By Blood Betrayed (The Kingsblood Chronicles) (23 page)

Saul grimaced. “Greater Undead. This Lyrial is more skilled than I had been led to believe by your tale. Unless he has some hold over Temvri?” he asked.

Snog shrugged. “That’s as could be. Lyrial has a chest he keeps a couple o’ specters in, and I’m sure he’ll be keepin’ a hoard o’ other goodies in there. Me people hae’ ne’er had the gumption ta’ brave the wraiths, ya see, sir.”

Another wolf called from the southwest, a different, almost excited howl. Saul smiled grimly. “Teg’s coming, too. He’ll get here first, but Temvri will be right behind him. I’ll tell Teg to put Snarl out of harm’s way, since the bear will be no good against the knight.”

He indicated the weapons the two were carrying. “Any of that enspelled?” he asked. “Also, you appear to be able to see in the dark. Is that true?” He gestured around the dark bakery.

Lian said, “I can see in the dark about as well as an elf, sir. My sword is magical, as is my dagger.” Without another word, he drew that weapon and handed it to Snog.

Snog said, “Milord?”

“A loan, Snog. Not a gift,” he replied, clasping the goblin on the shoulder, “unless you earn it.”

The goblin nodded, tugging on his chin. “Kind o’ ye in any event. I’m wishin’ that it were a brace of magicked bolts, but it’s plain better than nothin’.”

“Teg’s club is a fairly potent weapon in its own right,” Saul said, leading them out of the bakery. “It was a gift to him from the druid and his people. Where they got it, I haven’t a clue.”

“That worthy’s giantish work, sir,” said Snog, “or I’m nae judge of weaponry.”

Magical smiths among the giants were rare, but not unheard of. Most giants with magical talents tended to be elementalists, investing their learning in the battle magics.

At that moment, several wolf howls rose, from a semicircle to the south. Their intonation resembled the first one, and Saul stiffened.

“What is it?” Lian asked, extending a hand to the ranger’s arm.

Saul said, “Temvri’s brought reinforcements. There’s several groups of both Undead and goblins moving toward the city. There’s something else, too, but I couldn’t get a clear picture.”

Lian looked at Snog. “Would Lyrial come here?”

Snog scratched his head. “I suppose he might, if ye’re that important to him. Did ye spoil somethin’ o’ his?”

Lord Grey undoubtedly told him who you are, Lian
, Gem said.
Lyrial must want to capture you
.

Lian turned to Saul. “This has escalated beyond a single Undead, sir. We’ll be on our way.”

Saul shook his head. “Don’t be foolish. There’ll be wraiths with them, and they’ll bring you to ground long before you get away. You’ll have a better chance with me, I assure you.”

He led them to the west edge of the ruins, where they saw Teg and the bear approaching on the run. “Teg! Tell Snarl to go after the goblins and to leave the Undead alone!” the ranger ordered.

“Okay!” Teg said, smiling with a little confusion. “What goblins? I sees only Snog.”

The ranger snorted. “Snog’s a friend. But there will be more goblins, and they’re fair game. I don’t suppose the manticore followed you?”

Teg said, “No, he learnt last time. He like him meal for free, though.”

“Pity,” Saul said.

Grey shapes bounded from the woods, a dozen timber wolves. These were well-fed and healthy specimens, and they circled the five companions.

Teg said, “They gonna eat goblins, too?”

Saul nodded. “Yes. We have to go after Undead, Teg, because we have the magic weapons.”

“Teg understand,” the big ogre said, hugging Saul close to his thigh for a moment. He turned his eyes to the south and said, “Things be movin’ in woods.”

At the same time, Lian heard the jingling of chainmail, a sound that was horribly familiar.

Chapter Twelve

“Tieran possesses a weak magnetic field, allowing the use of a compass in navigation. However, the moon of Luck, Ashira, has a much stronger magnetic field, and can pull a compass off of true north. The degree of this intereference varies depending on the distance between Ashira and Tieran, for the luck god’s moon circles the Tieran-Lushran planetary system at a great distance along with its sister moons of Sina and Sterath. Ashira’s 56-day cycle is well studied, and skilled navigators can make fairly accurate approximations of true north based on complex charts. A far more common and less complicated method of determining direction, however, is to employ a magical compass which always points due north.”

-- Pilot’s Guild treatise on magnetic navigation

 “He’s coming,” Lian said, looking apprehensively toward the southwest. The treeline was close, almost a stone’s throw away, and his line of sight was obscured. However, he could still somehow perceive the knight’s approach.

Saul wordlessly nocked an arrow, drawing the bow back to its full extent. His eyes rested on the same point that Lian watched, as if he understood that Lian knew the location of his pursuer.
Or as if he, too, can sense Temvri
, Lian thought.

The bear had been occupied sniffing at the wolves, and they at him. Some kind of decision was evidently reached, and they separated, spreading across a ragged line behind the four warriors.

How much power do you have?
Lian asked Gem.
We may need some counterspells
.

Not much at all, son
, she replied.
I can possibly interfere with a few spells, nothing more.
The admission betrayed to Lian the gravity of his mentor’s state, for she had been forged with particular emphasis on defense from hostile magics. At full capacity, she was able to unweave magics literally all day.

He swallowed his panic at this revelation, then loosened up his shoulders and legs as much as he could, truly frightened at her admission.

“
Zu e ni vala, li dor
?” asked Snog softly in Govlikel.
Are you all right, my lord?

He nodded in reply after Gem translated for him. “Just nervous, Snog.”

“Heh. I can imagine, son,” Saul said. “It’s not every day one draws the attention of an Undead the likes of this Temvri. The only advice I can offer is to trust in your gods to see you through, and that things will unfold as they were intended.”

At that moment, the clearing palpably chilled, as the aura of the knight reached out to cast a pall over the nighttime sky. Without further warning, the brush parted, and the chainmail-clad Undead strode purposefully from the cover. At his shoulders was a pair of wraiths, to all appearances sake identical to the two Lian had encountered in Firavon’s Tower.

The knight’s hollow voice boomed across the distance, carrying easily to the warriors’ ears. “You should have kept moving, boy,” it intoned flatly. “You might have bought yourself a few more days.”

Lian didn’t reply, but Saul did, letting fly with his arrow. It flew in an almost flat trajectory, and struck the knight squarely in the chest. There was a massive silver shower of sparks, and Temvri actually stopped momentarily.

Powerful bow indeed
, Gem observed.

Saul drew forth a second arrow, twin to the first, but the wraiths weren’t going to allow a repeat of the first strike. With the swiftness possessed only by the incorporeal Dead, they crossed the distance before Saul could fire again. Teg and Lian readied their weapons to defend the ranger, but were shocked when the wraiths suddenly halted, twenty feet away from them, as if they suddenly sensed something.

Saul fired again, ignoring the wraiths. His second arrow flew as accurately as the first one had, but this time it encountered some kind of barrier before reaching the knight, and dissolved in an even more impressive shower of sparks. When the remaining shards of light struck the knight, it staggered, but this time didn’t halt its advance.

As Saul fired, Teg stepped forward, swinging his club at full extension. The wraith he targeted attempted to dodge the blow, but the unexpected swiftness of the ogre’s motion caught it while its attention was diverted. The club flared deep red as it struck true, and the wraith’s form was completely obliterated.

Lian moved to support Teg, but the ogre and the remaining wraith were both too high for him to be effective. The wraith dodged the ogre’s follow-through nimbly, and reached its arms out hungrily toward Teg.

Before it was able to make contact, a dagger from the region of Teg’s knees tore through the wraith’s side, then flew on to land somewhere in the darkness. The goblin scout screamed a Govlikel battle cry and rolled quickly away from the ogre. The strike, while not decisive, caused the wraith to hesitate, and thus allowed Teg to regain his balance.

The ogre and the wraith began a carefully choreographed dance, the wraith flitting gracefully beyond the club’s reach, as Teg smoothly kept himself faced toward the dangerous specter.

Saul drew another arrow, this one tipped with mundane steel. He let fly, but the arrow shattered before it approached within ten feet of the knight. “That’s the last of that tactic,” pronounced the ranger, drawing his sword. The blade had deep blood runnels along most of its length, and was carved with powerful runes.

The knight had closed half the distance and was rapidly approaching, and Lian turned to Snog. “If you saw where the dagger went, go get it. If not, join the animals and strike the ghouls and the
A’kra Vilshari
.”

The scout nodded. “I’ll never find it in time to do any good, so I’ll support the beasts.”

“Good throw, by the way,” Lian added approvingly, handing his crossbow to his henchman. “It’s yours after the fight, if we live.”

The goblin’s grin widened as he accepted the extra crossbow and fell back. Assessing the slopes at the foot of the promontory, he said, “If they brought bowmen, they’ll take that rise and try to get a good line of fire on us.”

“If that happens, we withdraw into the city proper, and try to keep hard cover between us and the archers,” Saul said. “Even with the walls breached, the castle is the best defense to be had, so head there.

“Teg! You all right?” he called to the ogre, who had maneuvered about five yards further from them in his deadly minuet with the wraith.

“I is fine, Saul,” Teg answered. “He just think I is stupid!”

The knight was now a mere twenty feet away, and it paused a half-step, almost as the wraiths had. Continuing its advance, directly toward Lian, it announced, “This lies between the boy and me. Stand thee aside.” It made no promise that it would leave the others unharmed.

“Not on my land,
ciònel
,” Saul replied. “You want him, you go through me.”

The grinning death’s head, now within arm’s reach, nodded and said, “So mote it be,” and immediately launched into a furious attack on the two warriors. Lian abruptly found himself hard pressed to merely parry the knight’s ferocious blows, and without opportunity to riposte. Saul, too, though he was proving a skilled swordsman, was unable to counterstrike the Undead’s lightning blows.

The deathly cold of the knight’s aura chilled Lian to the bone, penetrating both cloak and armor as if they didn’t exist.
That cold’s going to slow me down sooner or later,
he said to Gem, who replied by singing a few clear notes, as song which reminded Lian of springtime.

The biting cold instantly abated, and the knight growled in annoyance. Gem said,
I couldn’t cover Saul; I just don’t have the strength.
Despite the literally bone-chilling cold, Saul fought on seemingly unaffected. The ranger also did not flinch at the spell emanating from Gem.

The two warriors desperately sought an opening, but the knight wouldn’t allow one, pressing its attack until they had been forced more than twenty yards from Teg’s struggle with the wraith. One of the wolves, a large black male, suddenly broke away from the others and raced toward the knight. It struck the frigid zone but didn’t hesitate as it leapt for the knight’s throat. The knight took advantage of the momentum of its current strike to slash the wolf across the throat, killing it instantly, but the animal’s body continued on its course, crashing into the Undead’s chest, burying the knight’s blade deep into the lifeless body.

It took the knight only a moment to free the blade and regain its footing, but it was enough time for Lian and Saul to simultaneously strike it with powerful blows. Both of their weapons were enchanted, and they sliced long gouges in the Undead’s chainmail.

Temvri immediately regained the offensive, but his strikes were noticeably slower and less accurate, and Lian sought to take advantage of an opening. This opportunity proved to be a feint, for the knight regained his former quickness and closed its left hand on Lian’s arm. Saul, however, had read the motion correctly, and took a slash across his leg from the knight’s sword in order to neatly cleave Temvri’s hand from its arm.

Lian pulled back for a moment, using Gem to pry the skeletal hand from his arm, but it was already crumbling to dust.

“You’ll pay for that, blood-drinker,” Temvri said. “I’ll have your hand to replace it.”

Saul limped backward, parrying desperately, and Lian returned to the press. He didn’t have time to consider the implications of Temvri’s statement, and Temvri seemed unhindered by the loss of its hand. Saul growled, “You’ll have nothing,
ciònel
, save an ending.” For the second time, Saul had uttered a word which neither Gem nor Lian could translate.

All three warriors were more careful now, but Lian was well aware that the knight would win in a battle of attrition. He wasn’t suffering from fatigue yet, possibly due to Lord Grey’s potion, but he knew he couldn’t depend on it to last indefinitely, nor would his attention. He would eventually make a mistake that would prove to be lethal.

Snog shouted from his sentry position away from either fight, “Movement on the ridge! We’ll have enemy bolts flying soon!”

Saul began chanting as he swung his blade, and Gem commented,
Battle magics. Our mysterious friend is a sorcerer
.

Temvri attacked Saul in earnest, shifting its attention from the prince.
Mistake
, Lian thought in elation, and took advantage of the knight’s preoccupation to land a few blows on its swordarm. These didn’t penetrate, but they did interfere with Temvri’s attacks.