Battle Mage

by Peter Flannery

  As the sun grew lower in the sky Falco walked with Malaki down towards the manicured lawn where Patrick Feckler had prepared a simple scene. At one end of the lawn a circle of grass had been marked out with flowers strewn upon the grass. The Dalwhinnies had been busy and it seemed that not a plant on the estate had been spared. If it bore a flower it had met with a Dalwhinnie knife. And they were all present, the Dalwhinnies, the surviving cadets and many from the Fourth Army itself. All come to share in a moment of joy amidst the ever present horror of war.

  Blushing furiously Malaki allowed Falco to lead him to the circle of flowers where he stood looking awkward and self conscious. He was dressed in a tailored shirt, embroidered with Valentian knotwork, and a pair of fine leather trousers, the seams of which bore subtle stitching of the same design. He looked handsome and even Alex could not think of anything witty or insulting to say.

  To one side Tobias sat with the two Chasseur soldiers and the wagon drivers that had brought them over from Daston. Then Fossetta appeared with Heçamede, and with them came Bryna on the arm of Patrick Feckler. She was dressed in a beautiful gown of pearl white silk, delicately embroidered in coloured thread to match the patterns on Malaki’s shirt. With flowers in her deep red hair and a flush of nervous excitement on her cheeks she looked stunning, a point not wasted on the Dalwhinnies who met her arrival with a chorus of crude comments and whistles. Finally the emissary appeared, dressed in a pair of fine black trousers and a beautiful doublet of quilted grey silk. As the raucous greeting continued Patrick Feckler tried to calm things down.

  ‘Quiet! You lecherous dogs!’ he roared. ‘Let’s get started or there’ll be no time for drinking!’

  ‘Aye, but not too much for the big fella,’ shouted one man. ‘Or there’ll be no testing his spurtle tonight!’

  ‘Bollocks!’ cried another. ‘They’ve been shaggin each other for months.’

  Fossetta scowled disapprovingly but Messrs Laffite and Macaire roared with laughter along with the Dalwhinnies and the cadets who had been witness to Malaki and Bryna’s growing relationship.

  In the end it only took the emissary to raise a hand for the gathered throng to come to order. Smiling indulgently he brought the two young people together amid the circle of flowers and then with quiet solemnity he performed a simple ceremony in which he bound their hands together with a strip of plain white cloth. And so, on a late spring evening, Bryna Godwin and Malaki de Vane were married.

  As the bond was made Falco came forward with two silver rings that Patrick Feckler had somehow procured, and with the symbol of eternity adorning their hands Malaki and Bryna exchanged the gifts that they had agreed upon.

  Malaki gave Bryna a new quiver filled with arrows, while Bryna gave him a new scabbard for his sword. There was silence as she shouldered her quiver and Malaki fastened the sword about his waist, tokens of the lives they had chosen and the weapons of war that defined them.

  Finally they turned to face each other.

  ‘In the quiet of the night,’ said Malaki.

  ‘And in the raging heat of battle,’ said Bryna.

  ‘I will love you,’ they said together and more than one Dalwhinnie snorted back a tear.

  There was a moment of stillness in which Falco did not know if he had lost a brother or gained a sister. Either way it did not matter. In the face of so much suffering and fear, this was something good.

  ‘Right!’ cried Dedric Sayer. ‘Let’s get pissed!’

  The party raged long into the night and even the emissary got drunk, finally succumbing to an arm wrestling challenge from Paddy. The two men fought a mighty contest over a wooden table that was not up to the task and as they both collapsed to the floor Falco joined in the laughter, spilling a glass of beer down his front in the process. He was just wiping it away when he turned to see Jarek Snidesson standing beside him.

  ‘I think her father would have approved,’ said Jarek.

  ‘So do I,’ said Falco, wondering why Jarek had chosen this moment to speak to him.

  They stood in awkward silence until Jarek spoke again.

  ‘How can you do it?’ he asked.

  Falco shook his head, uncomprehending.

  ‘The demons,’ said Jarek. ‘They are like nothing I ever imagined. How can you...’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Falco. ‘All I know is that I can.’

  For a long moment Jarek simply stared at him.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, his voice cracking with emotion. ‘For everything... I... I never understood.’

  With this simple gesture an entire lifetime of unpleasantness was washed away.

  Falco felt his own throat tighten. He did not trust himself to speak. Instead he held out his hand.

  As Jarek moved away Falco turned back to watch Malaki and Bryna trying to extricate themselves from two hundred Dalwhinnies, each of whom seemed to think that they too were entitled to kiss the bride. In the end Patrick Feckler started laying about with a huge leather tankard and the happy couple were able to make their escape. Falco smiled but then his thoughts grew sombre. Tomorrow they would begin the journey back to Wrath and he would face a new series of trials, some of which were every bit as terrifying as facing the Slayer.

  The forging of a sword, the Rite of Assay and the summoning of a dragon.

  These were the things that would define his place in the world. But all that was for another time. Tonight his two best friends had got married and Falco was content.

  71

  The Serthian Wolf

  The Beltonian general Vercincallidus looked down from the ridge as his Heavy Horse smashed through the last line of Kardakae before continuing down the valley to safety. Behind them the remnants of the Possessed army swung about, searching for victims to satisfy their boundless appetite for death. But there would be no more death today. Not for the Sons of Eldur. Six hundred of his blessed warriors already lay dead, but they had died bravely and would be welcomed into the Halls of Hugrekki tonight.

  The general had already withdrawn his infantry. Now he raised his hand and a sigh rose up around the valley as a thousand poplar shafts drew back against a thousand bows of elm. The Possessed snarled and raged, surging forward but the general lowered his hand and a cloud of arrows shot down into the remaining ranks of the enemy. The longbows loosed and loosed again until only a few heavily armoured Kardakae remained, and then even these powerful warriors were destroyed by a final charge of Beltonian Heavy Horse. Another Possessed army destroyed by the great Vercincallidus, the man they called the Serthian Wolf.

  He did not wait to clear the field. He did not even pause to bury his own dead. Their bodies would provide food for the crows but their souls were safe, and that was all that mattered, that and the fact that they had thwarted the enemy once more.

  But he could not wait. Another Possessed army was advancing on their position, but this army was led by a demon and Vercincallidus would never confront such a force without the support of a battle mage. Instead he would seek out a target of his choosing. His scouts had already identified a suitable force, an army of four thousand Possessed just thirty miles east. This would take them further into the Forsaken Lands, but the general had learned to make these border lands his own.

  As the army moved out Vercincallidus turned to the blacksmith standing beside him. He threw back his wolf-skin cloak and drew up his sleeve, baring an arm that was covered with circular marks branded into the skin, each one representing a Possessed army that he had destroyed. The blacksmith raised the branding iron that glowed in the fading light of dusk. He glanced at his commander and waited for the familiar nod before pressing the red hot iron into the general’s flesh. The smell that rose up was a sickly combination of roasting meat and burning hair, but Vercincallidus uttered not a sound. He ground his teeth against the pain and offered it up as a prayer for those who had given their lives this day.

  Then, mounting his beautiful silver-dapple gelding he raised his mutilated arm to wave the army on. He
might not be able to face the demon now closing on their position, but somewhere to the east there was a Possessed force that they could attack. This would be the next target of Vercincallidus, the next army to feel the teeth of the Serthian Wolf.

  *

  The Marchio Dolor bowed his head as the dark angel gave its report. It was not spoken. It came in the form of broken images playing across his mind... leagues of empty plains and scorched forests, hills shot through with rivers choked and poisoned with the bodies of the dead, the landscape of the Forsaken Lands. He saw armies of the Faithful moving through the land, rendered small by the height at which the angel flew.

  Lower now, towards a dark stain that lay upon the land, closer still and he could make out the corpses of several thousand Possessed, their flesh rotting on blackened bones, their souls departed and drawn below where the price of their failure would be paid in full. No sign of the great Vercincallidus and his army. They had fled the scene, but even the most careful army leaves a trail and one of his fellow demons was already moving east to intercept him.

  ‘Good,’ thought the Marchio Dolor. He would keep his own army moving south and call upon another Duke to bring its forces north. Together they would herd the Serthian Wolf until he had nowhere else to run.

  72

  Diplomacy

  As the emissary had suggested, Quirren and Huthgarl would accompany Falco and Malaki on the journey back to Wrath. In these dangerous times a group of four would offer greater security and Falco had no objections so long as it did not slow them down. And so, in a scene reminiscent of the departure from Toulwar they said their farewells, leaving Bryna and the rest of the cadets to follow with the refugees from Le Matres. Tobias would continue his search with Fossetta and Heçamede but not so close to the front. They would move back into the heartland of Clemoncé where the danger was not yet so pressing.

  ‘We’ll work our way back to the capital,’ was the way Fossetta had put it. ‘Perhaps we’ll see you there.’

  Falco had nodded and kissed them all, gaining strength from seeing them again, even if it had been for just a short while. And with that they had set off through the forested heartland of Clemoncé. Each trailing a spare horse, they had maintained a steady pace and in little more than a week they were drawing near to the city. They decided to stop at an inn overlooking the Ford of Garr. Then in the evening they rode on to the city to take a look at the Irregulars before deciding how best to approach the task that the emissary had set for them.

  The Irregulars’ camp was like a ramshackle settlement on the outskirts of the city, a sprawling mass of tents and temporary wooden structures. They came across a group of boys playing on a rope swing and asked them if they knew General Forbier and Major Gazon. The boys nodded and, in exchange for two small coins, led them to a low hill overlooking the camp.

  ‘There,’ said one of the boys, pointing out two individuals who had clearly just returned from a hunting trip. Both were large men, but they left others to clean and prepare their kills while they washed in copper basins before reclining in chairs with what appeared to be glasses of wine.

  ‘Who’s the third man?’ asked Huthgarl, looking at another man who was clearly directing the work.

  ‘That’s Sergeant Hickey,’ said the boy. ‘He does the general’s bidding.’

  ‘They look like mercenaries,’ said Quirren and the others nodded. These men certainly did not look like disciplined soldiers.

  ‘Right,’ said Malaki. ‘We’ll write to them tonight and meet with them tomorrow as planned.’

  Huthgarl and Quirren nodded while Falco looked on, intrigued. They had not discussed their plans with him.

  ‘Don’t you worry about it,’ was all Malaki would say. ‘This is our task. You just focus on the Crucible and getting ready for the Rite.’

  Back at the tavern the three conspirators had composed two letters to be delivered by courier before the end of the day. One was to the instructors at the academy, advising them of their arrival. The other was to the current commanders of the Queen’s Irregulars ‘asking’ them to gather the army on the academy training grounds at the tenth hour of the following morning. A dispatch from the emissary had already been sent informing them that the cadets would be arriving to assume command, while a further note had been sent to Master Cyrano, warning him that a discreet sum of money might be required to facilitate the ‘retirement’ of certain military officers.

  They still refused to tell Falco what they had planned, but at least they allowed him to read the letter.

  ‘Well, it’s to the point,’ he said, somewhat dubiously.

  ‘Precisely,’ said Malaki. ‘They’ve already had notification from the emissary and that should be enough in itself. We’ll see what they have to say for themselves tomorrow.’

  The letter was duly delivered and if they could have heard the string of expletives issuing from the commanders’ quarters they would have realised that the emissary’s concerns about their intransigence had been fully justified.

  The young knights spent the rest of the evening cleaning their armour. They had now proven themselves in battle and before leaving Le Matres they had each been presented with a cloak, surcoat and lance pennant bearing the colours of the orders to which they now belonged. For Malaki a black horse head on a field of pale blue, Quirren bore the Black Eagle on red, while for Huthgarl it was a vibrant ochre with the single black flame of the Beltonian Heavy Horse. They would be wearing their colours tomorrow when they went to speak with the Irregulars’ commanders.

  The following day they rose early and ate a good breakfast before crossing the ford and riding down to the city. Skirting the double curtain wall they avoided the crowds and made their way round to the road that led up onto the plateau. Falco had been given some new armour before they set out for Wrath, but he felt decidedly underdressed beside the resplendent figures of Malaki, Quirren and Huthgarl. As they began the climb they saw a rider at the rim of the plateau. He noted their approach before galloping away.

  ‘Well I guess they know we’re on the way,’ said Quirren, a faint hint of nerves in his voice.

  However, Malaki looked as calm as you like, helm and shield strapped to his saddle, and the pale blue pennant flying from the point of his lance. His expression was resolute, the birthmark on his face muted by the grey light of a cloudy morning. Cresting the rise they could see that the army of the Queen’s Irregulars was gathered on the training fields just as their letter had requested, but it was not until they gained another rise that they appreciated just what a force it was.

  ‘It must be eight thousand strong,’ muttered Huthgarl looking at the disorderly ranks. ‘And to think they’ve been lying here in Wrath doing nothing.’

  ‘It’s a desperate leader that sends an untrained army to war,’ said Quirren.

  Malaki said nothing. His gaze was on the three men standing ahead of the army. They looked completely assured of their position as the young knights rode towards them.

  Falco allowed the others to go ahead of him. As Malaki had said, this was their task. But from the expression on their faces it was clear that General Forbier and Major Gazon had received Malaki’s letter and Falco suspected it was going to take more than a little bribery to dislodge them from the positions of power they enjoyed.

  Twenty yards from the two leaders Malaki, Quirren and Huthgarl dismounted and the man known as Forbier turned to face his army.

  ‘Men and women of the Irregulars,’ he bellowed. ‘You must be wondering why you have been mustered here this morning. Have you been chosen for a prestigious place at the Academy of War?’

  There was a chorus of mocking laughter.

  ‘No!’ said Forbier and he allowed the laughter to die down. ‘Have you been ordered to march out by the Queen, in whose name we serve?’

  This brought a chorus of cheers but there were many among the gathered host that seemed less than comfortable at the mention of the Queen.

  ‘No!’ said Forbier again. �
��We are here because an Illician nobleman thinks the Clemoncéan Irregulars would do better under the command of boys!’

  The laughter returned but it was no longer quite so enthusiastic. The soldiers of the army were looking at the three young knights now approaching their leaders. Despite what the general said they certainly did not look like boys.

  General Forbier turned away from his army and walked forwards. He was a big man, as were Major Gazon and Sergeant Hickey, the burly individual who ‘did the general’s bidding’. Quirren was right, they looked like hardened mercenaries and none more so than General Connard Forbier himself. Wearing half plate and split-skirted cavalry mail he approached Malaki with a heavy shouldered swagger, his hand resting casually on the hilt of his sword. Beside him came Major Gazon, looking every bit as dangerous. They watched the three young knights approach with feral amusement in their eyes.

  ‘Look here!’ sneered General Forbier, taking note of the design on Malaki’s surcoat. ‘This one fancies himself a Knight of Wrath!’

  Many among the ranks laughed, but as Malaki came close General Forbier’s voice dropped to a menacing whisper.

  ‘So you’re the cocksure bastard who thinks he can... ungh!

  Malaki kicked him squarely in the testicles, his foot driving up through the split in his mail shirt. As the general bent forward in pain Malaki caught hold of his head, his forearm clenched tight across the groaning man’s throat.

  With a curse Major Cazan moved to draw his sword but Huthgarl felled him with a punch that broke his nose and laid him flat out on the grass. Taken by surprise Sergeant Hickey reached for his own weapon only to find Quirren Klingemann’s sword point at his throat.

  ‘Move and you bleed,’ said Quirren and Sergeant Hickey was still.

  Still holding General Forbier in front of him Malaki turned to address the army who looked on in stunned silence.