The two galleys, with Goldwing still in the lead, emerged from the Bluewater Strait into the full sweep of the Courrain Ocean swells. The powerful, deep waves surprised Grimwar Bane and in fact frightened him a little, but he didn’t let his concern show. Instead, he kept his stern, tusked composure and stared at the rocky headland.
Stariz stood at his side, holding her mask in the crook of her arm as she inspected the landscape with a critical glare. As they came around the point, turning broadside to the waves, there seemed to be no good place to land. The entire shore was a rough headland, broken sheets of rock slashing down straight into the deep, churning water.
“Ahead, a few miles around there,” Argus Darkand pointed, as the deck pitched and yawed beneath the helmsman’s feet. “There’s a long stretch of flat beaches, with a nice hillside rising all the way to the citadel.”
“I remember,” the king declared. “I noticed the place years ago, marked it for just such a situation.” He turned to his wife. “Does Captain Broadnose have the Shield-Breakers ready? I want them to be first ashore.”
The queen nodded to the foredeck, where a hundred heavily armored ogres, each carrying a monstrous double-bladed axe, had hunkered down in various states of seasickness, clinging to rails. “I daresay they will waste no time stepping onto solid land,” she said dryly.
The rowers held a strong pace, and as the mouth of the strait slipped astern the precipitous coastline dwindled into rocky spurs and narrow coves. Now the king saw the green slopes of the terraces, rising like gigantic steps from the shore of a shallow bay. This approach, he thought, could not be guarded by any contraption of sticks and chain!
“Mark a course for the middle beach, and ground us there,” the king called back to Argus, as the drummer slowed the rowers to an easy, gentle glide.
There were no defenders in sight, the humans obviously having decided to cower behind the lofty walls of the fortress. Grimwar allowed himself a low chuckle, as he thought of the potent chalice and the orb. Those walls, that sturdy gate, would not give his army any trouble.
Many kayaks dotted the shore, above the reach of the high tide, while numerous shacks gathered around the base of a long pier a short distance down the beach. The galley continued to slow as it approached the gravelly shoreline. A steady surf pounded, waves that would have capsized a lesser boat, but Grimwar Bane’s galley smoothly cut through the foaming crests. There was a scuffing of the pebbled seabed under the hull, then the ship gave a huge lurch as it grounded. Stariz stumbled, and the king caught her elbow before she fell to her knees. A hundred paces to the left Hornet drove similarly into the shallows.
The great ramps, one to either side of the prow, creaked downward as the ogre king scanned the beach.
Warriors moved into position, feet tramping on the deck.
“Take the buildings and boats at once,” ordered Grimwar Bane. “Bring any livestock you capture back to the boat. Any humans put to the axe!”
As soon as the ramps were grounded the Shield-Breakers stormed ashore, roaring the name of Suderhold in unison, hammering their axes against their shields with a thunderous din. Wading awkwardly onto the dry, flat gravel above the breaking waves, they spread into a double-rank line and charged inland, scrambling up a low sea wall and rushing across the first of the terraced fields.
The great hatches on the mid-deck slammed open and more ogres came rushing up from below, charging straight down the ramps into the shallows and gathering into twenty-warrior raiding parties just in front of the galley. These were the Grenadiers, another of the king’s elite companies. Each was armed with a sword and a bundle of javelins. Once formed, they swarmed toward the huts and piers, using their blades and heavy, iron- studded boots to quickly shatter the wooden structures into kindling.
One detachment of the Shield-Breakers rambled along the high water line. Tearing into the kayaks with their axes, they swiftly destroyed two score of the boats. By then the king had swaggered down the ramp and waded onto the beach. Stariz, with Broadnose and a dozen ogres as her bodyguard, followed just behind. The ogres who had manned the oars were gathering their gear, emerging from hatches and filing off the deck. These were light troops, protected by stiff leather shirts, armed with short swords and spears. A score of them hauled heavy ropes, easing the wheeled catapult down the ramp, through the surf, and up onto the beach. Leaving two dozen heavily armed warriors to guard each of his prized galleys, Grimwar started to organize the rest of his troops along the wide, flat beach.
“Spread out there, you oafs!” he roared, as the last of the rowers trundled ashore. “Look smart, all of you!” He turned to Argus Darkand, who, as usual, was not far from his king’s side. “Take four warriors you trust and go into my cabin. Have them carry out the lockbox. You’ll fall in at the rear of the army, and I want you to keep that box under your eye at all times!”
“Yes, Sire-your will is mine!” declared the loyal helmsman. He turned to shout at several of the Grenadiers. “Scarnose, bring those three-come here!”
A few minutes later Argus emerged from the cabin with the crate containing the two golden weapons. The chest was borne on a pair of long poles supporting the crate. By then the formations on the beach had established regular lines, with the heavily armored Shield-Breakers in the center and the relatively light troops on the flanks. One group of Grenadiers formed a tight ring around the king, and another surrounded the four ogres carrying the crate.
“Remember, we must breach the walls and enter the keep to recover the Axe of Gonnas!” Stariz reminded her husband, as the front ranks started across a field of young barley. The plants, ankle high and frail, were trampled into pulp by the heavy ogre feet. The queen and her retinue of bodyguards lingered behind the others with the catapult, which rumbled slowly at the rear of the army.
“I have not forgotten,” the king replied cheerfully, tasting the great victory ahead. “Our first rush will plant the chalice beside the gate, where the fuse will be lit.”
Smoke tickled Grimwar’s nostrils as the first little fishing village yielded to flame. He scowled impatiently at his axemen, who were busy in the shallows chopping away the pilings of the sturdy pier. With a groan and snap of breaking timbers, the dock wobbled and collapsed.
“No animals in the sheds or pastures down here, Your Majesty,” reported one sooty warrior. “Nor humans. Lots of fodder and tools, though, which we have put to the torch.”
“Tools and fodder, but no men?” snorted the monarch, irritated. Given the hours it had taken the galleys to journey around the point so they could land on this shore, it was no wonder that the humans had made some safety preparations.
“No matter-there will be plenty of blood to be had up there,” he growled, looking up the slope at the far lofty citadel. “And livestock enough to fill our holds!” He started to laugh, then stopped, struck by a thought.
“That is, if the golden orb doesn’t blow everything inside that place clear off the face of the Icereach,” he added under his breath, in wonder.
Moreen stood atop one of the two tall gatehouse towers, watching the ogre ships come ashore. She clenched her teeth as the raiders destroyed the kayaks, broke apart the houses, and wrecked the pier of the nascent village. The sight of the two enemy galleys, but especially the gilt-trimmed Goldwing, caused an almost physical ache-even now, after eight years, she remembered her first sight of that vessel-the day her parents and all the warriors of her village had been slain by the brutish invaders.
But, she reminded herself, this time she was ready for the ogre attack-as ready as she could possibly be. A look into the citadel courtyard reassured her. Hundreds of Highlanders milled about. They would remain out of sight for now. She would not sacrifice valuable lives in a fruitless defense of the grounds outside Brackenrock’s walls. She looked along the trail leading toward the harbor, knowing Strongwind and many of his warriors had disappeared over the bluff a half hour earlier.
Watching the ogre raiders as they started climbing the terraces, heading toward the lofty citadel, Moreen felt another stab of fear. Each little hut on the farm terraces, home to an Arktos family now sheltered within the fortress, sprang into flames as the ogres passed, their heavy boots making muddy waste of each carefully tended field. With every indignity, each insult and offense to her peoples’ homes, her fear coalesced into deep, abiding rage.
But she was not foolish enough to send her warriors, brave though they might be, out to defend the surrounding land against the ogre horde. It was the walls of Brackenrock that were her peoples’ best hope. Farms
