A Darkness at Sethanon (61 page)

“What were
you doing running down the street?” he asked in a harsh
whisper. “The order for noncombatants to leave came a half hour
ago.”

The girl looked
frightened but spoke calmly. “My mother hid us in the cellar.”

Locklear looked
incredulous. “Why?”

The girl
regarded him with mixed expression and said, “Soldiers.”

Locklear swore.
A mother’s concern over her daughter’s virtue could cost
all three of her children their lives. He said, “Well, I hope
she prefers you dead to dishonoured.”

The girl
stiffened. “She’s dead. The trolls killed her. She fought
them while we ran.”

Locklear shook
his head, wiping his dripping forehead with the back of his hand.
“Sorry.” He studied her for a moment, then recognized she
was indeed pretty. “I really am sorry.” He was silent,
then added, “I’ve lost someone, too.”

A thump on the
floor above, and the girl stiffened more, fear making her eyes
enormous as she bit the back of her hand to keep from screaming. The
two smaller children clung to each other and Locklear whispered,
“Don’t make a sound.” He put his arm about the girl
and blew out the lamp and the cellar was plunged into darkness.

Guy ordered the
inner gate to the keep closed, and watched as those too slow to reach
it safely were cut down by the advancing horde. Archers fired from
the battlements, and anything that could be hurled at the attackers
was thrown - boiling water and oil, stones, heavy furniture - as the
last, desperate attempt to resist the onslaught began.

Then a shout
went up from the rear of the invading army and Murmandamus came
riding forward, trampling his own soldiers as often as not. Amos
waited beside Guy and Jimmy, ready for the first scaling ladders to
be brought forward. He looked at the frantically hurrying moredhel
leader and said, “The dung-eater still seems in a hurry,
doesn’t he? He’s a bit rough on the lads who happen to be
in his way.”

Guy shouted,
“Archers, there’s your target!” and a storm of
arrows descended about the broad-shouldered moredhel. With a scream
the horse was down and the rider fell and rolled. He leaped to his
feet, unharmed, and pointed toward the keep doors. A dozen goblins
and moredhel raced forward, to die under bow fire. Most bowmen
concentrated upon the moredhel leader, but none could harm him. The
arrows would harmlessly strike some invisible barrier and bounce off.

Then a ram was
carried forward, and while dozens of invaders died, it at last
reached the doors and was brought to bear. Moredhel archers kept the
defenders down, while the rhythmic pounding began.

Guy sat with his
back to the stones, as flight after flight of moredhel arrows sped
overhead. “Squire,” he said to Jimmy, “hurry
downstairs and see if de la Troville has his company together. Order
him to be ready at the inner door. I think we have less than ten
minutes before they’re inside.” Jimmy hurried off, and
Guy said to Amos, “Well, you pirate . .. it looks like we gave
them a good run.”

Hunkering down
beside Guy, Amos nodded. “The best. All things considered, we
did all right. A little more luck here or there, and we’d have
had his guts on a stick.” Amos sighed. “Still, there’s
no use dwelling on the past, I always say. Come along, let’s go
bleed some of those miserable land rats.” He leaped to his feet
and grabbed the throat of a goblin who had just cleared the wall. The
creature had not seen any defenders, and suddenly there was Amos,
seizing him by the throat. With a jerk he crushed the creature’s
windpipe, and cast him back down the ladder, dislodging three more
who were right behind him. Amos pushed the ladder away as Guy slashed
with his sword at another who climbed through a crenel beside Amos.

Amos stiffened
and gasped and, looking down, discovered an arrow in his side. “Damn
me!” he said, apparently astonished by the fact. Then a goblin
breasted the wall, and struck out with his sword, the impact nearly
spinning Amos around. The former sea captain’s knees buckled,
and he fell hard to the stones. Guy cut the goblin’s head from
his shoulders with a savage blow.

He knelt next to
Amos and said, “I’ve told you to keep your damn head
down.”

Amos smiled up
at him. “Next time I’ll listen,” he said weakly,
then his eyes closed.

Guy whirled as
another goblin came over the wall, and with an upward thrust he
gutted the creature. The Protector of Armengar, former Duke of
Bas-Tyra, slashed right and left, bringing death to any goblin,
troll, or moredhel who came close to him. But the outer wall of the
keep was breached, and more invaders swarmed over, and Guy saw
himself being slowly surrounded. Others on the wall heard the call
for retreat and hurried down the stairs to stand within the great
hall, but Guy stood over his fallen friend with sword ready, not
moving.

Murmandamus
walked over the bodies of his own soldiers, ignoring the cries of the
dying and wounded around him. He entered the barbican of the keep,
passing the shattered outer doors. With a curt motion of his hand he
ordered his soldiers forward with the ram to begin the assault upon
the inner door. He moved to one side while they began beating on the
door, their comrades seeking to rid the walls of Sethanon archers.
For an instant all within the killing ground of the barbican were
intent upon the splintering door, and Murmandamus stepped back into
the shadows, silently laughing at the folly of other creatures. With
each death he had gained power and now he was ready.

A moredhel
chieftain ran into the killing ground seeking his master. He brought
word of the battle in the city. Fighting over spoils had broken out
between two rival clans, and while they had been distracted, a pocket
of defenders had escaped certain annihilation. The master’s
presence was required to keep order. He grabbed one of his underlings
and asked Murmandamus’s whereabouts. The goblin pointed, and
the chieftain shoved the creature away, for the dark corner he
indicated was empty. The goblin ran forward to work upon the ram, for
another soldier had fallen to arrows from above, while the moredhel
chieftain continued to look for his master. He asked about, and all
said that Murmandamus had vanished. Cursing all omens, prophecies,
and heralds of destruction, the chieftain hurried back toward the
section of the city where his own clan battled. New orders were about
to be given.

Pug heard
Macros’s words in his mind.
They are trying to break
through
.

Pug and Macros’s
minds were linked, with a rapport beyond anything Pug had experienced
in his life. He knew the sorcerer, he understood him, he was one with
Macros. He remembered things from the sorcerer’s long history,
foreign lands with alien people, histories of worlds far distant, all
was his. And so was the knowledge.

With his mystic
eye, he could ‘see’ the place they would attempt to
enter. It existed between their physical world and the place where
Tomas waited, a seam between one time frame and another. And
something like sound was building, something that he could not hear
but could feel. A pressure was rising, as those who sought to enter
this world began their final assault.

Arutha tensed.
One moment he had been watching Pug and Macros standing like statues,
then suddenly another moved in the vast hall. From out of the shadows
came the giant moredhel, his face a thing of beauty and horror as he
removed his black dragon helm from his sweating brow. Bare of armour,
his chest revealed the dragon birthmark of his heritage, and in his
hand he held a black sword. He fixed his eyes upon Macros and Pug and
moved toward them.

Arutha stepped
out from behind a pillar, standing between Murmandamus and the two
motionless mages. He held his sword at the ready. “Now, baby
killer, you have your chance,” he said.

Murmandamus
faltered, his eyes growing wide. “How –” Then he
grinned. “I thank the fates, Lord of the West. You are now
mine.” He pointed his finger and a silver bolt of energy shot
forward, but it was warped to strike the blade of Arutha’s
sword, where it danced like incandescent fire, pulsing with white-hot
fury. Arutha flicked his wrist and the point of the blade touched the
stone floor. The fire winked out.

The moredhel’s
eyes again widened, and with a shriek of rage he leaped toward
Arutha. “I will not be denied!”

Arutha narrowly
avoided a blow of stunning savagery, which caused blue sparks to leap
when the black blade struck the stones. But as he moved back, his own
sword flicked out and he cut the moredhel upon the arm. Murmandamus
shrieked as if some grave injury had been done, and staggered back a
moment. He righted himself as Arutha followed the blow with another,
and was able to parry the Prince’s second thrust. With a look
of madness, Murmandamus clutched the wound, then regarded the crimson
wetness upon his palm. The moredhel said, “It is not possible!”

With catlike
quickness Arutha lashed out, and another cut appeared upon the
moredhel, this one across his bare chest. Arutha smiled a smile
without humour, one as savage as the moredhel’s had been. “It
is possible, scion of madness,” he said with studied purpose.
“I am the Lord of the West. I am the Bane of Darkness. I am
your destruction, slave of the Valheru.”

Murmandamus
roared in rage, the sound of a vanished age of insanity returning
into the world, and launched his attack. Arutha stood his ground and
they began to duel in earnest.

Pug.

I know.

They moved in
concert, weaving a pattern of power, erecting a lattice of energies
against the intruder. It was not so mighty a work as that used to
close off the great rift at the time of the golden bridge, but then
this rift hadn’t been opened yet. But there was pressure and
they were being tested.

The pounding on
the door continued as the wood began to splinter. Then came the sound
of distant thunder, growing louder. The pounding on the door halted
for a moment, then resumed. Twice more the booming sounded, as if
coming closer, as the sounds of fighting seemed to be increasing.
Then from outside came unexpected cries, and the pounding of the ram
on the door ceased. Then an explosion rocked the hall. Jimmy leaped
forward. He pulled aside the slide that covered the peephole, then
yelled back at de la Troville, “Open this door!”

The commander of
the company signed his men forward as the sounds of fighting reached
his ears, and it took the strength of most of the men to move the
half-detached door. Then they heaved and it opened and de la Troville
and Jimmy raced through. Before them men in brightly coloured armour
ran through the streets, battling moredhel and goblins on every hand.
Jimmy shouted, “Tsurani! By damn, it’s an army of
Tsurani!”

“Can it
really be?” said de la Troville.

“I’ve
heard enough stories from Duke Laurie to know what they’re
supposed to look like. Little fellows, but tough, all in bright
coloured armour.”

A squad of
goblins turned before the keep retreating from a larger company of
Tsurani, and de la Troville led his own men out, taking them in the
rear. Jimmy hurried past, and heard another loud explosion. Down a
broad avenue he could see a black-robed magician standing before a
smoking pile of barrels and an overturned wagon that had been used as
a breastwork. The magician began conjuring. Within a moment there
flowed from his hands a heavy rolling ball of energy which struck
some target beyond Jimmy’s line of sight, exploding in the
distance.

Then a company
of horsemen came galloping into view, and Jimmy recognized the banner
of Landreth. Riding alongside came Kulgan, Meecham, and two
black-robed magicians. They reined in and Kulgan left his mount,
nimbly for one so stout. He approached Jimmy, who said, “Kulgan!
I’ve never been so glad to see anyone in my life, I think.”

“Have we
arrived in time?” asked Hochopepa. Jimmy had never met the
black-robed man, but, given his arrival with Kulgan, Jimmy assumed he
had some authority. “I don’t know. Arutha vanished some
hours ago with Pug, Macros, Tomas, and a dragon, if you can believe
Galain’s report to du Bas-Tyra. Guy and Amos Trask are around
here somewhere.” He pointed toward some fighting in the
distance and said, “Du Masigny and the others are over there
somewhere, I think.” He looked around, his eyes wide with
terror and exhaustion. His voice began to sound thick with emotions
held too long in check, rising with a near-frantic note. “I
don’t know who’s left alive.”

Kulgan put his
hand on Jimmy’s shoulder, realizing the boy was close to
collapse. “It’s all right,” he said. Looking at
Hochopepa and Elgahar, he said, “You’d better look
inside. I don’t think this battle is truly over yet.”

Jimmy said,
“Where are all the Dark Brothers? There were thousands around
here only a . . . few minutes ago?”

Kulgan led the
boy away, while the two black-robed magicians ordered a squad of
Tsurani soldiers to accompany them into the keep, where the sounds of
fighting could still be heard. To Jimmy, the green-robed magician
said, “Ten magicians of the Assembly came to join us, and the
Emperor sent part of his army, so much did they fear the appearance
of the Enemy upon this world. We created a gate between the portal on
Stardock and a place less than a mile from the city, but out of sight
of Murmandamus’s army. We marched three thousand Tsurani here
along with the fifteen hundred horse from Landreth and Shamata, and
more are coming.”

Jimmy sat.
“Three thousand? Fifteen hundred? They ran from that?”

Kulgan sat next
to him. “And the Black Robes, whose magic they cannot oppose.
And the news that Martin is upon the plain with the army from Yabon,
four thousand strong, less than an hour away to the northwest. And
I’m sure their scouts saw the dust from the southwest, where
the soldiers from Darkmoor are marching beside those from Malac’s
Cross, followed by Gardan’s regiments from Krondor. And all can
see the banners of Northwarden to the northeast, and in the east the
King comes with his army, one or two days away at most. They are
surrounded, Jimmy, and they know it.” Kulgan’s voice
turned thoughtful. “And something had already disturbed them,
for even as we approached we saw bands of Dark Brothers quitting the
city, fleeing for the Dimwood. At least three or four thousand seemed
to have already abandoned the attack. And many of those between the
gate and here were not organized, and some even seemed to be falling
out among themselves, with one band fighting another. Something has
happened to blunt the attack at the moment of victory.”