Mindbender (63 page)

He went to bed with the understanding that his plan wasn’t perfect, but it was the best chance they had under the circumstances. He only hoped that he hadn’t missed something but knew that he most likely had. He also knew that the enemy was making plans, and as good as his sight was, he couldn’t see everything. Good people were going to die tomorrow on his order.

He drifted off to sleep, nursing his anger toward Phane for inflicting his narcissistic ambitions on the world.

***

He was up before dawn and took care strapping on his weapons and armor. He wore a baldric with Mindbender on his left hip and the Thinblade strapped across his back with the hilt over his right shoulder. He checked the blade of each to be sure they were clear in their scabbards. His wear-worn long knife on the right side of his belt and a throwing knife strapped onto the back of his belt completed his armaments. He left his bow and quiver with his pack to be carried through the Gate by the supply wagons that would bring up the rear of the assault force.

He emerged from his tent to find Lucky cheerfully cooking breakfast over a small fire. Then he saw Jataan P’Tal and almost faltered.

The battle mage was dressed in armor. He had always worn a simple tunic and fought with knives, but this morning he was dressed very differently. He wore a breastplate, grieves, bracers, gauntlets, and a helmet. He had a sword strapped to his belt and a spear thrust into the ground next to him with a large round shield resting against it.

Alexander took it in for a moment, then glanced over to Anatoly.

“A little disconcerting, isn’t it?” the big man-at-arms said.

Alexander could only nod his agreement.

“In large scale battle, danger can come from any direction without warning,” Jataan said. “I generally find armor cumbersome and anything more than a knife unnecessary, but given the circumstances, I believe it’s warranted.”

Jack whipped out his tablet and started writing furiously while nodding to himself.

The sky was just starting to turn deep blue and the stars were dimming when they finished their breakfast and went to the Gate. Conner, General Brand, and Mage Dax were already there.

Alexander surveyed the scene. Soldiers were staged for as far as he could see. Several units were lined up close to the Gate waiting to play their part in the initial push into Ruatha, while many more waited farther out for the order to move. Three units of a thousand men each stood the closest. The first were heavy infantry. Men selected for their strength and size as well as their experience and reputation for skill in battle. The second were heavy cavalry, armed with heavy spears, javelins, and long swords. Half rode big and powerful warhorses while the rest were mounted on the captured rhone steeds. The final unit was composed of archers equipped with long bows and a hundred arrows each.

During the night, a pile of boulders had been stacked on the Gate platform and a battering ram was waiting off to one side.

Alexander nodded good morning to Conner and his senior advisors, then drew a magic circle in the dirt before the Ithilian Gate. There was some murmuring from the troops when Alexander sat down and started meditating. He ignored them. Within a few minutes his awareness was floating above the Ruathan Gate. Dawn was just breaking over the horizon. The sky was clear and the battle flags flapped lazily in the gentle breeze.

Off in the distance he saw a cloud of dust rising into the air from the movement of his army. They were beginning to advance toward the enemy line. The battle would be joined within the hour.

He looked closely at the wall enclosing the Gate and saw that the enemy hadn’t taken the time to place new stakes in the ground or lay more oil-soaked straw. He floated amongst the archers lining the tops of the wall. They looked tired and nervous but they were alert and watching for any sign of movement. When he reached the spot on the straight wall that ran behind the Gate, he found a wizard, as expected. He returned to his body and stood up.

“There’s a wizard on the wall behind the Gate,” he said. “Our plan doesn’t change. Mage Dax, please proceed.”

The mage began casting a spell. It took several minutes to complete and, judging from the swell of his colors, required an unrestrained connection with the firmament. Once he completed his spell, the pile of boulders stacked on the Gate platform began to move. Slowly, the boulders took on a life of their own. Within a few minutes they were arranged in the form of a giant man. Flickerings of magical energy could be seen in the spaces between the stones. Once it was fully assembled, standing twelve feet tall, Mage Dax nodded to Alexander.

He went to the Gate controls and touched the outline of Ruatha on the little map. The Gate shimmered and then opened. A second later, arrows rained down through the Gate but none found their mark. The angle of attack from the wall made it impossible to shoot through the Gate any farther than a few feet.

With a word from Mage Dax, the creature of stone and magic started moving forward, gathering terrifying speed in just a few steps. It hit the wall facing the Gate with a thunderous crash, then began smashing the hastily built fortification with its giant stone fists. Arrows rained down on the magical creature with no effect. Alexander watched from a safe distance, marveling at the virtually limitless capacity of magic.

A bubble of liquid fire splashed against the back of the stone juggernaut and ignited with a whoosh, splattering droplets of flame all around, but still the magical creature continued to pound the wall. Stones began to break free and crash to the ground. Alexander smiled to himself when he saw the creature snatch up a block of stone and incorporate it into itself. As more stones fell, it gathered them up, adding to its size and bulk. As it grew, the blows to the stone wall grew in power and more stones fell. Sounds of shouting and alarm could be heard from the archers as the wall began to lose structural integrity.

By now the stone monster was twenty feet tall and the section of wall in front of it was nearly broken through. With one final blow, the wall shattered, sending stones scattering into the enemy infantry beyond. With the break in the wall, the stone creature was able to gather even more boulders up and add them to its mass and size. It started dismantling the wall piece by piece as the soldiers surrounding the fortification looked on in shock and amazement.

It quickly opened a twenty-foot gap in the stone wall and grew to thirty feet in height. Mage Dax gave a command and the creature turned and barreled into the corner of the semicircular wall where it met the straight wall running behind the Gate. Alexander heard shouted commands as the enemy commanders marshaled their forces to pour through the breach and into the enclosed space in front of the Gate.

As he gripped the hilt of Mindbender, his focus sharpened and his senses heightened the way they always did when he was in a fight. He created the image of a giant dragon in his mind and released it into the sword. With a flicker, the air before them condensed and a terrifying creature of bone and fang appeared.

Alexander’s army gasped in surprise.

The illusionary dragon roared in fury, then folded its wings and started squeezing through the Gate. Soldiers on the other side cried out in alarm at the threat of a dragon in their midst. They fell back, giving the stone giant more time to work on the wall.

The dragon stood guard on the other side of the Gate, sending the enemy into a mad scramble to regroup and form some sort of strategy capable of dealing with such a terrifying threat. A hail of arrows descended on the illusionary creature and the stone giant from all directions but had no effect.

“Prepare the cavalry,” Alexander said.

General Brand nodded and signaled to the cavalry commander.

Alexander smiled when he saw the shadow of the stone giant fall over the front of the Gate. It was nearing forty feet tall and gaining size rapidly from the stone blocks it was cannibalizing from the crumbling wall. It stepped into view and swept down with a mighty two-fisted blow onto the top of the wall. The weakened wall shuddered under the weight of the blow, then crumbled into rubble with a thunderous rolling crash.

Alexander focused on his dragon and it leapt up onto the remaining section of the semicircular wall and roared, sending nearby soldiers scrambling to escape the terrifying beast.

With the wall broken down, Mage Dax spoke another word of command and the now fifty-foot-tall rock monster waded out into the surrounding army, thrashing this way and that. Broken bodies of enemy soldiers flew through the air, sending the rest of the nearby soldiers into a panic. Mage Dax’s creation cut a wide swath of destruction through the enemy ranks, sending them into disarray and confusion. With a final word of command, the magical jumble of stones stopped and drew itself up to a full sixty feet, then abruptly exploded, sending boulders half the size of a man flying through the air in every direction, crashing into the enemy with deadly force.

“Well done, Mage Dax,” Alexander said.

“Send in the cavalry and prepare the infantry,” he said to General Brand.

A column of heavy cavalry ten-wide thundered past and through the Gate. They charged through the breach in the wall and into the chaotic field of enemy soldiers. A few of their infantry tried to organize a resistance but the leading soldiers mounted on the rhone trampled over them on their way to the ring of archers two hundred feet from the Gate.

The enemy archers were concentrating their fire on the dragon still perched atop the wall and roaring ferociously at the nearby infantry. By the time they saw the column of Ithilian cavalry coming for them, it was too late. The horsemen trampled into the ranks of archers, crushing them under hoof and striking them down with their heavy spears, then wheeling right and continuing their charge. The lightly armored archers were no match for the heavy armor and momentum of the cavalry crashing through their ranks and leaving a trail of carnage and broken bodies in their wake.

As the cavalry moved around the band of archers, they left the area where the stone giant had caused the most damage and the heavy infantry on both sides began to offer some resistance.

Squads of men rushed into the flanks of the charging column and drove spears into the sides of their steeds, then pulled the men down and stabbed them to death. But the cavalry didn’t stop—they had their orders and knew the risks. When one horse fell, the others closed ranks and filled in the gap to continue their charge through the archers.

Alexander sent Chloe through the Gate to scout for him. She floated in the aether high above and scanned the scene, while Alexander surveyed the battlefield through her eyes. The enemy had abandoned the broken wall and the soldiers in the immediate area were in disarray. They didn’t know what to make of the dragon and seemed to be waiting for it to attack. His cavalry were halfway around the circle of archers, leaving nothing but wreckage in their path. It saddened him that they had lost nearly two hundred of their number, but the necessity of eliminating the archers outweighed the cost.

On the outer perimeter of the Regency encampment, Alexander saw another battle unfolding as three legions of Ruathan soldiers attacked. They’d already breached the defensive ditch and berm in two places and were pouring into the encampment.

“Stay high and remain in the aether, Little One,” Alexander said to Chloe through his link with her mind.

“Be careful, My Love,” she said.

“Send in the infantry and prepare the archers,” Alexander commanded.

A thousand heavy infantry marched past twenty-wide and spread out as they entered the partially enclosed area in front of the Gate. Even though they all knew the dragon was nothing but an illusion, most couldn’t help but look up when it roared.

The enemy soldiers that had taken the brunt of the stone giant’s attack were scrambling to reorganize and present a coordinated resistance. Alexander’s infantry weren’t interested in fighting them. Instead they moved to seize what was left of the wall. Once on the other side of the Gate, they wheeled left and drove straight for the ramp leading up to the top of the long straight wall behind it. As they neared the base of the ramp, they met heavy resistance from an infantry unit that had managed to regroup. The fighting was fierce. Alexander watched as his soldiers fought to a standstill against the crush of superior numbers. The enemy commanders had regained control and were driving their forces toward the Gate to choke off the flow of Ithilian soldiers.

“It’s time,” Alexander said, drawing the Thinblade with his right hand and Mindbender with his left.

Anatoly unslung his war axe, Jataan strapped on his shield and took up his spear, Boaberous hefted his giant war hammer over his shoulder, and the thirteen Rangers commanded by Lieutenant Wyatt drew long swords as one. Jack and Lucky looked torn. They were staying behind until the area could be secured and neither looked happy about it.

“Wait for my signal, then send in the archers,” Alexander said to Conner. “Once they’re through, make sure the second wave is ready to go at a moment’s notice.”

“Good luck, Lord Reishi,” Conner said with a salute.

Alexander turned and stepped through the Gate and onto Ruathan soil for the first time in months. He and his men moved to the left of the Gate toward the infantry that had fought to a stalemate. His soldiers had planted their heavy shields in the dirt, forming an interlocking wall to defend against the throng pressing in toward them. Bodies were piling up in front of them as they stabbed past their shields with swords and spears, wounding or killing those in the first ranks of the enemy counterattack.