Wizardborn, page 20
Several men in the crowd guffawed. The angry look Myrrima gave him suggested that if he didn’t shut his mouth soon, she’d nock an arrow and practice on him.
With that, Gaborn spurred his mount forward and his Days rode at his side. Myrrima leapt on her own horse and charged after him, drawing an arrow from the quiver at her back. Binnesman and his wylde rode beside them.
Borenson was gathering up the reins when Iome grabbed his elbow and whispered, “A word to the wise, Sir Borenson. Your wife has many endowments of her own now. How do you think she got them?”
“She said you gave them to her—a gift,” Borenson said.
Iome offered a wry smile. “She earned them with that bow of hers. She saved me and Binnesman and the lives of everyone else at Castle Sylvarresta. She slew the Darkling Glory, and I have paid her twenty forcibles for her service.”
Borenson felt sure that Iome was waiting for his jaw to drop, but he didn’t give her the satisfaction.
Instead he offered in a casual tone, “Such things are only to be expected from a wife of mine.”
Iome smiled. “No doubt she can roast a fine piglet, too.”
Borenson laughed and climbed on his horse, raced downhill. He left only the wagon of forcibles and its guard behind, accompanied by the spidery old Kaifba Feykaald. He passed the frowth giants that loped steadily over the grass, their mail jangling like the chains to ships’ anchors. They smelled strongly of sour fat and carrion.
The hooves of the horses thundered over the ground through stands of golden alders toward the bright plain. Grasshoppers, fat from eating all summer, leapt away from the horse’s hooves. Yellow butterflies dipped here and there in the grass. Overhead, the sky was a blue bowl, and the wind felt brisk in Borenson’s face.
Borenson wondered about his wife. She hadn’t told him that she’d slain the Darkling Glory. He knew how hard it was to keep one’s mouth shut about such things.
He felt sheepish. He’d killed a reaver mage in the Dunnwood, a small one that wasn’t even so powerful as a scarlet sorceress, and dragged it home for his wife. It seemed a paltry prize now.
In the past few days, the world had turned upside down. He’d lost all his endowments, while she gained as many.
But he’d never imagined when he met her in the market at Bannisferre that Myrrima would someday slay a Darkling Glory, a beast of legend that he’d never even seen. He’d never imagined that she would take a bow and charge into the ranks of a reaver horde. He’d never imagined that she would want to accompany him to Inkarra.
Perhaps, Borenson thought, she’s trying to earn my respect.
But, no, even that seemed wrong. Myrrima wasn’t some drooling pup, eager to please. She had a toughness that did not so much beg for admiration as command it. She was that tough, right down to the core of her soul.
Borenson felt as if he were falling into a trap. He had told Myrrima himself that love was part attraction, part respect. He’d felt attracted to her from the moment he’d met her. And right now, he was feeling a whole lot of respect too.
A trio of gree whipped overhead, blacker than bats, writhing on the wind. The reavers thundered over the grasslands beneath a cloud of the winged beasts. From a distance the reavers had looked like a great gray serpent. Closer up, with the way that air vented from their abdomens, now the snake could be heard to hiss as if in anger.
Out on the plains, Skalbairn’s army rode back to join with the Brotherhood of the Wolf.
Borenson worried about his mount. He’d not have bought such an uncouth animal. The piebald mare had an endowment of brawn, one of grace, and two of metabolism, but she kept fighting the bit.
As he neared the reaver horde, the mare tossed her head and shied away. She’d ridden in battle with reavers before. He needed a steady mount, one that trusted him enough to charge a reaver close so that he could bury a lance in it. The mare fought him, tried to race away from the horde.
“Get back in line,” Borenson growled. “Don’t be afraid of them. Be afraid of me!” He slapped her ears with the reins and tried to work her toward the reavers, but she had endowments of her own. It was hard work. Reluctantly she followed the cavalry.
Myrrima had retrieved his ring mail, helm, and warhammer from Carris. With only one endowment of brawn, the weight dragged him.
He reached Skalbairn’s war band. It was traveling light and fast. Most of the knights already held lances, but a hundred wains carried spares.
Gaborn rode up to get a lance. Borenson bent as a squire passed him one too. The weapon was a heavy war lance, perhaps eighty-five pounds. He inspected its iron tip, sharpened to pierce the reaver’s hide. The shaft was polished and oiled, to speed its entry. Three recessed iron rings bound the ash at equal distances, to keep the wood from splitting.
Borenson hefted his lance, felt his mouth going dry. With so few endowments, it would be tough to keep the lance steady.
He glanced up and down the battle lines, saw some lords take two lances, one in each hand. They would plant one in the ground before the charge, return to make a second charge quickly. A week ago, he’d have done the same.
He saw a few knights reach for wine flasks. In the north-lands, men drank wine mingled with borage to lend them courage. Borenson thought it a coward’s act.
But there was little idle chatter, little boasting, the kind of thing that one hears from unseasoned lads out on their first charge. These men had fought at Carris. They’d already pounded into the reavers’ lines again and again, and lived to tell about it. That was a boast that damned few men could make.
Gaborn’s heralds sounded the charge, and Gaborn spurred his mount, leading the way. The cavalry was off. By now the reavers sluggishly loped nearly a mile ahead.
Gaborn circumvented their flank, taking his men to the west. As they crossed the reavers’ path, it looked like a shallow trench.
The reavers had beaten this track on the way north, compacting the soil to a depth of four or five feet compared to the surrounding terrain. There were no trees in that furrow, no bushes or rocks. Everything was pulverized.
Borenson imagined that in years to come, the reavers’ trail would fill with rainwater, frogs, and fish. Generations from now, people might stand in the shallows in the summer and still find the clear footprint of a reaver.
As his mount galloped along, he listened to the cadence of its hooves, imagined his heart beating in rhythm with it.
Gaborn led them west of the horde, so that the reavers moved along to Borenson’s left, but Gaborn kept half a mile downwind from the monsters.
Borenson watched them intently, in case they turned to attack—huge gray beasts, corded muscles rippling beneath flesh so dense it almost seemed to be bone.
To Borenson’s surprise, Gaborn did not order the charge immediately.
Myrrima rode up beside Borenson. She didn’t speak. She merely held her bow, arrow nocked.
They rode along, tense, poised to attack. Borenson’s palm grew sweaty on his warlance.
A pair of badgers, apparently disturbed by the trembling ground, came up out of their dens and sat staring toward the reavers.
The reavers loped ahead in a rocking motion, heads rising, and then abdomens. Their crystalline teeth flashed in the morning sun. Their huge forepaws were large enough to rip a horse in two.
Here and there, deep in the horde, Borenson spotted fiery runes branded into a scarlet sorceress. He looked up and down the length of the reavers’ lines. The sorceresses kept themselves hidden.
The reavers were a wall of flesh, far more impressive than any herd of elephants. Borenson found his blood thrumming through his veins. He’d often imagined lancing reavers as a child, but always he’d envisioned them in ones and twos. Never in his wildest fantasies could he have imagined this.
Sir Hoswell rode up beside them. The small man with his dark eyes and enormous moustache reminded Borenson of an otter.
He smiled at Myrrima. “Don’t worry yourself. Killing reavers isn’t so hard. Just think of them as a target—a big target. Aim for the sweet triangle. Or if they rise up on their hind legs, shoot between the abdominal plates. Other than that, don’t shoot at all. You’ll never get the angle to hit the soft spot under their palate.”
Myrrima did not answer.
Up and down the line, men began to make jests. Someone shouted, “Has anyone seen a runt in the horde? Sir Sedrick wants to battle it.”
A knight rejoined, “There’s no runts, but I saw a sickly one dragging its butt on the ground!”
“I’ll give a silver hawk,” another lord cried out, “to any man who will catch a gree between his teeth and swallow it whole.”
Tradition held that a knight should face death with boldness and a good humor.
But Borenson was in no mood for it today. He could not understand why Gaborn waited to charge. They rode on thus for nearly ten minutes.
The reavers kicked up a cloud of dust a hundred yards high as they slowly loped across the plains, and all of it was drifting west, right into the knights’ faces. Soon, the dirt powdered their armor and their hair, clogged their throats. It would take hours to clean it out of Borenson’s ring mail.
Borenson could see every reason to speed the attack before the day and the reavers warmed up. The fields were clear, the ground dry and even, with hardly a rock or a shrub. There was no reason for Gaborn to hesitate, no reason that a trained veteran could see.
But Gaborn was the Earth King, and saw things that others could not.
After a bit, a message came down the line. Warriors ahead of Borenson said, “The Earth King warns us not to outpace him, to charge when he does. Make no battle cry, blow no horns. Ranks three deep!”
The battle line spread out, so that each knight put ten yards between himself and his neighbor. Borenson positioned himself to be in the front rank.
Then he waited, and waited. His mare quit fighting him. Sometime during all of this, she seemed to find her courage.
Borenson never saw a signal, never heard an order to charge. Instead, he suddenly became aware that the lords began turning their mounts toward the reavers’ lines. Gaborn led the way by a dozen yards.
Gaborn kept his left hand raised, so that none would outpace him. He began trotting his horse toward the reavers. For their part, the reavers did not react. The huge monsters trod across the grasslands, apparently unaware of the impending attack.
At a thousand yards, Gaborn turned his mount a bit, began racing northeast toward the reavers’ lines at a forty-five degree angle. He spurred his horse into a canter, and dropped his lance into a couched position. All the Rune-lords along the front followed his lead.
Borenson did likewise. The mare surprised him. She ran with an especially fluid gait, and he found it easy to keep the lance tip from bouncing.
He watched the reaver horde, prepared for the moment when they would turn to confront him.
At five hundred yards, Gaborn spurred his charger into a gallop. Borenson’s mount seemed to leap beneath him, and the ground became a blur beneath her hooves. All up and down the line, a few chargers began to outpace the rest.
To Borenson’s surprise, the piebald mare did the same. She did indeed seem to have found her heart, and raced now toward the reavers.
Borenson began to search for his target. The rumbling of the reavers’ footsteps sounded far louder than the hooves of the charging horses. The rumbling worked into a man’s bones. Gree whipped overhead, squeaking. The reavers grew closer in his field of view, yet still the eyeless heads did not swivel his way, nor did the reavers wave the philia along their necks and jaws as they did when disturbed.
He spotted a flash of opal deep in the horde, a scarlet sorceress. But there was no way he could get to her. Instead he picked a reaver in the front rank, lowered his lance.
Time seemed to freeze as his charger raced on. He concentrated on the cadence of her hooves, on the little things all around him. With only one endowment of brawn to help, the heavy lance was a clumsy weapon, but he was a skilled knight. He marveled at how butterflies and grasshoppers still flew up from his horse’s path.
He tried to steady himself. For one instant the madness of what he sought to do struck him. If he missed his target on a reaver, if he fell from his horse and botched this in any of a hundred ways, he’d most likely end up dead.
He fought back a maniacal upwelling of terror, and began to chuckle.
At three hundred yards the reavers had not sensed the attack. At a hundred and fifty yards, some of them stumbled and began to swivel their heads.
But his mare was charging so fast that they had only a second or two to respond.
His reaver faltered, skidded to a halt, throwing up a cloud of dust. It was a huge blade-bearer that bore a glory hammer in its right paw.
The black iron hammer had a handle twenty feet long, and a head that weighed as much as a horse. A bit of human hide was tied near the base of the handle. A ballista bolt had pierced the reaver’s back, and stuck there still.
Up and down the lines, Borenson could hear the clash of metal against bone, the shouts of men, the screams of horses, the roaring of reavers.
His own reaver opened its mouth and raised its weapon as he approached.
Ease the tip in, he thought.
He pulled the tip of his lance up, adjusting for the change in angle, as his charger galloped. The monster loomed overhead.
Borenson began to rein his mount in, pull hard to the left. Then he was practically under the reaver, could see every crease in its warty gray hide. Its teeth flashed above him.
He guided the lance tip into the monster’s sweet triangle, felt it pierce the dense cartilage there. He let the weight of the lance carry it home, made his release. The lance plunged into the beast’s head.
The reaver hissed and swung its glory hammer—more in a spasm than an actual blow.
Borenson ducked violently, nearly colliding with the weapon as the hammer whooshed overhead.
Suddenly a second reaver spurred up the embankment. Borenson’s mare screamed and skidded, lost her footing and rolled, throwing him from the saddle.
For a brief second, he was in the air, the smell of dirt thick in his nostrils, a reaver roaring as it filled his vision.
Then he slammed into the ground. The air came out of him in a huff, and he seemed to ache everywhere at once. He knew he had to get up, to move, and he reached out for the ground and pushed with his hands.
He thought dully that he should grab his warhammer, put up a manly fight at the very least.
But he was a warrior of unfortunate proportion. Every muscle seemed to go to jelly, and he couldn’t decide which way was up.
He heard the reaver, rolled onto his back to face it.
The reaver charged, towering over him, its teeth flashing in the sun, philia writhing like snakes. It roared and raised its massive paws.
A bow twanged. An arrow blurred, disappeared into the reaver’s skull.
He looked toward the source. Myrrima hunched not ten feet behind him.
The reaver lurched backward, as if seeking to escape. Her bow twanged again and the monster’s legs went out from under it.
There was a hissing as a third reaver came in from the north. He saw the flash of glowing runes on its gray hide. A smell came before it in a thin gray haze, a stench that blinded Borenson and set his ears to buzzing so loudly that he could hear no other sound. His eyes burned as if they were full of acid.
Myrrima whirled as his sight dimmed. She shouted in fury and loosed an arrow.
23
TARGETS OF FLESH
Any archer who cannot draw, aim, and loose ten arrows in the space of a minute must be demoted to the ranks of the infantry.
—Standing Decree in Heredon
Myrrima’s heart pounded. Her arrow struck the bony plate of the reaver mage’s head. The shaft shattered under the impact.
She fumbled for her quiver, quickly drew an arrow to the full. Her legs felt weak, as if they’d give out beneath her.
Even with her endowments, the reaver’s spell made her eyes burn as if they had lye spilled in them, and there was a buzzing roar in her ears. She felt as if she were spinning.
Her hand shook as she drew aim.
She let the arrow fly. It slammed into the monster’s eyeless head, buried itself in the scarlet sorceress’s sweet triangle.
It did not kill her instantly.
An arrow didn’t have the bulk of a lance. Shooting this monster with an arrow was the equivalent of plunging a needle into a man’s brain. It would kill him, but not as fast and effectively as a heavier weapon might.
The mage roared and crouched back. She raised her crystalline staff, aimed it. A cloud of darkness, like a living shadow, hurtled from it, and Myrrima leapt aside. There was a roar, as if a huge stone had crashed to earth.
Suddenly Hoswell was at Myrrima’s right. His bow sang, and a second arrow plunged into the sorceress’s sweet triangle.
The monster roared in fury, and raised her arms to attack, but then wheeled as if to flee and collapsed to her belly. Air hissed from her posterior vents in rapid bursts, similar to the sound of a human panting.
Myrrima glanced back, saw the path that the reaver’s shadow blast had taken. The ground was crushed and broken, the grass sheared at its roots for yards around. She did not doubt that the spell would have shattered every bone in her body.
More reavers rushed into the fray, crawling over the dead. Myrrima leapt to her feet, drew a shaky aim at a blade-bearer.
“Take your time,” Hoswell shouted as he drew on a monster to their left.
She let the arrow fly. It found its mark. The reaver lunged backward, as if looking for an easier meal. It would be dead in seconds.
“Good,” Hoswell said.
Hoswell sprinted forward, into the thick of the reavers’ lines. Many of the monsters reacted to the humans’ charge merely by running faster, trying to escape through their deeply furrowed trail.
