by Jim Galford
Without warning, the loud noise ceased abruptly, making Therec sit up in the saddle and look back toward the mine. The moment he turned, a bright flash of light washed out his vision and numbed his body. The last thing he had seen before the light was at least twenty other horses running close by him.
Therec felt weightless for just a second before painful impacts against his legs and shoulders flared as he hit the ground, having been thrown by his horse. With a groan, he swept his arms out as best he could, calling forth magic to shield his body against being trampled by the other horses.
The limits of Therec’s magical training were made obvious almost immediately as the jarring blows from the horses clipping him made his concentration waver. He knew many healers possessed the ability to completely deflect one or two strikes against their body, no matter how powerful, but he could shield against many to a far smaller degree. Every inch of his body hurt, but he kept himself covered with his magic and cloak until he had gone some time without being kicked or stepped on.
Ears ringing loudly enough to drown out nearly anything, Therec let the magic fade, feeling his strength dwindle to the point of near-collapse. Slowly, he lowered his cloak and felt as though he had been transported far from where he had been minutes before.
For as far as Therec could see in every direction, horses were running wild without riders. The soldiers themselves were mostly lying strewn about the plains in broken positions, though he could see some trying to stand—and fall again, more often than not. The faces of the few survivors he could see told him that they were screaming, though he could hear none of it.
Therec pushed himself upright, just barely able to stand. He turned around toward the quarry, hoping to get a better idea of what had happened. When he did, he wished he had just walked away without looking back.
The quarry emitted a column of dark black smoke and pieces of the same shining metal that the golems had been built from lay strewn across the entire region. Near each piece, he could see bodies—or parts of bodies—scattered about.
Much of the mining village was gone, having been flattened by the explosion in the quarry. The broken frames of a few of the larger structures stood, though somewhat lopsided. Despite the destruction, Therec saw a few survivors there, still stumbling around, trying to recover.
A rumble through the ground numbed Therec’s feet, and he dropped to his knees to keep from being forcibly knocked over. He lifted his head slowly as the rumbling became stronger, watching in horror as a wide crack opened in the ground, running in a zigzag path from the quarry back toward Lantonne. The crack raced past where Therec lay, the ground falling away into darkness, swallowing everything in its path, including most of the fallen soldiers and their horses.
Therec could only imagine the screams as the survivors plunged to their deaths in the falling ground. Within seconds, he could no longer see the end of the collapsing path, racing as fast as it was toward the city.
The tunnel had become the liability Therec feared, though he could never have imagined this.
Chapter Five
“Sides Chosen”
Ilarra woke hours later, thankful for the silence that filled the basement. When she had finally drifted off, she could still hear the howls of the undead trying to reach her and Raeln, along with the mind-numbing thuds of the giant golems she had seen in the distance.
She sat up slowly, sliding Raeln’s protective arm off of her as she made her way toward the metal doors they had barricaded to keep the undead out. Ilarra stopped near the doors, looking up as a very faint tremor made dust fall in streams from the ceiling.
Whatever had happened was far away, making it likely they could escape. The army had apparently moved on.
“Raeln,” said Ilarra loudly, as she slid aside small pieces from pile of wood and rocks that Raeln had put in front of the door. “We’re leaving Lantonne. I am done with this city…it can burn for all I care. The magisters can be the first into the fire. We’re going home.”
Raeln’s soft dry chuckle let her know he was awake, and a second later, he joined her, easily shoving aside more of the debris than she would have been able to move in ten minutes or more.
Within minutes, the two of them had the doors cleared, and Raeln motioned Ilarra back. He took a cautious step up to the door, slowly sliding the bar that had been wedged to keep the doors closed before the barricade had been built.
Raeln first put his ear to the doors, waiting what felt to Ilarra like a long time. Then, he sniffed at the thin crack of light between the metal doors. Apparently satisfied, he slid the bar free and pushed the doors open, though he kept himself between Ilarra and the outside.
Following Raeln out into the painful sunlight, Ilarra saw every indication that an army had stampeded through the old village. Anything that was not part of a building had been knocked over or broken, often with dried blood left in the wake of the army’s passing.
Every building’s doors stood open, as though the undead had made a quick search of the village for living to attack before moving on. Where they and the golems had gone, Ilarra could only guess. She did still hear the booms of the golems in the distance, but the sound was muffled and did not concern her terribly.
Turning once more in place, looking for any sign of undead still in the area, Ilarra spun back toward the north and started to walk. She made it no more than two steps before Raeln grabbed her by the shoulder with a hand nearly large enough he could have wrapped it almost around her whole neck.
“What?” she demanded, giving the large wolf an annoyed glare. “We’re going home, Raeln.”
Ears going back to let Ilarra know he was serious, Raeln motioned toward the southeastern part of the village, where they had entered the night before.
“We are not going back to Lantonne.”
Raeln rolled his eyes and pointed directly at the building where they had attempted to sleep originally.
“You…want to check on the foxes? Why do we care, Raeln? Let’s let them fend for themselves.”
Shaking his head in exasperation, Raeln turned and headed for the building, letting Ilarra make her own choice about whether to go. Not that it was really a choice—if her guard was going that way, she did not exactly feel as if she had much say in the matter. Hurrying as best she could, Ilarra stayed a few steps behind Raeln, letting him better watch for threats.
When they did near the building, Ilarra saw Raeln’s fur on the back of his head and neck stand on end. Motioning for her to stay where she was, he moved slowly toward the open door of the old inn, his feet making no sound, even as the large paws came down on the old and normally creaky boards of the front porch.
Raeln paused briefly at the door, before slipping inside.
Minutes passed, and Ilarra found herself fidgeting as she searched the streets for anything coming to get her. She felt entirely exposed, unsure what to do with herself when there could be soldiers of Altis or their undead minions coming for her at any moment. Every so often, she even looked up at the sky, afraid that one of the golems might be about to step on her. It was exhausting being so afraid of what might happen, but that was why she had Raeln.
Finally, Ilarra had waited longer than she was willing to, and she hurried up the porch, wincing as the boards creaked under her footsteps—despite her easily weighing half or less what Raeln did. She darted inside, intending to wait for Raeln where she could not be seen by someone walking around in the village.
Ilarra took a moment at the door to adjust to the darker interior, hoping she was not about to walk into the group of gruff fox wildlings again. When her eyes did adjust, she nearly screamed at what she saw and had to clamp a hand to her mouth to prevent it.
Blood and human corpses covered the main room’s floor, scattered everywhere around the simple barricade wall the foxes had built at the foot of the steps. Several of the foxes were partially visible around the edges of the wall, while at least one had been dragged out into the main room and butchered. Fr
om what she could see, every one of the wildlings had died brutally, though they had taken a great many walking corpses with them.
At the top of the steps, Raeln was just coming out of the first bedroom, shaking his head as he did. He noticed Ilarra, gave her a warning glare, then hurried back to her side.
“Can we leave now?” she asked softly, not happy with how much her voice was shaking.
Raeln touched her cheek gently with his trimmed claws and nodded, motioning for her to leave the inn. Once he had followed her out, he pulled the broken door mostly shut, giving it a look that told Ilarra that he wished he could do more.
Almost as soon as they hit the street, a faint voice began to whisper at the edges of Ilarra’s mind. She looked around, trying to find the source, and noticed Raeln doing much the same. The words were faint, as though it was talking to someone else, but she could tell that the voice was within her own mind, not somewhere nearby.
“I want out of this village for good,” muttered Ilarra, setting off at a determined march toward the north. “Giant golems, armies of undead, and now ghosts. I’m done with Lantonne.”
They had gone perhaps three buildings when a black wolf—so large that, even running on all fours, it was larger than Raeln standing on two—darted across the road, faster than Ilarra thought possible. She froze as it disappeared between two more buildings, giving Raeln a nervous glance to see what he thought of the newcomer. She had never even heard of a ghost wolf, so this was new to her.
For the first time Ilarra could remember, Raeln looked afraid. She doubted it was for himself, but he was not comfortable. He looked very nearly ready to scoop her up and run for the northlands as fast as his legs would carry them.
Moments later, as Ilarra began slowly advancing toward the north, watching the alleys for signs of the wolf, she heard approaching horses. Looking south, thinking they must be riding in from Lantonne, she stopped and followed Raeln’s stare toward the north. Turning back that direction, she saw a large group—maybe fifty or so—of soldiers, several wearing the colors of Altis. Among their numbers she spotted wildlings, halflings, dwarves, and others. The sight of races that were normally enslaved by Altis riding for that city made her gape in amazement.
“Just what did we walk ourselves into?” she asked aloud.
Raeln growled and grabbed her arm, leading her off the road and ducked them into the back of one of the northernmost buildings where they could not be seen by the riders. Bending down as soon as they entered the old shack, Raeln quickly wrote in the dust on the floorboards.
“You think they’re the generals of the Altisian army?” Ilarra asked, reading what he had written. “Why would they have halflings…or wildlings…among them? Altis barely tolerates elves, let alone anything more distant from humans.”
Holding up his arms with the wrists crossed, Raeln made it look as though his arms were tied together.
“Slaves guarding the generals?”
Raeln nodded.
“I suppose that’s possible…still strange. Do you think we can avoid them?”
He thought a minute on that and sat down. Raeln leaned back against the wall of the building to wait.
“How long?”
Raeln shrugged and held up a finger to indicate “just a moment.” From what Ilarra could figure, he wanted to wait until their group was fully past before going back out. He would probably wait a little longer to be sure they did not double back.
Sitting in the old building, trying not to cough on the thick dust that rose with every shift of her sandaled feet, Ilarra waited about an hour. When she was starting to wonder how long Raeln meant to delay, he stood up and offered her his hand.
“About time,” she told him, rubbing at her itching nose. “Let’s get out of…”
Raeln froze, his ears straight up as he listened to something.
“Oh, not again. What this time?”
As expected, Raeln said nothing, but he also gave Ilarra no indication what he was thinking. He just kept turning his head slightly, listening to something she could not hear.
When Ilarra was about to push the issue, she first heard it. A faint buzzing, like a whistle heard through a wall. It grew louder each second, making her ears ache. She could only imagine what it was doing to Raeln. He had always been far more sensitive to sounds than she was.
“I don’t know what it is, either,” she told Raeln, grabbing his arm and tugging him toward what appeared to be a staircase down near the back of the room. “But I’d rather hide twice in one day than find out the hard way what’s making that sound.”
Raeln seemed reluctant, constantly looking out the broken windows of the building, but he did follow her. It took her longer than she had hoped to get him down the steps of the cellar, by which time the buzzing was making it difficult for her to concentrate. Unlike the last cellar, this one was partially collapsed and had no door to close, giving them almost no shelter from the noise or anything else.
“We need to stay down until this is all over,” Ilarra nearly screamed, trying to be heard above the noise. “We have enough food and water for another day in my pack…”
A boom shook the entire building, slamming Ilarra against one wall and then tossing her back the other way. She landed hard atop Raeln, who did not react to her at all. Seconds later, another rumble flipped her off of the wildling and onto the floor.
Ilarra panted nervously, staring up at the now-cracked wooden beams that held what was left of the ceiling up. In spots, she could see sunlight through areas where the floorboards of the upper floor had broken, and judging by how much light came through, she was wondering if the walls were even intact. They were lucky the whole thing had not come down on them.
“Raeln?”
The room remained silent.
Turning her head, Ilarra saw Raeln still slumped in one corner where he had fallen during the first quake. In the dim light, she could not see whether his eyes were open or not, but he did not move at all.
Ilarra groaned as she got her feet under her, her whole body throbbing with injuries she had not felt prior. She had taken far more of a beating than she had originally thought, but nothing was broken. Still, she would be hurting for days.
Staggering a little with each step, she went to Raeln, breathing a sigh of relief when she saw his chest slowly rising and falling. She knelt at his side, searching for any sign of whether he had been hurt. Even with her limited understanding of treating wounds, the cause was not difficult to ascertain.
Along Raeln’s head, behind his right ear, a long gash had opened. Blood spattered on the brick wall nearby made Ilarra guess he had been thrown into the wall. He was definitely losing a lot of blood, but she had no idea if it was normal for a wound of that sort.
“I’ll find help,” she whispered to Raeln, squeezing his hand.
Lifting her skirt to keep from tripping as she rushed up the steep stairs into the room above, Ilarra did not even think about the possibility that the Altisian army might still be nearby. She went straight out the door of the building, running into the dirt road out front, searching for anyone that might be able to help Raeln.
“Hello?” she called out as loudly as she dared, nearly tripping as she ran to the next street over. She kept calling as she went, making her way back toward the south end of the village, but no one answered.
Just as Ilarra was considering going back to check on Raeln, she saw the briefest glimpse of the giant black wolf she had seen before. Not knowing if it was a good sign or ill, she followed, ducking under the collapsed and leaning walls of the shattered buildings closer to the quarry east of the village. The farther she went, the less vertical items of any kind still stood until soon she was in a flattened area, filled with soldiers.
Dazed, Ilarra started to walk right into the group before realizing that she might be about to stride into the waiting arms of Altisian troops. She skidded to a stop and fell back behind what appeared to have been a stone chimney until a few minutes prior.
Ilarra watched the large group, studying each man. The group had settled in around something, most of the soldiers pointing weapons at a pile of dust and debris in the center of a fallen building. She was so occupied trying to figure out what they were doing, it took her longer than she cared to admit to figure out they all wore the white and blue of Lantonne’s military.
Stepping from her cover, Ilarra made it only a few strides into the open area before a heavily-muscled man grabbed her arm roughly. He looked her up and down and whistled to the other soldiers.
“She’s from the farming villages by the clothing,” called back a man carrying a spear, at the edge of the larger group. “This one’s got Altisian rags on it. Get Commander Phillith…we need some orders.”
The man holding Ilarra snorted, gave her another glare, then set off to her right, running toward a man atop an armored horse.
“What’s going on?” Ilarra asked meekly, approaching the edge of the group of soldiers. “Can you spare a man or two? My friend…”
Ilarra’s thoughts vanished as she realized that the pile of debris was moving, putting all the soldiers on alert. She stared as more dust and broken boards fell off of the man-like figure, letting her finally see what the soldiers were so concerned about.
Lying on the ground on its knees was a wildling, gasping for air. At first, she worried that this was somehow related to the giant black wolf she had seen, but there was no sign of the wolf at all. The wildling appeared to be unarmed and unaware that it was surrounded, still on all fours, coughing and shaking its head slowly.
“That’s not the wolf,” Ilarra said aloud, frowning. “Why the excitement? You act like you’ve never seen a wildling while that giant wolf is getting away.”