three hundred feet.
The spearmen presented a bristling line, standing barely twenty yards in front of the road and the wagons. Blayne shouted, “Halt!” and the riders pulled up, still at a fair remove from the enemy footmen. The Crown cavalry was streaming to the rear, looking for a way to countercharge, but the delay was fatal.
“Fire!” shouted Kerrigan, launching his first arrow at the towering bulk of the first bombard. The target loomed like a mountain, impossible to miss-but somehow the sputtering arrow, trailing a column of smoke, wiggled awkwardly through the air and fell harmlessly to the ground in front of the spearmen trying to protect the bombards. Cursing, Blayne reached for another missile and struggled to light the pitch while his horse pranced beneath him.
But there were at least two hundred flaming arrows launched in the first volley, and a few of them did find the range. A pair smacked into the side of one of the bombard haulers, the impact driving the burning pitch deep into its wooden planks. Several more landed in the beds of the wagons, while a few of the near misses landed close enough to the big oxen hauling the guns that they set the creatures to bellowing and pitching in their traces.
Close by the young lord, Red Wallace had his spell ready and launched a bolt of lightning from one fingertip. The explosive charge shot through the air with a hiss and crackle, searing through the line of spearmen and striking the side of the wagon with a blast. Immediately that heavy bed was shattered into timbers and traces, one sturdy wheel wobbling away as flames consumed the wreckage.
Smoke was rising from many of the wagons, including the two bearing the remaining bombards. Another wagon, struck by accident, exploded in flame, spewing a huge column of smoke.
“We hit their powder supply!” Blayne cried exultantly. He released one then another arrow, which vanished into the smoke and fire. In any event, flames rose from all the wagons, and by now the Crown cavalry had begun to spill around the mess, hundreds of foes, lances leveled, thundering toward the attacking Vingaard riders.
“Pull back!” cried Blayne Kerrigan.
His troops needed no further encouragement. They spun their horses away, back toward the ravine and the tangled pathways of the Southwood Forest. By the time they vanished into the gap, the weary riders of the Crown Army had fallen far behind.
“What in the name of the Abyss is going on back there?” Jaymes snarled, spinning his horse and staring in amazement at the column of smoke rising from the rear of the column. In the next instant, he put spurs to the steed and went racing back against the line of march, his horse dancing along the side of the road.
“Templar, follow me!” he ordered, coming on the Clerist Knight and his small company of priest-warriors. He didn’t wait to see that they obeyed, but continued racing headlong to the rear.
The damage was apparent while he was still a mile away. At least one wagon had exploded into bits, and many others were burning. He saw the tail end of the Vingaard column disappearing into the woods and forgot about them-at least for the time being.
There would be time enough, later, for the enemy to feel his wrath.
He had to save the bombards, if at all possible. But by the time he reached the scene, he could see that one of the great barrels was enveloped by flames, and that the fire covered the wooden body of the great carriage supporting the gun. Even as the emperor watched, the wagon collapsed, and the timbers forming the bore of the great barrel started to blacken. A second bombard lay on its side, cracked and broken-by some kind of magic, he suspected.
The third and last cannon was wreathed in smoke, but the wagon was not yet engulfed by flames, not yet lost. Templar, his own horse lathered, galloped up behind Jaymes, and the emperor pointed angrily at the lone bombard in its cradle of vulnerable wood, just starting to catch fire.
“Put that out!” he ordered.
The Clerist immediately began casting a spell. Jaymes watched soundlessly, his teeth clenched and his jaw aching, as a cloud quickly formed above the burning wagon. In no time a steady rain began to fall, and a few moments later the flames had been reduced to sizzling, blackened embers. The lone remaining bombard had survived, essentially undamaged.
“My lord!” cried General Dayr, coming up to the site on a frothing horse. “What happened?”
“Happened?” retorted the emperor coldly. He thought for a moment, his eyes glaring at the dark forest where the attackers had withdrawn.
“What happened is that the fate of Vingaard has been sealed,” he declared before turning his back on the damage and riding back toward the head of his army.
CHAPTER NINE
Selinda stared at the door to her room, the door that was almost constantly closed, tightly locked, and always carefully guarded, on the orders of her husband, the emperor. He was gone from the city, but his presence, his authority, seemed to linger everywhere-in the walls surrounding her, amid the guards who were the only people she saw, in the very air she breathed. She found herself turning quickly around several times each day, checking against the strong sensation he was in the room, watching her.
She wore the ring of teleportation from Coryn the White on her finger, nervously touching it as she looked at the door again. Selinda had been wearing the ring, staring at it, thinking about it, for a number of days. But she had been so worried about the unseen presence of the emperor that she had done nothing yet to activate the magical circlet.
It was not the closed, locked door that worried her, but rather those not-infrequent times when it swung open. Her guards were respectful, even kindly, and they often checked in on her to see whether she needed anything, how she was feeling, or simply to offer a bit of news or a home-baked treat from one of their wives. At first, Selinda welcomed the brief interaction with them, the few moments of conversation; otherwise her routine was monotonous. It lessened her sense of isolation to learn that a troupe of players had arrived in the city and were performing farces every evening, or that a cargo of fresh oranges had just arrived at the port.
But what if one of those guards came in to visit and found she was gone, thanks to Coryn’s magic ring? Whatever consequences she imagined were too frightening to contemplate. It was this fear, more than anything else, that had stayed her hand for a week, since Jaymes had marched through the pass and onto the plains. Instead, she had spent most of her time studying the city, the sky, the mountains, and the bay, from her lofty window. She watched and she remembered and she continued to seethe.
As the days passed slowly, she found herself snapping at the guards when they came by. She complained about the quality of her food, even though it was always prepared and served perfectly. She demanded things- fabrics and thread, links of jewelry chain and baubles, paints and canvas-that she had no intention of using. What was initially sadness became anger, and then the anger became barely repressed fury.
Until, at last, she knew that she could stay in that place no longer. Having just sent away her supper, barely touched, she had a reasonable hope she would be allowed privacy for the rest of the evening. If not… well, she was finally prepared to take the chance. The time was ripe for her to visit the person she wanted to see.
She donned a cloak with a soft hood that would conceal her face and her golden hair, and she removed her jewelry-except for the magical circlet given to her by the white wizard. With her destination clearly in mind, she followed Coryn’s instructions, turning the ring on her finger and imagining the place, calling up every detail she could remember.
The world faded away and she felt a momentary lightness in her stomach, the same sensation she’d experienced when she was riding and her horse took a high jump over a fence or stream. Selinda reached out to both sides, seeking something, anything, to grab for balance, but there was nothing there. She fought the urge to scream, but didn’t want to alarm her guards. The nothingness that surrounded her was everywhere, and her panic surged.
And just like that, the feeling passed. She found herself standing in the vestibule of the great temple of Kiri- Jolith, one of the loftiest sanctuaries in Palanthas, which was exactly the place she had imagined as her destination. The unsettled feeling lingered in her stomach, and she breathed hard, but other than that, everything seemed
