The Nightblade Epic Volume Two: A Book of Underrealm, page 21
“Papa!” The boy leaped into his father’s arms and held him tight.
“I ordered him to be retrieved the moment the horns sounded,” said the High King.
“Thank you, Your Majesty,” said Xain, his voice shaking.
“Your Majesty, the Shades attack from the shores of Selvan,” said Eamin. “They are pouring from the Birchwood in great strength. Even now they board boats to cross the channel, and may already have arrived at the island’s western gate.”
“Do you think we can hold them?”
“Mayhap we could, but at the same time a fleet comes from the east. They are ships of Dulmun. We thought the Shades had enlisted the help of Dorsea, but that was a deception. They have mustered Dulmun to their banner, and mean to take the Seat to stake their claim to power.”
“A clever ruse,” said Enalyn. “I might have known the warning came to us too easily.”
“Your Majesty,” said Loren, throwing herself forwards and dropping to one knee. “No words can express my—”
“Oh, stand, girl. You cannot think to blame yourself for this, for you did nothing wrong. Indeed, had you acted any other way, it would have been treason.” The last plate was strapped to her arm, and her squire helped her don gloves of interlocking metal scales. “Now it seems we must have a fight, if we wish to leave this island alive.”
“Your Majesty,” said Loren, rising to her feet. “I do not see how you can fight your way through so many. There might be another way, a means of escape besides—”
“Be silent, girl,” said the lord chancellor, staring at her with venom. “Beside the High King stand the greatest warriors Underrealm has ever known, and each of them would give their life for hers if need be. We will fight our way through, you may count on it.”
“Where is the dean?” said Enalyn, as though she had not heard either of them. “I should have thought he would be here by now.”
One of the royal guard standing nearby looked about uneasily, and then stepped forwards to speak. “Your Majesty … when we went to find him, we found his chamber empty. A student at the Academy said they saw him fleeing west, probably trying to escape the city before the battle.”
“Craven to the very end,” said Enalyn, shaking her head with a steely glare. “Let that be a lesson to you, girl: never appoint a wizard based upon his political convenience. Are we ready?”
“Your Highness—” said Loren, looking to Eamin, who was donning his own armor with the help of a page.
“Thank you for your counsel, Loren, but these are warriors all,” he said. “They will break through, if it can be done at all.”
With that, the High King raised her sword. Around her assembled the members of the royal guard, and outside them a sizable force of castle soldiers. Together they pressed forwards to the door of the throne room.
“Stay close to them,” said Xain, holding his son tight in his arms. “Look for a chance to help, but do not join the fighting if you have any choice. Wars fought in cities are often the bloodiest.”
Loren did not need the warning, for she still remembered Wellmont. But she nodded.
Quickly the procession made its way into the palace’s main hall. Still there was no resistance; Loren hoped they might reach the city before they encountered the Shades. Out in the streets, she thought she might be able to find a path to escape if the High King should become surrounded. Here in the palace, with only a single door to march through, it felt as if they were walking into the jaws of death itself.
The palace’s front door crashed open, and soldiers in blue and grey charged in with a roar. Over their heads flew black arrows, some landing among the High King’s guard while others narrowly missed Loren and her friends. She fell to the ground with a cry, dragging Chet with her. He landed with a grunt, and together they huddled until the rain of arrows ceased.
When they could stand again, they saw Enalyn’s force heavily engaged with the Shades who still poured in through the door. At once Loren saw the truth of what the Lord Prince had said: these were fine warriors. Their armor was thick and true, and the blows of their enemies could not pierce it. Their swords were sharp and gleaming, but soon streaked with the red of blood. Enalyn and Eamin were in the press, and every time an enemy drew near they struck quickly to cut them down. But for every Shade they killed, another stepped into place, and still more came through the door. Loren could see no end to their number. And each man of the palace guard who fell was irreplaceable.
“Retreat!” she cried in panic. “There are too many!”
Mayhap someone heard her, or mayhap they saw the truth for themselves. In any case, someone with a battlefield voice called the withdrawal, and they backed away slowly, making the Shades pay in blood for every foot of their advance. Armored hands seized the High King and the Lord Prince and dragged them backwards, out of the fighting and into the open space behind. The royal guard came with them, while the rest of the soldiers formed a rearguard to slow pursuit.
“Quickly!” said Eamin. Blood ran down his face, but Loren could not tell if it was his own. “They will cover our escape. Into the palace!”
They fled, and quickly, but still the clash of steel on steel followed them through the halls.
THEY STOPPED IN THE MAIN courtyard, the royal guard still in a protective ring around Enalyn. Loren and the others came to a halt nearby, and with a sharp gesture Enalyn beckoned them forwards.
“There is another entrance we mean to try,” she said. “The rear gate is smaller and more easily defended. The Shades might have ignored it, focusing their strength instead on the wider front gate.”
“But then again, they might not,” said Loren. “Your Majesty, let us find some way to get you to safety other than force of arms, for I do not think that will serve us.”
“She is informing you, not asking for your counsel,” said the lord chancellor. “It is a courtesy you should be grateful for.”
“If we escape to the east, that only means it will be even harder to make for the western docks and escape,” Chet said angrily. “Your duty is to save the High King, not die gloriously in battle beside her.”
The lord chancellor’s face turned ugly, his voice to a low snarl. “I know my duty, boy. I wager I have had it longer than you have been alive.”
Enalyn silenced him with a stern look and turned to Loren. “There is a hidden entrance. But it runs from the palace to the eastern docks. Those docks are currently occupied by the Dulmun fleet. Our foes have planned their attack well, and likely they were long in concocting their strategy. These men know their way about a battle. Put your faith in them.”
The sound of tramping boots filled the air, and a fresh group of palace soldiers marched into the courtyard to join them. “There are the reinforcements,” said the lord chancellor. “Your Majesty, we should be moving.”
He led them on, back into another wing of the palace that Loren had never explored. She soon became turned around and lost, and resigned herself to following the armored backs of the soldiers before her. Before long they pushed through another, smaller door, and found themselves in a narrow open space between the back of the palace and the eastern wall. There was the gate, smaller than the one to the west. Above, guards on the wall loosed arrows at unseen foes on the other side. But they could scarcely peek out from the battlements without having to duck a hail of enemy fire.
“It looks as though there are many of them beyond the gate,” Loren called out.
“Let us hope not enough,” said the Lord Prince. “Open the gate!”
The shout went up the wall, and guardsmen in the gatehouse leaned to the wheel. With the groaning of chains, the gate swung slowly inwards. Almost at once, Loren saw swords and spear tips pushed through the gap.
Eamin held his sword aloft and gave a battle cry. The palace guards charged into the fray, and the Shades were thrown back from the wall. They turned in a rout, many fleeing into the streets and vanishing into the alleys of the city. But some of their captains managed to rally, and slowly the grey and blue uniforms came together once more. The Lord Prince’s charge stalled, and the palace guards were pushed into a circle against the wall. Loren and her friends could not get through the gates, for it was blocked by armored bodies.
“They cannot get through,” said Gem. “They will be cut down.”
Loren did not answer him, but looked at Chet, and in his eyes she saw the same fear. Dread seized her heart. She had brought the enemy here and doomed the High King, and now she was powerless to save them.
Shadeborn. Shadeborn. Shadeborn.
A chant had begun to build beyond the wall. Loren quailed, for she recognized the word. That was what Rogan had called himself when they met in Dorsea. She craned her neck, and above the fighting she saw him. He had pressed through his troops to stand at their head, blocking the High King’s escape into the city.
Shadeborn, shadeborn, shadeborn.
Bolstered by their captain, the Shades were pressing forwards in earnest, and the palace guard were forced back through the gate. She saw the lord chancellor hacking desperately, trying to cut a path through the enemy. With a cry of rage he threw himself forwards, attacking Rogan himself.
His blade caught in the hook of Rogan’s axe and was turned aside. Then they danced, the lord chancellor striking with sword and shield both, while Rogan held his axe in both hands, his shield slung across his back. With the haft of it he blocked strike after strike, the lord chancellor pressing forwards. But Loren could see Rogan’s smile beneath his helmet; he was toying with the Mystic, drawing him out and into the midst of his army.
A sword came swinging from the left, and the lord chancellor caught it on his shield. But in that moment’s distraction, Rogan struck. His axe came down in a punishing blow that the lord chancellor barely avoided. But he was off his balance now, and Rogan pressed him back. Where before they had been matched blow for blow, now Rogan’s axe was a blur of speed, striking so quickly that it took all the Mystic’s skill to hold him back.
The axe bit deep into the joint at the shoulder, and the lord chancellor dropped his sword as he sank to his knees.
Twice more the axe rose and fell, first severing an arm, and then taking the head at the neck. The lord chancellor’s body fell beneath the boots of his enemy, and the Shades roared their approval.
With renewed vigor they pressed forwards now, and Rogan led them in another charge. The palace guards had to retreat through the inner gate. But the guards atop the wall had been slain, and the portcullis remained raised. Loren, Chet, and Gem threw themselves at one of the doors, struggling to push it closed against the mass of bodies. Loren stood at the edge of the door, just a few paces away from the fighting. Her heart thundered as steel flashed and blood soaked the pavement at her feet.
“Loren!” cried Rogan, drawing her gaze. He wore a rictus grin, blood covering his armor. She saw the hilt of a sword sticking from the side of his breastplate where someone had landed a blow, but the Necromancer’s dark magic kept him on his feet. “Daughter of the forest. You have done your duty well. Thank you for laying the path of our conquest.”
She gritted her teeth and stepped away from the doorway to snatch her bow. In the blink of an eye she drew, and whether it was by Albern’s training or some stroke of luck, her shaft sank into Rogan’s left eye and out the back of his head. His body went limp as a rag doll, and he fell beneath the press.
The palace guards gave a great cheer, and the Shades wavered. The Lord Prince led a counterattack, and they pushed their foes back through the gates. But the press of bodies was too thick beyond the walls, and it was all they could do to push the gates closed. The royal guards seized the Lord Prince and the High King and dragged them back into the castle, with Loren and her friends hastening to follow.
“THAT WAS A WELL-PLACED shot,” said the Lord Prince. His helmet had been knocked loose in the fighting, and Loren saw a bruise blooming to life on his cheek. “I had heard from Xain that you had no taste for killing.”
“He will not die,” said Loren grimly. “A dark enchantment protects him, binding him to life.”
“Still, it secured our escape, and I thank you,” said the High King, who had knelt to wrap a bandage about the knee of one of her royal guards. The woman had taken an arrow.
“You are welcome, Your Majesty,” said Loren. But the words were scarcely out before she turned on her heel and ran down the hallway towards the staircase.
“Loren!” said Chet. “Where are you going?”
“Finding us an escape,” she said. She took the stairs two at a time. Chet hastened to follow her, but he soon slowed, wincing at the injury in his chest. Though she wanted to scream with impatience, Loren stopped and went down, taking his arm to help him.
“Why go up?” said Chet. “We cannot fly away from here.”
“Mayhap, but one never knows. Certainly it seems that the ground floor has no escape.”
She threw open a door leading to one of the wide open balconies that ran all around the palace exterior. Below them she could see the fighting at the eastern wall. As she had expected, Rogan stood at the head of his soldiers again. The gaping wound where his eye had been was already stitching itself shut.
Loren looked around in desperation, searching for some other way, some hidden door she had not noticed before. It seemed impossible. She had been a guest here less than a month. How could she find a new route of escape more easily than those who had lived in the palace their whole lives? But she had to try. She ran down the balcony, around a corner of the building, and the sun blinked as it vanished behind the arches for a moment.
Chet nearly ran into her as she stopped in her tracks. When he saw her looking up, his gaze followed. “What is it?”
She did not answer him. She was looking at the arches. The palace stretched out in five great wings. Along the top was a balcony, just like the one they stood on now, but thirty feet higher. And from the end of each wing sprang an arch, rising gently before dipping back down to meet the towers that stood at each of the five corners in the castle’s outer wall.
“Come with me,” she said, and ran back into the palace.
When she reached the High King, the royal guard were engaged in a furious argument with the Lord Prince about what to do next. Xain and Gem stood apart. Gem saw them and came running, eyes wide.
“Where were you?” he said. “I thought you had run off and abandoned us.”
“You are not so lucky as all that,” said Loren. “You must suffer our company a bit longer—quite a while longer, if I have my way.”
“What do you—” he began, but she pushed past him to speak with the High King.
“Your Majesty,” she said, cutting through the argument between the Lord Prince and the royal guard. “There may be a chance to get you to safety.”
They all stopped at that and stared at her. But where Loren had quailed under their gaze in the throne room, now she had no time. She pressed on before they could answer.
“We have no chance of victory by warfare, as any of us can plainly see. All the castle entrances are blocked. This is not a time for blades and armor, but for stealth and secrecy. Shed your plate and follow me, and I can get you beyond the palace walls.”
“How?” said the Lord Prince, incredulous.
“The arches. They stretch from the top of each wing to the towers. They are high, but they are wide enough to walk on, and not too steep. But we have to go quickly, for it will be a dangerous crossing, and if they see us they will try to shoot us down.”
“That is madness,” said one of the royal guard. “It is fifty feet in the air.”
Enalyn studied Loren’s face for a moment before turning to Eamin. “What is your counsel, Lord Prince?”
He looked at Loren in wonder, and she could see the thought working its way through his mind. “I …” he began.
THOOM
They heard a great crash outside, and the roaring of an army.
“They have broken the eastern gate!” said one of the palace guard. “They are within the walls!”
“Enough,” said Enalyn. “If they are in the walls already, we have no choice. Up the stairs, and quickly!”
Loren led the way, jumping up the steps like a satyr on a mountainside, with Chet and Gem just behind. The High King followed, while the Lord Prince helped Xain and his son make the climb. Four of the royal guard came with them, the rest staying behind to guard the ground floor against the invaders.
Up and up the stairs wound in a spiral, and Loren ran past every floor. Only when she reached the top at last did she take the door leading out of the staircase, and quickly turned about to get her bearings. In a moment she found the door leading outside, and took it to another balcony. She went to the railing and looked down at the courtyard far below, where she saw the Shades doing battle with the palace soldiers on the pavement. The sight of it drew her gaze for a moment, but she forced herself to break away.
A few paces farther along the balcony, she found the spot where the arch joined the castle wall, some two paces below the balcony railing. It was not such a far drop, but it made Loren dizzy now; the arch was mayhap two paces wide, and if they stumbled upon landing, it was another fifteen-pace fall to the courtyard below.
“That is not an easy jump,” said Chet beside her.
“It is the only way. Would that we had a rope! There is one in my pack, but I left that in our quarters.”
The door opened behind them, and the rest of the procession came out onto the balcony. Xain took one look at the height and reeled heavily away from the railing. But Gem stood brightly on tiptoe, leaning far over the edge. “I made far more difficult leaps than this on the rooftops of Cabrus,” he remarked.
“Your Majesty, you cannot think to go through with this,” said the royal guard. “It is certain death.”
“Certain death is the battle that rages in the palace even now,” said Loren. “This is a hope, however slim.”
“Two paces, is about how slim I would call it,” said the Lord Prince.
