Dartun had no real idea what a Realm Gate would look like, but this sounded encouraging. However, he tried not to become too excited by the prospect of it. And the army camped closer could well have stepped through it. Dartun was aware that something new had come to this island, and it was far from benevolent.
The coming of the ice really had brought a change upon the Boreal Archipelago.
Todi tossed him back the deyja, a small device that caused momentary invisibility.
Dartun was impressed by this youngster. Whilst he might be naive, he was always keen to undertake these risky little missions now and then.
Dartun turned to the others. 'Prepare yourselves for an operation of stealth, using every device at our disposal. We head for the gate.'
*
But he couldn't hide the normal sounds made by the sleds and the dogs, nor could anything but darkness hide the undead. Dawn was an hour or so away, the horizon not yet purpling as the Order of the Equinox sped across the flat ice towards the north. Sunrise and sunset were a sudden business this far north. The armed undead ran alongside them, an eerily regular patter to their footsteps, as if they had connected to some distant mind in unison. Dartun didn't actually care what they were connected to, as long as they offered him some protection. Whether they were up to confronting this new race that was invading Tineag'l was another matter, but he had his relics, and he was still the most proficient cultist in the Archipelago. Years of acquiring knowledge wouldn't be wasted.
He crouched, his knees pulled up to his face, riding on a smaller sled along with Verain, Todi and Tuung, the three most trustworthy of his cultists. They travelled at the very front of the group, although the deyja was in operation so they couldn't be seen, only their trails in the snow.
It wasn't long before he could discern the peregrine army in more detail. Setting eyes on them for the first time in this crepuscular hour, he thought the assembled creatures shunned light itself, creatures seeking darkness. Not the best omen.
Their sheer numbers were worrying, too. Dartun estimated several thousand judging from the extent of their camp. Rumel mingled with the newer race, their distinctive skin reflecting the glow of torches ranged in neat rows to an almost mathematical precision. Dartun focused his gaze to the gate itself, the object of his travel. Of his desire. That way lay his only hope of finding something to prolong his life once again.
The call of some instrument sounded over to the east.
Torches began to shift, clustering in a manner that suggested a disturbance had been spotted. And Dartun knew full well that he was the focus of this attention. He tapped Tuung on the shoulder, who pulled on the reins to halt the dogs. Dartun pushed himself upright, stepped out of the sled. He picked up a skjaldborg, a heavy brass box like a traveller's chest, the same device he had designed for the Jamur forces decades ago. For a moment he headed forward as if to meet the oncoming ranks, even though he had his suspicions that they wouldn't be coming in peace. Dartun placed the skjaldborg down with a grunt, arranged it in the snow to face towards the intruders. They were indeed gathering in force now, a mass of black soldiers under the fire of torches. Thousands of them. He opened the relic, took off his gloves, adjusted the tiny dials inside. Closed his eyes, sensing the most minor of movements inside. A difficult task to perform in any weather, let alone out here. As the technology clicked into place, he opened his eyes to see sparks of Dawnir power flicker across its open surface. He stepped back, closed the lid, then glanced up to both sides in turn.
Behind him, his order remained still, an expression of fear on their faces.
'Don't worry.' He returned back to join them. 'They won't get past that for at least an hour.'
'Where did you set the limits?' Tuung said.
'I didn't,' Dartun said, and from someone there came a gasp.
Dartun put on his gloves and waited.
The army approached at a rapid pace, flaunting no banners – this was nothing graceful. The rumel rode horses, their heads clear above the level of the armoured alien race who travelled just as quickly by foot. They could soon see that this wasn't armour, but a kind of shell. Shell-creatures with claws, black and fearsome, but Dartun eyed them with a casual regard, as if watching an experiment.
The thick ice vibrated beneath their feet, responding to the bass thunder of animal and warrior. Some from his order beside him gave a mumble of concern. There must have been over a hundred soldiers now approaching them in two columns, and at thirty paces away the skjaldborg was all that lay between them.
Approaching troops and horses collapsed on impact when hitting the invisible wall cast up by the relic, the others colliding straight into the back of them.
Seeing how it was saving them, this relic didn't seem so much a piece of cultist technology as a makeshift prayer.
There were gasps of agony from behind it as the oncomers still desperately piled in to the shield. Horses lurched sideways. Metal armour pinged against the resisting emptiness.
Such power gave Dartun a cheap thrill at times, but he maintained his composure.
The shell-creatures seemed totally unable to comprehend what they faced. Fallen companions looked up from the ground with bulging eyes as the horses trampled them. At least they're not invincible, Dartun thought, seeing black blood spit against the flat nothingness and ooze down it as if on glass. To the rumel, at least, it soon became apparent that there was no way through, and some began shouting urgent commands to those at the rear. Their language was none that Dartun recognized.
Eventually the turmoil ceased and the rumel stood observing Dartun quite calmly, militant voyeurs. He turned to beckon to his entourage. 'Come on – don't be shy.'
The other cultists joined him.
'They look just like the rumels you find in the Archipelago, don't they?' Todi remarked.
'They do indeed,' Dartun replied. 'Which is interesting, don't you think?'
'How so?' Verain enquired.
'Because those ones have red skins, unlike any of ours. Otherwise they seem anatomically identical. Even those shell-creatures aren't all that far removed from what we find in our world. They're bipeds, for one thing. Yet if they stepped out of that Realm Gate,' he indicated the glow to the north, 'then why would there be any similarities at all?'
'That suggests some evolutionary link to our own world,' Todi said. 'Or maybe we derive from them in some way.'
'Excellent reasoning,' Dartun said. His mind was buzzing with theories. 'One might go so far as to say our ancestors might have shared origins, then?'
Someone on the other side tried firing an arrow, which struck the shield, stopped in midair, and fell uselessly to the ice. Others scraped the invisible wall with their swords. They weren't going anywhere.
Dartun walked in front of them, his arms folded, scrutinizing them. The armour of the rumel was sophisticated, he noted – intricate designs which had their roots in some of the ancient traditions of the Mathema civilization. They clutched swords, bows, small round shields, which meant interestingly that their technology seemed no more advanced than that of the Boreal Archipelago. Dartun wondered how this race might have evolved totally independently of his own world.
Gasps.
Dartun looked round to see a group of shell-creatures begin advancing upwards, digging their claws into the wall generated by the relic. He laughed at this absurd vision, but for a moment he wondered just how high the relic's range would offer sanctuary. He certainly didn't want to take any chances.
One of the creatures finally reached the top of the invisible barrier, then fell some distance to the ground, not far from his feet. Within moments, as if perceiving his own thoughts, the undead soldiers approached it.
'Make sure they kill it properly.' Dartun gestured for the undead to move. They shambled numbly forwards, inert, eyes focused at a vague distance. Fifty or so had gathered around their intended victim when another creature dropped from the summit of the unseen wall. As it collapsed on top of the undead, there was not a single sound of protest or alarm.
'Enough now,' Dartun decided, turning towards his sled. 'We head for the Realm Gate.'
*
Dawn broke with ferocious speed, shadows chased off the ice in the blink of an eye. The sled ride was uncomfortable, the entire company remaining silent. It was as if no one even wanted to mention having just encountered things from another world.
