“True spoken,” Gerran said. “We can blasted well forget about catching the bastards by surprise. Here, Mirro, I’ve got to ride forward and take charge of my archers. If there’s a scrap, good luck.”
“And the same to you.” Mirryn gave him a grin. “Lots of it.”
Gerran trotted his horse up the line and pulled in next to Vantalaber, the leader of the archers’ squad. As a sign of his position, Van wore a bird’s wing sewn to one side of his helm, which was mostly leather though reinforced with brass strips over the crown and around the base. Van grinned at him with the exact same expression as Mirryn and patted the bow laid across his cantle.
“We’ll aim for the horses first,” Van said.
“Good. If you can bring down a few in front, they’ll have to make a messy charge.”
About a mile on, the road entered a forest, a thick stand of old growth maple, larch, and scattered pine. Here and there branches overhung the road and scattered the dust cloud, but in a couple of miles more the road broke free of the cover. Dust rose again as the warbands followed the road into a wide meadow.
To either side stretched open farmland. A mile or so off to the left a plume of smoke rose, the sign of a burning farmstead, no doubt. Ahead of the oncoming Deverry force, armed and ready Horsekin sat on their heavy horses in two-deep ranks, formed into a rough crescent. Thirty raiders, maybe forty—Gerran had no time to count. He reached down and pulled a javelin from the sheath under his right leg. With a silver horn in hand, Prince Voran urged his horse up to the front rank.
“Now!” Voran shouted at the top of his lungs, then raised the horn and blew.
The archers peeled off, five on each side. The prince’s men threw their javelins in a hail of deadly steel, then drew swords on the follow through. The Horsekin shouted and flung up shields to deflect them. One javelin found its mark; a Horsekin in the second rank slumped in the saddle, then fell over his mount’s neck, but the raiders in the front rank held their position until the arrows began flying. With a whistle and hiss, death struck from the side. Horses screamed and reared; two fell to their knees, dying. The Horsekin in the rear rank screamed war cries and pressed forward; those in the front had no choice but to charge. In an answering roar of war cries, Voran’s men charged to meet them.
Gerran found himself caught in the front rank of the charge. Through the choking dust he spotted a Horsekin toward the edge of the enemy formation who was wearing the red tabard of the Keepers of Discipline. In dead silence, Gerran rode straight for him. A Westfolk arrow hissed by him and grazed the Keeper’s bay horse. A red stripe opened on the horse’s flank as it neighed and reared, pawing the air. When it came down, Gerran was there to meet its rider.
The Keeper swung down with his falcata. Gerran twisted away, ended up low in the saddle, then struck up from below. He caught the Keeper full in the face, just under the nasal bar of his helm. With a scream the Keeper tumbled backward just as another arrow struck his mount full in the neck. The horse went down, and Gerran spurred his own mount past them into the thick of the fighting.
So thick, in fact, that he found himself unable to face off with another Horsekin rider—the prince’s force outnumbered them at least two to one. The Westfolk archers had done their work to broaden the odds further. The remaining Horsekin were trying to turn and flee; the arrows kept coming, and Deverry riders were pushing hard into the center of what had been the Horsekin formation. Over the melee a brass horn sang out as somewhere a Horsekin officer signaled retreat.
Gerran pulled free of the hopeless mob and turned his horse. The Red Wolf men, trapped as they had been in the rear rank, were just joining the fighting, or trying to. Gerran allowed himself a grin at the thought of how frustrated Mirryn must be, then rose in the stirrups and looked for his archers, spread dangerously around the edge of the field. He began riding after them, yelling for them to join ranks and return to safety. A few heard him and turned their horses just as a Horsekin squad broke free of the mob and headed straight for Gerran, caught isolated on the edge of the battle.
You rash dolt! Gerran had just time to think it before the squad mobbed him, four riders, swinging hard with falcatas, pressing in two at a time. No time to think of attack—Gerran had shield and sword and parried with both. He swayed and ducked as his horse danced and kicked, but one of the Horsekin had managed to edge round to the rear. A hard blow caught Gerran on the back of his left shoulder. He nearly dropped the shield but clutched the handhold with all his arm’s failing strength and saved it.
All at once a Horsekin yelled, another screamed; the horse directly in front of his went down, an arrow in its throat. Gerran heard shouting, “Red Wolf! Red Wolf!” Swinging a blooded blade, Mirryn burst into the scrap from the side. A Horsekin went down. Daumyr spitted another in the back. The last raider tried to turn his horse and run, but a Westfolk arrow struck his horse full in the chest. Mirryn finished off the rider as the Horsekin fought to jump free of his falling mount.
Panting for breath, Gerran lowered his shield and saw only Deverry riders and Westfolk archers on the field. Prince Voran’s silver horn was singing the order to hold and stand. Mirryn pulled his horse up beside Gerran.
“My thanks,” Gerran gasped it out.
“You had the luck,” Mirryn said. “Daumyr spotted you off on the edge.”
With his drawn sword Gerran saluted Daumyr, who shoved his helm back and grinned with sweat running down his face. Vantalaber guided his horse up to join them with his bow slung over one shoulder.
“I’ve collected all our men, Gerro,” Van said. “All accounted for. It gladdens my heart to see you alive.”
“I got careless,” Gerran said. “I nearly paid for it, too.”
“It happens.” Van shrugged the comment away. “The prince’s captain tells me that a couple of Horsekin got clean away. He says it’s too dangerous to go after them, because they’re probably going to rejoin a larger force somewhere.”
“Most likely,” Gerran said. “This lot didn’t have a baggage train, not so much as a pack mule with them. They can’t be riding on their own.”
Prince Voran had reached the same conclusion. By then, the sun had climbed to zenith. The prince and Gerran discussed the situation while Mirryn and the two captains, Voran’s and Ridvar’s, sat on their horses with them and listened. With the immediate danger past, Gerran could allow himself to feel the pain in his shoulder, burning like fire from the falcata blow. Still, since no one had mentioned seeing any blood seeping through his mail, he forced his mind away from it.
“Good thing you thought of those scouts,” Voran said in an oddly mild tone of voice. “Now, we’ve got two men dead and a couple of wounded.” He turned in the saddle and spoke to his captain. “Caenvyr, make sure that any wounded Horsekin are disposed of. Then pick ten men for a guard to wait with our own wounded till the wagons catch up. It shouldn’t be long now. We’ll bury our dead in the oak trees near the holy temple.”
“Your Highness.” Caenvyr bowed from the saddle, then rode off.
Voran turned to Ridvar’s captain. “Your lord needs to know what’s happened here. Send messengers, but four of them, just in case any of the swine are hiding along the forest road. Bring them to me before they leave, so I can tell them the message.”
“Done, then, Your Highness.” The captain jogged off to follow orders.
“Now, as for us,” Voran returned his attention to the two lords. “Let’s gather our men and push on. I’m beginning to wonder if there’s a good reason why Govvin hasn’t answered that summons from the gwerbret.”
“So am I, Your Highness,” Gerran said. “The temple’s defensible if the main body of raiders come back for us.”
“Good thought, yet once again. Very well. Let’s ride.”
The temple complex stood at the top of a low hill. From the outside, it looked like a typical Deverry dun, with a high stone wall, crenellated, circling a tall broch tower. In the ward, or so Gerran had been told, the priests had
built a round temple of Bel out of the sacred oak wood. When they rode up to the base of the hill, he could see that the gates to the dun hung open, smashed half off their hinges. The warm spring wind brought down the unmistakable stink of rotting blood and flesh.
“By all the gods!” Prince Voran whispered. He started to say more, then merely shook his head in disbelief.
The men behind him began to curse and mutter among themselves. Gerran rose in his stirrups and looked through the gates. He could see what appeared to be irregular tree trunks. standing in the ward.
“It looks like they’ve taken the temple apart, Your Highness,” Gerran said. “Whoever they were.”
“And then they left again,” the prince said. “No man’s going to live in that stink. Dead priests, I assume.”
The prince had assumed correctly, but none of them could have guessed what lay ahead. Most of the prince’s men dismounted and armed, then followed the prince and Gerran while the Cengarn men and the Red Wolf guarded the horses. Cautiously, three abreast, they walked up the hill, then stopped, stunned, at the gates. Ravens rose from a feast, shrieking in annoyance at being disturbed.
Mercifully, all of the priests had already died. Each one of them had been stripped, bound, and then impaled on a long Horsekin spear, inserted in the anus and shoved all the way through to the back of the neck and out again. Their faces, twisted in agony, showed that they’d been still alive during the impalement. A few must have lived for some while, judging from their pain-twisted faces and the way they’d bitten through their own lips. Twelve priests in all, plus four servants, made up the thicket of death.
Gerran heard men behind him turning out of line to vomit off to the side of the gates. Prince Voran himself had gone dead-white, and drops of sweat beaded his face.
“Your Highness,” Gerran said. “Is the high priest one of these men?”
“He’s not.” Voran swallowed heavily. “Let’s look in the temple. He might have taken refuge at the altar.” He turned and called out to his men. “Get these poor bastards down! We’ll bury them properly out in the oak grove.”
The prince allowed Gerran to take the lead. They skirted the impalements and walked around the circular temple to reach the west-facing door. It, too, hung smashed from its hinges. Inside, a few shafts of sunlight streamed from the tiny windows up near the roof, plenty of light to see the remains of the statue of Bel, lying ax-hacked and scattered around the floor. On the stone altar Govvin lay stripped and gutted. The Horsekin had cut him open a few inches at a time and placed his internal organs in tidy lines on either side of him, bladder, guts, kidneys, stomach, and lungs, everything but the heart, which was missing. Ants crawled thick over the corpse and the altar, black with old blood.
“Just what I was expecting,” Gerran said.
The prince dropped to his knees and vomited like a commoner. Gerran turned his back to give him some privacy, but Voran recovered himself quickly. Together, they walked outside to watch as the men lowered the spears and removed the pitiful corpses. Most stuck and had to be pulled free. Gerran couldn’t begrudge the men the black jests they voiced to make the job bearable. “Like pulling pork off a spit” was the most common one.
By the time they’d finished, the wagons of the baggage train were creaking to a stop at the foot of the hill. Some of the men hurried off to fetch shovels. The prince watched them go, then turned to Gerran.
“I’d say that everyone’s been dead about three days,” Voran said.
“I agree, Your Highness,” Gerran said. “We’re going to find more carnage along the road to the north of here, I expect. I wonder how many more raiders there are?”
“I wonder where they are, too. What about Honelg’s old dun? The gwerbret left a fortguard there.”
“So he did, Your Highness. Let’s hope they’re standing a siege.”
“Or standing at all?” Voran’s voice turned grim. “Let’s hope, indeed. ”
“Here comes Caenvyr. Looks like he’s found somewhat.”
The prince’s captain came hurrying up, then bowed to the prince. He handed Gerran a bit of wood that had been cut and smoothed with an ax from the look of the marks left behind by the blade. It also carried two crude symbols carved with a dagger point: a drawing of a piggish creature and then a letter.
“I don’t know letters,” Gerran said. “Do you?”
“Just enough to know that’s an A,” Caenvyr said. “As in apred, perhaps?”
“Truly, that drawing looks like a boar to me, too,” Gerran said. “What does this mean?”
“I have no idea, my lord.” Caenvyr held out both hands palm upward. “I was hoping that you or his highness knew. I found it nailed up on the temple wall, so it must mean somewhat.”
Murmuring apologies, bowing to the prince, Nicedd joined Gerran. “I heard the captain mention Boars, my lord.” He looked at the scratched marks on the wood. “It’s them, all right!” Nicedd turned away and spat on the ground. “I might have known, my lord! They’re just the sort to murder a lot of helpless priests.”
“Here, what’s this?” Voran said. “Now look, silver dagger, Clan Apred was wiped out during the Cerrgonney Wars, or so I was told.”
“If Your Highness says so, then.” Nicedd ducked his head in an excuse for a bow.
“None of that!” Voran snapped. “If you know differently, tell me.”
“Well and good then, Your Highness. I come from up north in Cerrgonney. Those bastards of Boars live just over the border, between us and Dwarveholt. They’ve got a couple of duns up there, and they raided us whenever they could.”
Voran’s jaw dropped in surprise. He recovered himself with a quick nod. “Some of them must have escaped my ancestor’s justice, then,” Voran said. “And so you recognize their mark?”
“I do, Your Highness. I’ve always been told that they worship that Horsekin goddess, Al-what’s-it.”
“Alshandra,” Gerran said softly. “Well now, this is all starting to make sense.”
“True spoken, my lord,” Nicedd continued. “She’s their excuse for raiding. The lord I used to ride for caught one once and got some information out of him before he hanged him.”
“Why haven’t I heard about this?” Voran said.
“Well, um, Your Highness.” Nicedd began studying the ground. “I couldn’t say for certain, but Cerrgonney lords like to keep their troubles to themselves, if you take my meaning.”
“I’m afraid I do, but as justiciar, I’ll have to look into this further. ” He waved the wooden plaque in Gerran’s general direction. “Why would the raiders go out of their way to tell us who they are? It seems foolhardy.”
“Good question, Your Highness.” Gerran had been wondering the same thing. “They may have been leaving that bit of wood for the Horsekin, not for us, to show they’d done their part of a bargain. Or maybe they had a prisoner who wanted someone to know where she’d gone. I’m assuming it was a woman.”
“It might have been a castrated lad. If it was a woman, why would they have brought her along on a raid? She couldn’t have been taken captive here. The priests of Bel don’t allow so much as a mare or a hen inside their compounds.” Voran handed the plaque to Caenvyr. “Keep that in a safe place, Captain.” He turned back to Gerran. “Be that as it may, let’s get the dead buried. Then we’ll send out scouts.”
The scouts came back with grim news indeed. They’d gone a few miles north toward the Black Arrow’s old dun and on the way found a farm.
“Burnt to the ground, Your Highness,” the scout said, “and we didn’t find any corpses.”
The prince swore under his breath.
“We found a lot of hoofprints, too, Your Highness,” the scout went on. “Some were fresh, heading north. I’ll wager they were the scum who fled from us. But there were old prints, too, and a lot of horse droppings. Everything was pretty confused, but the tracks mostly pointed north.”
“It was hard to tell how many riders there were,” the second scout j
oined in. “Though I’d say there were a cursed lot more than we faced today, Your Highness.”
“Well and good, then,” Voran said. “Go rejoin your units, men.” He turned to Gerran. “Let’s see, we sent out messengers in mid-morning. They should ride straight through to Cengarn. Let’s hope the night watch lets them in.”
“It will, Your Highness,” Gerran said, “since they’re riding in your name.”
“Most likely, indeed. How long do you think it will take Ridvar to reach us with more men?”
Gerran had been unaware that the prince had asked for reinforcements, but he was pleased to hear it. “Another day and a half, Your Highness,” he said. “They can’t risk tiring their horses with maybe a battle waiting at the end of the ride.”
“True spoken. I’m thinking of making our night’s camp in the temple. As you remarked, it’s defensible, even without its gates. We can pull the supply wagons into the opening to block it.”
“Good idea, Your Highness. I can’t see the Horsekin dismounting to attack the compound. That’s assuming they don’t have spearmen with them, of course.”
“Of course.” Voran allowed himself a thin smile. “But I think it’s a safe assumption. It’s a long way to walk from their country to ours.”
“That’s one of the things that’s going to save us, Your Highness. In the long run, I mean.”
Voran winced. “True enough. One more thing. I want your honest opinion, Gerran. No agreeing with the prince just because he’s the prince. I’m thinking of staying in our fortified camp on the morrow to let those reinforcements reach us. Will we be safer, or is it a death trap?”
“Well, Your Highness, since we don’t know how many Horsekin are waiting up the road, riding out could be a death trap, too.” Gerran glanced back at the stone walls. “I spotted a couple of wells inside the temple grounds. There’s plenty of water, and we’ve got supplies left. I’d say we camp and hope Ridvar gets himself here fast.”
“Done, then.” He turned to a waiting servant. “Go find Caenvyr.”