by Guy Antibes
Emmy and Glory trotted to join them.
Outriders from the right side began to confirm Sam’s observation.
The general had the bugles blow as the army turned and re-ordered to face the east.
Sam looked at Banna. “Who guards our eastern flank?”
“The littered armies of Zogaz,” she said.
“So we might bear the full brunt of the Dictator.”
“Don’t worry about that. The general has just sent messengers. We might have a tough time of it at first, but the alliance will close.”
Sam wished he had the same confidence in the other Polistians that Banna had. He imagined they would wait until the two Vaarekian armies chewed each other up before attacking. There was nothing he could do. No one paid attention to Sam in his first real battle in Toraltia. Being fourteen or eighteen didn’t make a difference from what he could see. He was still too young to be taken seriously by any career officers.
“We will find a position on the south side now,” Sam said. “Fight hard,” he said to Banna.
“It is the only way I know how,” she said. “Take care, Sam.”
Sam didn’t doubt the sincerity of either statement as he led Emmy and Glory through the panicked troops. At least the general didn’t order a charge. The Army of Restoration stood its ground. Men and women did what they could to prepare for the onslaught.
Sam could see the cloud get closer. Riders from both sides headed out to their opponent and raced back, providing information to the officers about the enemy that wasn’t shared among the soldiers.
The Vaarekian army stopped. The front extended across the top of a gentle hill in the mildly rolling grasslands. Sam knew enough about tactics to understand that Kreb would want to fight from a position higher than the foe. Since there had been no orders to move out from the flat land that surrounded the Army of Restoration, it looked like the battle would be a waiting game.
Sam was all for that since it gave the Ristarians and Zogazin more time to converge. He guessed that this was the moment of time that tested the alliance. If the alliance forces attacked they had a chance; otherwise, they would be wiped out. He didn’t share his fears with Glory.
Banna’s army held their position for an hour. Kreb’s forces began to move forward. Sam now wished he had observed how the Army of Restoration had trained. He had no idea how they fought or how well-trained they were. The men around him looked grim, but he didn’t hear wails of fear from anyone yet. He considered that a good sign, remembering all the grumbling in the camp where he had rescued Glory.
He caught the girl’s gaze. “You and I don’t close with the enemy,” Sam said, reminding her of what they had gone over before. “Don’t get anxious. We fight better from a distance. It’s time for armor. Sit with your arms stretched out.”
Sam crafted as dense an armor as he dared on Glory. He used the same scale armor that he had before. “If you feel the armor isn’t working, put another layer on.”
Glory rolled her eyes. “I get to make my own helmet over my hat, though.”
Sam smiled. “Go ahead. I’m done.”
He admired Glory’s white armor. She shone on the battlefield, so if they got separated, he would be able to identify her.
Sam went to work on himself. He tied a scarf to his head, not for style, but to forestall the inevitable softening of his protection. His armor was similar to Glory’s, but the scales were twice as thick and just as hard. They wouldn’t be in a few hours, but who knew if they would be alive then, he thought grimly.
He wondered what kind of face, if any, Banna would carry into battle. She had worked years for this very moment. Did she feel triumphant, or was she just as afraid as Sam? Banna was made of stern stuff, to be sure, but another test was about to begin.
The tension in the air rose as the Vaarekian army drew nearer. Their forces weren’t as large as Sam had anticipated. Had Kreb split his forces, too?
Arrows began to pepper the air. Sam called to Glory for a bolt.
“Let’s find our range.”
He put it in the crossbow and pointed the weapon into the air to get the most distance. They both watched as the bolt disappeared from view. An explosion blew a hole in the dirt ten or twenty paces from the front line. The Vaarekian line began to bunch up and stall behind the hole that Sam’s ward had created.
“Another,” Sam said.
He aimed for another part of the line to the right of them. This bolt flew a bit farther, and Sam was certain that dirt from the blast had reached the front line.
An arrow from further down the line arced over the gap between the forces and fell among the first few rows. The blast tossed bodies around. Sam was certain that arrow was shot from Banna’s bow.
Sam recognized the wisdom of spreading out from Banna. He led Glory and Emmy to another spot on the front line and fired three bolts from there. The last one hit the front, totally disrupting that part of the line.
The Vaarekians were in range and charged to close with the enemy. Sam and Glory fired more bolts into the attackers. A few warded arrows fell among Banna’s troops. Their advantage was over, but warded bolts were more effective than Sam slicing his way through the enemy, even with his Lashak sword.
“We move back,” Sam said. Glory turned, and Emmy followed as the troops were given permission to close with the enemy.
Sam watched the Army of Restoration create a shield wall, advancing towards the Vaarekians, whose wall had been broken by the flying wards. The armies finally closed. Sam had feared Kreb’s army would be large enough to surround them, but that wasn’t the case.
He shot bolt after bolt over the line into the troops behind, aiming for mounted officers.
Glory was slowing up. “Can you keep it up?” Sam asked.
She shook her head. “I need to rest.”
Sam remembered Banna needing a few days to recover from the fight with the pirates. “Stay close.”
Sam’s wards were much more powerful than Glory’s, and holes of soldiers were created as Sam lobbed bolt after bolt over the heads of the soldiers into groups of mounted troops.
They rode just behind the front, targeting officers and troops clustered for protection. Suddenly, the Vaarekians began to retreat. Restoration officers tried to keep their men from pursuing the enemy, fearing a trap.
A few men began to run towards the enemy. Sam shot a bolt just in front of a large group of Banna’s army. They stopped and began to mill around, uncertain of what to do. Officers rode into their midst and urged them to retreat. Others saw the men stop and the Restoration lines evened up. The break in the Vaarekian line quickly filled in. Sam was convinced it was a feint, just as the officers feared.
The first stage of the battle was over. Men wailed between the two forces, but Glory pointed out that some of those ‘injured’ parties were placing wards.
Sam leveled his crossbow and shot bolts with lower-powered wards and stopped the warders in their tracks. He rode through the lines and shot at the warders she pointed out.
They reached the point where Banna and the senior officers were. A rider beckoned them to follow.
“Good shooting,” the general said, “but I don’t like you attacking injured men. That’s not appropriate on any battlefield.”
“Those were warders planting wards,” Glory said. “I pointed them out, and Sam shot them.
The general colored. “I guess this time that is appropriate on this battlefield. I had no idea Kreb would do something like that.”
Banna shook her head. “His vileness is only limited by his imagination and the imaginations of those who follow him. He has tried two tricks today, and there will be others.”
“Any word on the alliance troops?”
“Three fronts,” the general said. “The Zogazin are our only reinforcements from the east.”
Sam wondered about that. “Have you sent anyone to verify that?”
“What? Are you impugning the veracity of our allies?”
&
nbsp; “If I were you, I would want to make sure,” Sam said.
Banna nodded. “I will send my own scouts out,” she said. She called to an attending officer who galloped off.
That was an interesting development. Banna had troops loyal only to her.
~
Another Vaarekian attack was broken in the late afternoon. But eventually, night fell on the battlefield. Both armies rested and waited for reinforcements. Sam could tell the forces were evenly matched.
The day dawned without a word on reinforcements, but that wasn’t the case for the Vaarekians. Troops poured in during the morning to bolster Kreb’s army.
Sam found Banna. “Any word?”
“The Ristarians held and are joining us. One of the Trakatan units has withdrawn from the field without engaging the enemy, once they found out that Kreb is gathering his army.
A set of wagons showed up with Mito driving one of them.
“I couldn’t sit and do nothing, he said, “so I cobbled a new ward thrower from the parts of the original prototype and the monstrosity that Renatee delivered, along with more supplies from the armorers.”
Banna managed to smile while still looking angry. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“Neither should you,” Mito said.
They glared at each other for a long moment before Banna told him to move the thing to the front.
Sam joined him. He and Glory helped Mito set up the contraption. The thrower was mounted to a wagon, but the horses pushed the wagon rather than pulled. A crank for three or four men reminded Sam of the bilge pump on The Twisted Wind.
“How far does it throw wards?”
“Thirty paces, but it should take out everything in its path.”
Banna showed up with fifteen warders. “These are the ones that trained with you,” she said to Mito, who nodded.
“Get ready, and put on some armor.”
Kreb wasn’t going to wait any longer, and the larger army began to advance again. Sam and Glory rode to a different spot along the line and began to shoot wards into the oncoming troops.
Renatee’s contraption began to advance on the Vaarekians, attracting enemy arrows, but Mito had armored the machine. A single ward flew out from the ward thrower and exploded in front of the line. Then another flew and landed where it bit into the advance. The warders walked alongside, making wards on pollen disks and placing them in one of the throwers. Mito didn’t have time to figure out how to spin wards out of the disks.
Mito and two others began to crank, and the thrower began to toss wards into the advancing soldiers, cutting a large swath in the line. They began to back up and turned to run away from the advancing contraption.
Sam saw a green mist begin to fill the air on the enemy side. In a few moments, troops attacked, heedless of the bloody harvest from the contraption. More soldiers converged and eventually overwhelmed the ward-thrower. Most of the warders plus Mito and the cranking crew, fled. Sam noticed the Lashakan was riding on his stomach on the haunches of a horse, being led by one of his crew.
The machine had been taken, and an even more awful battle weapon was demonstrated. Green pollen spun from a similar machine, Sam could now see. It had been responsible for the deaths of over a hundred of Kreb’s troops in seconds, but they had achieved their objective. The Vaarekians dismantled Renatee’s contraption before Sam’s eyes.
The Restoration troops attacked. The clash was brutal. Sam shot at pockets where more of the green pollen was shot into the air. Banna joined in with her arrows until the green bloom stopped. The battle turned very bloody very quickly. Sam spotted flashes of reflected light from the armor on a group of soldiers. Kreb had come to see his new weapon destroyed by his personal enemies.
“Now that Kreb is on the battlefield, we have a chance to end this. Are you wearing your gold bracelet?”
“It never leaves my skin,” she said.
Sam had fashioned two gold pieces underneath Emmy’s collar before they left camp. He didn’t protect the horses, but that was a minor thought as they plunged into the gap created by Sam’s crossbow. He concentrated on creating warded bolts inside the chamber. He was surprised at how easy that was. There was a definite advantage to being a pollen magician rather than a pollen artist, a classification he had assigned to Glory. He began to fire more quickly, clearing the area as they rode into the enemy lines toward the cluster of officers in shiny armor.
Sam became excited at the success Glory and he were making, parting the enemy troops and decided to move closer. They got halfway there before a press of the troops overwhelmed them. Sam instantly regretted a mistake he would have never made in the dueling ring. Glory and he were about to fight to the death, but Glory was dragged off her horse, while soldiers covered Emmy with a heavy pollen tarp. An officer told Sam to surrender. He didn’t want Glory or Emmy killed on the battlefield because of him, so he nodded. They were taken prisoner and dragged to Kreb, where they were thrown on the ground.
“Two traitors together,” Kreb said. “I remember you well, Smith. I’ll not be defied by you any longer.”
Emmy barked, but she didn’t attack, burdened as she was by pollen draped all over.
Sam’s Lashak sword was removed, along with his wand. A soldier ripped the crossbow from Sam’s grasp and looked into the chamber. He shook his head and looked at Kreb as Sam and Glory were searched for hidden weapons. Sam ached as they took away his Lashak blade and his wand.
Fighting was still going on around them as Kreb casually called out crimes that Sam had supposedly committed in Tolloy. Most of them were lies. The crossbow was thrown at Sam’s feet.
“You won’t defy me this time,” Kreb said. “A duel fought by my rules.” He looked at Glory. “I want you to kill Smith.”
“No!” Glory said.
“Ah, but you will kill each other.” Kreb grinned at his toadies on horseback, oblivious to the battle while he snapped his finger. Smaller entered and slapped a patch of green pollen on both Glory’s and Sam’s necks.
Glory looked dazed for a moment, but Sam could see the gold bracelet fought against the effects of the pollen. As for him, he pretended to have glassy eyes. No one knew they both wore invisible armor. Glory’s helmet had been removed, and her hat tossed to the ground. Her hair looked like a dark thatched mess.
“Since Smith liked the crossbow so much, an unloaded crossbow against Wheeler’s sword,” Kreb said to his officers.
Someone pressed a sword in Glory’s hand.
“Give them some room,” Kreb said.
The circle increased in size. The officers clustered together at one end with their leader as Sam led Glory to the end of the circle.
“Fight to the death!” Kreb said. He looked at Smaller.
“Fight to the death!” Smaller said.
Glory snarled at Sam and launched a series of attacks that Sam barely evaded. He couldn’t afford to have her damage the crossbow, so he twirled and bounced against a soldier, drawing his sword.
Sam used his left hand against Glory’s two-handed grip. False anger filled her eyes as she kept up the attack. Sam continued to be on the defensive, but he got in a few convincing swipes, as well. Emmy began barking and struggling underneath the heavy tarp.
He let her inside his guard, and she nearly pierced Sam’s invisible armor. He pounded on her with the flat of his blade. She was beaten down to her knees. Sam created the most powerful warded bolt he could imagine in the crossbow as the crowd called for Glory’s death.
“The Ristarians have arrived!” someone said, so Sam and Glory stopped.
Kreb looked away at his officers. “What went wrong?”
The messenger shook his head.
“Kill him,” Kreb said to Glory. He turned to Sam. “Kill her.” Officers began to surround the Dictator as they all began to talk at once.
Smaller smiled and repeated Kreb’s command.
Sam looked into Smaller’s eyes and then raised the crossbow, pointed at Kreb, and fired at the Dictator
of Vaarek from a few paces away. Sam was thrown to the dirt by the blast. His ears rang while he scrambled to Glory, where he covered her with his armored body, waiting for the swords that would end his life. His thought was that he had now paid back Banna for every conceivable debt he owed her.
His armor withstood a few blows, but then nothing else happened. He wondered if he was dead. The blast had deafened him, and he could feel Glory struggle beneath him, but there were no screams that would pierce his deafness. Sam opened his eyes. The remains of Kreb and his officers were spread around the impromptu dueling ring. Vaarekian soldiers were running past Glory, Emmy, and him. The Vaarekian enemy was in full retreat.
It was only moments when the Army of the Restoration passed them by, swords raised high. Sam couldn’t hear the curses verbally thrown at their enemy, but he could read their lips well enough. Sam didn’t stop them to tell them they weren’t enemies any longer. Kreb, his command, and the dictatorship lay dead, not more than a few paces away.
His gaze never wavered from army chasing army other than to rip the pollen tarp off Emmy. Glory joined him, watching the awful victory. He tried to say something to her, but she shook her head and pointed at her ear. In a few more moments, someone tapped him on the shoulder. Sam turned and looked into Banna’s eyes.
“Is that Kreb?” she asked at the circle of bodies.
Sam had read her lips and nodded vigorously.
She gave him a sad smile. “You can’t hear, can you?”
Sam shrugged. Banna took Sam in her arms, bloodied armor and all, and kissed his forehead, eyes closed, for an unseemly amount of time.
Chapter Thirty-Two
~
“I can’t convince you to return to Tolloy?” Mito said, back in bed. His escape from the mechanical thrower had re-damaged any healing on his broken leg. He had returned to the main camp in a wagon.
Sam shook his head. “I’ve already endured a very uncomfortable farewell from Banna.”
“She loves you like a son and always will, you know. She would have stayed while your hearing mended, but our Banna is needed to help patch together a new government in Tolloy.”