The Eight Walls of Rogar: An Epic Fantasy Adventure Series! (The Lost Kingdoms of Laotswend Trilogy--Book One) (11 page)

Lost Friends

Andaris sat on a patchwork blanket beneath a large, especially wizened oak.  The tree stood in the center of a ring of lesser oaks that, like a crown, graced the head of the foremost rise in a wandering procession of hills.  A gaggle of geese flew in formation across the cloudless sky, then wheeled about over a swiftly flowing river, a silvery ribbon that shimmered and danced the length of the horizon.

What is this place?
Andaris wondered.
He couldn’t remember, though for some reason it didn’t seem to matter.  He felt so at peace, so completely calm. 
What was I just thinking about?
  But then the thread was gone and he was smiling, for Gaven, Trilla, and Jade were now there with him, laughing and talking without a care, enjoying the beautiful weather and each other’s company as they ate a picnic lunch.  Gone were the circles from beneath Gaven’s eyes, and the pain from Trilla’s.  Even Jade, as she demonstrated by rolling over and nuzzling Andaris’ hand with her nose, was back to her friendly self.  He rubbed her stomach affectionately, fed her a piece of cheese, and leaned the back of his head against the tree, feeling truly content.

Just as another smile was tugging at Andaris’ lips, the sky went suddenly from blue, to black, and then to crimson, swirling above them in a counter-clockwise motion.  Andaris stood as a blast of arctic air swept over the hilltop.  “What’s happening?” he yelled.  Instead of responding, his friends just kept chatting amongst themselves as though nothing were amiss.  Andaris watched with mounting dismay as it began to rain, because this was no ordinary rain—it was red like the sky, and when the drops hit the ground they sizzled.  Soon the verdant hills turned brown and the trees became skeletal.  He watched until the only green remaining was around the oak tree beneath which they sat, the grass ending in a scorched line beyond the cover of its branches.

“What’s the matter with you?” Andaris screamed.  “Don’t you see what’s happening?”

“There is a great army,” said a rasping voice.

Andaris spun around, and there, standing before him, was Ashel Tevellin.  His robe hung in tatters, his hair was streaked with gray, and his eyes were covered with skin, but it was he.

“It is much greater than they think,” he proclaimed.  Hunched over as he was, he resembled an old man, though was apparently not as frail as he looked, for with nothing more than a wave of his right hand a transparent blue dome mushroomed above them.  Andaris’ hair stood on end.  The dome crackled and arced, a barrier through which the rain could not pass.

“They cannot see it,” Ashel went on, pointing out across the ruined landscape.  “But you can.”

A dark army crested over the hills, trampling everything in its path, its ranks filled with bestial creatures that were part demon and part animal.  Ahead of them, in a bright flash of light, a second army appeared.  This one was comprised of fair-skinned men with golden hair and silver armor.  There were many hundreds of them; heads held high, riding atop prancing white steeds.  The sky parted above them.  Sunlight shone down, making their armor sparkle.  Green grass grew tall beneath the hooves of their horses.  Wildflowers bloomed.

“Look!” Ashel warned, gesturing over Andaris’ shoulder.

Andaris gasped as he turned, seeing one of the diseased creatures sitting on the blanket with his friends.  “Get away from them!” he yelled.  But neither it nor they appeared to hear.

The dark haired beast lounged on its side, dripping mucous and pus from its nostrils onto its fur.  The branches of the tree sagged as the creature hacked its filth into the air, the leaves turning oily and black.  The grass withered as Gaven happily took a bite of a worm-infested apple.  Andaris wanted desperately to help.  He tried, but found he could not move.  His eyes remained locked on the creature in morbid fascination as he struggled to make his legs work.

Ashel directed Andaris’ attention back to the army of light, the bulk of which was now disengaging the enemy and galloping towards the tree. 
They see what’s happening
, Andaris thought. 
They’re coming!

A bold-looking older man led the force, strong and vital despite his advanced years, staring ahead with slit-eyed resolve—a worried father seeing his daughter in danger.

King Laris
, Andaris realized. 
It must be.
 
He’s trying to reach Trilla
.

They rode hard, but the other army poured towards them like cockroaches, falling over themselves, biting and clawing each other in their haste.  King Laris and his men were soon overtaken, wholly consumed by the dark tide.  At last aware of what was happening, Trilla stood and cried out, watching in horror as her father was pulled from his horse into the swarming sea below.

Laris’ sword flashed from its sheath.  “To me!” he bellowed.  His men fought to reach him.  Out of the hundreds, only twelve were successful, joining with Laris to form a defensive square.  Creatures died from all sides of the square as the majority flowed past.  For a brief moment they held, yet only for a moment.  Each time a man fell, the others closed ranks, until just four remained.  The four stood back to back.  Then four became two, and two, as the stocky man with the iron shield took a spear through the gut, became one.  Laris’ sword struck out with vengeful fury, seeming to cover all sides at once.

He’s going to make it,
Andaris thought, looking on in astonishment as Laris hacked his way closer.  Knowing that his death meant his daughter’s death, the man simply refused to fall.  As if sensing this, the monster next to Trilla smiled cruelly, raised its sword and, with lazy contempt, stabbed its point through her heart.

“Nooo!” Laris yelled.  “Trilla!”

Making no sound, she stared blankly at the steel protruding from her chest, her face eerily composed.  She reached out and touched the sides of the blade, as though unconvinced it was real.  Her palms were sliced open as the sword was withdrawn.  She sat down and crossed her legs, still silent, a doll without a stand.  Her eyes unfocused…then she shuddered, slumped forward, and with a quiet little sigh, exhaled.  Unable to bear the loss of his daughter, the king brought his sword vertical and dropped to his knees, allowing his body to be swept away.

Gaven had been lying on the blanket with his hands clasped behind his head, chuckling and talking to empty air.  As the beast chopped Trilla’s fair head from her shoulders, Gaven’s laughter turned into a roar of agony.  Finally free of whatever spell he’d been under, he bounded to his feet—and was slain before he could even draw his sword.  Blood spilled over his lower lip as the creature stabbed its claws through his jugular.  Jade leaped at the thing with a ferocious snarl—and in mid-air was hacked in two.  Andaris could only watch as the creature retracted its claws and let Gaven fall face first to the ground, as a circle of red formed around the big man’s shoulders and head.  The thing turned, grinned at Andaris and, along with Gaven, Trilla, and Jade, dissolved to smoke and drifted away.

Ashel materialized in its place.

“Why didn’t you do something?” Andaris demanded.  “Why!”

Ashel stared at him with a look of deep regret.  “If only I could have,” he said sadly.

Then the dark army was upon them.  The earth shuddered beneath its ghastly weight.  Fissures opened in its wake, spewing jets of steam and fire into the air.

“You must not allow this to happen,” Ashel moaned.  “You must stop it.”

Andaris was trampled under before he could respond, ground down beneath hoof and boot.  And then he, like the others, turned to smoke and drifted away.

Desert Scout

H
is name was Kindere Muldune, and at nineteen he was the youngest scout in the Rogarian army.  His mission was to locate the shapeling force, record their position, numbers, rate of movement, and then report back.  The four other scouts who’d been sent before him had not yet returned.  It was also his job to find out why.  He had left Rogar ten days ago and had ridden due west into the Waste.  The farther he went, the more desolate it became.

There was an outpost two day’s ride west of the castle, under the command of Captain Bendolli.  Bendolli was Kindere’s uncle on his mother’s side, as well as his friend.  Another scout had been dispatched at the same time as Kindere.  His name was Onoaken Branchwood.  They had ridden together as far as the outpost, at which time Kindere had been given new supplies and Bendolli had been given new orders, orders which instructed the captain to finish the civilian evacuation of the area and pull his men back to the castle.

      Kindere sighed and tried to rub the kink out of his neck.  He had been given enough food and water to last him two weeks, which meant, strictly speaking, that he should have turned around yesterday.  Being a scout was often lonely work.  The night he’d spent at the outpost now seemed a lot longer than eight days ago.  He wasn’t sorry that he’d volunteered for this mission—he just hoped he didn’t disappoint everyone by going back empty-handed. 

       His mother had started sobbing when he’d told her goodbye, clinging to him as if she’d never see him again.  His father, although he’d done an admirable job of hiding it, had been worried too.  Worried, but so proud that even he had become choked up. 

      Kindere had been more affected by his father’s husky voice and glassy eyes than by his mother’s uncontrolled sobbing, because he knew it meant just as much…or perhaps even more.  It was the closest he’d ever seen the man come to tears, and if that wasn’t love, what was?  Indeed, his father seldom expressed emotion of any kind.  A lifetime of trial had beaten the sentimentality right out of him.  Keep your head down and keep trudging forward, no matter what happens—that was his motto.  He was slow to smile, and he never, ever, at least as far as his son knew, cried.

Kindere looked up at the sky.  The sun was so big and bright out here that, until it finally went down, it seemed it would shine forever.  It was warm now, but would become brutally cold when darkness fell.  He pulled out a small pouch containing a balm of herbs and animal fat, squeezing a pearl-sized amount onto the tip of his finger.  Trying not to wince, he rubbed some onto his cracked lips, and some into his nostrils.  His light complexion was ill suited to the desert, a fact which made an already difficult situation worse.  If he wanted to make what water he had last, he would have to limit himself to one cup per day.  Under normal circumstances that wasn’t enough.  In this environment it wasn’t nearly enough.

The sand had stopped blowing…for the moment anyway, so Kindere lowered his hood, raised his goggles, and took out his spyglass.  The scope was standard issue for all scouts.  His was new enough that the lenses were still scratch-free.  With a flick, he extended the eyepiece and looked through.

Nothing,
he thought.  There was only white sand and blue sky for as far as he could see, same as always.  He put the scope back into the case on his belt, lowered his goggles, raised his hood, and clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth.  His horse, which was exceptionally well trained, started forward at a walk.  If he had clicked twice, she would have galloped.  Three times, and she would have sprinted.  While peering through the scope, he’d spotted a sand dune that looked taller than the rest.  He decided to head for it.  Hopefully from up there he would be able to see farther.

By the time he reached the dune, the sun was hovering just above the horizon.  It had taken him longer than expected, but then that’s how traveling in the Waste could be.  Things were rarely as they seemed.  The endless tracts of sand could play tricks on the eyes—not to mention the mind.  Already the temperature was beginning to drop.  It would be dark soon, so once again he took out his scope and peered through.

To his disappointment, he saw only more sand, endless miles of it, stretching into the hazy distance.  Kindere leaned down and patted his horse on the neck.  “Well, Trika,” he said in a fond tone, “ready for some rest?”  Scouts typically formed strong and lasting bonds with their horses.  They needed one another for companionship, as well as survival.  A scout more times than not would risk his life to save his horse, and the horse would almost always do the same for him.

The next morning, Kindere woke up shivering, curled in the fetal position in the bottom half of his sleeping bag.  It was the cold that had woken him, his body telling him that he needed to get going.  The bag had a down lining that was supposed to keep a person alive even if the temperature dropped below zero.  Kindere clenched and unclenched his hands, trying to get some feeling back into his fingers.  As cold as he was, he couldn’t fault the bag’s design.  After all, he
was
still alive.  No one had claimed it would keep him alive in comfort.

Have to get my blood moving,
he thought as he unlaced the bag and poked out his head.  He gritted his teeth against the sudden stab of cold air, but then smiled, for the sky was just beginning to lighten.  “Thank the Maker,” he whispered.  If it had still been dark, he would have been tempted to start a fire, something which, given his mission and location, he very much needed to avoid.  After crawling out of the bag, he stamped his feet against the ground, hopping from one to the other.

Trika whinnied at him, seeming unusually restless.  “Goo…good mor…morning,” he chattered back at her.  She whinnied again, this time more insistently.  Trika normally had a very calm disposition, so when she started to snort and jerk her head from side to side, he became concerned.  Her senses were much more acute than his own.  To disregard her moods would be foolish.  Most times it would be nothing—an animal or a change in the weather.  Yet occasionally….

Kindere pulled out his scope, looking for anything unusual.  Turning to the west, he saw a line of clouds rolling in, their tops menacing and black, billowing up and out at an extraordinary rate. 
So that’s what’s bothering her,
he thought. 
There’s a storm coming.
  A light breeze whispered through his hair.  He pulled the eyepiece out as far as it would go. 
Is that rain on the horizon?
he wondered.

Lightning flashed across the sky, making him nearly drop his scope, for in that instant he saw thousands upon thousands of hunched over shapes moving fast behind what he now realized was not a wall of rain, but a shimmering silver curtain wreathed in mist.

His first impulse was to jump onto Trika’s back and ride east as fast as she could carry him.  This is not, however, what he did.
 
Going against every instinct he had, Kindere stayed and kept his eye pressed to that scope, because he, like his horse, was very well trained. 
Don’t panic,
he told himself. 
They’re still a long way off.

Even as the world brightened, the army remained cloaked, advancing at the same rate as the clouds, or perhaps it was the clouds that were advancing with it.  Either way, there was dark sorcery at work here, of that he had no doubt.  The curtain stretched from the ground to the bottom of the clouds, an impenetrable wall through which he could now see nothing.

The lightning had caused the curtain to become momentarily translucent, and yet still he’d only been able to make out vague silhouettes moving behind it.  Even if there were another flash, he doubted he could get more than a rough estimate of the army’s size.  Rogar already had estimates.  What they needed was a definite number.  Some of the silhouettes had loomed high above the others, seeming impossibly large.  He prayed this was just an illusion to inspire fear, for if not—if they were really as they had appeared—would even the
Eight Walls of Rogar
be enough to stop them?

A hundred shapelings holding up long poles marched out of the curtain.  Black and gold flags waved from the majority of these poles, but the four in the middle bore something else.  Kindere felt bile rise in his throat when he recognized what that something was.  Strung up on the poles like sadistic trophies were the four missing scouts, at least one of whom, horribly, was still alive.

Kindere knew them all by name.  Bullderk, the man who was screaming and kicking out his feet, was a good card player and a devoted husband.  It looked as though his eyes had been plucked clean from his head.  Ganden, the one on the far right, was a favorite with the ladies, too handsome for his own good, full of charm and laughter—now half his face was gone, caved in like spoiled fruit.  Halderk, second from the right, was a strapping lad not much older than Kindere, steadfast and kindhearted, always willing to offer a helping hand to those in need.  Finlock, second from the left, was engaged to be married to a girl with milky skin and jet-black hair.  She was far too pretty for him, or so everyone said.  But she adored him, every hair on his scruffy head.  They had grown up together, and had always known they would one day marry.  Finlock loved being a scout almost as much as he loved Alissa, and now he was dead.

Feeling a rage unlike any he had ever known—a rage fueled by fear and grief—Kindere struck the ground with his fist and cried out, “Rodan will make you pay for this!  The faithful will have their revenge!  The seas will swell with your blood!”

He was about to put away his scope and pull out his bow, with the hopes of putting Bullderk out of his misery, when several winged shapelings flew from behind the curtain and took the lead.  They were man-sized, moving through the air with remarkable agility and speed.  Kindere shuddered. 
Walls won’t do much good against them,
he thought. 
No matter how high.

One of the winged creatures turned its scaled head and made eye contact with him.  For a moment Kindere was transfixed, then he jerked the scope away and jumped to his feet.  It was definitely time to go.  Those things would reach him before Bullderk came in range, he was sure of it. 
Won’t do Rogar any good strung up on one of those poles,
he thought. 

After retracting its three prongs, Kindere pulled Trika’s anchor from the sand, slid it into its holster on the saddle, hopped onto her back, and clicked three times.  She lurched immediately into a sprint.

But how?
he wondered. 
How could it have seen me? 
He peered over his shoulder, half expecting one of the winged creatures to come swooping in for the kill.  The malevolence gleaming in its eyes had chilled him to his marrow.  In them, he’d seen a hatred for all things good and natural, as well as a ravenous lust for butchery. 
We are coming,
its eyes seemed to have said. 
We are coming to eat your flesh and steal your souls.
  Kindere leaned low in the saddle and squeezed his legs against Trika’s sides for more speed. 
Faster,
he thought.