by Don Perrin
“That’s why we figured it had to be sunlight reflecting off a breast plate or a helm or something,” said a third. “If it was a torch, we could still see it.”
“Any movement? Any goblin troops?”
The baaz all shook their heads. “No, nothing.”
“What do you think, Fon?” Thesik asked. “Should we tell Cresel? It could be more goblins. Sneaking up behind us.”
Fonrar turned the problem over in her mind. They could tell Cresel. Cresel would tell Squadron Leader Gloth. Gloth would have to pass it up the line to some other officer. The males related stories of the time when they fought with the Dragonarmies back in the War of the Lance, back when the horror was bureaucracy, not the enemy. It was always the dreaded Staff Officer who was the evil incarnate in the story, not the White Knight of Solamnia. In fact, the story goes that the White Knight of Solamnia was easily handled with a well-placed pit trap, but it had taken two weeks of wrangling to get permission to dig the pit. Fonrar didn’t have two weeks and, from the sounds of it, neither did any of them.
And that wasn’t the worst case scenario. The worst would be for Gloth to tell Cresel to go back to his duties. He wasn’t getting off report by listening to the wild tales of boojum in the night dreamed up by adolescent females. Fonrar knew Gloth would say that because she’d heard him say it before. He and the others. Even the honored and much respected Commander Kang, who seemed like a god to the girls, treated them as if they’d just been newly hatched and still had eggshell stuck to their bottoms.
“I’m not going to tell anyone,” Fonrar decided. “What would I tell them? That we saw flashes. And that we can’t see them now because it’s dark. You know perfectly well they’d just pat us on the head and tell us to go back to playing mumble-the-peg and leave the grown-ups alone.”
“So we don’t do anything?” Thesik said, astonished. “That isn’t like you, Fon.”
“Oh, we’re going to do something,” Fonrar stated. “You and I are going to go see for ourselves.”
Everyone started talking at once. Everyone wanted to go. Fonrar lifted her hand, jerked a thumb in the direction of their bodyguards. The females hushed instantly, everyone understanding. Fonrar began issuing orders.
“You bozaks stuff our bedrolls to make it look like we’re safely asleep. You know the drill. We’ve done this before.”
The last glimmers of the setting sun illuminated the ridge. In the afterglow of twilight, the guards would look down to see twenty slumbering figures, their wings wrapped around them for warmth. Only very close inspection would reveal two of those figures to be piles of rocks covered with blankets and Fonrar considered it unlikely that anyone would come to inspect them closely. For one, the males would never imagine that the females would take it into their heads to slip off in the night and, for two, the males were all far more concerned with what was happening on the opposite side of the ridge.
The females settled in for the night. Lying on their blankets, Fonrar and Thesik waited for the brilliant reds and golds in the sky to fade into pinks and grayish yellows. When those colors had faded to gray and then to blue-blackness, the shadows on the ridge were deep and dark. All that could be heard were the sounds of wings rustling as the females settled themselves. There came no sounds of battle, but Fonrar could feel the tenseness that pulled the air taut like a rope in a tug-of-war. Cresel and their other guards were nervous, restless. They paced the top of the ridge to see if they could see anything and conversed in low tones with other draconians. No fires were lit. Even the signal fire had now been doused. The stench of goblin fouled the air. They were out there somewhere. Perhaps circling around behind them.
Night drew her dark wings over the ridge. Fonrar waited until her eyes had adjusted to the darkness, shifted over to night vision, then she motioned to Thesik. When Cresel made a trip up to the top of the ridgeline, the two rose from their blankets and crept out of the female encampment. They moved carefully over the rocky surface, taking every step cautiously, fearing that a scrape of a claw or the dislodging of a stone would betray them. Back in camp, two of Fonrar’s bozak sisters would be quietly sliding rocks under the blankets, artfully forming the blankets around the rocks to look like two sleeping draconians.
Thesik was a good companion for a mission like this. Thesik was an aurak, the only aurak among them. More slender than Fonrar, Thesik was naturally graceful, naturally stealthy. Fonrar—larger-built, more muscular and bulky—was clumsier. She slipped and slid, scrabbled and blundered among the rocks. It seemed to her that she was making more noise than the goblin army and she expected any moment to hear Cresel shout and come racing after her. Thesik glided silently among the rocks, never placing her foot wrong, never disturbing so much as a bit of gravel.
The aurak was intelligent, the most intelligent of all the female draconians. She had been quick to catch the import of what Cresel was really trying to tell them, while the more practical and literal-minded Fonrar had thought only that the man liked to dig latrines. But, though smarter than Fonrar, Thesik was not a leader. She was quite content to allow Fonrar, the bozak, to take that role.
“You’re good at making decisions, Fon,” Thesik had told her friend. “You’re good at taking on responsibility. When the two of us walk through a forest, you concentrate on the path. You look right straight down it to the end. You don’t see anything else but the goal and how to reach it. Me—I get distracted by the trees and the birds, the plants and the animals. I want to see everything. I’d wander around lost in that forest forever, Fon, if you weren’t along to help me find the way out.”
“Yes,” Fonrar had replied. “But someday a tree’s going to fall down on top of me or something’s going to jump at me from that forest and I’d never see until it was too late. You, on the other hand, would be watching for it.”
Which is why, Fonrar said to herself, we make such a good team.
The two continued on their way down the ridge. No one heard them, no alarm was raised. The camp that they were now leaving far behind them was quiet. The stillness wasn’t peaceful. It was tense, waiting, watching.
* * * * *
Night settled far more quickly over the side of the ridge opposite from where the females slumbered. The darkness brought a hush to Kang’s command. The goblin’s sudden withdrawal had taken them all by surprise. No one cheered or celebrated, however.
“They’re not gone,” was the word whispered through camp. “They’re still out there. You can hear them.”
They could not only hear the enemy rustling in the tall grass down below, hear the creak of leather and the clank of mail, they could smell him—the foul rotted-meat stench of goblin. But even with their night vision, the draconians couldn’t get a sense of numbers or what the goblins were doing. All they knew was that the sounds weren’t coming any closer.
Kang had taken the opportunity provided by the unexpected lull to move his troops to the top of the ridge. The draconians crouched on their haunches, thankful for the respite. They drank water sparingly from waterskins that were running low, cleaned their weapons, made what repairs they could to armor and weapons that were in some cases past repairing. No one slept.
The waiting, the silence, the smell began to tell on their nerves.
“You want me to go and take a look, sir?” Slith asked. “See what the slime are up to?”
Kang shook his head. “No, they’ll come to us. I’m certain of that. It’s just a matter of time, and we’ve got all the time in the world. We’re not going anywhere and they know it.”
“So we just sit here and wait to die,” Gloth muttered.
Slith poked the Squadron Leader in the ribs. “You’re speaking to the commander,” he said severely.
“No, I wasn’t,” Gloth returned, aggrieved. “I was speaking to myself. It was my own private thought. A fellow’s got a right to his own private thoughts, doesn’t he?” He looked uneasily at Kang.
“We are not going to die,” Kang said, raising his voice
, not only to halt the argument, but so that other soldiers could hear him. Morale was low, as low as he’d ever seen it, and he blamed himself. He should be inspiring confidence, not fomenting doubt. “We can win this fight! We know goblins, damn it. They used to be our allies before they turned on us, the filthy scum. Just now, we gave them a bloody nose.”
Some of the men cheered raggedly. Kang was heartened.
“That’s why they skulked off,” he continued. “Their commanders are out there trying to whip some fighting spirit back into them. The next time they come, we’ll give them a bloody nose and a good ass-kicking into the bargain. And while they’re holding their behinds and crying for their mamas, we’ll take off running and put a good ten to fifteen miles between us and them before they can find the nerve to chase after us. We’ll find somewhere to hole up, hopefully better than that place we tried to defend last time.”
The draconians laughed, as Kang had intended, and several, hooting, nudged Slith. They had taken refuge against the goblins inside an abandoned granary. The goblins had stormed the granary in the dead of night, hoping to catch the draconians off guard. Goblins bashed in the doors, swarmed through the cracks in the timber walls like rats. During the vicious melee that followed, Slith, aiming for a goblin, had accidentally sliced through a weight-bearing timber that was holding up the ceiling. Down came the roof of the granary. The walls collapsed.
The draconians, with their tough hides and heavy helms, managed to escape the wreckage with no worse hurts than a few scales missing, a broken wing or two and one severely mangled tail that had to be amputated. The females had not been injured at all, due to the fact that Kang had stashed them underneath a large pile of hay. The smash-up had killed a number of goblins, however. The shaken goblin commander, who more than half believed the draconians had endangered themselves simply to kill more goblins, had withdrawn. But although they had won the battle, the granary was no longer defensible and the draconians had been forced to move on.
Rising to his feet, Slith took a mock bow. The soldiers jeered and tossed rocks at him until he sat down. He squatted next to Kang.
“Good speech, sir,” Slith said softly. “But you and I both know that these gobbos out there aren’t acting like any gobbos we’ve ever fought before.”
“You’re right,” said Kang worriedly. “I can’t figure—”
“Excuse me, sir,” said Gloth, apparently hoping to take his commander’s mind off his own infraction by casting aspersion on another, “I’ve had to put Cresel on report. I think you should reprimand him, sir.”
“Cresel?” Kang recognized the name of one of the females’ bodyguard and was suddenly alarmed. “What’s happened? Nothing wrong with the females, is there?”
“No, sir,” said Gloth. “But no thanks to Cresel. I found two of the females, a bozak and that aurak, standing on top of this ridge, not far from where you are right now, sir, watching the battle. They were cheering and everything.” He looked extremely disapproving.
Kang had no trouble guessing which two. “Fonrar and Thesik?”
“Yes, sir. Those two.”
“Cheering, were they?” Kang couldn’t help but smile.
If Fonrar had been a male, he would have marked her out as good officer material. A born leader, she was courageous, decisive, and, most important, exhibited common sense. As for Thesik, the aurak, Kang didn’t know what to make of her. He’d been extremely disconcerted to discover that one of the eggs had produced an aurak draconian. The auraks came from the eggs of golden dragons and were extremely rare among the draconian species. Kang had known few male auraks in his time and he had disliked and distrusted those.
Auraks dislike taking orders. They have no use for anyone, including their own kind, and they tended to be loners, holding themselves aloof from other draconians whom they considered inferior. Ambitious, secretive, extremely powerful in magic, auraks had been known to slay their inferior brethren without compunction. Due to their dire magicks and ruthless natures, auraks are feared and distrusted by all other draconians. They did not make good soldiers and were rarely to be found in the armies of draconians.
Kang had watched Thesik closely to see if she showed signs of developing a bent and twisted personality like male auraks, but so far all he had seen in her was an unfortunate tendency to daydream when she should have been concentrating on her engineering studies.
Kang had been concerned when he’d seen a friendship developing between Thesik and Fonrar, but now he was grateful for it. He hoped such a friendship would keep the more obnoxious qualities of an aurak from coming to the surface, if indeed, such qualities were even present in a female aurak.
“Sir,” said Gloth, reprovingly, seeing his commander smile, “the females were standing in the firelight! In arrow range! And Cresel didn’t even know they’d gone missing!”
“Oh, um, yes,” said Kang, banishing his smile. “You’re right, Gloth. We can’t have the females near the front lines. I’ll speak to Cresel. A week of digging latrines should make him more attentive to his duty.”
“My thought exactly, sir,” said Gloth, gratified.
He walked away, pleased, and Kang sighed deeply. What a farce. Cresel on report. In a few hours, less perhaps, Cresel might be battling for his life against a thousand goblins, with all his other comrades dead or dying. And what would become of the females then? As a last resort, Kang decided, he might send them away, send them north. But only as a last resort. They were in unknown territory. The few scouts who had ventured out to try to find a safe place to hole up had not returned. They were past their time and Kang was forced to conclude that they’d been captured or killed.
He couldn’t believe that his dream, his hope, the promise of a new life, was going to end ignominiously on top of this ridge. He couldn’t accept it. He and his men had come so far. They were so close to their destination—a city of their own, a city with thick walls and tall towers. In such a city, the draconians could stand against all the goblins in the world with a few Solamnic Knights thrown in for good measure! But that city might have been on the other side of the strange new moon for all the good it was going to do him. He was going to die out there in the long grass and unless he could find a way out for them, his Queen’s gift was going to die with him.
“Don’t give up, sir,” said Slith. “Don’t ever give up. If you do, you’re finished before you start.”
“Thank you, Slith,” said Kang, recognizing his own words coming back to him. “You’re right. If we do go out, we’ll make it a fight that they’ll sing about for generations to come.”
“Only one problem with that, sir,” said Slith, with a chuckle, “draconians can’t sing!”
Kang slugged his second in the shoulder and immediately felt much better.
A good thing. From out of the long grass came a familiar thwacking sound—the sound of hundreds of arrows being nocked. This was it. The beginning of the next attack.
“Shields!” Kang yelled.
Each draconian raised a small buckler to protect his face. There was a buzzing like a thousand angry wasps and arrows came raining down all around them. The goblins’ aim—poor at best—was hopeless in the dark.
“Steady, boys. They’ll soon quit this nonsense. They’ll be rushing in to try to carve us up like mutton in a minute!” Kang yelled. “They’ll find we’re sheep all right, sheep with fangs!”
The soldiers laughed, although the joke wasn’t a very good one. Humor, even bad humor, calmed the men and reminded them that they weren’t alone. They could all rely on each other, but most of all, they could rely on their commander.
Kang continued talking, letting them hear his voice. Now that the battle was coming, he shed his fear and his anxiety like a snake sheds an old skin. Draconians had been bred for fighting. This is what they did best.
“Tighten up your lines, there, First Squadron. We aren’t in some damned cotillion! You’re not choosing dance partners for my lady’s first ball! Now close up those ra
nks!”
The soldiers knew the drill. They had lived and fought together for years. Kang had once kept a chronicle of the deeds of their regiment. He had been quite proud of the book and had carried it with him in his knapsack. The book had even saved his life, having taken a spear thrust meant for him. Although he had survived, the spear had effectively ended the life of the book. Looking at the mangled pages, Kang had decided it was all a waste of time. Their deeds would be remembered in story and song. Except that draconians couldn’t sing.
Kang chuckled again appreciatively, but the laughter died as he watched rank after rank after rank of goblins rise up out of the long grass where they’d lain hidden. To make a bad situation worse, the goblins marched forward in disciplined unison, spears leveled, quick-stepping toward the draconian position.
“Not ordinary gobbos,” Slith said with a curse. “No, sir. Not ordinary at all.”
Slith was right. Normally the goblins would have charged in no order whatsoever, attempting to overwhelm them by numbers alone. Cowards by nature—undisciplined, slovenly cowards at that—goblins could be counted on to break and flee the moment they met fierce resistance. Not this time. The goblins were advancing in good order. They appeared to be disciplined and determined. Kang was shaken to the core.
Once again he wondered as he had wondered before, who was behind this? Who wanted them dead?
The draconians held their position, waited grimly for the lines to collide. The lead rank of goblins dashed forward, jabbing with their short spears. The draconians fought with hammer, axe and sword and the front line of goblins disintegrated into a bloody pulp. But more ranks were behind, all pushing forward. Here and there a draconian fell. On the left flank, a goblin arrow pierced a bozak’s scaly hide. He died instantly and, as customary after death, the bozak’s bones exploded. He took out ten goblins, but he also damaged his comrades, who had been unable to get out of the way.