Crossroads and Other Tales of Valdemar (31 page)

The scout who’d marked the back-trail stood nearby. His hands shook and his face was still pale, even after vomiting into the sand. Tregaran didn’t blame him. He was little more than a boy, a stock thief saved by a stint in the army from Karse’s rough justice. Tregaran looked at his pale face and shaking hands, and wondered if the boy thought keeping his hand now seemed a bargain.

Cogern toed the body with his boot, breaking into Tregaran’s thoughts. “What does this mind you of?”

Tregaran was a few seconds late. Mindalis, a scout leader, piped in first. “The man we found up by the border, Warmaster. The man with the horse.”

“Yeah,” Cogern said, in a troubled voice. “All we need is a horse’s head on a pike, and this’d be a perfect match.” He looked at Tregaran under his brows. “Absolutely perfect. This could be the same guy.”

Tregaran studied the body, comparing it to a body found in the borderland hills where Karse and Valdemar came together in the regiment’s Terilee River sector. The dead Herald, staked and tied out . . . not naked, but with his white leathers still about him to show what he had been. He had similarly been tied, flayed, and left to suffer unto death. Identically tied, once Tregaran saw what to look for.

“The Herald was little more than a boy,” Tregaran said slowly. “Whatever secrets he held would have been given up early in the torment. What had taken place after that had been for
fun
.”

Yet, the Herald’s surgical pain looked nothing to the outrages visited on the horse. The animal had been torn apart, by a hatred strong enough to shatter equine bones. The animal’s head, blue eyes open, set on a spearstave.

He returned to himself and shivered. Cogern’s marking the spear as Karsite, and the presence high on the border where Karse’s brave defenders protected them from the demon horses of Valdemar. The official version had paled when faced with the reality. They did not protect Karse from the demons . . . they protected the demons. A hard moment, the worst of his life.

Tregaran bent to look at the man’s hands. A laborer’s calluses, not a swordsman’s. He lay near the trail of the missing villagers, so was likely one of them. Whatever caused this man to die, it was even less then the Herald. That, at least, could be laid to spying. This? He could think of no sane reason.

“Officers,” Tregaran said, “file the regiment by. Let them get a good long look at what they are fighting against. We march at dusk. Blood for blood. Strength and honor.”

 

The lead scout pounded in on a stolen . . . borrowed horse.

“Sir, Thirteenth regiment reports having secured the crossroads. They will drive on to the city’s edge. They expect to ring the Sunlord’s by dawn. No sign of the Thirty-first yet.”

The firecat beside him looked up.
“Not to worry. Hergrim’s Thirty-first ran into more than they bargained for. Hardornan mercenaries, of all things, serving the Black. Most of the Black-robes’ mercenaries are dead, the rest scattered. In the name of the Good God, they’ll be at the city by dawn.”
It stretched and yawned, its job done.

“All right,” Tregaran replied, to the scout. “Give the Warmaster the same report and tell him to bring up the rest of the regiment. Once we’ve secured the priory, we’ll drive onto the city.” He paused, looking over the scout’s shoulder. “Never mind, the warmaster’s here.”

The older man, also on a “found” horse, halted in a spray of dust. The animal heaved and swayed. Cogern didn’t so much ride horses as wrestle them.

“Sir,” he said, while trying to control his snapping mount, “scouts report a village ahead. The trail goes straight in. Big fires. You’ll see ’em on the horizon once you come up out of the wadi.”

Tregaran shook his head. “No, our line of travel is north against the priory. That’s were they’ve massed their strength.”

Cogern shook his, a broad sweeping “no.” “Sir, looks like the Black-robes are drawn out. Not at the priory. Troops, mebbe a couple hundred. Priests out doing the Fires. Scout says there are mebbe forty to fifty Robes down there, and villagers. Hundreds of them.”

Tregaran puffed out his cheeks, thinking. “Okay, the village. Second Battle for the assault, hold the other two in reserve. It’s going to be too tight in there for one than one Battle at a time.”

Cogern nodded, rapping out orders to the under officers. The regiment shook itself out, moving from traveling order to assault column, then picked up Cogern’s trot.

Tregaran, a little ahead with the scouts, crested the wadi, and saw the firelight glow from over the low hills. Pillars of smoke rose, then spread out forming a black layer like a roof over the burning. The lurid red flames flickered and danced against the smoke and clouds, giving the little valley a hellish cast.

Second Battle came clattering up behind him, shields at the ready.

One scout, momentarily highlighted against the flickering red background, swung a piece of cloth over his head. Any sentries placed were now dead.

Tregaran led his Battle forward, charging up out of the wadi, across the flat ground, and started up the slope to where the scout now lay hidden. He heard the rest of the Battle, some four hundred men, go to ground below them. They sounded like a herd of horses puffing and blowing after the exertion of climbing the hill.

He leaned his head up over the crest of the hill, and peered over. The outer portion of the village glowed eerily in the firelight. Flames from fires leaped high, at thrice the height of a grown man. The firelight threw more red than yellow, the bonfires set in a rough circle around the outer court. The same pillars of smoke all but blocked the view into the inner part of the village. Tregaran could see the impression of more fires but little details. The rising smoke formed a complete veil over the town square.

He shook his head. Karse, wood-poor as it was, lost a treasure in the fires that night. An entire forest had to have gone into creating this much burning.

A knot of troops, several hundred strong, came into view from the village center. They formed a rough line, facing the regiment behind the hill. They obviously meant to defend the village from the Nineteenth Foot.

“They’re onto us, sir,” said the scout.

“No kidding,” replied Tregaran, then waved the horncallers to him. “Pass the word: ‘Rise and Make Ready.’ No Horns.”

The hornsmen scattered, running along the line and preparing the units for the charge. The Battle drawn into three rough lines, stood ready.

Tregaran raised his sword over his head and cut it down sharply.

“First sally. Go!”

The leading line of Second Battle gave the single shout “V’KANDIS!” and charged. They crested the low hill and sprang down the far side. The units’ leading edges lost coherence in the steep slide down the hill, but training, discipline, and momentum carried them into the thin line the Black-robes’ warriors set to defend their chiefs.

The mercenary men fought like lions, but in the eternal fight between soldier and warrior, soldier wins. The warriors, no matter how skilled, fought as singletons. The Men of Karse, trained and blooded brethren, fought as part of a larger unit. No shame in ganging two on one, three on two, five on two. No honor in the line, just the imperative of stab, guard, parry . . . shuffle step right to cover your mate’s exposed side. Thrust into the enemy’s back. His bad luck his mates didn’t cover down.

The leading edge of Second Battle broke into the black-robes’ line, fracturing it. Tregaran sent the second sally at that point, the men sliding down the steep slope. The reinforcements, piling into the first line, shattered the black-robes’ forces. They began to fall back. Warrior after warrior broke and ran as the fight turned south.

Tregaran still on the hilltop with the reserve, watched the enemy line fragment and fail.

He made a “come-here” gesture to the horncallers. “Blow ‘Halt Pursuit. Form Double Line.’ ” He looked at the Battle’s double squad of archers. They stood close by, weapons strung and ready. “Kill them,” he said quietly.

The archers leaped into action. They used the new Rethwellen pattern bows, sinew and wood . . . all backed with horn. The weapons shot fearsome distances on a flat trajectory. The archers brought the weapons into play quickly, standing on the hilltop and taking a savage toll on the firelit men who fled. Tregaran noted that the archers killed as many as the line. The Black-robes’ forces fell back into the village in disarray.

Tregaran’s mind flashed to a place where a regiment used the bow to provide the bulk of the killing power, rather than just skirmishing. He had an image of a line of pikes with Reth’ bows salted in, yard-long arrows in direct, flat-trajectory fire, and two or three more rows of archers behind, shooting overhead. The pikes would hold cavalry at bay, likely enough, and the Reth’ bows would punch through field armor for cert. If a half-company could work this slaughter, a regiment of bows would black the sun, and an arrow-storm that would shatter any unit closing. Valdemar’s slow, heavy foot would never have a chance.

The “Cease Arms” call brought him back to the moment.

The last of the Black-robes’ troops fled within the inner ring of houses surrounding the town square, depriving the archers of clear targets. Plunging fire remained an option, but there still remained at least one more fight tonight. Best to conserve arrows for the later fight.

He left a small detachment to guard the archers, and led the balance of the reserve down the hill. The horse they’d found for him plunged forward eagerly, not needing spur or goad. It nearly fell in the scree, and at one point sat down to avoid plunging tail over head.

The battle-line reformed quickly, the reserve moving to its accustomed place. He passed their lines, his horse bucking a little at the soldiers’ cheers. The troops’ blood was up. Winning did that, especially when the win laid low two of three enemy with no loss on your side.

Tregaran led them into the Fire-lit streets, nearly staggering from the heat and smell. No wood fed these flames. Instead, long bones marked the Fires’ fuel. Each piled between knee and waist high, and all burning with an unholy vitality. He was no stranger to battlefield carnage, enough to estimate a death count, and his gut told him hundreds lay slain just in the outer court. Most of the dead now fueled these fires.

He heard the sounds behind him as the soldiers took in the carnage and what burned in the fires all around. Their morale would soften if he gave them too much time.

“To me,” he bellowed. Then, “Charge!”

The Battle came behind him with a shout, and he led them between the thick, greasy pillars and around the line of buildings. The horse refused the flames, battling and bucking to avoid being driven forward. He felt it slide in the street, and fall heavily on one shoulder. Tregaran had bare moments to kick free to avoid having his leg crushed. He rolled away as the horse got its hooves under it and staggered upright, slipping one more time, before bolting in panic.

The troops, now ahead, rounded the corner. He grabbed what remained of his dignity, picked up his blade and shield from the street and ran to follow. His right leg still hurt, for cert from the fall, and it was more of a limp than a sprint when he cleared the corner.

His men already engaged hard, slamming into the fragments of the enemy battleline that still stood. A long line of families stood behind, calmly lined up by a roaring bonfire. The furnace heat struck him like a hammer, and he inhaled superheated air that brought him up short. Black-robes stood scattered throughout the town’s square.

Tregaran stood mute as more soldiers surged past him and broke into the square, cutting into the remaining mercenaries. Behind the mercenaries’ failing line, a priest calmly tapped a man on his shoulder. Tregaran watched helplessly as the man gathered up his daughter and, together with his wife and son, calmly walked into the center bonfire. The man’s flesh immediately burst into flames, but he stood without expression as the fires consumed him and all he loved.

Something about the smoke and rising sparks drew his eye. Tregaran slowly looked up, seeing the smoke from the fires bending together, blending into a single cloud, a maelstrom that slowly spun and turned, gathering the Fires into itself. He knew he should move, join the fight, but the overwhelming scene froze him. Decades of experience failed him as he took in something literally beyond his capacity. Failure and depression rolled over him. He had brought his men to this, failed them utterly. He tried to think of something to say, something to do, but his experience betrayed him as well. He simply couldn’t move.

The Black-robes’ last troops fell, and the soldiers broke past. They cut down priest after priest, and no few of the villagers as they turned to clumsily fight the veteran infantry. It became apparent to Tregaran than none of the victims moved of their own volition.

He shook himself out of his fugue. Now that he was aware of it, he could feel a heavy weight, like a blanket soaked in water, trying to descend on him. Its message was heavy, soporific.
“Listen to me. Do as I bid. Give over. You have failed. You are a failure. Just listen and all will be well.”

Tregaran tried to shrug the weight away, but now that he sensed it, he could feel it working its way into his mind. The depression built. He scanned around, frantically looking for the source of the oppressive weight in his mind. In the very center of the town square, next to the largest Fire, stood a priest working his stave.

A half-dozen soldiers cut their way through his final protection and pressed down on him. He raised his stave, and a
something
flowed out, moving like smoke. It coalesced in a few heartbeats, becoming a malevolent, envenomed whip, drawn from the end of the stave.

The first soldier swung his sword at the looping whip, his arm cutting smoke. Even in the distance Tregaran heard his high-keening scream. The man fell back, his arm boiling with blisters that ruptured. Maggots spilled from the wounds and chewed into his skin.