The Golden Shield of IBF (25 page)

We are good,
Garrison told himself
, and we fight for truth. They are bad, and they fight because they enjoy inflicting harm and pain and destruction. If we win, Creath will be a happy place (at least until the next lunatic dictator). If they win, darkness will cover the land (like it does).
Had Alan Garrison not already appreciated the differences between warriors and philosophers, and why the two rarely mixed, he would have understood it here, beside Swan as she concluded her address to the faithful. “... must steel ourselves for what is to come, be it victory or defeat. And, if it is the latter, you who remain behind will rise up again, fight again, and the victory will someday come. Good will triumph always, no matter how long or bloody the battle. Good will triumph!” Those who really appreciated the difference between warriors and philosophers knew that the warriors were the ones who were dreamers...

With the second-sight, Eran saw them as if in a dream, the vision of five ships blurred and unreal. She gave the orders for the ceremony to be prepared, her mount saddled, then set about dressing. Her second-sight could not penetrate the magic surrounding the summer palace, but she had regularly used it to view Woroc’Il’Lod at the boundary where the aura surrounding the summer palace began to fade.

The Company of Mir was approaching, and Swan would be of its number, as would her Champion. And, so too would be Eran’s old nemesis, Erg’Ran. This time, when they met, nothing would stand in the way of her revenge—if Erg’Ran lived that long.

Eran rode her newest horse, a better mount than he had been a lieutenant. He was still in training, and she used the whip and an oversized bit to regulate his gait, but he showed promise of speed and endurance under her hand. A lack of speed had never been his problem, and the endurance he’d learn.

She cantered him across the Great Plain of Koth, his rich black mane stiff on brisk wind which swept Edge Land, the only sound other than the beating of his hooves the creak of the leather and the jingle of the steel which constrained him to her convenience. Eran gave him a little spur and he quickened his pace.

Eran’s troops were formed before her, encircling the craggy stones of the facelike rock formation at the very center of the plain which since time began had been known as the Great Visage of Koth.

Six companies of the Horde of Koth formed the outer ring through which she passed, the circle closing behind her. There was an inner ring, this consisting of six units of the black masked Sword of Koth, fireswords raised in salute. As Eran passed, their swords lowered and the ring closed. Within the concentric circles of her military power were six circles of magical power. Six Handmaidens of Koth, wind tossing their black headveils and black dresses, comprised each individual ring, each of the women hand-linked to the others on either side of her. The rings were interlocked, the clasped hands of two of the women passed round those of two others, so that six rings formed one.

Eran stayed her mount, stroking the side of his great head with the lash of her whip. She liked the way his eyes widened and his nostrils quivered. He was already coming to know the whip’s promise.

Eran dismounted, her black cape, her voluminous black skirts, her hair caught up in the wind. Already, Eran could feel the power building. Her own magic, almost fully restored, would be too precious to squander should the Company of Mir reach Edge Land. Using the witchery of the Handmaidens would be enough for her purpose.

Two of the Handmaidens, heads bowed and eyes lowered behind opaque black veils, raised their arms and formed an arch beneath which Eran passed. She paused for a moment within this small circle of six, feeling their energy. Swan could have been one of them, the most powerful of them.

Eran reached the far side of the small circle and two Handmaidens again raised their arms to form an archway. Eran passed through, into the circle, which was six by six.

There was a Handmaiden for each of the six directions in each circle, and a circle of six for each of the six. Six by six. Power.

“I command the wind!” Eran began, and a single Handmaiden from each of the six circles repeated the words after her. “I command the sea!”

“I command the elements!”

The fast-moving clouds above paused.

Eran raised her voice, arms limp at her sides. “I command the wind!” Two voices from each circle uttered the words. “I command the sea.”

“I command the elements!”

The wind ceased and there was calm.

Eighteen voices.

The horizon began to glow in all directions and the rock beneath their feet and the clouds above turned black.

Twenty-four voices.

From within the clouds, there emanated a glow like the light of the two moons.

Thirty voices.

Thunder rumbled and lightning bolts streaked from the clouds to the ground surrounding the six circles of six and the troops beyond, forming a curtain of power and light.

Thirty-six voices spoke as one.

Balls of light soared over them, danced within their midst over the blackened rock. Eran raised her arms high above her head, palms opened.

Thirty-seven voices spoke as one, crying out toward the sky, “I command the elements!”

Thunder roared and lightning crackled. A wind, pregnant with power, cold as death, shrieked across the plain. Eran’s cape was torn from her shoulders, a whirlwind swirling round her, grasping at her hair.

Eran screamed her command. “Rise up, Woroc’Il’Lod! Rise up as when the moons cross your face and they draw you to them and your icy waters are pillars soaring into the sky! Rise up and seek the five ships and those lives aboard them which defy me! Rise up! Obey me! Bring forth destruction and sorrow! Rise up and bring forth death, Woroc’Il’Lod! Rise up, I command thee!”

All around them was night, illuminated only by the lightning and the balls of light. Magnified, louder and louder, the wind shrieked beyond endurance. “I command thee!”

Where there had been an eye’s blink earlier the cacophony of the elements, there was quiet; where there had been black night, there was grey day.

Exhausted by the magical power which had flowed through her, Eran lowered her arms to her sides.

The Handmaidens, still circled six by six, knelt, heads bowed, black veils tented round them, trailing over the ground toward which they gazed.

Her young lieutenant’s steel-shod hooves clicked anxiously against the stone beneath them.

Eran willed her cape to her shoulders, willed her hair into place as it had been. The magic was at work.

As their five ships were still not quite out of the magical aura of the summer palace, the clothes and boots and scabbards of the warriors dried quickly enough that Swan did not need to employ any of her own magic to assist. There was a small tent erected on deck for her to use when she changed. The bodice of the elaborate dress she’d worn for the procession was laced closed beneath her breasts.

She untied the knot and began to loosen the cords. Out of necessity, Swan fabricated her clothes through the use of magic, but refused to use magic to dress herself (except with the style of dress which was laced up the back from waist to neckline and required magic or an attendant because it was otherwise impossible to close). She stepped out of the dress and the comparatively fragile lace petticoats beneath its skirt.

Quickly, using magic to help her, she redid her hair, dispensing with the circlet of flowers and ribbons, plaiting her hair instead after the fashion of what Al’An had so curiously called a “sports braid.”

Because of the gathering chill, despite the tent breaking the growing wind, Swan redressed quickly, donning sturdier petticoats and a dress of heavier, more densely woven fabric. It was dark green, round necked, long sleeved, laced closed at the front and devoid of any trim. A loop at the end of each sleeve allowed for her middle finger to be inserted through. Swan pulled on sturdier boots as well. There was no need of a sword, and her dagger was where it always was on her leg.

She donned a dark brown great cape, leaving its hood down. Lastly, she wound a long shawl of heavy brown-and-green yarn over her head and around her shoulders. It was a gift knitted by Bin’Ah’s young wife.

Swan left the tent. The spray, colder than it had been when she’d entered the tent, immediately assaulted her, making her grateful for her sensible choice of wardrobe. The motion of the deck beneath her feet, because she had the horizon reference of the sea, was more pronounced to her.

The ship’s prow plunged forward into each wave, as if the vessel were about to be engulfed, then rose again. Beyond the prow, there was nothing to see but the vast, whitecapped greyness of Woroc’Il’Lod stretching infinitely around them. All that there was to relieve Woroc’Il’Lod’s emptiness, to reassure her mind and spirit that this was a reality and not a terrifying dream, were the other four ships of what Al’An called “Swan’s Armada.”

Woroc’Il’Lod frightened her, as it frightened everyone who set sail upon it.

The magical aura of the summer palace was gone as well. She could feel the emptiness of its absence. No longer would her magical energy be instantly renewed. She would have to be more cautious in its use.

Everyone seemed to be busily, almost frantically about his or her appointed task, adjusting sail, rowing at the oars, fighting the sea to keep it from claiming their lives. Hunching her shoulders against the rapidly growing cold and beneath the weight of the greatcape she clutched close around her, Swan moved to the stern rail. She was well aware that one chapter of her life was closing behind her. Another, which might be the final chapter, was beginning.

It was the ultimate bitter irony, she thought, her eyes focusing on a lonely whitecap far off to port. She ached for Al’An to touch her, hold her, make her his in every way, ached in body and soul to lie with him in the night, their flesh touching. Yet in order that the prophecy might be fulfilled, she must not be other than a virgin until she found the origin of her seed: her father.

Tears filled her eyes; she told herself it was the wind.

The whitecap she had been watching seemed somehow larger. It was an optical illusion, Swan decided. She kept watching it, however, even more intently.

Larger, still larger.

Swan worked the second-sight, clutching at the handrail more tightly. “Al’An! Erg’Ran! Gar’Ath! Mitan! The Gle’Ur’Gya! The Gle’Ur’Gya are coming!” Swan shouted.

There was one obvious reason why the Gle’Ur’Gya had a reputation as always overtaking their prey on the high seas, one reason other than their considerably larger, better rigged, faster ships. The Gle’Ur’Gya were seafarers, and any other Creathan merely a landsman who happened to be caught woefully out of his element at the most impossibly wrong time.

Binoculars were unknown in Creath, as were telescopes, no requirement for advanced optics to be invented or even considered. If one needed to look at something far away, one merely second-sighted it. If one had no magic, the thing to do was ask someone who did to look. Alan Garrison had no magic. “What do you see?” Garrison asked. “What do you see?!” The size and rigging were all the detail that he could make out from his position along the stern rail, but Erg’Ran, Swan and Mitan could second-sight the rapidly approaching Gle’Ur’Gya vessel in perfect detail. Gar’Ath, whose face often read like a book for the visually impaired, had no magic either, except that which he needed for swordsmithing. And his face asked the same questions.

Mitan answered first. “It is clearly a single vessel only, Champion. That is the way the Gle’Ur’Gya usually hunt. I count as many as half our number visible on deck alone, and the Gle’Ur’Gya ships have spaces below the deck where weapons are cared for and food is cooked. There could be more Gle’Ur’Gya there.”

“What kind of weapons?” Garrison pressed.

Erg’Ran spoke. “There are large fixed crossbows, of the type which are mounted to tripods and used in siege. They are affixed to the deck. I see twelve of them. They are cranked to the cocked position. Champion, no man, nor any Gle’Ur’Gya, is powerful enough to bend such prods. Their bolts are the size of short spears. A few strikes from one of these against our mast and it will be down, Champion.”

Unaided by the second-sight, Garrison was still able to gauge the height of the Gle’Ur’Gya’s main deck as compared to their own. It was amply high enough that anyone aboard the Gle’Ur’Gya ship firing even conventional crossbows or longbows had a decided tactical advantage. “Those megacrossbows? How much elevation capability do they have, if they were firing downward?”

It took several seconds for a response. Gar’Ath answered even though he, like Garrison, could not have been able to see them. “I am familiar with such weapons, from the great siege of Kli’Il’Yer, where the Horde of Koth killed many of us, Champion. These weapons rotate upward easily, either freely moving at the will of the marksman or being capable of locking into position for repeated firings on the same target.”

“How far do they crank downward, Gar’Ath?” Garrison was thinking of Renaissance-period warfare on Earth’s high seas, positing that their five little ships might be able to stay under the Gle’Ur’Gya’s artillery, if they could get close enough without getting sunk, first. That was the only encouragement, the sinking part. These were pirates and a ship gone to the bottom with cargo and gear intact was a prize lost.

Frantically, Garrison was trying to construct a scenario which would allow them some chance to combat the Gle’Ur’Gya’s superior firepower. Gar’Ath spoke. “If your magic, Enchantress, can be used to shield us from the cold, a number of us can swim out from our ships and board the Gle’Ur’Gya vessel secretly, then fight them on their own deck.”

“If we teamed that with longbow and crossbow firepower from our own decks, we might have something,” Garrison remarked. “Trouble there is that we could hit our own guys just as easily as hitting them. If only we had something to use as an explosive. We could sink her.” He realized that it would take a few precious seconds for the concept of what an explosive actually did to register, since they had no explosives in all of Creath. Perhaps, he thought, Swan could make something magically which—