That truth brought little comfort to Katerin O’Hale and sent a shudder along her spine.
• • •
Siobahn’s predictions were proven accurate the very next day, when villagers from the towns nearest Caer MacDonald began flocking into the city. Mostly, it was the young and the old who came in, in orderly fashion and all carrying provisions, ready to fight if necessary, to hold out against the wicked king of Avon to the last. And every group that came in spoke of their hardiest folk, who were moving to the west to meet with and hinder the approach of the cyclopian force.
Luthien didn’t have to ask to know that this was somehow Siobahn’s doing, that while he sat up on the roof, mulling over what seemed like an assured defeat, the half-elf and her stealthy cohorts were out and about, rousing the towns, telling them that the time for their independence had come.
The response from those towns was overwhelming. That day and the next, Luthien watched his garrison within the city grow from six thousand to ten thousand, and though many of the newer soldiers were elderly and could not match a powerful cyclopian in close combat, they had grown up on the Eriadoran plains hunting deer and elk, and they were skilled with their great yew bows.
So also were those younger warriors that went out in bands from the smaller villages, and Belsen’Krieg’s army found itself under assault barely two days and ten miles out from Port Charley.
The damage to the massive force was not excessive. Every once in a while a cyclopian went down, usually wounded, but sometimes killed, and flaming arrows whipped into the supply wagons, causing some excitement. More important, though, was the effect of the skirmishers on the army’s morale, for the cyclopians were being hindered and stung by an enemy that hit fast from concealment, then flittered away like a swarm of bees in a swift wind—an enemy they could not see and could not catch.
Belsen’Krieg kept them together and kept them marching straight for Montfort, promising them that once the city was overrun, they could slaughter a thousand humans for every dead cyclopian.
• • •
Oliver looked out at the heavy fog that came up that night, the third after the cyclopians had put into Port Charley, and he knew that this was no natural event. Since he had met up with Brind’Amour, the wizard had constantly complained about how weakened magic had become, but Oliver thought this enchantment wonderful, the perfect cover for this night’s business.
Seventy ships from Avon lay anchored out in the harbor, great warships, many with catapults or ballistae set on the poop deck. In studying those magnificent vessels that day, Oliver and Katerin had agreed that it was a good thing Brind’Amour had intervened in Port Charley. Had they followed their original plan and tried to keep the cyclopians out in the water, this picturesque and enchanting town would have been reduced to piles of rubble.
Katerin, Brind’Amour, and Gretel joined Oliver at the dock a short while later. Immediately, the young woman scowled at Oliver, and the halfling pretended that he did not understand.
Katerin grabbed the plumed hat off his head and ruffled his purple cape. “Could you not have dressed better for the occasion?” she grumbled.
Oliver pulled the hat back from her and put his free hand over his heart, as though she had just mortally wounded him. “But I am!” he wailed. “Do you not understand the value of impressing your enemy?”
“If we are successful this night,” Brind’Amour put in, “then our enemy will never see us.”
“Ah, but they will,” Oliver assured him. “I will wake at least one and let him see his doom before my rapier blade pierces his throat.”
Katerin smiled. She loved the halfling’s accent, the way he made rapier sound like “rah-pee-yer.” She wasn’t really angry with Oliver’s dress; she was just teasing him a bit to get the edges off her own nerves. Katerin was a straightforward fighter, an arena champion, and this stealthy assassination technique was not much to her liking.
There was no other choice, though, and she understood that. Seventy ships, nearly a thousand cyclopian crewmen. There could be no mistakes; not a ship could escape to sail south and warn Greensparrow.
Port Charley was bustling that night. Many of the cyclopian sailors were ashore, even most of those who were supposed to be on watch out at the boats, lured in by the promise of fine food and drink, and other, more base, pleasures. The town’s three taverns were bursting with excitement, and so were the more than a dozen private homes that had been opened up to accommodate the crews.
The killing would begin at midnight, when most of the one-eyes were too drunk to realize what was happening. By that time, a hundred small boats would be well on their way through the fog, out to the anchored ships.
“The signal!” Gretel motioned toward a flickering light to the north. She held up her own lantern to the south, unhooded it for just a moment, then again, and the message was relayed all down the line.
Brind’Amour, Oliver, and Katerin stepped into their small boat along with two of Port Charley’s folk, a husband and wife.
“In Gascony we have such bugs as we are this night,” Oliver said to them, quieting his tone as both Brind’Amour and Katerin shhh’d him. “They come from Espan, mostly, and so does their name,” the halfling continued in a whisper. “Mosquitoes. Clever bugs. You hear them in your ear and swat at them, but they are not there. They are somewhere else on your body, taking drops of your blood.
“We are mosquitoes,” the halfling decided. “Mosquitoes on Greensparrow.”
“Then let us hope that enough mosquitoes can suck a body dry,” Brind’Amour remarked, and they all went silent, drifting out from the docks, the oars barely touching the water, for stealth and not speed was the order of business this night.
Oliver was first up the anchor rope of the first ship they came upon, the halfling swiftly climbing hand over hand to the rail. He paused there, and then, to everyone’s disbelief, he began talking.
“Greetings, my one-eyed, bow-legged, wave-riding, so ugly friend,” he said, and reached under his cloak and produced a flask. “You are missing all the fun, but fear not, I, Oliver deBurrows, have brought the fun to you!”
Most alarmed were the villagers in the rowboat, but Katerin, who was beginning to figure this strange halfling out (and was beginning to understand why Luthien liked Oliver so much), stood up and steadied herself in the boat, taking the longbow from her shoulder.
They couldn’t see what was transpiring beyond the rail, just Oliver’s back, his purple cape fluttering in the breeze. “I have brought you a woman, as well,” the halfling said. “But that will cost you a few of your so fine Avon gold pieces.”
Predictably, the eager cyclopian leaned over the rail to get a look at the goods, and Katerin wasted no time in putting her arrow into the brute’s head.
Even as the bolt struck the mark, Oliver grabbed the cyclopian by the collar and heaved. The one-eye hit the water between the ship and the rowboat, bobbing facedown after the initial waves had settled.
Brind’Amour wanted to call up and scold Oliver, for the noise was too great. Suppose other cyclopians were about on the deck? But Oliver was out of sight.
There was indeed another cyclopian awake and roaming the deck, but by the time Katerin, the next up the rope, had made the rail, it was already dead, Oliver standing atop its massive chest, wiping his bloodstained rapier blade on its cloak.
“Mosquitoes,” the halfling whispered to her. “Buzz buzz.”
And so it went up and down the line, with every ship boarded and taken.
Back on shore, the killing commenced as well, and in only two of the twelve houses and one of the taverns did the cyclopians have enough wits about them to even put up a struggle.
When the wizard’s fog cleared later that night, nearly twenty of Port Charley’s folk were dead, another seven wounded, but not a cyclopian remained alive in the town, or in the harbor, and the rebels now possessed a fleet of seventy fine warships.
“It was too easy,” Brind’Amour sa
id to Oliver and Katerin before the three retired that night.
“They did not expect any trouble,” Katerin replied.
Brind’Amour nodded.
“They underestimate us,” Oliver added.
Still the wizard nodded. “And if that truth holds, Montfort will not be taken,” he said. The wizard dearly hoped he was right, but he remembered the image of mighty Belsen’Krieg, sophisticated, yet vicious, and doubted that the days ahead would be as easy as this night.
Late the next morning, so that the mosquitoes had the time for a good night’s rest, the town of Port Charley organized its own force, nearly a thousand strong. With Katerin upon Riverdancer, Oliver on Threadbare, and Brind’Amour on a fine roan stallion, joining old Phelpsi Dozier—who had been a commander in the first war against Greensparrow twenty years before—at the head of the column, the soldiers started out toward the east.
Heading for Montfort, which Brind’Amour would not yet let them call Caer MacDonald.
TAINTED
Belsen’Krieg, his ugly face a mask of outrage, pulled the cord from one of the sacks piled in the back of the wagon and reached inside with his huge hand. Those terrified cyclopians around him didn’t have to wait for their general to extract the hand to know what would be found.
“Tainted!” the ugly general bellowed. He yanked his hand from the sack and hurled the worthless supplies—part foodstuffs, but mostly fine beach sand—high into the air.
Montfort was only thirty miles from Port Charley, as the bird flies, but given the rough terrain and the season, with some trails blocked by piled snow and tumbled boulders and others deep with mud, the cyclopian general had planned on a five-day march. The army had done well; as far as Belsen’Krieg could determine, they had crossed the halfway point early that morning, the third day out. And now their route could be directly east, sliding away from the mountains to easier ground for more than half the remaining distance.
But they were nearly out of food. The soldiers had left Port Charley with few supplies, the plan being that the wagons would continually filter in behind them on the road. So it had gone for the first two days, but when the wagons had left the afternoon of that second day to go back to Port Charley and resupply, they had been attacked and burned.
Belsen’Krieg had promptly dispatched a brigade of a thousand of his finest troops to meet the next east-moving train. Despite a few minor skirmishes with the increasing numbers of rebels, that caravan had gotten through, to the cheers of the waiting army. Those cheers turned to silent frowns when the soldiers discovered they had been deceived, that the supplies which had gone out of the port city on the second day were not supplies at all.
The cyclopian leader stood and stared back to the west for a long, long time, fantasizing about the torture and mayhem he would wreak on the fools of Port Charley. Likely it was a small group of sympathizers for the rebels—the fact that the wagons got out of the town at all made Belsen’Krieg believe that the criminals in Port Charley were few. That wouldn’t hinder Belsen’Krieg’s revenge, though. He would flatten the town and sink all of their precious fishing boats. He would kill . . .
The cyclopian dismissed the fantasy. Those were thoughts for another day. Right now, Belsen’Krieg had too many pressing problems, too many decisions. He considered turning the force back to Port Charley, crushing the town and feasting well, maybe on the meat of dead humans. Then he looked back to the east, to the easier ground, the rolling fields of white and brown that lay before them. They were more than halfway to Montfort, and of the twelve or so miles remaining, at least ten of them would be away from the treacherous mountains. With a good hard march, the army could reach Montfort’s walls by twilight the next day. They might even happen upon a village or two, and there they could resupply.
There they could feast.
The cyclopian began to nod his huge head, and those around him stared hopefully, thinking that their magnificent leader had found a solution.
“We have two more hours of good light,” Belsen’Krieg announced. “Double-step!”
A couple of groans emanated from the gathering about the general, but Belsen’Krieg’s scowl silenced them effectively.
“Double-step,” he said again, calmly, evenly. Had this been an ordinary cyclopian tribe, one of the wild groups that lived in the mountains, Belsen’Krieg’s life would likely have been forfeit at that moment. But these were Praetorian Guards; most had spent their entire lives in training for service to Greensparrow. The grumbling stopped, except for the unintentional rumblings of empty stomachs, and the army resumed its march and gained another two miles before the sun dipped below the horizon and the chill night breeze came up.
Belsen’Krieg’s advance scouts came back to the army soon after it had pitched camp, reporting that they had discovered a village ahead, not far off the trail, only a few miles to the north of Montfort. The place was not deserted, the scouts assured Belsen’Krieg, for as dusk fell, lamps were lit in every house.
The brutish cyclopian leader smiled as he considered the news. He still did not know what to make of this rebellion, did not know how widespread it might be. Going into a small village might be risky, might incite more Eriadorans to join in the fight against Greensparrow. Belsen’Krieg considered his own soldiers, their morale dwindling with their supplies. They would go into the town, he decided, and take what they needed, and if a few humans were killed and a few buildings burned, then so be it.
That rumor spread through the cyclopian encampment quickly, eagerly, and the soldiers bedded down with hope.
As the darkness settled in deep about the camp though, the night, like the one before, became neither quiet nor restful, and hope shifted to uneasiness. Bands of rebels circled the camp, peppering the brutes with arrows, some fire-tipped, others whistling invisibly through the dark to thud into the ground or a tree, a tent pole or even a cyclopian, surprising and unnerving all those around. At one point, a volley of nearly a hundred burning bolts streaked through the night sky, and though not a single cyclopian was slain in that barrage, the effect on the whole of the army was truly unsettling.
Belsen’Krieg realized that the small rebel bands would do little real damage, and he knew that his soldiers needed to rest, but for the sake of morale, he had to respond. So bold an attack could not go unanswered. Companies were formed up and sent out into the darkness, but they saw nothing among the snowy and muddy fields and heard nothing except the taunts of the elusive Eriadorans, who knew this ground, their home ground.
One company, returning to the encampment, was attacked openly, if only briefly, as they neared the crest of a small hill. A group of men sprang up from concealment atop that hillock and charged down through the cyclopian ranks, swatting at the brutes with clubs and old swords, poking at them with pitchforks and slicing with scythes. They ran right through the cyclopians with no intention of stopping for a pitched fight, and rushed out, disappearing into the darkness. A few seconds of frenzy, another small thorn poked into the side of the huge army.
In truth, only a dozen Praetorian Guards were killed that long night, and only a score or so were wounded. But few of the brutes slept, and those who did, did not sleep well.
• • •
“The bait is set?” Luthien asked Siobahn soon before dawn of the next day, an overcast, rainy, and windswept day. He looked out from Caer MacDonald’s northern wall, across the lightening fields and hedgerows. He noted the lighter shade of gray, the last remnants of snow, clinging to the dark patches, losing the battle with spring.
“Felling Downs,” the half-elf replied. “We had fifty soldiers in there all the yesterday, and burned the lights long into the night.” Siobahn chuckled. “We expected to be attacked by the cyclopians’ advance scouts, but they stayed out.”
Luthien glanced at her sidelong. He had wondered where she had been the previous night, and now he thought himself foolish for not realizing that Siobahn would personally lead the group out to the small village north of Caer M
acDonald as bait. Wherever the fighting might be, Siobahn would find her way to the front. Even Shuglin and the other dwarfs, so tortured under Greensparrow’s rule, were not as fanatical. Everything in Siobahn’s life revolved around the rebellion and killing cyclopians.
Everything.
“How many have gone?” Luthien asked.
“Three hundred,” came the quick reply.
Again Luthien looked at the half-elf. Three hundred? Only three hundred? The cyclopian force numbered fifty times that, but they were supposed to go out and deal the brutes a stinging blow with only three hundred warriors? His expression, eyebrows arching high over his eyes, clearly asked all of those questions.
“We cannot safely cover more in the ground to the north,” Siobahn explained, and from her tone it was obvious that she wished they could send out the whole of their force. She, perhaps even more than Luthien, wanted to hit hard at the cyclopian army. “We cannot risk many lives on the open field.”
Luthien nodded. He knew the truth of what Siobahn was saying; in fact, he had initially argued against going out from Caer MacDonald at all. But the ambush plan was a good one. For the cyclopians to take the easiest and most logical route into Caer MacDonald, they would have to cross a small river west of Felling Downs, then turn south, through the town and straight to the foothills and the walled city. There was only one real bridge across that river anywhere in the vicinity, northwest of Felling Downs, but Luthien and his cohorts could cross the water in the rougher ground just to the west of Caer MacDonald. They would then strike out to the north and take up a secretive position in the hedgerows and other cover just south of the bridge—a bridge which Shuglin’s folk had already rigged for collapse. When the bulk of the enemy army got across, heading out for Felling Downs, that bridge would be taken down and those cyclopians caught on the western side would face the wrath of Luthien’s marauders.