Kara started to say more, but the snarls and howls of wolves came to her ears from the dark woods behind her. Dancer snorted and shifted nervously as did the other horses; they knew that sound, and they didn’t like it. The ranger turned her mount and peered into the gloomy shadows beneath the trees. The woods weren’t thick, and she could glimpse a handful of the dwarves as they crouched and waited. “They’re coming through the woods,” she breathed. It was up to the Icehammers now.
She heard the snap and thrum of crossbows, then scores of them firing almost as one, followed an instant later by a great chorus of goblin shrieks and wolves yipping in pain. “Steady,” she told the riders around her. “We’ve got to cover the Icehammers when they break off their fight. Steady, everyone.”
More crossbows sang in the night, and the chorus of pained cries changed into the ugly, incoherent roar of battle-hundreds of voices shouting and screaming, some in pain, some in fear, some in anger, some in victory. The deep voices of dwarves, the high harsh cries of goblins, and the fury of worgs all blended in a long, rolling battle- thunder that seemed to echo from the steep hillsides cupping the Winterspear Vale. It went on and on, much longer than Kara would have imagined, until she found herself leaning forward in her saddle and peering into the woods to see if she could see anything of the fighting a short distance off. But after a time the shouts and ring of steel on steel faded again, and Icehammers began to trot out of the woods-human mercenaries groping through the darkness, dwarves jogging along with slower strides but a much better sense of where they were headed.
“Lady Kara, the pickets to the right say that there’re goblin scouts on the eastern edge o’ the woods,” one of her adjutants reported.
“Very well,” she answered. She hardly felt as calm as she tried to sound, but that was her duty, to act as if she had expected everything that had happened tonight. She looked at a Shieldsworn sergeant nearby. “Kars, take your troop and the Jannarsk men there, and go drive off the scouts. Keep them from coming around the woods for half an hour, and then rejoin the column. If there are too many wolf riders to handle, use your discretion, but make sure you send word to me.”
The sergeant touched his knuckle to his brow. “Yes, m’lady,” he said. He gathered eight of the remaining Shieldsworn and a dozen of the Jannarsk Coster armsmen, and the small band rode off into the night. Kara wondered whether she would see them again.
Dancer snorted and stamped suddenly, and Kara saw motion beneath the trees off to her right. The brush thrashed and an ugly chorus of snarls came to her ears, and then goblin wolf riders suddenly broke through the treeline, chasing after the Icehammers as the mercenaries fell back.
“Take them!” she shouted, standing in her stirrups with her bow in her hand. She drew and fired, drew and fired again, and a goblin and worg went down together, each with an arrow in the throat. Her remaining riders charged at the enormous wolves, lances lowered and sabers high. The overeager goblins wheeled in panic and bounded back for the safety of the woods, but not before more fell under the steel of the Shieldsworn and the House mercenaries. Kara shot one more worg through its spine as it leaped away; the monster howled and crashed into a blackberry thicket, throwing its rider. The goblin dismounted was not much of a threat-but worgs could drag down men or horses. She searched for another target but decided to save her arrows. She might need them more before the night was out.
Several other quick skirmishes broke out along the woodline as wolf riders blundered too close to the soldiers they were hoping to chase down. After a dozen slashing duels of wolf rider and cavalryman, the woods fell silent again. Kara judged that the Red Claws had fallen back to mass for a more deliberate attack; this would be the moment to pull back again. The Icehammers were already marching south off the field, falling into ranks as they hurried away. It’ll have to be enough, she told herself, praying that she’d bought her ragged army half an hour’s lead on the pitiless marauders who followed them.
“Fall back!” she called to the riders nearby. “Stay with me!”
Kara cantered a few hundred yards farther down the road, her small company of riders following her standard as best they could. Then she wheeled around again, searching the open space they’d just crossed for any sign of pursuit. If the Red Claws pressed too close, she’d have to lead her weary riders against them to give the Icehammers time to put another mile under their boots, but for the moment it seemed the wolf riders had learned a little caution.
“Lady Kara!” Sarise called. “A rider!”
Kara looked back over her shoulder and saw a strapping young man with the beginnings of a thick beard approaching-one of the Ostings, she thought. His horse was badly blown, trembling with exhaustion, and the young man slid out of the saddle as soon as he saw her. “Lady Kara, there you are! I’m Brun Osting, and I’ve got a message from the harmach himself. He told me to tell you to gather whatever forces you’ve still got and march at once for Lendon’s Dike. He’s bringing the Spearmeet up from Hulburg, and he plans to make the stand for the city there.”
“Lendon’s Dike?” Kara asked sharply. That didn’t seem wise to her. It was almost a mile and a half long. Between what was left of her battered army and the Spearmeet, they simply didn’t have the numbers to defend a line of that length. And she doubted that the Spearmeet could stand up to the Bloody Skulls for long, wall or no wall. “I don’t think we can hold it, even with the Spearmeet. We’d be better off to fall back to the strongpoints in town.”
“The harmach said you might say that. He said to tell you that he’s had to abandon Griffonwatch. Some sort o’ terrible ghostly warriors overran the castle earlier tonight, and they’re still there.” The tavernkeeper’s son looked around to see who was in earshot, and lowered his voice. “And House Veruna men were waitin’ outside to barricade the gates, Lady Kara. Many o’ the harmach’s folk were killed, but all your kin got out safe.”
Kara shook her head in denial. “This makes no sense. Ghosts in Griffonwatch and the Veruna soldiers barricading them in? Are you sure you’ve got this message straight from the harmach?”
“I saw ’em myself up on the battlements, Lady Kara.” Brun Osting shuddered. “Spirits o’ ancient warriors, carryin’ pale swords and wearin’ tall helms. The harmach said he knew it’d all sound like madness, but he wanted me to repeat this to you: You’ve got to bring your army to Lendon’s Dike as quick as you can. He’s going to stand and fight there. And he wanted you to watch your back ’round the Verunas.”
“That’s better than a fifth of my army,” Kara answered. How was she supposed to pay attention to the battle-no, the retreat-if she was supposed to be on guard against assassination or treachery too? She looked around to get her bearings in the darkened vale. They’d been fighting and falling back for hours, and with surprise she saw that they were about halfway to Hulburg already. The old earthworks were not more than a couple of miles ahead. They’d be able to reach the dike easily enough, but what then?” I’ve got to speak with him myself,” she said aloud. “Sarise, go find Captain Ironthane and tell him he’s got command of the rear guard until I return. Have Master Osting relay his report to the captain. I’m riding ahead.”
“It isn’t safe to ride alone, my lady,” one of her adjutants pointed out.
“Then you, and you, and you-come with me, if you can keep up.” Kara pointed at several of the Shieldsworn riders nearby and rode off over the darkened fields, cutting cross-country. The Vale Road was full of her soldiers, and she didn’t want them to think she was abandoning the field. She hoped that Kendurkkel wouldn’t think so, either, but so far the dwarf captain had quickly grasped her commands and intentions. He’d understand that she was not leaving them.
Kara led her small band through muddy fields thick with the stubble of last year’s planting, until they found an old lane between homesteads that more or less paralleled the Vale Road. She set her spurs to Dancer and let the big mare stretch out her legs on the road, while her guards hurried to keep up with her. The rush of cold night air drove away her weariness. After a good run, she saw a long, straight row of trees rising up across her path-the old berm, long since overgrown with thickets and young trees. Scores of torches and lanterns burned along its length. “It seems the Spearmeet’s already here,” she said to herself. She veered back toward the Vale Road and in a few more minutes of riding climbed back onto the road a short distance from the place where it cut through the embankment.
Dozens of men worked furiously to build thornbrakes across the road. Along the earthworks more Hulburgans worked with axe and hatchet to make the top of the dike defensible. Now that she was closer to the old berm, she saw that the trees and tangled briar-patches covering its slopes made it a more formidable obstacle than she remembered; the men and women of the Spearmeet were felling trees and piling up brush on the north face of the dike to improve it even more. If only she had more archers, she might have a chance to hold it-at least for a little while.
“There, m’lady,” one of her riders said to her. He pointed to an improvised banner fluttering in the torchlight,
