“You cagey bastard,” Konowa said, his fury rising as he focused on the swirling entity that had once been Viceroy Faltinald Gwyn.
“We have to do something,” Yimt said, turning to look at Konowa. Konowa halted before he’d taken two steps toward the roadway leading down to the desert. His first reaction was to run all the way down there and wade into the beasts with nothing but his saber and his anger. He turned, and with an effort, sheathed his saber, allowing the frost fire to die out. Musket fire from the Iron Elves manning the fort’s walls was crackling like wet pine in a fire. Already, he could hear the shrieks and growls of the rakkes on the far side of the fort.
“The fort is untenable, and the regiment is in trouble. We’re between a rock and an even harder rock. We need to be able to create some kind of diversion,” he said, frustrated that he couldn’t think of anything big enough that would pose a threat to the mass of rakkes attacking the regiment.
“Your father’s a wizard and Miss Tekoy’s a witch,” Yimt said, though Konowa could tell by the tone of his voice he didn’t have much hope in that regard.
Konowa kicked the stone wall of the fort with his boot.
“Unless he’s stopped speaking squirrel I don’t think he’ll be much help, and Visyna is exhausted. Damn it! There has to be something else.”
“There’s nothing for it then,” Yimt said, standing to his full height and straightening his uniform. He clutched his drukar in his right hand and pointed toward the battle below. “We’ll just have to charge down there and take’em on head on.”
Konowa looked at the dwarf. “That’s suicide and you know it.”
“Aye, but it’s the best kind. Maybe we’ll buy them enough time to get away.”
Konowa was already shaking his head even though he still had no better idea. “We’ll call that plan B. I still want something we can do that gives us at least a five percent chance of survival.”
A small cough alerted Konowa to the presence of Pimmer. “Five percent you say?” he said, offering the two of them a smile he probably only brought out just before revealing the existence of the Calahrian Army outside the opposing diplomat’s capital city. “I think I have just the thing.”
Alwyn felt the presence of the dead rakkes before he saw them. The shades of the dead creatures tore through the wall between this world and the next, staining the air around them with a toxic mix of mindless fear and ravenous hunger. The cries of the living soldiers sounded distant and muted compared to the reaction of the shades of the Iron Elves’ dead.
They charged headlong into the dead creatures, meeting frenzy with the controlled violence of seasoned soldiers. The dead of the Iron Elves slashed and burned their way through the dead creatures, tearing their shadowy forms into fragments that shattered and bled darkness into the night. Frost fire sparked off them and burned holes in the ice on the ground, creating deep, black holes. Wails of absolute agony ebbed and flowed as the battle raged.
Frost fire consumed rakke shades, eating their essence until nothing but disembodied screams of pain remained to echo in the night. The temperature continued to fall as death swept across the mortal plane. It beckoned to things dead and gone eons before rakkes ever walked the earth. Huge, multilegged creatures with spike-crusted claws scrambled into being, lunging and stabbing at the shades of the Iron Elves and forcing them to slowly retreat.
The vortex around the creature continued to grow, its scouring winds tearing and scattering anything and everything they touched. It fed on the darkness, drawing ever more power as time disgorged dead after dead onto the field of battle. Each new creature was more twisted and broken than the last, its memory of what it was so fragmented that it could only piece together parts of what it had once been. What remained as strong as ever, however, was the rapacious need to feed, and these monsters of tentacle and spike, fang and barb, flew at the shades of the Iron Elves with abandon. The shades fell back, and Alwyn let them, knowing that not even they could withstand this force. There was only one way for this madness to stop.
Alwyn took in a breath and breathed out frost fire.
“I challenge you, Gwyn!” Alwyn shouted, and strode forth to meet the darkness head on.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Konowa, this is madness,” Visyna said, standing at the front gate of the fort. Except the front gate wasn’t there anymore. The two large wooden doors had been ripped from their hinges and repurposed by Viceroy Alstonfar. “The Viceroy is a very creative man, but this is just lunacy.”
Konowa couldn’t disagree, but he didn’t see what choice they had. He stepped aside as soldiers ran back and forth from inside the fort. They were scrambling to load as many supplies as would fit on the hastily constructed wooden contraption now resting on the top of the snow-covered roadway leading down to the desert floor. Armloads of anything and everything were being tossed onto the Viceroy’s invention, though Konowa thought a more apt description would be “disaster waiting to happen.” In this regard, he and Visyna agreed, but he couldn’t let her know that.
“Careful, Major, coming through,” a soldier said, tottering under the weight of a large wooden cask. Anything of possible value, especially foodstuffs, were being hurriedly bundled and loaded as RSM Arkhorn barked orders that would sound more at home in a grocer’s shop: “Try to find a bag of flour with a few less rat droppings in it! Don’t go mixing the tins of boot polish with the tins of jam. Some of us will be wanting toast later, and if I open the wrong tin in the dark guess who’ll be eating every bite!”
The crackle of a musket volley drifted up from the desert floor below, adding urgency to the loading. It was a clear reminder that living men were down there among all the shades. Smoke from volley after volley mixed with flashes of light and bursts of frost fire were making it difficult to see what was going on. The urge to charge down there rose up in Konowa again and he fought it by pacing. He looked down at the plain again. The Iron Elves with the Darkly Departed and Private Renwar would have to hold off Gwyn and his monsters for a little longer.
Konowa tore himself away from the view and faced Visyna. “It’s our only option,” he said, looking at the toboggan and wishing it wasn’t. While Konowa had been outside the fort bringing Visyna and her group inside, Pimmer had been hard at work crafting what was little more than thirty feet of sled with a bow made of wood planking, and everything nailed and banded together with cobbler’s supplies. It did not fill Konowa with confidence, but there really was no more time. More musket fire and a rising gibbering howl of maddened rakkes emphasized his point.
“I know it is,” Visyna said, leaning forward and giving him a quick kiss on the lips. The frost fire stung, but he thought he could get used to that.
“All aboard who’s going aboard,” Pimmer shouted.
Konowa turned. His mother was placing his father and Tyul onto the toboggan and getting them settled in. His father was still not talking. Konowa knew it was risky, but he hoped that thrusting the elf into the heart of a battle would snap him out of it. They were going to need him.
Pimmer ran past to direct a soldier where to put some sacks then hurried over to Konowa. “We’re just about ready, Major. I think you can call the soldiers down from the wall.”
Konowa heard their musket fire and shook his head. “Not until the very last moment.”
“We are rapidly approaching that moment,” he said. “Once
Konowa brought his right hand up to his ear and rubbed a knuckle in it. “
“HMT
“Of course. And the name?”
Pimmer’s smile lessened a little. “A bit cheeky, I know, but after I relayed your experiences with the flying
“And can you steer this. . elf?
