Matt looked at the slope of the Ridge, searching for signs of his soldiers. He saw none.
It looked like the only thing on the hill were trees, bushes, and mud. He peered closer, looking for anything out of place. There was no sign of anything amiss in the steady rain.
Exactly as he wanted it.
They rode along the stretch of road, their mounts slipping and sliding in the mud. He heard more than one of his lifeguard curse as they moved, and at least one of them had to catch up after they dropped their sword and had to dismount for it.
When they were about halfway along the road, Rethferd spoke up. “Riders again, sire. Coming fast, four of them.”
Matt’s eyebrows climbed. If the ambushers saw them and responded… “Drive them off again. They’re nothing to worry about.”
He said it loudly enough that the sound could carry over the wind and rain, hoping that the watchers on the Ridge would hear him. His lifeguards nodded and started to unlimber their bows and crossbows, but they paused as one of the riders called out.
“Tyrant of the Iron Kingdom! Give up! You cannot escape the fate that awaits you.”
Matt turned Nelson around in surprise, looking back across the distance that separated the two groups. The Alliance hadn’t tried diplomacy, not lately at least, and he didn’t think the Oath would make them capable of it. Still, it wouldn’t do any harm.
“And what can I expect from you, Knight? Are you promising mercy?”
“For you? No.” The Knight’s honesty was almost endearing. “You’ve done too much, and cost our people too much. Your companions and people might still be saved, however. Surrender, meet your fate with honor, and they can live.”
Matt looked back at them. The riders had not drawn their weapons. They seemed to be genuinely waiting for his answer. He grinned. “And if we fight?”
“Then you and your companions will all die.” The rider’s voice was cold. “We will liberate your people from your madness and return them to fair rule. Your tyranny will end, and we’ll erase every sign that you were ever here.”
For a long moment, Matt stared back at the riders. He knew they were being sincere; the way the Knight had spoken had been more than enough for that. Of course, he also knew that there were hundreds of soldiers listening to the exchange, watching from the Ridge. There would be only one chance to respond correctly.
He drew in a deep breath, and then spoke.
“I will not surrender, Knight. If your monarchs want my life, if they want my peoples’ freedom, then they are going to have to pay for it, in blood and sweat and tears.” Matt shook his head. “Tell your rulers this. If you had stayed in your own lands, we would not have killed you. If you had wanted peace, we would have given it. I’ll give them one last chance. If they turn around and leave our lands, never to return again, I won’t chase them back to their corrupted little thrones and burn their castles down around them. Otherwise, they can take the just rewards for all their crimes.”
The riders looked at one another. They seemed uneasy now. Maybe they knew, just like Matt knew, that retreat was no longer an option for the men and women who ruled them. Their Oath would drive them on, even when they should have run. Either way, the rider spoke one last time. “It saddens me to hear you reject my offer, but it does not surprise me. You’ll die, and so will all the people you’ve doomed today.”
Mat smiled, though he doubted the Knight could see him through the rain. “So be it. I’ll see you in Harvesthold.” Then he turned Nelson back to continue their journey.
That’s when he heard it. The sounds of numberless marching soldiers. He glanced back to see the riders retreating, but behind them, just coming around the bend, were the first ranks of the Army of Heroes. He grimaced as he realized the riders had just been stalling him.
Matt spurred Nelson on. “Come on. We’re almost there!”
The lifeguard took the last turn at speed, and Matt’s jaw dropped as he looked up at the barricade that Grufen had constructed.
It was gigantic, easily three times taller than a person. Made from a jumble of trees, rocks, and other rubble, it looked as if a giant had simply scooped together the leavings of the forest into a single massive barrier. The height was all that much worse because of the incline that led up to the thing. Even the Army of Heroes would take hours to pull it down.
Unfortunately, Matt couldn’t see any way around it, which was a problem, because he could still hear the entire Army of Heroes tromping its way through the mud and rain after him.
There was a single figure standing in front of the barricade, dressed in a cloak. They seemed to catch sight of the group and scurried forward, closing the distance between them. Matt peered at it through the rain, trying to see what person had been foolish enough to strand themselves here. “Gorfeld? Is that you? What are you doing here? How are we supposed to—”
“No time, sire. Everyone, gather close, please. As close as you can, mounts included. Anyone who doesn’t is going to have to run for it in that direction.” Gorfeld gestured to the thick woods to the east. Then he looked up at Matt. “I can only do this once. The Margrave has a group of freeholder volunteers that can act as decoys. They’re already on the other side of the barricade.”
As the lifeguards all clustered in together, Matt glanced back at the road. “What are we doing?”
Gorfeld gave him an irritated look. “One moment, sire.” The steward looked down, half-closing his eyes. Then he exhaled in a rush.
There was a sudden burst of light. When it faded, the world was different. Instead of the mud of the road, they were on a slope in the middle of a forest. It was still raining, but the sounds of marching soldiers were no longer behind them.
Matt looked around in alarm, but Gorfeld held a finger to his lips. The lifeguards all calmed down as the steward gestured for them to look to one side.
Tanya was standing there, a smug expression on her face. She wore a thick cloak and beckoned him over. Matt dismounted—Nelson wasn’t going to be able to maneuver very well in the brush—and stalked over to her. “What are you doing here?”
She visibly recoiled and held up a palm. Her voice was a harsh whisper. “Keep it down! You’re on the Ridge, about partway down the line.”
Matt calmed a little. He glanced back to see the rest of the group also dismounting. Gorfeld was giving them instructions and gesturing down the slope. “Why are you here? I thought you didn’t like battles.”
“Gorfeld needed someone to anchor his magic to. He decided I was the best one to use.” Tanya folded her arms and gave him a smug smile. “Besides, I got to talk to Melren. You should see what I’m going to be able to do now.”
Matt had opened his mouth to respond when Gorfeld crept up next to him. “Sire, Melren and his special detachment are down there waiting for you. Margrave Grufen believes that when the column comes to a stop, you should be near the Band of Heroes that Gwelfed mentioned in her reports. You wanted to lead the charge there, correct?”
He looked from Gorfeld to Tanya and back. “Yes. I do.”
“Then you should get in position. We don’t have much time—” Gorfeld cut off and looked down the slope. There, just visible through the trees and the rain, was a line of soldiers, marching in the mud.
Matt gave Tanya one last glare and then started to move down the slope. His lifeguards moved with him, wincing at every creak of leather or squelch of mud. As he moved, he started to pick out other soldiers crouched behind trees or bushes, tucked into every available kind of concealment. Off to either side, those hidden soldiers made a thin line.
Directly in front of him, however, there seemed to be an entire banner of men and women. All of whom, he realized, were Knights.
He paused for a moment as he realized just what kind of banner he would be leading into the ambush and then forced himself to continue forward. Matt eventually picked out Melren hiding behind a thick tree. The former noble was wearing a cloak over dark armor, and he grinned as Matt slid into place beside him. “Welcome to our team, King Matthew.”
Matt glanced around, seeing the peasant Knights all glancing at him and whispering amongst each other. “You really think they’re ready for this, Melren? They’ve barely had a week!”
The Imp gave him an offended look. “They’ve had nearly three! And they were highly motivated.” When Matt just glared at him, Melren sighed. “I was teaching them my best mantras, the ones all Firebloom Imps learn from childhood. They took to it like a fish to water, and every single one can cast a basic Blasting Flower spell. They will not let you down.”
He opened his mouth to argue more, when he glanced down the slope and froze.
Down in the mud of the road, the Army of Heroes had continued to march past. Banner after banner had walked by, trudging through the mire to reach Harvesthold and begin their conquest of the Iron Kingdom. The pikemen and archers were mostly wearing a simple gambeson and helmet, armor meant for peasants who weren’t expected to live long, anyway. Their cavalry was wearing similar equipment, though they were all armed with a lance and sword.
The soldiers passing by now were different. They were a mix of heavily armed and armored Men-at-Arms, together with Dwarven Crossguards who carried their oversized crossbows with pride. Most of them seemed to be Pinions from the Court of Ravens, who slinked along through the mud as if their boots barely touched the rain-soaked road.
At the center, there was another group of warriors. They wore an eclectic assortment of armor and carried weapons that were just as oddly matched to the soldiers around them. The banner they held was one that Matt had come to associate with the Band of Heroes themselves. Matt felt his breath quicken. They were right there. All he had to do was wipe out that banner and rescue Alerios…
He frowned. His eyes went over the banner as they marched, looking over the troops he could see through the rain. There wasn’t a Wizard among them that he could see, and nobody was marching along in chains. Where was Alerios?
Before he could search further, however, something happened down below on the road. The soldiers ahead of the Band abruptly slid to a halt; the ones behind were forced to stop as well, to avoid bunching up and crushing each other. Realization dawned on Matt as he watched their marching formations start to tangle and snarl. At the front of the column, the Army must have run into Grufen’s barricade. Their column was trapped, though most of them didn’t quite know it yet.
Matt felt the tension rise within him, and he started to form a few of his miniature spells. Anything larger and he risked accidentally catching his allies as they charged, and he couldn’t afford that now. He saw Melren gesture, and the Knights crouched around him seemed to fall into trances, each in groups of four. His lifeguards hefted their own weapons and readied themselves.
Then a horn rose over the sound of the rain, a clear and clarion call. The soldiers on the road paused and looked up. Many of them turned to their comrades to ask questions or make remarks. A few had even started setting down their packs or pulling out cookware, obviously assuming that their commanders had decided to halt for a while.
The veterans in front of him were not as unwary. They shifted in place, suddenly studying the forest around them. Matt saw some of them start to frown as they stared into the road south of them. Perhaps they’d seen some of the pits and ditches he’d ordered his troops to dig. Others were peering up the slope, straining to make something out.
Melren reached out and grabbed Matt’s arm. He held up three fingers, and Matt nodded. He settled back down to wait.
A second horn sounded. The troops around him tensed further. Matt felt his breath grow short. His mind flashed back to his last fight, the desperate one where he’d nearly been killed, along with his entire lifeguard. What kind of idiot was he, coming back to something like that? He was a King, wasn’t he? Why shouldn’t he lead from the back?
Even as a panicked part of his mind asked those questions, Matt knew the answers. The people around him were risking their lives. Could he ask them to do that if he wasn’t willing to do the same?
Before he could think about it further, the horn blasted again, this time twice in quick succession. Matt rose out of his hiding place, along with his entire army. For a single, impossible moment, the two armies stared at one another as the rain pattered down.
Then trees and boulders toppled down into the ranks of the Alliance soldiers. A warcry rose from hundreds of throats, and Matt hurled himself down the slope alongside his lifeguards. He saw the enemy scrambling to organize themselves, with the conscripts nearby seeming to dissolve into a panicked mob as they snatched for weapons, slipping and sliding in the mud.
The veterans ahead of him were doing better—at least until Melren’s students raised their hands, and nearly two dozen explosions rippled through their ranks.
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Each blast rose out of the soil, as if someone had buried landmines beneath the road and waited until that moment to set them off. Fire and mud rained down among the Band of Heroes; smoke and steam choked the air. Knights and Dwarves were scattered in all directions, many scrabbling in the mud as they clutched at wounds, or tried to regain their feet.
Matt charged straight into that chaotic mess, his mace held high. The first Knight he met was still stumbling to his feet; Matt brought his mace down on his head in a two-handed strike. His opponent tumbled away while another Man-at-Arms stepped forward to challenge him. He heard the woman screaming something just before Mulwan shot her in the throat.
A Dwarf rushed in, a battle axe held high. Matt blocked the swing with his mace, feeling the impact ring through the metal handle. Then he channeled his magic into the dirt and shoved. The Dwarf’s feet slipped out from under him, and Matt caught him with another overhand blow to make sure he stayed down.
He saw a Pinion drawing an arrow back to fire and channeled magic into a miniature version of Haunted Dirt. A somewhat soggy block of dirt formed between him and the archer; the arrow punched most of the way through it before it stopped. Matt released the spell and charged forward, catching the Pinion before they could ready another shot. A horizontal blow caught the woman across the chest. It snapped her bow and knocked her on her back. She drew a knife and tried to push herself back upright, and Matt finished her with a second strike.
The once-calm road was awash with screams and cries. He could hear shouts from captains and bannermen, frantically trying to instill order. Magic rippled and burst through the melee, adding to the confusion and casualties. Around him, the members of the Band of Heroes were already falling back, their numbers reduced both by the magical assault and his own lifeguards’ rush. It gave him the opening he needed. If he could just find the Wizard, he could—
An arrow shot past him, and Matt blinked. It had been a clear miss, something he wouldn’t have expected out of a Pinion or a Man-at-Arms. Not that he was complaining, but it seemed… odd. When he looked in the direction where it came from, he saw someone frantically pulling another arrow out of their quiver. She was dressed in a hooded cloak, but their armor was some kind of molded leather cuirass that a Pinion never would have worn. As she drew out an arrow, three more of them spilled out into the mud.
Matt realized he was standing there frozen, watching her frantically try to fit another arrow to her bowstring. He started towards the archer, ready to kill her the same way he had the Pinion. Then he paused. Why did that feel wrong?
He was still hesitating when someone in plate armor came sprinting at him from the side. They swung at him with a massive broadsword; Matt dropped back and put a hand on the top of his mace, so that he could block the strike with the strength of both arms. The impact shook through his elbows, and he grit his teeth at the twinge of pain.
His opponent danced back, the sword shaking in his hands. “Que se muere, pendejo!”
Matt froze. Had that been Spanish?
He was still staring in shock when a second armored man jumped in, slashing at him with a sword while he guarded himself with a broad, overly large shield. “It’s the Tyrant! Come help us kill this bastard!”
Matt stepped back. Those cuts were so clumsy, so slow. They didn’t seem like they were meant to wound, just scare him enough to make him back up. A dawning realization was starting to break through his confusion. The Alliance hadn’t just gone to Earth.
They’d brought more Humans back with them.
He felt himself lock up with shock. A part of him still couldn’t believe it; how many had the Alliance kidnapped? Were they here by choice, or had they been compelled somehow? Had they sworn the same Oath, or were they still redeemable?
Before he could force himself to move, he heard a woman scream on his right. “He’s mine!”
Matt spun on instinct and backpedaled as a woman wearing lacquered armor hacked at him—with a katana of all things—and brought his mace up to defend himself. He saw the cutting edge of the blade dull and chip as it hit the solid steel of his weapon a second time and then leaned into his next strike. The katana shattered, and he reared back to land a solid kick to the woman’s chest. She went over backwards into the mud, and he saw Wonoll darting in with his spear to finish her. Both of the men started to charge in to defend her.
“No!” Matt shouted as hard as he could over the chaos of the battle. “Don’t kill the Heroes! Capture only!”
He heard Wonoll curse, but the Imp still aborted his killing thrust. Another woman charged him with her own spear, forcing the Imp back, and Matt took the opportunity to put himself between them and the rest of the lifeguards. The archer shot at him again—badly, the arrow was way off target—and Matt spun back to face the humans. “Put down your weapons and I can get you home! Surrender!”
The one with the overlarge sword growled and set himself to strike again, while the one with the shield tried to help the would-be samurai up. “We aren’t going to surrender to you, Tyrant! They summoned us to defeat you.”
“I’m Human too, you idiots!” The woman with the spear halfheartedly tried to stab him, and he knocked the spearpoint aside with his mace. “Give up before you get yourself—”
He could never say, afterwards, what had warned him. One moment he was facing the Heroes; the next he had spun to his left, mace up and ready to block. The move saved his life. His mace just barely turned aside a sword thrust that would have disemboweled him.
The woman holding it was wearing scaled armor that almost seemed like it had been fused to her skin. Her open-faced helmet revealed a Knight’s face twisted by something beyond rage; her sword struck sparks from his mace as it slid past him. Matt tried to back up, but she pushed in close before he could and delivered a palm strike to his chest that nearly knocked him from his feet.
As he staggered, she came in again, her motions inhumanly fast. He barely managed to sidestep her next swing, and she ducked below his counterattack almost with a single graceful move. Before he’d even managed to set himself, she’d spun on one foot—somehow still surefooted even in the mud—and came back at him again.
He barely blocked her next strike. It hit with all the force of a battering ram; he half expected the mace to shatter, just like his old weapon had.
This time, however, it was his opponent’s weapon that failed. He saw her eyes go wide as the sword snapped, leaving her with barely a few inches of steel in her hand. Shards of metal whipped past him, and he grunted as two of them struck him in the cheek. She made as if to punch him again, and Matt managed to rob some of the impact by jerking away from the blow.
Matt knew he was outclassed, even with her sword broken. She wasn’t just a ruler; something told him she had to be a Queen of some kind. He had no time to play games with her. The other Humans were in danger, almost as much from their own side as from his lifeguards.
So he channeled another of his miniature spells and created a narrow, foot-deep hole in the mud, right where the Queen’s foot was going to land.
He saw her eyes go wide as her footing went abruptly awry; the snap of her ankle twisted in his gut. She still staggered forward towards him, and Matt put both his hands on his mace and swung at her torso like he was trying to hit a homerun.
The Queen tried to dodge, and with her unnatural grace, she nearly succeeded. The mace still caught her in the side, and she folded up around the hit with an agonized huff of air. Matt pulled his mace back and brought it down in an overhand swing as hard as he could.
It hit the Queen in the neck, right below where her spine met her skull. Her armor crumpled beneath the strike, and the Queen pitched forward onto her hands and knees. Yet, to Matt’s horror, she staggered back up and turned back towards him. Blood was leaking from her lips. There was a mad ferocity in her snarl as she brought her broken sword back up. “Die, die, d—!”
She started to take a step forward, and then Balred was there, driving his sword deep into her side. It snapped as she spun towards him, and the lifeguard simply continued his charge and slammed into her. They went over together into the mud, punching and stabbing at each other with their broken weapons.
Matt took a step forward, only for a swirl of wind to shove him to the side. A crossbow bolt the size of his arm shot past him a heartbeat later. He looked up and saw a Dwarf with an oversized crossbow standing on the trunk of a tree that had fallen across the road. She was swearing as she worked the crank of her crossbow, clearly intending to try again.
As she did, a second Dwarf hurled himself at Matt, a massive axe in his hands. Matt set himself to dodge the charge, and channeled another miniature spell as he did. The Dwarf hit the slick patch a moment later. His charge turned into a wild, flailing stumble. Matt sidestepped him like a matador avoiding a bull and smashed his mace into the back of his head as he went past.
The Dwarf went down, and then, incredibly, started to rise again. Another ruler? How many were here?
Matt took a step towards the Dwarf, but Rethferd reached the ruler first. The Hard Scythe Orc was wielding the weapon of a War Reaper, a polearm with an enormous concave blade on the end that they called a war scythe. Rethferd swung it down at the Dwarf’s neck, and the magic-wrapped blade seemed to eat its way through the Dwarf’s armor as if the metal wasn’t there.
As the headless Dwarf collapsed, Matt spun back to the other one, who was already taking aim at him with her crossbow again. It should have been impossible for her to reload so quickly, but Matt didn’t waste time questioning it. He needed to close the distance before she could—
His eyes went wide as the Dwarf seemed to explode in flame. Her body went flying off into the mud, and he looked to the side to see Melren with his arms up as if he’d just finished casting. The Imp looked triumphant for a moment, but then he pointed behind Matt and shouted.
Matt turned, already ducking low and bracing himself. He brought his mace up, both hands bracing it for whatever was coming.
The hit still drove him to his knees. A snarling Knight drew back his war hammer and kicked Matt right in the chest. Matt felt himself leave the ground, and he skidded across the mud on his back. The Knight roared and rushed forward at him, hammer held high.
Matt channeled a quick burst of Haunted Dust, planting a clump of soggy dirt in the Knight’s face. The Knight abruptly tried to stop, choking on the muck, and Matt channeled again, turning the mud into an even worse morass at his feet. He fought to stand as the Knight’s feet went out from under him, the breath burning in his chest. Had he broken a rib or something?
He took a precious moment to look out across the nearby battlefield. His lifeguard had virtually finished the fight already. Most of the normal Knights and Dwarves were down. Wonoll had managed to topple the samurai lady again, and was yelling at her to stay still. The spearwoman was wrestling with a Red Moon Orc named Tiridine over her spear; having occasionally sparred with the Orc woman before, Matt felt that situation was in hand.
Mulwan had somehow snuck across the fight and put a knife to the archer’s throat; the guy with the sword and shield was laying down his weapons, white-faced and swearing as the Goblin made threatening gestures at his friend. Rethferd and a Goblin named Girluk were backing the Spanish speaker up against a toppled tree; the enormous sword was missing half of its length from where the Orc had probably cut through it.
Matt turned his attention back to the Knight and spat blood into the mire. The man was already getting back up, but it wasn’t going to be an ambush this time. He readied his mace and his magic. Another slick spot might do the job, as long as it let him get a few more swings in. His eyes narrowed as the Knight finally swept the mud from his face and snarled.
Then, just as the Knight started their charge, a blast of something seemed to hit him right in the face. His expression went utterly rigid; frost formed over his still-open eyes and lips. The Knight dropped his hammer and clawed at his face until a second frigid gust of wind swept his feet out from under him. He hit the mud and thrashed for a moment before Matt strode over and finished him with an overhand strike.
He turned to see Tanya striding onto the road, stepping through the mud like it was someone’s dirty floor. “Honestly, Matt, it’s like you just can’t look out for yourself.”
Matt started towards her, trying not to limp. “You have to get out of here, Tanya. This isn’t some dinner party. You aren’t even wearing armor!”
She gave him a look that could have frozen his face. “I can handle myself just fine, and your lifeguards have it under control. Why aren’t we killing those guys? I thought—”
Tanya stopped, her face going pale, and Matt turned. He saw another archer, this one a Knight wearing heavy armor, running along the burning tree trunk towards them. They held a longbow in their hands and had an arrow nocked.
Matt reacted more out of instinct than anything else. He grabbed Tanya’s arm and yanked her behind him, stepping past her in the same motion. It was the fastest way to put himself between her and danger, and even then, as the bow came up, he didn’t know if he’d been fast enough.
Then the Knight loosed the arrow, and time seemed to slow. The arrow screamed through the air, seeming to split the raindrops in its wake. Matt registered its path a heartbeat before it took him in the right shoulder.
The impact sent pain washing through his right arm, followed by a terrifying numbness. It had punched right through one of the plates in his armor. He nearly lost his grasp on his mace, but Matt managed to get his left hand on it before his right failed him. Matt staggered backwards, feeling Tanya still behind him. She was safe.
He saw the Knight drop their bow and draw a sword. They were still running at him, and he fought to get his mace back up in front of him. The Knight jumped, their sword held and ready to plunge down at him.
Matt swung just as the Knight slammed into him. He managed to deflect the stab; the blade scraped by his left side instead of sliding directly into his heart. The Knight still slammed into him, and their weight smashed him back down into the mud. They rolled away from him off to the right, coming back to their feet in a single smooth motion.
The Knight’s sword glittered in their hand as they stalked back towards him. Matt struggled to get himself back to his feet, but one of his legs wasn’t working. A stab of pain lanced down through it every time he tried to put weight on his knee. He grimaced, trying not to see the cruel smile on the Knight’s face.
Then he saw a light burning behind him, and smelt fire. Tanya leaned across him, her expression distorted by utter rage, and she was screaming. “Back off!”
Tanya thrust her hand forward, and Matt caught sight of an intense, concentrated point of light hovering in her hand. Then the spell exploded outward in a single stream of flame. It caught the Knight in the chest and washed across them like dragonfire, setting hair and cloth alight in a heartbeat. The Knight let out an agonized scream and dropped their sword, but Tanya kept pouring more fire into them. She only stopped when she apparently exhausted her new Source, and by then the Knight had already become nothing more than a charred corpse.
Matt stared at the dead Knight, and then snorted. He forced himself up to his feet, trying not to lean on his bad knee. “Remind me not to get on your bad side.”
“As if you’re ever anywhere else.” Tanya seemed to be a little dazed. She reached out for the arrow and jerked back when he flinched. “Are you…”
“Not dead yet.” Matt grinned. He tried to flex the fingers in his numb right hand. “Best to leave it in for now.”
She nodded, though she seemed unhappy about it. A moment later, Balred was there, his broken sword in his hand. “Sire, you’re—”
Matt shook his head. “Do we have them? Are the Heroes captured?” The Orc nodded, and Matt looked across the mud-strewn carnage. “Get our people out of here. We’ve done all we need to. Send a message to Lord Grufen that he can pull our troops back if he wants. This army is finished.”
Balred glanced back at the remains of the Band of Heroes, and then at either side, where the sounds of battle were still happening. “Are you certain, sire?”
“Completely.” He gestured to the bodies in the mud. “Their rulers are dead, their Heroes are captured, and they’ve been bloodied. If what’s left of them doesn’t run as hard as they can back to their homes, I’d be shocked.”
The Orc hesitated, and then nodded. He and the other lifeguards followed as Matt led the way back up the Ridge, dragging and prodding the frightened Humans along with them. It was not a comfortable walk; between the wounds in his shoulder and side, and the agonizing pain in his ribs and knee, Matt felt more like a collection of injuries than a person at the moment.
It took him a moment to realize that aside from the rulers, there hadn’t been any other soldiers from the Alliance trying to help their Heroes. He glanced back, trying to make sense of it as he limped along. Had the fallen trees and the rain really separated them that much?
What he saw nearly made him stumble again. Tanya grabbed hold of one arm and Balred grabbed the other, ignoring his attempts to shrug off their help. He didn’t protest much, not with his mind whirling with the sight of nearly half the Army of Heroes fleeing into the trap-strewn ravine south of the road.
It made sense, in a way. The ambush had been unexpected. The Army of Heroes had been caught in the worst possible position. They’d already been tired from days of hard marching after an elusive enemy, and their commanders and heroes had abruptly died or vanished. Even the best Roman armies had been destroyed in those conditions—and the Army of Heroes hadn’t been a force of battle-hardened legionnaires. They’d been, for the most part, a mob of peasants with barely more than a month’s training. Why would anyone expect them to hold the line against a motivated ambush by veteran soldiers?
As Matt made his way back up the hill, he heard the horn blow again. There were two clear notes, and a triumphant roar swelled from below. Despite his wounds and the shock of finding how far the Alliance had sunk, he smiled as he heard his people claim victory once more.