Dark Obligations: Book One of the Phantom Badgers (20 page)

Roaring in pain, surprise, and fury, the Champion plucked a metal disk from its side and hurled it at the diminutive Badger, who instinctively threw herself flat, amazed that the six shafts had only
enraged it. The disk missed her by three feet, slamming into the planks that formed the tread way of the bridge and shearing apart one of the structure’s framework chains. The impact threw the bridge sideways, the resulting backlash jarring loose one of the javelins which anchored the tightening ropes, which sent the bridge see-sawing and dislodging the second javelin, thus intensifying the bucking motion.

Bridget
had been spinning her staff sling for a cast when the disk struck the bridge, knocking her off balance, inertia thrusting her towards the west; moments later the planks beneath her feet began to thrash as the ropes which had drawn the slack from the chains came loose. Only a desperate grab at a vertical support chain saved the advocate from pitching head-first off the west side of the bridge; swinging on the chain like a dancer pivoting from a polished pole, she managed to get her other hand onto the rusting links as her momentum carried her over the low rail-chain, losing her staff sling in the process.

Gasping at the pain in her shoulders as they took her full weight,
Bridget slid down several links on the chain as the bridge gyrated, ripping up the palms of her finger-less gloves and splintering several nails. As the bridge’s motion became less violent she swung her feet over the rail-chain and dropped gratefully to the filthy planks, heart hammering and her breath coming in desperate gasps as if she had just run a mile while carrying a full pack.

A Direbreed spun away from Moonblade, blood fountaining from its throat; Robin gave a croaking laugh and backpedaled, turning to face the goat-horned beast-man coming up on his left, one of the last still on its feet in this part of the cavern. With horrifying suddenness his left foot slipped on the blade
of a discarded sword, throwing him off-balance. For just an instant Moonblade wavered as the bearded swordsman fought for his balance, but an instant was all the Direbreed needed, slapping the enchanted blade aside with a small axe while lunging in with a mace, the spiked head of which slammed into the side of the Badger’s steel helm. Blackness swam before Robin’s eyes and a roaring filled his ears; he vaguely felt the impact of the dirt floor as he fell, his right hand still loosely gripping Moonblade, the leverage of the great sword’s blade digging into the soil turning him to land on his back.

Blinking his eyes open to a soundless world, Robin saw a gore-spattered Nuila catch the small axe on her
buckler as she drove her sword-point into the beast-man’s chest; wrenching the blade free, she finished if off with a mighty chop to the head that put a nasty nick in her sword’s blade where it met one of the creature’s horns. As the feeling began to return to his arms and legs Robin saw the dark-haired woman turn and kneel over him, her lips forming his name.

‘
Look around, look around, ignore me
,’ he shrieked silently, the words tangling into a useless moan in his numb mouth. ‘No, no, no, NO!’

Nuilia never saw the badly wounded Direbreed stagger up from behind, its studded maul held before it in a two-handed grip. The impact of the lovely young woman’s iron cap slamming into Robin’s forehead as her body was driven forward by the
force of the savage blow made his darkness complete.

The Draktaur came through the crumbling tendrils of the dying mist like a siege engine rumbling towards a city wall, one ponderous step at a time, its warped and twisted features bearing no more expression than that of a half-finished statue, the shimmering axe held easily before it. The last of the Direbreed in the east side of the cavern perished at Gabriella’s and Kroh’s hands as it stopped to hurl the disk at the bridge, but the loss of its followers did not appear to concern the creature, and to look at the size of the thing Durek couldn’t fault it for overconfidence.

The Captain stood ready, axe at low port,
Kroh, Gabriella, and Trellan in a line to his left. A Human stepped up on his right with a Black Dwarf’s helm on his head and a war mattock in his hands, pale-faced but determined. He glanced over at the Captain and tried to grin. “Now would be a good time to initiate that part of your brilliant plan where you cunningly dispose of that beast.” His Pradian was that of a native.

“Actually, the brilliant bits are all done,” the Dwarf confessed. “Now we just slug it out.”

The slave shook his head ruefully. “I was afraid of that. Johann Helbrit, by the way, and before it’s too late, my thanks for getting me this far.”

“Captain
Durek Toolsmaster, Phantom Badgers. And my apologies for not making it a better rescue.”

Johann shrugged. “
I’ve recently learned that there are worse things than dying, and being in that pen was rapidly becoming one.”

“Walking slow won’t save you,”
Kroh suddenly roared, startling everyone. “You’re about to die, but some of us have work to do afterwards, so step it up you uncooperative bastard. We haven't got all day to waste.” The Waybrother leaned his axe against his side in order to free both hands for a series of obscene gestures.

The Draktaur ignored the Dwarf’s jeering, stepping with majestic precision over the bodies of its Direbreed, moving its bulk with a
n eerie grace, ignoring the blue-black fluid trickling from the arrow-wounds along its side.

Without warning
Kroh’s axe flew through the air; caught off guard the Draktaur reacted too slowly, its parry missing completely. The enchanted weapon struck the Champion a hard blow on the left shoulder, shearing through the armor with a terrible impact before reversing course and darting back into the charging Waybrother’s hands. Durek and the others charged in an effort to take advantage of the very slender element of surprise Kroh had created for them, leaping over dead or dying Direbreed and abandoned weapons.

Kroh
was the first to reach the Champion; deftly sidestepping a vertical chop that hacked a six-inch deep trench into the dirt, he expertly struck at the Draktaur’s left arm, penetrating the forearm armor and drawing a line of dark blood forth. As the massive creature recovered from the force of the blow Gabriella darted in and struck the tree-stump-like front leg nearest her with her long war hammer, leaping back as the huge axe sung back up into the ready position.

The Captain struck just after Gabriella, badly denting the baroque breastplate without actually penetrating; he was backpedalling when the Draktaur suddenly erupted into a surprisingly quick movement, spinning sharply to the
its right, axe lashing out in a vicious horizontal arc. Durek saw the slave Johann trampled while in the act of leaping in to attack, the captured mattock smashed from his grip. Trellan, sabre blade black with blood from a wound on the Champion’s right rear leg, threw himself to the ground and rolled desperately. Kroh crabbed sideways in mid-charge and struck a blow that glanced off the gray-green armor.

For a moment the Captain thought that the beast’s maneuver had failed, but as the creature came back around to face him he saw the splash of blood on the blade and saw Gabriella’s headless corpse toppling onto the dirt. The pain that roared through him was sharper than any wound
, and cold water filled his bones. Roaring, he rushed the foe, axe ready, battle senses dulled under the pulsing waves of his anger and loss.

The Draktaur skipped back for range, stumbled a half-step as it did so, belching an annoyed roar, and struck, the accuracy ruined by its misstep, tearing another trench in the floor as the Badger Captain hacked a rent in the Champion’s side and
Kroh’s axe bit through the left forearm-guard again.

Durek
scuttled backward from the Draktaur as it brought its axe back up, hoping to put distance between it and himself, only to see the massive enemy hesitate and shuffle sideways. Fearing a trick the Badger Captain continued backing up, although Kroh did not; howling, the Waybrother swept in and hewed another rent into the weirdly inscribed armor. The Draktaur’s strike sent the Dwarf tumbling across the floor, saved only by the awkwardness of the blow.

Charging
as the enemy recovered, Durek struck hard, penetrating the side armor and racing away, seeing for the first time why the Draktaur was suddenly so uncertain: Johann was astride the creatures left rear leg, his arms and legs locked about it in the fashion of a man clinging to a tree trunk in a storm. The Draktaur’s bulk and heavy armor prevented it from bucking Johann loose in the manner of a horse, and its centaur-like physical shape and armor prevented it from reaching back to cut the Human off without exposing its front to the waiting Dwarves. Unless there were Direbreed still alive on the east side of the bridge that it could recall, Durek realized, the Champion was effectively hobbled by the weight and unbalancing effect of Johann’s perch.

An arrow whipped in to shatter
on the massive being’s helm, a distraction that Durek used to dart in and strike; the Draktaur was expecting this, however, and as the Dwarf leapt back its axe caught him on the side, sending a breath-stealing wave of pain through his body and peeling his breastplate from his chest like an oyster being shucked. Fortunately, his momentum and the impact sent him sprawling outside his foe’s now-limited reach.

Lying on the dirt, clutching his throbbing (but unbloodied, thank the Eight) side,
Durek could see Trellan behind the creature, taking advantage of its limited mobility to dart in and slash at its lower right left and lighter-armored belly. Kroh made another rush from the side and chopped at the thing’s armored flanks while yelling some incoherent battle cry; the Champion swung at the battered Waybrother but missed, perhaps distracted by an arrow that ripped into its unarmored lower left front leg.

That scene was repeated a half-dozen times:
Kroh leaping in, Starr peppering the Draktaur with arrows that shattered on its armor, Johann hanging on for dear life; Trellan seemed to have disappeared. The lunge and rush of the fight had caused the Champion to slowly turn until its left flank was towards Durek even as the Captain regained his equilibrium. Carefully planning each move before he made it, the Badger officer regained his feet and brought his axe up to the ready position. He had one or two strikes left in him and timing was going to be everything.

It took a
moment to register what he was seeing, but eventually he realized that Trellan was circling behind and to the side of the Champion pushing a wheelbarrow with a keg in it, a heavy banded keg that looked as if it had been full of nails at one time. Waiting until the Draktaur had lashed out at Kroh, who was now bleeding from several wounds, the ex-sailor charged behind his strange load, pushing the wheelbarrow to the massive creature’s armored side and then leaping to its back using the barrow-mounted keg as a stepping stone. Seizing the Champion around the neck from behind, Trellan raked a dagger’s point across the Draktaur’s helm front, trying for the vision slit.

Roaring like a
n ox with its tail in the millstones, the Draktaur staggered backwards, stumbling over the wheelbarrow as it scrabbled behind its shoulders with first one hand and then the other, trying desperately to dislodge Trellan. Durek shook himself free of his shock and trotted carefully in, mindful of his throbbing ribs, and delivered one massive, double-handed swing that would have shattered the haft of an ordinary axe, the enchanted edge biting deep through the joints of two plates. Wrenching the weapon free, Durek trotted back out of range as Kroh bored in and struck again.

Trellan had managed to get the point and two inches of blade through a slit in the helm and was rocking it in for all he was worth when a hand the size of a kettle clamped on his shoulder and flung him through the air like a man hurling a
n annoying child. Years on the rigging in storms had taught him well: he let go of the dagger to avoid spitting himself and curled into a ball, landing hard enough to drive the air from his lungs but with enough roll to keep from breaking any bones.

Durek
hit the Draktaur on its unarmored knee just as it was throwing Trellan; it was a risky strike, even for one as short as a Dwarf, but he counted on the distraction being enough. The edge of his axe splintered the kneecap and ripped deep through sinew and muscle; blue-black blood spouted as he ripped the weapon free and scrambled away.

Breathing heavily, axe at port arms, the Draktaur faced its foes, blood trickling from the right vision slit of its helm. One leg was crippled, another was wounded by Trellan’s attacks, a
nd a third had an adult male Human hanging onto it for dear life: the Champion had no mobility left and all present knew it. The bloody helm turned and Durek risked a glance over his shoulder: Janna and Rolf were coming from under the bridge, which meant that no Direbreed were left on that side of the battlefield. Without his minions to guard his long flanks, and without the mobility to keep his foes in front of him, the great armored beast was dead, and it knew it. It stood and waited, hoping for the chance to take another of its foes with it into death.

Kroh
came spinning from behind the Draktaur, twirling like a child playing on a summer’s day, gripping a length of stout rope whose end was tied to a rock the size of a loaf of bread. Timing it well, the Waybrother released the rope, sending his ten-pound projectile through the air to slam between the motionless Champion’s armored shoulder blades with a great
clang
and an impact that sprayed rock fragments like shrapnel. The impact lifted the armored bulk onto its toes; before it could recover from its shock Durek had charged forward, ignoring his aching side, and slammed his axe into the bloody left forearm whose armor had been ruined earlier by Kroh’s vicious attacks. The Draktaur’s one-handed riposte struck his helm with enough force to split the metal and turn the Badger’s knees to water, but the Captain managed to stagger back into Rolf’s waiting arms. Without a pause the thin half-Orc dragged the Dwarf well away from the battle.