Draconis' Bane (31 page)

Kevin nodded in
agreement, turning his gaze on Hanna.

“Tell Euri what’s
happening, she’ll be upset, but I’d rather she knew than be hurt at
not being included.” He instructed.

The Duke had received
word from his brother-in-law, William, weeks ago about the mounting
Terum presence along their border. Rather than leave anything to
chance, Kevin had assembled four thousand soldiers from his own
compliment and ridden for Irudin at once. Alison, not wishing to be
left behind again and also understandably worried about her brother
William, had arrived by coach two days ago.

The pair of them had
sought out Eurydice at Hanna’s request, only to find that his baby
sister wasn’t the baby he remembered. In the past year she’d grown
considerably in maturity as well as bearing. The three of them had
spoken at length about her visions, Kevin being much more alarmed
than Alison. His wife took a more pragmatic approach to this whole
magic business, but Kevin had seen enough in his life not to
discount Euri’s experiences.

He rushed through
town on horseback and though the southern gate where his men had
been camped for the last week. Everyone was ready as he rode past
them, including the Irudin reserves which helped to swell his army
to seven thousand warriors. He’d also found a useful unit of
engineers whom he’d sent ahead three days ago.

Kevin anticipated
meeting up with them just as they approached the enemy camp. As he
motioned for the army to march, secretly hoped he wouldn’t be too
late.

~

Eurydice snuck out of
the broom cupboard, her face pail and eyes red as she wiped away
the tears that had rolled down her face. The cupboard had been a
useful discovery. Especially when the others would leave her out of
what was going on. She could hide in there and listen as they
discussed matters over their meals. It irritated the young lady
that she had to resort to subterfuge to keep involved. After all of
Tristan’s attacks she wasn’t about to be kept out of this
adult
business
.

She walked
purposefully down the hall and up the nearest flight of stairs to
Kevin and Alison’s room. Euri confidently knocked on the door, she
faintly heard Alison call her in. She looked up from her packing,
slowing noticeably, and said; “Euri!”

Eurydice’s eyes
narrowed; “I’m coming along.” She pronounced.

Alison tried to
object, but couldn’t find a good reason to deny the young girl.
Finally her shoulders sagged and she nodded.

~

“LOOSE!” Chieftain
Fred yelled as archers fired over the shields around them.

Less than
five-hundred defenders remained and every last one of them had
filtered over to the large courtyard Tristan and his unit held. Now
a dome of shields surrounded the remaining defenders as arrows,
spears and crossbow bolts rained down from the occupied walls. As
one the shields shifted, allowing the fifty archers to stand and
fire again. More often than not they couldn’t take proper aim
because of the consistency of the attackers’ strikes.

“How many fell that
time Tristan?” Fred called.

“Less than a dozen
Uncle!” Tristan shouted back.

Fred cursed as
another brave band of attackers rushed forward.

“THRUST!” Fred
shouted.

Twenty of the closest
defenders slid their shields down and skewed the attackers and
Tristan’s spear was yanked out of his hand. He cursed, looking
through the gap between his shield and his neighbors to see an orc
running away from the fight, the spear jutting out of his
stomach.

“Spear!” He called.
William grabbed one of the few spares remaining and thrust it into
Tristan’s outstretched hand.

“Try to hold onto
this one, won’t you?” He joked.

Tristan was forced to
laugh, despite the grim situation, his cousin still had a wit he
found infectious. During stressful times such as these memories
came to the young Prince unbidden of his childhood. This time it
was a moment when William had broken the tension with a jest he
couldn’t quite recall. He shook his head of those thoughts, trying
to keep his focus here and now. Distracted men, as his father used
to tell him, are dead men. A shout followed by a loud slam echoed
through the courtyard from the western gate. His Uncle placed his
hand on Tristan’s shoulder.

“That was an
excellent idea.” He said nodding his head towards the gate.

Shortly after the
first few men filtered over to his unit, he and his cousin had led
a five man team over to the gate. They sliced the counter balance
weights from their ropes, set fire to the crank that allowed the
gate to be lowered and finally they put the large timber into its
housing and ordered the bowmen to lose their arrows above it.

The gate now
shuddered as the giants outside tried to break it down. Inside the
fortress several troll engineers tried to repair the damage
Tristan’s team had inflicted. Every now and then their guards would
lower their shields, and at those times…

“LOOSE!” Fred
shouted.

The dome of shields
shifted as the fifty archers fired towards the gate killing another
score of engineers and their warrior escorts. The thudding from the
giants continued on though. As of yet, only the men and orcs could
swarm over the wall to take the fight to the Suttenites. A pack of
wild looking orcs, easily fifty strong decided they were done with
patience as they rushed the defenders position.

Tristan could smell
their rancid breath as they closed in on the defenders, slowly so
as not to be impaled, they began looking for weaknesses in the
defense. They began prodding the defenders shields with their own
spears. Their leader shouted and the orcs began their war cry. It
was an ear splitting racket which reminded Tristan of the death cry
of a horse.

They backed away and
then ran forward. Five of them dropped suddenly at their feet,
dead. Tristan looked at William seeing his confusion echoed in his
cousins’ features. Another five dropped, one of them staggered
forward, an arrow protruding from its neck. “That’s my girl!” Fred
proclaimed proudly.

The young Prince
turned his gaze up to find that a group of eight women had occupied
one of the towers and were raining arrows down on the attackers
from above. Numerous orcs turned their bows on them, firing wildly
as the women dropped below the parapet. Fred’s daughter Gail, wife
to his cousin William rose again with the other seven women and
took another score of attackers down with their arrows. William
cheered along with his troops despite his obvious fear for his
wife. Tristan couldn’t quite fathom why women were treated as
delicate porcelain dolls, all of the women he knew were the most
headstrong, stubborn and admittedly; dangerous lot.

A strangely familiar
horn blasted from out on the battlefield. Fewer and fewer orcs and
men came pouring over the battlements, until there were none at
all. Bodies were strewn around the battlements, and pages ran up
the stairs to begin clearing them away. Orc, man and Suttenite
bodies were separated into attackers and defenders. Attackers were
hefted up and tossed over the walls while the defenders were
stripped of rings and other keepsakes and hauled over to a growing
funeral pyre, which had been allowed to burn down during the latest
attack.

Meanwhile, attackers
who were already inside the battlements had formed a unit of their
own and traveled around the inner town wreaking havoc everywhere.
The organized Suttenites killed attacking warriors bit by bit,
until within the fortress there was fewer than fifty of them
left.

Fred shouted for an
attack and the dome broke apart as the last fifty attackers tried
to flee the courtyard they’d allowed themselves to stumble into.
Most of them fell to the women’s arrows, though some of them fell
to Lion Clan archers who had managed to barricade themselves inside
a tower closer to the battlements.

“You two, see if you
can undo the damage you did to the gate. We should keep the
pressure on while they retreat!” Fred shouted to Tristan and
William over the shouts of his own men.

By the time the
cousins reached the gate the last of the troll engineers had been
slaughtered and the only thing still holding the gate shut was the
large timber. William called over a few more men and together they
hefted the chunk of wood out of its cradle.

“Now, how do we get
the damned thing open?” The Prince asked of his cousin.

William pointed to a
pair of long poles on either side of the door. He explained as they
returned to the battlements that they turned to release the locks
on the top and bottom of the gate. Tristan looked over the parapet
as they approached his uncle. The battlefield was a mess; bodies
piled high, fires burning in odd places, abandoned towers on fire,
shattered ladders littering the ground at the foot of the
Heatherington walls. The familiar horn blared over the battlefield
again and the familiarity clicked in Tristan’s mind.

“That’s Kevin!” He
blurted.

“Duke Kevin?” His
uncle asked.

The attackers were
being pushed closer to them as Kevin’s force took the fight to them
from the rear. His brothers’ force was fanned out, encircling the
invaders and forcing them to fight as they backed into the rotting
piles of bodies of their fallen comrades. Tristan smiled as Fred
ordered the archers to pick targets. When the order to fire came,
the nearest giant was filled with at least a hundred arrows. He
tittered back and forth, blood drenching his ragged clothing.
Finally, the enormous creature dramatically groaned, tilted and
fell over, knocking down two towers and killing a further score of
Terum soldiers. A cheer went up along the walls as the archers drew
back for another volley.

“Loose!” Uncle Fred
called calmly.

Another score of
arrows crossed the gap between the defenders walls and the
attackers. Men fell from horses; orcs fell from their wargs, large
canines the size of a horse with jagged teeth and long claws, and
giants ran for the mountains. Their army was in full rout leaving
only the core Terum force, which were already dropping their
weapons and calling for parley.

Within minutes, Terum
soldiers were being herded into a small group, surrounded on all
sides by Kevin’s army. Tristan’s chest swelled with pride as his
older brother rode forward and dismounted as he handed his reins
off to a soldier. He began issuing orders to his men as the hairs
on the back of Tristan’s neck began to rise.

He wasn’t sure
exactly how he knew, but Tristan knew that a sorcerer below was
conjuring a spell. Tristan motioned for his uncles’ longbow again.
The Prince drew back the longbow, searching the defeated soldiers
below as they were backed still closer to the Heatherington walls.
Tristan could see his older brother moving through his army,
restoring order and issuing commands, his height separating him
easily from those around him. Panic began to set in, Tristan could
feel a spell of terrible magnitude was being conjured, but he
couldn’t find the damned magician!

“William, help!” He
called.

William drew back his
own bow, looking sideways questioningly at his cousin.

“What am I looking
for?” He asked.

“That damned
sorcerer.” Tristan replied quickly.

“There, the far left
close to that toppled tower!” His uncle called.

Tristan let his arrow
fly. It flew straight and true, but struck a magical barrier
surrounding the mage mere inches from his neck. The Prince swore,
he was panicking and trying desperately to come up with a
solution.

Kevin worked his way
through his army and walked forward to stand in front of King
Roger. The King of Terum was brother to Samuel, the former
patrician of Irudin that Kevin had executed for treason less than a
year ago. The two of them approached one another, the anger flowing
off each man like steam from a hot bath.

The two men began
yelling at one another, waving their arms about, pointing at
borders and the keep. Then it came to Tristan, as if a voice in his
mind told him calmly the solution. He reached up and tugged out a
hair from his head, tied it around Williams’ arrow and nodded for
him to shoot.

William’s arrow
whistled through the air as it descended quickly on the sorcerer.
It sent up a shower of blood as it collided with the sorcerer’s
neck knocking him sideways. Kevin and Roger looked over in shock as
the sorcerer fell, his spell interrupted.

While Kevin was
distracted by the sudden death of the magic user, Roger lifted his
left arm up and pulled a dagger from the inside of his bracer. He
raised the dagger over his head, ready to strike.

He went limp fell
forward at Kevin’s feet, an arrow sticking out of the back of his
neck. Kevin looked up to the battlements. Tristan’s bowstring was
still quivering, his eyes closed and his shoulders sagged in
relief.

The gates slammed
shut behind Kevin’s army as they escorted what remained of the
invaders’ force to the dungeons along the southern wall. Tristan
waited, standing in the middle of the courtyard he’d been holding
for hours. Kevin cleared the congestion of men and embraced his
brother. He held Tristan at arm’s length, looking the young man up
and down.

“Nice shot.” He
finally muttered.

Tristan shrugged,
laughing; “One way or the other you were about to become a
corpse.”

Kevin pushed his
younger brother one handed on the side of his head as they laughed
and walked back to the main hall.

“Alison should be
arriving in a couple days while we mop up the last of this rabble.”
He said.

“What? You brought
her along?” Tristan asked, not bothering to hide the shock in his
voice.