River Of Life (Book 3) (40 page)

As Hendle turned back toward the battle, a squalling and screeching
sound split the sky.  Hendle’s throat and stomach twisted.  Looking up, he
watched as a cloud of dragbas glided into the fight.  For the giants, they were
no more than mosquitoes, but for the main soldiers of Hendle’s army, they were
a horrible end to life.

WITH the wraiths pushing their army with their very presence,
their army surged forward, pushing Hendle’s into a retreat.  Slowly Hendle’s
army was being pushed against the wall’s edge.  There were no towers to flee
down and only a few ladders.  The only other exit was a couple gates, and
slowly the wizard’s army began to trickle through them.  The dragbas picked at
random members from Hendle’s army to take into the air and then consume in
seconds.  Hendle watched as empty chunks of armor rained back down.  He saw
before his eyes the battle that had consumed Mortaz over two decades
before—except the goblins were on the opposite side this time.

Bahsal tried to reassemble his dwarve warriors to try a counter
attack.  The dwarve leader yelled at different commanders, taking the full
force of his own dwarve army along with those of the Broken Mountains, and waded into the enemy, a wall of axes and thick bodies.  He formed them into a
wedge, pushing forward.  He kept shoving banner men around, commanding new
rhythms from the drummers.  He wanted to push the wraith's army apart, but he
did not want his own men to march behind the enemy, to be cut off from their
escape.

Bahsal came close to Hendle.  "We're going to push them
apart, divide them, force them back and to the sides.  Use the gates behind us
to escape.  Topple the towers over the edge and make a ramp.  Can use them to
at least get off this first wall.  And get the giants to swat those damn
dragbas down," Bahsal told the wizard.

No one could get an exact count as to how many wraiths there
were.  The warlocks drifted around both armies, appearing and then fading
away.  Wherever they appeared, the soldiers of Hendle’s army began to cough up
dust as they immediately aged from the inside.  Within moments, the soldier
would become a handful of dust that was added to the desert.

Wherever a wraith appeared, Hendle's army surged backward into a
retreat that became an enormous wave of shoving bodies.  The army of the
wizards feared the power of the wraiths and the death that their very presence
brought.  A wraith stood on the upper wall chanting a spell that flowed down
into the bottom tier.  It was a high-pitched screech that caused the ears to
bleed and warped the mind.  It was a spell of insanity, of panic and despair. 
Members of the flailing army began leaping from the walls to plummet to the
earth far below as the spell stole their logic, destroyed their ability to
think.

Hendle began humming his own counter spell.  A sparkling blue
wave started at his feet and moved through his army, filling their minds with
the calm of the twilight world of the elves.  It was a spell taught to Erelon
by the elves of the twilight world, and this spell he had handed on to Hendle.

The enemy loosed a huge arrow with attached chains.  It was shot
by a machine with cranks and pulleys.  The recoil caused by the release of the
arrow, made the machine jerk backward, leaving the ground for a moment before
landing with a crunch.  The arrow burst through a giant’s body.  The chains
were attached to a spool, and monsters began to reel the chain in, slowly
pulling the giant to its knees.  Every pierced muscle in the giant’s body
popped out as the force was intense.  Several more burst through his body,
tearing through muscles, breaking bones, a red explosion of mangled flesh
bursting from where each arrow struck.

As the giant came to his knees, thrashing against the chains
which grounded him, goblins swarmed onto him like ants over a dead carcass. 
Their swords pierced and tore into the giant, carving away his muscles.  Many
goblins bit in, the giant struggling as he watched the goblins eating his own
flesh as they tore it from his body.

A chain snapped free, and the thrashing body of the giant caused
the chain to slip through the air, smashing into the enemies.  It whistled and
then collided into the bodies of the goblins, breaking them with tremendous
force.  The tip of the chain caught an ogre in the face, smashing every bone. 
A troll strode over, driving his large spear through the giant's throat.  Auri
watched as his own army was forced apart, slowly separated from the giant,
unable to help his ally.  Slowly the thrashing of the giant grew less intense
as goblins carved pieces away, and then the giant finally crashed to the earth
on his chest, a few nerves still jerking, causing muscles to vibrate, but soon,
even those ceased.

Bahsal had learned long ago how to use every part of his axe as
a weapon.  He blocked with the flat of his axe and then brought the top up,
smashing it below the goblin’s helmet, stunning it, smashing its jaw.  Then
Bahsal brought the axe around, up over his head and then down, splitting the
goblin’s helm and skull.

Bahsal breathed heavy and stopped to take a short look around. 
The dwarve’s greatest fear was that the enemy goblins underfoot would come back
to life among his army.  The dwarve dropped his head and ducked back into the
battle, bringing the axe in low, into the belly of one creature, and then
taking the legs out from under another.  He wasted no time making sure the
goblins were dead.  All that concerned the dwarve was that they could no longer
fight.  The dwarves behind would make sure the fallen enemies were dead.

An ogre jumped from within the goblins, scattering its allies. 
As other dwarves stood paralyzed, Bahsal rushed in.  The dwarve rolled below
the mace as it came crashing into the earth.  Bahsal heaved his axe into the
belly of the big monster.  Then he swung the axe around, taking a leg just
below the knee joint.  As the ogre dropped, Bahsal brought the axe back down,
taking the arm that carried the mace.  The monster's weapon dropped to stick
upright in the earth.  Finally Bahsal’s axe came back up into the ogre’s helm. 
The ogre dropped to the earth with a flop.

Though Bahsal’s part of the army fared best as the dwarve leader
tried to push forward, the wraiths would not allow it.  When Bahsal gained
ground, the wraiths would appear, destroying Bahsal’s army with panic and
death.  Bahsal watched as the dwarve beside him disappeared into dust, the
armor falling to the ground.  Bahsal jumped backward as a ghastly form
developed beside him.

"Barku," the dwarve growled as he shoved his axe into
the form.  It dissipated and blew away.  More than one way to fight the
wraiths.  Detour their path so someone else would have to face them, he thought
grimly.

Auri threw his shoulder into Iriote.  The weapons master had
seen his nemesis wading through the wizard’s army, his scimitar slicing in
large, fast arcs.  The assassin flew backward from the impact.  Auri was
wielding his grimdget.  The heavy blade crashed into the ground, missing the
assassin as he rolled.  Auri easily spun the blade around, using every inch of
it.  Auri brought the blade through the skull of one goblin and slammed the
back of the weapon into another, stunning it, and then brought the pointed end
down into another.

Iriote attacked, and Auri easily blocked the scimitar, bringing
his own weapon through a full swing.  The grimdget was fast in the hands of
Auri.  Iriote continued to back off, waiting for his chance to make his own
strike.  Auri brought the blade around under hand, over his head and then swung
wide in front, so quickly that the assassin had no chance to make a thrust of
his own as he arched his head back to avoid being severed at the neck and then
had to suck in his stomach to avoid being gutted.

The long handle of Auri's weapon exchanged hands as he passed it
back and forth from one to the other as it spun around on all sides.  He
blocked the lunge of a goblin and then with a downward stroke severed another
from neck to navel.  Always advancing on the assassin.  Auri's gaze never
seemed to leave his rival even as he dispatched the lives of the goblin's
around him.  Iriote backed away tripping over a stone, falling backwards. 
Iriote’s face turned white as the blade cut through his arm.

“Not yet,” Iriote hissed and then backed into a swarm of
goblins, clawing away on the ground.  The goblins charged Auri, swarming as
they tried to protect their general.

Grism tried to take a troll, alone.  None were there to help,
and the troll was a menace, scattering Grism’s allies with a giant mace.  He
was not accustomed to evading and then striking in planned attacks.  Grism
always waded in swinging.  But here, the old fighter had to avoid the massive
club, attacking only when the troll appeared open to an attack.

The club slammed close to Grism, sending his body sprawling
through the air like an empty bottle in a bar.  As Grism rolled over and looked
back up, the club was raised high above the troll’s head.  Grism barely had
time to move before the club again crashed into the earth, again sending his
body airborne.  Grism lost his hearing as the explosive impact left his ears
ringing.  Grism looked up into the eyes of the stubborn troll as his body
floated.  Grism could count the blood vessels in the troll's eyes, the beads of
sweat dripping around the contours of his muscles, watched as the troll's eyes
went from hateful to concentrative as it aimed to mash his much smaller
opponent.  The breeze is quite comfortable, Grism thought to himself and was
immediately unsure why that thought would go through his mind.  The mace again
raised in this last effort to kill Grism.

Auri’s body blew over Grism.  The weapons master rolled and came
up with the grimdget, smashing it into both shins.  He slammed it first into
one and then twisted, burying it in the other.  The troll let out a roar of
pain.  A giant’s stray rock from a sling smashed into the troll’s knee,
disintegrating the joint.  As the troll crashed to the earth, Auri rushed
toward it, his grimdget crashing down against the helm, the handle shattering
in his hands.

Auri grumbled curses as he rolled out of the path of the troll’s
hands, which were swiping at the foreign prince.  The weapons master’s hands
came in contact with a goblin lance, and he charged, forcing it through the
troll’s skull.  The troll's eyes went immediately blank; his head snapped back;
and drool formed in the corner of his lips.

Auri stepped over to Grism and helped the old brawler to his
feet.  “Should stay close,” Auri warned.

Grism walked right behind the southerner as they marched back
toward the main battle.  Stay close, Grism thought to himself.  This was a
battle, not a game in a pub.  What did the southern prince expect?

"Maybe I'll give you a leash," Grism grumbled.

"I'm sure someone has some rope," Auri bit back.

As they joined the other southerners, a mob of goblins rushed. 
They slammed into the defensive line.  Grism found himself ducking below the
legs of a particularly tall goblin, and as he stood back up, Auri was gone. 
Only a few men were left close to the old brawler.  They were trying to keep a
circle of goblins from rushing over them.

The mayor was leading his small band of centaurs.  Their huge
frames burst through the lines of the wraith’s army.  They were massive,
wielding huge swords and shaolin spades.  They crushed the enemy, trying to
force the enemy into breaking apart, trying to divide them, push them into a
retreating frenzy.  But the wraiths held their army together simply with their
presence, as any goblin who broke away in an attempt to flee was immediately
torn apart by the force of a spell by the wraiths.  So the wraiths' army drove
the wizards' army against the walls.

Fresmir fought where he wished; the wraiths left him alone.  The
Brect seemed to be the only warrior on the battlefield that the wraiths
feared.  The Brect would leap over huge piles of goblins to land on a troll,
tearing the jugular out of the massive creature with his fangs.  The short
sword in his hands darted in and out of enemies leaving huge holes, but he
would pick up massive weapons, huge maces, axes, and swords, and then leap into
the battle striking out, clearing huge paths.  The strength of the Brect had
been unknown; both armies watched as he dragged trolls to the ground, and the
wraiths would not approach him.  The Brect did not seem to control any powerful
magic.  Yet, there was something within the creature that made even those of
the wizards' army uneasy in his presence.  The absence of his lower body made
many question his relationship to the warlocks.  He had been given no orders. 
Hendle even avoided him, wondering what had happened between Fresmir and Erelon
to instill this kind of loyalty.

The dragbas continued to harass the wizards' army, lifting off
soldiers while pieces of armor and bones rained to the ground covered in
blood.  They had been a feared nemesis two decades earlier, and still the
wizards had found no efficient way of destroying them.  The dragbas were
impossible to target with a bow or any other weapon, and there were hundreds of
them.  The best method seemed to be the giants, who swatted at them like flies,
using their huge shields and mallets.

One wizard stepped beside Hendle, "Let me give it a
try."

A fiery explosion sounded from inside the dragba cloud.  At
first a ball of white light quickly spread, engulfing the winged creatures, and
as it died, it slowly turned to black as if all the light had been sucked into
a hole.  Pieces of rubbery wing or falling bone rained down, but the main mass
seemed to feel the attack before it had happened and had scattered like
frightened birds.  The impact of the explosion, the frantic increase and
decrease of light, the repercussion against the walls and the mountains shook
the ground, and a few stones fell out of the walls.  Hendle caught the wizard
as he blacked out.

"Take him," Hendle ordered.  Two soldiers rushed over
and carried the wizard away.

Hendle saw a wispy shadow reform across the ground.  He looked
up as the sky returned to a pale grey blue, a buzzing cloud of dragbas reforming
again like gnats.  There seemed to be a never-ending supply.  The general shook
his head.  He did not have enough wizards to do that again.