Azurite (Daughter of the Mountain Book 1) (45 page)

              “Get well.  A sick Queen will not win this war,” he said then left her chamber to find Olger Guttensen.

Chapter 26

             
Despite the warmth of summer infiltrating the mountain forests, the underlying mines of Samaria still held the frigid chill of eternal winter.  But that didn’t bother Talan Leatherby as he jogged rapidly through the abandoned mines of the Anions, blueprint in one hand and a lantern in the other.  Salem trailed closely on his heals, and the sound of their heavy breathing and pattering footsteps echoed eerily off of the ancient mountain walls.  The scarce light from Talan’s lantern only shed enough glow for him to see directly in front of him.  Therefore, the young man had to constantly keep his arm stretched out and fingertips sliding along the jagged wall to ensure that he didn’t accidently veer off of his objective course.  When his fingertips felt the mine sharply turn to the left, Talan abruptly halted.  Salem tried to skid to a stop behind him but ended up ramming into Talan’s frame, causing curses to flow freely from both their mouth.

              “Ow!” Talan cried, rubbing his lower back where Salem’s elbow had made contact.  “Be careful!” 

              “Well, I can’t see anything in this muck place,” Salem complained.  He held his lantern up to his face, which did nothing to increase its luminosity or the reach of the light.  “Are we in the right location?”

              “I think so,” Talan replied as he unfolded the blueprint of his own creation and studied it intently.  “This should be mine one hundred and two.  It goes no further than this.”  He nudged his head towards the vast expanse of darkness around the corner and Salem shuddered nervously.  The natural formation of the cave began as soon as the mine ended, and its oblique rock walls were so tightly constricted, that Talan couldn’t even imagine how the originally miners had carved all of it away to make the mine.

              “We’re underneath the eight mile slot canyon that meets the southeastern road,” Talan explained, and Salem frowned.

              “Why would we detonate most of our fire powder here?” he asked.  “It seems like a waste.”

              “Olger will march his men directly through here,” Talan replied.  “It’s the only flat land through this part of the Anions and easiest to travel on horseback.  Plus, if he continues going this direction, he will get to Alumhy quicker.  But we all know it’s a bottle neck.”  He turned to face Salem.  “Now,” he added with a chipper smile.  “Are you ready to pack in this fire powder?”

              With that, the two men began unloading the bags of fire powder into a series of deep crevices in the wall.  When that was done, they ran the fuse and packed it in with a clay mold to ensure it stayed in place.  For the next hour, the two men repeated the processes, running numerous fuses through the mine until Salem had about ten fuses held firmly in his hand.

              They exited the mine the same way the entered.  The entrance was about a quarter mile from the beginning of the slot canyon, and the underground mine looped back around till it was directly below the slim rock formations that created the walls of the canyon.  The ingress to the abandoned mine was so consumed by overgrowing vegetation that Talan was positive any scouting Noman would walk right past it without a second glance.

              “What do we do now?” Salem asked when they were outside in the tepid morning air.  It was early morning and dew still hung densely on the trees and grass.  A light fog lingered like smoke along the ground as the cool night air met the sun-heated ground from the day before.  Talan listened to the sonority of the forest that was both beautiful and peaceful, and drank it in.  He took a seat cross-legged underneath a large wild bush and leaned against the rocky mountain.

              “Now we wait,” Talan said.  Salem looked around nervously, fuses still in hand, then took a seat next to Talan so they could wait to play their part in the upcoming battle that was soon to commence.

***

              General Bludworth, Captain Atwater, and an army of archers stood atop the slot canyon that marked the halfway point into Samaria. It was a narrow formation with tall mountain walls on both sides.  The ground was level, but the path was crooked, and at certain the times the bends and curves throughout the canyon could cause one to loose sight of those ahead of them.  The labyrinthine of the gorge was both a positive and negative asset to fighting the Noman troops.  First off, it made it easier for archers to hide amongst the curves of the rock, but at the same time, it made aiming and hitting a target less probable because of the added obstructions.  But that’s where the plan regarding the detonations of the fire powder came into play.

              Brutus walked along the edge of the canyon, his boots crunching the gravel underneath.  He surveyed the empty chasm below him.  It was temporarily covered in shadow because of the direction the sun was facing.  Brutus squeezed his eyes shut and turned away.  Looking down into the three hundred foot drop made Brutus slightly lightheaded.  Across from him, on the other side of the canyon, archers stood perched like owls on a tree branch, fully armed and loaded, waiting for the command to fire.  They talked softly among themselves in hushed whispers, preventing the favorable acoustics of the canyon from parroting their words.

Scouts had been released during the night to track the Noman’s movement through the mountains, but so far only a few of them had returned.  Therefore, Brutus was forced to go off of his many years of military experience to assist him in guessing the Noman’s exact location.  According to the scouts, the majority of the battalions they’d send out during the night to combat the influx of Olger’s troops had been mercilessly butchered.

As Brutus studied his surroundings, a movement to his right caught his attention.  It was Vincent Lowe, the Queen’s personal Guard, coming over to speak with him.

“General,” Vincent greeted with the Samarian salute.

“Major,” Brutus replied.

“I bring instruction directly from Queen Evangeline,” Vincent began.  Brutus’s ears prickled with intrigue.  He couldn’t image what else that self-absorbed woman could possibly want from him, but the General just nodded for Vincent to continue.

“She demands the enemy Overlord not be harmed when he is taken into custody,” Vincent told him.  “He must be brought directly to Mizra and delivered to Queen Evangeline herself.” 

Brutus brought his hand to his jaw and slowly stroked the scratchy beard that was growing there.  He couldn’t foresee these new instructions going over very well with the men of his army who wanted nothing more than to kill Olger and all of his brutal soldiers.  

“Tell the Queen her orders are understood,” he answered wearily.  There was nothing he wanted more desperately than to see Olger Guttensen’s filthy blood splashed along the canyon walls by the Samarian Guard.  But orders are orders. 

“Major?”  Brutus saw the other man halt before taking his leave.  “While I know the Queen has final authority, can I convince you to send a messenger back in your place?  Right now I can use all the experienced Guard with military training I can find.”  Vincent gave him a small smile.

“It would be my honor, General,” he said.  No sooner had the words left Vincent’s mouth than a boy, no older than twelve years old, came racing dangerously fast along the edge of the canyon, spewing clouds of dust in his wake.  He was dressed in plain cloths, stained and dirty from days without wash, and his face and hair were covered in dirt.

“General Bludworth!” he cried out, immediately catching Brutus’s attention.  “General Bludworth!”  The General recognized the boy as one of the scouts they’d sent out into the wilderness two days ago to track the Noman troops.  He jogged to meet up with him.  The boy was gasping for air and bent over with his head between his legs trying to catch his breath.

“General…they…are…coming,” he gasped as he pulled in deep gulps of air.  He swung his head back up and looked at Brutus with wide eyes.  “They’ve already entered the canyon…already one mile in.  They’re taken the whole eastern half of Samaria!”

Brutus clasped the boy’s shoulder firmly.  “Thank you,” he said then met Vincent’s worried eyes.  “We don’t have much time.” 

The formation of Samarian archers still waited nervously atop the canyon’s jagged walls, hidden inside crevices, or behind boulders.  They were fully garbed in dull plate armor and heavy chainmail, with conical helms protecting their heads.  Brutus even allowed to them to wear their richly colored indigo tunics, for the pigment of the dye surprisingly blended into the blue mountains and obscured their presence even further.  The General stood waiting, staring fixated on a bend in the canyon where Olger’s troops would soon appear. 

A drove of soldiers soon emerged in the Samarian’s line of fire.  They flew simple black flags that were ripped and torn from their time in the wind.  The enemies were dressed in lamellar armor, brown as mud and just as dirty.  Each soldier held a bronze-edged round shield with the notorious grizzly bear painted in the middle.

From where the Samarian archers were spying, the canyon was at its narrowest, and the Noman army was forced the walk single file through the rock.  Brutus let them pass for what seemed like an eternity, waiting silently for Olger to come into his line of sight.  He could feel tension wafting off of the soldiers around him.  They didn’t want these vile foreigners desecrating anymore of Samaria’s sacred land; they wanted them dead.  But Brutus knew that Olger Guttensen would be located somewhere in the middle of the Noman procession, and he didn’t want to make any rash decisions when it came to his plan of attack.

And then Brutus saw the Overlord.  Not because he looked any different from the other soldiers, but because his armor showed no signs of wear, and his shield was perfectly smooth and unmolested.  The General whistled softly, letting the enigmatic musical notes bounce through the canyon walls, the first sign to his men to load their bows.  Below them, the Nomans didn’t even notice the subtle sound as they went about moving through the canyon.  Then he whistled again and gave the signal to attack.

Slick black arrows flew downward from every hidden angle of the canyon and towards their unsuspecting victims.  They landed with fatal thuds into the meaty arms and legs of the enemy, or pierced directly through the lamellar amour until they met skin and bone.  Cries of pain and anger burst forth from the army of Nomans as men fell to their knees from the Samarian inflicted wounds.  Pandemonium followed as others tried to fight back, loading their own arrows and flinging them at the stationary Samarians, but Brutus’s men were to well hidden by the structure of the rock.  Leaders of the Noman army yelled out useless commands to their ranks, but they fell on deaf ears as the soldiers sought only to protect themselves. 

The tightness of the canyon prevented the Nomans from being able to flee from the Samarian’s vicious counter-attack, and numerous soldiers keeled over from their wounds or tried to turn around and run the other direction against the grain of the foot traffic.  Through the cries of death, Brutus recognized a familiar Noman voice trying to regain control over the remaining sliver of men still being pummeled with arrows.  Olger swiveled around furiously, his upper lip lifted into a nasty snarl as he yelled commands at his panicking men.

“Get down!” Olger bellowed in his strong accent. “We’ve been ambushed! Form a shell and retreat.  We must find another way through the mountain!” 

Even from three hundred feet above the canyon, Brutus could see Olger’s cruel gaze skim the top of the canyon with murderous intent.  Following the Overlord’s command, every uninjured Noman soldier knelt down to the ground and brought their round shields above their heads, forming a horizontal protective barrier against the assaulting arrows.  One by one their shields flew up until the line of enemy soldiers was protected by the sides of the canyon and the wood of their shields. 

Brutus could hear the muffled sounds of Olger yelling more commands down below, then the entire formation of Noman warriors did an about face, shields held high, and began retreating towards the entrance of the slot canyon.  The shield barrier proved effective against the Samarians as their deadly weapons either bounced off or became stuck in the wood of the round shields.  From above, the Nomans looked like a line of ants crawling their way through a crack in the earth, about to be stomped on.

“Fall back, men!” Brutus called out.  “Fall back, and cease fire!”  Brutus’s commands were echoed through the ranks of soldiers so that even those furthest away from the General heard his instructions. 

As the rain of Samarian arrows ceased, Brutus looked for the scout who’d been assigned the duty of setting off the smoke signal so Talan’s team of miners could begin their detonations.  The scout was waiting where the canyon began to descend downward into rocky steps.  A circle of wood was smoldering lightly, and a damp blanket was covering the fire.  When Brutus gave his signature whistle, the boy the lifted the blanket and a large puff of grey smoke ascended rapidly into the sky.  This was done three times.

Brutus permitted the Noman formation to get a head start, allowing them to think that the Samarians has given up now that they had created a phalanx with their shields.  Around him, all the archers were relocating back to the central top of the canyon where Brutus was stationed.  Because Talan had strategically placed the fire powder underneath the canyon, any Samarian who fell behind could become victim to his explosions.

Brutus had also stationed small groups of Guards outside the canyon and up into the tree covered hills, hidden from view.  They’d been encroaching on the Nomans location once they’d entered into the canyon and were set up to intercept and kill any stragglers not struck dead by the blasts.  Up above, the last of the grey puffs from the smoke signal had blended into the clouds, and Brutus looked around nervously, waiting for Talan’s response.