The Sorcerer's Scourge (41 page)

Men removed from the immediate battle struck torches and lit lamps. Wizards, sorcerer, and clerics conjured brilliant lights to hover overhead. None of it extended the range of vision more than a few extra yards as the fog and light seemed locked in a struggle to destroy each other. All of them waited to see what would happen next, knowing in their hearts that the visual impairment was the least of the cloying fog’s effect.

They did not have to wait long. Men fighting near the edge of battle began shouting in alarm, then in pain and terror. From out of the mists, bodies raised themselves from the snowy ground and began clawing at the soldiers still stunned from the appearance of the mists. The nightmare fully unfolded as all those men and horses buried in the avalanche clawed their way to the surface and threw themselves at the soldiers.

Many of the dead men were still in their saddles as they emerged from the snow and began hacking at the live soldiers with their weapons. Whether the men were previously friend or foe did not matter. Anything that breathed was now the enemy, and they killed without hesitation or remorse. Some were too stunned to move and the undead hewed them down before they could process the unfolding nightmare. Others tried to run, but there was nowhere to go as the dead littered the battlefield.

Terror gripped the living as they began to process the horror that unfolded before their eyes. Hundreds of wounded men lay in tents, removed from the forward lines of battle. Caalendor may be a usurper, but he and his men still followed the code of battle, both sides allowing the other to collect their dead and wounded. What was meant to be an act of honor and compassion painted the scene for the greatest macabre tragedy yet to come.

The dead lay behind a berm of snow, not a hundred yards from the tents of the wounded. Normally, they would be at least twice as far away and buried. However, the freezing cold made such preparations unnecessary. Now those dead men rose and attacked the nearest and most vulnerable they could find—the wounded.

Azerick heard the screams coming from the medical tents and his blood froze as he gripped his staff tight enough to whiten his knuckles. “Jarvin, get your officers to consolidate the soldiers! We cannot do anything useful right now without killing our own men. Bring the forward line back. I doubt anyone is still interested in killing each other right now. Rusty, Allister, stay by the King and do what you can to keep the undead at bay.”

“What are you going to do, boy?” Allister asked nervously.

Azerick turned towards the tents. “I have to help those men.”

Jarvin summoned his nearest officers and directed them to pull all of their forces back while Azerick raced up the hill towards the tents. When he arrived, he found two of the tents ablaze. Whether the undead monsters had knocked over a lamp or stove or the men set them on fire intentionally, he did not know. Whatever the reason, it only served to help the wounded men who were desperately fighting for their lives. Those who were able.

Azerick saw some the worst injured being pulled from tents or back inside by the undead horrors as they tried to crawl away. The ambulatory wounded formed a defense between the two burning tents, hacking at any loathsome creature that came near while trying to protect those that were unable to raise a blade in their own defense.

Scores of undead were converging on the men, mostly from the direction of the dead pit. Several tents were still up between Azerick and the oncoming scourge, but whether or not they still held the living, he did not know nor did he have the luxury of a choice if they did. This was not a question of how many would live through this scourge. It was a question of any of them surviving at all.

Azerick unleashed hellish flames upon the mass of shambling creatures, incinerating scores of them in an instant. Still they came on. Another massive fireball obliterated as many as a hundred more, but he knew that several times that number still lay within the dead pit and were likely already swarming towards them. Azerick turned towards the sound of his name.

“Lord Giles! Thank Solarian you are here! What can we do?” a soldier asked.

Azerick recognized the man as the officer in charge of the reserve forces. The sorcerer raised a massive curtain of fire practically on top of the leading undead minions. It would not stop them, the passage was too wide, but it would buy them several minutes as the monsters mindlessly searched for a way around.

“Lieutenant, get all these wounded men into wagons and pull them down towards the front line. If you have the room, take with you anything that will burn. Fire and courage will be our greatest defense.”

“Yes, sir!”

Azerick turned back towards the dead pits and raised two more flaming walls, extending his fiery barrier to buy the lieutenant and his men more time to take the wounded to safety. He wondered if it would be enough.

The reserve and support units loaded all the wagons they could find with wounded, supplies, and combustibles. There were not enough horses as most had torn the picket line from the ground and fled the instant they got wind of the unnatural creatures stalking towards them. It was left to the healthy soldiers to pull nearly half the wagons by hand. Desperation and going downhill provided them all with the necessary means to accomplish their task.

The heart of the battle was bedlam. The fact that so many of the undead had risen in the very midst of the battlefield made it nearly impossible for the men to separate themselves from combat so that they could fall back and form a sound defense.

“How goes it down here?” Azerick asked as he shoved his way through the press of men to reach his friends.

Allister looked at the sorcerer grimly. “It does not look good, son. More of the foul creatures are converging upon us, and every man that falls to them gets back up and we have to put him down again.”

“Too bad Caalendor has all the clerics with him. We sure could use some divine intervention on our side,” Rusty said bitterly.

Azerick thought a moment. “We have to work together. We need to combine our forces or we are all going to die.”

“Good luck with that,” Alex quipped. “His people are almost as likely to attack one of ours as one of those monsters.”

“Then we will have to convince him,” Azerick said resolutely.

Allister raised an eyebrow and looked at the young sorcerer. “You have that look in your eye that says you have an idea.”

“I do.”

Azerick Explained his desperate plan to Allister.

The archmage stroked his beard as he thought. “You know we’re shooting blind here.”

“I think it is the only way. Once we get him and explain our reasoning, at the very least I think he will agree to a temporary alliance. He is a Chosen of Solarian after all, no matter how misguided his ideas about the legitimacy of Jarvin’s reign.”

“I hope you’re right, son.”

Azerick opened a shimmering gate and both men jumped through. They emerged several hundred yards to the south and found scores of men frantically hacking at the tide of unholy creations seeking to spill their blood. Both mages lashed out with their arcane energies at the most hard-pressed groups.

“Break free and flee through the portal!” Azerick shouted at the fighters.

He then opened another rent in the air and jumped through. The two spell casters repeated the process until they spied the magical lights provided by the clerics. They could not be sure which of the lights belonged to Caalendor, but it was a good guess that it was one near the middle.

No one seemed to notice the two mages that stepped out of the portal right in their midst as they were too intent on driving back the horde of undead and largely blinded by the thick vapors. Thanks to the cleric’s ability to repulse the monsters, they were able to reduce the number of locations from which the creatures could attack and focus their defenses. However, they also had a greater number of the creatures attacking them due to the greater number of casualties they had sustained during the last several days of battle.

It took them only a moment to locate the Bishop as he shouted orders to his men and hurled curses at the undead. Azerick casually strolled up behind the cleric and tapped him on the shoulder. Caalendor turned and his eyes narrowed in confusion at the face he did not recognize. Those same eyes went round when Azerick struck him in the gut hard enough to expel every bit of air they held. Before he could fall to the ground, Azerick hoisted him onto his shoulder and turned towards the waiting portal. The Bishop was not a small man nor was he anywhere near being thin, but Azerick’s demon-enhanced strength had little problem managing the burden.

Unlike their entrance, the assault did not go unnoticed. At least a dozen men and a Chosen advanced upon the two infiltrators. Allister used a strike of raw force and sent the cleric flying backwards while Azerick used the power of his staff to summon a ring of flames to keep the soldiers at bay.

With the gasping priest slung over one shoulder, Azerick and Allister sprinted through the still open gates, slowing just long enough to blast any of the undead monsters that stood between them. The two men with their captive leapt from the last gate and found Jarvin near where they had left him. Azerick carried the Bishop over to where the King stood shouting orders, and unceremoniously dropped him to the ground.

Bishop Caalendor gathered his feet and brushed the snow from his armor. “I should have expected this sort of treachery from you; you and that infernal, soul-damned vampire of yours!”

“You sanctimonious fool!” Jarvin raged back. “Do you not see these things killing my men as well? This is because of you! The church is supposed to protect us from this sort of thing, but you were too busy worrying about my parentage and failed to do your duty!”

“Lies! You expect me to listen to a man that consorts with the undead? You would gladly slaughter your own men to add to your unholy army!”

Jarvin clenched and unclenched his fists, trying to force a measure of calm upon himself. “I did not know Landrin Bailey’s nature until he rescued me and my family from the treachery you set in motion. His actions and character has so far proven significantly more decent and humanitarian than yours has. Listen, Caalendor. What is happening right now is more important than me, you, or our opinions on legitimacy. I do not think any of us will survive this night if we continue to battle each other.”

The cleric narrowed his eyes at the exiled King in suspicion. “What do have in mind?”

“A temporary alliance. Order your people to fight their way north, my people will battle south, and we will combine our might. My people need your priests to hold the undead at bay. You need my wizards to destroy them.”

The Bishop’s face twisted into a sneer. “I disagree. Those monsters cannot get past my priests, and my men will hack them apart. It may take longer and I may lose more men, but we can prevail. You will be destroyed and I shall be victorious.”

Jarvin bit off the scathing reply he was forming when a new outcry sounded all around. Monstrous beasts with the body parts of men and men with the parts of beasts tore into the humans with the same fearlessness and recklessness of the undead, but with far greater fervor. Several stag men leapt completely over the heads of the soldiers and seemed intent upon reaching Jarvin and those near him.

Several of the creatures wielded clubs that they swung about with incredible strength. Blows shattered bones, snapped blades, and sent men flying. Some of the brutes lifted dead or wounded men from their feet and hurled them at the humans or used them as shields or bludgeons against their foes.

Two of the hideous creatures leapt past the thrusting and slashing weapons of Jarvin’s men, ignoring the superficial wounds the received in order to strike down the King and spell casters as their master commanded.

Azerick struck one of the creatures in its human torso at the same instant Rusty and Allister unleashed arcane destruction upon the other. The ragman hit by Rusty’s flames and Allister’s energy strikes died almost instantly, laying it in a smoldering heap of twisted limbs, and ruined flesh. The monster Azerick struck dropped to the snow but stubbornly tried to drag itself forward and regain its feet. Alex leapt to the fore, struck off its human head, and ended its struggles.

“What under the light are those things?” Bishop Caalendor exclaimed.