Chapter 10

“Hey, Kskel.”

Kskel’s eyes opened. He sucked in a deep breath.

“I’m up. What’s going on?”

“Nothing,” Fensis said. “They’re getting ready to move.”

Kskel sat up from the floor, wiping the crust out of his eyes. Light leaked through the slits of the nearby shutters.

“What time is it?” He asked.

“Midmorning,” Fensis replied. “Il-Enkraagh wants to move while we have daylight.”

It wasn’t much, but some sleep was better than none.

They had slowly regained their senses and bearings after the blind flight into the night, curving back to the road following the Rol’en’gorek. From there, they followed it east, stopping at the next Human clanhold to rest. The place had long been emptied, with the Humans being moved away from the river by the local tribes to keep them from randomly being eaten by passing migrants. As such, il-Enkraagh’s exhausted warband and its tagalongs could rest in any den they pleased.

Most chose the buildings around the hold’s central clearing, however, and Kskel found that they were far from the only people who had escaped the city when he went to open the shutters.

“How many people got out?” He asked as he scanned the mix of Beastmen and Humans huddling around the clearing.

“I don’t know,” Fensis said. “Lots. Since we were the first ones in, il-Enverre wants us to blaze the trail east and secure the next hold.”

Kskel turned away from the window.

“…how long have you been up for?”

“Not long. The Lords were discussing it in the clearing.”

“Can the Urmah keep up with us?”

“Il-Enkraagh said they could.”

It was probably true, but he still had his doubts about the decision. If it were up to him, he would have reorganised things sooner rather than later, assigning the Nar, Urmah and Ocelo to protect the civilians and Humans while the Lup, Gao and Con fanned out to screen ahead. Warriors were better than civilians when it came to their long-range endurance, but they still were what they were, and they had just come out of an intense battle.

“Did we get the barges out?”

“Yeah, but we have far from enough. Less than a dozen barges. They’re shipping the civilians upriver first.”

Maybe that was why. With fewer to protect, they were using their extra strength to form mixed groups that could strike at the Undead as they advanced. That was good. So long as they maintained discipline, purpose, and the will to fight, they wouldn’t be beaten so easily by the teeming hordes of the Undead.

Kskel paced around the room, stretching away the last bits of his sleepiness before shaking out his coat. His stomach growled.

“Do they have food?”

“Yeah,” Fensis said. “The noncombatants moved supplies out on a bunch of wagons.”

After equipping his things, Kskel stepped out of the den and into the clearing. A light mist lingered in the streets of the hold, and only a few people were awake and moving about. He raised his nose into the air, following the scent of preserved meat. To the side of the clearing, he found a cart with several Urmah warriors standing guard over it. Il-Enkraagh rose to his feet as Kskel and Fensis approached.

“Good work last night,” he said. “Ready for more?”

“Ready or not,” Kskel replied, “we do what we must.”

The Urmah Lord shook his mane in approval.

“Well said! Here, eat your fill – you’ll need it.”

Kskel took a strip of meat into his mouth, savouring the salty sweetness of Nug imported from the jungles of home. Back when he had lived there, it was an everyday staple for the poorest of the poor. Now, it seemed like a rare delicacy.

“Thanks for coming down for us last night,” Kskel said. “And sorry.”

“There’s nothing for you to be sorry for,” il-Enkraagh replied. “That…whatever it was…played us good. My clan lost a quarter of its mystics, and mystics from the tribes fighting nearby got caught up in it as well.”

Whatever it was…

“You felt it, too?”

“I did. I doubt anyone didn’t. The Elder Liches that Clan Torokgha warned us about were everything they claimed, but that presence lurking behind them was far worse.”

“Did you see what it was?”

“No. Il-Enverre said that more strong Undead appeared after we broke out, but they weren’t the same thing.”

“Il-Enverre made it, huh. How many got out of the city?”

“The civilians were evacuated safely,” Il-Enkraagh replied. “Most of our warriors, as well. The ones that volunteered to act as the rearguard didn’t make it.”

“What about the Humans?”

“A few hundred. The damn fools didn’t want to leave. The Undead stormed the walls before we could force most of them to come with us.”

How many thousands did that add to the numbers of the Undead? He knew Humans were small-minded, but couldn’t they understand even that much?

“Where are the Undead now?” Kskel asked.

“There are no signs of pursuit,” Il-Enkraagh answered. “They’re probably feasting on those idiot Humans.”

“What about the countryside? If what you said before the fight started last night is still true, the Undead might have overtaken our flanks.”

“That’s why we’re heading out,” the Urmah Lord said. “Il-Enverre’s sent two dozen warbands to secure the road east. Your usual warband is being added to mine for this, and we’re to destroy any Undead that have gotten ahead of us.”

Kskel nodded. It was a simple enough combination. The Lup would sniff out any Undead, and the Urmah would tear apart anything that couldn’t be handled through skirmishing alone.

They departed a half hour later, feet splashing over the stone road as they padded along at a quick jog. The downpour of the previous night had settled into a drizzle, though the many rivers and streams they crossed were still swollen with runoff. To the south, the silt-laden Rol’en’gorek dominated the landscape.

“Think they could come out of the river?” Fensis asked.

“I don’t see why not,” Kskel answered. “Whether they can advance directly against the current is another question. Even the strongest swimmer can be washed away by the smallest river during the deluge.”

His gaze followed a pair of hunters assigned to the shore, then it turned away, crossing the road to the waterlogged fields in the north.

“Even with the weather like this,” he said, “they should still be faster overland. You’ve heard the stories: they’re slow when they haven’t caught your scent, but they never tire. Every second we stop is a second they have to catch up.”

“These Humans space their holds at annoying distances, too,” Fensis said. “Thirty kilometres is too far for our Nar and Urmah civilians to travel in one day.”

“It’s why they’re sticking them in the barges first, I guess. The ships will be back for another trip by the evening, too. Maybe they’ll bring back more with them and we can all get out of here.”

“If only life were so convenient,” Kskel grunted.

An hour later, thick columns of smoke along the riverbank confirmed that life was, indeed, not so convenient. Their two warbands ran to the shore, finding hundreds of Beastmen dragging themselves out of the water.

“Uh, they’re not Undead, right?” Fensis stopped a few metres away from the closest of them.

“Of course not,” Kskel rushed forward, wading into the water to help a Con mother and her children ashore. “What happened, miss?”

“Th-the…the boats,” she gasped for breath. “Fire…”

Hundreds of other warriors rushed to the aid of the civilians being washed downstream. The river was filled with bobbing heads trying to escape the current.

“Did the Undead do it?” Fensis dragged another group out of the water.

“Who else would have done it?” Kskel said, “Fires don’t just accidentally happen during the deluge. Did you see how it happened?”

The miserable-looking survivors nearby looked to one another.

“No,” someone said. “I-I don’t understand it. The barges were packed. We should have noticed something, but then, suddenly fires started springing up everywhere! We doused them with water from the river, but they wouldn’t go out.”

Magic?

He recalled the Elder Liches’ conflagration on the wall. Their attack had come out of nowhere, too.

“What do you think?” He asked a nearby mystic.

“We know too little about what these Undead magic casters are capable of,” she replied, “but there are countless spells that produce flames. One can only assume that it’s well within the realm of possibility.”

Kskel looked upriver to the burnt-out remains of the closest barge, which had been hastily run aground to save its passengers. The ships further from shore had become little more than bits of flaming wreckage floating by. If river transportation could be so easily denied to them, their situation was far worse than they initially expected.

Once they could no longer spot anyone in the water, Kskel and Fensis returned to the road where il-Enkraagh and Enjaka – Kskel and Fensis’ chieftain and the leader of their warband – were looking out over the mass of shipwrecked civilians.

“Kskel,’ Enjaka said, “how many were on your part of the shore?”

“About a hundred,” Kskel replied.

“It looks like most survived,” il-Enkraagh said. “But that’s close to two thousand people requiring escort. If the Undead hit us now…”

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“Never mind now,” Enjaka snorted. “These people won’t get far as they are. We’re going to have to put them up in the next Human village so they can rest.”

“And who will guard them?”

“We won’t have to wait for long. More warbands escorting the remaining civilians should be on the way. My scouts say that it’s clear.”

Il-Enkraagh blew out a loud sigh.

“There’s that, at least.”

The warbands were instructed to help the civilians to the nearby village, which wasn’t anywhere near large enough to accommodate them all. Every building was filled and those who couldn’t fit inside huddled under the eaves trying to dry themselves off. Fences were taken apart and bonfires lit, the soaked wood adding more columns of smoke to the morning sky.

“At least the people behind us should see that something’s wrong,” Kskel said as they patrolled the village perimeter.

“Do you think the Undead went out to attack the boats on purpose?” Fensis asked.

“Of course they did,” Kskel spat. “They have no honour whatsoever.”

Any warrior with half a lick of sense understood what was going on. The Elder Liches could fly, meaning that they could attack anywhere at their leisure. Yet, they had only done so at two points.

The first was when Il-Enkraagh rallied the defenders of the western wall to rescue the hunters that had fallen into the swarms of Undead. It was a feat of valour that any clan would gladly have their Bards boast of in song. As if to quench the elation that came with that glorious moment, the Elder Liches had appeared to wreak havoc.

Now, they had burnt their ships and with it any hope for an expeditious retreat. He knew what would happen next. The civilians would be subjected to the same, arduous flight that those bare few in the west had survived…and the warrior clans were honour-bound to protect them. In a single act of cold calculation, their fates had been set on a predictable course.

He shuddered as he recalled the dread presence they had felt over the city. It was as if a vile harbinger of darkness had appeared, delivering a wordless whisper of the terrors to come.

“Uh, you didn’t catch anything, did you?” Fensis eyed him warily.

“Huh?”

“You just shivered like you had a chill. One of those Ghouls didn’t bite you, did they?”

“I’m fine,” Kskel said. “Something scratched my back last night, but a mystic on the wall healed it.”

And then that mystic got scoured off the wall by a blazing inferno.

He didn’t want to remember it. His eyes wandered over the ground ahead of them, stopping at a smooth stone half-buried in the mud. He knelt to pick it up, adding it to his poorly-stocked pouch of bullets.

“Make sure you have ammunition as well,” he said. “If those damn things come flying in again…”

“Uh-huh.”

They mindlessly patrolled the premises for the next hour, at which point the first of the groups following after them from the city appeared on the horizon. An Ocelo Lord ran up to the village with his retinue.

“What’s going on here?” He said, “Where did all these people come from?”

“The Elder Liches attacked the ships that left ahead of us,” Kskel said. “They’re resting here for now.”

“Just great. Is il-Enkraagh here?”

Kskel bobbed his head and led the Lord to il-Enkraagh and Enjaka. There was little they could come up with between them, so the Ocelo Lord was left with the survivors while il-Enkraagh and Enjaka departed to carry out their original orders.

The rain picked up as the day went on; otherwise, it was uneventful. They didn’t grow lax in their vigilance, however, scrutinising the riverbank and rows of vineyards along the road. When they arrived at their destination, they were surprised to find a few warbands already occupying it. The scents on the eastern winds proved that they were of the living.

Il-Enkraagh looked up at the gatehouse through the downpour, shading his eyes with a paw.

“Who goes there?” He shouted.

“Gao Okor’mar and its constituent tribes!” One of the Gao shouted back down at them, “Most of them, anyway. We’re on the way to Torokgha, but we stopped here for the night.”

Gao Okor’mar managed the lands northeast of the Human city they had just evacuated. Since the Undead were reportedly advancing along the entire front, it made sense that they would head for the Rol’en’gorek on the way to the city on the lake that served as Clan Torokgha’s hold.

“This is bad…” il-Enkraagh muttered under his breath.

Kskel gave the Urmah Lord a sidelong glance. With so many civilians on their hands, he could only think that having more warriors around to protect them was a good thing.

Once the sentries granted them passage, il-Enkraagh made his way straight to the centre of the hold, his black mane tossing in the wind as he scanned the surroundings. Gao Okor’mar wasn’t a small clan by any measure, and Kskel guessed that there were several thousand warriors plus five times their number of civilians present in the hold and its surroundings. Much like the one that they had come from, people were trying to make the best of an unexpected situation, with tribes dividing the area between them.

They found the Clanlord on the southern side of the clan’s central clearing, conferring with two dozen tribal chieftains. They turned at the sound of il-Enkraagh’s approach.

“You too?” The Gao Lord said.

“Everyone, going by the number of runners that reached us,” il-Enkraagh replied. “When did you arrive in this hold, il-Enkaew?”

“The first of us arrived three hours ago,” il-Enkaew told them. “People are still trickling in. There weren’t any boats moored here, but I sent a pack of hunters across the Rol’en’gorek to Torokgha. They should be back with some ships late this afternoon.”

“Didn’t you see the–no, never mind,” il-Enkraagh released a tired sigh. “Those who have rested the longest need to continue moving east. We have at least fifty thousand coming from the west.”

“Fifty thousand…did you fight at all?”

“For about half of last night. We destroyed thousands of Undead, but more kept coming. Those Elder Liches they’ve been talking about showed up…and there’s something worse behind them. Il-Enverre made the call to withdraw after we found out what was going on across the entire front.”

Il-Enkaew and his chieftains spent several moments silently digesting the information.

“Since you came out of the city relatively unscathed,” il-Enkaew said, “can we offer resistance at every town along the way? We’ll have eighty thousand between us.”

“I don’t doubt that we could,” il-Enkraagh said, “and we will probably have to. The Undead horde’s behaviour has clearly changed – there is some malevolent will actively directing them now. They’re using tactics we’ve never seen before. Speaking of which, I hope those boats you sent for never come.”

“…why?”

“The barges that we were using to transport our people were destroyed in transit. I was going to ask if you saw the columns of smoke downriver, but you probably sent those runners hours before then.”

“What did it cost the Undead to do that?” Il-Enkaew asked.

“Nothing, as far as we could see,” il-Enkraagh answered. “The ships just went up in flames on the river while it was raining.”

Il-Enkaew gao Okor’mar looked down, pressing a paw to the back of his neck. Kskel’s mouth fell open in dismay as he realised the implications that il-Enkraagh was pointing out.

Crossing the Rol’en’gorek during the deluge was impossible for most without using ships. With the Undead destroying those ships, everyone north of the river was effectively separated from those in the south. Their new destination was the Human city on the border of the jungle, some one hundred-odd kilometres away.

“We’ll get our people going,” il-Enkaew said. “Every group that comes in will be allowed four hours of rest. Does that sound alright?”

“It will be prudent to split up the races, as well,” il-Enkraagh nodded. “The Con, Gao and Lup civilians can cover the distance in two days or so. It will take the Nar and Urmah three times as long. The forerunners shouldn’t need an escort, so we can dedicate all of our forces towards delaying the Undead advance. I’m sure il-Enverre will find the reasoning sound…by the way, where are your Humans?”

Il-Enkaew exchanged glances with his chieftains.

“They were, uh…sedated, if you can call it that. We used the stuff that Sage Khhschlr distributed to pacify them while our defenders were busy. Those Humans weren’t going anywhere unless we planned on carrying them.”

“I’m glad we didn’t use that stuff,” il-Enkraagh said. “Il-Enverre and the others don’t trust that ‘Sage’ any further than they can throw her, so he just left her delivery to rot.”

If the entire countryside was filled with sedated Humans, how many millions did that add to the ranks of the Undead? Their situation only seemed to grow worse with every new bit of information.

Kskel’s warband drew the night watch, so he and Fensis curled up in a free spot along the inside of the hold’s wall. Fensis prodded him awake a few hours later, and he found the place four times as crowded as before.

“Has il-Enverre arrived yet?” Kskel asked.

“No idea,” Fensis yawned. “I got up five minutes before you did.”

They gave up their spot to a family that was wandering around with lost looks on their faces. Enjaka assigned them to the piers, where they found that a large crowd had gathered.

“What’s going on here?” Fensis asked as they swapped with a pair of sentries from gao Okor’mar.

“First batch for transport,” the sentry answered. “Il-Enkaew’s hoping we can sneak out at least one trip before the Undead notice.”

What were the chances of that? The Undead already knew to destroy their boats.

“Have the Undead shown up at all?” Kskel asked.

“Nope, it’s been pretty quiet. Not even a Wraith to pester us like they usually do.”

Maybe they did have a chance. The front was huge and whatever was directing the Undead couldn’t be everywhere at once. Even ten Elder Liches was a scarce number to control so many Undead over such a wide area.

Kskel and Fensis took their place in the line of sentries along the wharf. An hour later, a group of dots appeared on the eastern horizon, which rapidly resolved into river barges.

“Good!” Il-Enkaew clapped his paws, “Our ships are coming in – no pushing! We’ll fit as many as we reasonably can.”

Though the crowd didn’t press forward, the weight of their anticipation and anxiety felt much the same. Kskel divided his attention between the waiting civilians and the approaching ships.

“…what?”

Kskel looked over his shoulder at Fensis’ confused voice. Some four hundred metres away, one of the ships was gone. There were no flames or plumes of smoke: it had simply disappeared.

“I didn’t see it,” Kskel said, “what happe–”

One by one, the barges sunk into the river. Their crews milled about on their decks, looking just as confused as Kskel felt before jumping overboard. They, too, vanished in turn.

“Can someone explain what in the world happened to those ships?!” Il-Enkaew’s frustrated roar sounded over the waterfront.

“Th-they just sunk!” One of the other sentries said, “No sign of a fight.”

A worried clamour rose from the crowd. Kskel was too busy watching the river’s surface to see what they were doing. There were no pieces of debris or bodies floating by.

“Get your people moving, il-Enkaew,” Il-Enkraagh called down from the nearby wall. “It’s clear that they aren’t going to let us cross.”

Half of the sentries along the wharf were reorganised to help clear the way to the eastern gate. Kskel and Fensis remained, watchful for whatever had sunk their transports.

“How many Undead do you think are in the river?” Fensis said.

“I don’t know,” Kskel replied.

“This is really bad, isn’t it? There are enough Undead to push us back across the entire basin. We’re cut in half by the river, but the Undead can cross whenever they want.”

“The Clanlords will figure something out,” Kskel told the younger hunter. “We just need to help hold things together.”

He wasn’t sure if his words were in any way convincing. No matter which way he looked at it, they were in a dire situation.

Kskel’s eyes went to il-Enkraagh on the wall, who was still watching the civilians gathered along the wharf file out of the city. A Con runner came up behind the Urmah Lord, who turned and swivelled his ears toward the newcomer. Ten minutes passed before Enjaka came down to speak to the members of his warband stationed along the wharf.

“The Undead are on the move,” he said, “they left the city two hours ago.”

“Are we having everyone vacate this hold, then?” Kskel asked.

“Not right away,” Enjaka shook his head. “The people need a bit of rest or they’ll be collapsing on the road. At their current rate, the Undead will reach this hold in a day, but il-Enverre is conducting a fighting withdrawal. Hopefully, that will slow things down enough that we can get the civilians out of this alive.”

“But the warriors need to rest, too…”

“Il-Enverre’s already issued orders for that. In the morning, the warriors here will head out and begin skirmishing in the forward forces’ place. Il-Enverre’s forces will rest here and prepare the defences for whenever the Undead arrive. We’ll head to the next hold once the Undead reach this one and repeat.”

Kskel tried to remember how many walled holds there were to the easternmost city.

“That will get us five days at this rate?” Fensis said, “Our slowest need six.”

“If we stall for four hours at every hold,” Enjaka said, “that should get us enough time. The fastest civilian groups will get there in two days, so we may even receive reinforcements at some point.”

“Don’t we still have Undead moving on the flanks? If we try to stall our part of the front, we’re going to end up in the situation we withdrew to avoid in the first place.”

“We know,” their Lord rumbled grimly. “But that is what we must do to protect our people. The best we can do about the flanks for now is to have hunters screen for approaching Undead. Who knows – killing tens of thousands of Undead a day may completely syphon away their strength before this fight gets very far.”

“That would be nice,” Kskel grunted. “What about nar Torokgha? Do we know what they’re doing yet?”

“No,” Enjaka shook his head, “but since they sent those boats, they should at least have some idea of what’s going on here. Il-Enkraagh just sent a few hunters to update them on our situation.”

“Will they make it with Undead watching the water now?” Fensis asked.

“They haven’t been able to detect any of our decent hunters so far,” Enjaka said. “We should be able to establish some lines of communication soon.”

He hoped it would be the case. Despite all of their preparations prior to the Undead advance, everything their forces did a mere day after it started was more improvisation than anything else.

“For now,” Enjaka told them, “you’re to continue carrying out your duties. Once your watch is over, get as much rest as possible – we’re going to have a long fight ahead of us.”