Dal went to the commander and waved his hand over the cauterized wound while touching focus points on the ear, jaw, and the side of the neck with his other hand. The blood and fluid leaking from the jagged wound slowed and the pained look on the commander’s face eased up a little. It didn’t heal the man of his injury, but it made it a little more tolerable. He had removed some of the pain and had infused the wound itself with rohw to allow it to start knitting itself. The awkum was worthless for healing. Its very nature was more suited to causing injury than healing it. Still, the rohw sufficed.
By the time he had finished with the commander’s wound, the other soldiers were gathered where he needed them. Most of those left were uninjured. Perhaps they ran or were just lucky, but they lived and the others did not, so he could not argue with their methods.
The commander muttered a weak “Thank you,” and Dal nodded to him.
“When we get back to Mwantgeray, those of you who are uninjured will immediately take the injured to the healers.” Most of the men snapped to attention and saluted, those who were physically able. Using the bell artifact—he had practiced enough with it to use it now without thought—he and all the soldiers left alive disappeared from the chamber and instantly appeared in a familiar courtyard.
As he had directed, the able-bodied soldiers picked up the wounded and carried them off to the healers. Within minutes, Chetra Dal stood alone, bell in hand and the other two artifacts in the pack on his back. He let out a breath. It was a near thing, but he was ready to move onto the next part of his plan.
As he walked slowly toward the main keep building, he wondered if Vahi and his bhor had been able to eliminate his foes. It would be unfortunate if all of his adversaries were killed, but if they could not defeat their attackers, perhaps they were insufficient as disciples in any case. Ayim Rasaad would have to be replaced, that was clear, but as to who would be his new apprentice, he had no idea and no expectations.
For probably the hundredth time since he had made the choice, he wondered if he should have tried to kill Rindu and the others in the cave at Iboghan. As always, he shrugged and told himself that arguing with past decisions was counter-productive. He shuffled toward his rooms, artifacts in tow.
Chapter 29
When Sam, with the others, returned to the teleportation area in front of the stables at Whitehall, he immediately noticed that something was different. Looking out across the bailey, he saw movement. People ran to and fro, and other people hurried along the walls. He’d never seen anyone on the battlements like that. What was going on?
He looked to Rindu and Nalia. They both had blank expressions on their faces, hers a little closer to confusion than his stony appearance. Emerius raised an eyebrow, and Ix’s head swiveled as she tried to take in the scene. Togo Cairn moved his head around as if he was looking for some sense in all the movement.
“What’s going on?” Sam asked the empty air.
“We’re under siege,” a voice said from behind him as one of the stable hands took the manu’s reins. “An army showed up a few hours ago. A big one, so I hear.”
“I want to check out the army.” Sam headed for the walls. The others fell in step behind him as he took the closest set of enclosed stairs to the top. The stairs zigzagged back and forth inside the tower. Halfway up, Sam wished they had taken one of the many sets of exposed stairs so he could have seen something other than white stone.
The stairs finally opened up onto the walkway, affording a view of the sky and the lands surrounding the fortress. Sam squinted at the light reflecting off the stone after being in the dimly lit stairwell. He remembered these walkways. He had come onto them from the other side, from the face of the wall itself, when he, Rindu, and Nalia were infiltrating the fortress to rescue Dr. Walt and to try to get the information he needed to go home. It seemed like years ago.
The causeway along the battlements was wide, more than fifteen feet. The crenels of the parapet came up to just above Sam’s waist, and the merlons between rose to the middle of his chest. He chose a place in front of one of the crenels and looked out at the buffer zone below.
There was a cleared area, a buffer zone, surrounding the entire fortress. Surrounding all but the main pathway, where the road cut through the forest met the cliffs. The ring of unbroken flat plain was designed to keep a force from sneaking up on the walls, Sam had been told. His mind spun off into thinking about how the buffer area had no plants at all growing on it, not even the smallest weed. The builders of the fortress must have used some kind of power to keep it from being overgrown. But that was unimportant right now.
In the barren area between the fortress cliffs and the Undead Forest, he saw what everyone had been dreading since Lahim Chode had viewed and told them about it. An army, thousands strong, spread throughout the previously empty buffer zone. They were arrayed near the pathway up the cliffs, just to the north.
Sam had seen its like in movies, but seeing it in real life was nearly overwhelming. The thought that every individual waiting down there wanted to kill him and his friends was sobering and more than a little scary, despite the high walls and cliffs protecting them.
The horde sprawled out over a quarter-mile of the treeless area. From the distance, Sam couldn’t pick out individuals. The entire thing was one squirming mass. Some tiny shapes were bigger than the others, either manu or—more likely—some type of mutant. There were tents and thick lines that looked like latrines that had been dug, and smoke drifted up from some of the fires that had been built and started early.
It was a disorganized mess, it seemed to Sam, but what did he expect? These were not well-trained and well-disciplined troops. It was a ragtag collection of bandits-turned-soldier, a few legitimate soldiers, and mutated creatures whose only aim was to kill and maim. He wasn’t sure if that observation made him feel more comfortable or less.
“They arrived this morning,” Danaba Kemp said, stepping up to Sam, “and began immediately setting up camp, staying together near the path and the switchbacks. They’ll try using the walkway that winds up to the main gate of the fortress, I think. Trying to scale the cliffs and then the walls while we kill them at our leisure doesn’t seem like sound strategy. Then again, who knows what mutated creatures will try?”
Sam turned to the former Red Fang. “How many are there? I’m no good at estimating numbers by looking at a group like that.”
“Approximately seven thousand. Chode was right, it seems.”
“Yeah,” Sam said, “lucky us. How many soldiers do we have?”
Danaba Kemp ran his fingers through his hair, pausing to tug on it before dropping his hands. “Not quite a thousand.”
“Oh.”
“However,” the general said, “we have me, and I am worth at least several hundred.” His smile recalled how he used to be—brash and lively—before he shouldered the stress and responsibility of being the head of the forces of the new government. “And you are worth at least four or five soldiers.” He winked.
“Hey, I’ve been practicing. I’m worth at least six soldiers. Maybe two or three mutants,” Sam responded, laughing. It was nice to break the tension.
“What are your plans, Danaba Kemp?” Rindu asked seriously. “How will we meet this challenge?”
Kemp looked back out at the army arrayed before them. “I will wait to see what they’ll do. These cliffs, these walls, they’re a tough nut to crack. You know that as well as anyone. We’ll wait them out and see what happens. When they take action, we’ll counter it…if we can. There’s no chance of starving us out. We have food enough for almost a year, water forever, and if worse comes to worst, Sam here can teleport anything we need in from some of the major cities. We’ll be fine.”
Sam wished Danaba’s expression didn’t give lie to what he had just said.
“So, tell me the good news,” the general continued. “Tell me you got the artifact so we don’t have to worry about some guy with god-like powers coming in and destroying us all
while we stand watching.”
“Um,” Sam hedged, “about that. We were too late. Chetra Dal got the last of the artifacts. He has all three now.”
“Lovely.”
“Yeah,” Sam said. “We need to get to Dr. Walt and see if we can figure out what to do. I’m not giving up yet. Chetra Dal is not down there with the artifacts, so maybe we can still come up with something.”
Kemp slapped Sam on the shoulder, regaining some of the boisterous attitude he used to display so readily. “That’s the spirit. I’ll come with you. There’s no need for me to stand here and watch them make dinner.”
The group went down one of the exposed stairways—much more pleasant than the inside stairwell—and headed for the keep. Togo Cairn took his leave to go to the barracks. Surely there was something else they could do. It couldn’t be hopeless, could it?
As the group entered the keep itself, Danaba took the lead. “Dr. Walt will be in one of the audience chambers. He’s been stuck in there with the delegates for the new government all day. Let’s see if he has any hair left.” The man grinned, but it looked to Sam like a predator baring its teeth before striking.
Fifteen minutes of walking through corridors later, they approached a set of huge double wooden doors with metal bindings. Even though the doors were closed, shouting voices poured into the hall. Sam heard the sound several corridors before they actually reached their destination. He looked at Danaba Kemp, and the general shrugged as he reached for the door handle.
If Sam thought it was loud in the hall, he was shocked at the level of sound as Danaba swung one of the doors open. There must have been thirty people in the room, though it could hold many more than that. And every one of them seemed to be shouting at once. Dr. Walt was on the far side of the chamber, up on a dais, standing behind a podium. His normally flyaway hair was positively Einsteinian, and his eyes darted frantically around the room. When they locked on Sam, the look on Dr. Walt’s face reminded Sam of news footage showing people rescued from floods or other disasters. He breathed out and his shoulders slumped. As Sam and the others stepped inside, the room became quiet as if on cue. All eyes watched him walk up to Dr. Walt at the podium. Soft whispers started swirling in the still air. Sam heard bits of it: “Sam Sharp,” “Hero of Gythe,” “will take care of things now,” and other such nonsense. When Sam looked behind him to say something to Nalia, he realized that the others had stayed in the doorway. He was on his own.
“Dr. Walt,” he said, as if there weren’t almost three dozen people looking at him. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but we need to talk about something, if you have a few minutes.”
“Yes, yes, of course, Sam,” he said, breathlessly as if he had been exercising. “We were just discussing what needs to be done about the army outside the walls.”
“What are you going to do about it, Sam?” a man’s voice said from the mass of people.
“Yeah,” another said, “we’re trapped here. What will happen to us?”
Several other people spoke up, also, but what they said was drowned out by the cacophony of the voices.
Sam raised his hand and the sound died down. “I have just returned to Whitehall to find the army outside. I am as shocked as you are, though we knew it was on its way here. That is one of the things I need to talk to Dr. Walt about.
“Danaba has the matter well in hand right now. The army has not attacked, nor will they be able to anytime soon. I’m not sure if you noticed, but we’re in a fortress. With the cliffs and the walls, I don’t expect it’ll ever come to a battle.”
“Sure, but what about us,” said another voice he didn’t recognize—this one a woman’s. “We’re trapped here.”
“Well,” Sam said, “that’s easy enough to remedy. If you would like to leave, I can teleport you somewhere else.”
The voices started up again, not shouting for attention, but discussing what Sam had just said amongst themselves.
He wasn’t sure why, but Sam was quickly becoming irritated. It was probably the loss of the last artifact and his fatigue, but his temper flared.
“I would have thought,” Sam said, cutting through the noise of the discussions, breaking them into pieces to restore the silence, “that as leaders of your respective communities, you would want to stay and work out how to protect not just yourselves but your constituents as well. If you would like to flee, though, see me after I have talked to Dr. Walt, and I will help you run back to your homes. While they still stand. Those of you who will act as respectable representatives may remain here, safe in the fortress, while the future of Gythe is decided.”
Sam paused. The silence was now absolute. No whispers, no discussion, not even the sound of feet shifting or papers shuffling interrupted the calm, quiet air.
“There are important things happening, and you all decide it’s the right time to squabble? I told Dr. Walt that I would not be part of this government, not because I don’t believe in it, but because I don’t feel worthy to take on such an honorable task. Seeing what I just witnessed, I have not changed my mind, but my reason. I don’t want to be part of a group of children whining about not getting their way.” He looked around the room, making eye contact with many of the delegates, some he had met and others he had not.
“Now if you can stop arguing for a few minutes while I discuss with Dr. Walt matters that have to do with our future, I will be more than happy to help you run away to your homes afterward.” He scanned the audience one more time, caught Dr. Walt’s eye and jerked his head toward the door, and walked out of the room.
Dr. Walt followed him, and as they crossed the threshold, he expected to hear the room burst out in sound again. It didn’t. He took a final look back, and they were all looking at him, some of them with reddening cheeks. He closed the door.
Sam let out an exasperated breath and ran his fingers through his hair. Looking around, he saw his friends all looking at him. Emerius’s mouth was open.
“What?” he said.
“Sam, that was…” Dr. Walt said, “that was fantastic. I think you gave them something to think about.”
“Think about?” Sam said incredulously. “My temper got the best of me and I said things I’ll probably regret. It was all true, but I probably shouldn’t have said any of it. They just had me so frustrated. We’re trying to save the world, and they want to go home to their mommies. Ugh.”
Danaba Kemp slapped Sam on the back. “You did exactly the right thing, Sam, and you are one of the few who can probably get away with it. Those delegates have been acting like spoiled children since they arrived. It’s about time they got spanked.”
Sam didn’t understand it. Rindu was regarding him with some expression he didn’t recognize. Was that pride? Nalia smiled openly at him. Ix had a smirk on her face. Dr. Walt looked more relaxed. They were all crazy.
“Anyway, none of that matters,” Sam said. “Dr. Walt, we need to figure out our next step. Chetra Dal got the last artifact. Is there anything we can do now? Is there any way to combat the artifacts when they’re used all together?”
“He obtained the third item, then?” Dr. Walt said. “That is unfortunate, truly. I did find one bit of information that may be of use. I reread one of the books that had a reference to all three of the artifacts. It was conjecture, but it is something.
“You see, the artifacts were never used all together. There was never the need to do so. They were used—before they were all hidden away—a few times individually, but never together, as far as I can tell.
“Anyway, one passage proposes that because of the unique situation of taking three powerful items endowed with different qualities and using them together as one, there would need to be some acclimatization. In other words, the user would have to learn how to use them as one and, maybe more importantly, the artifacts would have to learn to work with the user. He would have to spend time communing with the items in order to use them effectively. The author proposes that this might take a few weeks to accomplish. Once
the user had communed with the trio, however, he could not imagine any power being sufficient to stand against them.”
Rindu rubbed his chin. “Yes, that does sound reasonable. Perhaps the author is correct. We do not know if Chetra Dal knows the area here well enough to teleport here, but if he did, he probably would have come already to finish us if he could use the artifacts efficiently. Perhaps we still have time yet.”
“So what you’re saying,” Sam said, “is that Chetra Dal probably needs some time until he’s able to even use the artifacts?”
“That is what I think, yes,” Dr. Walt said.
“So if we can get to him before he finishes communing with the three items, we might be able to stop him before he gets too powerful.”
“Yes.”
It might be grasping at straws, but at least it was something. It gave them at least a possible way to succeed. “Then that’s what we’ll do,” Sam said. “We’ll go and tear the items right out of his hands.” He thought a moment and then sighed. “But we don’t know where he is, do we?”
The others shared his disappointment, sagging as if deflated.
“Would the seer know anything about it?” Emerius asked.
“We can hope,” Dr. Walt said. “I’ve been so busy with the delegates that I haven’t had time to talk to Lahim lately. We should go ask him. The people in the room can wait a little longer for me to return.”
The procession made their way through the keep to Lahim Chode’s room. Any they passed goggled at the large and varied group as it hurried down the corridor as if the fate of the world hung on them getting to their destination. None of the observers could have known that it really did.
After knocking and hearing Lahim’s “come,” they all crowded into the small chamber.
Harmonic Magic Series Boxed Set Page 123