Shadow Blizzard (57 page)

“Wait, Kli-Kli!” Lamplighter interrupted, speaking for the first time. “Where did help come from there?”

“Have you forgotten about our fifteen thousand men permanently stationed on the border with Miranueh?”

“I haven’t forgotten, but I’m sure Miranueh didn’t forget them, either. The whole of the west is under the command of the Carp now.” (This was a disdainful name for the inhabitants of Miranueh.)

“Don’t worry about that! Everything’s just great there as well! Twenty thousand Firstborn advanced against Maiding. The King of Miranueh couldn’t bear the sight of such injustice and he added ten thousand of his pikemen and four thousand cavalry to our fifteen thousand.”

“Wha-a-at!” This time all three of us gaped in amazement.

“Uh-huh. The orcs had really got up His Majesty’s nose one way or another, and His Majesty decided to intervene to help his neighbor to the north.”

“I don’t believe it! I’ll believe anything, but not Miranueh! All these centuries we’ve been squabbling over the Disputed Lands, and then this!”

“Don’t the priests say that you should be generous, Harold?” the gobliness giggled. “Darkness only knows what made the king of Miranueh act so generously at just the right moment, but our own obliging Stalkon bowed gratefully and handed Miranueh the Disputed Lands.”

Hallas choked on his wine and started coughing. Eel thumped the gnome on the back.

“No great loss. All those years spent haggling over twenty leagues of swampy land that’s no good to anyone … Only northerners would do that sort of thing.…”

“Well, in Garrak you’ve got plenty of land to spare, but it’s in short supply up here,” said Lamplighter, springing to the defense of his native kingdom. “But what’s done is done. So the orcs were driven back from Maiding?”

“Not just driven back, but surrounded and wiped out!” the gobliness positively sang. “Victory on all fronts! And the allied army didn’t stop at that, it went into the Black Forest, to help our brothers the elves. If our generals have any brains at all, they’ll clear the Firstborn out of the Golden Forest completely.”

“For which—three cheers,” said Hallas, raising his glass.

“So the ones who attacked Moitsig were a surviving fragment of the central army?”

“No, Mumr. They were lured out of Zagraba. Our soldiers were lucky, they picked up the clan chief of the Grun Ear-Cutters himself as he and his rabble were making their way back to their native forest. And they strung him up on the city gates, as a lesson to anyone who doesn’t want to stay quietly at home in the Golden Forest. And those young pups didn’t understand the message and crept out under the eye of Sagra. They wanted to retrieve the body. Well, they were massacred.… Right, Harold. And now for you. While you were cooling your heels in the barracks, I managed to run a couple of errands and pick up a few things.” And so saying, the gobliness reached into the sack and set a crossbow on the table, together with twenty short bolts. “There … without a decent weapon you’ll soon pine away.”

I picked up the crossbow. Of course, it wasn’t my little beauty, the one I’d left behind in Hrad Spein, but it wasn’t bad at all. I used to have one just like it before. A “wasp”—a light weapon, and very reliable.

“Where did you get it?”

“I filched it, of course. From their armory,” she said, bursting with pride.

“And what if they catch me with it now?” I chuckled, amazed at Kli-Kli’s sheer cheek in stealing a weapon from right under a soldier’s nose.

“If they catch you, Dancer, then you’ll have to deal with it. I’ve done my bit. All the rest is your problem.”

“Thanks a lot, Kli-Kli,” I said sarcastically to my “benefactress.”

“Don’t mention it,” she answered in the same tone of voice, and grinned gleefully. “And by the way, all of you, better get those jaws working, I’ve still got to take you to get some warm clothes. Winter’s almost here, and you’re still prancing about in those rags.”

“Are we all going thieving together?” Hallas inquired, rolling his one eye.

“You have a very poor opinion of goblins, Lucky,” the gobliness said resentfully. “Why do we have to go thieving? Egrassa’s settled everything with the commandant. All we have to do now is pick up some warm things and we can hit the road. When we reach Avendoom, the real frosts will start to bite, and then all of you will say thank you to the little goblin, yes you will, for the nice warm clothes, because, if not for me, you would all have frozen to death.”

“I thought you just said that Egrassa made the arrangements for the clothes, not you,” Eel remarked innocently.

“But who do you think told him?” Kli-Kli asked spitefully.

“You told me,” Egrassa replied as he walked into the room. “Get ready, there’s an armed detachment leaving Moitsig in an hour. We’ll leave with them.”

“Why with them?” Hallas asked with a scowl. “Are we likely to lose our way?”

“You’re forgetting that although the orcs have been routed, the chances of running into scattered units of Firstborn are still very high. Would you like to lose your second eye, too?”

The gnome’s answer to that was to brag that he’d like to see the orcs try to get anywhere near him, and that if they did, a certain mattock would smash their skulls in for them.

“Are the Moitsig warriors going to Ranneng, too?”

“No, Eel. They’re in a hurry to get to Margend County. Part of the central army of the Firstborn has been surrounded only one day’s journey from here. Neol Iragen’s detachment is going to take part in the forthcoming battle.”

“Are there many orcs?” Lucky inquired, stroking his beard.

“About five and a half thousand.”

“That’s enough for me,” the gnome said with a decisive nod, and Deler’s hat fell down over his eyes. “Why are you all sitting there? Let’s get moving, or they’ll finish off all the orcs without us!”

I would have liked to say that would be for the best, but I kept my mouth shut. Why upset the gnome? Hallas was as happy as a child who’d just been promised a toy.

*   *   *

We left Moitsig an hour and a half later to loud howls of acclamation from the townsfolk, who were seeing their warriors off on their victorious campaign (no one had any doubt that they would be victorious). The commandant had been kind enough to present us with horses as well as warm clothes.

I’d been given a dark brown stallion with a marked inclination to try to kill his masters. In any case, the beast kept attempting to break into a gallop and dispatch his unfortunate rider directly to his grave. By some cruel jest of the gods, it was a cavalry horse, whose only aim in life was to go dashing forward at breakneck speed, preferably to the sound of a bugle. After my gentle Little Bee, this example of the equine species filled me with anxiety and creeping horror. It cost me an incredible effort just to hold the hothead back and not tumble out of the saddle. Eel watched with a compassionate expression as I struggled in vain to subdue the demon of frenzied unreason that possessed the horse, until finally he couldn’t stand it anymore and offered to swap horses with me. Before the Garrakian could change his mind, I slipped out of the saddle and mounted a gentle, rather shaggy, and well-fed horse of indeterminate breed.

Now this was a horse that really suited me! She would only run if I wanted her to, or if there was an ogre chasing her.

“What’s she called?” I asked.

“Horse,” said the Garrakian, smiling.

One of the soldiers riding behind us overheard the conversation and roared with laughter. I don’t know what he found so funny.

“All right then, Horse it is,” I chuckled, patting the animal on the neck. “The name really suits her.”

“Look, Harold, over there? Those men over there, in the gray cloaks.”

“The members of the Order, you mean?”

“Those are the ones. It was that six who stopped the orcs at Moitsig.”

“Well, good for them.”

I personally felt no interest at all in the magicians.

But then I wondered what they’d say if they found out about the Rainbow Horn. And for a moment I felt the urge to hand the magical artifact over to them and never have anything more to do with magic again. I had to struggle with myself not to get rid of the Horn there and then.

The road led northward and, according to that know-all Kli-Kli, it would take us directly to Ranneng, but first we had to get past the small county of Margend, which ran along the west bank of the Iselina almost as far as Boltnik.

A detachment of mounted men six hundred strong set out from Moitsig. Two days earlier one and a half thousand heavy infantry from the Cat Halberdiers and the Rollicking Rogues had left the city in the direction of Margend. The Halberdiers had arrived in the city from Maiding immediately after the orcs in that section of the front were routed and forces had to be shifted urgently to the east, toward the Iselina. The Rollickers had been quartered in Moitsig and were spoiling for a fight.

Baron Gabsbarg’s soldier was riding in our unit, and he told me all the soldiers’ gossip. The lad jabbered away without a break, but just when I was going to ask about the baron he was called up to the front to Neol Iragen, and I had to postpone my questions for some other time.

In the way of things, our large mounted detachment ought soon to overtake the infantry and the large transport column wending its way toward the Second Army of the South that had encircled the remnants of the Firstborn. From what the soldiers were saying, we should arrive in the afternoon of the next day, in time to help our forces drive the orcs into the river. Egrassa was riding somewhere up at the head of the detachment with Neol Iragen, so we were left to our own devices. Or, rather, the gobliness was. Deprived of the elf’s oversight, Kli-Kli decided to slip back into the role of the king’s favorite jester. An hour later a good two hundred of the soldiers were laughing heartily at her jokes and songs and verses and other fancy tricks.

Ten minutes after that, the entire detachment had heard about the little sharp-tongued goblin traveling in the first unit. Naturally, the other five units started vying with each other to get Kli-Kli to join them. She was the life and soul of the honorable company once again, and she amused the soldiers until twilight fell, when the detachment halted for the night at a large village completely untouched by the war.

The locals turned out to be expecting us, and although there weren’t enough houses for such a great horde, the local baron, who had come dashing from the nearest castle, complete with his numerous retinue, had made everything ready to receive his victorious guests. Thanks to Egrassa, we were even given a house where we could spend the night.

While Eel and the elf and I were settling into the new place, Kli-Kli managed to slip off. Hallas and Lamplighter didn’t stay around for long, either. They were almost carried off shoulder-high to the center of the village, where the festivities in honor of the arrival of the glorious warriors were due to begin. I thought how many listeners the gnome would have now. The soldiers invited us as well, but I declined and Eel thought about it for a moment, then shook his head, too. Egrassa was invited to dine at the baron’s festive table and he went in order to be polite.

It was dark outside. I breathed in the cold air that felt wintry already.

“Smells like the first snow,” said Eel, as if he was reading my mind.

“It’s cool, all right,” I agreed. “November’s a cold month in the south this year.”

“Is this cold? It’s nothing but a light frost,” he chuckled. “See how pale the stars are? In a serious frost they burn like the jewels in the royal crown.”

“Our Stalkon doesn’t have all that many precious stones in his crown.”

“I meant the Garrakian crown.”

“Oh!” I said, realizing I’d said something stupid.

We said nothing for a while, listening to the happy shouting and laughter ringing out in the night.

“They’re making merry, as if there was no war at all,” I murmured.

“And why not? There’ll be war and a battle tomorrow, but today they have a chance to forget about everything. Is that such a bad thing?”

“Why no,” I said, embarrassed. “It’s probably a good thing.”

“What’s bothering you, Harold?”

I paused, trying to find the right words. Unfortunately, as usual, the ones I really needed didn’t come to mind.

“It’s not that easy to explain. What the Gray One said, the Master, the Rainbow Horn, and, of course, the balance and all the consequences that follow. It’s not very nice to think that without even wanting to, I might be carrying around the deadliest snake of all in my bag.”

“Just don’t think about it.”

“What?”

“Look here. What do you see?” He took the “sister” out of its scabbard.

“A weapon,” I muttered stupidly.

“That’s right, a weapon. Is it dangerous right now?”

“No,” I replied after a moment’s thought.

“That’s right. The ‘sister’ is in my hands. Everything depends on who’s holding the weapon and what he wants to use it for. The Rainbow Horn is a weapon just like the ‘sister,’ and it’s in your hands. I don’t believe you want to consign the world to oblivion.”

“But I won’t always have it.”

“The Order will take care of the Horn. Or don’t you trust magicians any longer?”

“I do, but what the Gray One said…”

“What the Gray One said is just words, that’s all. My old granny, may she dwell in the light, always used to say that prophecies never come true if we don’t want them to.”

“That’s very reassuring,” I said with a bitter grin, but I don’t think the warrior could make out my pitiful grimace in the dark. “Why don’t we go and join the others? Maybe they’ll leave some wine for us?”

“I doubt if the lieutenant will allow the soldiers to drink much. And they’re no fools, anyway: There’s not much pleasure in going into battle with a hangover. So you and I can’t count on anything more than a mug of beer. But let’s hurry, or Hallas will guzzle our share.”

*   *   *

The cavalry detachment left the village when the horizon in the east was marked out by a pearly-crimson thread of dawn.

“It’s going to be a clear day,” Lamplighter said, and a cloud of steam billowed out of his mouth.