Dragon Alliance: Rise Against Shadow (48 page)

“You are food,” the hairy, brutish grummish leader snarled as he moved to engage the orc chieftain, raising his spiked morning star.

“Enough!” Ashram yelled, and he fired a magic missile, hitting the grummish chieftain in the head, killing it instantly. “Now get back in line,” he continued as Barlog echoed the command and pushed several of the larger grummish back in their skirmish line; they all obeyed with little less hesitation. Grummish did not fear anything, but they respected power, especially magically originated power.

A ballista spear then struck one of the behirs in the neck, piercing it straight through. The creature reared up, gave a muffled roar, and then collapsed. Three more were then struck, killing one and severely injuring the other two.

“These snake dragons don’t have very thick skin,” Colonel Ronson said. “Pour it on boys,” he ordered through his seeing crystal, as all his ballistae gunners were loading and firing as fast as they could. “Drop as many as you can; that will make less work for your dragons.”

“Damn those ballistae!” Ashram screamed. He counted almost thirty land dragons, and he surmised there must be another company in reserve, so he flew down and yelled to the remainder of his behirs to move to the front line, to hit them as hard and as fast as possible, then prepare for their reserve forces. He would soon join the behirs with his own destructive spells but couldn’t right now. He knew better than to take on such an assembled force, especially with the wizard that was moving with them. He had over ninety of these new creatures, and he felt confident they would match the Alliance land dragons.

As the front lines of the legion and Ashram’s army closed to within three hundred yards, the Battle Point archers and crossbowmen began to fire in volleys. Hundreds of arrows arched over and rained down onto the ranks of the evil sorcerer’s troops. Many were finding their mark, for the orcs and grummish in particular were not that heavily armored. Some of the arrows were actually penetrating the behirs’ hides as well. The orc and Morgathian archers began to fire back, but their short bows, weaker limbed crossbows, and iron or soft steel arrow tips did not have the distance and power of the Alliance long composite bows and crossbows. The sorcerer’s army also lacked leadership in coordinating their archers.

Scores of orcs and regular infantry were falling to arrow wounds, as the both armies continued to close the gap between them. Once they were within one hundred yards of each other, both the land dragons and the behirs began to gather power to unleash their breath weapons. The ballistae and catapult crews continued to fire and wreak heavy damage to the enemy lines, as well as hitting more behirs with greater consistency and effect.

Jodem saw Ashram on his nightmare take to flight, and he responded by nudging Alvanch to launch into the air to meet him. The Talon sorcerer started the close melee by firing a series of lightning bolts at the legion. Jodem raised his staff and stopped the six chain lighting bolts with his shield, but the energy of Ashram’s spells did strike hard. “A sorcerer of some power,” he shouted to Ashram. “You might actually present a challenge before I vanquish you.” he chided.

“I wouldn’t be so confident if I were you, Alliance magician,” Ashram countered.

“Fool, you don’t know what you have just entered into,” Jodem said as he fired a disruption ray at Ashram. The Morgathian sorcerer’s shield held against the spell, but the blast pushed the nightmare back several yards in midair. Jodem then sent up a prismatic ray, which burst in brilliant colors several hundred yards into the sky. With that signal, the land dragons all breathed fire at the onrushing behirs and the line of troops moving with them. Strikenth and Talonth then took to wing from back where they had originally teleported the legion into the area, issuing their challenge roars.

Ashram’s eyes opened wide in both shock and amazement at the presence of the two silver dragons, and he spurred his pitch black demon horse to the rear. The legion’s hippogriff wings were heavily engaged in fighting the manticores and hymenoids, along with the remaining dragon spawn. The numbers were about even, with both sides having approximately two hundred aerial forces, but the hippogriffs and their riders were slowly gaining the advantage.

“Padonan, we’ll do an attack on the sorcerer’s ground forces, then sweep through and give the hippogriffs a little help, and repeat that until either they are destroyed or chromatics appear,” Lordan yelled over to the junior dragonrider.

“Yes sir,” he answered. “Did you get that, my friend?” he asked Strikenth.

Talonth already let me know, we will hit the right side of the Morgathian columns, concentrating on the behir creatures,
his silver dragon answered.

“Excellent, my friend; follow Talonth in his dive,” Padonan explained as he grabbed his glaive, springing the mithril blades open from its six curved arms. The two silver dragons began to dive on the leading edge of the sorcerer’s army. Both roared before simultaneously firing their freezing breath weapons. The icy blue beams had a cold that was beyond imagination, and they struck two of the lead behirs and any orc or grummish standing within fifteen yards of the creatures. The orcs and grummish caught in the icy blast instantly froze solid and shattered as they fell. The behirs that were hit roared a high shrill warble as their long sinuous bodies were partially froze and fell over on their many legs, which shattered from the intense cold. The combined strike left both behirs severely wounded and over sixty or more orcs and grummish dead, with as many injured from partial freezing. Lordan fired an energy bolt from his powerful dragonstone lance, which burst in the middle of the orcs, sending a dozen flying through the air.

As the two silver dragons pulled up from their diving attack, the behirs switched from firing lightning bolts at the land dragons to them. Twenty or more bolts were directed at the pair of metallics, of which four struck Talonth’s shield and three hit Strikenth’s. Their shields took the impacts of the bolts without much trouble, as the snake-like dragon creatures had a fraction of the power of a blue dragon. As they pulled up and ascended, the downdraft from their wings almost knocked a section of the ranks of orcs and men over, and they both unleashed a flame strike spell on the troops in the back of the army’s column. Sheets of flame engulfed three dozen orcs and Morgathian fighters in a combined area of forty square yards.

Padonan looked back as Strikenth flew up and away from the sorcerer’s army and threw his glaive, which streamed toward the rear columns. The mithril star-shaped weapon hit the trailing orc, cutting him in half in a blink of an eye, and continued slicing twenty more before ascending to return to Padonan’s waiting hand. Both dragons roared a challenge to let the Battle Point hippogriffs know they were coming and to clear a path for them to attack any enemy in front of them.

The two armies were almost on top of each other now. The legion had three land dragons injured to the point that they could not continue the attack in the exchange in breath weapon fire from the behirs. Two had taken three or more direct hits in the chest and neck from the lightning bolts, with the third being hit in the front leg after their magic shields had depleted. They fell back to the rear of the advancing legion, and their crews immediately started to apply Aloras salve to their wounds. The behirs were not faring well, with the combination of the land dragons’ fiery breath and their ballistae gunners taking out half of their numbers. Over twenty had fallen so far, along with hundreds of orcs and grummish caught in the blasts. The magic shield that the land dragons can project, while only a fraction of what a metallic dragon can produce, was still more than what the behirs had; which was minimal.

“Sergeant, tell all the crews to ready for close combat,” Colonel Ronson ordered. “Thank the Creator these creatures don’t have shields, or we might have been in trouble, for they can fire their lightning bolts very fast. Let’s see how they are in a fang and claw fight.”

The land dragons started to issue their challenge roars, which the behirs returned weakly. The remaining grummish and orcs started to break into a charge from about fifty yards out. The heavy infantry line in the front, three deep, lowered their spears and raised their shields in preparation for the assault. The two rows of archers and crossbowmen fired as fast as they could to maximize the damage on the rushing creatures. One grummish took six arrows to bring it down.

“Arms!” the sergeants shouted to the front line infantrymen as they locked shields and readied for the orc and grummish charge. “Archers, fire at will!” Colonel Sheer shouted as the two ranks of bowmen and crossbowmen began firing as rapidly as they could at the onrushing creatures. In spite of the damage inflicted by the archers, ballistae, land dragons, Strikenth, and Talonth, the legion was still outnumbered, but the odds were now better.

The first wave of orcs and grummish were skillfully impaled on the legionnaires’ long spears, with the wall of locked shields taking most of the blows. The discipline and coordination of the Battle Point soldiers was impressive. They were a well-drilled team, with the second and third infantry ranks spearing, hacking, or thrusting any enemy that was giving the first line a great deal of trouble. The first line soldiers knew their lives depended on this until the formations were completely broken, when the fight would then go into individual melee. Additionally, this coordination went on with the aid of the two ranks of archers directly behind them, either taking close shots of opportunity or drawing their short swords and entering into the combat directly.

The Battle Point line held the initial assault, with only a handful of the most tenacious grummish breaking through. These were quickly met with a several arrows fired at point-blank range or as many swords thrust into them as possible to bring them down. The land dragons had moved just ahead of the infantry to take the behirs on directly. In a tooth to claw fight, the blue snake-like creatures proved to be severely overmatched by the powerful land dragons. They were not nearly as strong or as tough. One of the larger land dragons almost picked up the behir it attacked, as its fangs sunk into the softer blue hide, knocking it to the ground and then raking it with its two front claws, bearing all of its weight onto the slender blue torso.

The ballistae gunners were firing at their wingman’s opponents if they could not get a shot at the one their land dragon was fighting with. Land dragons always fought in pairs for mutual support. This added to their effectiveness, especially against larger opponents such as giants or chromatic dragons.

General Daddonan called to Colonel Reddit for the cavalry to charge on both flanks to prevent the numerically superior enemy from flanking them, especially the nimble gnolls and the Morgathian cavalry. Reddit ordered the horns to be sounded and called his cavalry commanders to split troops and charge up both sides of the enemy battle line, with the order to keep any enemy cavalry and the gnolls from moving behind the legion. The medium-type cavalry split and thundered past the right and left side of the line, cutting the gnoll scouts apart with their deadly tribladed lances in their wedge formations, which did not allow the hyena-like creatures to single out riders and jump them. This was a favorite tactic of the man/wolf creatures.

Ashram’s cavalry had to re-form after Strikenth’s and Talonth’s attack, which delayed them. Now Colonel Reddit’s horsemen had the initiative, and they charged headlong into the disorganized black armored cavalry, dashing any hope of them using their slightly greater numbers to their advantage. As a whole, the Battle Point horse soldiers rivaled even Colonel Lordan’s own cavalry of his mounted legion, taking many lessons from the northern Kaskar horse clans.

As the battle raged behind him, Ashram was cursing the giant clan that was supposed to support his behirs. Now with two silver dragons to contend with, he was starting to panic. “Lodar, I need at least two wings of chromatics, and I need them now!” the sorcerer shouted into the dark crystal on the end of his staff, as his nightmare was racing back to the encampment. “And where is that incompetent Fellaxe?”

“Ashram, are you having a little problem?” the warlord sarcastically responded.

“There is no time for your insolence, Lodar, send the dragons now,” Ashram snapped back.

“I’ll see what I can do, sorcerer,” the senior death knight and warlord answered back, with a sinister smile on his scarred face, obviously enjoying Ashram’s predicament. “Ashram, I’m sending Thurex and Krekon, with their wings, to relieve you. That will give you two red dragons and the combined twelve additional dragons in their squadrons. Again it has to be me to rescue the mighty Talon sorcerer, what a pity,” Lodar chided. These reinforcements would be coming from his northern most outpost along the Morgathian border.

“I will see to his attitude later,” Ashram said as he began to approach his camp, only to see three dead giants lying beside his now collapsed tent. “What is going on here?” he shouted at Mkel and his group on the ground.

“The Talon sorcerer!” Dekeen shouted as he drew and fired an arrow. The empowered arrow from Elm struck Ashram’s magic shield with a huge explosion. The impact pushed the sorcerer’s nightmare back in midair. Mkel quickly followed up Dekeen’s shot with an exploding-tipped bolt that burst on the sorcerer’s shield, again pushing his mount back from the resulting impact.

Who are these individuals, and what powers do they possess? The source must be dragonstone in origin
, Ashram thought to himself as he whirled his staff to focus on a fireball spell, which he hurled at Dekeen and Mkel. The glowing fiery projectile hurtled toward the two, which impacted on their combined magic shields from their three dragonstone weapons.