The Lost Realm (44 page)

Not yet . . .

There was movement in the trees ahead: a huge, shifting surge, like some gigantic hidden beast taking a breath. Tarlan didn't exactly see it, didn't exactly hear it. But he felt it, like a pulse of heat in his belly.

“NOW!” he roared.

The instant he shouted, Theeta began to climb.

“Hold thorrod,” she cawed.

It sometimes took a while for Tarlan to interpret the deceptively simple language of the thorrods. This time he understood at once. Thrusting his fingers into the ruff of feathers at her neck, he gripped tighter than he'd ever gripped before.

“I'm holding, Theeta!” he yelled.

Theeta flipped all the way over onto her back, reversing her direction, and plunged down toward the Galadronians. For an instant Tarlan was hanging upside down, his hands buried deep in her feathers, his legs flailing. Then, as Theeta completed her roll, he was secure on her back once more, his legs gripping her heaving flanks, his black cloak streaming out behind him, the wind blasting his face.

“Now!” he screamed. “To battle!”

The forest erupted.

First to advance was a line of giant bears, lumbering through the undergrowth on all fours, bellowing like thunder. As they met the Galadronian front line, the soldiers gaped in stupid surprise. Before they could react, the bears reared up, batting aside first the tree-cutting machines, then the men who'd been carrying them.

Immediately behind the bears, running fast, came a huge pack of gray timber wolves. Greythorn was leading them. When they reached the bears, Greythorn let out a single, piercing howl; the bears dropped low, allowing the wolves to climb their hunched backs and leap at the throats of the second wave of Galadronians.

You think you've got an army, Tyro?
Tarlan thought deliriously.
Now
this
is an army!

By now Theeta had reached the lowest point of her dive. The tree canopy was too dense for her to descend all the way to the ground, so she flattened her wings against the air, reducing her speed to nothing in the time it took Tarlan to take a single breath.

“Stay close!” Tarlan shouted in her ear.

He threw himself off her back, grabbing at the nearest tree and dropping in a barely controlled fall through its branches to the ground. Landing hard, he drew his sword and ran into battle.

The Galadronians had begun to fight back. Their shock at being ambushed had turned to fierce resolve. Moonlight flashed off a fearsome array of curved swords. Tarlan saw a leaping stag pierced by a dozen arrows. The majestic creature crashed dead to the ground, its huge antlers smashing apart against the trunk of a tree.

A pair of eagles emerged from the darkness. They flew at the faces of the sidebow archers who'd brought down the stag, raking the enemy with their talons.

“Die, you mangy cat!”

Tarlan turned to see a tall Galadronian woman raising her sword over the fallen stag. Something was trapped beneath it, struggling to free itself: a lithe creature with blue-and-white striped fur.

“Filos!”

Tarlan hurdled a fallen tree and sank his blade into the Galadronian's side, fortuitously finding the gap where the plates of her armor met. She fell back, dead.

“I can't get free!” Filos cried.

“Brock!” Tarlan shouted. The bear was hugging one of the Galadronian soldiers to him and roaring in fury. When he released his gargantuan paws, the man collapsed like an empty sack. Brock bounded over and set his weight against the dead stag while Tarlan helped Filos out from beneath it. To his relief the tigron was unhurt.

“Thank you.” Filos licked his face, then hurled herself at the nearest Galadronian.

Tarlan followed her, surprised to see how few of the enemy were still standing. There were bodies everywhere, and the ground was thick with blood. Apart from the dead stag, he couldn't see a single member of his pack with more than a superficial wound.

The ground shook beneath his feet, and Kassan rode up. There was blood on the boy's sword.

“It worked!” Kassan shouted. “Your plan worked, Tarlan. They're dead, all of them!”

Tarlan watched as three wild boars ran their tusks through the last few Galadronians; then the forest was still. He was suddenly aware of the breath rasping in his throat, the sharp tang of blood in the air, the steam rising from the panting bodies of a thousand animals.

“This is only the start,” he said grimly. “All of you—follow me!”

They emerged into the open, close to the outer defenses of Deep Poynt. Tarlan's heart sank immediately. The Galadronians who hadn't pursued them into the forest had penetrated beyond the outer ring of stakes—many of which now lay useless and half-buried in the ground—and were fighting hand to hand with the town's defenders. The gates were still wide open, and the town was ablaze.

“We need Melchior,” Tarlan muttered.

“Who's Melchior?” asked Kassan.

“Someone who can help us beat them. But he has a long way to come.”

“Then we'll just have to hold out until he gets here.”

Tarlan liked Kassan's straightforwardness. Up to now, he'd regarded humans as frustratingly complex: all hidden meanings and politics. It was refreshing to find someone who said things how they were.

“You're right,” he said, ruffling the boy's hair. “Tell me, who's the leader of Deep Poynt?”

Kassan pointed to a spot where the fighting was thickest. “We call him The Hammer.”

Tarlan saw a mountain of a man draped with loose leather armor. His hair was a thick red thatch. His eyes blazed vivid green. He was wielding not a sword but an enormous iron hammer, twice the size of any blacksmith's tool Tarlan had seen.

“He's the Defender of Deep Poynt,” Kassan added. “He looks even bigger up close.”

Tarlan thought for a moment, then called Filos, Greythorn, and Brock to him. They were more than his companions now, he realized. They were his lieutenants.

“Take the pack. Lead them around the town. Stay low. Don't be seen. As soon as you're ready, attack the Galadronians on their north flank. The hill is steeper there—they won't be expecting it.”

As the three animals began to carry out his orders, Tarlan summoned Theeta down from where she'd been circling.

He pointed at The Hammer. “Take me to him.”

As they flew in over the outskirts of Deep Poynt, Tarlan wasn't surprised to see Tyro plowing through the lines of defenders, working his way steadily toward the gates of the fortress.

Does nothing slow that man down?

“You call that rabble of animals an army?” Tyro shouted up as the thorrod's shadow passed over him.

“They're better than an army,” Tarlan answered. “They are my pack.”

He pulled Theeta around so that she was hovering directly above Tyro's head.

“You're dead!” Tyro shouted up. “All of you, dead already! As soon as we take this fortress, the rest of Isur will bow before us. Galadron has come, boy. Nothing can stand in our way!”

“I can!”

His defiance was answered by a volley of arrows. Theeta veered away, carrying Tarlan on toward the town. Her chest heaving, she landed on the fortress wall, close to where The Hammer was beating back a fresh Galadronian onslaught.

Having felled the last of the enemies around him, the gigantic warrior bent his head toward an Isurian soldier who'd been tugging at his leather tunic. Swiveling on his heels, the Defender of Deep Poynt stared at Tarlan. Moonlight twinkled deep in his striking green eyes.

“Are you a miracle?” His voice boomed out over the battlefield. As he spoke, a lone Galadronian rushed up behind him. Without looking, The Hammer casually swept his enormous iron weapon out behind him, meeting the skull of his attacker. He continued speaking as if nothing had happened. “You do not look miraculous, yet you ride a thorrod. You bring an army of animals.”

“Never mind what I am,” Tarlan replied. “You need my help, and you need it now.”

“Oh, but I do mind what you are. You have a look about you, boy. Your hair is red, though not as red as mine. Red with gold, some might say. The color of prophecy, they are telling me.”

The Hammer raised one shaggy red eyebrow. His broad mouth twitched with what might have been humor.

“We don't have time for this,” said Tarlan. “You have to retreat into the town—or what's left of it. Get inside and close the gates. We'll hold them off until help arrives.”

The half smile became a grimace. “Retreat? The Hammer has never retreated, boy!”

Suddenly Tarlan was tired of debate. He was tired of shouting down to these squabbling humans, trying to make them see what to him was so clear.

“Well, you're going to retreat now,” he told him.

He was aware that other Isurians were looking up at him. Some looked confused; some looked awestruck; a few looked nervously at The Hammer, clearly wondering how their leader would react to being spoken to like this.

The Hammer's mouth opened. The Hammer's mouth closed.

“Tell me why I should do this, boy,” said the man-mountain.

Tarlan hesitated. The words he knew he had to speak felt wrong.

Yet they also felt
right
.

“Because your future king commands you!” he roared.

A long gasp rippled through the crowd. The iron hammer slipped through the meaty fingers of its owner and hit the ground with a colossal thud.

On Theeta's back, Tarlan waited.

“Do as he says,” said The Hammer slowly. He looked dazed, as if he couldn't quite comprehend what was coming out of his mouth. “Behind the walls. Close the gates. Everyone. Now!”

The retreat began immediately. Even before Theeta had taken to the air again, the rearmost ranks of the Isurian defenders had fallen back inside the town perimeter and were urging their companions to join them.

Leaving them to it, Tarlan guided his thorrod steed back over the battlefield just in time to see Brock, Filos, and Greythorn leading the gigantic pack of animals up the nearby slope to meet the Galadronians' northern flank. But his excitement turned quickly to dismay as a line of swordsmen cut down the leading ranks of foxes and wolves. At the same time, sidebow arrows flew high and far, biting into the animals bringing up the rear.

We're too exposed!

“Drive them into the woods!” Tarlan yelled.

Hearing his battle cry, the bears surged forward with renewed energy, Brock in front. Filos led in a wave of big forest cats that penetrated deep into the Galadronian ranks, and then wheeled around to push the enemy down the slope they'd just climbed. The fighting was intense, but gradually the animals began to force the invaders away from the town and toward the trees.

“Hold your ground! Hold your ground, curse you all!”

It was Tyro, shouldering his way toward the front line, stabbing his sword at the attacking animals and using its flat edge to slap his own soldiers into action.

“Down, Theeta!” Tarlan yelled.

With a terrible shriek, Theeta tipped into a dive.

Tyro looked up. The instant he saw them bearing down on him, he pulled a short throwing knife from his belt, from which at least ten identical blades were hanging. He drew back his arm and threw it upward; thin blades protruding from the knife's hilt made it spin in the air like an arrow. It was aimed straight at Tarlan.

Acting purely on instinct, Tarlan lifted his sword. The knife struck it with such force that his arm was wrenched back. A bolt of pain shot from his fingers to his shoulder and, horrified, he watched his sword fall from his hand and disappear into the battle below.

Tyro's face was split into a grin. He was already aiming another knife. “Now I have you, barbarian!”

“Go!” Tarlan yelled.

The instant Tyro let the knife fly, Theeta twisted sideways. The air beside Tarlan's head screamed as the knife flew past. It missed him, just barely, but his throbbing fingers struggled to find a grip as the thorrod bucked and turned. With a sickening lurch he fell.

He landed sprawling on the battlefield, just curling his arms over his head in time to cushion the blow. The wind blew from his lungs. Tarlan lay still for a moment, fighting for breath and trying to shake the ringing in his ears.

When he did, he could hear Theeta's cries of panic.

Then a voice: “I have come to finish you, barbarian!”

Tarlan rolled over. Tyro was looming over him and lunged, thrusting his curved sword with blinding speed. Tarlan rolled again and the blade stabbed the muddy ground beside him. Scrabbling on his elbows, Tarlan tried to squirm away.

“Not so fast.” With a grin, Tyro pulled back his boot and kicked Tarlan hard in the ribs. Pain exploded through Tarlan's chest. He tried to move, but his limp body refused to obey him. All he could do was watch as Tyro raised his sword above his head.

“All things come to an end, barbarian,” Tyro growled. “Even prophecies. It's time for you to die.”