He took her gently by the arm. “We need to get out of here,” he said softly. “There’s nothing more to be done.”
A desperate look of denial flashed across her face to be swiftly replaced by calm. “I fear you are correct.”
The knowledge had started to percolate through the other mages. They had put down their wands and began to reverse their rituals. A few of them ran towards the tents or simply raced off to grab horses or any other means of escape. The High Command had got the message too. Azaar and his staff had ordered their servants to pack and were now mounting their destriers. Joran and his followers had already left. It was obvious that none of them were going to risk falling into the enemy’s hands if they could help it.
The Sardeans might respect the usual principles of war concerning captured officers but then again they might not. Anybody capable of unleashing the Army of the Dead might be capable of breaking the articles.
“What do you want me to do about Tamara?” Rik asked.
“Bring her with us. We may have need of her services.”
Rik was glad that he had not been given the order to kill his half sister. He was not sure he would have obeyed it.
From below came the sounds of screaming and dying. The battle was over. The killing went on. The Army of the Dead was still recruiting.
Sardec was not entirely sure how they had managed to get clear. All he could remember was running, hiding in ditches and copses of trees and fighting against the walking dead until somehow they were away looking down on the battlefield from the nearby hills, surveying what was obviously the scene of a disaster for the Talorean military.
The dead swarmed below them, numberless as an army of ants, impossible for human effort to stop. They crawled over everything. The broken batteries, the corpses of wyrms and dragons. Elemental light still flickered under the dark clouds. Exhaustion leeched his strength and he bled from a dozen small cuts. He looked at the troops. There were perhaps half a dozen soldiers, a few Foragers and some others who had joined them during the rout.
His shoulders slumped. He felt physically nauseous. Defeat hit him like a blow, more potent even than pain and fatigue. He took an inventory of his gear. He still had his sword. He had lost his pistol somewhere. He had a small pouch of dried meat and a water flask full of spirits.
He glanced at the others- the Barbarian was present, covered in gore, his head bandaged with a strip torn from someone’s tunic. Weasel pulled on his pipe. His face grimy, deep lines of fatigue and worry etched in his face, older than Sardec could ever remember him looking. Toadface was there and Handsome Jan as well but no one else he recognised. He cast his mind back. The last he remembered of Sergeant Hef was seeing the little man disappear beneath a pile of snarling biting corpses.
How had it come to this, he thought? How could the proud army of Talorea have been so comprehensively beaten? The answer seemed clear enough-sorcery and superior numbers. An army poorly supplied, worn out by plague and hunger had simply been overwhelmed by an army that had no need for sleep or food or shelter.
It was not quite that simple. The Sardeans had living warriors too, but they had been sheltered behind a wall of walking corpses. They had been fresh when they entered combat and they had not been near unmanned by the presence of the walking dead. They were allies after all, not foes.
“Sir,” said Weasel
“Yes?” Sardec realised that the humans had been talking to him for a while. He had barely noticed their voices while lost in his own thoughts.
“What do you want us to do?” Sardec fought down his sense of hopelessness. He felt like telling them to do anything they felt like, that none of it mattered now. He took a deep breath and brought the impulse under control. He was a Terrarch officer. Better was expected of him.
One step at a time, he told himself. First things first. They needed to get clear of this place and find shelter for the night. After that they could give thought to what they should do. At least he thought he was with the right men for the job. It was time for the Foragers to forage.
“Let’s get some shelter and some food,” he said, “then we will start looking for a way back to home. Back to the camp and see if we can salvage any gear.”
“The bastards beat us,” said the Barbarian. “I don’t believe it. Maybe we should have prayed Weasel.”
If there ever was a time to pray, thought Sardec, now was it.
Sardec reeled back into what this morning had been their camp. All around were the signs of a hasty departure where people had simply picked up whatever possessions were nearby and turned and fled.
He paused for a moment, and the full magnitude of the defeat washed over him. The camp was lost. The baggage train was lost. The men would have surrendered if there had been anybody to surrender to, but the dead just kept on coming, and there was no alternative but to flee or to fight until your body was dragged down and became part of the attacking horde when it rose.
Desperately he looked around for Rena, searching through the debris of a camp made suddenly strange, looking for the spot where they had slept the night before. It felt now as if that had happened in another lifetime not merely a few hours in the past. At first he saw no sight of her or of any of the other girls or camp followers.
Out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of a group of people arguing. One woman was screaming and a bunch of children clustered around her crying. To his surprise he noticed that the Barbarian and Weasel were there as well, talking and gesturing and pointing towards the horizon. Relief surged through Sardec when he saw that Rena was amongst that small group as well.
As he approached a group he saw that the crying woman was Sergeant Hef's wife Marcie and the children were hers. It occurred to him then that there had been a real human cost to the battle today beyond the lives lost. This woman had lost her husband and those children had lost her father. None of which was going to count for much if they were still around when the Sardeans got here.
Rena rushed towards him and threw her arms around him. For once he did not push her away but kissed her hungrily not caring who saw them. It seemed absurd to worry about such things with the world falling into ruin all around them.
"Round up those people! Now!" Sardec shouted to the remaining soldiers. "We've got to get them out of here."
Marcie screamed and struggled. The Barbarian lifted her, still kicking, and tossed her across his shoulder. He told the children to come with him. They danced around him, aiming kicks and punches, having no more effect than if they had attacked a giant wyrm.
"The rest of you have got two minutes to grab what you can," Sardec shouted, "and then we're leaving. Anyone not with us can stay behind and argue with the dead men."
Rena stared at him, as if she'd never seen him before, and he realised that she never had. He was covered in blood and muck and filled with an urgency to get them all out of here before disaster could overtake them completely.
The surviving Foragers shouted their acknowledgements and hustled the camp followers to get ready. In less than two minutes they were heading out of the camp and away from the battlefield, terribly aware of the whoops and howls of the Sardeans soldiers behind them. Sardec shouted at them to keep up the pace. He knew that he had to get as much ground between the survivors and the Sardeans as he could before nightfall.
It was extremely unlikely that any of them would manage to escape but looking at Rena and the children he felt he had to try.
Chapter Twenty-One
Sardec sat by the camp fire conscious for perhaps the first time in his life of the enormity of defeat. It hung over him like a vast shadow, making its presence felt in the chill of the breeze and the darkness that danced around the flickering embers.