The chieftain turned away to assess the condition of his own people. He hadn’t had time to realize who had been killed or wounded, and his heart was in his mouth as he hurried back to the caravan.
The lead wagons had stopped during the aborted ambush, which had brought the entire caravan to a halt. Some of the clanspeople were helping the wounded men, while others were coming up to join the vanguard and keep a close watch on the broken Tarnish force.
Valorian gave the wagons only a cursory glance before he slid off Hunnul and went to help the wounded. His heart was pounding with dread. When he saw Aiden alive and uninjured, his fear and anger eased, then it soared again when he saw the dead faces of two of his guards, who had ridden with him from the gates of Actigorium and had stood by him before the duel with Karez. One of his other guards was slightly grazed, and there were five other warriors who were wounded. But there was still one face Valorian had not seen yet.
He hurried from group to group, helping where he could, loading the wounded into wagons, and searching. He used his power to dissolve arrows lodged in men’s bodies and to transform scraps of cloth into clean linens for bandages.
Finally Valorian yelled to his brother, “Where is Mordan?”
Aiden shook his head and pointed to a wagon several vehicles back. His face grim, Valorian hurried over, and there he found his friend lying on a pile of blankets hastily thrown over the contents of the wagon. Mordan stirred slightly when Valorian climbed up beside him, but the chieftain went cold. It was immediately obvious why someone had put Mordan there without trying to bandage his wound.
In the bloodied mess of Mordan’s torn tunic was an arrow lodged between his ribs.
Valorian felt sick. Mordan’s lids were open, his eyes dark pools against his deathly white skin. He was breathing in shallow, rapid breaths, and his hands were clenched against the pain. He saw his chieftain and attempted a feeble smile.
Very carefully Valorian used his dagger to cut away part of Mordan’s tunic. He probed the edges of the ugly wound and studied Mordan’s face. Usually an arrow buried in a clansman’s chest spelled death. The clanspeople had very simple surgical practices and only herbal medicines. Removing the shaft and barb would kill him as quickly as leaving it in his chest.
But Valorian’s hopes rose a little as he examined the muscular warrior. He didn’t think the barb had pierced Mordan’s lung or heart, for there was no blood on his lips and his pallor wasn’t gray with approaching death. Perhaps, with magic, he would be able to help his friend. He could not heal; he could only remove. But maybe that would be enough to give Mordan a fighting chance to live.
Gently Valorian touched a finger to the red-dyed feathers.
Mordan stared up at him, totally trusting. There was a pause while Valorian concentrated, then a brief word and the arrow vanished, shaft and all, into mist, leaving only the wound of its entry.
Mordan’s fingers slowly uncurled. “You have a habit of disappointing the Harbingers,” he whispered gratefully.
“They can argue with Amara,” Valorian said, hiding his own intense relief behind the task of bandaging the bleeding wound. He clasped Mordan’s shoulder and was about to leave him when the warrior’s hand clamped on his arm.
“Lord,” Mordan said, his voice hoarse with worry and pain. “That was only a small force trying to slow us down. They knew we were coming. Look to the rear!”
Valorian jumped to his feet with a sudden jolt of apprehension. Mordan’s words made too much sense. The caravan, stopped in place, was open and vulnerable to attack, and it wound down the valley for a long way through trees and open spaces, making it impossible for Valorian to see the end of it. If the attack on the vanguard was meant to stop the train of wagons, then it was likely that the rear was in danger, too. A powerful sense of urgency boiled up inside him.
He whistled for Hunnul. “See you at the pass,” he said softly to Mordan and jumped from the wagon to Hunnul’s back. He shouted to his brother, “Aiden, get the caravan moving now! Get them to the pass!” and he was gone, racing along the file of wagons toward the rear.
“Get moving! Go, go!” he yelled to the Clan drivers as Hunnul galloped by. “Don’t stop. Keep going!”
He and the stallion were halfway back along the length of the caravan when the frantic blast of the rear guard’s signal horn sounded through the valley, followed almost immediately by Tarnish legion horns signaling the attack. Fear swept up the stalled wagons. The drivers, already nervous and tense from the ambush in front, began jostling their vehicles and teams and shouting at one another. The drovers pushed their herds into motion again.
Perhaps thirty mounted men and boys riding beside the wagons saw Valorian racing back toward the rear guard and rode after him to help. Screaming broke out from the end of the train of vehicles, mingled with the clash of weapons.
Hunnul plunged into a patch of trees and out the other side in two strides, just in time to see the warriors in the rear guard close into hand-to-hand fighting with a troop of Tarnish cavalry wearing the crescent moon of the IVth Legion. The men were too close together for Valorian to use his magic, so he slowed Hunnul just long enough for the other riders to catch up with him. Then he drew his sword and shouted a piercing war cry. The small force of clansmen charged into the skirmish.
Hunnul plunged into the midst of the Tarnish horsemen with hooves kicking and teeth snapping. Valorian fought with desperation and cold anger, laying about him with his black sword as if every man who faced him were Tyrranis himself.
Shouts of rage, cries of pain, and the deafening clash of iron on iron filled his ears. The clansmen around him were fighting like wolves with every weapon they could lay their hands on. They weren’t as well trained or armed as the legionnaires, but they stood to lose everything if they failed. Every clansmen knew there would be no surrender.
Valorian parried a heavy blow at his head from a beefy Tarnish officer, avoided a second blow, and swiftly jabbed his blade at the unprotected spot between the man’s jaw and his breastplate. Blood spurted from the wound, and the Tarn toppled from his horse. Hunnul pushed forward through the struggling mass of horses and men.
“For Surgart and Amara!” Valorian yelled over the uproar, and his men, hearing his rally cry, responded with yells of their own.
Slowly the Tarns began to give way before the ferocious defense of the Clan warriors. The soldiers had expected to meet weak, cowardly clansmen who would flee at the first strong attack. They weren’t prepared for the fierce-eyed men and boys who fought back with a strength born of desperation.
Suddenly the melee seemed to lurch as the Tarns hesitated. “Withdraw!” a soldier yelled, and the Tarns broke off, turned their horses, and galloped away, leaving the clansmen gasping in relief. The beleaguered rear guard raised a cheer when they saw the legionnaires fleeing back down the valley.
“Lord Valorian, you’re a welcome sight,” called one of the warriors with a tired grin.
The chieftain hung on to Hunnul, who was prancing in excited circles, and asked, “What happened here?”
“They came out of those woods up there,” the warrior responded, and he pointed to a large strip of trees growing along the edge of the valley. “Just as we passed by, they charged out at us. There must have been almost a hundred of them! If you hadn’t come when you did, they would have overrun us for sure.”
“Did you see General Tyrranis with them?”
The man shook his head. “No.”
Valorian stared worriedly down the valley where the Tarns had disappeared. If there had been about one hundred soldiers in the front ambush and the same number in the rear, where was the rest of the garrison? Where was Tyrranis? The general would never let the Clan get away this easily!