As I walked back home to Spellgarden in the middle of the night, I could not help but reflect on the perversity of having an ancient example of my ancestors’ craft cooped up in a cavern like a villein in a dungeon, awaiting sentencing. It was certainly not something I had considered would be part of my new posting.
At the same time, I knew in my heart that Forseti was the key to . . . to something. Rescuing the Forsaken, perhaps. Or negotiating with the Vundel. Or securing the cooperation of the Alka Alon. Or destroying Sheruel and Korbal. Or . . . something.
I didn’t know what. But if I couldn’t think of some way to use an ancient intelligence locked in my cellar to my advantage, I wasn’t the wizard I thought I was.
Spellgate
Part Four
A Winter of War
“Minalan’s deployment at Traveler’s Tower was less a chance for him to strike decisively at the foe, and more an opportunity to experiment. He and his bellicose fellows in the trade saw all of Vanador as a chance to hone their spells. Warmagic is a potent tool, and a dangerous one, and the opportunities to advance it against such a deserving foe.”
From the Scrolls of Lawbrother Bryte the Wiser
Chapter Thirty-Two
The Defense of Traveler’s Tower
The winter rains of the Wilderlands were no friend to the approaching army. They came down in great gales of sudden gusts of wind and unexpected sleet as the gurvani marched through the night toward Traveler’s Tower.
They’d taken the ford at the village of Rauhallin, on the northern fork of the Wildwater, two days before . . . just as the overcast gloom that had allowed them to force-march from Lotanz transformed into punishing, cold rain. Since then, the ragged vanguard struggled through the soggy country as best they could, in the face of the unrelenting rain and swollen rivers. To improve their traction they were issued iron shoes, like they’d used on the frozen Poros. That worked . . . but the sharp cleats of the shoes unintentionally churned the route into mud that hampered the rest of the column. Wearing iron shoes had to be bad enough. Sinking up to your furry knees in cold mud in iron shoes must have been miserable.
Mavone’s Ravens sent a stream of delighted dispatches from the field describing the mired army in detail. We had to contend with the rain, as well, but then we were largely finished with our maneuvers. Traveler’s Tower had been garrisoned before the weather took a turn, and we were working with half-way decent roads, not trying to push thirty thousand goblins down a track designed for a two-wheeled cart.
Our problems were inconveniences, by comparison, and many could be remedied with magic and good drainage. The elaborate trenchworks that had grown up in front of Traveler’s Tower had been built with drainage in mind, and where gravity and engineering could not shed water appropriately, a few hydrophobic spells sufficed.
The redoubts we’d built to challenge the assault had rooves of thatch or sturdy tarpaulins which kept us dry. Stone cobbles and wooden planks kept our boots from eroding the soaked pathways between defensive works into impassability. And heatstones placed within the temporary barracks and encampments kept the chill away.
And that was before I arrived with my household.
The Tower’s Keeper had reserved the small rise to the left of the path to the Tower for me, at my request. Terleman had chosen the spot well. It was as close to the center of the defense of the nearby main road as I could ask for, and I’m certain any gurvani spies watching the place would have been confused about why such an obvious defensive advantage would go un-developed by the stupid humani. Redoubts and fortified ditchworks surrounded the little howe, but it was left bare and undefended. For me.
I drove my customized wain to the spot myself, the jostling ride reminding me of the long journey with my father, and the long conversations we shared, but I quickly pulled myself away from nostalgia and focused on the battle ahead. I had to be at my best. I was meeting a new evil dark lord for the first time, after all, and I wanted to make an impression.
That motivation was behind my appearance at the defense of Traveler’s Tower. I wasn’t trying to defeat the entire army, here – though I would, if I could manage it – I was trying to defend the tower, slow down Gaja Katar’s advance . . . and remind the gurvani just how they fared when they went up against the Spellmonger. The more I could demoralize the troops before they assailed Spellgate, the better.
Mavone’s Ravens had tormented in the northlands, Arborn’s rangers had frustrated them at Lotanz, and their own commanders had been slain for suspicion of betrayal. They were all warmed up for me, and I wanted to make certain I took full advantage of it.
My wagon was filled with enchantments and components for spells, and the six wagons behind it were crammed with warmagi – the beginnings of my personal guard. Taren was among them, as was Rustallo and Wenek, both of whom had led small contingents north to support me. Caswallon had insisted on accompanying the Spellmonger into battle and brought no less than five well-trained warmagi who had fallen into his orbit. A half-dozen Sparks, formally of the Tudry garrison and with loyalty to Astyral, also volunteered, and I didn’t turn them away. Most of the best warmagi I knew were already in positions of authority in my armies, but I still had plenty of deadly friends who wanted to fight next to Minalan the Spellmonger.
Mavone met me in person with a small contingent of cavalry when I pulled the wagon to a halt on the hillside. He looked back at the long line of wagons and the four-hundred infantry I’d borrowed from Sandoval to add to the defenses.
“You know we aren’t expecting a prolonged siege,” he chided. “That’s an awful lot of men, for this little spot.” Indeed, the hillock wasn’t more than two or three acres. But it rose more than ten feet over the road, below.
“Half of the infantry can be sent to the Tower to stiffen the defenses and be held in reserve,” I pointed out. “Don’t worry about the rest – I have it figured out,” I promised.
“Of course you do,” Mavone said, skeptically. “The vanguard is but a day away from us, now, unless the weather turns even worse. You have that long to prepare your defense, Count.”
“I’ll have most of it ready in an hour or two. How fares the tower’s defenses?”
“Stout,” he admitted. “They’ve been expecting this for a while. The walls are thick, the provisions plentiful, and the water clear. The foe will have to get past this diversion to even approach the walls, and then brave three hundred crossbows raining bolts on them as they fight uphill in the rain, in the middle of a spellfield. I like our chances.”
“So do I,” I agreed, as I got down off the wagon and shook the rain off my hat. The spells kept most of it away, but magic isn’t perfect. “Where can I set up?”
“Anywhere that’s not otherwise occupied,” he proposed. “There are two thousand men around you. They’ve been working on this defense for weeks. Try not to get in their way.”
I chuckled, and pulled Blizzard from where I’d stowed it in the wagon. I surveyed the hill, and the road below, and tried to visualize the approaching army, before I selected a spot. Then I measured ten staff-lengths back, and led the team there, out of the way. I stood in the back of the wagon to help gain a better perspective, until I was absolutely certain which direction was best, and then I cast the spell.
Within moments, a three-story, freestanding wooden fortress appeared in the clearing, dominating the landscape. Only the peak of Traveler’s Tower in the distance was larger.
“The Sudden Fortress,” Mavone sighed, in admiration.
“The second Sudden Fortress,” I corrected. “I’ve had the Malkas Alon constructing the base, and then had Taren enchant it. There have been some improvements,” I promised. “It’s bigger, for one thing, and designed to hold nearly twice as many men. It’s more imposing, and better constructed. Almost twice as many combat constructs. Hoxters full of supplies. Active defenses. Support enchantments. Even an infirmary. And this one is designed to survive a battle, defend troops in a protracted engage
ment, and be used again.”
“And an ideal method of waving your thaumaturgic phallus in the metaphorical air,” he observed. “Well done, Minalan!”
“I’m hoping I can be enough of a fearsome asshole to draw Gaja Katar out,” I proposed, as I opened the thick wooden gate in the rear of the sturdy wooden tower, and led the team and wagon inside. Mavone and his men followed, looking around at the exotic defense in wonder. “If he gets killed in battle, then his army falls apart before he gets to Spellgate.”
“And if you don’t kill him here,” he agreed, “we can fall back and face him again, there.”
“How did Gaja Katar fare at Lotanz?” I asked, as my men began filing in and unloading the wagons. “You saw the dispatches. What am I working against here, tactically?”
“He fared poorly,” Mavone reported. “His tactics were basic, at best. Infantry charges and poorly-organized attempts at sapping defenses. His goblins were poorly protected by his magical corps, and he tried to ignore the archers, to his great loss. He strategizes like a drunken plowman, as Terleman said,” Mavone quipped. “When Arborn led the countercharge that cleared the causeway, Gaja Katar withdrew his troops back into the fire of the archers he’d just escaped. Poor form,” he concluded.
“Strength over sophistication,” I nodded. “That will be helpful. Does he like to announce himself and talk about how impressive he is before he fights?”
“It’s traditional,” Mavone shrugged. “Apparently all of those long-winded soliloquies in the Alka Alon epics weren’t mere literary embellishment. You cannot just go around slaughtering your enemies without introducing yourself. It’s uncivilized.”
“That might be helpful, too. And if he’s compelling his troops with the force of his ego, shattering that becomes a military matter.” I didn’t want to irritate my Alka Alon allies by ignoring their hallowed martial traditions, but if I could execute an enemy general because he talked too much, I’d have the gratitude of every military man, everywhere. “I’m ready to put my ego into the service of humanity.”
“For which we are all eternally grateful,” Mavone said, sarcastically rolling his eyes. “I assume you are going to bury him in symbolic snowflakes until his ego collapses?”
“Snowflakes are for Sevendor,” I reminded him, which reminded me of something. I gestured to the open peak of the watchtower, on which a tall pole was attached. With a command, I activated the hoxter I’d placed there myself, which engaged other spells. In moments a long blue banner bearing a fearsome black hammer was unfurled. In addition, a tailored magelight in the shape of a massive hammer formed at the top of the pole, glowing with a pale blue light. “In Vanador, we hit things with a hammer. Let me get this place set up, and we can discuss tactics over dinner, tonight.”
“This place has a kitchen?” he asked, surprised.
“A small one, in case of siege. Firepit, cistern, everything. But I’m having dinner imported from the Spellgarden kitchen, by magic. Corned ham, tonight,” I promised. “And white bean porridge.”
***
Setting up the battlefield took a little longer than I anticipated, but that’s my fault. After a very productive and delicious dinner, I wandered the field with a selection of my gentlemen warmagi, and prepared the defense. Had I followed my initial plan, we would have been done by midnight . . . but I got inspired during the process and started improvising, much to the frustration of my soggy apprentice. Ruderal had followed me to battle – his first official one, anyway – to provide me service and help out with the defense. I was reluctant to include him, but he was determined to come.
The extended work on the spellfield and other preparations in the cold, cold rain in the middle of the night challenged his normally placid mood. He even snapped a few times. Or he might be anxious about the coming battle – I lacked his Talent to tell for certain.
All night long, last-minute refugees, reinforcements, and deliveries passed through the sentries and made their way up to the Tower. As the hours ran, the flow slowed to trickle. Around midnight, the last messenger rode through, and then nothing. The goblin army was in the way.
When I was finally done the next morning I was satisfied with the result. There were nasty tricks aplenty laid up around the hill, in the road, and across the field beyond. The wood beyond the field would provide no refuge for retreat or deserters. The infantry from the Vanador Guard took positions with their bows along the long side of the fortress, where three rows of crenellations and dozens of arrow slits allowed them a plentiful field of fire. And the grand weapon of the fort, the great ballista that stood in the central turret on the second floor that Carmella had contributed to the design, was manned and ready. The rain hadn’t ceased all night, but our men were well-rested and relatively dry.
The first goblins who approached us that afternoon, by contrast, were exhausted and miserably wet. In fact, a wet goblin looks even more gruesome than a dry one, as their fur clings to their ungainly frames, revealing their inhuman bodies in detail. Goblins avoid rivers partially because they can’t swim, but also because they don’t like being wet one bit. Their fur absorbs the water like a rag. The first sad, drenched unit who made it up the road stopped just out of bowshot – what they thought was bowshot – and glared at us in the cold gloom.
It was the end of the day, and the sun would soon set behind the clouds, removing what little light there was. Gurvani prefer attacks at dusk, for the element of surprise, supposedly. But these bedraggled scrugs looked reluctant to engage us, until they received reinforcements. Viewing them through magesight told me that they were tired and intimidated, and would rather be elsewhere. Only the prospect of reinforcements kept them from running at the sight of the defenses.
“Should we begin?” Wenek asked, eagerly, as he paced the battlement. He’d been thirsty for action for months, now, ever since he’d recovered from Olum Seheri.
“No, wait,” I instructed. “Let’s let them accumulate enough to make it worth the effort. Remember, we’re trying to slow them down.”
“There’s more coming up the road, now,” Wenek agreed, a few moments later. “Time to recall the sentries, and hoist the battle flag, at least?”
“We can do that much,” I agreed, as I watched a second, larger unit of gurvani infantry add themselves to the formation in the distance. “But nobody fires unless the flares go up,” I ordered. “I want them closer, if possible.”
I spent the next half-hour discussing the battle plan with the field commanders who were in charge of the ditchworks and redoubts. They were mostly local men who had trained with the garrison at the Tower and had volunteered for the duty. They weren’t as well-armored as I would have preferred, but they all had bows, spears, and swords or axes, and every man wore an iron helm of some sort.
More importantly, they could dig. Trying to move along the sides of the roads would put the gurvani into a muddy field of stony pits and bunkers filled with defenders. Berms of raw earth had been created to afford protection for archers and conceal fearsome axe-men.
But the ditchworks also allowed them to conceal their numbers. From their vantage point, apart from my toy wooden castle only two or three hundred men were visible . . . and it was impossible for them to gauge how many lurked below the grade.
My inspired orders to these men were simple: follow the battle flags, sit tight, and don’t let any gurvani pass unchallenged. Simple orders for simple fellows.
By the time I returned my attention to our foes, they had doubled in number as two more infantry units had joined.
“They’re starting to get themselves sorted out,” Wenek reported, as he took a break from scrying with magesight. “Some senior officers showed up and started getting them ready. This last unit seems particularly determined,” he offered, pointing into the darkness.
I engaged magesight and followed his finger until I saw what had interested him.
The goblins below us moved with unnatural speed across the darkened landscape, thousands of f
ootfalls pounding the turf as they formed themselves into a long line, parallel to the road. They were a fearsome crew, warlike and determined goblins despite the poor conditions.
I say goblins, because the soldiery of the third group that was deploying against us were not really gurvani anymore. None of them were under five feet tall, and I saw that the nearly man-sized goblins carried heavy spears or axes, not just clubs and knives. Maragorku, I realized, turning the strange name Gurkarl had given me for them over in my mind. I studied them carefully. Though they were lightly armored, what armor they did have was elaborate. Instead of the simple iron pot most gurvani warriors wore, the helmets of these goblins boasted thick cheekguards over their thicker jaws and neckplates of steel, and of a uniform design.
Nor were they unaccompanied. A score of Fell Hounds, bearing one or two of the smaller, more natural-looking gurvani cavalrymen on their backs paced the column and screened it fore and aft while it got sorted out.
To my surprise the officer under the dark standard was not a shaman, as I’d expected, but a grim-looking specimen of this new, larger goblin breed. He barked orders at his troops and got a response, even from the reluctant. As each new unit arrived, he gave the orders as to deployment in the gathering force.
“No ordinary scrugs, Min. This must be the new crop,” Wenek pronounced, a note of anticipation in his voice. “They’re larger than the ones at Olum Seheri. Stronger. More of a challenge.”
“I don’t like the look of their captain, either,” I agreed. “He looks far too competent.”
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