Valorian (36 page)

"I don't believe it. General Sarjas, surely you don't want to risk your troops against such a beast."

Antonine appealed to the commander of the XIIth Legion, who was sitting on his horse behind them, tight-lipped at the actions of the two governors.

"He won't have to," Tyrranis snarled before the commander could speak. "I'll take my own garrison against the rear guard. You attack the Clan. Surely your legion will have no trouble dealing with women and children."

Stung by the insult in the repetition of his own earlier words, the young governor's face turned fiery red. "But what if there are more—"

"There are no other magic-wielders!" Tyrranis stabbed a finger toward the disappearing caravan.

"There is only him, and he is mine!"

For just a moment, Antonine accidentally looked full into Tyrranis's dark eyes, past the icy glare into the seething rage in the general's mind. In that brief glimpse, he thought he saw the growing shadows of madness. A shudder overtook him, and he wrenched his eyes away from that awful face. "All right, all right," he said sullenly. "We will do it." Anything to finish this dreadful task and be rid of Tyrranis.

Without another word or gesture, Tyrranis drew his sword and whipped his horse into a gallop down the slope to cut off his retreating troops. The officers pulled up in front of him at the bottom of the hill, shamefaced and frightened, their horses lathered and their tunics dust-covered.

"Cowards!" he screamed at them. "You are not fit to be Tarns! Stop those men at once and reform your ranks before I cut you down myself."

None of the officers disobeyed him. As quickly as possible, they stopped the fleeing legionnaires, rounded up the panicked horses, and brought the troop back under control. Al the while, the gorthling image roared and howled from its place on the trail.

When the IVth Legion detachments were regrouped, the general rode past the lines of white-faced soldiers. "What you see is a fake!" he yelled, shaking a fist toward the gorthling. "You ran from an image, you fools! Those are real." And he gestured to the rear guard and the tail end of the Clan caravan they could see disappearing up the val ey. "Destroy them!" he bellowed. "Destroy them now. Prove that you are men, not rabbits."

The troops gave a ragged cheer. With the speed and skil that had always been his strength in battle, Tyrranis reorganized his men into a new attack formation.

But even his best plan or his worst threats wouldn't have convinced the legionnaires to attack that hideous screaming monster if Tyrranis himself had not led the charge. Raising his sword over his head, the Tarnish general bellowed the order to charge and spurred his horse into a gallop, straight toward the fearsome gorthling. The soldiers followed, rather reluctantly at first as they watched their general approach the monster, then with gathering confidence when they saw the gorthling could not lay its hands on the man.

Before the Tarns' startled eyes, Tyrranis forced his horse to run directly through the beast's legs.

With a thunderous shout, the Chadarian forces spurred after him.

Valorian watched the general with dismay. He had to admit that Tyrranis had courage, but the general made things very difficult. Valorian's strength was flagging from the heavy use of magic, and now the Tarns were attacking again. He instantly blanked out the image of the gorthling to save his energy and sent Hunnul cantering back to catch up with the rest of the rear guard. The Clan warriors turned one more time to face the enemy while the caravan rumbled away as fast as it could go over the uneven ground.

This time the Tarns didn't charge in a straight line. They split into three groups that attacked the rear guard from several different directions. One group galloped up the slope above the valley and fired a black rain of arrows down into the lines of Clan warriors. The other groups, one led by Tyrranis, spurred their horses toward the front and the right flank of the rear guard.

Valorian tried desperately to duck the falling arrows behind his small shield and at the same time keep the Tarns at bay with missiles of blue energy, fireballs, and smoke screens. Yet the Tarns faced his barrage and kept coming. He felt his strength slowly draining away and his spells becoming weaker.

Despite his power, he was only one man against determined, overwhelming forces who were coming at him from several different directions. None of the other clansmen could help him fight off the Tarns until they came into arrow range, and by that time, it was too late.

The Tarnish charge swept into their midst, their swords smashing into their defenses. Valorian and his rear guard tried to hold their formation, but the clansmen couldn't maneuver or fight the running battle they excelled at. They had to stand in the open and defend themselves. Al too quickly their thin ranks crumpled under the overwhelming onslaught. The warriors fell back around their chieftain in a last attempt to make a stand. Everything was in a bloody tangle of horses wheeling and colliding, men struggling and falling, and over it all was the sickly smell of blood and fear.

In moments, the superior Tarnish forces had ringed in the rear guard and cut them off from the rest of the Clan. The end of the caravan was now left open and helpless.

Seeing their danger, the drivers urged their horses frantically and drew their own weapons to try to defend their lives and their families. Strangely, the Chadarian forces didn't move to attack the line of wagons. Instead, they concentrated their ferocity on the rear guard.

Valorian saw all of this with a horrified clarity. He couldn't defend the entire caravan when it was strung out along the trail, and now he was too busy fighting for his own life to defend the warriors around him. They were trapped in a desperate battle of hand-to-hand combat. Valorian knew if he didn't do something fast, the entire rear guard would be slaughtered, leaving the Clan virtually defenseless. He saw Tyrranis fighting his way toward him, and he began to urge Hunnul forward to meet the general.

Then he heard something that froze his blood. A new fanfare of trumpets blasted through the sounds of shouting, neighing, and clashing weapons. The chieftain jerked his head around to look down the valley. What he saw stunned him with an appalling feeling of utter despair.

There, in solid ranks of cavalry and infantry moving up beside the river, was an entire legion—one thousand of the emperor's finest men—heading rapidly after the fleeing Clan. Sick, Valorian recognized the black eagle emblems on their tunics. It was the XIIth Legion from the Ramtharin Plains.

Tyrranis cut down a young clansman in his way and saw the hopeless look on Valorian's face. "Yes, magic-wielder," he shouted at the chieftain. "Your Clan is about to die!"

And for one moment of eternity, Valorian believed he was right.

Like an indestructible war machine, the legion's ranks marched in solid phalanxes past the surrounded rear guard. Their black pennons fluttered in the breeze like crows' wings. The tramp of their feet and the rattle of their armor sounded like a death knell to Valorian. He watched helplessly as they increased their speed to a quick jog to catch up to the Clan caravan.

The Chadarian garrison, encouraged by the sight of their comrades, tightened the ring of fighting relentlessly around the remaining warriors. The chieftain risked one last glance after the legion before he was forced to fend off another attacker. He gritted his teeth. He could taste the dust and smell the blood of his failure. If only he had more strength, more ability to wield his magic, more power. There just hadn't been enough of those within him to save his people.

A stab of resentment burned through him. If he was Amara's champion, if he had risked everything to face the gorthlings for her, why was she letting him lead his people into this slaughter? Why had she turned her back on him?

Heartsick, he hefted his weapon and was about to rally his men when small fragments of his own thoughts came back into his mind with startling clarity. More power. Gorthlings.

Of course. That was what he needed, a gorthling. With a gorthling in his control to enhance his power, he could stil use his magic to sweep away the Tarns and save his people. But, by the gods, how could be get one of those creatures out of Gormoth to help him here in the mortal realm? Would a gorthling's enhancement be effective outside of Ealgoden?

Valorian had no answers to his questions yet, and very little time left to learn them. His small force was being cut to pieces, and Tyrranis was closing in on him. Only two warriors stood between himself and the general, who was fighting ferociously to reach him.

Valorian made up his mind then and there. He had little left to lose at that point, and for good or ill, he was going to try it. He turned Hunnul away from the edge of the fighting to a small clear space in the center of the beleaguered ring. "Pul in, pul in!" he yel ed to his men. "Fal back and stand by me!"

His cry went rapidly through the rear guard, and as fast as they could, the cIanspeople obeyed.

Some were still on horseback, some were on foot, and some were being held up by their friends. In al , there were only about half of the one hundred stil alive. Together they formed a tight knot around their lord chieftain. The Tarns dosed in after them.

Valorian realized he didn't have the strength to maintain a magic shield around his small force while he strove to capture a gorthling, but he could give them some shelter. Delving into the last of his strength, he focused his spel down into the ground to the rock beneath the soil.

Suddenly the earth began to rumble in a ring around the Clan warriors. The combatants paused in the midst of their fighting; the Tarns looked about nervously and began to back away. Only Tyrranis did not move. He was reaching for his protective amulet when al at once huge slabs of stone erupted through the ground at his horse's feet. The animal staggered backward out of the way. There was the sound of a great rending crash, and the slabs came together to form a circular wall higher than a man on horseback around the clansmen and their horses. A larger, opaque slab of rock rose higher than the rest and came down over the top with a thundering boom, forming a roof that would protect the men inside from the Tarns' arrows and spears.

A stunned silence fell over the battleground. The Tarns stared at the stone fortification in amazement and confusion.

Only General Tyrranis was not surprised. He was furious. "You cannot escape, clansman!" he shrieked. "You have just built your own tomb!" Then he turned to his men. "You have assaulted defenses bigger and stronger than this. Tear that thing apart—with your hands if you have to!" The soldiers hesitated, then reluctantly moved in toward the stone edifice.

Inside the round stone building, the clansmen were staring at the wal s in equal amazement. "What is this?" one man' murmured.

Valorian heard him and lifted his head to look at the men clustered around him. They were al weary, sweat-soaked, filthy with dirt and spattered blood. Several were wounded, and one man died even as his two friends laid him down to help him. Some of the riders were dismounting to calm their nervous horses.

The light glimmering through the opaque ceiling was dim with a strange yellow tint that cast a sickly hue over every man's face. The air was warm and growing stuffy with the smell of sweat and blood, but a slight breeze and some light were able to leak through the cracks between the slabs.

A harsh voice broke the silence. "Lord Valorian, what do you expect us to do now, set up camp?" It was Karez, snide as always.

Valorian ignored his tone and slid off Hunnul to the ground. His legs nearly buckled under him because he was so tired, and he had to catch Hunnul's mane to keep himself upright. "I'm going to summon help," he said hoarsely, "and I need time to do it."

"Time!" one of the warriors cried. "We have no time. Didn't you see the legion? They're going to slaughter the Clan! We have to stop them."

"We
will
stop them. But we are no good to our families dead. "

"And they are no good to us dead!" Karez said bel igerently. "You brought us to this disaster with your talk of escaping the Tarns. Wel , they caught us anyway. Now what are you going to do?"

Valorian stifled the urge to weld Karez's tongue permanently to the roof of his mouth and said as calmly as he could, "I will do what I have to do. Now, be quiet! The rest of you keep a watch through those gaps in the stone.

The men and boys looked at one another uneasily, then did as he asked. The chieftain had brought them this far, farther than many believed they would ever get. Perhaps he could stil save them.

Valorian went to stand beside the man who had just died. The man's two friends were still beside him, wiping the dirt from his face and laying his sword by his side. One man had tears in his eyes. The chieftain sagged to the ground and sat cross-legged beside the dead warrior. He had known the man for years and keenly felt his loss. "The Harbingers will be coming soon," he said softly.

The man's friends glanced at him askance at the mention of Harbingers, but they didn't move away.

Without a word being spoken, Hunnul came to stand behind Valorian, his long legs lightly supporting his master's back.

"I need your strength, my friend. Will you stay with me?" Valorian asked the stallion quietly.

Gladly
, Hunnul replied and lowered his muzzle until it rested gently on the man's head. The clansmen around them watched curiously.

Although Valorian was still uncertain of what he was doing, he had an idea-the only idea he could think of. He prayed it would work, because he was certain he wouldn't have enough strength left to try anything else.

He pul ed off his gold armband and set it on his knee in easy reach, leaned back against Hunnul's front legs, and closed his eyes. He felt the magic begin to gather within him. The sounds of the world around him gradually faded to silence as his mind ranged outward to touch the stal ion's being. Because of their earlier meld, his thoughts found Hunnul's very quickly and merged perfectly into the horse's consciousness.