Arts of Dark and Light: Book 01 - A Throne of Bones (90 page)

LODI

The river was still moving quickly, as proved by the occasional branch that floated under the bridge at an alarming rate. But its dark surface was still unbroken as the first red-gold rays of the morning touched upon it. A few of the orcs were beginning to stir. Six of them were sleeping upon the bridge itself, and the rest were scattered haphazardly around the flickering remnants of a fire that had burned through the night. Fishbones and some larger bones that looked as if they had once belonged to a four-legged creature littered the vicinity, along with the other inevitable signs of orcish habitation. After three days, the stench was nearly strong enough to bring tears to Lodi’s eyes, and he was hiding in the underbrush of the forest some thirty paces away.

There were still eighteen of them. Unfortunately, the plenitude of fish in the river prevented them from feeling any need to resort to cannibalism, which would have had the very useful consequence of reducing their numbers.

Lodi shifted his position uncomfortably, as the weight of the crossbow was starting to put his left forearm to sleep. He figured he and Thorald could both fire two bolts before the orcs would have any idea where they were, at which point the two dwarves would have to sprint for the bridge and cut their way through the survivors. The mer, assuming they showed up, might take down a few if they were so inclined, but it would be unwise to count on the watermen being able to do much more than provide a useful distraction, given their inability to fight on land.

One of the bigger orcs rose, emitted a thunderous fart, then looked around as it scratched itself. It kicked a nearby orc awake and pointed to the river. Grumbling, the smaller orc picked up one of the rude fishing rods that was lying near the bridge and staggered over to a pile of detritus that included several fishheads. After picking some flesh from one of the heads and impaling it on the hook, it trudged over to the riverbank and cast the line into the water. The bigger orc growled something at it, to which it appeared to take some offense. It turned its head and opened its mouth to reply.

Without even a ripple of warning, a mer rose up from the water and swept both its legs out from under the orc with a thin wooden rod of some sort.

The orc shrieked, and the camp stirred to life.

With all eyes on the river, Lodi took advantage of the confusion to trigger the crossbow. The bolt smashed directly into the back of the bigger orc. It dropped instantly, but not a single one of the seventeen remaining orcs noticed, because the mer had raised its rod, which turned out to be a spear with a wickedly barbed head on it, and plunged it into the screaming orc’s chest.

The orcs on the bridge and riverbank shouted and reached for their weapons, but the mer pulled its impaled and flailing victim into the rushing water, where it vanished, never to be seen again.

“Should I loose?” whispered Thorald as Lodi slipped another bolt into place and began cranking the windlass that drew the whipcord.

“No, just wait,” he replied in a low voice. “But when you do, take the one with the bow on the north side of the bridge. Do you see him?”

“Yeah, I got him.”

The orcs were distracted by the attack, but they weren’t in complete disarray yet. Now they were all peering out over the water, with clubs and swords in hand. Four of them had bows, and it was those that most concerned Lodi now. The watery ambush had been effective, but he sincerely hoped it wasn’t the mer’s best—or only—shot.

It wasn’t. Again without warning, the mer leaped from the water, but this time on the other side of the bridge. The orcs pointed and shouted, and three of those with bows loosed their arrows, but the mer was safely submerged again before they even struck the water.

The orcs were clearly frightened now, gabbling and shrieking at each other.

Three different mer surfaced on the south side of the bridge, and each hurled a spear at an orc on the riverbank. All two of the three went down screaming and wounded, the third simply collapsed, stone dead, with a spear jutting out both sides of its head. The orcs’ fright turned into panic.

“Now!” hissed Lodi, and he loosed a bolt at one of the orcs on the bridge. It struck a little lower than he’d intended but pierced the orc through the neck, causing it to drop its bow and fall to its knees, scrabbling at the bolt. Thorald’s shot was cleaner, as his bolt hit his target right in the heart and felled it where it stood.

Seven down, with four orcs already dead and a fifth that appeared to be mortally wounded. That was too much for the orcs. They began to flee away from the river in the direction of the forest.

One of them, a big naked brute with a broken lower tusk, came rushing directly toward them in its panic while Lodi and Thorald were still reloading their crossbows. Fortunately, it didn’t see them or it would have caught them off-guard and helpless. Lodi smashed it across its flat-nosed face with the heavy crossbow, knocking it to the ground, then pounced on it and drove the bolt in his left hand into the monster’s right eye socket.

The orc roared and threw him off before Lodi could pound it deeply enough to penetrate its feeble brain and kill it. But it had no stomach for continuing the battle, and it fled, bleeding, blinded, and shrieking, deeper into the trees.

“
Faenikh elvete!
” Lodi cursed, glaring at the crossbow’s prod. He’d broken it on the orc’s thick skull. He tossed the ruined weapon to the ground and pointed to the bridge. “Let’s go, lad!”

He slipped his battleaxe from his shoulder and burst from the ground with a war cry that was answered by the high-pitched shrieks of the mer as they gleefully slapped their arms and tails against the surface of the water.

There were still two orcs on the bridge. One was cringing below the wooden sides in an attempt to hide from the screeching mer, and the other was attending to the one Lodi had shot through the throat. Although bows were within reach, neither of the orcs tried to reach them. Indeed, only the second one even rose to its feet and tried to defend itself.

But its crude wooden club was no match for mountain-forged dwarven steel. Two sweeps of Lodi’s axe was enough to send the orc flying from the bridge, bleeding, to the waiting mer below.

The water fairly boiled as they swarmed upon it, tearing at the struggling orc with their thick, wicked teeth. Their murderous enthusiasm was truly frightening to see. Lodi almost felt sorry for the remaining
gront
on the bridge, which screamed pitifully at him and bared its fangs despite the tears of terror running down its terrified green face.

Almost, but not quite. Unmoved by its unintelligible threats or pleas, Lodi lifted it up by its throat, then hurled it over the side and into the river where death waited below. Remembering his earlier promise, he flipped a gold coin in after it.

Lodi raised his axe in salute to the watermen, who were far too occupied with their bloody repast to pay the dwarves the least attention. He shrugged and beckoned for Thorald to follow him. Lodi stopped as soon as they’d crossed the bridge and began tearing dead branches from a dying old tree not far from the river.

“What are you doing?” Thorald asked. “Shouldn’t we be moving on before those orcs find their stones and start chasing us? They’ve seen the two of us, and they can’t be so stupid as to think the mer will come to our aid in the forest!”

“We have two choices, lad: Run, and hope we can outrun them, which we can’t, or slow them down a bit. Quite a bit, considering how far south they’ll have to go to find the next bridge. They damn sure aren’t going to risk fording the river anywhere.”

Thorald looked back at the deadly flowing water, and Lodi grinned to himself as the younger dwarf shivered. The blood was well downstream now and the mer had disappeared beneath the surface again, but he knew that Thorald would never look at the peaceful, undisturbed surface of a river again without wondering what lay beneath it.

The pile of branches was growing rapidly and had nearly reached their belts when Thorald suddenly seemed to grasp what Lodi was intending. “We’re going to burn the bridge?”

“Why not? It’s wood,” Lodi answered. “But you’ve got a different job to do.”

“What’s that?”

Lodi pointed to the thick wooden supports that held the bridge fixed into the ground, then to Thorald’s axe. “Unless you want to end up as stew, get chopping!”

Despite his youth, Thorald was still moaning about his aching arms and back on the morning of the third day after they’d crossed the bridge and left it a burned shambles behind them. It had cost them almost the entire morning to destroy it, but the party of orcs that had showed up on the other river bank before Thorald had finished chopping through the wooden supports didn’t dare to try to put out the flames that were greedily eating away at the beams suspended over the water. They cursed and jeered, and even loosed a few arrows that didn’t even come close to hitting either Lodi or Thorald, but they stayed on the far bank.

By the time the last remaining supports had finally snapped under the stress of holding the entire weight and the two-thirds of the structure collapsed, burning, into the rushing water, half of the orcs had already wandered away, and the rest had been gathered in a circle watching two of their fellows roll around on the ground, snarling and snapping at each other.

The tactic appeared to have bought them the time they needed to make their escape, as they’d seen no sign of pursuit since they’d left the river behind them. Even so, Lodi kept them on the move from dawn until dusk, stopping to rest only when both of them were on the verge of collapsing. It was a brutal pace, and Lodi knew they couldn’t maintain it much longer. But he was determined that they would get word of the imminent invasion to someone civilized, be it dwarf, man, or elf, before he would permit himself to relax. But civilization was nowhere to be found in the great forest of the Greenwaste. It had died there long ago with the fall of Glaislael.

“This is mad, Lodi. You’re killing us!”

Thorald didn’t sound petulant, merely resigned.

Lodi lay on his back next to the panting younger dwarf. His legs burned, and he dreaded the thought of looking at the bleeding mass that was the bottom of his feet. He hadn’t felt worse since the time he’d been lying in a similar manner on the sands of the great Amorran stadium with tens of thousands of men watching him bleed to death.

“A little walking never hurt no one, lad.”

Thorald snorted.

And in fairness, Lodi didn’t believe his own words either.

MARCUS

The men were beginning to break down. It was three weeks since they’d marched underground to escape the besieged castra, and there had been three desertions yesterday. Another five, all from the same century, had vanished the day before. Nor was it merely their morale that was suffering. The wagons being drawn by the mule teams now contained more sick legionaries than supplies, which meant that they were not only going to have to find a way to restock before reaching the safety of Vallyrium but would probably also need to spend at least two days to allow the men to rest and recover their strength.

If the scouts’ reports were correct, they would reach Solacte, the second-largest city of the Larinii, the day after tomorrow. Marcus toyed with the idea of pushing on until sunset and permitting an open camp, which in combination with an early start and a double-time march in the morning might allow them to reach it tomorrow evening, but after looking back at the long line of march, he resisted the foolish temptation. Too many men were already bowed and shuffling under the weight of their packs, and several centurions were shooting expectant looks at him, waiting for him to give the order to stop and begin constructing the castra in which they would spend the night.