by Jim Galford
The soldiers ignored her completely, even as the wildling started to get up, layers of dirt from the explosion falling off of him in chunks and dusty streams. He was clearly disoriented, his large orange eyes unfocused as he sat upright, staring blankly at the crowd around him. His gaze passed over Ilarra without really seeing her.
Ilarra nearly turned to walk away to find someone else to help Raeln when she saw the remains of intricate armor on the wildling. That was a good sign he was not just a random passerby caught in the explosion. Nearby, she could see the broken hilt of a sword. He was one of the Altisians, and these soldiers would kill him without a second thought.
Shaking her head at the senselessness of a slave from Altis being forced to fight for his masters, then executed by Lantonne for doing so, Ilarra gave the wildling man a sad stare, knowing he might have a spear put through him before he even knew it was coming. Still, it was none of her business. This was a military matter.
As the wildling sat up, a long tail—perhaps longer than he was tall—swept out from the rubble around him, revealing two wildling children that lay in the dirt under where he had been lying. Though the dust from the explosion masked their markings, Ilarra found herself smiling at them, thinking back to when Raeln had been brought to her as a pup. Ilarra saw these children and took back her initial thoughts of the man’s origins. After all, who brings their children to war? Regardless of weapons, this man was no soldier.
Blinking hard, the wildling snarled at the soldiers, seemingly just noticing them. He bared his teeth slightly, tensing as he looked over the crowd, clearly giving an indication that he would fight rather than surrender. She had seen the same reaction from Raeln enough times to recognize it as fear with the willingness to act. It was a test to see if the soldiers would negotiate or simply attack him and the children. Slowly, the wilding hunkered down over the children, guarding them.
“Let me talk to him, if you won’t!” Ilarra called out, only to be shoved back out of the ring of soldiers.
“Do we kill it or throw it in with the others?” asked one of the soldiers standing near the wildling, keeping a spear tip near the animal-man. “It’s not the wolf, but I still say it doesn’t belong here.”
The wildling clearly understood, grabbing the two children and pulling them to his chest. The willingness to protect them made it clear to Ilarra that these were his young. Anyone with any sense would back away quickly…most parents would gladly kill to protect their children, and she could hardly fault him for doing so. Still, the soldiers kept their weapons on the man.
Ilarra glanced back at the mounted commander, expecting him to be the sensible one. Wildlings were hardly illegal in Lantonne, and with their history of being enslaved in Altis, she fully believed that the commander would have the wildling held for his own safety. Once the animal-like man understood that they meant no harm…
“Throw him in a cage,” called out another man in the uniform of an officer, while the commander was busy with several of his soldiers. “I’m not worried about trying a beast for murder. Skin the pups or toss them in the quarry. I don’t care.”
Stunned, Ilarra watched as soldiers moved in on the wildling and the two young, while other soldiers readied crossbows. This was not what she had been taught about her own people and was unheard-of behavior back in Hyeth. Even a true enemy would not be cut down without a chance to defend themselves, let alone one that had likely been enslaved to fight, if he had even fought at all. A soldier that attacked a parent holding their children would have been killed on sight back home.
With a roar that Ilarra would have expected of a wolf or lion wildling, the filthy wildling man leapt to his feet and tore into the nearest soldier. Even holding the children to his chest, he managed to rip half the face off the human before going after the next nearest.
“Kill him fast!” cried one of the spear-wielding soldiers.
Reacting as fast as she could when the soldiers moved to kill the wildling, Ilarra summoned some of the paltry magic she had learned. She rattled off the obscure words and made the gestures of the formula, making sharp motions toward one crossbowman after another, causing their weapons to be thrown from their grip. When one man turned on her, she switched spells, using a sharp magical word of rebuke that flung him far from her. For once, she had no thoughts of looking foolish or making a mistake. There were lives on the line.
It was all she could do to keep there from being further bloodshed. Ilarra knew she was breaking all kinds of laws of Lantonne as she wove together another spell, pulling bits of magic from the ether to drop a net of pure energy over a soldier that tried to spear the wildling, slamming the soldier to the ground. With each spell, she felt nausea growing in the pit of her stomach as her capabilities reached and surpassed their limits. She had never even tried to cast more than two or three spells at a time in her classes and she had already cast many more than that.
Turning to stop more of the soldiers that were closing in while the wildling fought for his life against three that she dared not attack for fear of hitting the wildling, Ilarra nearly lost her balance as the exertion caught up with her. She dizzily put a hand to her head, then looked up in time to see a gloved fist swung at her head.
Ilarra collapsed as her head exploded with pain. Crawling to her knees, she tried to think clearly enough to form another spell to defend herself. She stumbled and fell, then vomited as the effort of casting so many difficult spells caught up with her. Gagging, she kept one hand on her head and the other her stomach as she lay at the feet of the solider.
“Little idiot, that one,” barked the soldier over her. “Finish off the wildling!”
Ilarra could only groan and try to sit up, unable to focus with the ringing in her head. Not far away, she could see the wildling kneeling on the ground, a sword already driven through his stomach. The two children were crying nearby, clinging to each other as the soldiers stepped over them, weapons ready to strike.
She had failed the man and his children, Ilarra thought sadly, waiting for the soldiers to finish the man off. With great effort, she forced herself to stand, trying to cast one more spell to drive back the men that were preparing to execute the wildling and his children.
As she did, black robes swept in front of her and she saw the tattooed man from the caravan holding up his hands to stop her. “Commander!” the man called out, though he never took her eyes off of her. “Get your men under control!”
Before the commander had fully turned, the officer that had given the order raised a hand to stop the men, who all looked back and forth between the commander and the black robed man in confusion.
“Fine,” growled the soldier in charge, giving Ilarra a murderous glare, while his commander looked around wide-eyed and the bloodshed. “Throw them all in the wagon. Damn, I hate cornered vermin. If the wildling lives, it gets a trial. The girl goes on trial for treason.”
Struggling to stay on her feet as the soldiers dragged away the wildlings toward a group of prison wagons that were being brought up from the quarry area, Ilarra tried to talk to the soldier in charge to explain herself, but he turned his horse and left her. The other soldiers followed suit, several going out of their way to knock her aside with their shoulders.
As the soldiers filtered past her, Ilarra stood in the remains of the mining camp, wondering how they could ignore Lantonne’s very laws in order to defend the city. It seemed insane to her. She had defended a man’s right to trial, and yet, she knew that she would face questioning or punishment for doing so. Even the black-robed foreigner was more willing to save them than her own people.
Remembering that Raeln lay bleeding nearby, Ilarra started to turn and head back to him when a soldier stepped in front of her and took her wrists. Without a word, he clamped manacles onto her and began to lead her away, nearly pulling her off her feet.
The whole way back to Lantonne, she lost herself in her own mind, questioning whether she had done the right thing. More importantly, she prayed that Raeln would sur
vive, or she would never forgive herself, assuming she even lived through his death.
Chapter Six
“Into War”
The dead are those who were once like ourselves and should be afforded all the respect one might show their own ancestors’ memories. To this end, the Preservers shall raise those to be remembered and keep their walking memorial appearing as it did in life. Should an ancestor show undo decay, it shall be destroyed to keep from defiling the memory of that person. Better to lose the memory than to see it decay.
At no time may a Preserver restore the consciousness of the ancestor. To do so would be abomination and defiles the life they once lived. Any who would raise an ancestor back to a semblance of life shall have their life ended and their body destroyed, to be forgotten to time.
Those who honor the memory of those fallen without disgracing themselves in the process are to be revered.
- Third law of Turess
Therec groaned as he came around, wondering for a second where his wife was as he stared up at the wooden ceiling. It looked much like the roof of the central temple in Turessi, but after his eyes began to focus properly, Therec realized that the wood was not a native type of those lands, nor was the construction.
Gradually, he remembered where he was and what had happened. Dizzy and badly injured, he had argued with Commander Phillith, insisting on going with the troops that had survived. The men had been nearly insane with anger over seeing most of their fellows killed and had tried to take it out on a potential citizen—a wildling, but in these lands, that was still no justification for violence.
Once the girl who had attacked the soldiers had been subdued, Therec had tried to remain conscious, but the pain in his head had grown far worse. He remembered the commander offering to take him back to the city, then trying to get onto Phillith’s horse for the ride back to town, but that was the last thing he could remember.
“Is someone there?” Therec wheezed, though his voice cracked. His throat felt as though he had swallowed at least a fistful of dirt.
“Shut your damned mouth, necromancer,” came Arlind’s voice as the dwarven woman leaned over him. “Have the decency to stay dead. You’re making me wish I had the guts to step on your throat myself.”
Touching a wet rag to his forehead—which stung as though he had open gashes there—Arlind frowned and shook her head. “Started to think I was rid of you,” she muttered, giving him a small smile to let him know she was not entirely serious. “You’re one of the lucky ones. Most of the men didn’t come back. Barely got my own ass out of there.”
Turning to peer at the place where he lay, Therec realized he was lying in some kind of storage room with stone walls. Around him, every inch of the floor had been swept hastily and bodies of the injured now lay on straw or the bare floor, most groaning, though some he could tell were already dead. Much of the floor was coated with dried blood that smelled strongly enough to cover the now-faint scent of old grain.
“Where are we?” Therec managed to croak out.
“Store room on the first floor of the keep. We didn’t want to take the wounded any farther than we had to. Most didn’t even make it even to the outer city. I think your heart stopped at least twice, but didn’t stay that way long enough for me to call for a parade.”
Wincing and tucking an arm to his chest as his ribs throbbed painfully, Therec forced himself to sit up. He quickly shoved away Arlind’s attempts to keep him down, biting back the pain that was beginning to flare up all over his body.
“You’re in no damned shape to stand,” she warned, backing away after giving up on trying to make him lie still. “Might bleed out if you get up…then again, go ahead and get up.”
Scowling back at her, Therec shook his head. “Pain is a lie the body tells us that the mind can overcome,” he told her, trying to call forth the meager healing magic at his own disposal. That only made his head throb more and he gave up for the moment. “Nothing is broken. I will live through the day.”
“Almost everything was broken. I practically put you back together from parts. Some of the others weren’t as lucky. I caught you just in time. If you’d slipped a little farther, we’d be dragging your remains to the tower’s resurrection circle. They’re so backed up now, I doubt half those people can be saved. Luckily, some dumb soldier told me your kind don’t expect to get brought back, so you were on the short list to rot down here.”
Therec studied her face, searching for any sign she was over exaggerating in hopes of earning a debt from him. He saw none and decided she was telling the truth. “Why save a necromancer?” he asked softly. “You could have looked the other way and no one would have been the wiser. I know you hate my kind, so why let me live?”
Arlind snorted and looked around at the wounded in the room, some of whom Therec could now see were being tended to by other healers and common doctors. She made as if to spit, but stopped and instead answered, “I would know if I let someone die when I could prevent it,” she finally answered gruffly. “Besides, necromancers can heal if they want to…I need all the help I can get. I’m putting your ass to work.”
Bowing as best he could through the pain, Therec gave the woman a smile.
“You have my gratitude, Arlind. I’m certain you have my wife’s as well.”
Looking genuinely uncomfortable, Arlind stomped her foot and gestured around the room. “Get to work, necromancer,” she told him abruptly. “I see one walking corpse and I’ll have you run through, got it?”
Grinning, Therec stood unsteadily, then went to the nearest soldier. The man’s shoulder was crushed and he appeared to have lost a large amount of blood.
Taking a knee at the man’s side, Therec pushed aside his own pain and focused on the faint voices that whispered in the back of his mind. The dead came at his calling, disappointed that he wished to prevent a spirit from passing into their realm, but they allowed his magic to come anyway.
A rush of energy poured through Therec’s hand into the soldier. Beneath his fingers, he could feel the torn skin mending and the shoulder shift abruptly back into place. In seconds, the man gasped and began breathing more easily.
“See,” Arlind called after him as she headed to the next man, “that wasn’t so hard, was it?”
*
By evening, Therec was out on the walls, leaning on the stone battlements as he watched the north. From that direction, a near-constant train of wagons entered the city gates, bearing the wounded and dead. Past the wagons, the quarry seemed to endlessly belch black smoke with no visible fire.
In Turessi, Therec would have been expected to meet wagons such as those to raise the fallen whose bodies were not too badly ravaged or those that could be repaired. If the dead could not be mended sufficiently, it was his duty to destroy them utterly and speak on their behalf to their survivors. Here, he found himself going out of his way to avoid the caravan, out of fear of how he would be treated simply for being near the bodies of the fallen.
Idly, he traced the tattoos on his cheekbones. They were meant to be a mark of station and a statement that he was a learned man, but here they were a liability, making the commoners outright fear him and the highborn take a step back when he approached. He had done nothing to harm these people, but they looked at him with disgust just the same. After the day’s losses, the fear they felt would be far worse.
“How many?” he asked aloud, having heard the faint scrape of a soft boot on the stone floor of the battlements.
Stepping up alongside Therec, Kinet leaned on the stone wall too. “I gave up counting at two hundred,” Kinet answered grimly, watching the wagons coming in. “We probably lost twice that in the outer city. The tunnel went right under a housing district. I’m guessing the death toll will pass a thousand. Injuries could be up over many times that.”
Therec shook his head in dismay. “My people have been warring with one another and those who enter our lands for almost two thousand years,” he told Kinet, turning his back on the
city so he would not have to watch the caravan of death. “Never have I seen a single battle go this badly. A thousand souls lost in less than ten minutes…no army could have ever dreamed of that kind of destruction.”
“Well, there is some good news.”
Therec stared at the man in disbelief. “What can possibly qualify as good news, when the mortal memory of that many people has been lost?”
“We got them.”
Staring at the man did little to prod him into explaining, so Therec finally asked, “You got who?”
“The Altisian commanders,” explained Kinet, smiling grimly. “Fifty living soldiers out there through the whole thing, probably commanding the undead. Our scouts—those that survived—reported seeing the Altisians climbing one of our war golems. They did something to it to make it explode like that.”
“How many of those fifty did you capture?”
“All the leaders, plus most of their troops. Probably thirty or so in total. I know a few died during the explosion and a few cowards got away, but the majority are in our cells.”
“I know you don’t want to hear me say this,” Therec began, “but I could not possibly control more than a handful of those undead, and I have trained since I was able to walk. Those fifty soldiers must all have incredible training if they were guiding the army.”
“That’s what Arlind said, too. We’re treating them all as enemy troops and possible necromancers…no offense.”
Nodding, knowing that arguing was of little use, Therec asked, “Can I see them?”
“The prisoners?”
“Yes. If they’re powerful enough to raise that kind of army, I want to know what I am up against. The king does want my advice in this war and I cannot very well give it without knowing their capabilities.”
Kinet screwed up his face in annoyance, but nodded. “Come on, then.”