'How is it coming?' Jotharam wondered.
'If you leave off interrupting me, I will likely succeed.'
'Sorry,' breathed the adolescent.
'Now then. .' muttered the archer, as he made some final adjustment.
There came a
The lord archer placed his hand upon an engraved palm print etched into the Wardlight's side.
The enveloping night broke wide open by a shin shy;ing light that bloomed somewhere above Demora Tower. Radiance beat down from the arcane outburst to bathe the countryside. Jotharam saw all Sarshel revealed, like a toy city, in an instant. Beyond it was Lake Ashane to the east, and the battle-scarred wilderness all around, for miles in all directions. And on that plain, an army crawled forward from out of the west.
A small army to be sure, filled with black shapes mostly squat, though a few were trollish in their gangly, stoop-shouldered height. They advanced on Sarshel in a long, thin line, inching forward like the tide in a slow but unstoppable march.
A flight of burning arrows took to the sky, unleashed from the attacking line. A few fell short of Sarshel's west wall, but many scored the stone edifice, or plunged into the bunker to find the terrified flesh of defenders unlucky enough to have been standing in the trajectory of a lethal shaft.
The advancing hobgoblin line screamed and jeered. The trolls threw boulders, and goblins waved spears and torches, and sang a song of torture and woe.
Cruel horns sounded. The line surged forward, with black-gauntleted hobgoblins at the fore swinging glowing warhammers. The defenders on Sarshel's west wall answered with their own tempest of arrows, which plowed into the advancing line. Many hobgoblins fell, but many more retreated, screaming dire promises in their debased language.
The line surged forward yet again, gaining ground by increments.
However, even Jotharam's untrained eye could see the attacking army was too thin to hold the ground they gained against the still confused defense, should that defense finally firm up.
On the other hand, from the viewpoint of the defenders on the ground, the line must have seemed like the vanguard of an army of immense size. Only Demora's height revealed the line as a slender threat, scarcely wide enough to withstand even a single charge, should any dare it.
'Is that all there are?' wondered Jotharam.
'No, it is a diversionary force,' said the lord archer. 'Look!' He pointed east, where Lake Ashane kissed Sarshel's port district in a wide bay. Even as the Wardlight's radiance dimmed, Jotharam saw the true threat.
Hundreds of small boats, canoes, and crude rafts floated the still water of Lake Ashane, silently converging on the docks. As the commotion and clamor of the obvious attack pulled defenders to the west, the true threat to Sarshel prepared a massive onslaught from the east.
The Wardlight guttered and failed. Night returned.
'We must get word to Imphras straight away,' came the lord archer's voice from behind Jotharam. The courier nodded but remained staring out into the darkness, his eyes still resting on the memory of what had just been revealed. The archer continued, 'Once he knows their true strategy-oh!'
An awful hiss jerked Jotharam's gaze back into the tower cupola.
A short sword dark as obsidian protruded from the lord archer's stomach, just below his sternum. The lord archer collapsed to one knee, clutching vainly at the blood-soaked blade.
A creature with long green ears and wearing chain mail smeared with black grease stood just beyond the lord archer's reach, grinning with needle-sharp teeth.
Jotharam cried, 'I know you!'
It sniggered and said in broken Common, 'Good thing I follow you, little one. Very tricky, but your tricks done now. Imphras and Sarshel soon both dead.'
Jotharam yelled unintelligibly and hurled himself at the foul assassin, his own sword somehow unsheathed and in his hand, stabbing, slicing, tearing …
The goblin evaded, dancing back. Jotharam bulled forward. His fury at seeing the lord archer so sorely wounded washed away his fear. Besides, the little cur was without its sword!
The courier landed a cut on its shoulder, but the goblin used the opportunity to slip inside Jotharam's guard. Like a performer delivering a kiss, it leaned forward and bit the boy's exposed neck.
Jotharam hooted with astonishment and dropped his sword. The goblin bit down harder. Jotharam heard it giggle through its clenched teeth. A warm spurt of blood ran down Jotharam's neck and flowed under his gambeson. Fear returned, but his rage was the stronger. A red haze fell before his eyes, and he roared.
He grabbed the clinging goblin with both hands. It would not relinquish its grip. Like a dog with its jaws around a succulent bone, the goblin clung to his neck. Jotharam's first instinct was to forcefully shove it away, but he had a sudden image of his neck being ripped out as he forced the creature off.
Instead, he started to squeeze. He clutched the creature around its throat and throttled it with all his fury- fueled strength.
The goblin maintained its grip only a few heartbeats more before its jaws loosened. It tried to gasp and squeal. Too late.
Jotharam did not relinquish his choke hold until the creature was as limp as a rag.
He threw the flaccid body to the floor, his own breath coming in great heaves. Then he remembered the goblin assassin's obsidian sword.
'Lord Archer!' Jotharam ran to the wounded man.
The archer half-reclined against the Wardlight. A still-enlarging pool of blood surrounded him. His eyes were open but glassy. He no longer clutched at his terrible wound. Instead, he struggled with his quiver.
'Lord Archer, let me help you!' Jotharam grabbed the quiver from the man's shaking hands. 'Do you have a healing draught in your quiver? Is there another compartment?'
The man shook his head and said in an alarmingly breathy voice, 'I have none. I left them in the bunkhouse. No- Jotharam, listen to me, now! I have something very important to tell you.'
'Yes, what?'
'Reach into my quiver and pull out the black arrow.'
'Yes, very well… I have it.'
'Good, that's a good lad. Now, Jotharam, you must deliver that arrow to Imphras. He will know. . what it means. When he sees this shaft, he will know the message comes directly from his lord archer. We worked out the signal years ago, but never had call to use it, till now. Emerald is west, scarlet south, silver north, and black… means the foe attacks from the west.'
'I can't just leave you-'
'You can, and you will!' interrupted the archer, his voice suddenly echoing with a portion of its original strength. 'Are you a sworn soldier of Sarshel? Then obey your commanding officer, a prerogative I claim now. Climb down the secret way and bring that arrow to Imphras as quick as your legs can carry you.'
Unable to speak for fear he would sob, Jotharam only nodded, then saluted. The lord archer returned his salute with a shaking hand.
Jotharam turned, scrubbing at his eyes with the palm of his free hand. In the other, he clutched the lord archer's message.
He held the arrow's smooth shaft in his teeth as he hung for a moment from the trapdoor opening, then dropped onto the narrow space below.
Before he put his hands to the rungs to begin the long descent, he transferred the arrow to his empty sheath-his sword remained behind on the floor next to the strangled goblin and the dying lord archer.
He shook his head and started down the ladder. He had a duty to perform. If he didn't get the message to Imphras, more than the tall man he left behind would die tonight.
His descent through the narrow, lightless shaft was easier than the ascent. He was used to the spacing, even if he couldn't see the rungs, and he moved in the direction his heavy armor wanted to drag him.
Jotharam's foot jarred a grunt from him when he reached the shaft's bottom sooner than he expected. In the darkness of the concealed niche, he carefully removed the arrow from his sheath and held it tightly.
He peered out through the crevice, and saw Sarshel's north wall, and the bunker that ran immediately in front
