“But the Aldebaran forces are in the way!”
“It’s a risk we’ll have to take. The entire field will lay thick with Aldebaran dead in a matter of minutes if we don’t reach them in time!”
* * * *
Stellan led a charge of armed riders from the castle gate as the mob of attackers ran like slavering trolls toward the Aldebaran troops. Some came galloping on all fours and hissed like fiends; others ran with outstretched arms as rotten flesh swayed from their bodies. The advancing ghouls carried no weapons, but their pernicious blood was deadly enough.
“Don’t touch them!” Stellan shouted. “Aim for the head but do not allow direct contact with your person!”
Edward turned, scowling, at the sound of Stellan’s voice. Stellan and his men released a cloud of arrows from taut strings. Edward’s expression lapsed into one of dread. Before Edward could rally his troops, the arrows rained down in sheets upon the Pestilence infected, crippling them into a writhing mass on the ground. Bloodcurdling cries pierced the air as the malformed creatures dropped in heaps, vomiting forth a sickening combination of blood and bile.
Stellan allowed himself a brief feeling of satisfaction at Edward’s look of surprise.
He continued his assault against the Pestilence attackers. The once snow-white field now flowed a deep red, filled with the unholy sights and sounds of battle. The opposing armies met, and many a limb was hewn from its body. More arrows pierced the infected. But while many of the mutants fell, twice that appeared to spill forth from the forests.
“Reload and unleash!” shouted Stellan. Attracted by the sound, an emaciated, skinless Pestilence victim bounded toward him. He leaped into the air, a spindly projectile of bones and sinew. Stellan shot an arrow straight into the creature’s eye socket. The attacker twisted about in midair for a few moments before dropping to the ground.
Again and again the embattled soldiers of Vandeborg fired upon the invaders as their replacements boiled over from the stygian forest. Stellan frowned as he assessed how outmatched they were. We must prevail or the Five Lands will perish!
The sky darkened. Stellan tensed, searching the field of combat for the cause. The hairs on the back of his neck rose as the new threat revealed itself.
Across from him on the field, a woman appeared, a haunting beauty dressed in a flowing gown of black and purple.
Sada!
Stellan narrowed his eyes. He wasn’t surprised to learn she had survived Patrulha’s final attack. There were plenty of ways for practitioners of the Dark Arts to outmaneuver Fate, depending on the price one was willing to pay.
Sada calmly drew closer amid the chaos. Her eyes were naught but black, her countenance, one of pure corruption. The battling troops parted in fear as she glided across the bloody battlefield.
“Prince Stellan of Vandeborg, hear me.” she announced. “We pleaded with you to join our righteous cause, but you rebuked us. We ordered you to cease your aimless crusade, yet you defied us. I even offered you protection in a bestial form, but you have summarily rejected my strategy. Well, no more. We cannot allow these traitorous actions to continue. For your treachery, King Renaudas, the true sovereign of the Five Lands, has commanded your death. This is a sentence I am only too happy to deliver.”
Led by Lionel, a sea of his men formed a protective ring, but Stellan ordered them back. Over Lionel’s protests, he dismounted and approached his sister. He picked up an ominous change in her, as though a malicious entity shared her soul. “Sada, what have you done?”
Hideous laughter tore through the air, a harpy’s cry mixed with thunder. “She who was once blind has been granted sight, brother, and power to command forces far beyond your comprehension!”
An unearthly glow formed about her. It grew brighter and brighter, a thousand times more intense than the burning sun above. An acrid smell filled the winds whirling about her. Then her impossibly high-pitched scream sent a great rain of fire streaming toward everything in its path.
The attack leveled scores of soldiers and Pestilence alike. Chaos reigned with weapons of smoke and fire.
Stellan glanced up to see a huge bolt descending upon him. A hard force knocked him aside. He fell fast, his cheek slamming into the slush-covered ground. The bolt hit the ground where he’d been standing only moments before. Static discharge crackled about him, but he was safe.
He felt a tug, a pull of magick. Turning his head, he discovered why. Sada stood within a large perimeter of melted snow. Her eyes were closed, her hands outstretched. Stellan sensed the momentum as she harnessed waves of invisible power from dimensions unknown.
How much time did he have for a counterattack? Cursing, he scrambled to his feet. Then he paused, shocked at the sight on the ground before him.
A scorched and dazed Lionel lay sprawled upon the ground. His hair and clothes were badly singed. Burn marks covered his exposed skin. Blood poured from myriad wounds.
“No!” An avalanche of distress hit him upon seeing Lionel’s paralyzed form. With Hunter’s help, Stellan snapped Lionel up on his horse and rode back to the castle. He yelled for the portcullis to be raised.
Lionel lifted his head and groaned, blood seeping from the corners of his mouth. “Oh, dear,” he said, glancing down, “how inconvenient. This shirt is barely a fortnight old.”
“Let’s get you inside,” Stellan told the cavalier Duke. As he rushed inside, his temples began to ache. Then he grimaced, for Sada’s malignant laughter echoed mercilessly inside his head.
Chapter 39
The number of wounded soldiers escalated as Vandeborg Castle filled with the dread air of inevitability. The battle was not going well. Clarysa saw it in everyone’s faces. She heard it in the men’s frequent groans of pain.
She rushed to Gretchen’s side with more makeshift bandages. They were strips of
