Shadow Chaser (23 page)

Yes, this is no fairy tale. It’s only in fairy tales that men die honorably and silently. In life they usually squirm and howl and bleed a lot. Blood was oozing through the wounded man’s white fingers. He had been stuck as neatly as any pig.

Arnkh’s sword rose and came down again. The man fell silent forever.

“Withdraw!” Markauz ordered when he caught sight of us. “This noise will bring the whole nest of them running!”

So we ran. That is, the jester and I ran. The others withdrew in organized fashion to positions that had been prepared beforehand and were guarded by the Wild Hearts who had not been involved in the fight, Honeycomb and Lamplighter, and a rear line support group consisting of Egrassa and Miralissa, armed with bows. I couldn’t see Uncle anywhere. No doubt the platoon sergeant had been left behind at the inn because of his wound.

I heard shouting behind me, a crossbow bolt whistled through the air, and I took a dive, burying my nose in the ground and almost smothering the ling underneath me. Egrassa and Miralissa, joined by Ell, began returning the enemy’s fire, aiming at the windows and doorway of the building. Three of our pursuers decided to chase after us and try their luck in honest combat, but they each caught an arrow in the chest and ended up stretched out on the ground. That discouraged any more of the villains from sticking their noses out from behind their stone walls.

“Is everyone all right?” Miralissa asked, pulling her bowstring with an arrow on it back to her ear.

Twang!

“If you don’t count my nerves!” said Kli-Kli, as usual taking any opportunity to complain.

“There’s worse to come,” I muttered, getting up off the ground.

“Withdraw to the horses!”

Alistan’s order was never carried out. Something white but, unfortunately, not fluffy took off from the top story of the building where we had been held in the basement for almost an entire day and night.

“Look out!” shouted Miralissa.

I dropped to the ground again, and everyone else followed my example, including the elves. A blinding white disk rustled through the air with a with a whistling sound and crashed into an unfortunate apple tree, shattering it into a thousand tiny chips of wood.

A shaman, darkness take me! There’s another of the Nameless One’s shamans in the house, but Loudmouth told us … Well, never mind what he told us! A fact is a fact: A sorcerer had just flung something rather unpleasant at us, and it was only by good fortune and the will of the gods that he had missed by a good ten yards.

Miralissa was already on her feet; she started whispering and spinning like a top in a spellbinding dance. Ah, if only the elfess had power over the ordinary magic of men and the light elves, instead of shamanism that takes far too long to prepare, then we might have a chance, but this way it’s a game of cat and mouse. Or more like blind man’s bluff in total darkness. Whoever was quickest would win.

Ell and Egrassa concentrated their fire on the window that the disk had flown out of.

“Milord Alistan!” Miralissa’s cousin shouted before he fired yet another arrow at the window. “Get the men away!”

The dark elves’ attention was completely focused on the window. They had totally forgotten about the door, and the Nameless One’s followers immediately took advantage of the fact. Two crossbow men darted outside with the clear intention of making holes in our hides.

“There’s nothing we can do!” said Egrassa, taking another arrow out of his seriously depleted quiver. “They’re yours!”

The shaman could not be allowed to concentrate on a new spell. If the hail of arrows relented even for a moment, a white disk would reduce us all to a bloody pulp.

“Marmot, the crossbow!” I barked, and surprised even myself by jumping up off the ground.

With no hesitation, the Wild Heart tossed me my little darling. Thank Sagot, it was already loaded.

One of the enemy managed to get a shot off first, squatting down and firing at me from a kneeling position. Without aiming. Don’t anybody ever try to tell me that the Nameless One doesn’t have any professional soldiers! The only place you find crossbowmen with that kind of skill is in the army.

I would have caught a bolt in my lung if Alistan had not covered me with his shield—the bolt thudded into this barrier that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere. I chose the crossbowman who hadn’t fired yet as my target and pressed my trigger.

The crash was every bit as impressive as the shaman’s spell, I can tell you! The poor guy was reduced to a charred firebrand, and the other one, who was hastily reloading his crossbow, had his right arm blown off and his face almost completely burned away. I think the only ones who took no notice of the devastation caused by my shot were Miralissa, who was still whispering a spell, and the elves, who were busy preventing the Nameless One’s shaman from concentrating.

I hadn’t even looked at what my crossbow was loaded with. A bolt with a fiery elemental!

“Marmot, the darkness take you! What did you load it with?”

“That was Kli-Kli!”

“Harold!” the goblin whined. “They all look almost exactly the same!”

“Almost! Surely you can see that there are three red stripes on these?”

“Don’t be so stingy! The bolt may have cost five gold pieces, but this is no time to be cheap.”

When the doorway was suddenly covered with ice and we heard howls of pain, Miralissa finally stopped singing her song and spinning round like a child’s top at a fair.

The elves stopped firing and a white disk immediately came flying out of the window, as if that was all it had been waiting for. It was flying straight at us, and I swear I thought that this was the end!

But then the elfess’s spell took effect, and a green wall flashed up in front of us for an instant. It flashed up and then disappeared, but the disk, either flung back or reflected, went flying back in the opposite direction. Unfortunately, it hit the corner of the house, and not the window where the shaman was hiding.

Fine fragments of stone shot off in all directions, striking down the Nameless One’s supporters who had come darting out of the house. The magic shield protected us against being wounded or maimed.

Yet another disk, and another deflection back toward the house in which our enemy was lodged, but this time a green shield just like ours sprang up in front of the white projectile and it flew off to one side, demolishing a shed standing thirty yards from the building. Our horses whinnied in fright.

Another disk. And another. The Nameless One’s shaman possessed far greater skill than the elfin princess. Our shield sagged and shuddered noticeably with every impact.

“Get away, you idiots! I can’t maintain the defense for very long!” exclaimed Miralissa, pale from the effort.

“I’ll help!” said Kli-Kli, and he started rummaging desperately in his pockets.

“Let’s move back, Kli-Kli,” said milord, reaching out his hand to grab the goblin by the scruff of the neck, but Kli-Kli took a tangled bundle of string out of his pocket and pulled on some inconspicuous little loose end.

The whole structure, woven for so long with such care by the jester, who had promised that he would show us some “terrible shamanism,” instantly came unwoven and then dissolved into thin air in the most magical manner imaginable.

“Oi!” said Kli-Kli, gazing wildly at his empty hands: He evidently hadn’t been expecting this effect. “Why did it do that?”

Miralissa surprised me by pulling me down onto the ground then covering her head with her hands, and shouting, “Get down! Quick!”

The sight of the elfess with her face buried in the dirt was highly persuasive: If she was willing to do what no dark elf would normally do (bathing in mud is not one of the main elfin pastimes), then there was no point in wasting any time on thinking.

I dropped to the ground for the third time in the last two minutes, noticing as I fell that the roof of the building had flown a good five yards up into the air and was falling back into the fountains of roaring flame that were pouring out of all the windows and doors.

Boo-oooom!

An incredibly powerful blast of heat roared past above us. The air was sizzling hot and impossible to breathe. It scorched my throat and lungs. My clothes didn’t protect me, either. The heat licked at my skin, even through my jacket, shirt, and trousers.

I didn’t dare to raise my head until about twenty seconds later. The massive two-story stone house with a tiled roof no longer existed. All that was left was one wall that had survived by some kind of miracle. There were flames still roaring and licking at the stones. A broad spiral of black smoke was rising up into the sky.

Who would believe that could happen? He just pulled on a stupid piece of string, and suddenly there was nothing left! No house, and none of the people inside it, either.

Everybody, including me, was staring at the fire. I got up, dusted myself off, and glanced warily at the goblin.

“I … I … I didn’t mean it!” Kli-Kli jabbered, retreating in the face of our none-too-gentle glances. “I never thought! Honestly! There ought to have been a little fog, that’s all.”

“Fog!” Deler roared. He spat the sand out of his mouth, jabbed his finger toward the ruined building, and asked acidly, “Is that your idea of a little shower?”

“But honestly, I didn’t think that would happen!” the jester said with a guilty sniff. “My grandfather the shaman showed me that when I was little … I suppose I didn’t tie forty-five knots in it after all.”

The little jester’s face was covered in soot and mud and it wore an extremely guilty expression.

“Kli-Kli,” Miralissa sighed, wiping her dirty face with the back of her hand, “if you ever do anything like that again without warning me…”

The goblin started nodding so fervently that I thought his head would fall off his shoulders any moment.

In the distance we heard the sound of people hurrying toward the site of the explosion. It was time for us to get out while the going was good.

“To the horses! Quickly!” said Alistan, throwing his shield over his shoulder and running on ahead toward the spot where the horses had been whinnying only a few moments earlier.

I handed the ling to Marmot and tried to keep up with the captain of the royal guard.

“That was great!” panted Kli-Kli, running along beside me. “You can tell my grandfather was a shaman all right! I certainly showed them!”

There was not a trace of remorse in the goblin’s expression.

“You almost roasted us along with them, you genius!”

“You’re just annoyed because you’re envious of my abilities,” the jester replied.

I snorted derisively. Kli-Kli only pretends to be a fool and a windbag. In all honesty, the goblin is smarter than Master of the Order Artsivus, he just works on his image. But at moments like this I am almost ready to believe that the royal fool really does act the buffoon because he is so witless.

We ran past the smoking ruins of the shed and saw our horses beyond the apple trees. The poor animals were snorting and wriggling their ears in fright, and their eyes were wide with terror.

I greeted Little Bee with a gentle slap on her flank and jumped up into the saddle.

Alistan immediately set the horses to a gallop, and I had to focus all my attention on my riding, to make sure I wouldn’t go crashing into some tree that just happened to turn up in front of me. It was only after we saw Ranneng come into view ahead and we approached the city walls that the weariness came crashing down on me with all the weight of the sky.

7

BRIGHT IDEAS FROM A GOBLIN

When our squad came flying into the yard of the inn on lathered horses, Uncle was waiting for us, striding nervously from one corner to another. His lips moved rapidly as he counted the riders and he smiled happily once he was sure everyone was safe and well. Honeycomb jumped down off his horse and started telling his friend in a low voice what had happened during our rescue. Uncle clicked his tongue in disappointment, regretting that his wound had prevented him from taking part in the battle.

I handed Little Bee’s reins to a servant who came darting up and then sat down on the ground right there on the spot. I was reduced to a state of total exhaustion; the final ounce of strength had been drained out of me.

“Hey, old friend? Are you still alive?” I heard a sympathetic voice ask.

Glancing up, I saw Bass towering over me.

“And what are you doing here?”

“He’s here on probation,” the jester said, plonking his backside down on the grass beside me. “Or something of the sort.”

“Something of the sort?” I asked like an echo.

Bass didn’t say anything, just looked at me expectantly. What did he want? Meanwhile Kli-Kli pulled one of his beloved carrots out from under his new cloak, crunched on it, and then spoke with his mouth full.

“You ought to know that if it wasn’t for your friend here, you and Eel would have been dead men,” the goblin explained as he chewed. “He showed us where they were hiding you.”

I gave my old comrade a quizzical look. He sat down warily beside me and started telling me what had happened. Kli-Kli occasionally forgot about his carrot and added his own weighty comments to Bass’s story.