Worms' Ending: Book Eight (The Longsword Chronicles 8) (34 page)

First, though, came the ending of Kanosenn. Let Insinnian
sweat behind the throne of Juria wondering when next Gawain might sneak over
the walls of Castletown. Let the lordling Consort wonder what became of his
Commander of Retribution. Let the Toorseneth wonder, too, how it came to pass
that so strong a force could be so utterly annihilated by so few.

Gawain stood, and so silently did he rise that not even the
leather of his saddle creaked for the loss of his weight upon it. He took
another turn around the camp and his sleeping comrades. His sleeping friends.
Tomorrow they would ride not for safety and home, but for vengeance, and to
strike a blow in the name of the oaths they had taken, for friends lost, and
friends they hadn’t met yet. The Toorseneth had much still to answer for, after
all.

oOo

35. Pink

It was birds responsible for revealing the Ahk-Viell’s camp
to Gawain and his hunters, though none bearing a mystic Eye borne aloft.
Rather, it was the frequent
pinkpinkpink!
calls of alarm from disturbed
blackbirds, and their regularity, which caught Gawain’s ear.

They had followed the trail left by the three crystal
riders, staying well to the west of it, and were unsurprised when, an hour or
so before noon, the trail swung more to the east and towards a copse beside a
river, quite probably the same river which had flowed into and out of the lake
to the east of the corridor of uncertainty. The southern forest at the end of
that broad corridor of land was far behind them now, and though it had seemed
vast before the brief battle of the binding, it had been in reality smaller
than the forest in Last Ridings.

Those percussive calls of alarmed blackbirds told of a
regular patrol disturbing the birds with their passing, and the frequency of
the calls spoke of a small perimeter walked most likely by a solitary watchman.
Gawain had eased them well to the west, had left the horses, and together the
four had sneaked and slunk and made their stooped and hasty way across scrubby
ground and were now squatting behind a thorny shrub.

Kanosenn, or one of his underlings, had chosen a poor camp.
Tents there were in abundance, and the few survivors were now hurrying to bring
them down and bundle them up, making a hasty pile of them at the tree line. The
tents had been pitched in an area of clear ground with the copse to the north,
and on the west bank of a sharp meander in a river. The bend in the flow
carried the waters briefly westward before looping slowly back to the
southeast, so that camp was nestled in the crook of that bend, fast-flowing
water to the east and all the way around to the south.

Though the river might well be shallow enough for a crossing
without the need for horses to swim here, its waters were swift and bitterly
cold. True, it served to protect the camp’s eastern and southern flanks as it
looped around, and presumably elves had believed nothing bad could come at them
from the west, which was the only unobstructed direction anyone could approach
from. But…

But, Gawain smiled his grim smile, protection on three sides
also meant the enemy had nowhere to run but north back into the trees and
thence all the way to the forest they had left behind, or south or east across
the freezing river. They could of course run straight towards attackers running
at them from the west, but Gawain felt it unlikely given the nature of those
attackers, one of whom, after all, bore an urgent message for the elves from
King Eryk of Threlland, and another who bore a big white stick and was anxious
to use it.

There would be no surprise here, though. A clear hundred
yards of open land dotted with clumps of weedthorn lay sprouting from the well
watered grasses between the four hunters and their quarry. Seven elves in all,
and one of them Kanosenn. Why they were so intent on breaking the camp instead
of simply abandoning it and continuing their running south, or west for Juria,
Gawain didn’t know. Perhaps it was some folly by the elfwizard, a form of
scorched earth, denying the enemy the succour of tents and blankets and camp
comforts. One of the elves was already dousing the growing pile of waxed canvas
coverings with a container of what looked to be ellamas oil.

In truth, there really was little else in the camp but the
small one-man tents and the short poles and guys used to erect them. They would
serve to keep a soldier dry in the night while in bivouac, and keep the worst
of the wind from chilling bones, but little else.

Pinkpinkpinkpink!
came the alarm call again, the lone
guard circling through the trees of the copse as Gawain suspected, the better
to peer out to the north lest an enemy approach from that direction. Clearly,
Kanosenn expected no pursuit, or there would be greater watchfulness, and no
delaying with the tents; the lone watchman was probably just a sop to warriors
and what training they might have had in Elvendere.

Two riders were hurrying about the business of watering all
seven of the horses and filling canteens and water skins, one was on foot patrol
in the copse, and the rest busy with the destruction of the tents while the
Ahk-Viell leant on his staff at the riverbank and stared into the waters.

Delaying here at their former campsite was a mistake, and
Gawain began to understand even without strange aquamire to give him insight.
Perhaps some archaic tome on military tactics written by a fool who had never
engaged in them might have advocated such folly as denying a pursuing enemy the
comforts of tents in winter. Perhaps, after a thousand years of isolation, such
archaic tactics, and yes, cavalry formations such as those advocated by
Tellemek of Callodon, might still seem current and effective to elves
unfamiliar with advances made in lowland warfare over the centuries. Gawain
tucked away the observation, convinced it might be an important one.

The last of the tents was simply kicked over and trampled,
the frustrated elfguard gathering up the stiff canvas and in a tangle of thin
ropes manhandling it to the pile.

“When that lot goes up there’ll be a great deal of smoke,”
Gawain whispered. “And the breezes as ever in this season are from the north.
Stand ready. When it’s lit, we’ll charge.”

“On foot?” Allazar whispered.

“Tired? Or are your poor old bones creaking today?”

“It is a lot of ground to cover, Longsword.”

“Not really. They have nowhere to go. A blazing pile of
waxed and oil-drenched canvas in the trees to the north, freezing water east
and south. That leaves only one direction.”

“Aye,” the wizard nodded, and gripped the staff, “Ours.”

“Take a slight lead, Allazar, and raise your Shield should
any arrows be loosed our way. We run as silently as we can. No battle-cries.
With luck we’ll steal a few yards closer to them before we’re seen. Ven?”

“MiThal?”

“Shoot those wearing crystal garb first. I don’t want them
hiding from your Sight in the smoke or in the trees. You may loose the moment
we are seen.”

The ranger smiled. “Yes, miThal.”

“Oggy?”

“Melord?”

“Hurl what arrows you will wherever you will once Ven starts
shooting.”

“I might stick an ‘orsey, melord,” Ognorm whispered
dejectedly.

“You might. Or you might stick a bastard would’ve watched
you die in agony with a smile on his face yesterday.”

“Arr, now you put it like that then...”

“Allazar?”

“Longsword?”

“If they’re not shooting back at us when they come within
your range, by all means do whatever you like.”

“Thank you.”

“Remember, it’ll be smoky. Stay together. I don’t want any
confusion concerning friend or foe. Anyone in doubt?”

None were.

They waited.

A hundred yards away, one of the elves gave a whistle. It
was low, a signal to the watchman in the trees, but foolish nevertheless. Poor
discipline. Gawain imagined these were likely common Eastguard, elven warriors
good with the bow and the sword but not thalangard-trained. More used to long,
idle watches near the tree line overlooking Ferdan and Juria. Common elvish
soldiery isolated from the world a thousand years and as unaware of the
stupidity of whistling signals in enemy territory as they were of the
Toorseneth’s long centuries of betrayal.

The watchman emerged from the trees, gave a wave to indicate
an all-clear, and Kanosenn gave up his solitary pondering of the waters of the
river and turned around to face the camp, pausing only briefly to cast a glance
westward. He made a shooing motion to hurry the men of the Retribution along (and
Gawain smiled again when he thought of the name the fools had been given) and
climbed into his saddle, adjusting his dark robes, small white spots marking
the myriad places where once dark stone gems had been affixed to the material.

The hunters braced, weapons readied, breath becoming shallow
and rapid, hearts pounding, and watched as an indolent elfguard strode to the
heap of oil-soaked tents and struck a firestone on a hunting knife as if he
would hurl the shower of sparks into the incendiary pile. Three attempts it
took, and then with a great
whump!
and a fierce blue flame, the oil
took.

Almost at once a great plume of greasy black smoke began to
belch from the heap, enveloping the unfortunate elf who wasn’t quick enough on
his feet to avoid it. The smoke wafted across the empty campsite, and at once,
Gawain sprinted from cover, his companions with him.

The smoke made a catastrophe of any plans the elves might
have had for a peaceful and efficient departure from their old camping ground.
It billowed, and clung low as it wafted through them. It also widened the eyes
of the four hunters sprinting quietly towards them and sent a frisson of alarm
through Gawain; it was much denser than he’d expected.

But the breezes came and went as breezes do, and while the
elves were still uttering curses and coughs and blaming the fool who’d lit the
pyre instead of themselves for building it upwind, patches of clear air allowed
one of the elves to spot the threat charging towards them.

“Arangard!” he screamed, pointing frantically at the four
wild men rushing in from the west, “Arangard!”

But even as the warning was fading and the elfguard was
desperately dragging his bow from his saddle, Venderrian, sprinting, leapt into
the air, drew, and shot the rider of the Tau in the back, the arrow drilling
clean through the left shoulder blade and out through the heart and ribs. The
rider had been wearing a crystal-coated tunic.

Gawain hurled his arrow the moment Venderrian’s feet hit the
ground, the ranger drawing another arrow on the run. Ognorm’s cast was a
heartbeat behind Gawain’s. Ognorm’s arrow thudded into the thick leather of a
rider’s saddle, Gawain’s hit the rider in the right side just below the
shoulder, shock sending the elf tumbling off his horse before another billowing
cloud of smoke engulfed the target.

Venderrian leapt and shot again, and again hit the mark,
killing the gem-studded guardsman who’d so disturbed the local blackbirds that
they’d betrayed the campsite to Gawain. They’d sprinted fifty yards now, the
gap closing rapidly, and a corner of Gawain’s crystal-clear mind noted that the
ranger was leaping into the air before shooting to give a certain stillness to
the aim which sprinting impacts of boots on the ground would otherwise disturb.
And
that
was certainly not in some archaic Callodon manual of warfare.

He hurled another arrow, and saw it speeding towards its
mark, unstoppable, and then another roiling mass of smoke drifting across
clearing from the burning waxed canvas. Ognorm threw an arrow, and then drew
Nadcracker, and Gawain drew his sword. For the briefest moment, he saw
Allazar’s Shield flare and an arrow shatter against it, and then the Shield was
a great Surge and hurled into the smoke, sending great vortices ripping through
the fug, bowling over horses.

Chaos ensued then, on all sides.
No plan survives contact
with the enemy
rang in Gawain’s ears as the clash of steel from his left
told of Ognorm encountering the rider who’d been knocked off his horse by
Gawain’s arrow. A sickening thud followed, and told of Eryk’s message being
well and truly delivered.

The crackle of lightning and the stomach-wrenching squeal of
a horse cut dreadfully short, and then a great splashing from the south of the
camp, from the river.

The sound of Venderrian’s bow, another shot loosed, the cry
of a stricken elf and the splash of a body falling into water.

A dark shape lurched through the smoke towards Gawain, one
hand waving as if to clear the belching smoke from in front of its face, the
other clutching a short sword. Gawain swung, and heard the thud of an arrow’s
impact just before his blade cut the elfguard open from shoulder to hip.

More splashing, another crackling blast of white fire, and
then a gap in the smoke revealed the scene, although briefly. It also revealed
Kanosenn and a rider of the Tau on horseback emerging from the freezing waters
on the eastern bank of the river, and Allazar rushing to launch white fire at
them from the western side. Venderrian loosed a shot, but Kanosenn had already
raised his shield behind him, and the arrow, and Allazar’s white fire, were
harmlessly spent.

Allazar screamed, a stream of curses in the wizards’ tongue
Gawain thought, but the two survivors of the ambush were thundering southeast,
and beginning a slow arc which would eventually swing them around to a more
westerly direction. Five elves of the Tau were dead, and a horse. Gawain
summoned Gwyn with a whistle, cleaned his sword, and while they waited for
their own horses to arrive in answer to the call, set about salvaging arrows,
food, a couple of warm blankets, and setting loose the four surviving horses
once of the Tau.

“The Ahk-Viell escaped,” Allazar glowered.

“They’re not easy to kill when they’re forewarned,” Gawain
declared. “Was it you loosed fire and killed that poor horse?”

“No. It was the Ahk-Viell loosing it blindly through the
smoke towards us. The days of Zaine are ended, Longsword, for a wizard to
unleash his fire blindly thus, heedless of who or what it might strike.”

“You’re the Sardor, Allazar, it’s for you to decide whether
or not the D’ith adhere to ancient tenets. Knowing as we do that no other breed
of wizard does should make it a little easier to tell friend from foe when it’s
dressed in robes and sandals and carrying a big stick.”

“It is far from the season for such garb.”

“Indeed it is. And if those two scum of the Tau don’t freeze
to death after their charging through that river or stop to light a fire to
thaw out, then they have a good start on us. We’ll keep to the west of them,
keep pressing them south, and run the bastards into the ground.”