Circle of Reign (69 page)

Reign discerned the meaning behind Jayden’s words, that her brother would not likely survive, but she could not accept this.

“Ready? None of us are
ready
!” Reign defended her brother. “Hedron did not choose this, nor did I! But have some faith in him. He is young but you cannot see the strength he hides under a boyish façade. He will do what he must!”

“As will we all,” Evrin said.

FIFTY-ONE

Aiden

Day 5 of 2
^nd
Dimming 412 A.U.

AIDEN SAW THE TERRIBLE SIGHT
ahead of him and felt the tremors from below. One league north approached a storm of flying demons like a feral haze floating above the forested canopy. The brilliant, cold-blue light of first moon cast eerily morphing shadows under the beasts that gave an illusion not unlike black waves fighting against one another as they washed over the leafy shore. Aiden did not need to be a wood-dweller to feel the approach of more than a thousand score invaders below him on the ground where the Southern army waited. It was as if a piece of the thunder that clapped above them had become incarnate and walked upon the land below. The lightning that ripped the skies illuminated the flying horde every minute or less, leaving no doubt as to the number of enemies facing them.

He stood in plain sight—there was no point in concealment—upon the leafy terrain at the top of the trees that lined the northern rim of Calyn at the head of ten thousand Arlethian warriors, only a fifth of what their army had once been. They were at the center of their battle formation with roughly fifteen thousand civilian men, women and children on either flank. The civilian militia, all Arlethians, was adequately armed, mercifully, thanks
to the arrival of Lord Hoyt’s forces from the south. They hauled with them weapons and armor they had stripped from the Eastern Province’s forces, enough to arm twenty thousand soldiers. Some of the militia did not look strong enough to even lift the swords or axes given them, but the moment would give them strength.
Ancients be with us!
The fear that permeated the air as they watched the massive winged cavalry approach them was palpable.

As he scanned to the right and then left, he caught sight of a figure he thought he knew, a little girl with a bow of wood-dweller create.
Rue-anna!
Seilia’s daughter from the village Eledir. He wondered if Mikahl, her brother, would be here, but he did not see him in his brief scan.

If she’s here, Fletch must be also
.

He thought about sprinting to her in the few brief moments that remained and ordering her down, but there were more than a hundred score of children mixed into the militia. His orders would not be rational but he also knew he could not protect the little ones, though he desperately wanted to. The age of innocence, he knew, would mean nothing to the foes that now approached.

Hedron had given Aiden command of their forces despite his protests that he must stay at his Lord’s side. The boy—now a man and lord—insisted and stated his arguments well. No one else had faced one of these Alysaar, as Jayden called them, before; nor the Borathein who mounted them, almost as beastly as the flying creatures themselves. Aiden had not just faced one Alysaar, but two. While one did escape, the other he gutted thoroughly, slicing its head in half down through the neck to the shoulders. Its two riders had fared no better. He knew how to kill them. This fact gave both the soldiers and militia a few much needed threads of courage as they faced the threat of almost certain genocide.

He gripped the Triarch leafling between his palm and sword hilt more tightly. Most of the Arlethians with him, if not all, also had a leafling in their grip. Every increased bit of sensory perception would aid them, both in their attacks as well as chances for survival.

What if Wellyn releases his Dark Influence again?
There wasn’t any doubt that he would, Aiden realized, and knew there was nothing he could do about it.
Focus. Think of nothing but this moment
. He quieted his mind until he could hear nothing but the beat of his heart. Slow. Confident.

It started small. Aiden took a silent step forward, then another. Those behind him followed. In less than five strides, the full force of roughly forty thousand charged. There was no yell or verbal challenge, only air whistling around them as they propelled themselves to an inhuman velocity. The Borathein would see only blurs upon the dark treetops beneath them, but their speed would not camouflage them from the Alysaar. Their vision was far more acute than humans with literally breakneck reflexes. He had experienced this only days past at Jayden’s cottage.

Aiden dragged his sword along the canopy, creating an uneven rhythm as his blade bounced off branches and leaves, the same way he used to do when he was a boy with his wooden practice blade. He was close enough now to clearly distinguish one enemy from the other without the aid of sporadic flashes of lightning in the night sky. A command was heard from the foremost rider, and the Alysaar with their riders began a steep incline. It was as beautiful and terrible as a tidal wave moments before pulverizing a doomed soul in its path. The Alysaar wave crested and dove sharply, vehemently, toward the charging wood-dwellers. The grandeur of the sight was awe-inspiring and Aiden felt a kernel of fear burrowing inside him. He captured it before it took root and recycled the friction. A sensation of tingling went through his right hand and he knew his sword was vibrating as it had done that night long ago, from which all these current events had their genesis.

He ran faster, into the crashing wave of demons, determined to see it break around him. He prayed for those who so bravely had taken up a blade in defense of their lands and families. They ran willingly with him into a nightmare that left little hope of relinquishing those it ensnared, but they charged with him regardless. He knew morning would never come for most. Perhaps not even
for him. Just moments before the first Alysaar crashed down upon him, he smiled.

The ear splitting screech of the demons—sonorously both high and low in pitch—cracked through the night air.

Aiden launched.

The ground shook under Hedron’s feet. Huksinai, Alabeth and Thurik waited on his left side, each lined up shoulder to shoulder. They were eager yet disciplined—even Thurik—and they knew they would not be restrained this time. Alabeth looked up at Hedron and put her ears flat.

“You’ll be fine,” he promised and pet her head behind her ears.

To his right on horseback were Lord Calder Hoyt, Master Gernald Quarry, and Lord Marshal Wenthil, whom Lord Hoyt had appointed to lead the ground forces with Hedron’s consent. Hedron stood with his own feet on the ground. A wood-dweller lost much of his advantage in battle when riding a horse. Not only were they more agile on their own but wood-dwellers also needed to feel the ground as keenly as possible, and a horse would be a natural buffer to those vibrations running through the ground and conducted by the massive interwoven root system of the forest. In addition to the South’s thirty thousand here on the ground were roughly twelve thousand Arlethians. None of them soldiers, but standing bravely all the same. Merrick was just behind Hedron, his heavy hammer resting against a shoulder the size of a mountainside. Hedron felt no pity for those who would be in its way when the avalanche began. It would be only moments now.

Wenthil had organized their ground forces as best he could, being unfamiliar with the terrain and also with commanding civilians who were Arlethians. He did not know how to best use their abilities to an overall advantage and there was no time to learn. The Lord Marshal had given permission to Glimon, who finally
revealed himself bashfully to be a retired command sergeant and had served in the Orsarian War, to deploy the civilian militias as he best saw fit. When Hedron asked Glimon why he had not previously made his experience known, he humbly said, “Those days are not something we intended to remember, certainly not repeat.”

“We?” Lord Kerr asked.

In response, Glimon had simply motioned to Teagan and Merrick, and things suddenly made more sense to the young Lord.

No matter the fear that ran through him and the enormity of the foe that threaded its way through the trees toward him, Hedron could only think of Kathryn. She had insisted on fighting by his and her father’s side, but the two men forbade it in unison. Kicking and screaming, she was finally carried away by two hold guards and sequestered in a small village that lay deep in the forest south of Calyn. Kathryn had no training for battle and neither Hedron nor Lord Hoyt would allow her to be present even if she had.

“Good luck with that one,” Hoyt had said as they watched her being dragged away.

“How did you ever convince her to see reason growing up?” Hedron asked.

Hoyt turned to Hedron. “A little fatherly advice for your relationship, son. She is the one who persuades, not the one persuaded. And yes, she is usually right. It’s rather maddening.”

Thurik howled, bringing Hedron’s focus back to the present. His two siblings joined the lonesome note, making a bone-chilling chorus. The enemy came into view. Arlethian scouts, using both the forest as a medium and their eyes, reported the enemy’s strength at roughly two hundred thousand. Even knowing the number of the enemy could not have prepared him for the visceral sight of the massive horde, an infestation running wild. Hedron did not know if eradication was possible, but he would try to stand against this disease the Dark had sent to his home.

He thought of Kathryn once again and prayed the Ancient Heavens would protect her if he could not. He took a step forward.

As he spoke the words to himself, he felt them more personally and knew he was referring to Kathryn just as much as his ancestral home of Arlethia.

…I am life to those behind me, death to those in front. I am Arlethia…She is my strength and my all…

Hedron charged.

As Hedron ran forward toward the enemy ahead of everyone else, Lord Hoyt saw the boy become Thannuel, not only in appearance but also in action. The three wolves that went everywhere he did were not far behind. And then the blacksmith was running, his hammer held high above his head. Lord Marshal Wenthil cursed at seeing Hedron dash forward and hastily called for a charge. The cry went up among the soldiers and they surged forward.

General Roan was famished. He lay in the tall grasses near where the remnants of the Realm’s army still camped, licking their wounds. They had not moved since he felt his men fall. Roan judged the enemy numbers to be a little above thirty thousand, not more than thirty-five thousand. He had survived the past days on grass and a few morsels of bread and cheese he had managed to acquire from those he had slain.

How many days has it been?
His best guess was half a span plus one. Time seemed almost of no consequence to him now. He observed the Senthary forces, waiting for something to develop, but nothing had. Not until this evening.

He felt a force from the southwest approach his position. Not wood-dwellers. He surmised this must have been the remainder of the middle battlefront twenty leagues south and lamented all the more at what that meant. By now he had thought any remaining Sentharian forces would have already arrived. He had held out
hope that the two fronts south of his own would have fared better than his, but until now no evidence either way had surfaced. The hope he held thinned.