A Handful Of Men - The Stricken Field Part 34

"True," Olybino admitted. He walked a few more paces, then returned and leaned his knuckles on the table. His eyes glittered. "What you told me last night was impressive. That faun has a flair for strategy! He found the only way to recruit a counterforcea"that's a.s.suming that there are enough sorcerers still at large, which I doubt. Nor do I believe that his absurd idealistic new protocol would work in practice, not for a minute. But it makes a good rallying cry. In fact his plan is the only hope, so we may as well try it. The problem is to spread the word to the frees before the Covin hunts them downa"which it continues to do."

"I will help in any way I can, sir." Umpily could not bear to remember how he had been deceived by the fake Shandie. Sorcery or not, the humiliation was agony. He felt a burning need to redeem himself. He was ruefully aware that this remorse was out of character, and might fade in a day or two, but at the moment he was capable of anything . . . capable of considering anything.

The warlock snorted. "The best thing you can do, I suspect, is to keep scribbling gossip in that diary of yours. Oha"you didn't think I knew about that? Why do you suppose you so often happened to be present when I turned up to talk with Shandie?"

He straightened and turned to his three minions. "Did you know you are in the presence of one of the great historians of Pandemia? Future ages will turn to his records whenever they need to know what the prince imperial had for breakfast on a particular day."

They smiled faintly at the mockery. The warden turned his threatening gaze back to Umpily. Even without his grandiose armor and bogus muscle, Olybino could still intimidate. Indeed, he had more dignity without such ostentatious fakery. Who would tell him that, either?

"It is time to leave. We removed your spell of obedience. Do you want it replaced?"

Umpily shivered and shook his head. His mouth was too dry for speech. Everything he had written in his memoirs for the last four months was rubbish!

"Sure? You will be happier being deceived!"

"I am sure," Umpily croaked.

Olybino chuckled. "Good for you. Very well. We shall put a shielding on you instead. That way you will not be taken in by the Covin's illusions, and you will still have a visible sorcery on you. The Covin will a.s.sume it is the loyalty spell. Of course it will not withstand close scrutiny, so you must avoid attracting attention. When the dwarf learns what I have planned . . . Well, just say that very soon the little cave rat is going to be considerably out of sorts. He may go looking for scapegoats on whom he can vent his ill temper."

Horrors! Umpily shivered. "What must I do?"

The warlock showed his teeth in a sinister smile. "Just watch! This is going to be a very interesting morning." He turned to his votaries, his face suddenly grim. "What I must do now must be done quickly. I cannot give you very much time. Be on your way."

Apparently Umpily was already shielded from sorcery, for the three were no longer disguised. The two former guardsmen were recognizable again, although Umpily would not have known them had he not expected to. The tall one he recalled as a younger brother of Count Ipherio. The woman was the charming daughter of Senator Heolclue. She smiled at him; the two men nodded solemnly. They rose. Umpily heaved himself upright, also, with more effort than he had expected. Then the woman sank down on her knees on the cobbles, and the two men copied her.

"The Good be with you, your Omnipotence!" she said, her voice breaking.

"A soldier knows his duty," the warlock snapped.

The count's brother raised clasped hands in appeal. "Master, let us stay and help, I beg you!" His eyes glistened with tears.

"I told you there would be no more argument! Be off with you! Hub is no place for sorcerers now." Olybino turned his back on them all, folding his arms. The three rose to their feet and headed for the door, with Umpily at their heels.

4.

"Now will you tell me what's going on?" Jalon inquired, his tone unusually petulant.

"I'll tell you one thing that been going on." Rap took the wheel from the minstrel's unresisting fingers. "We have been straying a mite off course, Helmsman."

Dreadnaught, in fact, was broadside to the weather and drifting aimlessly. Fortunately the wind was light and the waves were puny. No one would trust Jalon with the helm otherwise.

"I was trying to find a rhyme for *whelk,' " he explained without a blush. "Forgot to watch the compa.s.s. Now, what is going on?"

Rap grinned at him in disbelief. "Have you ever wandered out of the house in the morning without remembering to dress?"

"Oh, yes!" Jalon looked surprised that his friend would even ask. "Dozens of times." He was apparently unaware that his present shirt was inside out. "Now, please, what is going on?"

Rap studied the sails for a moment, taking the ship's pulse. She was coming round slowly, turning her bowsprit to the dawn. He was coming around slowly himself, recovering from the extremely weird experience of being in concert with the other sorcerers. He had spent the last hour as part of a meld of sorcerers, and being just Rap again required some adjustment.

"We were scouting."

"I thought that was too dangerous?"

"We decided we had to risk it. It's pretty safe if we all work together. So much power is just about impossible to detect."

Jalon pulled a face. "Sounds backward. So what'yu find?"

"Dragons."

"Still?"

"Still. Just about every dragon in the Reach, we think. He's got them flying north. It's an incredible display of power, because they keep trying to scatter. He's holding them together, though. The Covin is. And we've found his target, we think."

"Well?"

"Goblins."

"Goblins?" The minstrel scratched his flaxen mop. "I know I'm no scholar, but I am sure it's a long way to goblin country! . . . isn't it?"

"The goblins are in Pithmot, at a place called Bandon The Impire's got five legions lined up against them." Rap yawned. He was intensely weary, and sick of the alien taint of dragon in his mind. Goblins almost on Home Water! Yet why should he be surprised by that? Years ago, the G.o.ds had decreed that Death Bird would live to be the scourge of the Impire. They had not mentioned dragons, though.

Jalon's blue eyes were wide. "You're quite sure Zinixo's on the legions' side?"

"That we are about to find out," Rap said grimly. "A few minutes more. We think he's going to destroy the goblins in front of the legions to demonstrate his power and compel respect. That's the best idea anyone's been able to come up with."

The minstrel shuddered convulsively, as if seized by a sudden ague. "That's awful! Can't you do anything?"

"Now, don't you start!" Rap had the ship under way again. He had spent half the night in argument with trolls who wanted to warn everyone in the dragons' path and anthropophagi who wanted to turn the blaze aside. Just a gentle nudge would be enough, they said, because if the worms once scattered not even the Covin would ever regain control. Knowing that, they said, Zinixo would not dare resist a little sideways nudge.

It had taken every trick and skill and argument Rap could muster to win his a.s.sociates around to his own viewa"the sensible view, of course.

"We're going to do nothing!" he said. "We could make very little difference, and possibly make things a great deal worse. We might let the blaze scatter over half the Impire. We'd give ourselves away to the usurper, and that would be the end of the game. So we sit on the sidelines and puke, that's all we can do."

Jalon looked aghast at this cold-blooded decision. "You'll let dragons attack people and not even try to rescue them?" "That's what we decided."

But would it work? Would all those kindly trolls be able to restrain themselves when the burning started? Would the anthropophagi be able to resist the lure of battlea"not to mention the occult view of people cooking? And could the Covin continue to control such an enormous blaze once it had tasted metal? There was potential here for one of the greatest disasters of all time.

Rap would find out very shortly.

He smiled at the minstrel's woebegone expression. "Don't sing too many laments for the goblins, buddy mine. They didn't get to South Pithmot by hitching rides in haywains. Our old friend Death Bird has probably left a trail of b.l.o.o.d.y footprints all the way from Pondague. I'm sure there isn't a soul in that mob of his that doesn't deserve what's coming!"

Easy to say! Dragons were a bad way to die. The G.o.ds had crafted Death Bird's destiny for him and he could not have evaded it. His ultimate end must be ordained, too.

Rap decided a few minutes alone with the wheel were just what he needed to soothe his tattered nerves. "Why don't you go and find me some breakfast, of buddy?" he asked. "I'll finish your watch for you."

Jalon nodded, blue eyes deadly serious. "I'll check out the galley. Which would you prefera"spruce bough salad or housemaid's knees?"

Before Rap could answer, a voice roared in his head. SORCERERS, ATTEND! BEHOLD THE POWER OF THE ALMIGHTY!

"Rap?" Jalon said. "Rap? Rap, what's the matter?"

5.

Dawn found Kadie already awake, gritty-eyed and sourmouthed, huddled in the corner of a stone wall that enclosed an orchard. She had slept very little, if at all. Goblin preparations for battle included more than the usual amounts of torture. Perhaps the screaming was partly intended to frighten the enemy, although the legions had been far out of earshot when darkness fell. More important, apparently, was the effect on the spectators, because the victims had not been impish prisoners but goblin volunteers, who had directed the honors being inflicted on themselves. Thus few of the goblins had slept, either, and now they were roused to manic bloodl.u.s.t, twitching and jabbering with excitement. Many of them bore b.l.o.o.d.y relics hung on strings around their necksa"fingers and even more gruesome tokens, freely donated by their original owners.

There had been no opportunity for escape, and she could not hope for any now.

The orchard was to be the command post and was already full of goblins. Several of the trees had been lopped off and a platform built upon them to provide a lookout. Death Bird had yielded to his son's hysterical pleading and agreed that he might join in the a.s.sault instead of being held in the rear. The king himself was going to lead the first charge. To Kadie it all seemed very much like a suicidal last stand.

Death Bird had detailed a half-dozen men to guard her. They stood around her, sulking mightily, and glaring at her from their hideously angular eyes. They felt slighted, obviously, and she was convinced that they would cut her throat as soon as the battle began, so that they could go and join in. The one thing no goblin wanted was the shame of being taken prisoner.

She had eaten nothing the previous evening. Allena the Mare had disappeared, and had almost certainly provided the skimpy provisions she had seen handed around. Somehow Kadie resented that more than almost anything. How could they be so cruel?

Then Blood Beak came striding through the trees. He had his bow already strung in his hand, sword and quiver slung on his shoulders. A shapeless piece of raw flesh dangled in the center of his bare chest; it had dribbled blood all over him.

"Is almost time!" He bared his big teeth at her.

She cowered smaller, feeling the stones of the wall cold through her cloak. "Good-bye, then." She still had her magic rapier.

"Come! Will watch from lookout."

He was trembling with excitement. He would drag her there if she refused. Reluctantly she rose. The surly guards closed in around her, and they all headed off through the trees.

There was no proper ladder, only a log with a few stumps of branches still attached. She clambered up, awkward in her long cloak and anxious not to trip over her sword, following Blood Beak. The uneven nest on top was already packed with chiefs, creaking under their weight. She found a place to sit, aware that her guards could see her and were waiting underneath.

The sky was blue already, with a burning wound in the northeast showing where the sun was about to rise in molten gold. A lark sang its heart out far overhead, and lesser songsters whistled and chirruped in the trees. She had never heard birdsong like that in Krasnegar. It was a beautiful day to die.

"Are coming!" a man hidden from her proclaimed. She recognized the king's voice. The legions did seem closer, a wall of men and bronze, advancing slowly.

If I am to be rescued, then now is the moment, she thought, but her childish ideas of rescues seemed very foolish now. She was not going to be rescued. She was going to be killed by the goblins long before the imps arrived. As soon as Death Bird left, probably. Her parents would never know what had happened to her. She would never know what had happened to them, or Gath, either. If Gath was here, he could tell her what was going to happen. Of course she was glad Gath was not herea"but it would be nice to have someone.

An edge of burning bronze broke over the horizon like a trumpet call. There was not a cloud in the sky, not even smoke. She shivered with cold and fear and lack of sleep. Still the birds sang. Death was a long sleep, but she wished she could have lived longer. She had not had time to collect very much good for the G.o.ds to find when they weighed her soul. "Nothing here at all, " They would say . . .

A pair of bare legs *came into view, then Blood Beak knelt down on the adjacent log, balancing precariously. He leered at her, his eyes full of madness.

"Kill many, many imps!" He had to raise his voice over the raucous babbling of the chiefs behind him. Their bragging and boasting were just bl.u.s.ter to hide nervousness.

"You're outnumbered," she said. She was not sure, but it seemed likely, and his scowl confirmed it.

"No matter numbers! Better men. Better killers."

She sighed. "Good luck. At times I almost came to like you, Blood Beak."

His eyes flashed within their tattoos. "Tonight will bed you!"

"Tonight will bury you."

She turned away and blinked at the glare. The sun was above the skyline now. To the north the Imperial Army glittered. If she watched carefully, she could make out its creeping advance, a fiery tide slowly engulfing cottages, copses, walls, coming on remorselessly like a breaker entering Wide Bay at Krasnegar.

Off to one side lay the river. It was not far awaya"a few minutes' ride on a good horsea"and she would be safe if she could only somehow move herself to that far bank. She noticed then that the far bank was already crowded. A mult.i.tude of imps had come to watch the battle. They blackened every tree, every wall, every vantage point. Ghouls!

A sudden silence alerted her. The chatter around her had died away, although the murmur of the waiting army beneath was still rumbling like the sea. Men were turning around, moving cautiously on the unsteady footing. Everyone was staring south, and up. Kadie scrambled up to her knees, and took a firm grip on a stub of branch. A cloud? Birds?

Why should everyone be staring at birds? Had they never seen a flock of gulls before? Then she heard another sound, a very low note, surf far off. The birds were approaching steadily, not wheeling around as gulls did. They were moving awfully slowly, so they must be awfully high. Then how could she see them? And why did they glitter like that?

"Dragons!" someone said in a whisper. It might have been Death Bird himself.

Nonsense! She turned for a glance at the legions. They were almost close enough to make out individual men now, and they had stopped coming. The cavalry had drawn out in front, and the horses seemed to be giving a lot of trouble. She checked the spectators across the river, who were closer. No, they weren't! They were in full flight. The trees were bare.

"Dragons!" The mutters grew louder. The horde below the platform had noticed, also, and its mutter had stilled. The lark had fallen silent. There was only that sinister low rumble from the sky.

Yes, dragons! Oh, G.o.ds be merciful! So the river would not offer safe refuge at all, and the spectators would die, also. Dragons rarely took out less than a county, even when there were only one or two of them.

"Metal," a voice nearby said, uncertainly. "Must throw away metal." n.o.body answered. n.o.body moved. How could a man throw away his weapons when an enemy army was almost within range?

The flock was closer now, the shivery deep note recognizable as the beat of innumerable huge wings, all blended into one like the sound of raindrops becoming the single roar of a storm. Kadie's heart drummed painfully in her chest. Dragons! The stories she had heard and all the books she had read had rarely ever mentioned more than one dragon, two at the most, and there must be hundreds up there. They were almost directly overhead now, a spray of glittering sparks. Like diamonds in sunlight red and blue and white. Blaze, she remembered. Not a flock of dragons, a blaze of dragons. She had thought that dragons were almost extinct. She had never guessed there could still be so many left in the world.

Her neck was growing sore with staring straight up. She glanced at the river, and the far bank was completely deserted now. But the chiefs beside her were beginning to mutter again, making unbelieving sounds of hope. The dragons were pa.s.sing overhead, high as clouds, but not changing their flight. They were going to fly on, not stop to attack, fly right over the goblin hordea"to where?

Then there was change. The blaze seemed to slow its advance, seemed to grow brighter. They were coming!

A torrent of rainbow light poured down. Like a shower of jewels, the blaze fell from the sky. It was so beautiful to watch that she had no time for fear. n.o.body had seen this in hundreds of years, a blaze of dragons stooping! She could make out individuals now, big ones, small ones. The big ones were in the lead, glittering monsters with outspread wings, and the lesser dragons followed like a shower of glittering dust. Some of them must be huge, bigger than any ship she had ever seen, big as houses. Still they fell, still they grew larger, spiraling down from the sky. Almost she thought she could feel heat from them, even at this distance. They were spreading out in a vee, the foremost heading for the Imperial center, the laggards aiming for the flanks.

And they were not stooping on the goblinsa"they were heading for the Imperial legions. The dragons had come to rescue the goblins!

She scrambled to her feet, wobbling on the log, heedless of the risk of falling. All around her the goblins' voices were growing louder in a steady growl of astonishment that seemed to contain no words and grew rapidly into a roar of excitement. The dragons were attacking the legions!

"Are saved!" Blood Beak screamed. "See imps run!" The wall of bronze had broken. Maddened horses wheeled everywhere in wild disorder and foot soldiers scattered like chaff. Some were even running toward the goblins.

The lead worms impacted the center of the line. Dust and smoke billowed out from the ground as the great wings slowed their fall. Flame erupted from gra.s.s and trees. More and more dragons followed, two showers now, until a great sheet of flame engulfed the whole Imperial Army; wind roared and smoke billowed. Still more dragons descended into the holocaust. Faint screaming told of death agonies as men were burned or eaten.

Refugees came fleeing out of the smoke, racing for the goblin horde, and dragons flashed in pursuit, worms of fire streaking over the ground faster than racehorses. The baby latecomers came straight down on some of the fugitives. Kadie knew she was screaming, and could not hear herself over the deafening cheers of the goblins. She watched men being run down, flattened, engulfed. She saw stony dragon jaws seize them as dogs would seize rats, lifting them high to gulp them down. Usually they exploded in clouds of b.l.o.o.d.y steam before they were even swallowed. Terrified men fled across the smoking meadows, being chased by dragons of all sizesa"some longer than longships, others no bigger than ponies. The little ones glowed a dull red, but the giants had a blue-white glare that hurt the eyes.

Yet there seemed to be an invisible fence halfway between the opposing armies. Dragons that had caught their prey wheeled around to return to the flaming center, ignoring the feast of goblin swords beyond. A very few legionaries managed to reach that occult border and cross into safety. Their pursuers turned back as if forbidden to come farther. The fugitives continued to run until goblin arrows cut them down.

The legions had disappeared, houses and trees had vanished, and there was nothing left to burn. Air shimmered above a fiery welter of dragons where the Imperial Army had stood. In the farther distance, the little town was a roaring inferno, already almost consumed. Whoever had sent these monsters was on the goblins' side, and the goblins were screaming themselves hoa.r.s.e with excitement as they watched.

There was nothing left. Now what?

Now withdrawal. A whitea"hot dragon as big as a temple thundered over the ground with wings beating up clouds of flying ash. It launched itself into the air, heading straight for the goblins. The cheering stopped. Others followed it. Shivers of terror ran through the watchers, but they had no time to run before it became obvious that there would be no attack. The lead monster continued its painful climb, fighting its way up the sky. It pa.s.sed over the goblins too high for a bow shot, had anyone been crazy enough to try, but even at that height, blasts of scorching air beat down from its wings. One after another, the rest of the blaze followed it. The charred and empty land they left glowed faintly red.