Ashes of a Black Frost

in front of them while three chose to lay flat on their backs and use the very ground itself as a means of steadying their aim.

Unaware or uncaring of the reception that awaited them, the sarka har dove. Each tucked in their branch-and-leaf wings with a grating shriek and steepened their dive. A high-pitched whistling began to build, cutting through the wind and the shouting.

Konowa tapped into his anger and forced the frost fire to light his blade. He had no illusions that it would make one bit of difference against these monsters, but he had another motive. “On my command, shoot above the tip of my saber, men, and not a moment before. We’ll get one chance at this, so make it count.” He could have left it at that, probably should have, but in a night that seemed destined to be his last, he needed to say more. “Remember, shoot just above the saber, not below. I’ve already had one ear tip trimmed, I don’t need a matching set!”

Konowa’s own laughter filled his ears making it difficult to tell whether anyone else had joined in. Above, the sarka har angled their approach and now lined up one behind the other.

They were diving directly at him.

“Aim. .”

Prayers, curses, and possibly even a song rose from the ranks. No matter where a soldier kneeled or lay it looked like the wooden dragons were diving straight at them. More than a few hands trembled, and at least two soldiers had left their ramrods sticking in the barrels of their muskets, but be they terrified or simply scared, they held their ground and took aim.

Still a hundred yards away and forty yards high, the lead sarka har thrust out its wings with a crack like a cannon shot, slowing its descent. The sarka har behind it followed suit. A moment later each had lowered its thorn-lined branch in preparation of a raking run along the column.

Konowa filled his lungs with air and opened his eyes wide. Whatever was about to happen, he wasn’t going to miss it. He sighted along the edge of his saber blade and squeezed the pommel until he was sure he would crush it.

The lead monster filled Konowa’s sky above his saber as the sarka har hurtled downward to ten yards away.

“Fire!”

ELEVEN

The massed musket fire of the regiment lit up the night. Thunder and smoke rolled over Konowa as the volley snapped forth like iron rain. Musket balls whizzed above his head, one even grazing his outstretched saber blade setting the lead ball ablaze with black flame. The lead sarka har took the full brunt of the volley. Its wings shredded as the musket balls tore it apart while its trunk shattered into splinters as the shots carved through it. It exploded in a searing flash, scattering chunks of flaming debris outward as it continued its dive toward the ground.

And Konowa.

Konowa never considered joining the artillery. To be an officer in that branch of the service meant having a superior understanding of mathematics and physics, especially the calculation of such bizarre, finicky notions as velocity and trajectory. He didn’t have the head for that kind of thing. Just how much he didn’t was now hurtling toward him as an expanding fireball.

“Son of a-” was as far he got, not out of any sense of sudden decorum, but on account of the wind being knocked from his lungs. The flaming pieces of the sarka har crashed into the road three feet in front of Konowa and bounced. A six-foot section slammed into the wagon wheel in front of him which, while saving his life, still hit him at a high rate of speed. The world as he knew it vanished in a tornado of bright and dark, fire and ice.

And then he was floating. Blood pounded in his ears and every joint, muscle, and bone in his body felt pulverized. The wind tore at his uniform and he became conscious that he was trying and failing to get air into his lungs. He convulsed and a gulp of frigid air plunged down his throat, snapping open his eyes.

Sounds and sensations flooded back. He could see the flaming wreckage of the first sarka har on the road thirty feet below. He couldn’t see the second.

Konowa became aware of a rhythmic creaking and turned his head just enough to catch the up and down beat of a large wooden wing. As his head cleared, the scope of just how much he hadn’t thought through where to stand hit him. He was hanging by the waist, probably from his leather belt by the feel of his stomach, facing downward, which meant the second sarka har was directly above.

The shouts of the soldiers below began to make it through to his brain.

“Jump, Major, jump!”

“The snow will break your fall!”

“Jump!”

The sarka har lurched and Konowa experienced a feeling of momentary weightlessness. He twisted his body so that he could get a better look at the sarka har. For the second time that night he wished he hadn’t.

The bloody thing was on fire.

The urgent shouts for him to jump rang clear in his ears. He fumbled madly for his belt buckle and began thrashing at the branches that he was tangled up in. The sarka har didn’t appear to know he was there as it was having an increasingly difficult time staying airborne. With his back now to the earth below, Konowa couldn’t see how high they were off the ground, but the rushing wind in his ears and rising emptiness in his stomach told him it was getting closer.

He swung his fists against the branches and with a loud snap he was free and falling. He spun as he dropped and saw a snowdrift rushing up to him as he completed two and a half revolutions. He missed the snowbank by a good six feet, careened off a camel-dead or alive he couldn’t tell, they all smelled the same-and skipped off the ground four times in a succession of geysers of snow before sliding to a gentle stop flat on his back.

Time didn’t stand still so much as avert its eyes. Konowa was aware he wasn’t breathing, but he couldn’t tell if it was because he was dead, or that he’d momentarily forgot how. He suspected he was still alive.

“Bloody hell!”

Pain registered in overlapping waves that threatened to take his breath away again. He tried to lift his head and immediately regretted it.

“. . bloody hell. .”

A rumbling explosion marked the demise of the second sarka har somewhere off to his left. He smiled, hoping it hurt as much as he did. A sweaty face appeared above him and it took a moment for its features to swim into view before they promptly went the other way into a throbbing blur.

“Major! That was magnificent! I can safely say in all my years serving in the diplomatic corps I have never seen anything that could come close in sheer spectacle,” the Viceroy said, his evident cheer just one more pain for Konowa to bear.

Konowa managed to curl a finger of his right hand and motioned for the Viceroy to come closer. He needed to be quick. His vision was graying around the edges and his body was slipping into a euphoric numbness he recognized as impending unconsciousness.

The Viceroy leaned in and turned his ear to Konowa’s lips. Konowa spoke, though his words were little more than a whisper. The light was fading fast, but he had to tell someone one more time in case these were his last words

Soldiers rushed up to stand around. RSM Aguom arrived a moment later and knelt down on the other side of him. “What did he say, Viceroy?”

Viceroy Alstonfar looked up with pursed lips before responding. Before he could say anything, Konowa rallied enough to say it himself.

“Whatever you do. . if there are any ashes left of me. . don’t put them in a damn wooden box.”