Chapter Twenty-Two
They left via the rear door of the manor, attempting to keep a low profile in case any mercenaries lay in wait. After a cursory search, Colt found the trail left in the snow and followed a course directly for Culdeny. The big man stressed they should travel the eastern highway instead of taking the direct route, as that reduced the chances of them encountering any ambush as they approached the town.
The sight of the horses brought a smile to Criosa’s face, particularly the white mare Nellise had been riding. It was the princess’s own horse and Nellise was happy to relinquish it to her. The mounts were still tired from their long ride, so Aiden and the others were forced to walk them through the night.
Colt stayed in the lead, keeping the Stonegaard Mountains to their right as they travelled briskly across the snow-covered plains of north-central Aielund. The air was crisp and cold as the terrain slowly began to ascend into the foothills.
Shortly thereafter, Colt steered them away from the tracks they had been following, which could only mean they were only hours away from the besieged town. To their dismay, a dull red glow lit the sky to their north-west, an ominous sign of events transpiring in Culdeny even now.
The waning moon provided only just enough light to see by so Colt was making good use of Aiden’s goggles as he and Sayana lead them onward. The dull roar of the sea could be heard somewhere up ahead, but it was a different sound that caught Sayana's sharp hearing stopping her dead in her tracks.
“Did you hear that?” she asked with a trembling voice. Aiden listened carefully, but couldn't hear anything other than their horses steps through the snow, and the distant sound of the sea.
“I hear nothing out of the ordinary,” he answered.
“It was the growl of a large beast, far in the distance,” she explained. “I - there it is again.”
“Okay, I heard it that time,” Aiden muttered in fear. Though they couldn't see each other's expressions in the darkness, Aiden could guess they were as afraid as he was. “Anyone care to venture a guess as to what that was?”
“You hear all sorts of things during a war,” Colt said with a shrug. “That could have been the groan of a siege engine, or the collapse of a building.”
“This far away from Culdeny?” Nellise queried.
“We're wasting time,” Colt growled. “We need to get there as soon as possible, or there ain't gonna be a town left to save.” Too tired to argue, Aiden pressed on with a reluctant Sayana by his side.
Nearly half an hour later they finally emerged onto the eastern highway, a long, straight stretch of road that followed the cliffs of northern Aielund all the way through the Stonegaard Mountains and on to the capital, Fairloch, nearly a week's travel to the east.
They’d heard no more of the deep growling sounds, but the scene before them when they climbed down from their saddles was one of devastation.
The smell of charred flesh and burnt wood drifted through the air, and the smouldering remains of a large fire could be seen just up the road a little. There were a dozen bodies all clad in metal armour that had partially melted from the heat. Nearby trees were blackened and charred, as if the entire area had been blasted with fire of incredible intensity.
“What could have done this?” Criosa asked with a trembling voice as they searched amongst the wreckage. The princess suddenly retched, and dashed off into the bushes to throw up.
“I've got tracks over here,” Colt said grimly. “Mostly theirs, I think, judging by the boot prints. They were running from the east as fast as they could. Whatever hit them, it happened while they were moving. There's no sign of a fight - they just burned.”
Movement from the brush on the side of the road made everyone whirl around with their weapons at the ready. Half a dozen men in the livery of the Kingdom Guard emerged onto the road with their hands in the air. They carried an assortment of swords, maces and longbows.
“Who are you?” Colt barked, ready to shoot them at the first sign of trouble.
“Sergeant Evans, Kingdom Guard Culdeny detachment, second company,” an older man replied in a tired voice. “We’re the only survivors of this attack. You’re not with the mercenaries - that much I can tell.”
“No, I think we’re on the same side,” Colt suggested before he was interrupted.
“Help, I've found someone over here,” came Criosa's sudden cry from the side of the road. Colt and the others lowered their weapons. As one, they rushed over to see a terribly burned man lying in the snow. He was alive, though only just, and as Nellise brought forth a prayer of light, they could see that his skin was horribly burned and must have been in terrible pain.
“You're going to be okay,” Nellise told him gently as she knelt beside the man, her crystal in one hand.
“I've never heard a priest lie like that before,” the burned man managed to choke out, exhibiting remarkable bravado considering his condition.
“She's the finest healer in these parts, friend,” Colt told the man, “she's gonna have you on your feet and back in the fight in no time.”
“No thanks,” he gasped, “I don't want to fight that thing.”
“You saw what attacked you?” Pacian asked.
“Dragon,” came the dreaded reply, “it was a dragon. Size of a house...” Aiden felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up and a deathly silence fell over the assembled group as they digested this information.
“There hasn't been a dragon in these parts for centuries,” Colt said. “Where the hell did it come from?” Aiden kept his silence, hoping that somehow, the dragon in his dreams hadn't somehow come back to the real world.
“I'll ask it next time,” the burned soldier replied, clasping onto Sergeant Evan’s hand as he struggled to breathe.
“My squad was patrolling the highway,” the old soldier explained, “and we came across the monster in the mountains, watching the road. We managed to make it back here before it caught up. Is he going to make it?”
“He's too far gone,” Nellise whispered sadly, looking down on the burned man with regret as he stiffened, then relaxed for the last time. Evans gently placed the man’s hand across his chest, while Aiden looked around at the carnage the dragon had wrought.
“It must have attacked Culdeny,” he muttered, “that's why we saw it on fire, well before the Steel Tigers could have made it there.”
“Maybe the dragon attacked the mercenaries as well?” Criosa asked with a trembling voice, sounding like she was starting to regret her decision to come along.
“We'll find out when we get closer to town,” Aiden surmised. “If the army is still there, then it means the dragon has to be working with them.”
“Is that even possible?” Pacian asked, incredulously. “How do you deal with something that could turn you into a pile of ash in seconds?”
“It has been done in the past,” Sayana pointed out. “There are dragons in the mountains where the akora live. They have had dealings in the past, though the price is always too high.” Though she hadn't looked at Aiden directly, he knew she was speaking to him when she said that.
“If they are working together, then there is nothing we can do to help Culdeny,” Criosa whispered soberly. “How can we fight something that powerful?”
“We don't,” Aiden surmised. “We're going to engage the leaders of the Steel Tigers, and if that dragon shows up, we pull back. It can't be everywhere at once, and this poor man said it was back on the highway in the mountains.”
“If you’re planning to take on the people attacking our home, we’re going to help,” Sergeant Evans volunteered. “My lads gave their lives in defence of the realm, and I for one ain't going to let them die in vain.”
“We could use all the help we can get,” Aiden agreed.
“Let’s move west while I scout along the way,” Colt ordered. “Save the horses. We’re going to need whatever they’ve got left.” With their numbers bolstered, they cautiously set off along the frozen road. It
wasn’t long before they saw a flash of light rising into the sky from the tree line, to disappear into the distant glow from the town.
“They've set up siege engines,” Evans advised. “I guess that means they are working with the dragon.”
“No sign of it yet, though,” Aiden said hopefully. “Colt would have said something if he'd seen it.” It wasn’t long before they began to hear the sounds of distant battle, the screams and cries of men fighting for their lives echoing across the frigid landscape.
When they had gone as close as they'd dared, Aiden called for everyone to stop so Colt could move ahead to investigate further. It was a tense wait, but gave them time to catch their breath after the long day’s journey. Aiden drank from his water skin and rested his eyes for a minute, letting the distant sounds of war wash over him.
When he opened his eyes again, Colt had returned, crouching down in the snow to let them know the situation.
“They're just over the rise, about two hundred yards away,” he started, speaking to the gathered assortment of soldiers, civilians and royalty. “Got themselves a couple of big siege engines, trebuchets I think.”
“We're still half a mile from Culdeny,” the sergeant remarked. “How many men are they holding in reserve this far back?”
“About two dozen, not including their engineers,” Colt grunted. “There are a few mounted warriors, too, including their commander, from what I can tell.”
“Robert Black is there?” Aiden asked, suddenly very interested. “How could you tell?”
“They've got a few runners ferrying orders back and forth from the front lines, and they were always meeting up with this one bloke in heavy armour. Has himself a nice big stallion to ride, too, so I think it's a safe bet that he's in charge.”
“How much light was there?” Nellise asked. “We had planned a dawn attack, but if my guess is correct, we're still over an hour from first light.”
“I saw some lanterns here and there, but it's not quite enough to fight in. I had an idea, though – they're using burning pitch in those siege engines, so if we set those on fire...”
“I can do that,” Sayana said with a measure of fear in her voice. Aiden glanced around at the faces lit by the distant fires and saw the same trepidation he felt. They were in over their heads and they knew it.
“Okay people,” Aiden said to catch their attention. “I know you're tired, and I know you're hurt, in more ways than one. I feel the same way. If I thought we had a choice here, I'd be staying out of this fight altogether. This isn't my war and for most of you, it isn't yours either.”
“The people who should be fighting this aren't here, so it falls to us to step forward and do our part. We've heard about the King fighting a war in another country, and didn't think we were part of it. But now the war has come right to our doorstep and if we walk away, we may not have a home left to go back to.”
“Things have come between us in recent weeks,” he continued sombrely, speaking directly to his companions, and more specifically to Sayana. “Personality conflicts, hard choices, stressful situations. Under ordinary circumstances, we probably would have gone our separate ways. But remember when we first started working together? We were a team, and we were unstoppable. That's what we need to be here. If we want to survive the next hour, we need to put aside our issues and trust in each other.”
They looked to each other and in the dim light of the nearby burning town, appeared to be ashamed of the way they had been behaving of late. Pacian was the first to speak and for the first time in many days, Aiden heard his cocky old friend once more.
“I think I speak for all of us, when I say that the Steel Tigers are in for a very bad day.”