supply lines to the Earthspeaker’s camp.” He told them. “We must make up for the lack.”
The hunters listened thoughtfully, for they were all of them old men, and they had many lifetimes of experience behind them. “We have hunted all that we can.” Broken Axe replied. “The game has grown wary and scarce.”
“Our sons need the food.” Jumps Leaping replied, but what Broken Axe had said was true. Maintaining a hundred thousand Cthochi sitting in camps in the great ring around the stonecutter city of Northcraven was difficult, and all across the northern Cthochi territories Jumps Leaping had led his hunters, men too old for battle but still capable of finding game, and they had winnowed the summer herds of auroch and caribous to almost nothing. The women had harvested all of the summer planting, and with this blizzard thickly blanketing the land, there would be no more grain or vegetables to send.
“We could range farther north.” Mourning Elk said. “The Vesthan are quiet this year.”
Jumps Leaping shook his head. “The Vesthan are quiet because they fear our young warriors. Once they see that it is only old men who come, they will hunt us. We must remember that they are ogres, after all, even if they seem to have forgotten it. I think we have gone as far north as we can.”
“The herds have grown fickle.” Broken Axe said. “I have seen many thousands of elk on the west side of the Falls River, but they do not cross it. We need to hunt them there.”
Jumps Leaping thought about it. In the spring one of their hunting camps had been attacked and destroyed by the Muharl, but the scouts who investigated the attack had tracked the raiders back to the Falls River, finding many dead ogres. It was plain that the hidden people had been at work, pushing the ogres back into their own lands. The Falls River, which was really just the easternmost branch of the much larger Bone River, formed an ancient boundary between the Cthochi and the Muharl, but it was usually not an issue. None of the Cthochi bands regularly hunted there, and there were few Muharl on the other side. The hunting camp that had been hit was out of its reckoning, and should not have been there in the first place, and apparently the attack had been some kind of retaliation for earlier raiding by the Cthochi.
More mistakes, Jumps Leaping thought. The Cthochi were all taught not to trouble the Muharl, for they were dangerous and could be vengeful, but on the other hand the Vesthan, who were a smaller and weaker breed of ogre, were often hunted for sport and to prove the manhood of young warriors. A band of hunters had mistakenly attacked a small band of Muharl in the spring, thinking them Vesthan, and the Muharl had retaliated, but at a tremendous cost. Since then the area around the ancient boundary had been quiet, with both sides fearing to cross it.
The fickle migrating herds of caribous and elk had come south early, but now they only bunched on the wrong side of the ancient boundary. The area was deserted, and the chances of the Muharl encountering his hunters was slight if he sent them west. “You may follow the herd.” He told Broken Axe finally. “But do not follow after any that you have wounded. Make your kills clean and bring the meat back swiftly. Do not make camp or dress out the animals on the Muharl side. We can butcher them on our own lands.”
“We could drive the herds east of the Falls River.” Broken Axe suggested.
Jumps Leaping was doubtful. Driving a herd any distance at all meant at least a day spent in preparation, and with all of the snow accumulating, there would be no way to do so without leaving tracks. Still, there had been a desperate note in the drums of the Earthspeaker. A melt following this early blizzard was likely, and the snows had probably kept the Muharl close to their camps. There were few bands of ogres in the eastern Muharl, and these were small and leery of crossing the Falls River branch of the Bone. A herd driven across would mean food for many days, even for an army so large as the Earthspeaker’s. It was a risk, but war meant risk, and at last he judged it one worth taking. He nodded. “Drive them if you can, Broken Axe.”
It would prove to be a monumental mistake.
Chapter 83: Kingdom of the Green Hills, Mid to Late Leath
South of the town of Bolter and the city of Arker and west of th
e town of North Down, any map would show you an open space with but a single rarely traveled road passing through it. To the east of that road, north of the town of Kremston, in a remote and unpeopled region that overlies territory claimed by Pulflover Barony, Arker Barony, the Duchy of Zoric and the Duchy of Elderest, an ancient forest of oak trees stands, crisscrossed by a baffling maze of cattle and deer trails. Every trail has been worn by the passage of animals and men right down through the thin topsoil to a layer of uniformly colored stone and gravel, every bit of it creamy white like the surface skein of a tub of freshly drawn goat’s milk. The oaks, most of them giants born in ancient days, stand many times the height of men, and even when they drop their leaves in autumn, thick clumps of mistletoe clustered in their branches obscure the sky above. In the shadows of the oaks a dense and unyielding lower bracken of cedar and thorn bushes line the paths closely and overtop them often, so that wandering those paths often feels like walking through a long green everturning tunnel paved with white.
Horses may travel here, although the wise riders wear leather pants to avoid being pierced by thorns, and men and narrow wagons may pass. The wood smells strongly of cedar, a sharp and pleasant smell that somehow seems both clean and earthy. Deep in the heart of this confusing wood a narrow and deep valley lies, cut by a stream of cold and clear water that eventually winds its way through the wood to spend itself in the mires and swamps of eastern Zoric. A mighty castle cut from the bedrock itself stands beside this stream, protected by its own strength and a moat so deep that things lost in it cannot be recovered by divers. Many fish swim in the water, some of them quite large and toothsome, but the fishermen in the nearby village take them anyway.
War of the Misread Augury: Book One of the Black Griffin Rising Trilogy Page 109