First Lord's Fury

CHAPTER 49

Gaius Octavian’s host dismounted at the mouth of the Calderon Valley, much to the relief of riders and mounts alike. Fidelias watched the entire process, bemused. How different would the role of cavalry be if horses could talk?

And draw swords.

And eat their riders.

He thought there might be a great deal less running about.

Fidelias shook his head and struggled to focus on the task at hand. Such wandering thoughts might perhaps be natural in the face of exhaustion and near-certain death, but they wouldn’t help accomplish the mission.

The captain came riding in from a nearby patch of woods on his big black, his singulares trailing at a slight distance. Though the trees had been a quarter mile away, he had insisted. It would never do, after all, for the Legions to see their Princeps beholden to the call of nature just as they were.

Fidelias swung down from his own horse and walked over to join the captain.

“… know you aren’t used to performing in this role,” Octavian was saying to two young men—a cavalry centurion named Quartus and Sir Callum of the First Aleran’s Knights. Both were the right arms of Maximus and Crassus, respectively, within the First Aleran. “But you’ve been trained well,” Octavian continued. “You’ll do fine.”

Both young man replied in the affirmative and, Fidelias thought, tried to look more confident than they felt. But then, the captain was doing the exact same thing. He was just a lot better at it than the other two. It also said something about him that, even here, at the last, the captain had arranged matters so that he could have a moment to bolster their spirits before the rest of the commanders of the host arrived.

It took only moments for the command staff of both Legions to reach them, along with Varg, Nasaug, and Master Marok in his vord-chitin mantle. To Fidelias’s surprise, Sha was there as well, clad in Hunter grey, pacing along in Varg’s shadow.

“Gentlemen,” Octavian said. There were no murmurs to be quieted—everyone was tired, though only the Cane didn’t look it. Their fur simply seemed a bit limper than was usual. “Let’s get right to it. There are two and a half million enemy troops packed into the next fifty miles or so. There are about forty thousand of us. So there are plenty of vord to share. Let’s not be stingy.”

A rumble of laughter went around the group. Nasaug looked amused, though Varg didn’t. Varg looked patient.

“Garrison is about fifty miles from here, on the causeway. They’ve still got almost a hundred and fifty thousand legionares and support from another hundred thousand Marat.”

“That isn’t enough to face the vord directly,” Nasaug said, his deep voice resonant.

“No,” Octavian said. “It isn’t. Somewhere between here and Garrison is the vord Queen. Once we kill her, we aren’t facing an army anymore. We kill her, we have a chance.”

Sir Callum lifted his hand. “Sir…? Um, how are we going to find her?”

Octavian gave him a wolfish smile. “Well, Sir Callum. It appears that some blackhearted villains destroyed the vord’s food storehouse at Riva, then proceeded to burn out the croach that was supposed to be their supply line.”

Another rumble of laughter went around the group.

“As a result, there are more than a million vord thirty miles east of here, at the site of an old steadholt called Aricholt. They’re completely motionless—asleep, in some kind of hibernation.”

“How do you know this?” Varg asked.

“Sorcery.”

Varg eyed Octavian, an expression far more intimidating on a Cane’s face than an Aleran’s, then flicked his ears in acknowledgment.

Marok let out a thoughtful growl. “Some of my monastic brethren once pursued similar disciplines. If the vord can do that, they will not need as much food to survive.”

Octavian nodded. “I think they must be the vord reserves. And I think the vord Queen will be nearby.” He looked around the circle. “Gentlemen, we are going to come down on them in force and annihilate them.”

Silence fell on the circle.

“Sir,” Sir Callum said slowly. “Attack a million with… sir, that’s… the odds are…”

“Twenty-five to one,” Varg said quietly.

“Shall we wait for them to wake up and come to us?” Octavian asked, his mouth spread in a wide, confident grin. “No, Sir Callum. The time for being cautious is long past.”

“What if they wake up?” Callum asked.

“What if they don’t?” Octavian countered. “What if the vord never need them? What if we do nothing while the vord at Garrision overwhelm the Legions?”

Callum frowned and bowed his head. Then he nodded.

“We’re going to hit them as fast and as hard as we can,” Octavian continued. “And we’re going to inflict a crowbegotten lot of harm on them. While that’s happening, I will lead a strike team after the Queen. As the most experienced Aleran present, Valiar Marcus will be in command once I am gone.”

Fidelias felt his stomach drop out. He began to say something, but Octavian shot him a level look, and he subsided.

“Varg will be his second,” Octavian continued. “Our objective is to eliminate the vord reserves at Aricholt, then fortify our position. Questions?”

No one spoke.

“All right, then, gentlemen,” Octavian said, smiling. “Let’s get to work. Oh, Master Marok. Would you be willing to speak with me privately for a moment? Thank you.”

Fidelias watched the assembly break up as the captain moved over to one side, speaking quietly with Marok. The Cane listened and made short replies. He nodded once, then he and the captain exchanged bows.

The captain strode over to him after speaking to Marok. “Marcus,” he said.

“That’s me.”

Octavian’s mouth tugged up at the corner. “With any luck,” he said, “I’ll be busy elsewhere once the music starts.”

“I heard,” Fidelias said.

“I’m not going to ask you if you can handle it. I’m telling you that you bloody well will handle it.”

“Yes, sir.”

Octavian nodded, and said, “We’re going all out. Maximum damage to the enemy. Everyone, everyone, including me, is to be considered expendable.” He looked back down the column. Hundreds of men and Canim were visible even within the ritualists’ concealing mist. There was pain in his eyes. “We can’t let the Queen escape us. And we can’t allow those reserves to be used against Garrison. No matter the cost.”

“I understand, Captain,” Fidelias said quietly. “I’ll get it done.”

Tavi rode at the head of the column the rest of the way to the engagement. Moving down the causeway, it took them a little more than an hour to make the trip, and his mouth was dry the whole time, no matter how many times he drank from his water flask. Scouts and outriders reported infrequent contact with the enemy. They wouldn’t have been able to see much—the host was still riding veiled beneath Master Marok’s misty cloud. Of course, the reverse also held true. It was difficult for the host to see out. They had to rely heavily upon their scouts to be their eyes and ears.

They turned off the causeway to cover the last three or four miles to Aricholt upon a nonfurycrafted road. In the darkness, the ride was an eerie one. Vord cries drifted up and down the valley. Garrison was only another half an hour or so away upon the causeway, but that was plenty of distance to muffle all but the most piercing cries of the vord, who must have been laying siege to the place. The distant crackles and booms of firecraftings came through clearly, though. From the sound of it, there were still plenty of Citizens standing up to the vord—either that, or the idea he’d shared with his uncle by letter, about the mules and the fire-spheres, had actually paid off. If that was true, he’d be a little startled, he’d admit. He never thought that one would work out.

A scout from the Free Aleran appeared out of the mist ahead of them, riding his horse back at an easy lope. He pulled up next to the command group and saluted Tavi.

“Report.”

“Sir, the steadholt is up ahead. It’s covered in the croach and…” He shook his head. “The reserves you talked about are there.”

“Asleep?”

“Maybe,” the man said. “They weren’t moving.”

Tavi looked over his shoulder at Fidelias, and said, “Signal the halt. Quietly.”

Fidelias nodded. Signals were passed by hand gesture and lowered voice back down the column.

“I want to see this for myself,” Tavi said. “Everyone else, remain here.”

“I am going,” Kitai said.

Tavi eyed her. He had no desire whatsoever to expose her—expose them—to danger, but he gave in to the inevitable on the lesser risk. “Fine. But we’re only going up to look, and we’re doing it under sound, sight, and earth veils.”

Kitai shrugged her shoulders. “As you would, Aleran.”

They rode out together, and Tavi pulled up a windcrafted veil around them as they did. Without being told, Kitai managed the crafting that would hide the sounds of their passing and another that would make the earth more pliable beneath the hooves of their mounts, greatly reducing the amount of vibration they sent through the earth as they walked, in an effort to avoid detection by enemy earthcrafters who might be standing sentry duty.

They rode about half a mile before leaving the protective mists around the host—and were immediately bathed by the light of a waning moon. Predawn hovered in the east, a cold blue light that was only barely brighter than the darkness of night.

They went off the road, and approached the steadholt from the southwest, walking their horses carefully through the thick woods. A murmur from Tavi, and a low, constant effort of will made the trees bend back their limbs, and the new growth of briar and brush allow them to pass without sound or inconvenience. It took them only moments to come within sight of Aricholt.

Tavi had only heard it described by his uncle, and that had never been in great detail. The steadholt had been an average example of the breed—a barn, a great hall, some living quarters and workshops, all of them made of stone. A stone wall circled the place, though it had crumbled in multiple locations.

Standing in the fields were row after row of large, egg-shaped forms, which Tavi suddenly realized were the bodies of the vord warriors. They stretched for a square mile, easily, even with each one curled into a ball and stacked up touching the mantises beside it. None of them moved—it would appear that they were indeed asleep, at least for the moment.

Glowing green croach spread out from the barn and had already begun to creep outward. There was a crowd of mantis warriors sitting around the far side of the barn, a hundred or more. Further sentries crouched around the exterior of the barn, one every ten feet or so. Wax spiders rolled in and out, vomiting out fresh patches of croach, then trundling back inside to pick up more.

“Remind you of anything?” Tavi asked Kitai quietly.

She nodded. “The Queen’s hive under Alera Imperia.”

The high-pitched howl of windstreams bearing Aleran fliers screamed far overhead. Tavi looked up and saw a flier glide smoothly down to the barn entrance—a slender woman clad all in black, whose head had been badly scarred with burns. She passed through the crowd of mantises, shoving them out of the way like unruly lambs, then glanced over her shoulder and up before vanishing into the barn.

“She’s there,” he heard himself whisper. “Bloody crows, the Queen is right there in that barn.”

Kitai’s hand went to her sword. “Should we attack?”

He shook his head. Together they turned their horses and began moving slowly and stealthily back to the host.

Kitai stared at him, visibly furious, as they reentered the mists, and stopped her horse. “That was an opportunity. Perhaps the best one we are going to have. It was foolish of you to cast it aside out of some harebrained need to protect me.”

“That wasn’t what I was doing, Kitai.”

“The crows it was not,” Kitai said. “And if you think for a moment that you are going to hunt this Queen by yourself, Aleran, you are mistaken. I will not permit you to face her alone.”

“Kitai—”

“I don’t know who is on this strike team you mentioned, but I am hereby assigning myself to it.”

“You’re not on the team. You are the team. I’ve already decided that the safest place for you is next to me.”

Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “You have?”

He nodded. Then he stopped his horse and turned to her. “I wish you to become my mate,” he said, duplicating her own accented Aleran flawlessly. “Set the challenge of your choice.”

She tilted her head. “What?”

“You heard me,” he said.

Kitai stared at him for a moment more, then said, “Let the winner of the trial be the one who slays the vord Queen.”

Tavi huffed out a laugh. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you didn’t want me to marry you.”

She smiled at him. “No, fool,” she said. “I most certainly do. Kill this creature, my Aleran, and make our world a place where we might live again, where our child might grow up in safety. Kill her, and I will be yours until death parts us.”

Tavi stared at Kitai and thought that he’d never seen a creature so beautiful. He leaned over to her and kissed her hard on the mouth. When it was through, they rested their foreheads together, until Kitai’s horse sidestepped, and they both nearly plummeted off.

They shared another smile, righted themselves, and returned to the host.

Tavi rode up to Fidelias, who stood talking with Varg. “All right,” he said. “It’s just ahead. Give the order to get us under way and prepare to sound the attack.”