The Name Of The Sword (Book 4)

by J. L. Doty

  Carsaris said, “It bothers me that he didn’t use the nether ways to get them here. How did he get them here?”

  Valso turned and vented his anger on the skeletal wizard. “It doesn’t matter. He can’t breach these walls.”

  He changed in an instant, went from angry to happy and exuberant. “I almost regret that your husband is such an idiot. What fun is there in stepping on the toes of a fool?”

  Rhianne considered his words carefully. “But my husband has never been a fool.”

  Valso looked her way and his eyes narrowed, and for an instant she thought she saw fear there. She continued, “And every time someone thinks him the fool, it is they who learn the fool’s lesson.”

  Valso’s eyes flashed with open fear, and he let that thing into his soul. It spoke in that voice that was not Valso’s, “I care nothing for this city, for it is the Mortal Plane I will rule.”

  He loomed over her, his eyes flaring with the red fires of his hatred. She tried to look away, but he reached out and gripped her throat, lifted her and held her with her toes barely brushing the stone of the parapet. Holding onto his wrist she struggled to breathe as he pulled her face close to his and forced her to look into his eyes. In them she saw armies of tormented souls, broken and twisted by his hatred. In them she saw her fate, and that of the entire Mortal Plane.

  He tossed her like a rag doll onto the stone of the parapet. Her head slammed against the battlement and she lost consciousness.

  ••••

  “There’s no bloody way we’re going to take those walls,” BlakeDown said.

  Morgin looked past BlakeDown at the walls of Durin as Olivia responded. “I’m sure my grandson has a plan. After all, he defeated Illalla nicely at Csairne Glen when we were heavily outnumbered.”

  Morgin left BlakeDown and Olivia to their argument. The two were so wrapped up in their mutual animosity, and their constant struggle to gain the upper hand, that neither paid him the least bit of attention. Still holding Mortiss’ reins he walked forward to the edge of the ash-charred ground. The impenetrable walls of Durin loomed three hundred paces distant, and well out of bowshot.

  He’d considered bypassing the walls, sending warriors through shadows directly into the palace. But he now had enough experience to know it would take hours to transport the entire army. At best, he’d get a few twelves into the palace before Valso realized what he was doing, and a few more into the inner bailey, but that would put them in the midst of an overwhelming force of jackal warriors and Decouix armsmen. Morgin couldn’t fight Valso with the odds stacked so heavily against them. He needed an army at his back, with Valso and Magwa’s armies neutralized, and to accomplish that he’d have to take the city step by step. But first he had to take the walls, and he knew he couldn’t breach them with an army of twelve thousand, needed four or five times that, plus engines of war, ladders, and all the paraphernalia of a siege.

  Standing at the edge of the ash-covered ground, he could make out a small group of people on the parapets at the top of Durin’s wall just over the main gates, though the distance was too great to discern any detail. For several heartbeats he sensed the enormous well of power Valso had shown him, and that told him the Decouix king stood there looking down at him. He sensed Rhianne there as well, guessed Valso was delighting at the paltry size of the invading army, was probably bragging how he would crush it. It would be so like the Decouix to drag her there to listen to his gloating.

  At the thought of Rhianne Morgin recalled her words. There is no power in the blade. It is but a thing of steel . . . It was the power in your soul, and you needed to learn to control it.

  He gripped the sword’s hilt and pulled it from its sheath. He held it up to look at it, let the sun glint off the old blade. He’d never looked at it through the eyes of a SteelMaster before, realized now that somewhere deep inside he had feared doing so, had feared the truth he might find. He examined the old steel from tip to hilt, then lifted his left hand, snapped a fingernail against the blade, and the ping of the metal rang in his ears. He took up the sound, strengthened it, listened to the steel sing, and it did so with a single voice, then he let the sound die. The blade had clearly been forged by a SteelMaster, forged by him. He said to it, “You are my self-forged blade.”

  Like a fool, all his life he had sought to control the power in the blade, and it took Rhianne’s insight to show him the truth. He looked at Mortiss standing quietly beside him. “She was right.”

  She neighed, Of course she was.

  While he’d been focused on the blade, NickoLot, AnnaRail and France had come forward to stand beside him. He noticed his Benesh’ere friends had gathered around to watch. They stood about him in silence, though he was thankful he saw no reverence in the looks they gave him, just determination, and expectation.

  Somewhere behind him he heard Olivia and BlakeDown coming forward, heard them easily because they continued their argument unabated. Wylow and PaulStaff stepped up beside him, looking toward the walls of the city. Without looking at him Wylow said, “He’s right, you know. With what we have, if we try to assault those walls, they’ll crush us.”

  PaulStaff said, “Aye, lad. What are you going to do?”

  Morgin had considered using his shadows to attempt to open the city’s gates. If he knew a shadow near the gates, he could transport a small force of Benesh’ere there, and take the defenders by surprise from behind. With the gates open they wouldn’t have to throw themselves against the walls, which would be futile. But he didn’t know any shadows near the gates.

  He considered stepping into a shadow he knew in the castle, then working his way from shadow to shadow to the city gates to identify a shadow there. But it had taken him hours to work his way across the city to find Tulellcoe and Cort in the inn, and they couldn’t afford to wait hours. At the moment they had the element of surprise. It hadn’t taken any preparation to send the city guard out to burn the ramshackle market outside the walls. But if he gave Valso enough time to organize sorties, the battle would be in the open fields outside the city. Badly outnumbered, they would lose that fight.

  Morgin turned to Mortiss and said, “What do you think, an aerial assault?”

  She neighed, Excellent idea.

  ••••

  NickoLot had begun to wonder at Morgin’s sanity. Several times now she had watched him speak to his horse as if it were human. He frequently asked the animal its advice, though all he ever got from it was a splutter or a neigh. But somehow that seemed to satisfy him, and now he looked up to the sky expectantly.

  NickoLot looked up, looked where he was looking, and saw a flight of birds, tiny black specs against the bright blue of the morning sky, probably a murder of crows. They circled, descending slowly, gliding downward on a dry thermal without flapping their wings, just circling and descending and drifting closer. She began to discern shape and detail, and there was something wrong about these crows. Their bodies were distorted and strange, and certainly larger than crows, probably more the size of a vulture or an eagle. Then she noticed that each had a creature riding on its back. She squinted, and realized the birds’ riders were human shaped and human sized. Only when two of the strange birds settled to the ground in front of them, a smaller one carrying a rider and a larger one riderless, did she truly comprehend their size. She gasped and stepped back a pace, for these birds were not birds. Behind her she heard others cry out and utter sounds of amazement.

  The animals in front of them were part eagle and part lion, odd misshapen creatures larger than any horse, coal black from head to foot, with blood-red eyes. The larger, riderless one bowed its head to Morgin and said, “Your Majesty.”

  As more of the winged eagle-lion animals settled to the ground around them, the rider on the smaller one climbed down from its back and approached Morgin. She was the most beautiful woman Nicki had ever seen, but it was a sterile beauty without the warmth of mortality. She had a broadsword strapped to her side, and she carried a bow and
a quiver of arrows. She dropped to one knee in front of Morgin and said, “Your Majesty, I brought all 11 legions.”

  He said, “Ellowyn, please rise,” and she stood.

  He asked her, “Will WolfDane be joining us?”

  “Aye, my lord,” she said. “He has much to settle with the queen of the jackal court.”

  Morgin turned to Olivia and BlakeDown, and indicating the beautiful woman he said, “I’d like to introduce the Archangel Ellowyn, commander of the second legion of angels.”

  Olivia smiled, while BlakeDown stood dumbfounded, his mouth open like a simpleton.

  The larger of the strange eagle-lions laughed and said, “You have changed since we last met, no longer the sad and lonely Benesh’ere warrior.”

  “And this,” Morgin said, indicating the enormous half-bird, “is TarnThane, the griffin lord.”

  Morgin turned to the smaller of the two griffins, bowed deeply and said, “Your Majesty.”

  To BlakeDown and Olivia he said. “This is SheelThane, Queen of the House of the Thane. We met 12 centuries ago, in a dream.”

  Nicki was sooo going to have a talk with this brother of hers.

  ••••

  Rhianne regained consciousness laying on the walkway of the parapet. She lay there for a moment, trying to forget the horror she’d seen in Valso’s eyes. The power Valso—or rather his master—commanded was so overwhelmingly immense, she and Morgin had little chance of defeating it. Morgin would die on the battlefield below throwing his army against these walls, and she would die in this city at Valso’s pleasure.

  As she struggled to her feet Valso rushed over to her and helped her up. “I’m so sorry, dear Rhianne, but when you taunt me, you must suffer the consequences.”

  Her legs still felt a little weak, so she reached out and put a hand on a crenel to steady herself. Magwa pointed up to the sky and said, “Look.”

  Rhianne craned her neck to look in the direction the bitch-queen pointed, saw what looked to be a murder of crows high in the sky, but instinct told her otherwise. AnneRhianne, an ancient Benesh’ere princess, had haunted Rhianne’s dreams, and she knew these half-birds for what they were. Back then she had thought her dreams were just dreams, but she had since learned otherwise, and it seemed that every day she would learn that lesson again.

  Standing next to her Valso said, “Hmmm, I hadn’t anticipated the Thane, or the Legions. Clever of him. So we’ll lose a few more jackals and armsmen than expected, but they’ll never take these walls, will they, Carsaris?”

  The skeletal wizard held up an arrow, his eyes clouded with fear. “We have the means . . . to deal with the Thane, sire.”

  The jackal warriors around them began yipping and howling like mistreated dogs. Far behind Morgin’s army a massive pack of enormous dogs larger than horses emerged from the woodland, loping forward to join the invading army.

  “No,” Magwa shouted. “Not the Dane.” She swung toward Valso. “You didn’t tell us we would have to fight the Dane pack.”

  Valso dismissed her complaints with a wave of his hand. “They can’t reach you at the top of these walls, can they? All they can do is stand below and howl while you rain arrows down upon them. Defend the wall at all costs, and we’ll crush them here.”

  ••••

  Riding on TarnThane’s back was anything but pleasant. As Morgin and the legions of angels approached the walls of Durin from high above, he found the view magnificent, but the griffins didn’t tolerate saddles. The bony ridge of TarnThane’s spine made sitting up straight an unpleasant feat, so he clung to his bow, hugged the griffin’s neck, and prayed he wouldn’t fall.

  With every angel carrying a bow and arrows, they should have had the advantage of height. They could stay high enough to remain out of range of arrows from below, and rain arrows down on their enemy from above. But as the leading edge of the assault approached the wall, arrows shot up from below with impossible speed, and griffins tumbled out of the sky to their deaths.

  Morgin spotted a small clutch of people on the parapets just above the main gates: Valso, Rhianne, Magwa, Carsaris and several Kulls. It angered him that Valso would expose Rhianne so, but then he noticed that Valso deflected all the arrows that came their way with some sort of magical shield.

  TarnThane stayed high and banked to one side, circling the wall just above the gates. Morgin saw one of Valso’s wizards standing on the wall next to a bowman. The bowman handed him an arrow, the wizard did something to it, handed it back to the bowman, and when the bowman released the arrow it shot upward like a bold of lightning.

  Morgin pulled an arrow from his quiver, nocked it, and asked the steel arrowhead to strike true. He drew the bowstring back, aimed and released the arrow. It streaked through the air, pierced the wizard’s heart and he tumbled off the parapet, leaving the bowman with nothing but simple, mundane arrows.

  As Morgin looked for another wizard-bowman pair, TarnThane flapped his massive wings and rose higher. “Remember your purpose here,” he called back to Morgin.

  “You’re right,” Morgin said, realizing he’d lost sight of his primary goal. He wasn’t riding on a griffin’s back to kill enemy wizards. “Get me closer.”

  As TarnThane lowered his head and dove, Morgin’s stomach climbed up into his throat. He gulped, recalling that the ancient Benesh’ere warrior Morddon had considered all of the griffins crazy half-birds. TarnThane pulled out of the dive and sliced through the air just above the wall, low enough to cause several bowmen there to duck. Behind the gates Morgin saw a wide, cobbled square bordered by the gates on one side and buildings on the other three. The square was empty of all but soldiers marching through it. They looked up as he and TarnThane streaked overhead. He sensed a steel-tipped arrow cutting through the air toward them, told the steel to deflect and it did.

  “I got what I need,” he said to TarnThane.

  The griffin banked steeply and turned back toward the army of the Lesser Clans.

  35

  Shadows of the City

  As the battle above the wall raged on, TarnThane settled to the ground in the midst of Morgin’s army. Morgin climbed off the griffin’s back, glad to be back on solid ground.

  “Did you find it?” Jerst asked.

  “Aye,” Morgin said. “An alley between two buildings, about a hundred paces from the gates. And no one is paying it the least bit of attention. But I found something better too.”

  France handed him a short, sharpened tree branch. “Draw it out for us, lad.”

  The clan leaders and many of their lieutenants gathered around. Morgin squatted down and carefully drew in the dirt what he recalled of the square, the buildings, and the byways just behind the gates of the city. As he drew he said, “There are several entries into the city, but we’re going to concentrate on the main gates. On both sides of the gates, about 20 paces from them, there’s a shadowed archway in the wall at ground level. Above each is another shadowed archway on the parapets. I’m guessing that they’re connected by stairs, but it doesn’t matter because I can use the shadows in all of those archways, and the shadows in the alley.”

  Jerst had claimed the right to lead the assault on the gates and open them, and Morgin felt it right to oblige him. There could be nothing more frightening for the defenders than to suddenly have towering Benesh’ere warriors appear among them, wielding swords and war axes.

  Sitting on TarnThane’s back on the flight back, Morgin had thought this through carefully. He’d been looking for one shadow, hadn’t considered that he might find several he could use. He finished by saying, “I’m going to send the first two twelves out through the archways on top of the wall. Tell them to cause as much havoc as possible.”

  He looked specifically at Jerst. “But Valso is holding my wife captive up there, so be careful. And if you can, rescue her.”

  The warmaster nodded, and Morgin continued. “The next 24 I’ll send out of the alley. Tell them to head up the street toward the center of the city
. Like the first 24 their job is to draw attention away from the gates. The last two twelves I’ll send out through the archways at ground level near the gates. Their job is to open the gates. Then I’m going to repeat, sending each group reinforcements until the gates open.”

  He looked up at the faces leaning over him, all looking down at the crude sketch he’d scratched in the dirt. He looked pointedly at BlakeDown, Brandon, Wylow and PaulStaff. “Stay out of bowshot, but when the gates start to open, charge with mounted troops in the lead, foot soldiers following. We have to take those gates without losing our army beneath the walls.”

  As the leaders dispersed to brief their armsmen, France gripped Morgin’s arm and said quietly, “The real battle here today, it isn’t for the city, is it?”

  Morgin paused and looked his friend in the face. It brought joy to his heart to see the glint in the swordsman’s eyes again. “No, my friend,” he said. “We’re taking the city only so I can get to Valso. The real battle will be Rhianne and me against that thing he’s allowed onto the Mortal Plane.”

  France nodded and grinned. “Well then, lad, you and me, all the way.”

  Morgin owed France the truth. “But we can’t win that battle, because I haven’t found my true name.”

  France looked over Morgin’s shoulder at the clan leaders. “The old witch says your true name is AethonSword.”

  Morgin shrugged. “And in that, she’s wrong. Trust me, friend. Find a place to hide when this is done, because I don’t think it’s going to end well.”

  ••••

  Morgin stood at the edge of the charred ground and faced the gates of Durin in the distance. On his immediate right the hellhound pack sat on their haunches, silent and intent, their eyes focused on the gates of Durin. A hundred paces farther to the right the army of the Lesser Clans had assembled, while the Benesh’ere had formed up a hundred paces to his left. In front of him stood a little over two hundred Benesh’ere, organized into squads of 24 warriors each, all on foot without their mounts.

  Morgin had told Jerst, “Regardless of how this ends, the responsibility of the Benesh’ere is to make sure no Kulls survive this day.”