Bottled abyss redrum hor.., p.24
Stormsworn, page 24
“Be well, Ancorans.” Drakkar raised his hand and offered a smile. It wasn’t the greeting of the Steamsworn, but the salutation of a friend.
“We’ll see you again.” The words came out harder than Jacob had intended. He tried to offset that fact with a jab at Samuel. “Try not to complain the entire time.”
The Spider Knight smirked at him. “Try not to jump off any cliffs before you empty your pack.”
Alice laughed as she pulled away to the northwest. “Be careful, both of you. And like Jacob said, we’ll see you again.”
* * *
The columns marching through the Gray Woods had a rhythm. A steady beat of claws and feet pounding the forest floor that was almost louder in its absence than it had been when they were in the middle of it. But as soon as they crossed over the first lower ridge, putting more distance and earth between them and the others, the woods grew quiet.
Occasional calls managed to find their way through the forest. But for the most part, Jacob would never have been able to tell there was a literal army marching less than a mile away. Of course, the longer they strayed from their original path, the more distance any sound had to travel.
He let his gaze roam, checking the lowest branches of the canopy and any shadow that could hide an ambush. It might have been more likely that an attack would focus on the main forces deeper in the woods, but ambushing stray soldiers was a sound strategy as well.
Jacob glanced down at his armor and blew out a breath, pulling the gray cloak out of his saddlebag that would disguise him as one of the Children of the Dark Fire. Alice had worn hers all day despite the rise in humidity, but the thick air made Jacob want to wear far less, even than the light cloak.
He had little doubt he’d be drenched in sweat by the time they reached the tunnels, but there were larger concerns. He only hoped when they found Samuel and Drakkar again, the pair would be no worse for wear.
* * *
Samuel frowned as the columns rolled back on themselves. He knew many Spider Knights were closer to the third set of flags. They’d slowed to a point that he and Drakkar had passed them by. Perhaps it was to help keep the eyes at the front of the lines fresh, or perhaps there was some other strategy preferred by Karn that he wasn’t familiar with.
Drakkar pointed to the northeast. “Is that Alana?”
Samuel squinted against the low cloud of dust being churned up by the Stalkers and Tree Killers. To add to the mess, a handful of Walkers scurried through the dried leaves, kicking up even more detritus. The path cleared enough for him to see who Drakkar was pointing at.
Tight locs fell to the center of her back between the neatly shaved sides of her head. As she slowed, Samuel could just see the hint of the tattoos on her scalp.
“That’s her.” Samuel nodded. “It has to be.”
Drakkar urged his Stalker forward, drifting to the other side of a Forest Giant as they lost sight of Alana and found her again on the opposite side of the massive trunk. “Alana!”
The leader of Cave turned toward her name, raising her fist in greeting as Drakkar caught up to her in earnest.
Drakkar held out his hand as if forming the Steamsworn Fist. “I did not realize you were riding with us today.”
“Allie is leading the defenses in Karn. We wanted at least one of us on the front. There are a great many tactics we agree on, and some I think Karn would resist if left to their own devices.”
“Have you heard from our brothers in Ancora?” Drakkar asked.
For a brief moment, Samuel had forgotten that a force of Cave Guardians had journeyed to Ancora, both to help defend the city and assist in the restoration of the Lowlands. He was glad of the changes that had come between Ancora and Cave, but he still remembered the awful things his father had once said about the underground city.
It wasn’t a hatred of Cave exactly, but a distrust of its people that could be traced back to the Deadlands War. But it wasn’t Cave who had betrayed Ancora. It was the Ancorans themselves in those darkest hours.
“Samuel?”
He glanced up when Drakkar called his name. “Sorry, what was that?”
Drakkar’s brow furrowed, but he didn’t say more about Samuel’s distraction. “Alana spoke with Branddur. Apparently, Baddawick and Nora have been providing shelter and entertainment for the Cave Guardians.”
“That’s great. I’m glad to hear it.”
Alana raised her finger, drawing both of their attention. “Perhaps more amusingly, Baddawick has been throwing more parties than he likely should be, forcing the Cave Guardians and Spider Knights to mingle with Parliament and the Lowlanders. It is a good strategy to build bonds on both sides of the walls.”
Samuel grinned at Alana. “I always knew that old man was a politician at heart.”
“I would never think to insult him with a label such as that.” Drakkar placed a hand over his heart. “Now, as for Alana’s politics in Cave …”
She narrowed her eyes. “You beg for favors with one hand and slap your benefactor with the other.”
“You slapped someone?” Samuel asked, appalled.
Alana’s stern expression cracked, and she didn’t hide her laughter. “No, Spider Knight. It is only an expression. From another time, when Drakkar and I were many years younger.”
“Younger than Rikken.” A smile came and went across Drakkar’s face. “Perhaps we can have days like that again. Without war upon our doorstep.”
The flags ahead shifted, and no relay came before the first cries rose in the woods. The shouts reached them before the new pattern was raised.
“Ambush!”
It was a strange thing, hearing that cry as they moved through the forest. In the past, when Samuel had heard someone shout a similar warning, it was immediately followed by relentless fighting in the immediate area. Moving in columns with their allies, the warning here was not the same.
His halberd still came into his hand through instinct alone. Countless drills had instilled the memory in the very fiber of his muscles. The surge of adrenaline still coursed through his body, his fingertips tingling in anticipation as he waited for some shadow to move, some assassin to drop from the canopy, but none came.
Instead, there was the distant sound of conflict. The hammering ring of metal on metal and the faint screams of the dying as their column marched forward. The flags changed again, and their compatriots from Karn visibly relaxed as the red circle flew against a white background.
Samuel took several deep breaths to center himself. It was exhausting being that alert, on the verge of panic, and having nowhere to direct his energy. If he focused too hard, he’d jump at every sound, every movement, but his time in the Spider Knights had taught him better than that.
He picked up his crossbow and twisted the winch in the stock. The teeth of the mechanism grew taller as the gears inside turned, only lowering when the string was primed. He locked a bolt in place, pulling the leather strap of the safety tight across the release.
Only then did he let the crossbow hang from the saddle once more, turning his attention to Bessie. He ran his fingers through her hair in a familiar pattern, tracing a figure eight behind her eyes. It was familiar to them both, and a simple way to ground himself. Her stride relaxed in time, her body lifting a bit higher from the ground, every step no longer ready to launch her and her rider through the air.
They rode as one, and any tension Samuel felt was often reflected by the spider. That’s how it was when you’d spent enough time with the same mount. Separate beings, but one unit. It was one of the secrets of the Spider Knights, a secret that made them deadlier than most.
Nearly a mile passed before they reached the site of the ambush. Invaders—bugs with so much bulk they could have charged through the Lowlands wall of Ancora—lay strewn across the forest floor. Bombardiers, their sides pierced and in some cases ruptured entirely, towered above the dead riders. The gray cloaks of the Children of the Dark Fire did little to hide the blood staining the earth and bodies.
A few had fallen to bolts, but the seared flesh and warped metals told of a different fate for many more. As horrible as the scene was, Samuel realized there weren’t more than a dozen riders in that mass of corpses. Some of the Bombardiers hadn’t been saddled, but they’d ridden into battle, regardless.
In the back of his mind, he wondered if the bugs had a hive mentality in the Gray Woods. Even separated from their own, were they so desperate to stay together that they had no thought of self-preservation? He glanced at Drakkar and Alana, the soldiers from Karn and Ballern and beyond. Were any of them really that different from those beetles?
It was a thought for another time, and preferably a time with far more drinks in hand.
The flags shifted, and Alana called out the orders.
“Clear to the front. If there are more ambushes, they haven’t been detected yet, or the traps are still waiting. Keep your eyes wide and your teeth sharp.”
Many of the Cave Guardians answered with a quick rap of fists on armor. Alana acknowledged them with a nod. She turned her focus to a small map in her hand, checking coordinates before projecting her voice again.
“We’re within a mile of the forest’s edge. You all know the plan. Push them back, hold, and escape into the woods before our reinforcements arrive.”
Samuel knew their paths would intersect with two other columns of their allies. Nothing changed in the first half mile, but he could hear them soon after. Heavy thuds in the forest, not entirely dampened by the underbrush and trees around.
Within a quarter mile, there wasn’t any question about what was making those sounds. Between the wide gaps in the Gray Woods, Titan Mechs marched, manned by pairs of pilots. Samuel had often seen them controlled by a single operator, but in battle, that wasn’t the best option. Like a destroyer deployed without its cannoneers.
Beyond those towering monstrosities were tight formations of smaller Mechs, the exoskeletons of Jacob’s design. Jacob and Charles’s design, Samuel thought. They didn’t look much taller than a person, but their layered armor hissed like muted wind chimes as they marched.
The flags shifted again, the white and blue lowering before being replaced by a blood-red vision that made Samuel’s heart stutter. It wasn’t the flag of Karn, or Belldorn, not of Ancora or Bollwerk. Instead, the dark embroidery showed the outline of a Shadowwing, as if mocking the flags of Fel. Stormborn.
Drakkar stood in his saddle, braced against the stirrups as he pointed to the nearest of the flags before clapping his hands together in one sharp strike. The grin on the Cave Guardian’s face sent a chill down Samuel’s spine.
The shadows of the Gray Woods lightened as they reached the edge of the forest and the full expanse of their forces stepped into the light. There wasn’t time to appraise the situation more than that. Clouds of smoke and dirt hurled into the air as the report of a Bombardier’s blast echoed across the wide field.
The flags didn’t change. They stayed with the bearers, leading the charge. Tree Killers and spiders alike surged forward. There was no way to direct the mounts then. All they could do was hold tight and attack when the time came. But that wasn’t entirely true. There was something they could do. Something warriors and battle-worn soldiers had done for countless centuries.
Drakkar released a howl as he raised a spear to the skies. “For the Stormborn!”
The world screamed with him.
* * *
Accustomed to the close-quarters combat of Cave and the ravines surrounding the underground city, and to the tight streets of Bollwerk and Belldorn, Drakkar was struck by just how far ahead he could see. It was something he’d only really experienced when he’d ridden through the clouds with the dragonriders.
Belldorn was the one place he’d seen forces like what waited for them in the narrow prairie between the Gray Woods and the city outside the Great Machine. But they were not all armored crawlers here. The Children of the Dark Fire marched forward on Bombardiers and Tree Killers, perhaps not as durable as metal machines but more agile and better armed, to be sure. Their enemies’ mounts numbered in the hundreds across that field, with more stationed along the streets.
His Stalker surged with the frantic pace of his cohorts, the spider’s claws digging deep furrows into the dirt and mud beneath churned-up grass as they sprinted toward the front line. Even from a distance, Drakkar felt a small relief in not being in that first wave. The front lines on both sides fell like so much wheat to be harvested, blood turning the ground into a slick pool of mud that sent many soldiers to their knees and their deaths.
The flags of the forward units lowered as their bearers collided with the enemy. There was a reason those signals were fastened to spears, and they did their work as well as any other. It was the last chance Drakkar had to appraise the field as a whole. Each company had their orders, knew what they were supposed to do, but many fled back into the woods at the carnage unfolding before them.
Limbs severed at the swipe of swords. Riders collapsed when whistling bolts took them in the chest and head. And then he was there, feeling the tug on his cloak as a bolt passed through it. Drakkar gritted his teeth as he caught the strike of a long halberd on his spear.
He escaped the blade, but it cut deep into his Stalker’s leg, finding a space in the armor. The spider reeled, and the spear tip snapped off when the gap closed, the force flinging the haft into the attacker’s face. Drakkar doubted the man could have survived the split wood embedded in his skull, but the Stalker reared back and lunged at the Tree Killer.
The bug’s scythes broke with the force of the impact, and the Stalker’s fangs found the rider. The strike came fast, and the Stalker forced its way deeper into the chaos. Drakkar landed a few blows with his spear before hurling it over the front line, putting down a nearby archer, who fell beneath the bloody battle.
He grabbed another of the collapsible spears, readying it for an immediate defense.
Swords rang off the Stalker’s armor, but more than one found its mark, leaving trails of gore running down the beast’s legs. His mount wouldn’t last long. Drakkar needed to get away from the front, but he caught sight of Alana, a bolt in her shoulder. Her thick leather armor gave her some protection, but he had no idea how deep that bolt had gotten.
A blast of heat rolled by him, threatening to scald his face as the attack of a Bombardier thundered by. Two spiders died in the blast, but he didn’t see Bessie’s gray hair, and that would have to be enough for now.
Alana raised a spear and cried out as she hurled it past her spider’s head, impaling an armored Walker swerving through the ranks. It reared up to strike, and Drakkar leveled his crossbow. The first bolt struck beneath the armored head, causing the Walker to jerk violently to the side.
He’d seen that kind of movement in the wild. When Walkers fought and attacked with such vehemence, they sometimes cracked their own chitin. The only thing that cracked now was the neck of its rider. She fell limply to the ground, lost in the rolling storm of legs and blood.
“Alana!”
She raised her fist in acknowledgment but didn’t turn to look at Drakkar. That was the stuff of fledgling warriors and the dead. It was enough. That simple motion told him she wasn’t mortally wounded. Her Stalker struck at the flailing Walker, silencing the beast once and for all before sprinting over the corpse.
It created a break in the lines of their enemy, and the mounted forces of their alliance surged through it, spreading the columns of the Children of the Dark Fire as they went. Some on both sides showed their lack of training, turning to engage the riders as they sprinted past.
But to do that was to expose their backs, and they were felled in short order. The columns from Karn continued pushing through, Tree Killers and Stalkers forcing the lines farther away, crushing the forwardmost soldiers from the Children of the Dark Fire into tight formations, until the Titan Mechs did their work.
It was a vision Drakkar wished he’d never seen. A Bombardier scooped up into the hands of a Titan Mech, its rider launching bolt after bolt to ping harmlessly off the canopy. The back of the Bombardier started to smoke, and the Titan Mech slammed it into the earth, crushing men and women and mounts before the Bombardier ruptured.
Flesh boiled in that wave of fluid. The concentrated attack turned into a cloud of superheated liquid. But their enemy wasn’t the only casualty. The heat poured into the Titan Mech, filling it with steam before hydraulics snapped when their tolerances were breached.
He couldn’t hear the pilots’ screams. He could only watch as they clawed at the thick condensation on the glass before falling still. The Titan Mech slowly leaned to the side like a Forest Giant finally at the end of its long life. The impact when it fell crushed soldiers from every company beneath its mass, spraying mud and detritus and viscera across the lines.
And the lines broke. The forces of their enemy turned, and Karn’s flags rose into the air once more. The Stormborn symbol no longer sailed above the battlefield. Instead, a square white flag with a red square in the middle signaled the retreat.
It wasn’t immediate, as some of the skirmishes required far more focus. That in itself was enough to trigger more casualties and leave more bodies on the field. Drakkar tried not to dwell on that as he circled behind Samuel as the Spider Knight sprinted past, Bessie’s armor covered in the red blood of the fallen.
Drakkar wove between Samuel and Alana, the intensity of his focus slowly bleeding away as they drew farther from the field of battle. At last, they stood at the outskirts of the Gray Woods, their mounts breathing heavily beneath them while others collapsed, unlikely to rise again.
He turned back to the woods ahead, the shadows a balm as they closed in around him.
* * *
After tending to the spiders, Samuel checked over Drakkar’s armor when the Cave Guardian removed his cloak to repair the worst of the cuts. “I don’t think you need to worry about your cloak right now.”
