Keselo’s catapults stopped hurling fireballs, and the flight of the bison gradually slowed.
Longbow looked off to the east of the knoll and saw that the cloud of dust the Malavi horsemen had stirred up during the rescue of the Atazak commoners had begun to settle back to earth, and the “Guardians of Divinity” that had fled the arrow-storm of the Tonthakans were more than a little distressed as they gradually came to realize that the ordinaries no longer stood between them and their enemies. The higher-ranking Guardians who surrounded Divine Azakan seemed to grasp that even more quickly than their comrades did, and they spread out and moved forward with their spears held threateningly to persuade the Atazakans who now formed the most forward ranks that the option of flight was no longer open to them.
“They spend more time waving their spears at each other than they do when they’re trying to frighten an enemy, don’t they?” Rabbit observed.
“Having somebody—anybody—between them and their enemies seems to be very important to the Atazaks,” Longbow agreed. “Personal safety seems to be their main concern.”
Then Rabbit straightened and shaded his eyes from the light of the rising sun. “The little venom-spitters seem to have decided that they don’t want to play anymore. They’re crawling off through the bushes all over down there. Of course, once Dahlaine had shut off the wind, they weren’t at all useful anymore, and that probably irritated old Holy no end. Irritating a crazy man isn’t a very good idea, is it?”
“Longbow!” Padan called. “We’ve got the breastworks pretty much out of the way. Do you need us here for anything else?”
“Not that I can think of,” Longbow called back. “Get your men out of there.” Then he glanced down the dry riverbed. The bison were still milling around, but they hadn’t gone back to grazing. “It’s time to toot again,” he told Rabbit. “Let Keselo know that it’s all right now to start the bison moving again.”
“I thought you’d never ask,” Rabbit replied, lifting his horn.
There were scattered clouds hanging over the eastern horizon, and the sun, which as yet had not risen, touched them with glorious color of many shades. Longbow was still not comfortable in the treeless meadowland, but he had to admit that the sunrises and sunsets of the region were beautiful beyond belief.
He pulled his thoughts away from the scenery and peered on down the dry riverbed where Keselo’s fire-missiles were dropping with great splashes of flame no more than twenty paces behind the terrified bison. The massive creatures were fleeing up the dry riverbed in wide-eyed panic.
It was quite obvious to Longbow that bison were not as clever as the deer of Zelana’s Domain were—nor as timid. A herd of deer could vanish into the forest at the slightest sound. Bison, on the other hand, were not particularly timid—as long as nobody was throwing fire at them.
Then the herd of bison crested the ridge top just to the north of the small knoll where Longbow and his friends were watching.
“I hadn’t realized how big they are,” Rabbit said, sounding slightly awed. “They aren’t likely to come up here, are they, Chief Two-Hands?”
Tlantar shook his head. “They’ll take the easiest route, and that’s down the slope. I’m sure that they’ll want to get a long way away from that fire, and they’ll run faster when they start going downhill.”
“Are there any bison herds over in Atazakan?” Athlan asked.
“I’ve never been there,” Two-Hands replied, “but I rather doubt it. Bison eat grass, not trees, so they wouldn’t be very interested in forest country.”
“The Atazaks have probably never even seen a herd of bison, have they?”
“It’s not very likely. And even if there were bison over there, Holy Azakan and his Guardians live in the city of Palandor, so about the only wild creatures they’ve ever seen have been birds. They probably won’t even realize that they’re in any danger until it’s too late. I think it’s called ‘learning the hard way,’ and that’s the worst way to learn anything.”
“They’ll be much wiser for the rest of their lives, though,” Rabbit noted, “which might even be as long as about five minutes.”
As Two-Hands had predicted, the stampede of the shaggy bison picked up speed as they fled on down the slope. The “Guardians” stationed near the upper end of the slope stood gaping at the huge creatures bearing down on them, and then they turned and tried to run away. The ones stationed farther on down the slope, however, met them with spears and commands to return to their positions.
The discussion didn’t last very long, though, because the herd of terrified bison ran right over the top of both groups.
Then, in a final demonstration of his insanity, Holy Azakan rose from his ornate chair—or possibly throne—and raised one hand in a commanding sort of way. “Come no farther!” he ordered. “I am thy god! Kneel down before me lest I destroy thee, one and all. If ye do not obey me, I will punish ye all, and great will be thy suffering. I will command the earth to open and swallow ye! I shall even command the sun—which is my father—to burn ye down to ashes. I do tell ye, one and all, that ye have seen your last day, and great will be the lamentation of all of thy kind—for truly . . .” He broke off and looked around, his eyes widening in horror as he realized that he was all alone. His “Guardians” had either fled in terror or vanished, screaming, under the sharp hooves of the terror-stricken bison.
“Mother!” Azakan cried out. “Save me! Rescue me, please, mother, please! Don’t let them hurt me!” Then his voice became a shrill scream of absolute terror, but the bison paid no heed, and Azakan’s shriek was lost in the rumbling thunder of a thousand hooves.
“Most appropriate,” Chief Two-Hands said.
“I don’t follow you,” Longbow admitted.
“I couldn’t really swear to this, friend Longbow,” Tlantar said, “but the word reached Asmie a long time back that the very first thing Azakan did when he assumed the throne of Atazakan was to order the execution of his mother and all her other children. Now that all came home to roost. He died begging his mother to save him, but she wasn’t there anymore.”
“There were a few of them who managed to stay alive, Chief Two-Hands,” Tladak reported along about noon. “They were the ones intelligent enough—or maybe lucky enough—to hide behind large boulders on down the slope. We rounded them up and took their spears away from them. What do you think we should do with them?”
Two-Hands shrugged. “Tell them to go home,” he suggested. Then he scratched his cheek and turned to look at Ekial. “You might want to tell the commoners that ‘Holy Azakan’ isn’t around anymore and that most of his ‘Guardians’ are dead. Let them decide what to do with the survivors.”
“After the way the Guardians treated then, the commoners aren’t likely to treat the survivors very nicely.”
“That’s up to them,” Two-Hands said. “We have other things to attend to right now.”
Longbow walked a short distance away from the others. “Are you there?” he sent a silent thought out to Zelana.
“Of course I am,” her voice replied. “How are things going up there?”
“It’s all over—and I suppose you could say that we won.”
“That was quick.”
“We had some help.”
“What happened to the crazy Atazak?”
“He isn’t crazy anymore.”
“You cured him? How did you manage to do that?”
“He happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong—or maybe the right—time. He doesn’t have time to be crazy anymore. He’s much too busy being dead.”
“You stuck an arrow in his forehead, I take it?”
“No. That wasn’t necessary. We might be able to find a few bits and pieces of him to give to your big brother, but I wouldn’t make any large bets on that. He stopped being all in one piece rather quickly. Did you want any details?”
Zelana made a gagging sort of sound. “Spare me,” she said. “Were you able to persuade the rest of the
Atazaks to go on back home?”
“There weren’t really very many of them left. It’s going to take us a few days to get back down there to Mount Shrak. Ekial and the other Malavi can come on down faster if Dahlaine really needs them. Have the servants of the Vlagh started their invasion yet?”
“Not as far as we’ve been able to determine. Hurry on back, Longbow. Things aren’t the same when you’re not here.”
“We’ll be along in just a little while. Tell Eleria that I said hello.”
“That’s sweet, Longbow,” Zelana said.
“Try not to get carried away with it,” he told her.
THE FORTRESS
1
It was a crisp day in late autumn as Narasan and Sorgan led the Trogite army and their assorted allies from the encampment around Mount Shrak down toward the southern mountains.
“Who’s in charge of the men you sent down to that gorge to help Gunda build the foundation for our fort?” Narasan asked his friend.
“Skell and Torl,” Sorgan replied. “I always put my relatives in charge when I’m not going to be there.” He looked around and drew in a deep breath. “It’s good to be out in the open again,” he said. “You don’t necessarily have to tell Dahlaine that I said this, but living in a cave for weeks on end doesn’t really light my fire. I start to get jumpy when I can’t see the open sky above me.”
“It does take a bit of getting used to,” Narasan agreed. “We’re warriors, Sorgan. We aren’t supposed to live inside—whether it’s houses or caves.” Then he smiled briefly at his friend. “I’m not sure just exactly why, but that cave seemed to shrink quite a bit when Dahlaine’s little boy brought that bear into the map-room.”
“He was a big one, all right,” Sorgan said. “There are bears up in the hills above Weros over in the Land of Maag, but they’d look like midgets compared to that monster Ashad seems to believe is his brother. I didn’t know that bears could grow that big.”
“Different varieties, I’d imagine,” Narasan said. “It might be something like the differences between you Maags and the men of my race. Your first mate, Ox, is about twice as big as Gunda or Padan.”
“That might have something to do with it,” Sorgan agreed. “Of course, Ox is one of the biggest men I’ve ever come across.” He smiled. “That’s always made my life much easier. When you’ve got somebody as big as Ox to back you up, the men in the crew don’t argue with you very much. How far would you say it is down to Crystal Gorge? I don’t really read maps very well. I’ve spent most of my life at sea, and we sort of think in days rather than miles.”
“I made it to be about forty miles down to the mouth of the gorge, and Gunda’s building the foundation about ten miles on down from there.”
“And your men can cover only about ten miles a day?”
“That sort of depends on the terrain, Sorgan. When it’s flat and there aren’t many trees, we can usually walk fifteen. If it’s steep and forested, we’re lucky if we can cover five.”
Sorgan peered on ahead. “Here comes that warrior woman called Trenicia,” he said. “I never did get the straight story about her. After she threw all those jewels back at Zelana’s sister and told her that she wouldn’t work for her anymore, why did she decide to come north with you instead of trying to find some way to go on back home?”
“I’m not entirely sure, Sorgan,” Narasan admitted. “Maybe she just wanted to see more of the Land of Dhrall—or maybe she wanted to find out if Dahlaine might want to hire her to fight in this war. She’s a very complicated woman, and she can do things that I wouldn’t even try. When we were marching from the east coast to Mount Shrak, she got bored and started ranging out in front of the army. She seemed to enjoy sneaking up on deer and frightening those huge bison. As it turned out, she’s an extremely good scout. She’d come back to our camp every evening, and give us a detailed—and very accurate—description of the ground we’d cover the following day. There’s something that she wants, but I can’t for the life of me figure out just what it is.”
“Women are like that, Narasan. They always want something, but they’ll never tell you exactly what it is.”
“Are we still just plodding along, Narasan?” the warrior queen demanded as she joined them.
“I’m an expert plodder, Trenicia,” Narasan replied. “Is there anything interesting out to the front?”
“Not really—just more of those miles and miles of nothing but miles and miles. The mountains to the south are still a few days away.”
“Did you see any of those bison herds?” Sorgan asked her.
“Not directly ahead of us,” she replied. “There’s a fair-sized herd eight or ten miles off to the west, but they weren’t moving in this direction.”
“That’s a relief,” Sorgan said. “After what Chief Two-Hands told us about those overgrown animals and what happens to people who can’t get out of the way when the animals start to run, just the thought of being in the wrong place at the wrong time tightens my jaws more than a little. If Longbow happened to be with us, I could probably relax, but he had to go north with all those other useful people to chase the Atazaks back to where they belong.”
“It’s not really going to take them very long, Sorgan,” Narasan replied. “From what Dahlaine told us about the people of Atazakan, I don’t think very many of them will survive when our people attack them.”
“What I can’t understand, though, is why Dahlaine even permitted the crazy man to take over that part of his country.”
“Heritage, Sorgan,” Narasan explained to his friend. “Dahlaine doesn’t like to interfere with the people of his Domain. Azakan was the son of the former king, so he inherited the throne when his father died.”
“That might be all right in normal situations, Narasan, but ‘crazy’ sort of disqualifies somebody for leadership, wouldn’t you say?”
“That might depend on how many people the crazy one can persuade to join him—or her. Dahlaine’s sister has quite a few problems, and she’s been getting all kinds of bad help from her priesthood. Dahlaine should have locked her away years ago.”
Then Sub-Commander Andar came back from the advance cohorts. “The Malavi called Ariga came up from the south, Commander,” he reported in his deep voice. “He wanted me to tell you that he and his friends haven’t encountered any of the creatures of the Wasteland so far.”
“Have they been able to reach Gunda’s wall yet?”
“Not yet, Commander. They have seen the northern end of the gorge. So far, they’ve been checking every nook and cranny down there to be certain that the bug-people aren’t hiding in the bushes up here on this end of the gorge.”
“Ah, well,” Narasan said. “Apparently we’re going to have to go down the gorge by ourselves to find out how far Gunda’s managed to get.”
“I’m sure he’s done just fine, Commander,” Andar said. “Gunda’s just about the best when it comes to building walls.”
It was two days later when the grassy meadowland came to an abrupt stop and some very rocky mountains reared up out of the ground.
“Every time we turn around here in the Land of Dhrall, we seem to encounter more of these silly mountains,” Narasan grumbled.
“They’re pretty to look at,” Sorgan replied.
“Looking is all right, Sorgan,” Narasan said. “It’s the climbing that I don’t like. There are hills down in the empire, but they’re a lot gentler than these piles of rocks we keep encountering here in the Land of Dhrall.”
Sorgan sighed. “I know how you feel, my friend,” he said. “Hills and mountains had a lot to do with my decision to become a sailor. There are big waves out at sea—sometimes almost as steep and rugged as these mountains are—but our ships do all the climbing for us.”
“How nice of them,” Narasan replied. Then he shaded his eyes and looked up toward the top of the steep ridge. “Here she comes again,” he said to Sorgan, pointing up the slope that Trenicia was descending at a dead run. “Doesn’t s
he ever run out of breath?” Sorgan demanded. “As far as I’ve been able to determine, she runs all the time.”
“Are we still practicing our plodding, Narasan?” Trenicia called as she loped on down the slope.
“Why do you run so much?” Sorgan bluntly asked the warrior queen.
“I like to run,” she replied with a shrug. “It’s the best way I know of to stay in good shape—a much better way than sitting around drinking beer day in and day out.”
“Be nice,” Sorgan replied mildly.
“I’m always nice, Hook-Beak.” Then she pointed off to the left. “If you and your people go that way, you’ll find the going much easier. You’ll start to encounter a lot of trees if you go around the other way.”
“How far would you say it is to the mouth of Crystal Gorge?” Narasan asked her.
“I could run there in about three hours,” she replied. “I’d imagine that it’ll take you and the other plodders about two days. I’ll go on ahead and keep an eye out for those enemies of yours. I’ll come back and warn you if I happen to see any of them.” Then she turned and ran off again.
“That woman’s starting to irritate me,” Sorgan muttered.
It was slow going for the next two days, and Narasan blamed Dahlaine for that to some degree. The time they’d spent in the cave under Mount Shrak rather painfully brought back the warning that old Sergeant Wilmer had repeated over and over when Narasan had been only a boy. He could almost hear the old soldier’s warning, “If’n y’ don’t git no exercise a-tall fer three straight days, yer a-gonna stort gittin’ flabby an’ short-winded. If’n y’ don’t stay in good shape, yer enemies’ll cut y’ all t’ pieces the first time y’ come up against ’em—an’ that’s the pure an’ honest truth.”
“I think I should have paid more attention,” Narasan privately admitted.
It was about midafternoon of their second day in the rugged mountains that formed the southern boundary of Dahlaine’s Domain when Ariga the horse-soldier rode up to meet them. “It’s just a couple more miles to the north end of Crystal Gorge,” he advised, swinging down from the back of his horse.