Crusader

Chapter 18

The sun’s first rays had scarcely begun to show over the horizon and Cyrus was still riding. He could feel the fatigue edging on him. A river lay to his left, burbling against its bank, snaking out of sight. Less than a mile ahead was a bridge: large, made of stones stacked one on top of the other, grouted together to hold against all manner of traffic that would cross it. The river was not particularly wide or particularly deep but enough so to make traversing it wickedly difficult, even if the water hadn’t been as high as it was.

“It is called the Fennterin River,” Longwell said, his voice a low whisper. “The bridge ahead is called Harrow’s Crossing. The Fennterin overruns its banks every spring, likely in a few weeks as the water seeps down from the highlands when the rains come. They built the bridge to aid travelers going to the northern towns, to help keep the trade routes open to Vernadam and southern Galbadien in times of flood.”

Cyrus stared at the bridge in the distance and saw figures over the small ridge of stones that railed either side of it. “You’re sure that the walls are only a few feet high?”

“Absolutely,” Longwell said. “I’ve been on it countless times; it’s low enough that an upset horse could easily jump over.”

“Good.” Cyrus peered ahead. “Martaina, what does it look like to you?”

The elf was to his left, and her eyes were trained on the bridge. “Men on horseback, some others dismounted, with bows.” She turned to him and smiled. “I think that scout J’anda pulled the information out of had the right of it; it looks as though they’ve placed their entire cavalry and all their bowmen on the bridge to protect their retreat.”

“Leaving a nice wide swath of open fields between them and their exit route,” Terian said, his destrier carrying him along with them. “Imagine their surprise when they see an army at their backs and their retreat cut off.”

“Let’s keep it low,” Cyrus said, dropping his voice. “We still need the element of surprise.” He heard the soft release of an arrow to his left and turned to see Martaina, bow in hand. She shrugged and he followed her sightline to see a body up the incline of the riverbank, rolling down, lifeless, an arrow protruding from the face. “Good shot.”

The riverbank sloped at a steep angle, obscuring their view of the fields and the flat ground above them. They had taken a long, circuitous route that Martaina had found for them through the woods, traversing rocky paths and uneven ground, taking care to eliminate the enemy’s scouts and even one small line of pickets when they reached the edge of the forest. They had crossed from the wood’s edge to the incline down by the river several miles west of where the Sylorean army waited in ambush. It had taken all night. But it will be worth it, if we can pull this off.

Every twig snap seemed to carry with it extra danger, and the long night’s journey had taken its toll. Cyrus looked around at the ragtag officers on horseback: Terian’s dark eyes darted back and forth, keeping careful watch for anything around them. Curatio looked relatively intact, but Cyrus caught a glimpse of the healer rubbing his face, as though he were trying to brush off the desire to sleep. Past him was the wizard, Mendicant, the goblin’s green scales and facial ridges barely visible in the dawn’s early light.

The bridge drew ever closer, and Cyrus beckoned for others to join him at the fore; Nyad, Ryin, Mendicant, and J’anda came forward, along with a few other spellcasters. The voices on the raised bridge were hushed, but occasional laughter came from the horsed cavalry.

Cyrus held up his hand, bringing them all to a stop a hundred feet from the bridge, partially obscured. “Remember,” he whispered so that the spellcasters could hear him. “I want chaos. Fire. Lightning is acceptable, but only if it produces a hell of a thunderclap. Chaos is the word of the day, ladies, gentlemen, and goblin, so let’s spread the word to the Sylorean army.” Nods greeted him as the spellcasters turned their attention to the bridge. “Let’s give ’em a sunrise they’ll remember,” Cyrus whispered.

“Their last?” Terian shrugged when Cyrus turned to look at him questioningly. “Well, it is.”

“J’anda,” Cyrus said, “are you ready to do your part?”

“I am ever ready to do my part,” the enchanter said, “and, if needs be, the part of ten thousand others as well.”

“Needs be,” Cyrus said. “Get to it.”

Cyrus waited, counting the seconds as they passed, the cool air coming off the river slipping through the joints of his armor, chilling him. He ran his hand over his helm, straightening it. Damned hair, he thought, shifting it back under his helm. At least the beard will be gone soon. He felt a stir of something within and smiled.

The first blast of flame exploded on the bridge only a moment later, a blast ten feet wide and ten feet tall, at the railing opposite them. Screams tore through the early morning silence, breaking it as another burst of fire landed on the bridge a moment later and shouts overcame the pre-dawn calm, dissolving it into the chaos Cyrus had sought. Three men tumbled over the side of the bridge in the first few seconds, along with their horses.

Cyrus heard a soft moan from Martaina. When he looked over at her, she wore a frown. “Couldn’t we have found a way to rout them without hurting the horses?”

“Sorry,” Cyrus said with a shake of the head. “I’ve got no love of harming animals, but we need to throw their rearguard into utter disarray.”

Another dozen or more horses vaulted off the side of the bridge, flames covering their riders, wreathing the end of the bridge in a way that reminded Cyrus of another bridge, only months earlier, and a wizard who had sacrificed years from her life to bring twice as much fire as his whole corps of spellcasters were delivering now-and not nearly so sustained as what Chirenya had created.

Cyrus could feel the heat, as though a furnace door had opened in front of him. He could see bodies tumbling off as the men and horses sought to escape the fiery doom that awaited any who remained on the bridge. They fell, dropping off the side onto the rocks in the shallows below. Most remained unmoving, but a few still moaned or cried out. Cyrus saw one man trapped under a whinnying horse that could not stand, though it kept trying, and he cringed. “Martaina,” he said. “For the gods’ sakes, give them some mercy.”

He heard the arrows begin to fly only a moment later, and he turned away from the destruction he had ordered as the last of the inferno faded away. The bridge was silent, but the ground and water below was a mass of moaning and whinnying, the survivors of the jump crying out for relief that would not come-at least not in the way they intended it.

“I’d say you’d suffer in Mortus’s oil pits for that bit of cruelty,” Martaina said as she loosed another arrow, “but I think we both know that at this point, that’s not likely true.”

“There were some folks suffering there, that’s certain,” Cyrus said, recalling the phantoms that had been loosed when Mortus died; souls crying out, screaming in pain for vengeance; they sounded much like the suffering souls under the bridge. “No time for recriminations now. J’anda?” Cyrus looked to the enchanter. “Are we set?”

“Set,” J’anda said. “Excellent choice of words. They look like a matching set, in fact.” He waved his hand toward figures that were lined up in even rows behind them, stretching over the riverbanks and onto the river, horsemen with the helms of Galbadien’s dragoons, walking on water as though it were the greenest grass. “Let us hope that our enemies don’t look too closely at their conformity and see through the illusion of it all.”

“They’ve never seen an enchanter at work,” Cyrus said. “And by the time they figure it out, hopefully it’ll be too late.” He drew his sword, Praelior, and urged Windrider up the bank. “Let’s get out in front of this charging army of specters and get these Syloreans turned around.” His horse stormed up the embankment as Cyrus held his sword aloft. He heard the others follow him in the morning gloom and saw the illusory dragoon army close behind as they crested the top of the ridge.

A flat, grassy plain stretched before him, running all the way to the edge of the Forest of Waigh. Cyrus saw the road that led from the bridge back to the forest, the one they had been following with the army until they caught the scout. Set up on either side of the road at the forest’s edge were ranks of soldiers, footmen with pikes, polearms, and swords. Standard bearers waited at either end, each of which was divided into six armies, each with four or five ranks lined up one behind another. They were arranged in a half circle around the entrance to the woods, although now many of them had turned, heads looking toward the bridge to try and make sense of the flaming chaos.

When Cyrus crested the edge of the embankment he judged the distance to the nearest army at only a few hundred yards. He let Windrider carry him onward as he watched the armies before him panic, men turning, stunned at the appearance of a charging army on the rear flank. The Sylorean officers screamed at their men to turn in formation but Cyrus watched them hesitate before beginning to organize. Too slow.

Detached from the body of any of the six legions, dead in the center of the road back to the forest was another cluster, smaller, this one only a few men. Cyrus squinted, and saw that one of them appeared to be much shorter than the others, and had a long beard, one that reached nearly to his waist. The dwarf carried a hammer almost as tall as he was, holding it diagonally across his body with both hands. The small group of fighters was only about six strong, Cyrus noted. He pointed his sword at them and noticed Windrider had already altered his heading to charge the mercenaries. “Clever horse,” he said faintly. “So, so clever.”

The others changed course behind him, and Cyrus felt the wind rushing through his hair, blowing it out the bottom of his helm. His mouth was wide with a feral grin; he was going into battle, riding into danger from the fore, his forces behind him. The dwarf ahead of him was already running out to meet him, along with the others in his party, while the rest of the Sylorean army was still executing its turn and trying to shift their formations to deal with the threat at their flank. Cyrus saw horses beginning to stream out of the woods behind the backs of the Syloreans. The real Galbadien Dragoons were forming up to hit the unsuspecting Syloreans from behind while Cyrus distracted them.

“Watch out for the paladin’s attack!” Cyrus shouted as they closed the distance to the mercenaries. He locked his eyes to the dwarf, watched him extend his hand, felt Windrider tense beneath him.

A blast of ice sent the dwarf staggering, his hand flying into the air as he loosed a massive burst of force that went sailing over Cyrus’s head, barely brushing his helm but sending it flying. Cyrus could see the two mercenary warriors, armored at the fore, and the two rangers, their bows drawn and arrows ready to loose. Each of them was downed in the next moment; one caught an arrow in the face from Martaina, who smiled grimly as she drew another arrow. The other was blasted by a bolt of lightning that originated from Ryin Ayend, who sent the man spiraling through the air as though thrown.

“Spellcasters!” Cyrus yelled, “let loose on the armies! Keep them off us while we finish the mercenaries!” He watched another arrow sail forth, this one from Aisling, and it came to rest in the thigh of the mercenary healer, who let out a cry and fell to the ground.

Flames sparked up in a line along either side of their charge, isolating Cyrus and the Sanctuary forces from the Syloreans on either side; the lines blazed back toward the woods but stopped behind the mercenaries, sending the grass into conflagration as it looped around the four surviving mercenaries, cutting them off from Sylorean reinforcement.

Another arrow caught the healer in the face as he cast a spell, sitting on his haunches, his legs in front of him. His hand dropped, limp, into his lap, and he fell backward, dead, forcing Cyrus to smile. The dwarf had been knocked over by the ice spell, but was back on his feet now, hunched over, the two heavily armored warriors flanking him to either side. “Get the paladin!” Cyrus shouted as the dwarf’s hand rose again, this time without warning. Cyrus was only ten feet away now-

The air around the paladin’s hand rippled as his spell burst forth from his mailed hand. With the aid of Praelior’s mystic enhancement to his speed and reflexes, time seemed to slow as the air folded around the force of the spell, the world distorting as the enchantment sped toward Cyrus. Windrider had already cut hard to the right before the blast landed, and the horse managed to dodge under the effects. Cyrus felt himself hit by the widening radius of power as the wave bloomed outward, like a wall had been picked up and slammed into him. He flew sideways off the horse, dragging his legs behind him as he flipped in midair, before coming to rest on his shoulder.

The impact knocked the air out of him, but he maintained his grip on his sword. He looked back and saw the paladin’s attack wreaking havoc behind him; half of Cyrus’s small force had been hit, and a trail of upturned earth ten feet wide marked the place where the paladin’s incantation had wrought its effects. Those who hadn’t been hit had dodged outside of the cone of destruction, trying to get their horses back under control. Cyrus saw Curatio among them, as well as Terian. “Come on!” Cyrus shouted and slung himself to his feet. “Terian, get over here!”

Cyrus turned and found the dwarf already upon him, hammer raised above his head. Cyrus brought Praelior up, turning aside the dwarf’s first attack by landing a glancing blow on the head of the big, stone hammer that sent it reeling off to the side. The dwarf was fast, however, and used the momentum of the attack to pirouette, coming around with a spinning assault that Cyrus dodged, but only barely.

Cyrus brought Praelior around and landed the blade on the hammer’s long handle; it was almost as long as the dwarf was tall, and when he hit the wood with his blade, it chipped only slightly. His hammer is mystical. Praelior would cut through regular wood as easily as passing through flesh.

“You’re faster than most dwarves I’ve met,” Cyrus said, feeling the hammer strike a glancing blow off his breastplate as he landed one home upon the dwarf’s shoulder, leaving a thin line in the steel that drew the mercenary’s attention.

“Oh, yah?” The dwarf smiled, his long, brown mustache and beard shaking. The beard was braided at the bottom, and his bushy hair was ponytailed in the back. He wore weathered armor, steel with a dirty sort of look, and his eyes carried little spots of brown in the middle of large white eyeballs. “Then I’ll tell you that you move faster than most humans I’ve met.”

“So long as we’re forming this fine mutual admiration society,” Cyrus said, meeting the hammer’s head with Praelior again, blocking the dwarf’s attempt to crush his skull, but at the cost of sending a jarring pain through both of Cyrus’s arms, “I’ll tell you that your hammer is quite impressive, even for a mystical weapon. Most of them I’ve met can’t stand up to my sword.”

“Big strapping fellow like you, dressed all in black? I’m surprised your foes don’t all run away from you screaming in terror.” The dwarf pivoted around and landed a blow under Cyrus’s exposed armpit as he was stepping into a swing of his blade. Cyrus felt the armor hold but ram, hard, into his ribs. They cracked and felt the searing agony run through his side, gritting his teeth, trying to keep the pain from overwhelming him. The dwarf pressed forward, lifting his hammer over his head for a killing blow, but Cyrus used Praelior to deflect the strike, whirling away from the paladin.

“I believe you’re mocking me, sir,” Cyrus said, tasting blood in his mouth. A quick glance around the battlefield found the Syloreans in panic; they’d turned and engaged J’anda’s army thinking it was real and had discovered too late it was not. The Galbadien dragoons were visible behind the dwarf, some already cutting through the Sylorean forces, their upper bodies visible over the heads of the writhing and panicked Sylorean army as the dragoons cut their way through on a charge. Shouts drowned out everything, screams of the defeated and the battle cries of those still standing and fighting. The only difference was in pitch, not volume.

“I believe you’re right,” the dwarf said without irony. “But it’s nothing personal, even though you did just kill my comrades.” He brought the hammer down furiously again and Cyrus felt the impact as he blocked it with his sword.

Being on the defensive is not a good strategy for this fight, Cyrus thought. I need a healing spell. “The Syloreans are faltering.” Cyrus sidestepped another vertical attack from the dwarf. “Without you and your friends to save them, the Galbadien army will break them.” Cyrus lunged forward as the dwarf was turning to swing his hammer around again. Cyrus’s attack ran right along the seam of the dwarf’s waist, and he felt it hit chainmail; the dwarf halted his attack and tried to back off, toddling backward on his short legs. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“Away.” The dwarf swung his hammer with one hand and Cyrus was forced to step back. The dwarf raised his other hand and white light coursed down his side, a small healing spell. The dwarf smirked at him. “Just for a second though, lad. I wouldn’t want to step out on you before I’ve killed you, after all.”

“Not much chance of that.” Cyrus came at him again, ignoring the pain in his ribs, embracing the agony, letting it enrage him.

“Why?” The dwarf smiled, that irritating smile. “Do you think your friends’ll be saving you? Because I don’t.”

“Oh, yeah?” Cyrus brought his blade down and it clanged against the head of the hammer, and he raised it and brought it down again, this time cutting centimeters into the handle. “Why’s that?”

“Because …” the dwarf said, bringing his hammer up and hitting Cyrus in the nose with the handle, “… Curatio there is far too busy trying to rally your spellcasters to keep the Sylorean army from turning around and stampeding through you lot on their retreat.”

Cyrus staggered back, stunned by both the blow to his face and dimly aware that the dwarf had called Curatio by name. He glanced back, a quick turn of the head and saw that it was true; the healer was with the spellcasters, flames were rippling in careful lines across the plains, turning back the tide of screaming Syloreans as the Galbadien dragoons continued to cut through their ranks. Cyrus turned back to the dwarf and over the little man’s shoulder he saw the Sanctuary army, the bulk of it, burrowing into the footmen in the center of the melee while the dragoons drove through the flanks of the Sylorean army.

“So you’re from Sanctuary, eh?” The dwarf leered at him, little half-smile wicked upon his face. “You’re a long way from the Plains of Perdamun, lad.” He balanced the hammer in his hand, bouncing it with one hand and letting the handle slap his palm in the other as he advanced toward Cyrus slowly. “A long damned way you came just to try and kill me and mine.”

“I killed yours,” Cyrus said, trying to shake off the disorientation. Blood flowed freely from his nose down his lips and every word he spoke let more of it run into his mouth, the hard, metallic taste of it drowning out all else. “Now all that’s left is to kill you.”

The dwarf chuckled, his small frame gyrating slightly from the laugh. “Easier said than followed through with.” He extended the hammer with one hand and pointed it at Cyrus. “But if you want to give it a try, now seems the opportune moment.”

Cyrus clutched Praelior in both hands, holding it defensively. “I’ve been known to do dumb things,” he said, staring the dwarf down, “but attacking a strong adversary to no purpose while I’m injured isn’t one of them.”

“Let me give you reason, then.” The dwarf held up his palm and Cyrus nearly flinched as another blast of force hit him before he could dodge.

The spell made contact with his shoulder as it passed and jerked him around in a half-circle before leaving him to come to rest on the ground. He felt the numbness in his arm from the blast, and clenched his other fist to find he had, in fact, held onto his sword. He rolled to the side as the hammer landed in the mud where he had lain, splattering his armor from the force of impact. The hammer came down again as Cyrus rolled to a knee, this blow missing him by only inches.

Cyrus saw Terian, a half-dozen paces away, the flames from the spellcasters behind him, a wall of fire keeping the army of Syloreas from retreating. The dark knight stared at him, blade in hand. Smoke was everywhere, black clouds that drifted lazily around him. “Terian,” Cyrus said. “Help me!”

Terian did not move, and Cyrus cocked his head at the dark elf, who stood still, watching. Cyrus started to call out to him again but the hammer hit him in the face, a short, fast stab that landed on Cyrus’s already-wounded nose and caused a flash in his eyes. He blinked and realized he was on the ground and the dwarf was over him, brandishing the hammer.

“Friends, eh?” The dwarf said, shaking his head. “Guildmates, yah? Someday, lad, maybe if you grow wise, you’ll realize that you really can’t rely on anyone but yourself.” The dwarf chuckled. “‘Course, that’d mean living long enough to learn from your mistakes.” He hefted the hammer on his shoulder. “Best of luck with that.”

The dwarf raised the hammer above his head and brought it down on Cyrus, a full-force swing from on high. Cyrus watched it come down, the arc slow and graceful, and wondered what it would feel like when it-