Master (Book 5)

by Robert J. Crane

  Vaste sniffed. “Wow, I hadn’t noticed that until you said something. Is it my imagination or is it worse than—”

  “Than the trolls?” Vara asked, slicing her way through a charging rank of dark elves clad in full armor. “It is. I always knew corpses emitted a smell following death, but whatever these trolls are doing after they die is possibly the most repugnant thing I have caught scent of since a certain unwashed warrior of Bellarum breezed through the doors of Sanctuary several years ago.”

  “What the hell was that for?” Cyrus asked, fending off a hacking attack from a bulky dark elf wearing a full suit of plate mail.

  “For calling me a madwoman,” Vara replied. “Did you think I would merely forget that insult?”

  “I think you hurt Vara’s feelings,” Vaste said.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Cyrus said, blanching away from the smell as he plunged Praelior through the flimsy chestpiece of the dark elf, “she doesn’t have feelings.”

  “I actually do,” Vara said primly as she fired another blast from her hand, less forceful this time. Twelve dark elves were flung into the rank of soldiers behind them. “There are three distinct emotions—annoyance, blinding rage and ‘stab you in the face.’” She buried a sword in the open center slot in the middle of a dark elf’s helm, penetrating through the back of his head and the steel beyond. “I suppose it would be obvious even to a dullard such as yourself which state I am presently in.”

  Cyrus was about to answer when an arrow lodged itself in the face of the next dark elf he was turning his attention to. He paused as the dark elf fell to his feet, then shrugged.

  “Oh, no, don’t bother turning to see who saved you the trouble of killing that one,” came Martaina’s voice from behind him.

  “You may have killed him, but I still have fifty thousand of his fellows to worry about,” Cyrus said, not turning back as another dark elf came at him. “Excellent work on that schiltron, Martaina.”

  “How would you know?” she asked. “It’s not like you could see it from here.”

  “Rumors reached even my ears,” Cyrus said, Praelior cutting through a dark elf’s blade as he blocked a strike.

  “Well, I have another rumor for your ears,” Martaina said, sounding more than a little put out. The stink of the battlefield seemed to be growing stronger, wafting into his nostrils enough that Cyrus felt an involuntary cough come upon him.

  “I hope it involves a certain someone’s slutty behavior,” Vaste said. “And by a ‘certain someone,’ I mean Cyrus.”

  “Gods, I could do without your constant monologue on my life, troll,” Cyrus said. “What have I done to deserve this?”

  “You want a list?” Vaste asked. “Let me get a long parchment.”

  “Excuse me,” Martaina said with faux politeness, “I have news you’ll want to hear.”

  “I am all ears,” Vara said from behind a solid line of three dark elves that she was fending off with quick sword work. The clanging of blades was loud enough that Cyrus could hear it from ten feet away over the cacophony of battle.

  “A peculiar thing for an elf to say.” Vaste’s tone was filled with amusement.

  “While eliminating that schiltron, I caught sight of the enemy General at the back of the line with the reserves,” Martaina said. “We’re about to have a problem.”

  Cyrus waited then glanced at Vaste. “What? No quip for that?”

  “I wouldn’t want to lighten the mood before she delivers the calamitous news,” Vaste said. “Then you might be smiling in amusement as the axe descends. I’d rather cheer you up after you lose your head.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense!” Cyrus said as he caught a dark elf without a helmet in the temple, shearing the top of the soldier’s head off. A thick knot of black hair spun in the air, slinging blood that peppered Cyrus’s armor as it fell.

  “I suspect that fellow would get it,” Vaste said.

  “If this news doesn’t get delivered soon,” Vara said, and Cyrus could hear the tension bleeding through her voice, “I am going to turn this blade around and begin hacking my way through our own lines, starting with the troll and going next to the woman whose sole purpose in life seems to be to fling thin pieces of wood through the air at our foes while being vague about important information in the midst of a battle.”

  “We know the General of the dark elven forces,” Martaina said, face twisting with loathing. “And his army. It’s Malpravus. And Goliath. They’re sitting in reserve waiting to sweep in on the next wave.”

  Chapter 32

  “Spell casters?” Cyrus asked as he grabbed a dark elf and ran his blade across his enemy’s throat, blocking a sword strike with his vambrace. The clanging sound of the metal clashing echoed in his ears and he felt the sharp pressure of the hit reverberate up his arm.

  “Aplenty,” Martaina replied. “They’ve got them on a line protected by the forward advance of their infantry. Bowmen, too, led by a helmeted ranger that I believe you’ve made the acquaintance of.” Cyrus felt his hand clench harder around Praelior. “All told, looks like about five thousand in number.”

  “That’s surely not their whole army,” Vaste said. “They were more numerous than that when last we encountered them.”

  “They were also being exiled from most of the civilized world when last we encountered them,” Vara said. “I can’t imagine that’s been good for their recruiting.”

  “I don’t know, I would think it would open all manner of possibilities if they sold it right,” Vaste said. “‘Join Goliath, and become the violent, pillaging brigand you’ve always wanted to be!’”

  Cyrus felt his mind ticking away as he brought his sword down against another dark elf. The smell was rancid, like death had walked among them. He tried to filter it out of his mind.

  “Cyrus,” Vara said warningly, “do not choose this moment to go empty of skull upon us.”

  Cyrus shot her a frown. “I am not going empty of skull.” He dodged a sword blow and hacked off the arm that had attacked him, leaving a dark elf screaming with blood geysering from the stump. Cyrus punched the dark elf in the face and the screaming ceased. “Although I am surprised you would say that, given at any normal time you’d say that was my natural state.”

  “We are about to face off with a guild replete with spell casters,” Vara said as the clangor of swords and axes, screams and cries rang over the once-verdant field. It had been pretty once, Cyrus supposed, though he’d been too busy with preparations before the battle to notice and too busy with the battle to spend much time thinking about it since. He stepped into a puddle of blood that splashed upon his black boot. “This is not a common battle with an army like we faced in Termina,” Vara said, drawing his attention back to her as she finished beheading a dark elf.

  “I suppose you’ll be surprised to learn I’m aware of that,” he snapped at her, “and I have a solution already prepared.”

  “Tell me it does not involve our two sides grinding each other up in some facsimile of the process of making sausage,” she said.

  “What?” Cyrus asked, genuinely agape at her. “No, it does not resemble the process of making sausage.” He paused and gave it a moment’s thought before a sword blade coming at him forced him to dodge. “At least not any more than any battle does, I suppose.”

  “Sounds like a winner to me, then,” Vaste said. “What do we need to do? Because it looks as though this wave of dark elves is thinning rapidly.”

  Cyrus looked across the battle and had to concede Vaste was right. The end of this rank of soldiers was visible, and there was a space between them and the next. Cyrus could see a more mixed force over the heads of the dark elves; the lighter skins of humans and elves were visible in the lines of the army, as was the garb of spell casters and even some bows to indicate the rangers in their lines. “Martaina, signal all the wizards to cast a cessation spell over the field of battle and maintain it continuously.”

  There was an immediate ceasing of th
e conversation, a long pause in which the sounds of battle filled the air. “Oh,” Vaste said, “this old chestnut again.”

  “And you call me mad?” Vara asked. “Not all of us carry the sword of a god to give us advantage in combat without magic to support us.”

  Cyrus cut through the last three dark elves in his field of vision and stood, chest heaving with the effort thus far. “Martaina, deliver my orders.”

  “Yes, sir,” the elf said, practically leaking sarcasm. “I can’t wait to see how this turns out.” When he turned to say something else to her, she was already gone.

  “This does seem on the face of it to be a rather odd order,” Vaste said, and Cyrus gave him a cocked eyebrow. “See how I said that without any noticeable trace of mockery or derision?”

  “I was looking for it,” Cyrus said.

  “I’m not using it because I’m concerned,” Vaste said, face deep with expression. Someone screamed loudly nearby, but Cyrus ignored them as the troll went on. “Concerned that you might think that facing an army of superior numbers without magic to heal our front rank is somehow a valid strategy.”

  “Relax,” Cyrus said, waving him off. Vara lingered nearby, watching, and his eyes met hers. Her irises blazed blue even in the last dying light of the day, and they assessed him, looking straight through him. “We’re only going to hold them in place here while they get hit by forces used to fighting without magic.”

  “You mean to deploy the Luukessia dragoons against them,” Vara said. Her icy eyes were still suspicious. “Hit their delicate flank?”

  “I do,” Cyrus said with a nod. He turned to look toward the Goliath legions, but they were halted in place. “It should be a rather interesting experiment.”

  “They could die, Cyrus,” Vara said. He could see in her eyes the seriousness.

  “It’s a battle,” Cyrus said. “We all could die, though the odds against us go up rather a lot if we choose to waste our numerically inferior forces against spell casters. We can’t win a slugging match. Brute force in this fight is pointless. The name of our game is to face them in manageable numbers and with all the advantages in our favor.” He paused and looked to his left, where he could see the lines of dragoons on horseback in the distance, just waiting to be turned loose. “Besides, I’ll get them a round of resurrection spells after we’ve won.”

  “Wow,” Vaste said, “is it my imagination or have you become a lot more cavalier about dying?”

  “Indeed,” Vara said. “I can recall a moment during our first battle in Purgatory in which you told me you wished for none of your troops to die for fear of what they would lose.”

  “I’ve died a lot since then,” Cyrus said, keeping his eyes fixed on the Goliath army. “It’s allowed me a new perspective on life and death.”

  “I had just assumed you’d forgotten your good sense,” Vaste said. “You know, after one resurrection spell too many.”

  “He—” Vara started.

  “Never had any,” Cyrus cut her off. “I’m growing tired of that one. Too predictable. If either of you have any better ideas, I’m open to them.” He waited, letting the cool twilight air filter in through the cracks of his armor. He moved his neck to the side, willing the heat building up within to escape. “No? Okay, we’ll go with my idea, then. Vaste,” Cyrus said. “I need you to get back behind the lines with the other healers. I can’t take a chance that Goliath might break through and kill any of you, so get your people—”

  “My people?” Vaste asked, sounding insulted. “I’m not dragging any of those corpses, have you seen the size of them? Plus there’s the smell …”

  “—get your healers situated in the middle of the lines,” Cyrus finished. “Now would be a good time to do that.” He made a waving gesture toward the troll.

  “You’re just sick of me, I can tell,” Vaste said, turning away with what looked to Cyrus like reluctance. “I’ll be back to annoy you later. Unless they kill you, in which case I suppose I’ll have to cast a resurrection spell. If you forget that I’m going to annoy you, though, I’ll be most cross with you.”

  “That very thought will haunt me into staying alive, I assure you,” Cyrus said. He watched the troll wave and push his way back through the lines, parting warriors of Sanctuary by nearly knocking them aside.

  “You failed to mention the real reason you’re doing this,” Vara said, as Cyrus turned back to him. “The cessation spell?” She watched him, and he could see her waiting for his reaction. “You lied to him about why you’re employing it.”

  “It would have just upset him,” Cyrus said, and the uneasiness within. “And you know how he gets. Best he’s forgotten, or else I’d never have gotten him off the front line and back to safety.”

  “But you didn’t forget,” she said, almost accusation.

  Cyrus shook his head. “No, I didn’t forget.” He looked back at the Goliath lines, at the massing formation of soldiers, rangers, and spell casters. They waited in the distance, an army of dark elves behind them in lines as far as Cyrus could see. “I’m not sure Vaste did, either, really.” He sighed, and looked at Vara, who stared back at him. “After all, it’s hard to forget we’re facing a foe who can use his magic to raise the corpses of the dead to fight for him.”

  Finally, Cyrus turned to look across the empty gulf between the lines. The Goliath army still stood well back, prepared for a charge but as yet unmoving. They were line after line of foes, and even to his eye, the mix of spell casters with the warriors and rangers signaled a new sort of challenge. His eyes wandered, the spell that Vaste had cast upon him giving his sight additional clarity with which to hone in on the figures in the distance.

  Far to the back of the Goliath line, almost fading into the next rank of dark elves from the Sovereign’s army, Cyrus saw him at last. He wore his black cloak and cowl for this occasion, but the cowl was down and his skeletally thin face was visible to Cyrus’s aided eyes. He could just make out the smile as Malpravus stood staring across the battlefield. He smiles, as though he can see me looking at looking at him.

  He probably can, Cyrus thought, staring at the necromancer. He didn’t look any different than he had when Cyrus had last seen the Guildmaster of Goliath; just as ungainly, just as bony. And the smile—it was ever the same as it had been. The whole appearance of the dark elf sent a warm rage through Cyrus. He fixated on the enemy general, staring, waiting for him to order his army to move.

  It took almost a minute of staring for Cyrus to realize that Malpravus was deep in consultation with the man on his left. He was speaking, mouth moving, thin and satisfied, occasionally opening to grin in a manner more fitting for a deeply satisfying conversation than a battlefield where his army was losing.

  “Do you see him?” Vara asked, interrupting Cyrus’s reverie.

  “Malpravus?” Cyrus asked. “Of course. He’d be hard to miss.”

  “No,” Vara said, and her voice held a mournful tone. “Not Malpravus. Who he’s talking to.”

  Cyrus blinked and refocused his eyes. The spell gave him great clarity of detail, but it took some getting used to. He squinted his eyes, opening and closing them, at first unsure of what he was seeing. That is not possible. He blinked again, trying to clear his vision, but when he opened his eyes, what he saw remained exactly the same.

  To Malpravus’s left stood a man in armor of a dark hue. Spikes on his pauldrons made it look as though an accidental turn would impale the necromancer through the head. His face was hidden under a helm that bore protrusions of its own, spiked like a crown. “It can’t be,” Cyrus said, scarcely believing it. “He wouldn’t …”

  “He would,” Vara said. “He has.”

  Cyrus shook his head, never taking his eyes off the dark elf until the man lifted his helm. As the spiked helmet came up, a shock of blackest hair fell from beneath it, and the face became too obvious for even Cyrus to deny any longer.

  Terian.

  Chapter 33

  The army of Goliath came chargi
ng only moments later, finally diverting Cyrus’s attention from Malpravus and Terian. The two of them stood at the back of the lines as the first warriors of Goliath began their charge. Cyrus met the eyes of a yellow-armored troll in the front rank and knew that the beast would be coming for him.

  “Yei,” Vara said.

  “Verily,” Cyrus said with a smile.

  “Are you making a joke?” Vara asked, clearly perturbed.

  “Sure, why not?” Cyrus kept his eyes on the troll that was charging directly for him. There were others of his kind down the lines, a handful of troll warriors speckled in among the humans, elves and dark elves of the Goliath charge. Their lines were large, an imbalance obvious in the size differential. Cyrus looked down the Sanctuary line and saw much shorter, smaller figures.

  “Because we’re about to engage a front rank that puts us at a disadvantage,” Vara said. “This gallows humor—”

  “Is all I have right now,” Cyrus said, taking a deep breath of the rank battlefield air. “Well, that and a godly weapon, a plan, and a few prayers I should throw to the God of War.”

  “And quickly,” Odellan said from down the line.

  “Vara, Odellan, take a troll each,” Cyrus said. “I’ll get Yei. Pass the word down the line that anyone with a mystical weapon is to take on a troll and have the rangers try and assist them as the Goliath charge gets close.

  The first volley of arrows fired from the rangers now on either side of Cyrus’s main line. The warriors at the front had reformed in battle order after the clash with the last dark elven charge. He noticed few gaps, those that had died having been dragged back toward the rear of the lines where they waited to be resurrected by Sanctuary’s corps of healers. The swishing sound of the arrows taking flight made little impact on the furious cries of the Goliath army’s charge.

  “I imagine their spell casters will discover that their spells aren’t working right about now,” Cyrus said, settling into a ready stance. “And won’t that be a lovely surprise for them. Ready the counter-charge!” He waited and heard his call taken up down the line, the rattling of metal weapons against armor and scabbards a fearsome sound that drowned out the Goliath battle cry, if only temporarily. “CHARGE!”