Amric’s blades flickered forth, deflecting raking talons and dealing death with every stroke. Instinct and reflex took over as each strike flowed unbroken into the next. Foes fell all about him, crashing to the ground atop one another.
Their footing became treacherous as the hillside ran red about them, and the warriors backed up in unison. A snarling form clambered over its fellows and sprang at him, fangs flashing. His boot lashed out to send it tumbling down the hill. Murderous tentacles writhed against his leggings, and his skin prickled as they penetrated the leather. A sweeping downward cut stilled them, but he felt a spreading wetness there. More tentacles peeled at the chain mail around his chest and shoulder, making contact at last with the bare flesh of his upper arm. Starlight danced on his blade as he parted the appendages from their owner, and he sent a reverse stroke that aborted the resulting howl of rage.
And still they came on. Foot by grudging foot, the warriors gave ground, backing up the hill before the relentless tide. Blood flew wide from their swords as they found their mark time and again, and though Amric could not spare the attention to watch the cast-off fluid slow in midair and arc back to be absorbed by the ravenous bloodbeasts, he could hear the patter of it alighting on their bodies.
A red haze rose before his eyes, the lifeblood from his many lacerations rising in a fine mist to be consumed by the fiends. A glance aside showed the same cloud before Valkarr. The bloodbeasts did not need to strike a mortal blow; instead they could wear their prey down gradually, draining and weakening it over time until it became too feeble to withstand the rest of the pack. If the battle went on much longer, he and Valkarr would slow and be dragged down. The shriek of a terrified horse at his back told him that they would not be able to retreat much further, either. Very soon, even if the animals did not panic and bolt into the midst of the bloodbeasts, the warriors would lack sufficient maneuvering room to prevent members of the pack from slipping past.
Amric set his jaw, watching for his opportunity. There was a brief lull in the ebb and flow of battle, and he seized the moment. He lunged forward into their midst, a blur of motion as he laid about with demonic ferocity. A bare instant behind him, Valkarr plunged into the thick of the pack as well, a second whirlwind of biting steel. Here at the center of the maelstrom, there was no room for finesse or grace, no precision to the dance of death. Instead there was only force and fury, and a merciless, indomitable will.
The razor-edged kiss of lashing tentacles became a constant pain as the throng closed about them. Amric clove one of the bloodbeasts nearly in half, smashed away slavering jaws with a fisted hilt, shouldered aside a twisting form, and sent a snapping head spinning into the night atop a scarlet fountain. His blades sang in the night air, such was their blinding speed, and he gave rein to his wrath. He felt tireless, unconquerable, but he knew it was the heady illusion of combat. His rage would sustain him only so long. They had to break the charge now, or they were lost.
Suddenly it was over. The snarling creatures faded back from them, and Amric and Valkarr stood alone among the strewn heaps of bodies, gasping for breath. The handful of remaining bloodbeasts gathered down the hill, drawing to themselves the last of the blood from the air and a few long strands from their fallen fellows. The fiends glared up the slope at them with burning eyes, and Amric glared back, his own lip curling. He would show no sign of weakness now, or invite another rush. At last the bloodbeasts turned and loped down the hill, melting into the forest without a backward glance.
Valkarr sank to his haunches, wobbled there for a moment, and then sat down heavily. Amric turned and was relieved to see that all of the horses were still present, and were beginning to subside. Then he noticed Halthak staring open-mouthed at him.
“I–I have never seen the like,” he stammered. “Standing fast against such odds…. And the speed! I could not even follow your movements. When you charged into the midst of those dreadful things, I was certain you would be swarmed under.”
“There was little choice,” Amric said with a rueful chuckle. “And I must admit I was not much more confident of the outcome. It was a close thing, and we were very fortunate.”
He flicked his swords to either side to clear the blood from the blades, and sheathed them both. He then peered past the Half-Ork and into the deeper darkness at the base of the cliff.
“Where is Bellimar?” he asked.
Halthak spun around in surprise, his head craning from side to side before he faced Amric again with furrowed brow.
“I do not know,” he said. “He never uttered a word once the battle began, and I heard no hint of a struggle behind me. I did not see him slip away either, but I was engrossed in the battle. Where could he have gone, unseen?”
Amric frowned and shook his head as he continued to scan about in vain. “The darkness could have concealed much, and we can certainly claim distraction. At the same time, we can see most of the slope from here, and we are backed by the sheer face of this cliff.”
“We are in no condition to chase after him,” Valkarr muttered in a thick voice from where he still sat on the ground. “And we do not dare call for him, for fear of attracting more predators. There is nothing we can do for him until the morning’s light, and until we rest.”
He gave a wet cough as he finished speaking, and Halthak started, hastening forward with wide eyes.
“How stupid of me to prattle on while you sit there, exhausted and bleeding!” the healer said.
Halthak handed the gathered reins of the horses to Amric, and knelt by Valkarr. The Sil’ath, shoulders sagging, made no objection as the healer pressed a hand to the flesh of his arm and closed his eyes. After a moment, those eyes flared open and the look of concern upon the Half-Ork’s coarse features was unmistakable. Amric heard his friend’s ragged breathing, and realized with a chill that Valkarr had taken more grievous wounds under the veil of night than he himself had.
“Valkarr, listen to me,” Halthak said, his tone low and urgent. “Your injuries are severe, and must be treated. By your leave, I wish to heal you now, as I did this morning.”
Valkarr looked at him with black eyes that were dull and unfocused, and he slurred something in the Sil’ath tongue that not even Amric could understand. Halthak glanced aside at Amric, who nodded. The healer turned back to Valkarr and continued in a rapid whisper.
“This will make you very tired, warrior, and you may succumb to sleep before I am even finished. This is normal, as your body must give some of its energy to the healing process, and you have precious little to spare just now. Do you understand?”
Valkarr mumbled something else unintelligible, and gave a bubbling chuckle. Halthak bowed his head and squeezed his eyes shut in concentration. He gave a low gasp through clenched teeth, and Amric watched in fascination as a dense, scarlet latticework of stripes sprouted across his grey skin, even as they dwindled from the other’s scaly green hide. Valkarr stiffened at first, then relaxed, and when the last of his wounds faded from view his eyelids drooped and his chin fell to his chest. Halthak eased him to his back on the rocky hillside, already asleep. By the time he stood to face Amric, the many lacerations he had assumed had vanished as well.