More blood, so much more, yet the sudden overwhelming gouts of red quickly subsided-the soldier’s heart already stopped, the life that was her mind already fleeing this corporeal carnage-and she was collapsing, forward, the sword in her right hand half drawn and never to go further, head dipping, chin to chest, then down, face-first onto the ground. A heavy sound. A thump. Whereupon all motion from her ceased.
Gesler’s crossbow thudded, releasing a quarrel that sliced past Corabb, not a hand’s breadth from his right shoulder.
A bellow of pain from the demon-the finned bolt sunk deep into its chest, well above its two hearts.
Corabb Bhilan Thenu’alas closed fast, yelling something in the tribal tongue, something like ‘Leoman’s balls!’
Gesler reloading on one knee. Stormy, Saltlick and Shortnose thundering past him, followed by Koryk and Tarr. Smiles swinging wide, crossbow in her hands-one of Fid’s weapons, this one headed with a sharper-which she then trained on the farmhouse entrance, where a second demon had appeared. Oh, she was fast indeed, that quarrel flitting across the intervening space, making a strange warbling sound as it went, and the second demon, seeing it, somehow swinging his weapon-a tulwar-into its path-not much use, that gesture, as the sharper exploded.
Another scream of pain, the huge demon knocked back, off its feet, crashing into the side of the farmhouse. Wood, sod and chinking bowed inward, and as the demon fell, the entire wall on that side of the doorframe went with it.
And what am I doing? Damn me, what am 1 doing? Bottle leapt upright, desperately drawing on whatever warren first answered his summons.
The axe-wielding demon surged towards Corabb. The wedge-blade slashed its deadly arc. Struck Corabb’s shield at an oblique angle, caromed upward and would have caught the side of Corabb’s head if not for the man’s stumbling, left knee buckling as he inadvertently stepped into a groundhog hole, losing his balance and pitching to one side. His answering sword-swing, which should have been batted aside by the demon’s swing-through, dipped well under it, the edge thunking hard into the demon’s right knee.
It howled.
In the next instant Stormy, flanked by his heavies, arrived. Swords chopping, shields clattering up against the wounded Kenryll’ah. Blood and pieces of meat spattered the air.
Another bellow from the demon as it launched itself backward, clear of the deadly infighting, gaining room to swing the wood-axe in a horizontal slash that crumpled all three shields lifting to intercept it. Banded metal and wood exploded in all directions. Saltlick grunted from a broken arm.
‘Clear!’ someone shouted, and Stormy and his heavies flung themselves backward. Corabb, still lying on the ground, rolled after them.
The demon stood, momentarily confused, readying its axe.
Smiles’s hand-thrown sharper struck it on its left temple.
Bright light, deafening crack, smoke, and the demon was reeling away, one side of its bestial face obliterated into red pulp.
Yet Bottle sensed the creature’s mind already righting itself.
Gesler was yelling. ‘Withdraw! Everyone!’
Summoning all he had, Bottle assailed the demon’s brain with Mockra. Felt it recoil, stunned.
From the ruined farmhouse, the second Kenryll’ah was beginning to clamber free.
Smiles tossed another sharper into the wreckage. A second snapping explosion, more smoke, more of the building falling down.
‘We’re pulling out!’
Bottle saw Koryk and Tarr hesitate, desperate to close in on the stunned demon. At that moment Fiddler and Cuttle arrived.
‘Hood’s balls!’ Fiddler swore. ‘Get moving, Koryk! Tarr! Move!’
Gesler was making some strange gesture. ‘We go south! South!’
Saltlick and Shortnose swung in that direction, but Stormy pulled them back. ‘That’s called misdirection, y’damned idiots!’
The squads reforming as they moved, eastward, now in a run. The shock of Uru Hela’s death and the battle that followed keeping them quiet now, just their gasping breaths, the sounds of armour like broken crockery underfoot. Behind them, smoke billowing from the farmhouse. An axe-wielding demon staggering about in a daze, blood streaming from its head.
Damned sharper should have cracked that skull wide open, Bottle well knew. Thick bones, I guess. Kenryll’ah, aye, not their underlings. No, Highborn of Aral Gamelon, he was sure of that.
Stormy started up. ‘Hood-damned demon farmers! They got Hood-damned demon farmers! Sowing seeds, yanking teats, spinnin’ wool-and chopping strangers to pieces! Gesler, old friend, 1 hate this place, you hear me? Hate it!’
‘Keep quiet!’ Fiddler snarled. ‘We was lucky enough all those sharpers didn’t mince us on the road-now your bleating’s telling those demons exactly where we’re going!’
‘I wasn’t going to lose any more,’ Stormy retorted in a bitter growl. ‘I’d swore it-’
‘Should’ve known better,’ Gesler cut in. ‘Damn you, Stormy, don’t make promises you can’t keep-we’re in a fight here and people are going to die. No more promises, got me?’
A surly nod was his only answer.
They ran on, the end of a long, long night now tumbled over into day. For the others, Bottle knew, there’d be rest ahead. Somewhere. But not him. No, he’d need to work illusions to hide them. He’d need to flit from creature to creature out in the forest, checking on their backtrail. He needed to keep these fools alive.
Crawling from the wreckage of the farmhouse, the demon prince spat out some blood, then settled back onto his haunches and looked blearily around. His brother stood nearby, cut and lashed about the body and half his face torn away. Well, it had never been much of a face anyway, and most of it would grow back. Except maybe for that eye.
His brother saw him and staggered over. ‘I’m never going to believe you again,’ he said.
‘Whatever do you mean?’ The words were harsh, painful to utter. He’d inhaled some flames with that second grenade.
‘You said farming was peaceful. You said we could just retire.’
‘It was peaceful,’ he retorted. ‘All our neighbours ran away, didn’t they?’
‘These ones didn’t.’
‘Weren’t farmers, though. I believe I can say that with some assurance.’
‘My head hurts.’
‘Mine too.’
‘Where did they run to?’
‘Not south.’
‘Should we go after them, brother? As it stands, I’d have to venture the opinion that they had the better of us in this little skirmish, and that displeases me.’
‘It’s worth considering. My ire is awakened, after all. Although I suggest you find your matlock, brother, instead of that silly wood-axe.’
‘Nearest thing within reach. And now I’ll have to dig into our crumpled, smouldering abode-all that digging we did, all for nothing!’
At that moment they heard, distinctly, the sound of horses. Coming fast up the track.
‘Listen, there’s more of them. No time to find your matlock, brother. Let us set forth and commence our sweet vengeance, shall we?’
‘Superior notion indeed. One of my eyes still works, which should suffice.’
The two Kenryll’ah demon princes set out for the cart path.
It was really not their day.
A quarter of a league now from the farmhouse, and Fiddler swung round, confirming for Bottle yet again that the old sergeant had hidden talents. ‘Horses,’ he said.
Bottle had sensed the same.
The squads halted, under bright sunlight, alongside a cobbled road left in bad repair. Another cluster of farm buildings awaited them a thousand paces to the east. No smoke rising from the chimney. No surprise with demons for neighbours, 1 suppose.
The detonations were a drumbeat of thunderous concussions that shook the earth beneath them.
‘Four!’ Fiddler said with a savage grin.
Bottle saw Cuttle staring at the sergeant with undisguised awe and more than a little worship.
Smoke now, billowing in the distance, an earthen blot rising above the treeline.