Wildling (28 page)

Soon he let her go. He didn't want to, but he had to. Not only would it have been improper, it was embarrassing with his family standing around watching. Especially when he noticed a smile curling up around the corners of his mother's mouth.

“For luck. Now go and help with the fire and bring my family to safety please. And in time I'll return and we'll discuss this some more.”

Sena silently did as he asked, looking a little shocked as she walked away. Perhaps he shouldn't have done it. Maybe it had been too much. And yet he had to admit it felt good to have her finally at a loss for words.

Of course his family were never going to be so quiet, and instantly he was engulfed in more hugs, kisses and tears as he was busy trying to undress and pack his clothes away in the back pack. It made things difficult as he packed, even when he kept telling them he would be all right.

They didn't believe him of course. Even he wasn't sure he believed it himself. He had never gone to war. And none of the battles he had fought would be anything like what he feared was coming. And even that would only be after he had crossed a hundred leagues of the most dangerous lands in the world and faced any number of deadly creatures.

Still, somehow he managed it and shifted into his beast, and as the afternoon sun slowly sank into the distant hills, he began his journey east to the pass. At least there was one good thing to come out of this entire mess. He knew that whatever lay ahead, no matter how tough it was, it would be the end. Win or lose, live or die he would not have to fight another war. The Dicans would be putting all their strength into this battle. All they had left. If they lost they would not recover. Not before the lake was refilled. And if they won he would likely be dead.

Then again, maybe there was one other good thing to come out of it. He had kissed Sena. And she seemed to like it.

Chapter Forty.

Dorn caught up with some of the other shifters in the foot hills of the Eteris ranges just before the pass, and he let out a small roar to attract their attention as he crossed the loose shale and trotted towards them.

They were shifters like him. He knew that immediately. It wasn't just that they were heading in the same direction, towards the ranges and the central wastes beyond. Nor even that running bears, wolves and tigers didn't normally travel together. The packs on their backs were also a solid clue that they were no simple beasts. They obviously knew the same of him as they stopped and waited for him to join them. The moment he arrived however, they set off again, heading for the ranges.

“Dappled panther – you must be Dorn. The one who started this mess.” The wolf spoke to him, catching Dorn by surprise. He was speaking to him while in wolf form. That was something Dorn couldn't do. He could roar as a man, though not as well as he could as a panther, but he couldn't speak as a beast. So instead he let out a small roar hoping they would understand.

“
And not trained yet either.” The wolf sounded disappointed. “Never mind, all hands to the deck as the Enderlese say.”

“
I'm Garren, the bear is Sara and the tiger Madras. And up above is Nelalas.”

Dorn looked up to see a huge golden tailed eagle soaring above them and was impressed. He had long known that some shifters had flying creatures as their shapes but had never seen one. It had to be difficult mastering the techniques of flying. He was also trying to work out how Sara, which sounded like a woman's name to him, could be such a large running bear. She had to weigh at least two hundred and fifty pounds, and he simply didn't know any women that large.

And then there was the training the man had mentioned. Shifters could be trained? Even though Petran had said as much it still seemed strange to him. The gift was what it was. You shifted, and over time as you grew more familiar with you alternate forms you learned to use them. Sometimes you could even blur the lines a little between the shapes. To roar as a man and apparently to talk as a beast. He wondered what else he could learn to do.

But probably this wasn't the place to ask such things.

It was time to carry on into the ranges, and then beyond them, into the heart of the wastes themselves. So he trotted with them as they continued towards the distant peaks wondering just what else he would discover and how many more were coming from the ancient temple. The fact that there were any at all meant that his theory had been accepted, no matter how crazy it sounded. But then when he'd already met with Eris and Sena and been given the supplies he'd asked for he'd fairly much known that. They wouldn't have been sent if the Lady had thought he was crazed.

As they trotted towards their destination he realised one thing more. They were speaking to him. Apparently his being shunned had ended, just as Petran had said. Or perhaps it was because they were going into battle and soldiers needed to talk on the battlefield. Or maybe because the Lady Sylfene had relented in her punishment, after blaming him for his wrongful judgement of course. Then again maybe it had something to do with the fact that she was still speaking to him every night in his sleep. Continuing his lessons no matter how much he wished she'd stop.

He wondered what else she might have relented on. Was he still barred from the temple? Sena had said no – as long as he apologised. Not that he had any intention of apologising. And if he didn't apologise and remained barred, when his family finally arrived there could he visit them? Perhaps stay with them for a bit? Maybe even go through the training Petran had mentioned? That was as long as it wasn't any more history lessons.

It was something to think about. Assuming he survived.

Chapter Forty One.

The goblin stood on the ledge looking out over the mountains almost as if he were surveying them. And maybe he was in a way, looking for both food and danger. But he didn't spot either. Not when Dorn and the others stood completely still and waited for him to leave. Like most predators goblins spotted movement before anything else. The movement that told them their prey was near. As long as they stood still they were safe.

Of course there was also a small chasm between them which helped. To reach them the goblin would have had to make his way all the way around the mountain pass trail, a good six or seven hundred yards, or else try to leap a hundred yards with a thousand yard fall onto rocks below him if he failed. They were actually relatively safe. But since the track passed right in front of the cave mouth, they wouldn't be if they tried to creep past it.

He was an ugly creature. At least as hideous in life as he was in Dorn's imagination. He looked like a hairless ape standing perhaps only two thirds the height of a man, but with huge fangs in a snout like face and with claws that could crunch rock. In form he was all wrong too;  his legs were too short and his arms too long giving him an ungainly walk, though the reach of those arms made him deadly at close range. Still, being ugly wasn't such a terrible thing and it wasn't what frightened Dorn about goblins. One on one he or any of them could defeat the creature. It was that behind him in the mountain den there were hundreds more. One noise, one shout from the creature and they would come swarming out. Goblins attacked in hordes and then bite by bite tore their prey apart.

Of course they couldn't just stand there forever. So it came as a relief when the goblin turned on his heels and waddled back into his den to join the rest of his horde. It let them breathe again. Sara most of all. She was the one who had come prepared to face the goblins.

No sooner had the goblin wandered back into his den then she shifted back into her human form and drew her crossbow. She amazed him as she did it, as she had every other time he had seen her walking on two legs. As a woman she was a giantess, standing easily a head taller than him and with huge muscles bulging in every part of her body. She was the only shifter he knew that actually looked more impressive in her human shape than she did as her creature. She was also the only human he'd ever seen, man or woman, who could wield such a massive crossbow. Just the strength needed to draw the string back would have been beyond most. He was sure it was beyond him. But the only thing that mattered was that she did it.

Then she took aim and let the massive bolt loose.

It streaked through the air like a lightning bolt, moving so fast that his eyes couldn't keep up. It crossed the hundred paces or so from her to the den before he could blink. A heartbeat later he heard it smash into a stone wall somewhere inside the den, the sound of steel on stone, and of glass shattering followed immediately by the raucous noise of perhaps hundreds of other goblins reacting to the sudden noise.

They shrieked and grunted, swiftly working themselves up into a frenzy as they tried to work out what had happened. But none of them appeared on the ledge outside, and Dorn was grateful for that. His fear had always been that the sound of the bolt smashing into something solid would lead to a mass exodus from the den, and that then they'd have to run or fight. And fighting hundreds of goblins at once was a dangerous task even with so many of them.

In time the goblins settled down again. The noise of their howling died away and with it the beating of his heart slowed as well. Sara smiled, satisfied with her work, slung her huge crossbow on to her back and shifted once more into her beast shape. All around Dorn could see the others relaxing as well. There were more of them than there had been when he'd joined the others. The band of five had become eighteen over the previous day as they'd started picking their way through the mountain pass. Others would join them in time, running down from Balen Rale or Terris Lee after they'd finished preparing. And each new shifter that joined them was another ally in the struggle ahead. A struggle that might well kill them all.

But so far things were going according to plan. And there was a plan for each and every danger they might have to face. They hoped. Sara had come prepared for the goblins. He could deal with the trolls, and their flyers could handle the rocs. And at the end, together with the others he would deal the Dicans some heavy damage. Enough he hoped to stop them. Or at least to hold them back until the real army arrived. He hoped. For the moment though they just had to wait.

But waiting was never easy. Not for any of them. Maybe impatience was part of a shifter’s essence.

In time though they saw the first signs of the plan working. They saw smoke. Garren pointed with a paw and the others saw it too. There were smiles all around. Even on faces that weren't human. But all of them knew better than to make a sound. Not now. The time for making a little noise would come soon though.

The smoke started thickening as they watched and the noise from inside the den suddenly started up again as the goblins realised that something was wrong. They didn't know what but they knew they couldn't breathe. And soon he knew some of them would make a dash for the entrance and the fresh air outside. Or the brightest and strongest of them would. But they wouldn't make it. Hopefully. Not when the passage leading to front entrance was on fire. The stone itself burning.

It had been a cunning plan; the priests from Balen Rale had obviously learned something of strategy as well as divinity during their studies. And with so many enchanters there, many of them both old and powerful, the little vials of spelled water that Sara was carrying had been quickly crafted.

It seemed they had been crafted well. The binding of rock burn was powerful. He knew that when the smoke became black and he could suddenly see flames bursting from den's entrance. Big flames leaping ten and twenty feet into the air. Soon he became aware that there were more entrances and exits to the den than just the one in front of them. More places where black smoke was pouring out of the mountain. Obviously the mountain was riddled with the goblins' caves.

Then the goblins surprised him. Three of them screeching frantically came rushing out of the den, having run through the flames. They were desperate to survive. But unfortunately for them it wasn't to be. They were on fire. Even without fur they'd somehow caught fire as they ran through the flames, and the pain and flame had robbed them of their minds. They escaped the den but then in their hysteria ran straight off the end of the ledge and began their long plummet to the rocks far below – screaming all the way.

Inside things were probably worse for the rest of the horde. The screeching had reached a desperate crescendo as they panicked, and he could imagine from some of the noises they heard that they were fighting one another as well. Blinded by the thick smoke, choking to death and possibly on fire, they were losing control and lashing out at anything nearby. Even now he guessed the goblins were tearing into each other's flesh. Goblins were savage creatures.

In time things calmed down a little inside the mountain as the goblins died, something for which Dorn was grateful. But of course there was no such thing as an easy victory in this land. Barely two days into the mountains and they were already learning that lesson.

The first sign of trouble was the blood curdling cry that split the air above them. Dorn looked up. They all did and immediately they spotted their new enemy; a roc circling in the skies above. The noise and the smoke had obviously alerted it that something was happening, and as always it thought that something might be food. To a roc everything was food.

They were the monsters of the sky, the largest creatures that could surely ever take to the air. But fortunately they were also slow. They soared and glided rather than flapping their wings and darting through the skies like sparrows. Which worked out rather well for Nelalas and Brin – the golden tailed eagle and the banded falcon. Even as he studied the roc, as always amazed that anything so large could take to the skies, he watched the two shapes dive. They were tiny in comparison to the roc, but they were fast and nimble, and most important of all they had the height.

They struck from above, diving, levelling out at the last second, and letting their steel talons reach out and tear huge gashes in the roc's wings, before they shot past it like arrows. The priests had fashioned them each a pair of impossibly sharp talons just for this very purpose. To cut through the tendons and bones of the rocs.

The roc gave out another blood curdling cry as it realised it had been attacked, but it was far too late. The shifters had done exactly what they needed to do, and the roc's wings were damaged. Even as they banked and started climbing for the heavens, it lost the battle and started spinning out of control. The damage had been bad enough that its wings could no longer support it in the air. Not as they should.

As Dorn watched it started spiralling downward, trying to use its wings to straighten its path but failing. And then it smashed into the side of the mountain barely a few hundred paces from them with a thump that could be felt through the rock itself. Injured and still letting out its ear piercing cry it bounced off and then started a long, slow and confused tumble down the side of the mountain, chasing the burning goblins to the bottom. Once it got there Dorn knew it would not come after them. It might not die, even with all the injuries it surely sustained as it smashed again and again into the side of the mountain but it wouldn't be able to fly. They were massive impacts and even a roc had to feel them. But as long as it stayed down that was all that mattered.

He let his attention return to the goblin den and the smoke still pouring out of it. It seemed thinner than before, not as dark, but the sounds coming out of it were also less. He guessed that meant that most of the goblins were dead, or at least too badly injured to cry out.

Twenty minutes, maybe half an hour later it was over. The smoke had stopped billowing forth and only a few wisps still crept from the various gaps and holes in the mountain. There was no noise coming from within either. Not even when Garren let out a huge howl that should have had them pouring forth in numbers.

It was time to move on. To make their way further along the trail to where it bent backwards and then came back straight past the goblin den. That was a good thing, and Dorn knew he should be smiling. They could pass by safely. And the army when it followed them through here in a week or two could do the same. And while they did that the stonewrights they would surely have with them to even up and widen the trail for their wagons to travel it, could seal the cave up so that no more goblins could ever call it home again.

But as they set off Dorn wondered if this was all too soon. They were barely two days into the mountains and in that time had faced down rocs, trolls and now a goblin den. And while they had defeated them all and their numbers were growing as more shifters joined them, they still had four more days of travelling through the mountains before they even reached the central plateau. And once there they had no idea at all how dangerous things would become.

The only good thing was that if this was what they were facing as they came down from the north and headed for the lake then it was also surely what the Dicans were facing as they came up from the south. Hopefully the Dicans wouldn't be as well prepared. Hopefully.