Then, silently, terrible shapes began to rise from the moonshadows-ancient warriors in tattered hauberks, their skeletal faces blank with hopelessness and dread. An evil green light burned in the empty sockets of their eyes. The draft horse whinnied in terror and tried to rear in its traces; Geran rolled aside and abandoned the wagon, as did the others. The animal bolted away in panic, filling the courtyard with the horrendous sound of its screams and the clattering racket of the wagon bouncing over the cobblestones. Shouts of human terror echoed from the hallways and rooms of the gatehouse nearby as more and more of the specters appeared and glided into the castle.
“The King in Copper!” Mirya gasped. “He’s here!”
Geran caught her arm and retreated a few steps toward the storeroom behind him, sweeping out his sword even as he wondered if it would help against ghostly steel and spectral claws. Dozens of the terrible wraiths were already in sight, and more were appearing by the moment. “I hesitated too long,” he groaned. “Sergen’s decided to strike.”
A wraith flew overhead, wailing in a shrill, cold voice as it streaked past. It drew up and turned to gaze at them, the shadowy image of a long-dead warrior. “Slay them all,” it whispered to itself then it leaped down at Mirya, sweeping its phantom sword from its scabbard. Geran shoved her behind him as he parried with his backsword. Elven steel glimmered in the moonlight against dark shadowstuff, but the wraith’s ghostly weapon passed through Geran’s steel and sank into his arm. A bitter white chill pierced the swordmage’s flesh, and he cried out in agony. Then the wraith’s blade passed through him, leaving behind a thin white line of cold, pallid flesh like the scar of an old wound.
“Vaar thel murne!” Sarth shouted, and from his fingertips he hurled a bolt of bright fire at the center of the wraith’s body. The blazing bolt burned a hole right through the spirit’s substance, such as it was, and the wraith recoiled as though sorely wounded. “Steel is of little use now, Geran!”
The wraith’s features wavered and grew indistinct, but within moments its ghostly fabric began to knit together again, and the malice of its emerald eyes glittered brightly. It turned its attention to the tiefling and glided forward, raising its phantom blade high for another strike. “Damn the luck,” Sarth muttered. “Perhaps my magic is not of much use, either.”
Geran shook off the lingering numbness in his sword-arm and found the spell he was seeking. “Reith arroch!” he called, and his sword suddenly blazed with a brilliant white radiance. He leaped up to meet the wraith and drove his point right between the spirit’s eyes; this time the elven steel bit into the unearthly substance as if into living flesh. The wraith shrieked once, pinioned by the sword through its forehead, and then a flash of argent light destroyed it. But more wraiths swirled around them, and the castle courtyard began to take on an eerie, sepulchral appearance, as if the mere presence of the dead warriors had dragged Griffonwatch itself into the spectral horror of their shadowy existence.
“We can’t stay here, Geran,” Hamil warned. He had his daggers in hand-enchanted weapons both, but who could say whether they were keen enough to pierce flesh that was not there? — and he kept them poised as a defense of sorts, trying to hold off wraiths drawing close from that side. “We’re too exposed here!”
Geran looked around, and his gaze fell on the door leading to the banquet hall. A Shieldsworn guard fought furiously on the steps, only to crumple under the slashing assault of several of the furious wraiths. There was only one thing to do-Geran had to reach the harmach and the rest of the Hulmasters before the wraiths did. Hoping the others would follow his lead, he dashed across the courtyard and bounded up the steps into Griffonwatch’s horror-haunted halls.
TWENTY-FOUR
10 Tarsakh, the Year of the Ageless One
The Hulburgans had chosen a good defensive position. The track descending from the moorland down into the river valley ran between a high hillside on the east and a small rocky rise on the right. The white rushing Winterspear wound across the vale just in front of the human defenses, spanned by an old bridge of stone. One of their small watchtowers stood atop the rocky rise. Mhurren grinned in appreciation as he studied the small army arrayed against him. The sun had set more than an hour ago, but great bonfires burned across here and there in front of the human positions, set so the humans would have light enough to fight by. The human soldiers were careful to stand well back from the firelight; they might not be able to see past the line of fires, but then again, Mhurren couldn’t send his warriors at them without sending them through the firelight. Whoever the commander was, he was no fool.
“They think that little stream will stop us?” Kraashk snarled. The hobgoblin chieftain waved his hand at the humans. He was taller than Mhurren by half a head, and his rank brown hair was braided with tapers around his face; in battle Kraashk lit them to wreathe his face in flame and reeking smoke, believing it terrified his enemies. He pointed across the vale to its lower side, where the hillsides steepened and drew together again. “They would be wiser to stand at the defile, there.”
Mhurren shook his head. “The river runs through the middle of it. Dividing their warriors between the banks would be folly. Each part is unable to guard the other there. No, their captain chose good ground. The whole army fights as one, and he can fall back if he is beaten here.”
“You think like a human,” Kraashk said and let his fangs show for an instant to demonstrate that he did not mean it as a compliment.
The Bloody Skull chieftain ignored his vassal’s barb. He studied the vale for a time, then nodded to himself. It was a good plan. He pointed to the high hillside on the humans’ right flank. “Can your wolf riders manage that hillside, Kraashk?”
The hobgoblin studied it for a moment. “It won’t be easy, but yes, they could do it.”
“Then my plan is simple. Take your wolf riders around to the top of that hill. I will attack down the throat of the valley and bring the humans right to the edge of the stream. When I signal, you bring the Red Claws down the hill and take them in the flank. The humans will be busy with me, so they won’t have time to shoot at you.”
Kraashk grinned in appreciation, and this time he intended no insult. “A good plan,” the hobgoblin said. For all the fierceness he claimed, he was quite clever and quickly grasped what Mhurren intended. “Give me an hour to get my wolf riders where you want them, then begin your attack. Do not call for me too early.”
“Then go,” Mhurren said. The hobgoblin held up his spear in salute then jogged off into the cold and windy night, already barking out orders at his tribesmen. Mhurren looked around. “Avrun!” he called.
The Warlock Knight was waiting nearby. “Yes, King Mhurren?”
“I will drive the Hulburgans down the valley in an hour. Can you see the place where the valley narrows, there? I want your manticores and wyverns to wait there on the heights. When the Hulburgans flee, they are to feast.”
The helmed human nodded. “What of my spellcasters?”
“They are to shield my warriors. We will attack at the bridge, there. Use your magic to keep the humans from shooting us to pieces.”
“It shall be as you say,” the Vaasan agreed. He went off to speak with the other black-armored humans and their pet monsters.
Mhurren idly wondered what Avrun would do if he came up with a plan that the Warlock Knights objected to. Would they try to reason with him? Threaten him? Use some form of magical compulsion? Or simply arrange his death and replace him with a warchief more amenable to their control? Tonight it did not matter, but the day would come when he decided that he would not do what they wished him to do. The trick was simple: He needed to make himself strong enough that the Skullsmashers, the Red Claws, and the other bands of rabble infesting Thar feared him more than they feared Vaasa. Destroying Hulburg would be a good start toward that goal. Each victory Mhurren won would increase his standing among the other chieftains of Thar, and soon enough they would come to believe that he’d won those victories with his own strength and cunning, not Vaasan magic or allegiances. And when they did, he might have a chance to turn against the Warlock Knights and rule in his own name.