Path of the Magi (Tales of Tiberius) (33 page)

In another part of the woods, Welby and his squad had found a small country tavern to shelter in for the night.  He sat by the fire over a pint enjoying the unexpected peace and quiet.  He almost didn’t notice the man coming up beside him.

“As I live and breathe, if it ain’t old Welby,” said a familiar voice. 

Welby looked up to see an old associate from his days in the Green Woods.  Joe was thinner than he remembered; his face looking worn.

“Hello, Joe, it’s been a while hasn’t it?”

“I heard you’d taken the Queen’s shilling,” Joe said.  “I didn’t believe it when I heard it, but here you are,” Joe said, fingering the Ranger’s tunic Welby wore.

Welby wondered where this was going.  Last he had heard, Joe was still in the bandit gangs. 

“Times change,” Welby said.  “The law has come to the border lands.  I like to be on the winning side.” 

Joe’s voice dropped down low.  “Winds change all the time Welby.  You did me a good turn a couple of times.  I like to even the score.  Might be time to take a few days off.  Leave of absence for you health, if you get my drift.”

Welby looked sharply at Joe now.  “What are you talking about?”

“Keep your voice down,” Joe whispered.  “It’s worth my life breathing a word like this to anyone.  But I owe you, Welby.  Anyways, I’m not saying nothing.  Just that you’re looking a bit pale is all.  You could take a few days off.  A week or so maybe, away from here.  Like I said, it will be good for your health.”

“Listen, Joe, if you know something...”

Joe looked frightened now.  “I’ve said too much already.  It’s worth my life, Welby!  We were born and bred here.  We know the queen is real power around here.  I can’t say more; she’ll have my life for it!” 

Welby nodded.  “Ok, Joe.  I appreciate the health advice.”

Joe slipped away.  “You take that warning. Get away from here.  Get away quick before All Hallows'.” 

Welby watched him leave, then took a long drink.  Then he got up.  He had to find the captain.  Something was up, something bad.

Deep in the forests, a band of goblins sat around a campfire.  An ugly female dropped a small bit of roasted rabbit in front of her chief, who glared at her.

“Don’t snarl at me!  Be grateful you’ve got a tasty bit of rabbit the way things are going.  We ought to be raiding some sheep at least, not crawling back to the rocks.”

“We be eating man flesh again soon.  We’ve had orders.”

Whatever else he was going to say was cut off as he suddenly found himself jerked up into the air.  He floated a few feet in the air for a second or so while everyone in the camp gasped in astonishment and wonder.  A second later he flew across the forest; his brief flight ended abruptly when his body smashed into a large sturdy tree.  The rest of the goblins stood staring for a moment.  Then another of the warriors suddenly fell over dead with an arrow sticking in his throat.  A couple of seconds later another one died.

Someone glanced at the arrow.  “Elves and wizards!  Run!” 

There was pandemonium in the camp as a couple of more arrows hit.  Goblins were scrambling for cover and generally running for their lives. 

A few hundred yards away, Gillyian put down his bow.

“They’ll be back shortly with reinforcements,” he said, turning to Tiberius. 

“We'd best hurry then,”  Tiberius said.  They quickly jogged over to the goblin camp where they found the goblin chief still unconscious by the base of the tree he'd been slammed into.  Gillyian took the knife and sword from the stunned goblin.  As the goblin chief came to, Tiberius gestured again, and the goblin slid up the side of the tree.

“What do you know about the queen’s plans?”  Tiberius asked him.

The goblin gasped for air.  “I tell you nothing!” he snarled.  He was starting to panic though.  It was hard to breathed in the wizard’s telekinetic grip. 

Tiberius gave a loud laugh.  “I already know everything!  I’m just a bit curious how much she trusts her little minions.”

The goblin looked startled.  “You know about…”  He cut off his words but not his thoughts. 

“Her pathetic little raid on Halloween?  I know everything!  Did she bother telling you the target?”

The goblin stared at the wizard, his eyes wide with astonishment.  How could they know about the raid already?  Who had blabbed?  The wizard knew more than he did apparently, the queen hadn’t told anyone the exact target yet.  Just to gather towards the south before Halloween.  The wizard seemed to know it all.

The goblin's panicked deliberations ended with a thump as the wizard released his telekinetic grip and let him crash down to the forest floor.   

  Tiberius stood looking over him in disgust.  “I guess that’s all you know.”

A second later Tiberius was slightly startled to see an arrow emerge from the goblin’s chest.  Gillyian shot him straight through the heart, instantly killing the goblin.  Tiberius spun around and glared at Gillyian.

Gillyian shrugged back at him.  “Sorry.  I thought you said you were done with him.” 

“I suppose so, but did you have to kill our prisoner?”  Tiberius said.

Gillyian shouldered his bow;  “I thought you might get it into your head to do something noble and foolish like letting him go.  Killing a goblin in cold blood is a job for an elder who really knows and understands what a goblin is.  They are all going back to hell sooner or later, so why not sooner?” 

Tiberius tried to think of something to say, but Gillyian just came and put a hand on his shoulder and smiled. 

“You’ve grown up so much since I first met you, but in some ways you are still very young.  I only hate goblins because I know them.  Anyway, we’d better get a move on or there is going to be more senseless killing, which you so rightly abhor.”

“Were you able to read his mind?” Gillyian asked, as they mounted their horses.”

“It worked; I can read surface thoughts when I make the effort.  Telling him I knew everything brought the plan to his mind.  He didn’t know much.  Just that he’s been ordered back to join in a raid.  They plan to attack on Halloween, to the south apparently.”  

In spite of himself, Gillyian looked at the dead goblin and worried.  “Could he have been concealing things from you?  Maybe we should have kept him alive for a deeper probe.”

“Anything more than surface thoughts takes a lot of time and skill.  Very unreliable too.  It’s easy to mix fact and fantasy,”  Tiberius explained.

“Halloween … that doesn’t give us much time,”  Gillyian pondered as they began to ride. 

“I know,” Tiberius replied, and Gillyian noted the hooves on their horses started to glow with a blue flame. 

Back at Vonair, Lord Brandon was finishing another long day.  It should have been routine, but the reports coming in were now anything but routine.  Something was up and it worried him.  Harvest time had been a running battle with the goblins and other dark fairy folk as long as he had been Lord of Vonair.  Last year had been pretty intense, as the goblins struggled to steal enough of the harvest to get through the winter.  The start of this month had been no different.  

Suddenly, everything had stopped.  At first he’d ignored it.  It could have been so many innocent things: a late messenger, the goblins taking the day off, who knew?  But it had been a few days now and everything had gone quiet.  Too quiet, Brandon laughed to himself.  He never thought that cliché was possible.  But now that he faced it, it was the only way to describe the situation.  It wasn’t like the goblins, and it had to mean they were up to something.  Probably something not good for him, though a slim part of his mind held out hope that it was some sort of internal strife.  He’d heard some rumors the goblins were growing unhappy with their queen.  All the same something was up.  He could feel it.

     He stared at the map stretched out in a corner of the Great Hall.  It was covered with wooden chits representing the positions of his patrols.  Darras and Tiberius were already out.  El Gato was due to leave in the morning.   He wondered where to send him, when the man walked in and saluted. 

“What news, Captain?”

“Nothing to report, M’lord.  Everything is still very quiet.”

“I don’t like this at all,” Lord Brandon said to El Gato.  “None of our patrols have encountered any resistance.  They should be desperate now.  We’ve been on their heels all summer.  They’ve got to be running out of food.  With winter closing in they’ve got to do something.” 

“I’ll bet someone’s making a move on the queen.  I’m surprised it hasn’t happened before this,”  El Gato said. 

“That’s possible, but…”  Lord Brandon checked his thoughts.  Lord Darras had just walked into the room unexpectedly, with one of his Rangers in tow.  Welby, wasn’t it?  He was one of the men they’d turned from the old Green Woods gangs.  Maybe here was news at last.

“I thought you should hear this M’lord,”  Darras said.  “Welby was approached by one of his old associates.”

Lord Brandon looked expectantly at Welby, who cleared his throat nervously before speaking.

“We were having dinner in a local tavern on the border.  Thought we might get a bit of news.  Everything had been so quiet.  I had an old friend come up to me and suggest that I take a few days off for my health.  He owes me a favor and apparently he thinks something is up.”

“We’ve had a few other hints and tips too,”  Darras said.  “All the bandit gangs are on alert.  There’s an urgent call out for mercenaries and I don’t think it’s assassins this time.” 

Brandon pressed his hands down on the table.  “The bitch queen is up to something all right,” he said.  “Some sort of raid or attack.  I just wish I knew more.  We’d better alert the towns and militias.  Maybe even evacuate Lychester?”  

“Any sign of Tiberius?”

“One of my men reported that he and Lord Gillyian went scouting closer to the Black Hills.”  Lord Darras said. 

“Here, M’lord,” Tiberius said, suddenly striding into the chamber as if on cue. 

Lord Brandon looked up expectantly.  Tiberius was looking more worn than usual.  “Well?”

“Forgive my appearance, M’lord.  I came as fast as I could.  It is as we feared.  The goblins are gathering their remaining forces.  Everything they can on this side of the river.  They are planning a massive raid on the eve of All Hallows.  I took the news directly from the mind of a goblin chief.”

“Halloween?!  That’s only three days away!  The Rangers can’t handle that many at once,” Lord Brandon said grimly.  “We’ll just have to button down until we can get reinforcements.  Maybe now those bureaucrats back in the capital will authorize a siege of her fortress in the Black Hills.  As it is, we barely have time to alert the townsfolk.  If we send messengers now, they should have time to make a run towards the fortress at Vonair…”

“With respect, sir, I think that’s what she’s counting on,” Tiberius said.  “They can’t win a stand up fight against the army of the Stewardship.  This has to be a raid in force, fast and bloody.  She’ll expect us to retreat back to strongholds.  With us locked up in towers, she can help herself to whatever goods and grain are stored out in the country.  We won’t be able to move enough food into shelters in time.”

“What choice do we have?  I can’t give battle with just the Rangers.  If I call up the county militia, where do I send them?  We can’t defend every village.  On such short notice how can I defend anything?”

“Bring the army up from Sherwood and Walsingham,”  El Gato said.  “We’ve enough troops.  We can be on her doorstep in three days time.”

“That might be our best plan,”  Darras said.  “Only trouble is that she’ll see that coming.  The road from Fort Marion is watched.  As soon as they open the doors she’ll know the army is on it’s way to her.  She fall back inside of her caves.  We don’t have enough men to drive her out of there, and while we’re doing that she’ll slip some of her army out one of her back doors and raid some other town.  The army can’t stay on her doorstep forever.”

“Darras,” Tiberius asked, “What do you think she’d do if she thought we weren’t on to her?”

Darras studied the map.  “If I were her I’d come straight south to Lychester, hit there on Halloween, Secondtown on the 1st.  I’d make for Henry’s on the 2nd; after that it would depend on reports of how close the army is.  From Henry’s she can scatter in all directions and let the army try and catch her.”

“That’s probably her plan,” Lord Brandon concurred.  “I doubt she’d target Stapleshire, too much chance of being caught between the armies of Sherwood and Walsingham.  Northwest she’d be running away from our armies but into the elves.   The towns along the river have better fortifications too.  She hasn’t bothered Lychester much; I’ll bet she’s been saving it as a juicy morsel for just such an occasion as this.

“What if the army didn’t just march out from Fort Marion?  They could force march south west behind the wall, cut over near Walsingham and with help from the gnomes take the back roads over the hills to Lychester,” Tiberius suggested. 

“That would take a week,” Lord Brandon protested.

“I don’t think so.  The army should be able to force march one day behind the wall, 30 miles.  Another 20 to Lychester over the hills.  Easily done in two days.”

“I don’t know.  It would take a day for the messenger to get to Fort Marion.  If the commander is around and he decides to listen to the messenger…”

“What if you were to go yourself, sir?  I can have you there in two hours,” Tiberius said.

“Two hours?  The fastest stagecoach couldn’t … oh...” It suddenly hit Lord Brandon what Tiberius was suggesting. 

“I can get you to Fort Marion in two hours.  Another hour to Walsingham.  We can have the army on the move by dawn.”

Darras nodded agreement.  “If they can come up though the hills from the south there’s a chance the queen’s troops won’t see them until it’s too late.  If we can have the militia join them…”

“It’s sixty miles from here to Lychester,”  Lord Brandon said. 

“Fifty miles has been done in a single day, frequently,” Darras said.

“Yes, but can our militia do it in three?”  Lord Brandon took a few steps over and looked out the window at the sky.  It was more overcast than he would have liked, but not overly threatening.  “If the weather holds...”  He shook his head.  “Look, you boys don’t know what you’re asking.  Even if I can get there in an instant there’s no guarantee that I’ll be able to talk the other commanders into this plan.  If we guess wrong, the queen could slip around us and make an attack on Sherwood City.  Colonel Brice may not feel like risking his career for this scheme.  God only knows what they’ll think of this idea down in Walsingham.  In any case, we will be committed.  We’ll be putting the county militia against the queen’s army for sure.  That could be a near thing if we don’t get our reinforcements from the regular army.”   

“If there’s any chance, sir, I think we should try,” Darras said enthusiastically.  “At worst we’ll get the other commanders to put on a show of force.  That would blunt the force of the queen’s raid if nothing else.” 

Lord Brandon made up his mind.  “By God, we’ll try it.  At worst we will drive her back into her holes.  Darras, you’ll take command in my absence.  If anyone can get the militia to Lychester in three days it’s you.  I want messengers to every village on their way tonight.  Get Malory to send reinforcements to Reuelshire.  They’ll never make it to Lychester in time but Reuelshire will need the reinforcements if they slip past us somehow.  Tiberius, how do we do this?”

“Just saddle your horse and be ready to ride; I’ll take care of the rest,” he answered.  

Getting the horses ready didn’t take long.  Lord Brandon and Tiberius rode normally, walking their horses out of the fortress.

“What now?”  Lord Brandon asked.

“Now?  Now we ride!”  Tiberius answered.  Leaning towards the horses and gripping his staff he spoke, “Kuru kiel la vento!”

Both horses reared up and the next minute both were off like a shot.  The horses ran, starting out running as any horses would, but Lord Brandon soon realized they were accelerating beyond what was normally possible for a horse.  The hooves of the horses were glowing with a blue fire and sparks frequently lit out when their hooves touched a rock on the road.  They rode neck and neck together.  Lord Brandon realized he still had to guide the horse; he was still riding it.  Actually it seemed to be running fairly normally apart from the fact it was going faster than was normally possible. 

Tiberius looked over at him.  He had to shout a bit because of the wind.  “Are you all right?” he asked.

Lord Brandon shouted back at him, “I have got to learn how you do this!”

Tiberius laughed and they continued along the road.

The guards at the Sherwood Fortress were alarmed by a faint blue light moving towards them, very quickly.  The captain of the watch was summoned but the light was fading and slowing down as he came to the walls.  At last two men were seen on horseback riding up calmly to the gate. 

“Who goes there?” the captain asked, shining a light down on the riders.

“Lord Brandon of Vonair.  I need to speak to your CO.  Now!”

Recognizing the colonel, the sergeant snapped to attention. “Yes, M’lord!  Sir, the commander’s gone to bed.”

Lord Brandon stepped over to him.  “It’s only nine o’clock.  Wake him; don’t tell me he’s indisposed, either.  I don’t care if you have to kick a whore out of a his room and sober him up, I need to see him, NOW!”

The sergeant practically fell over himself trying to salute, back up, and go get the commander all at once.  Tiberius spoke a brief word to Lord Brandon.

“I need to speak with Dallen about covering the witch’s spies.”

“Go now; this will take a while.  How quick before we can do this again?”

“As quick as you like,”  Tiberius replied.

“Check back in an hour; if we can make Walsingham before midnight…”

“We should, if luck holds.”

“Good, an hour then; wait, Dallen’s in Sherwood City, isn’t he?  Could you take a quick note to General Fuller?  He should be informed; the Sherwood Militia might have to cover Fort Marion.”

Lord Brandon drew out some paper and scratched out a quick message. 

Tiberius hesitated, one of the few times Lord Brandon ever saw Tiberius falter. 

“General Fuller’s your father isn’t he?  I gather you don’t talk much these days.  If it’s too awkward…”

Tiberius snatched the note. 

“No, that’s fine.  He’s never hesitated to do his duty.  Nor have I.  He’s just not … enthusiastic about my chosen profession.  I’ll meet you back at the inn, around midnight.”

A few minutes later, Tiberius entered Dallen’s mansion.  Mr. Eumaios met him with a cup of coffee, which Tiberius gratefully accepted.  Dallen joined him a minute later. 

“Always a pleasure, Tiberius; what brings you out this time of night?”

“I’m sorry, sir; the hour presses.  The goblins are massing for an attack on Halloween.  We’ve just days to stop them.”

“What can I do to help?”  Dallen asked.

“I brought Lord Brandon here to speak with the army.  I think we can have the troops in place in time, but I’m worried about the enemy's spies.  If we can keep them from knowing our true position it would be a great advantage.  But they have many birds and shadow creatures at their command.  I know the theories of how to combat that but…”

Dallen smiled.  “Ah, the old game, eh?” He gave a gentle chuckle.  “Yes, that’s a bit tricky.  You’ll need to study my monograph on the subject.  For now, though, I think I can teach best by a bit of demonstration.”

Dallen gave a soft whistle.  A moment later one of his silver birds flew up and he held out a finger for it to perch upon.  Dallen bent over and whispered to it. 

“Get the others, we’re going to keep the goblin queen’s spies on the run for a few days.” 

The silver bird saluted.  “We’ll take care of it, sir!”