He stood on the wall with Furin.
The Rai came quickly this time, the drum beat in time with his fluttering heart. They held shields to protect themselves from arrows.
“You said they would wait until night,” said Furin.
“I had hoped they would.” The soldiers advanced, not as many coming this time, which he was sure meant they would be assaulting both the Forestgate and the Tiltgate. “We need people on both gates, Furin.” She nodded.
“It is going to be harder, isn’t it?” He watched the Rai’s forces, grim expressions on their faces. The Rai army had not expected resistance on the first attack, now they knew what to expect and would be ready. They would want to avenge their fallen, and they would want to avenge the insult of being beaten by villagers and outlaws. Shouts bounced back and forth among them, though he was unable to make out the words. Soldiers banged their spears against their shields in time with the drum. The noise filled the wooded clearing around Harn. Only when they were nearer could he make out what was shouted. Not words. Names. They shouted the names of their dead.
For a moment, he was tempted to bring the reborn onto the wall, but he wanted them hidden. A surprise for when, not if, the Rai breached the gate. Another chance to break the morale of the attackers, when they found two elite warriors from legend waiting for them.
He took a deep breath. Behind him the archers were in good spirits, sure of themselves after their first victory. He wondered how long that would last. He had half of the best archers dressed as Forestals on this wall. The rest on the other wall and Sengui led the forces there. Cahan held his bow, and would use it this time.
In the field the Rai no longer stood behind small groups of troops, but had warriors walking in front of them with large wooden shields. He picked an arrow and nocked it. Aimed at the leader of the Rai, Galderin, and let fly. He watched the arrow, saw it hit the shield before the Rai but not puncture it. He let the bow fall to his side.
“Yes,” he said, “it is going to be harder.” The first troops crossed into the killing zone. He raised his hand, readying the archers. Let the attackers come a little further, get as many as possible in range. A flame went up from the rear of their lines. Answered with a roar from the other side of the village.
“The Forestgate!” said Furin and she turned. Cahan grabbed her arm.
“We must trust that Sengui can follow instructions and leave them to it.” He looked to her. “This is our wall, Furin. It will need all of our attention.” He let his hand fall. “Loose!” The arrow storm began. The attacking soldiers lifted shields above their heads. He heard the drumming of arrows falling, watched the oncoming army for soldiers falling. None did. Cahan started to loose arrows into the front rank, aiming for the throats of those holding the shields. Picking out the trunk or branch leaders when he could. A death for every arrow, his chosen archers copied him, their aim not as precise but they did good work until the front rank lowered their shields, deciding the arrows from the front were more dangerous than the arrows from above. Their shields were not as strong as those used to protect the Rai, they protected them from Cahan’s pretend Forestals, but not from his arrows which punched straight through.
It did not matter.
He could not loose quickly enough to do the sort of damage the Forestals had. The soldiers were pushing through the killing zone quickly. The Rai hanging back, not entering the place where a stray arrow could hit them.
With a roar, the forces of the Rai charged. Throwing aside their shields, choosing speed over protection.
“Spears!” he shouted, “spears to the walls!” He felt the platform shaking as villagers ran up the ladders, joining him on the ledge. His chosen archers continued to loose, Cahan along with them. The Rai’s forces reached the edge of the pit. Bridge runners came forward, throwing lengths of wood over the pit. Spears were thrown. A villager fell, and another.
“Shields!” shouted from further along the wall. Villagers ducked, hiding behind shields or the wall. For a moment, it felt like he was young, back when he was an itinerant warrior. The air loud with the shouting of the Rai’s forces. Screams from the wounded on both sides. The soldiers threw their spears further and better than the villagers could. The thud of a body hitting the floor. More bridge runners, throwing lengths of wood across the pit and against the spiked hillocks on either side. Cahan ignored them. Their bridges were small, no more than one soldier at a time could pass over them. What bothered him was a group who were putting a larger bridge across the pit in front of the gate. In the fury of the attack they had not noticed the sap that the ram had been soaked through with. The pit was bridged.
Soldiers streaming over the pit.
“Rocks!” shouted Cahan. “Throw rocks at them, do not waste spears!”
The villagers on the wall were holding the enemy. Throwing rocks, using spears on the ladder climbers. Shouts from below. The drums beating faster. The spears coming at them. Screams and shouts and noise. More soldiers rushing across the bridge, carrying more ladders and screaming their fury.
“Fire!” shouted Cahan. Furin held up a torch and he lit the end of an arrow dipped in sap. Waited a moment until the fire had caught. Stood. Drew. Loosed.
The arrow flashed by the soldiers. The warriors had shields up, sweat on faces. Anger, fury, hate. Barely seeing the arrow. The names of their dead hanging in the air like hateful promises.
Nothing happened.
The riot of bodies below continued. Pushing forward as his arrow vanished into the pit. Another ladder being raised. Crashing against the wall. Hooked tops biting. A woman, drawing back an arm to throw a spear, eyes wide, bright with joy as she aimed at him.
The weight telling. Cahan could feel it. The momentum of the battle was with the attackers.
A light.
A small fire beneath the bridge.
Growing.
Billowing outwards, flames following the pit around, igniting the chemicals from the tanners’ pits. The crack of sap jars bursting in the heat. The force of the exploding bottles throwing the makeshift bridge into the air, spilling soldiers into the fire below to be impaled as they burned. Screams of fury replaced by screams of pain. Cahan raised his arm in front of his face. Fire hot on his skin. The Rai army backing away from the furious heat.
An exultation within him. Cowl writhing beneath his skin. He wanted to open the gates. Call out an attack. Push forward.
They could not pass the fire any more than the attackers could. Villagers were jeering from the walls, calling soldiers cowards as they ran. Cahan turned, shouting, “Chosen spears and archers to the Forestgate!” and jumped from the wall. Followed by the villagers he had picked as the best warriors. The rest stayed on the wall. Lost in victory.
Over the forest the light was setting, framing the trees as black teeth against the pinking sky.
Cahan ran towards the Forestgate. Felt something in his gut. The squirm of his cowl beneath his skin. It was reacting to another cowl user, somewhere near.
“Down!” he roared out the words. Saw the reborn, standing with a group of villagers armed with spears, react, throwing themselves at the floor.
A great flash lit the village. A second set of shadows cast. Another light. Framing the wall as a shadow, the villagers on it caught in odd positions, bodies askew, arms and legs in places they should not be as the gate below exploded. The shockwave knocking those villagers to the floor who had not heard his shout. Soldiers, led by one of the Rai, streaming into the village.
“To me! Spears and archers!” screamed at the top of Cahan’s voice as he pulled himself up.
“Woolside archers to me! Woolside spears to me!” this from Sengui, sprinting towards him with her spear and shield.
The two reborn by his side, now he needed them. This was their time. Their element.
Villagers running to join him as he pulled the axes from the thighs of his armour. Something nightmarish of this, seen through the flickering fire of the exploded gate. People running. Some with purpose, some in panic. Had the Rai that came through the Forestgate not expended their energy destroying it they would have been finished. But the attack on the gate had taken all they had and, rather than joining their troops, they hung back, letting their troops enter first. The soldiers were loath to act without the orders of their Rai, and set up a shield wall just inside the village. Behind them their Rai leaned on a soldier. The Rai straightened, the soldier slumped as sacrifice was taken from them.
Cahan knew they did not have long.
“Form shields!” he shouted. “Woolside! Form shields! Tanside! To me!” The messy shield wall before him tightened, though he did not think it would stop a concerted charge. “My chosen! Draw!”
Behind him the chosen archers, dressed as Forestals, nocked arrows and brought tension to their bows. The villagers did not have the skill to shoot accurately over the line of their own shields in front of them; they needed direct line of sight, more risk than he liked, but there was little other choice. “Shields down!” The shieldbearers with their spears knelt. The bows loosed. Arrows the length of his forearm streaking through the air. At this range, even loosed by amateurs, they were devastating. It should have been over with the second volley. Had they been better trained, quicker to loose and draw, quicker to get the shields back up then Cahan’s prophecy of a hundred archers breaking an army would have been proven true, and by less than twenty bows.
But they were not.
The Rai’s forces knew what to expect. They were ready. Heavy shields blocked the second volley of arrows, and though some got through it was not enough. Worse, they had their spears ready. He heard the order. Saw spear arms draw back. Shouted out, “Shields!” But their shields were weak things and the spears cut into their ranks. The woman behind him fell without a sound. One of the reborn added her shield to his own. He heard screaming. He heard the wet thud of sharp wood cutting into flesh. He heard bodies hit the ground. He heard panicked voices. All the familiar sounds of war, all the things he had spent so long wishing never to hear again.
You were running but you were not running fast enough.
All for naught, death came to him. No matter what lies he told himself he could not escape that. He could blame Venn. He could blame the Forestals. He could blame the treefall. But the truth was he had put all of this into motion by coming back to his childhood farm all those years ago.
You need me.
He felt the line wavering. He felt panic beginning in the heat of the bodies around him. The quick breaths, the sobs of fear.
They would break if he did not do something.
The Rai joined their troops. Moving into the second rank, they felt victory was near but still sought the protection of their soldiers’ shields and bodies. Fire danced along their ornate armour.
Cahan knew he must act. Another volley of spears would break the villagers.
“Into them!” He screamed it. Charged the shield wall.
As he ran the reborn ran with him. Resplendent in their ancient armour, they looked at home here, among the sobbing and the screaming. A roar from behind as the villagers joined the charge. Another rain of spears. It was a simple act for him to weave among them. The weapons moved as if through heavy sap. He moved like a creature of the water. Silver and fast.
The reborn were even faster. They did not bother to dodge the spears. They relied on speed, running straight for the enemy, a spear in each hand, shields left behind. As they ran one screamed, a monstrous sound that would have been more at home on some creature of Wyrdwood, something with hook-tipped tentacles and a poison-tipped beak that struck from the shadows to drag off its prey. But there was nothing of striking from the shadows about the reborn. They cut through the twilight, through flames, leaping over burning wood. Two slender, armour-clad figures carrying death. The Rai pointed, shouting orders. The soldiers concentrated their next volley on the reborn. The one in the lead, the one he called Nahac, could not escape. The first spear hit her armour, bouncing off. She missed a step but did not stop. Immortal, unable to die, they cared little for tactics.
She ran on.
The next spear hit her helmet, knocking her head back.
She ran on.
Two more hit, these punctured her armour, cracking the wood, piercing her body and she screamed. But not in pain, it was a sound of frustration as her body weakened. Another spear pierced her and she fell.
The second reborn ran on.
She had been using the first as a shield and when her sister dropped to her knees she used the body to vault into the air, throwing herself at the enemy shield wall with a spear in each hand. Crashing into them, knocking soldiers back, filling the air with the sound of hardwood against hardwood. A spear through the head of a soldier. Her impact opened a gap in their wall. She did not stop. The gap in the wall left the Rai exposed and she threw herself at them, forcing her spear through their armour. The Rai screaming out in pain.
But it took more than a spear to kill Rai.
This one was old, as Cahan ran towards them he could feel it. Rather than fall, rather than die like they should, the Rai reached out with both hands. Clasped them around the armoured head of the reborn. Cahan felt the pulse of power through his cowl. Felt the fire coming. Heard the reborn scream as the Rai let fire flood from their hands and into her helmet, destroying her flesh, cracking bone in the sudden and intense heat. The Rai let go of her. She fell. The Rai shouted out in victory, but only once.
For then Cahan was among them.
I need you.
So aware of the world around him.
I am here.
His power was small, had he fed it with a life it would have been larger but he had sworn not to. What power he had was taken from the slow seep of the ground and the bright light of his spirit. He could not burn Rai, or throw fire. If he tried to steal life from the Rai their soldiers would cut him down.
But even so, he was quick and he was lethal.
The Rai let go of the smoking corpse of the reborn. His axe took their head from their shoulders.
No stopping him. Axes flashing. None could stand against him. Screaming, shouting, cursing in the name of the Osere. Men and women died under his axes. Blood covered him. He was unstoppable. A fury. A monster. Cutting out a clearing around him. Turning the tide.
The villager’s shield wall hit. He felt the impact. Heard the impact. The shouting. They were winning. He was winning.
And then.
Without warning.
They were not.
He became an old man. His armour heavy. His muscles tired. The world a blur.
Before him stood Sorha. It felt as if they were the only two in the village.
“Cahan Du-Nahere,” she said, and drew her blade. “I have a most strange effect on the Rai.”