Into the Deep Wood

The Witch was gone.

She’d disappeared into the darkness, sliding her body down the muddy earth. It stuck to her, and he could see for a moment as she grabbed at roots to stop her fall. His heart sank, but he said nothing.

They’d lowered a rope as far as it could go without knowing if it was enough.

Ivan sat against the roots by the entrance, Kladenets sheathed by his side, and their packs left beside him. He allowed his head to roll back and closed his eyes.

Waiting was the only thing he could do now.

Evening fell, and with it came a cold so sharp that even under every layer of clothes he had, chills still shuddered through him.

At times, he paced. At times he sat. At times he circled around the Great Oak, looking up into its branches, into the darkness so high up that it seemed to swallow the sky.

Two days had passed. Two nights.

And on the third came the serpent.

It wound its way through the trees more carefully than before, although its black glossy scales still scraped against the trunks, making the trees groan. The moment he heard it, Ivan’s muscles tensed up and he felt his blood warm. He went for the sword, keeping it low, his back to the Great Oak.

The remnants of its other heads hung loosely –one was sliced and the wound healed into dirt-crusted black and pink flesh. The other, the one they'd taken at the Western Wound, was still shredded and hung off in uneven pieces. The head was gone, it must have gotten stuck among the trees where they found its skull. It held the remaining head high as it dragged the two necks along.

The serpent stopped at the edge of the clearing, keeping its distance from the man. Its head remained still, facing him, as its body caught up, coiling.

The Champion’s bravery guards the Witch, then. He thinks his might and the power of his love will save her in the beating heart of the forest.

The words echoed inside his mind, the voice sounding as if it strained to form the words.

Ivan gripped the sword tighter but did not reply. There were no other men here this time, nor gods. There were no ships with iron blades forged into their noses. He was the only one.

The only one standing between the serpent and the Witch.

Tell me, Champion, has she ever said those words? I need not ask, I can already smell the heartbreak on you. Yet here you stand, a man who would lay down his life for one who would forget your name before your body cooled.

“Do not approach, devil,” Ivan whispered, and even from so far, the serpent seemed to hear. Its coils shifted, the rising moon’s light glinting from them as if they were made of steel. It did not attack.

“What are you?”

I am Nothing.

I have always been Nothing.

I can give you things, Champion. Your faith has guided your every step, I know it guides them still. I can make you the head of the Order—the new High Templar. Swear the Oath, and the faithful will fall behind you. Leave now, and you will have it.

“You do not speak for the faithful.” Ivan shook his head, taking a step closer.

The serpent’s tongue flickered out, and its head crept to the left, meaning to circle around the clearing slowly.

Then, contest the kingdoms. I will guide your weapon to slay those who taint the land. The selfish kings. Return and lead the Iron Claws across the seas. Conquer them. Raise your sword against the imposter who claims to be the Shattered God himself. Show them the might of the All-Father whom they have forsaken in the West.

“I do not wish to sit as king.”

Ivan steadied his breathing. He saw the serpent carefully move about, looking for an opening. Biding it’s time.

Its neck slowly drew back to strike.

If you do not wish glory, if you do not have taste for power, then bow down before me –and I shall take all my favor from the Deathless One and bring it to your feet. A god could not stand against you or take from you what is yours again. I will give you that which you most desire and cannot have. She’s bound to me. She is mine to command, and I can command her to be yours.

“You lie!” This time, he shouted. And as he did, the serpent struck. Its jaws unhinged. Ivan raised Kladenets. And, the serpent swallowed him whole.

The Northern soldiers retreated as the wooden gates were thrown open. Many had laid down their weapons when they could not run. The whole city was lit up as the battle drew people out of their homes in the middle of the night.

The first of the given orders was to man the walls. The second was to sweep the streets. The third was to set sentries around the next barrier in the very center - the walls of the High District atop the hill, where the Obsidian Tower rose as a black obelisk with the moon at its back.

They stood looking up at where it met the sky, the torches, lamps, and bonfires lit inside.

"It-s filled with noble-s pi-ssing their s-tarched s-kirt-s and whatever s-oldier-s retreated pa-st it-s wall-s. It i-s s-mall, it won't hold." Yaro said, the whistle between his teeth more prominent with the cold.

“It’s not them I’m worried about. We’ll starve them out in no time; they did not allow the unsightly warehouses to be built among their mansions, and even their pantries will grow empty.” Marat said next to him. He turned to look back toward the wall and the main road that ran down the bare valley. “It’s the horde returning to take the city in Korschey’s name.”

“We’re on the better s-ide of the wall now,” Yaro chuckled, “and led by a better man.”

“Hm.” Marat took one deep breath in. It was not the soldiers now; it was not the king, and it was not him. Now, everything depended on Val. The horde would not relent until their king was dead.

The day was spent in preparation. Typhonos distributed supplies to the people as they had been nearly starved. The West had been the invader, the occupiers, and it was just as important to show the common folk what that meant as it was to hold the city. And, although wary, they took the food and clothes. They side-eyed the soldiers and hurried back indoors, but only a handful shouted and threw rocks at the sight of patrols.

“Let your people starve, and they will turn on you,” Typhonos muttered as he joined Marat in a home where Korschey’s soldiers had chased out the inhabitants. It stood empty now.

“Your Majesty,” Marat bowed his head; he did not wish Typhonos to toss him over the wall if he were casual again, “Men have been sent out but have not returned. If the armies continue at the same speed as before, they will be here by nightfall.”

The night of the third day.

At no other time had the strong, authoritative King Typhonos looked as small and shriveled as he did now. The silent, steady light was gone behind his eyes. He nodded absently.

“Do as you see fit. I have been wrong every time I go against my son's will. I’ve trusted him this far in this, and I will trust again.” He said, “There is not a man out there that wouldn’t follow you. Not a man there that doesn’t trust his life to you. Care for each one of them as my son did.”

Marat nodded. It did not seem like more words had to be said, so he bowed again and left.

Before evening fell, clouds began to gather in the sky. They drained any remaining color out of the land and dampened the air with the promise of rain.

A single pathfinder returned, one of seven men. He was closer to death than not, an arrow in his back. His blood flooded his shirt and seeped from under the leather tunic.

Korschey’s horde was near. So near that they saw the torches at the end of the valley just as darkness began to spread behind the clouds. There was a sea of them, the end not visible even from the highest guard tower.

Among them came the dark, tall shapes of the iron giants that would soon rip through the city walls. They appeared black among the lights, moving as fast as the mounted men.

The torches ceased their crawl across the valley close enough that any man atop the wall could see their flags trembling in the growing winds.

Each man tensed, holding his weapon near as if the enemy could appear at any moment. So many of them had never seen war. So many of them had not ever felt the cold winds of the North. Their stomachs were still empty, the evening meals had not been prepared until late, and they were called to the walls having only smelled it.

Frost began forming on the stones, and each archer’s boots would slip on it as they fought against the wind. Their only hope was that it would die down before the enemy advanced.

Outside the gates, the men on horseback that remained below brought their spears upright, each ensuring that his helmet sat taut and the animal remained subdued.

But, as it turned out, the enemy had not only come down the main road.

From beyond the wall of the High District began pouring the viscous black fog. At first, the men stationed there thought that the city burned –its ash coming down in waves and washing over the barrier. But the wind did not carry it away. It did not bring with it the smell of the fire’s devastation. Instead, its rotten sulphuric odor struck the flesh with a sting and a spreading burn that quickly ate through the men’s skin –faster than the one they faced outside the city.

The soldiers ran, knocking on every door to get the citizens outside. The cries of those who remained rose in the night as the cloud spread across the streets, taking any living being into its abyss, their skin sloughing off in strips and eyes turning bloody and red.

“Pigshit…” Marat swore under his breath as a panicked man rattled off what was happening further in the city. It had been the same curse that took his divinity in the forest before the tree giant came.

“Mar–fuck-what-s-your-name, the Ember Sword!” Yaro huffed as he, too, appeared. “They’re moving forward.”

Behind him came a captain with the same news. The horde was advancing. They never set up tents or camps or meant to lay siege to the city. They meant to trap the intruders there. They meant to force them into death by steel or death by the toxic air.

“Aim for the machinery first!” Marat called out as he ran atop the walls. “You see ladders; you take down the men carrying them until we can load the mangonel. Ready the ballistae!”

“You almo-st s-ound like you know what you’re doing!” Yaro ran behind him, Anushka in his hands despite the unlikeliness of using it anytime soon. “General and all.”

“Almost,” Marat said, his eyes on the advancing tide of lights.”It doesn’t matter if I do or not; it only matters if it works.”

He’d ordered the soldiers to force the people into the homes, and the gates closed. Many heavily armored men remained outside, ready to meet the first waves to get past the archers.

“To think, a decade ago, you picked s-quirrely bastard-s out of the wood-s and wre-stled s-limy water thing-s. S-uch is life.” The red-bearded man shook his head.

“It was you that wrestled slimy water things a decade ago.” Marat’s lip twitched in a grin.

“You telling me you didn’t?” Yaro huffed, “I heard all about the farm.”

The whistle of the wind ate the sounds of the approaching soldiers until they were close. Their torches were put out, a dark wall of steel coming at the men below.

Somewhere further down the battlements came a captain's shout for the archers to prepare. To the other side of Marat came the command to draw. To loose an uninterrupted current raining on the men below. They may not have seen war but they were ready to face it now.

At least, these were men—flesh and blood behind layers of leather and metal plating.

But only men.

He drew the All-Father’s Reach. The arrow met its target, and a man hit the ground. Just like that, a life snuffed out. It was a life that may very well have been the son or father of any of the people hiding in their homes behind him. He drew another, and another, just like the man beside him had.

“Battering ram!” Yaro called out, his voice getting lost in the wind.

Marat turned just in time to see the pikemen on horseback move forward. The battering ram was far behind the lines of men, but it was not the only one. The heavy machinery would not be far behind.

At that moment, he realized they would not stop. Korschey would not let them stop.

He was at the steps in moments and running down, disturbed frost leaving a layer of white underneath his footsteps.

He grabbed heavy leather off the racks. Gloves, coats. Marat took the first horse he saw, slinging as much padding over it as he could. He covered its head and urged it up the streets and away from the wall toward the black fog.

The horse’s hooves clacked and echoed through the dark, empty streets. The ground began to spot where the first droplets of rain came down. A block later, the downpour began, sending mud flying to the sides as Marat rode into the wall of black, undisturbed death that would not wash away.

He felt the burning on his face, his scalp, his neck. He brought an arm up to shield his eyes. The horse neighed in pain but did not stop. As he blinked, he could spot where blood began to seep through the blisters on its uncovered legs.

The shadowed gates appeared ahead, and he hopped off, hitting the horse to urge it back.

Marat hoped it would make it back.

He pulled the scarf further and ran ahead. The gates were unmanned, the fog enveloping the iron bars and the street beyond. They weren't reinforced, better suited to keep the riffraff out of the noble’s way than a whole army.

A grappling hook, and he pulled himself up, blinking away the sting in his eyes as he got above the toxic air. Behind him, he could hear the sounds of battle. The boom and crumble of stone made him cringe, but he dared not look for fear that he may turn back if he did.

Forward. Only forward.

His feet landed on the smooth cobblestone, a stark difference from the broken, cheap paving outside the gates of the wealthy. The streets were enveloped in the thick black blanket here as well.

He could see some dim lights in the windows.

The walls were unmanned.

And this distressed Marat more than the alternative.

He pressed himself against the building. The street was lined with decorative columns before him stretching straight toward the Obsidian Palace.

He took a deep breath and felt the burning in his lungs despite the thick wool fabric covering his mouth.

Taking off in a run, Marat went forward. And, at the very first echo of his footsteps, the crossbow bolt whistled past his ear, missing only by a miracle.

"There!" A shout, a voice, it came from the rooftops.

More followed.

He did not dare look up, keeping his eyes only on the steps before him, the ground almost lost beneath the fog. He listened for where they came from and switched his step, dashing into alleyways and against walls where the roof overhang protected him from view.

His fingers brushed where the four layers of wool and leather covered his shoulder. The noxious gas had eaten through the first, only threads of it hanging off the one below it. His fingers found the rip from where an arrow grazed his arm and another where the tip exposed the threads of his collar. They'd both missed penetrating only by a hair. Sheer luck, as he felt in his bones that the divinity had been stripped from him again.

A woman's wail came from a window. He saw her silhouette as she pointed at him, screaming for help. He heard the footsteps across the roof coming toward him.

Run.

Run. Run. Run.

They were hidden by the night, by the clouds, by the whispers of the raindrops hitting the street and shingles, but they saw him. They saw him move along the streets and alleys.

His jaw clenched as he felt an arrow hit his thigh; it stuck in but not as far as it would have if it weren't for the layers, barely half the tip scraping the numbed muscle. He pulled it out, barely stopping to do so. If this was the worst, then the night was merciful indeed.

More sounds behind him. They didn't dare step onto the ground lest they be burned. They couldn't follow him, but each soldier shouted to the next.

When Marat finally looked up, the palace was ahead.

He could feel how damp the inner layers were from sweat and the outer from the heavy, humid air. They weighed heavily on him.

How long had he been running?

The fog receded the closer he got to the palace, and he could see the guards. They hadn't heard the commotion yet and still stood in formation around the grand staircase.

Leaning against a stone statue, he pulled off the outer layers of the armor, stripping down only to the wool tunic on top of the linen shirt. The cold seized him immediately, but the additional weight gone was a relief. His blood was warmed enough to last, and should he die here, it did not matter if it was in comfort.

The rain fell harder, shielding him from view as he dashed for the west entrance. He could see the five men standing guard there. The doors weren't barricaded like the grand ones up front, undoubtedly to allow the nobility to come in and out.

Korschey's pride would not allow his status to fall, even in times of war.

He nocked the arrow, and in the next heartbeat, the body of a guard slowly crumpled to the ground. He heard the draw of steel, but the bowstring was already pulled back.

Another down.

The remaining three went to take cover, but there was none, the thin, decorative iron ballisters leaving them exposed. They ducked, and in a moment, two dashed forward, the third never again getting up.

He waited, and the last two fell with deep cuts of the hunter’s knife, spilling their blood into the puddles formed between the protruding courtyard stones.