The Game of Fates (80 page)

“Well,
Keryak, we’ll see if we have anything to say about it or not,” Durik said then
held up his spear.  “Riders!” he called.  “Follow me!”

The
Wolf Riders dashed forward in one body, the weight of their mounts adding much
momentum to the weight of their charge.  The mass of ants was beginning to
spread out mindlessly to envelope the kobold line, a thing Durik could not
allow.  With spears, swords, and shields raised, the small body of wolf-riding
cavalry smashed into the outer areas of the dispersed ant flank, mowing down
many ant warriors in succession and causing the rest to begin to recoil back
toward their companions in the main column.

The
young kobold leader then led his small cavalry group back up the hill to the
place where they had started, where they all pulled out bows, focusing on the
several stragglers who were still attempting to go around the kobold flank and
to cover the retreat of a pair of their companions whose mounts had been killed
in the charge.

Before
long, the flank was again secure.  Durik and his little band of wolf riders had
succeeded in keeping the ants attacking the main kobold line and not coming
around behind their line.

He
knew it was very temporary, however, and in fact could see the next group of
ants begin to break out from the main group to surge toward the woods as if to
come around behind the line.  Lifting his spear again, Durik prepared to lead
another charge to continue to shape the enemy’s attack to their advantage.

With
blood on his sword, and a grin full of malice on his face, Shagra looked down
the slope from where his many warriors were slaying the ants by the score.  The
battle was going well against these wolf-sized ants.  They were easy to kill,
exposing their thin necks as they tried to bite him and his orc warriors,
unable to reach them with the short spikes on their arms, and charging forward
without heed to their own safety.

But
now, as he looked down the slope, Shagra face changed from one of dominance to
one of fear; the ant queen was coming directly for his part of the line.

The
earth shook as the massive creature’s spiked legs smashed whatever was in her
way.  Her eyes were wild with anger and malice.  Her mandibles, great blades of
chitin, scythed through the air as they opened and closed.  Her armor was thick
and covered with small spikes.  It was clear to Shagra that she would instantly
dominate the field wherever she went… and he didn’t know if he and his orcs
could stop her, or if his warriors would even try.

He
understood the need to hold the line.  As little as he thought about others, he
could still work this equation.  He knew that, if he ran, the ants would just
hunt him down and kill him anyway.  There was no running from this danger.  The
kobolds might delay the ants, but they’d still find him.  There was just too
many of them.  They would quickly dominate both of these valleys, and probably
the entire southern rim of the Great Forest as well.

“Spears! 
Throw at big bug!” he called out.  The ant queen had just reached the front of
their lines, and some of his warriors were beginning to run, even as the ant
warriors made space for their queen mother to fight.

Here
and there a spear was thrown, but none of them stuck much less pierced the
armor.  Suddenly, from the direction of the stone hill, a long spear with
feathers on the back snapped through the armor of the ant queen’s abdomen,
sinking in a short distance and causing the ant queen to rear up and wave her
mandibles in the air.

At
the same time she stepped forward, smashing an orc warrior beneath one
tree-trunk like leg and trapping another orc warrior by his leg beneath another
of its great feet, the warrior’s leg snapping loudly as it cried out with the
excruciating pain.

Getting
up his anger, Shagra yelled out in rage at the mighty queen.  Rushing forward
with his sword in both hands, he swung it with all his might at the nearest
leg.  With a resounding
crack
a line appeared in the chitinous armor of
the leg.  Drawing his sword back, Shagra swung again with all his might.  This
time the sound was a sick crunch, and the ant queen’s leg recoiled with the
pain.

Looking
up as the leg withdrew, Shagra moved just quick enough to avoid the massive
mandibles of the enraged queen.

Krulak,
leader of the Kobold Cavalry contingent, rode at the head of his force behind
the Krall Gen’s Archer Guard.  He had no love for the orcs, in fact he had
nothing but hatred and wishes of death for them, but right now the right flank
was secure, and the ant queen was about to blow completely through their lines…
right where the orcs were.

“Gaenthik!”
he called out to the covenant mage who rode behind him.

“Yes,
sire!” the older, wispy kobold yelled back in his thin voice.

“I
need a volley of fire bolts on that monster when we get close enough!” he
called out.

“Yes,
sire!” Gaenthik yelled back.

“Do
you think they’ll pierce its armor?” Krulak called back to him.

“We’ll
soon find out,” Gaenthik said, riding up next to his leader.  “But let’s see if
we can hit her somewhere that isn’t armored.”

“Good
thinking, Gaenthik,” Krulak said, reining in behind the orc part of the line. 
“Riders!  Form a line!  Plant spears and draw bows!” he called out.

Behind
him, Gaenthik gathered the other four covenant magic wielders of the cavalry
contingent.  Soon, the five unarmored kobolds were lined up behind Krulak.

“Fire
bolts, mages,” Gaenthik said in a high voice, the stress of the situation
clearly playing on his nerves.  “And aim for the tender spots.  We’ll not be
able to pierce the armor, I would imagine.”

Breathing
in through his nose, then out slowly through his mouth, Gaenthik tried to
dissipate the stress of the situation a bit so he could concentrate.  In a
moment, as one, the five covenant mages lifted their hands and formed triangles
with their fingers in front of them.  Soon, fire formed between their fingers,
fire which they sent speeding toward the massive beast to their front.

Gorgon
grabbed his father by the arm.  The older kobold had been about to fire at the
ant queen again, but news of the dragon’s arrival on the battlefield was more
important from his son’s perspective.

Flying
in over the entire mass of ants, the dragon breathed a cone of fire through the
middle of the rear elements of the ant horde.  As Goryon, Gorgon, and their two
teams watched from the top of Great Bow Hill, ant warriors curled up into tight
balls in the flame, many popping like corn in a fire, while many others writhed
about on the edges of the flame.  It was a horrific sight to see, yet exciting
to the kobolds whose hopes of surviving the ants just a few moments ago had been
very low.

“Yes!”
Jerrig Queen Slayer yelled next to the pair of muscled warriors.  “Kill them! 
Kill all of the nasty creatures!”

Gorgon
turned to the skinny warrior, who had gained his honor name of Queen Slayer by
killing ants, a very important one in particular.  “You do realize that we
could be next!” he said.

“Yes,
but right now that dragon’s killing ants, not us!” Jerrig replied, a confidence
which he’d not had before gaining his honor name helping him to stand up to his
much more physically imposing team leader.

Gorgon
Hammer just shook his head.

“Son,”
Goryon called out to Gorgon as he moved Troka and Arbelk out from the front of
the Great Bows.  “Dragon or not, that ant queen needs to die!  Get back to your
Great Bow for now.  There’ll be plenty of time to fight that beast when it
comes closer.

As
Gorgon returned to his Great Bow and aimed toward the ant queen, the dragon
wheeled around and began flying away from the kobold line, blowing a cone of
fire down on another mass of ants as it went, instantly catching the woods on
the south of the battlefield on fire.

“Firing!”
Goryon called, then pulled the lever.  In a few moments, as the Great Bow
missile finished its graceful arc, another spear plunged into the ant queen’s
side, this time a little deeper, as she had turned more perpendicular to the
stony hill.

Arren
e-Arnor walked carefully between the rows of wounded kobolds lying under the
shade of the trees at the edge of the large clearing.  While many looked at him
in wonder and amazement, many more were not capable of even noticing him.  It
was like this in every battlefield he had ever been to; the wounded hauled off
behind the main line of each of the forces while the able fought on.  It seemed
the only way to keep the morale of those on the line intact; to separate the
miserable and distraught from those who still had to have hope.

With
bow in hand, and resplendent looking in his silvered armor, the elf prince
walked carefully through the clearing.  The light of midday was tempered by the cloud of ash and smoke that had begun to settle over the valley, the same
cloud which had brought him to seek shelter with the noble kobolds of the
southern valley rather than allowing him to slip away off to the north, now
that he had escaped the dragon’s hunting.

As
he approached the far end of the clearing on the top of the hill, he could hear
the running of many little feet.  Squinting to pierce the shadows under the
boughs of the trees at the clearing’s edge, he could see hundreds of panicked
kobolds running in his direction.

Stretching
his bow over his back quickly, he jumped up and grabbed a branch, pulling
himself up and onto the branch in one fluid motion.  Below him on the forest
floor, kobolds began to stream past by the hundreds.  They didn’t seem too
panicked, however, and he wondered at that.  It almost appeared preplanned. 
What was perhaps most surprising was that there were a few orcs among them. 
Not many, maybe only twenty or thirty, but they were there nonetheless.

As
Arren watched, the kobolds began forming up in the center of the clearing, by
unit it appeared by the similarity of their dress and gear among members of the
same formations.  Then, as he was surveying the scene, a kobold stopped at the
bottom of his tree and looked up at him.