Love And War (37 page)

Huma stared into the soldier's eyes, seeing the fear clouded in them. The man wanted to
retreat but could not. Instead, he attacked with renewed fury, swearing at the top of his
voice. But the attack was short as the man, weakened by the loss of blood, almost fell,
tripping on his own feet.

Huma dodged to his right, almost colliding with the woman. He turned as the enemy soldier
slipped and fell on his side, shrieking with pain. The soldier lost his grip on the sword.
With his remaining hand, he clawed at the muddy, bloody ground. Rolling to his back, he
stripped the helmet from his head, tossing it to the side. Huma was shocked by the youth
in that face. His opponent was a young man who couldn't even grow a beard or a proper
moustache; he'd had no chance to live. Now his skin was waxy and unnatural- looking, as
the last of his blood pumped itself onto the ground. The young man died, a scream bubbling
on his crimson-stained lips.

All around Huma the battle continued to rage. Men hammered each other to the ground,
caving in heads and hacking limbs from bodies. Men shouted and screamed and fought. Even
the reinforcements the Queen had found in the obelisk were not enough to save her. Slowly,
her army shrank as her soldiers died.

And then, again, the sky closed over, the clouds boiled, and the heavens flashed with
their anger. Another new army sprang from the remains of the old. Fresh men leaped to
fight the exhausted men that Huma had led to this spot. A dozen, two, and then one-hundred
more came at them, rising from the bloody ground strewn with the bodies of the slain. The
Queen could call on this army, reinforcing it until all of Huma's men were dead.

These new soldiers moved forward with a fury that was impossible to stop. They chopped
their way through the ranks of the pikemen, lopping heads from bodies and crushing skulls
with the detachment of men clearing vines from a forest trail. The ground was slick with
blood and jellied brains.

Huma, seeing his army disintegrating around him, stood his ground. His armor was slimy
with the blood of those he had killed. There were patches of splattered gray from the
brains of his victims. Sweat from the effort of the fight soaked his underclothes. His
feet were wet from standing ankle-deep in the blood of those who had died in the battle.

But there was no more retreat. If the Queen won now, she won for good because too much had
happened. Too many had already died. Their bodies were piled around him. These were the
men who had trusted him.

The Queen's soldiers came at them with a renewed vengeance. Huma held his ground for a
moment, fighting them. Slowly, as more of his men died, he was forced to retreat, selling
the bloody ground to the Queen at the high price of the deaths of her own soldiers. And then he was at the dragonlance, his back
against it.

There was nowhere for him to go, nowhere for him to retreat to. It was time to make his
last stand, because to do less would be a betrayal of the men who had ridden with him.
Arms shaking with fatigue, he swung his sword, dripping with gore, and held the enemy at
bay.

Two of the enemy came at him, one feinting to the left and moving to the right. That man
struck at the woman who was busy fighting another adversary. Huma, sensing the attack on
her, dived between her and the man. The enemy's blade slammed into Huma's armor near the
shoulder, cleaving it easily. Huma felt white-hot pain wash down his side and into his
chest as his blood spilled.

Huma held onto his sword with a super-human effort, and swung it, catching the man in the
side. There was a crunch as the metal of the enemy's armor caved in. Drawing on all of his
strength, Huma twisted his blade free. But the force caused him to stumble. He went to one
knee and began toppling forward. His hand shot out and held him up. Out of the comer of
his eye, he saw his opponent raising his sword above his head like an axe. Huma didn't
wait for the deadly blade to fall; he rolled to his right, onto his wounded shoulder,
screaming in agony. At that same instant, he thrust his own weapon upward into the stomach
of the Queen's soldier.

The enemy took a staggering step forward and then dropped his own blade behind his back.
He reached with both hands, touching the sword that extended from his stomach. Clumsily,
he sat down as blood dripped from his mouth. He tried to grin, his teeth stained crimson,
and then toppled to his side with a bubbling croak.

Huma felt cool hands on him and turned. The woman was crouched next to him, her silver
hair splattered with blood, her armor covered with it. She had removed her helmet so that
he could see her face. Without a word, she helped Huma to his feet. He staggered back a
step and reached out, grabbing the dragonlance to steady himself. He leaned on it, using
it for support.

Around him were the tattered remains of his army. They had trusted his judgment, and he
had led them to annihilation. They had followed him blindly, and he had brought them to
destruction. He was sick with the horror that was unfolding around him. But he was
powerless to change it. Powerless to stop the carnage. He leaned on the lance and stared
at the battlefield. Stared at the dead men lying on it and at the soldiers who still fought on it. The sun, touching the horizon,
threw a blood-red glow over the plain that seemed fitting.

Pockets of fighting surrounded the obelisk, but it was clear that the Queen had the upper
hand now. Around Huma were the hacked-up bodies of his own dead soldiers. Bodies missing
hands and arms and feet and legs. There were bodies without heads and bodies that were
little more than chopped-up trunks. Under them, the ground was covered with a thick layer
of bloody mud.

The din of battle had dropped off as Huma's men died. He could hear the shouting of his
knights, calling encouragement to one another as the Queen's soldiers slowly cut them to
ribbons. They were brave men dying bravely in a losing cause. Brave men who wouldn't give
up until they were all dead. Brave men who believed that Huma would still, somehow, lead
them to victory. Brave men who believed that their loss was their own fault. They hadn't
given enough of themselves to win the battle or the war. They believed their sacrifice was
somehow less than worthy, so they were not destined to win.

Huma felt the frustration and rage bum through him. It was he who was the failure. If he
had been smart enough or strong enough, they would have won. If they failed, it was his
fault because his men gave all that they had in them. He stood upright, the pain in his
shoulder and chest almost forgotten. He stared at the obelisk. An evil black tower forty
feet tall, the top glowing with a golden, malevolent light. At the base, the Queen, the
second most beautiful woman he had ever seen, was astride her horse, watching the
destruction of Huma's army. She had taken off her helmet and held it tucked under her arm
as she studied the progress of the battle. She was grinning because Huma had fallen into
her trap.

He could stand the agony of losing no longer. The rage burned in him like a blazing forest
because there was nothing more he could do. The battle was lost. The war was lost. And his
men had all died in vain. In desperation he jerked the dragonlance free of the ground and
aimed it at the tower in a final gesture of defiance. No longer could he beat the Queen.
She had drawn him into the battle so that she could destroy his army. She had won the
battle, and with the battle . . . the war.

With the strength that remained in him, Huma hurled the lance at the tower. The motion
dropped him to his knees, shooting pain through his body. When he looked up he saw that the lance had buried itself in the obsidian of the obelisk above the Queen's
head. The lance, forged over the fires of dwarves, forged with the Hammer of Kharas by
dwarves, was more than an ordinary weapon. It had a strength of its own. Designed to kill
dragons, it held an internal power that was now directed against the obelisk. A power that
could destroy the largest of monsters. A power that was stronger than that of the Dark
Queen.

Huma grinned then and saw that the glow had faded from the top of the obelisk. There was a
rumbling in the ground, as if the tower were trying to shake the lance from its side like
an animal chewing at an arrow in its flank. Cracks, bathed in a cold, blue light appeared,
radiating outward from the point where the lance was buried in the obsidian surface. There
was a roaring, like a gale through trees, as the cracks expanded up and down the side of
the obelisk from the top to the bottom.

The Queen turned, saw the damage, and knew what it meant. She knew that the source of her
sudden power, of her impossible victory, was being destroyed. She screamed, “Nol NO! It's
too late!”

But even as she shouted, the cracks widened and chunks of the obsidian broke loose,
falling in slow motion. A rumbling, like all the thunder ever heard, washed over the
soldiers of both armies, as bigger pieces of the tower fell; the top of the obelisk
collapsed inward with a demonic roar.

Huma, unsure of what he had done, struggled to his feet. He was lightheaded, dizzy. He was
sick to his stomach and thought that he would pass out. The wound he had suffered pained
him greatly, and he felt his blood pumping from his body and dripping down his side. But
he ignored the sensation, watching as the obelisk seemed to die before him.

The Queen kicked at the flanks of her horse. It leaped from the base of the structure, but
then she turned. She waved her arms, shouting, her words lost in the rumbling, thundering
destruction of the ominous black tower. Lightning flashed from it, lancing upward into the
clouds that were boiling angrily above them.

A glowing ball of red appeared in front of her, trailing sparks. It flashed upward toward
the dragonlance and exploded around it. For a moment, she believed that she had destroyed
the dragonlance and that her power would return. But, when the glow had faded, the lance
was still there, embedded in the obelisk like an arrow through the heart of a warrior. An
arrow through the heart of her power.

The Queen turned her horse again and rode to the foot of the giant black tower. She tried
to seize the dragonlance, but her fingers fell far short. Carefully, she slipped her feet
under her so that she could stand on the horse's back, but even then she could not reach
the lance. Shaking with frustration and rage, she leaped. For a moment, her fingers curled
around the shaft of the lance. Suddenly, she screamed in pain and fell to the trembling
ground.

As she fell, her horse bolted from her, fleeing from the field, trampling the bodies of
the dead. The Queen got to her feet, holding her hands in front of her as if they had been
badly burned. She turned and stared into the deepening of the night, her hatred stabbing
out toward Huma like a beacon at the edge of the ocean. She stepped back so that she was
leaning against the smooth surface of the obelisk, trying to draw power from it.

Wind now swirled around the obelisk as the internal rumbling of it built until the ground
vibrated. For a moment, nothing happened, and it seemed that the tower had healed itself.
Some of the cracks started to disappear and the icy blue light that wrapped the structure
began to fade.

Strangely, abruptly, the rumbling started again, and the cracks reappeared and widened.
The obelisk seemed to shrink in on itself and tremble as if fighting with itself. Then
suddenly, it exploded, blowing apart in a blinding flash of blue-white light.

The force of the concussion knocked Huma, and those with him, from their feet. Tiny bits
of obsidian rained down on them, kicking up dust on the distant hills like the first drops
of rain after a summer drought. Stunned by all he had seen, Huma lay staring at the
clearing sky as the clouds overhead melted away until he was staring into the deepening of
the heavens, studded with thousands of stars.

The Dark Queen, like the obsidian obelisk, was gone. There were bits of the tower
scattered all over the plain, but nothing was left of the Queen. She had been banished
when the obelisk had exploded in fire and light.

With the silver-haired woman's help, Huma sat up. Before him was a smoking crater where
the obelisk had been. Around it were the bodies of his men killed by the Queen's army, but
her soldiers, living and dead, were all gone, washed away in the flash of light and smoke
and fire that had destroyed the obelisk and the Dark Queen's evil power.

Slowly, those of Huma's men who still lived got to their feet. They were a tired,
bloodstained and mud-splattered lot who stared at the crater. One or two of them started forward slowly, as if they didn't
believe what they had seen, as if they couldn't believe that the tower had destroyed
itself trying to free itself from the dragonlance.

Huma found that he could no longer move. His hands and feet were cold, as if he had spent
the day on a winter outing. Breathing hurt him; his lungs ached as he held his breath,
inhaling only when the pain became too much for him.

The woman cradled his head in her arms, her eyes heavy with tears.

“We have won,” he told her, the joy in his voice unmistakable.

“Yes,” she agreed, her voice hushed. “In the end, it was you who saved the day.” She tried
to smile and failed. “You saved the day just as your men knew you would.”

He tried to nod but found the motion made him sick, made his head swim. His eyesight was
failing, and he was no longer sure what was going on around him. He tried to smile and
asked, “What happened?”

“It was the dragonlance,” she said, blinking rapidly. She looked upward, away from his
pale face and added, “It cut to the heart of her power and destroyed it. Destroyed it and
her army at once.”

“I didn't know,” said Huma. “No way you could,” she told him. “My men? How are my men?”
She looked at the field around her. The womenfolk had lighted fires on the surrounding hills. Many of them, looking for husbands, brothers, and
sons, slipped among the dead, searching.