Alutar: The Great Demon (46 page)

Garth turned serious. “I had heard of the prince’s plight,” Garth said. “It bothered me that everyone had given up on him. I knew of an extraordinary healer, but there was no chance of getting either Montero or the king to listen to me. I did the only thing that I could do. I spirited the prince away and got him healed. Was that wrong?”

“Goodness no,” answered the general. “Don’t misunderstand me. I would have hanged you if I had caught you, but I am glad that I did not. I remember Prince Harold as a lad. He was always sickly, and my heart went out to him. You can’t imagine how I felt when he walked through that door today. He has turned into quite a handsome young man, and he seems to have a good head on his shoulders, too.” The general chuckled. “I think King Harowin is going to have his hands full with the young prince. Harold always was idealistic, but I no longer see his views as juvenile. I could see the hurt in his eyes when he talked about the slums. The king will allow Harold to do what he wants as a way to humor him, but I believe the prince will actually do some good there.”

“He will,” agreed Garth. “If you find it in your power to aid him, please do so. He truly wants a better Ertak for the citizens.”

The vanguard of the Federation force halted. General Askor and General Eylor were in the front third of the column when it halted, and both generals left the column and rode forward. When they reached the vanguard, they discovered the reason for the halt. The forest ended and a broad grassy plain spread out before them. In the distance, the walls of Tagaret could be seen.

“Tagaret,” General Askor said breathlessly. “We have reached it unscathed.”

“Hardly unscathed,” frowned General Eylor. “We lost three of our battle mages and another two are not fit to fight. All of our men have welts all over their bodies, first from the insects and then from the bees that accosted us earlier today. A couple of hundred men are so bad off that they will not be able to fight at all, and most of our cavalry units are without horses.”

General Askor sighed irritably. “I meant unscathed by an attack,” he scowled. “Stop dwelling on trivial matters. Look at the wall, Eylor. That is the first obstacle that we must breech.”

“The city has three walls in total,” stated General Eylor. “This is but the outermost one. What are your orders?”

General Askor turned in his saddle and saw Colonel Hildon not far behind him. He waved the officer forward, and Colonel Maxwell of the 38
^th
Corps came with him.

“I want our armies camped along this broad plain,” instructed General Askor. “The 37
^th
Corps will occupy the southern section and the 38
^th
Corps the northern section. All command tents will be situated between the two armies but at the rear of the encampment. I want a defensive camp established with barricades on three sides. Leave the forward facing side unencumbered. Once the defensive barricades are established, send out foraging teams, and get the engineers started on making the siege engines. Also, assign a large group of men to make scaling ladders. I want everything ready for an attack tomorrow.”

Colonel Hildon frowned, but said nothing.

“You have a problem with my orders, Hildon?” asked General Askor.

“No, Sir,” answered the colonel, “but the men are not in the best of shape. Many of them spent the better part of their energy today merely by walking. Your tasks will keep them up half the night. I was assuming that we would be resting the men for a day or two before attacking the city.”

“The Alceans knew somehow that we were coming,” answered General Askor. “I have no doubt that they have already sent out messages for reinforcements. I have no intention of giving them the time they need to be reinforced. We will attack tomorrow.”

“I will see that your orders are carried out, General,” Colonel Hildon replied.

Colonel Hildon immediately began issuing orders to the men of the 37
^th
Corps. Colonel Maxwell turned his horse and headed back along the trail to inform the 38
^th
Corps of the orders. The two generals sat for a while in silence, staring at the distant walled city. On the walls of that city, a small group of Alceans stood, staring westward at the edge of the forest.

“I am sure of it,” stated General Gregor. “I have seen several glints of their armor already. The enemy has arrived.”

“Seeing as we were expecting them yesterday,” offered Colonel Borowski, “I am not surprised to see them. They will probably spend the day tomorrow making siege engines.”

“It is dangerous to make such an assumption,” the general said dryly. “The fact that they force-marched their army from the portal tells me that they are in a hurry. I would not be surprised to hear them felling timber tonight for those siege engines.”

“Our defenders will be ready for an attack in the morning,” declared King Arik. “We have all worked hard to prepare for this battle, I will not have us caught napping when it begins.”

“I wish Jenneva had known about this,” Queen Tanya said. “I could use her help.”

“How could she not know?” asked the king.

“We got word that Garth had been arrested in Farmin,” answered the queen. “She separated from me to see if he needed help. I didn’t find out about the attack until I returned to the Red Swords.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” said King Arik. “These armies only have eight black-cloaks assigned to them.”

“Only?” frowned the queen. “After all these years, you still do not understand magic well. While I might prevail against any one of them, or even a group of them, they can easily split up, denying me the chance to counteract their spells. Also, I will be needed mostly for shields to save as many of our men as possible. Trust me, I could use Jenneva by my side. Even Theos would be a boon, but I sent him and Balamor to Ur. Karl has no mage up there, and I suspect that he desperately needs some.”

“And that leaves only you to shield the king,” frowned General Gregor. “That is most disturbing. Do you know how to make fire glue, or is Jenneva required for that?”

“I know how to make it,” answered the queen, “but there should be ample supplies in the palace.”

“Not ample enough,” interjected King Arik. “We sent a lot of it through to Zara. We are going to need more.”

The queen sighed and nodded. “Then I had better get busy,” she said wearily. “I will be in the palace if I am needed.”

The queen left the wall to return to the Royal Palace. King Arik watched her go and then turned back to gaze at the western horizon. The sounds of trees being felled carried on the wind, and the king nodded knowingly.

“They are wasting no time,” he said to no one in particular.

“They are felling trees for barricades,” stated General Gregor. “If the sounds last more than an hour or two, we will have notice that they are working on the siege engines.”

“It looks like they are setting up camp only before the western wall,” Colonel Borowski commented a while later. “I would have expected them to camp outside all three sides of the city.”

“They are not trying to stop us from escaping,” replied General Gregor. “As long as they can guard their flanks when they attack, I suspect that they will concentrate their entire force on just the western wall. They seek to overwhelm us quickly.”

A fairy flew down and landed on King Arik’s shoulder next to Prince Midge. The fairy prince ordered the other fairy to report on the enemy.

“They will attack tomorrow,” reported the fairy spy. “They will spend tonight building siege engines and scaling ladders. There seems to be some problems among the enemy. They spoke as if the men had had a hard time getting here.”

“What do you mean?” asked King Arik. “Were they attacked?”

“That is not clear,” frowned the fairy. “They spoke of welts covering the men’s bodies, and the loss of most of their horses. Three battle mages died and two were badly injured. Whatever happened, there is discord among them. The men want to rest, but the generals are committed to attacking tomorrow. That is all that I know.”

King Arik and General Gregor exchanged puzzling glances.

“This would be the prefect time for a Ranger attack,” General Gregor sighed. “Anything that would keep those men up all night would keep them exhausted.”

“We do not have Rangers available,” countered the king, “but that should not stop us from harassing the enemy. Prince Midge, send out some fairy spies. I want a clearer picture of what happened to the enemy army and just how exhausted those men are. Also try to find out exactly where the siege engines are being built.”

“I will see to it, Bringer,” replied Prince Midge. “You shall know everything about the enemy before morning.”

“I want the information in the next four hours,” stated King Arik. “It can not wait until morning. Let us learn what we can in that timeframe and then use that information to our advantage. I will be napping in my quarters at the castle. Wake me when they return.”

* * * *

Colonel Hildon had just checked on the progress of the men making the siege engines. He was in the process of returning to his tent when he heard shouts from the direction of the southern barricades. He halted and stared in that direction, but there was nothing to see. Most of the campfires had already burned to embers, and the moon had not risen yet. As he stood silently staring into the darkness, the shouting grew closer, and it spread at an alarming pace. He frowned deeply wondering what was going on, but he was not going to charge headlong into the darkness until he was sure that it was not a diversion. He stood still, listening intently. The shouting continued to come closer, but there were also other sounds now. He could hear the snap of bowstrings in the distance, but also another sound that he could not identify. It was a softer sound, a strange sound, and he focused on it. Suddenly, flames split the sky, and a loud roar thundered through the encampment. Colonel Hildon glanced up and gasped.

A massive dragon was flying over the encampment, and instantly the colonel knew what the sound had been. It had been the flapping of the creature’s wings. He instinctively ducked as the dragon flew overhead. All around him, men were shouting and scrambling for their bows, but he knew such efforts were futile unless the dragon made another pass over the camp. The creature was too fast to target without a bow already in hand. The colonel rose to a standing position as the dragon continued northward. He listened to the spreading shouts until the dragon passed over the northern barricades.

“There you are,” called Colonel Maxwell. “I was looking all over for you. Did you see the dragon?”

“He flew right overhead,” answered Colonel Hildon. “I never heard that there were dragons in Alcea.”

“I thought they were mythical creatures,” replied Colonel Maxwell. “The whole camp is awake now,” he added with exasperation. “Do you think Askor will still demand an attack tomorrow?”

“He will,” answered Colonel Hildon. “He is determined to conquer Tagaret as quickly as possible. Do you hear any reports of the dragon attacking anyone?”

“No,” answered Colonel Maxwell. “It just flew over the camp, although I heard that it spit flames out of its mouth.”

“That much is true,” frowned Colonel Hildon. “I saw it myself. Why didn’t it attack anyone?”

“Maybe it doesn’t like arrows,” chuckled Colonel Maxwell. “Why do you want it to attack someone?”

“I don’t,” replied Colonel Hildon, “but I expected it to at least grab one of the men, or maybe a horse.”

“Perhaps it feels uncomfortable attacking such a large body of men,” theorized Colonel Maxwell. “Be thankful that it is not picking us off one by one.”

“Picking off twenty thousand men?” Colonel Hildon scoffed. “It would take it years to devour such a number, and it would be killed long before it could attack a fraction of that number. I am more concerned with its antics depriving the men of sleep.”

“One more pass over the camp,” frowned Colonel Maxwell, “and not a single man will go back to sleep. Already there is talk of drawing straws to see who will stay up and watch for the dragon’s next pass. You are right to be concerned.”

As the two colonels stood talking to one another, a giant flash of light appeared off to the west. Both men turned and gazed in wonder. Flash after flash lit up the night sky, and both colonels gasped in disbelief.

“The siege engines?” shouted Colonel Maxwell. “They are burning.”

“Look above the flashes of light,” Colonel Hildon said in awe. “Tell me what I am seeing is only a mirage.”

Colonel Maxwell gasped anew. “A man riding a dragon?”

“I was hoping that my eyes were tricking me,” frowned Colonel Hildon. “You do know what this means, don’t you?”

“What?” Colonel Maxwell asked with a puzzled look.

“The dragons are not just an idle danger to our men,” stated Colonel Hildon. “The Alceans control them.”

“What kind of land have we invaded?” asked Colonel Maxwell.

“The kind we should not have invaded,” frowned Colonel Hildon. “It is all becoming clearer to me now. The attacks of the wild boars, the insects, the bats, and even the bees, they have all been orchestrated by the Alceans. The enemy engaged us days ago, and we were not even aware of it.”

“The attacks have not been anything for the Alceans to cheer about,” retorted Colonel Maxwell. “Other than a few black-cloaks, there have been no deaths.”

“But there will be in the morning,” countered Colonel Hildon. “Ants may not be able to kill our men, but they can make our battle prowess almost nonexistent. When we charge the wall in the morning, our men will die by the hundreds. They will be slow and hesitant. That will be enough to kill them.”

“Surely, General Askor will not attack after this,” stated Colonel Maxwell. “We will have no siege engines.”

“He will attack regardless,” replied Colonel Hildon, “and I agree with him at this point. It is now clear to me what the Alceans are doing. The dragon did not attack anyone because it was not meant to. It was meant to awaken the whole camp so that no one missed the horror of our siege engines burning. As long as we remain camped here, the dragon will become a nightly visitor, and we will never get any siege engines built. Our men will become more disheartened by the day with the attack on Tagaret. No, Maxwell, we must attack tomorrow. We either attack or flee. There are no other choices.”