Midnight had long passed before the beasts and the gnomes took their first, brief break. While marching through the sand and scattered thistles, sedges, and sawgrass under the dim night sky, Roland had learned first-hand of the accuracy of Sloat’s description of the grim Color Gnomes.
They were a craggy, weathered people with exaggerated features: knuckles too large for the hands, hands too large for the arms, bodies too wide for the legs, noses and ears too large for the faces. Their posture was stooped, their shoulders rounded, their stomachs ample, their jaws square, their stares icy. Their obsession with color seemed totally at odds with their cold personalities. But not only did they carry bright, sputtering torches in a rainbow of hues, but they dressed in hooded jackets of various bright shades.
Anxious to press the battle before Ishyrus could complete its destruction of the realm bonds, the alliance of beasts and gnomes had hurriedly drawn up a scheme of attack. The animals, being far stealthier than the Gnomes, were to creep under the cover of night to the western edge of the ridge overlooking Point Harrow. Meanwhile, the Gnomes, who had the better trained and more disciplined army, were to execute a precise and intricate march. They were to circle around to the bay at the eastern shore of the peninsula. All of the birds flying with the animals were were hovering in the sky, ready to engage any airborne enemy to keep them from spotting the maneuver. A lone eagle, flying high enough to observe the movements of both groups and too high to be seen by the enemy, would screech the signal for the attack to begin. The animals would then charge from the southwest while the Gnomes cut across the point from the east.
Convinced that the defense of the entire lower realms depended on stopping Ishyrus before it dissolved the realm bonds, the allies had agreed to throw every last claw, tooth, sword and ax at their command into this battle, leaving nothing in reserve.
“The only alternatives,” Hatanwa the wolverine reminded everyone, “are success or death. If we lose at Point Harrow, we lose the war. We lose the realms. We lose the future."
Packory had suggested that Roland and Sloat split up between the advancing armies, so as to provide the enemy with two unexpected elements to ponder in its analysis of their foe. Neither Roland not Sloat could imagine Ishyrus or anyone else wasting a thought on either of them. But Roland agreed to the plan, for an entirely different reason. As the combat drew near, Sloat began openly second-guessing his presence in a camp of war. Roland decided he had enough worries without marching side-by-side into battle with a Tishaaran in the throes of a wrestling match with his conscience. Feeling somewhat ill at ease among the beasts anyway, Roland had casually offered his services to the Gnomes.
“Perhaps I could pass myself off as an off-color Gnome,” he had quipped to Sloat as he set off to join the dour people. Of course, Sloat had not seen the humor.
Greenrafter, one of the Gnome chieftains, had glowered at Roland’s request to join them. But strictly on grounds that Roland more closely resembled the Gnomes than the animals, he reluctantly tolerated his presence. “To the rear,” the chieftain had barked, with no further word of welcome.
Roland trudged along, staring at the bobbing heads of the somber soldiers before him. They had left their extinguished torches stacked near the animal camp. Now they accepted bruises and twisted ankles on their unlit path as the price of the crucial element of surprise.
The restless Fourth Realm wind continued to scour the ridges, yet it could not dislodge a spotty fog that had settled into the hollows. The Gnomes rarely spoke beyond occasional muffled debates about the best way to fight a weasel while fending off vulture talons, or whether an ax or club would work better against the spiny-backed Urchins, the cruel, coastal-dwelling Fourth Realmers.
This sort of talk called Roland’s attention to the fact that he was marching into battle unarmed. Spare weapons were not readily available in the realms, or if they were, no one parted easily with them. He had not the slightest idea what he would do once the fighting started. I feel like a water boy. Call me Gunga Din.
When the Gnomes reached their appointed positions, they wasted no time in arranging themselves into compact lines of assault. They waited wordlessly in the spray of waves that crashed upon the rocks on their right flank, glaring at the campfires that flickered in the distance. Roland stood in the rear of the army, feeling totally alone in the world. This felt curiously unlike the fear he had faced when he confronted the Raxxar horde, or when the Droom had closed in on him at the Thousand Valleys, and nothing like the terror of the Fifth Realm. This was a duller, deeper, nauseating dread. This was beyond the range of any personal afflictions. Before, the fear had all been inside him, freezing his veins and jamming his senses. Now the fear was outside; it was everywhere, spreading across the Point as if on the wings of a cold wind. This was war.
An eagle’s screech ripped through the night silence. With more of a grunt than a battle cry, the hooded Gnomes sprang over a small knoll and charged at a full run.
Oh, my God! Roland repeatedly pleaded for divine help as he inched forward, waiting for the front lines to clear out so that he could join the attack. But before he could move, a bolt of lightning seared the sky, sizzling the heavens like fat on a hot grill. Roland had to shield his eyes from the blinding shaft that tore through the clouds. Just as the image of the bolt faded, the sky exploded in fireworks that cast a crackling purple radiance over the Point. A supernatural roar erupted, followed by a terrible cry that did not echo against the background of the earth but rather seemed to radiate from the sky. It crashed down as from another cosmos, from the other side of death, overwhelming the earth on which Roland stood.
Roland dropped to his knees and braced himself on all fours against the quaking ground, wondering what new horrors had been set loose against them. Not until the tumult died away did he lift his head to look toward the Point. Far off in the distance on the highest bluff of Point Harrow, so far away that it appeared to float in the sea, a purple bonfire raged. Its evil flames leapt high into the sky where, lashed by winds, they writhed in spectacular contortions.
The Gnomes halted their attack. Roland could see some of the hooded warriors silhouetted against the distant purple flames as they turned to each other in confusion and despair. Anxious whispers turned to terrified cries: questions gave way to sharp answers and despairing shouts.
Roland longed for someone to whom he could direct his own questions, but the Gnomes were all busy in heated conversation with one another, and he tried without much success to pick up what was being said. Finally, one grizzled fellow with a stubbly chin, apparently not well-regarded by his peers, had no one else to whom he could repeat the spreading rumor, and so he growled it to Roland. “They’ve broken through! We’ve been bedeviled by the powers of the Fifth! That and Urchin magic.”
“What do you mean? What happened?” Roland asked.
The Gnome grumbled some more about Fifth Realm devilry. “Was that it?” asked Roland. “Was that the breaking the of the realm bonds?”
But the fellow had nothing more to say. The entire camp had fallen into confusion. Dark curses grew more bitter, but no one seemed to have any idea of what to do. Then at last, Roland heard his name being called, summoned by the two main Gnome chieftains, Redmerit and Greenrafter. He was escorted through the ranks of the Gnomes to the forward line, where the chieftains were in animated conversation.
“Ah, there you are!” cried Greenrafter, a large, powerful Gnome with flowing white hair and beard and eyebrows enough to form a broom. But he proceeded to ignore him, leaving Roland to witness a furious argument about what had happened and what was to be done. According to Greenrafter, the battle and the war were over already.
“We are too late!” he cried. “Any fool can see that Ishyrus has broken the realm bonds. See how the purple flames burn.” They are as strong now as when they ignited." He gestured toward the flames that burned like an evil beacon far away on the highest ocean bluff of Point Harrow. The flames seemed impossibly far away.
“Who would deny that this is the greatest tragedy ever to befall the realmlands since the dawn of remembered time?” Greenrafter continued. “We now face the might and wrath of the Fifth Realm. Who among us can stand against the supernatural, much less fight it? Look what the power of Ishyrus has done in one stroke. It has thrown our entire army back from the peninsula. We stand here now, at least five miles east of where we started the attack, by my reckoning. Ishyrus has been watching, calculating, and has chosen exactly the right time to strike. Our beast allies have already commited to the assault, counting on our aid from their right flank, and now it will not come. We cannot hope to get there before the battle is over and our friends are slaughtered!”
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Roland imagined the scene with horror. All of the animals, plus Sloat, were charging headlong into the enemy at this very moment, oblivious to the disaster on their eastern flank. Even now, hard-pressed from all sides, they were casting furtive eyes to the east, pleading for the support upon which they had gambled their lives.
“I agree ‘tis of no use,” said Redmerit. “By the time we get there ‘twill be too late. Naught to do but watch the buzzards dine on the dead and go down fighting in our turn. Nonetheless, we must do it. We must race with all speed to the Point. Whether we get there too late or not, we must try. We swore to attack on the eagles’ cry, and that we must do. A Gnome is faithful to his word.”
“Why bother?” growled Greenrafter. “We agreed to attack in order to prevent the breaking of the realms. That mission has already failed. It is utter madness to charge head-long into the might of the Accursed Realm, before which none of us can stand.”
“We’ve no choice,” insisted Redmerit. “We said we would attack. If we fail to keep our word to our allies, we will never crawl out out from under the shame.”
“Who’ll be there to accuse us?” came the reply. “The beasts will all be dead whether we go to their aid or no.”
“We stand on the edge of our graves whether we attack or no,” said Redmerit. “Our lands are now laid bare to the Nephilim ghouls. What future do you see for us? Better to die here in defense of our honor than to die faithless, cowering in some hole and waiting for the demons of the Fifth to drag us out!”
“But even if we were to engage in this fool’s mission for the sake of honor, what is to keep Ishyrus from pushing us back again every time we get close?” asked Greenrafter. He turned to Roland, “You, that is why you were summoned. They say you’ve been to the Accursed Land. Tell us what you know of the magic of that realm. What do we face? What powers does Ishyrus wield?”
Roland felt put on the spot. Sweat flowed freely down his temple as he tried to dredge up the unnerving memories of his time in the Fifth Realm. He tried to recall his conversation with Adonaram and his experience in fighting off Draxis. The powers of the Fifth Realm were beyond imagining, once they got loose. Except. . .
“Wait a minute,” said Roland. “I don’t know if Ishyrus has much in the way of real power just yet.”
“Bahh!” cried Greenrafter. “Call it what you will, t’were a powerful spell it cast to throw an entire army far from the field in one snap of a finger.”
“But it’s been starved for centuries,” said Roland. “Ishyrus is a Seraph, and they feed off good will and peace and all those virtues. It can’t have fed on anything before it broke the realm bonds and it’s got nothing to feed on now, with a battle going on around him. It really cannot be all that powerful. Not yet.”
Both Gnome chieftains stared at him in disgust and disbelief. “You call moving an entire army five miles to the rear `not that powerful?’” scoffed Greenrafter. “I’d like to hear what you think real power might do!”
“You have to understand this; until they feed again, their only power is illusion,” said Roland, staring suspiciously at the fire burning miles away on the Point. Their power is an illusion. Only an illusion. Suddenly, it hit him. “You know what?” he said, “I don’t think Ishyrus really threw us back. I think it made us think it’s thrown us back. Yeah, that’s how it would have to work.”
Redmerit and Greenrafter raised their heavy eyebrows and stared at each other for a few moments. “I think you’re daft,” snorted Redmerit. “But since I’m all for continuing the attack, such as we can, we can certainly test out your bizarre theory. Let us go, now, Greenrafter, and see how soon we come upon the field of battle.”
Greenrafter shook his head sadly. “Whether it be five miles or five feet, we will find ourselves on the last battlefield of of the Gnomes,” he warned. ”Are you prepared to send your soldiers to their doom, Redmerit?”
“We gave the beasts our word, Greenrafter. That is all there is to the matter.”
Greenrafter blew out a long sigh, and gripped his long battle-ax. “Then let us make a fight that the enemy will long remember, for I fear there will be none on our side to recount the deeds.”
Word spread quickly and the Gnome ranks reformed. The army broke into a forced march, the Gnomes' short legs pistoning over the ground. Barely had they begun to move when Roland heard the first screams that forewarned of a battle tableau more obscene than anything Roland could imagine. The Gnome army crested a line of hills and there discovered that Roland had been right; their removal from the battlefield had been only an illusion. Under the bright moonlight, now turning to dawn, the found a field on which the animals, widely dispersed, were fighting for their lives against the enemy horde.
The wolverines whirled and slashed as if berserk. Mighty rams shattered the bones of their foes, and several large cougars and black bears raked holes in the enemy lines. For an instant these islands of defiance gave Roland hope. But he quickly saw that these were the exception. The numbers of standing animals were too few. Unsupported by Gnome weaponry, they were especially vulnerable to arrows. Clouds of cruel barbs whooshed through the purple haze.
The Gnomes lurched into a heavy-legged sprint to save their allies. But a second enemy force lay in wait for them. Charging out of a deep ravine, fresh troops of Raxxars, Urchins, Brookings, and Pharitans cut off the Gnomes before they could reach the shattered lines of the beasts. At the same time, weasels and the enormous white bears of the north tore into one flank, while huge beasts that reminded Roland of prehistoric animals attacked the other. Enormous sailbacked, reptile-like creatures rose up from the hills, some sporting long horns on their faces, as well as a giant sloth, a mastodon, and several wooly rhinoceros. These were the creatures known only among the animals as “the Terrible Ones” who had long lived in isolation on the far western shores of the Fourth Realm.
Their allies’ cries of anguish from across the field maddened the Gnomes to a murderous fury. Despite being vastly outnumbered, they tore into the ranks of their foes and battered their way forward, inch by inch. But as they did so, a chill crept over the Gnome vanguard. Even Roland, still in the rear, insulated by lines of Gnomes eagerly seeking an opening to join the fray, could feel it--a thin almost invisible mist, filled with poison. Several Gnomes cried out loud and, although untouched by weapon, claw, or tooth, fell writhing to the ground and then lay still.
Only then did they notice the trees.
The Point Harrow peninsula supported few trees beyond an occasional orphaned wisp of a sapling doomed to an exhausting struggle for existence in the wind-whipped, barren hills. But now, knotted, leafless trunks with glassy smooth limbs appeared from nowhere into the middle of the battlefield. These wooden specters dissolved in the dawn light only to slowly materialize a short distance away. Whenever any of the valiant Gnome warriors came within range of their shadows, he fell into an invisible web of death from which there was no escape.
“Tree wraiths!” cried the Gnomes in despair. “The Fifth Realm is upon us! Retreat!” They called to the animals, ”Nephilim! Flee! Save yourselves however you can!”
The front lines of the Gnomes fought heroically to buy time for those who fled toward the ridge. The bright hues of their hoods reflected the morning sun and decorated the nightmarish landscape with incongruous brightness. But fear reflected in those normally belligerent eyes. Droves of Raxxars swarmed upon them from every side. Rats, wild dogs, wildcats, bats, and weasels dodged through the retreating ranks of Gnomes and raced past them to cut off their escape. The Terrible Ones slashed wide swaths of death and destruction in the Gnome ranks.
Across the field, the tattered remnants of the animal army gave up the fight and ran for their lives. Fast on their heels charged the enemy, their ranks swelled by fresh Barbarian hordes from the far western Fourth Realm land of Stogmor and a regiment of ashen-faced Brookings. they fell upon the wounded and the stragglers near the foot of the bald ridge.
Roland searched for Sloat among the scattered ranks of animals but could not find him. Wait! There he was cracking his tishaarat at an onrushing Barbarian! There he fell, his dusty blue cloak disappearing beneath the bulk of his powerful foe. Roland’s shout of horror died in his throat as Gnomes crowded in on him from all sides, driven back by the overwhelming forces surrounding them. Swords and claws slashed cruelly on all sides as the carnage drew closer. One Gnome stepped on Roland’s foot while another pitched backwards onto him, hurling Roland to the ground. He narrowly escaped being hewn by the ax of a Gnome who swung wildly while keeping a terrified eye on the tree wraiths that silently stole among the ranks.
A Third Realm Pharitan, dressed in shimmering chain mail, fell next to Roland. After freeing his foot from beneath the bleeding corpse, Roland pried loose the sword still clenched in the Pharitan’s hand. Dismayed at its weight, he held it in front of him with both hands. While it was too heavy for him to wield effectively, he could at least use it to block some of the blows coming at him.
The Gnomes and animals would have been annihilated on the spot by their vastly superior foe had not an unexpected reinforcement taken the field. Roaring with a savagery that stopped the enemy in its tracks, two dozen golden-brown grizzlies charged into battle.
The big bears tore savagely into the smaller vermin harassing the Gnomes’ rear until the air was choked with fur. Just as the main pocket of Gnomes was caving in on all sides, the grizzlies tore open a hole in the rear wall of Ishyrus’s deadly snare. Roland joined the flood of dour warriors who poured through the gap and raced back toward their camp. Meanwhile, the grizzlies swept along the flanks, scattering entire regiments of the enemy host.
The ferocious bears were few, however, and their impact was short-lived. Their great strength was soon countered by the Terrible Ones, who stepped forward, seeking out bears for in single combat. At the same time, the tree wraiths advanced upon them, and though the grizzlies were too wary to fall under their fatal spells, the presence of the wraiths
greatly restricted their movement. Beyond screens of tree wraiths, the rest of Ishyrus’s armies regrouped.
Roaring their defiance, the grizzlies slashed up and down the lines, dodging blows of the Terrible Ones with graceful feints and staying clear of the wraiths. They held the enemy at bay just long enough for the bulk of the Gnomes to regroup atop a ridge.
The grizzlies then bounded off to the west to harass the armies that pursued the decimated animal ranks. But the endless tide of Ishyrus’s servants continued to pour in from all sides. The swiftest of the enemy, the Pharitans, cut off the retreat. The two armies--the Gnomes and the animals--clung to shrinking islands, surrounded by a surging sea of enemies. The heroic effort of the grizzlies appeared to have merely postponed the inevitable for a short time. The soldiers of Ishyrus shouted in triumph as they pushed in for the kill. Intoxicated by the might of their numbers and spurred to boldness by the invincibility of the Terrible Ones and by the immortal tree wraiths, they pressed in upon the shrinking knots of allies.
All at once, thunder rumbled anew under the cloudless sky. The earth shook.
“Here comes the final flourish Ishyrus’s wizardry to finish us off,” cried a Gnome.
The roar grew louder, deafening, and Roland wondered what form the latest manifestation of their doom would take. Were the Urchins conjuring up huge boulders to crush them where they stood? Or had Ishyrus yet another army, even more powerful, waiting in the wings to finish them off? Perhaps the Droom had arrived to do the honors. Or had a legion of 1,000 Nephilim burst upon the scene in search of the nourishment of pain denied them for so many centuries?