Cataclysm, p.9
Cataclysm, page 9
part #1 of Rebirth Series
“Yep, not as effective as using your first born or even a twin brother but effective nonetheless,” Juin replied. “They work well enough I suppose, if you have time to draw out a rune that is.” Juin said, his skepticism obvious.
“Yeah, I’m working on that but powerful magic’s require preparation and prayer.”
“Then it is useless in battle, like I have always said.”
“We’ll see brother, we will…see.
What most would deem the most brutal and dangerous wilderness the Elves of Lilieack called home. The Rachis mountain range on the far norther portion of the continent had developed the name of the Bone Spires to the locals, or sometimes just the Bones or the Spires depending upon where you’re from, especially when something perilous has happened. Consisting of hundreds of miles of ridges and sheer cliff walls, spires like giant stalagmites stretching up beyond your eye. Valleys of grass and trees with streams of mountain runoff sitting pristine as bastions of life trapped, resting within the rugged terrain between spires far above sea level. Unreachable other than to an Aerial the peaks joined as many through centuries of collected dirt and debris creating hidden pockets of life or death. Flora and fauna unseen in the lower elevations, survived in this harsh land, up where the air is thin and predators few. Small, untouched eco-systems devoid of the harsh reality of the world, left alone to exist and die within their own folly or time.
Trolls and giants lived in abundance in the Bones as well as sprites, gnomes, and ethereals of any given shape or visage. Each feeling that they were the sole right holders to the Rachis.
The Bone Spires can strip the will to live from people but the opposite is true for my brother, as it is for me. The Spires are life to people like us. I worry for him even though he be one of the greatest swords of the elven nation. I am by his side and have proved on several occasions that I am the best archer for the last two festivals running, yet still I worry. I am hard, cold, and unaffected by the brutality required to do what we have to do, he…still has a boyishness about him that I would rather he not loose.
“You should go home,” Juil said.
He smiled broader “Just when we are starting to have fun? Never.”
“Go back to the university and earn both of our degrees and I will do the same out here for you.”
“Okay,” he replied nonchalantly.
“Really, you will?”
“No, silly girl. I will not drop everything simply because you have another goofy idea. I would already be in the belly of a lokai if I did all that you request.”
“You never do anything that I ask you to, but this time you should.”
“Should I? I mean is it really the right choice?”
“I think it is,” Juil said in her most sincere and thoughtful tone that may or may not have worked upon her brother before, she could never really be sure. If only he wasn’t so smart, she cursed inwardly not for the first time.
“Well then, I think I should take it under advisement,” Juin said, matter of fact.
“You won’t go, will you.”
“Not a chance in hell. I will never leave you to your own whims, sister, you would never be able to survive by yourself,” he said jokingly, though she knew that deep down…he meant it. “Besides, a couple of maneuvers more and we will have them stuck in a box canyon. I am sure you would like my blade there for that.”
“I worry for you. Your style is so…reckless,” Juil said, knowing that her brother Juin had a ready-made answer to which he had used many times for this argument. It was not only Juil who thought Juin took too many risks. Drick had been reduced to the flank for his outspokenness on the subject. Drick, as the Har Karoome, should lead the charges and have a final say in tactics, it was what he was trained for. Juin, as the Karoome, should stand back and oversee, approve and disapprove and develop the next steps in the attack or retreat depending upon whatever the situation called for. Juin however wouldn’t allow for that.
“I will slow it down as I get older, I am sure, for now though, the rush is what motivates me.”
“I don’t know how you do it to be honest. I wouldn’t be able to keep my feet under myself moving like you do,” she said without mockery, for his quickness was legendary.
“I don’t know either. On a normal day I am faster than what is typical, but in the heat of battle, a type of clarity overcomes me and I find a rhythm that doesn’t allow for mistakes and I simply follow it.”
“You’ll never lead troops like a true prince if you don’t change, Juin.”
“I have no intentions of ever leading troops that will be your department, little sister and the Har Karoome’s, this is naught but a raid and our party is a raiding party, not an army.”
“Our destinies are never our own.”
“Enough of this boorish conversation, let’s get back to killing these…mer, mu… Whatever they are.”
“Muridai, though they look like pinch faced humans to me, but no human could survive these lands.”
“There have been a few, but they don’t last long now do they?”
Within seconds their steeds were flowing smoothly across a wide valley following a mountain stream that had formed a small lake. A nice place to bed down for a night or two once their business was finished, though the lake, being runoff, held no fish. Soon they were pulling up on the vanguard of their force as they made their way up a mountain trail.
“What news?” Juil asked of the warrior stationed there.
“Goat riders were sighted early this morning but we believe it was to take a census before the battle.”
“Have they sent emissaries?” Juin quizzed.
“No, and they haven’t been seen since.”
Damn gnomes always seem to know when something is going to break. Cunning little bastards is what they are, even if they are of the ‘Five’ I still don’t trust them. Juil thought of the Treaty of the Five, which brought relative peace to the land for the last three centuries.
“Where is the first spear?” Juil asked, knowing that he would be where the brunt of their attack started.
“Follow the switch back for a mile and then the west ridge which curves up around to the plateau.”
With salutes the twins rode off, each pondering the same key bit of information. Why did the first spear set the attack from low ground? Then they saw it as they climbed much higher than what was being called a plateau which in actuality should have been referred to as a bowl, cleft as it was in an area where the mountain itself had broken and over thousands of years evolved into a private ecosystem. A perfect spot to hide since people could walk right by a thousand feet below and never know it is there, yet bad because once they knew you were there, there was nowhere to run as far as they could tell. The secluded inaccessibility of the bowl cleft caused more than a little trepidation for Juil. There was simply nowhere to run except down when things went south.
The spires continued straight up on the far side of the bowl making an un-scalable wall for over a thousand feet to end in a seven-fingered row of ragged peaks touching the bottom of the clouds, perfect for an ambush. There are caves lining the base of the spires offering the possibility of an exit but something about the shadows didn’t look right. It was too far to say for sure but something was there.
“Probably safe to assume that those caves are littered with the ratish muridai,” Juil said
“Rats do like dark places; fire will usually flush them out,” Juin returned.
“Yeah, what are you going to get to burn in a cave?”
“There is that, isn’t there. Second spear has sent out a reactionary force.”
“Reactionary force? Really, Juin, where do you get this stuff.”
“From incredibly old books, besides…I don’t think that I am using it right.”
“Doesn’t matter, we haven’t fought like that since the end of machines. Come on, let’s get down there before we miss out on the action,” Juil said and gave her mount a kick, Juin followed as they made their way over to the first spear. Your Har Karoome should be up here leading this you know. You are denying him valuable training by keeping him in the rear.”
“We will speak of it later.” He said shortly obviously not wanting to hear what she had to say about that subject, again.
They had to follow the trail up and around a copse that forced them to the extreme outside of the trail where they could look down hundreds of feet to a rocky pass below. It was the fact that she could see the beings at all that far away that triggered her instincts.
“Look Juin, trolls.” She pointed down into the pass.”
“It’s a trap,” Juin said angrily after processing the information.
“Go to the first spear and warn him, I’ll go watch our flank with Drick,” Juil said, spinning on her heels without waiting for a reply. Drick was not only the Her Karoome but he was her friend and had been since childhood. Her spear and bow will do much more against giants and trolls than his sword. What took them over an hour to accomplish on the ascent was covered in ten minutes at full gallop down the gradual slope trusting to Ice King’s agile hooves. The horn blasted signaling that the rear guard was under attack just as Juil came in sight of the valley below. Large boulders were being hurled at the elves who were scrambling to get behind something and keep their heads down. There was no trying to defend when boulders the size of men are flying. They stormed the ridge as masses of giant and troll flesh tried to overwhelm the resistance.
Juil took an offshoot to the trail that they would never have seen on the way up giving her an elevated view of the entire valley. Far down below on the plane, three giants and twice as many trolls were rushing the entrenched elves regardless of the number of arrows they sent into them. The lead giant was an easy quarter mile ahead of the rest and he looked like a porcupine with all of the arrows sticking out of him. She didn’t know if it was blood loss or exhaustion but the giant fell and lay still. The elves erupted in a cheer. It was rare they could take out a giant without the help of the twins or one of the others trained for such tasks.
Juil saw a completely different situation, almost every arrow they owned was stuck in that one beast and there were two more coming. She saw the fourth spear take out his sword to stand defiantly against the mass of meat that would soon be upon them. A noble gesture to be sure but not what Juil had in mind for closing out a successful campaign.
She brought her horn to her lips and sounded the retreat. The elves in the distance heard and ran to their mounts. She followed up with a sequence of horn blasts that told the rear guard to regroup with the main force and not try to access the mountain. Out on the plains on horseback the elves might have a chance, but on foot and low on arrows they were as good as weaponless. The mountain passes and the ridge trail would offer the attackers new challenges for their limited minds to comprehend, so she swirled her blade in the air until all of them were in front so that she could literally spur them up the trail.
The trail fanned out into open area where their horses were tied before it condensed into the narrow switchback that would bring them the rest of the way to Juin and the second spear.
“Fourth spear, take the guard up to the bowl and assist Juin,” she said, having the suspicion that if what was down in the valley surprised them with a giant attack, whatever was going on up top was just as much of a surprise.
“Drick, you stay with me!” she shouted and the son of Lilieack’s first general dropped from the ranks and waited for her. “Hold this,” she said and threw him the sack of squirming lokai. She dismounted and set herself at the top of the trail head and started to stomp a pattern into the snow starting from the outside and working her way in. “Where’s your horse?” Juil asked the Har Karoome who had not noticed that his own mount had followed the others.
“Must have followed the herd, should have never brought a three-year-old on a campaign,” he replied with a hint of sarcasm.
“Ice King can handle both of us for a short bit. Young ones are tough, especially when you don’t geld them.” Juil made the stab at his wanting to breed a couple of his mares with the three-year-old.
She continued stamping out runes in the snow made easier because she could see the lines—many times she was on hard dirt and even rock but the rune simply had to be traced in order for it to have power, it didn’t have to be seen. As long as the pattern was right and made in the proper sequence it would do what she needed it to do.
Juil could see the top of the first giant’s head as he navigated the trail, but she didn’t worry as she had made the center and completed her rune.
“Drick, toss one of those lokai over here,” she said and the elf reached in the bag, pulled out a snarling lokai pup, and tossed it to the elven princess who deftly caught it with one hand and slit its throat in one smooth motion. She squeezed the blood into the center of the rune before shoving the tips of her arrows directly into the blood patch. “Another, quickly,” she said and repeated her steps.
“Give me your arrows.”
“I only have three left.”
“Send them, here…smear this on your blade,” she said as she pitched him a bloody snow ball she collected out of the center of the rune. The first giant’s head started to bob into view as it made its way up the trail and Juil took aim. Just before the beast came into range it stopped and stared at her menacingly. Soon another joined it and finally the third and what they hoped was the last was standing in a line with the other two and still they didn’t advance.
Trolls, they’re waiting for the trolls. This is not good; these things were bad enough when they were simply mindless monsters but this…this is definitely not good. Her quick mind started processing the situation and she realized that she was missing something. The path, there was no way the trolls could fit on that path with the giants. It simply isn’t wide enough.
“Drick, take Ice King and check over the west ridge!” Juil shouted, the ridge being a quarter mile distance, Drick jumped on Ice King and took off at a gallop, leaving Juil alone in the center of the rune stamped in the snow. Wind pushed her glacial blue hair back from her pale face in a myriad of patterns as she slowly scanned around the giants and up the side of the spire to her right. The side so steep that throwing distance was an hour’s walk over land. Her arrow was notched and the string slack until she picked her target.
Bows are like swords, don’t draw them until you’re ready to kill. She was ready and the enchanted drops of lokai blood dripping off the end of her shaft proved it. She had killed a lot on this trip, it seemed the Bone Spires were filling up with all kinds of unsavory types. They had never seen giants before but had run into several on this trip. Her father and grandfather both claim to have never seen one, yet here they had seen five, killed two, and ran away from the other three. Now there were three more right here in front of her, possibly the same three they had run from.
“Trolls! Lots of them,” Drick shouted and spurred Ice King back to her. His face was panicked and she quickly sheathed her bloody arrows in the quiver which acted as a signal for the giants to start sprinting toward her. Ice King was faster and Juil was soon swinging up behind Drick as they headed toward the switchback that would join them with the rest of their force and leave their flank unprotected.
Ice King shifted right and then sharp left and the two riders ducked to avoid the projectiles being thrown to try and prevent their escape. Lilieack was known for two things, the highest quality steel and powerful steeds that were more companion in their intelligence than horse. Ice King knew before they did that the switchback was cut off as soon as the first trolls who had scaled the outer cliff crested the rim and swarmed over the trail. The horse detoured toward the opposite side of the copse, his silver coat and white patch-working blending well with the billowing snow.
Juil felt as if she was a deer framed against the tree line for the giants now that they altered course, and the projectiles hurled their way was proof of it. An entire tree was hurled at them, Ice King barely managing to jump it, resulting in leaving a floating target bearing two riders for far too long.
They were suddenly flying back into the woods having been hit with a lump of foul-smelling gunk thrown by the giants. What splashed over them, caused their gag reflexes to kick into high gear instantly. The three of them fell together but only two got up. They were behind the front line of pine saplings having bowled a couple of them over in the fall. Drick stayed in the saddle as all in Lilieack are expert riders but Juil was struggling at getting her leg that bent out at an odd angle under her. Drick started to dismount when he had to change plans as a troll came barreling through the trees with a howl.
Larger and broader than a human with thick bark-like skin made them almost impervious to regular steel. Blades of precious metals being their bane, as well as fire. Spiked hair shot out erratically from an over-sized, squat head with a huge flattened nose. It was a beast meant to strike fear into the hearts of even the strongest. Crooked, dirty teeth with large spaces gave them a daft, childlike smile, and they howled like long lost souls crushed at the feet of the Bone Spires.
Drick, son of Diedrick, darted in and skewered the first one with the blood treated sword. Blue and green veins burst through the troll’s face; his head began to swell as he fell to the ground but Drick was on to another that had followed the first.
Juil had her bow out now instead of trying to rise; her knee being injured in a way that would take time to heal even in the best conditions. She saw Drick finish a third troll and turn back toward her at a gallop, leaning out of the saddle to make the high-risk maneuver of trying to scoop her off the ground. She slung the bow over her shoulder and reached out toward the elf but only saw a giant’s foot step over her and kick the horse and rider away as if it was nothing but a hound blocking a threshold. She spun to get her bow around and shoot the giant but the foot settled over her and gently forced her to the ground. She was trapped, there were too many for her and Drick alone to face… she had to save what she could.
“Limick coumu lemand!” she shouted with what she believed to be her last breath. It was high elvish to run and find her brother but Drick didn’t speak high elvish so it was lost on him.
