A War of Three Kings (Dying Lands #2)

30. Aldrin

Chapter 30

Aldrin

I t has been three days of brutal bloodshed. Three days of next to no sleep while harassing the enemy across this landscape of rolling hills and open fields. Of slaughtering their flank.

Absolute chaos rains down around me as swords strike flesh, as enemy soldiers run and our people cut them down on foot and horseback. I could laugh at the fools who believe they are escaping us toward their salvation at the ruins of Wenchwick Hold, but I am too fucking livid for that.

Instead, I throw out hardened platforms of air, leaping across them and base jumping until I reach the thick of the enemy’s tail. I send that magical royal command throughout the battlefield for all my Spring Court warriors to muster to me, and a cloud of fifty high fae base jump through the air alongside me to rain death below.

I land in front of a man who staggers to a stop. Gripping my sword with both hands, I thrust it deep into his shoulder where his armor panels meet. Blood gurgles from the wound as I rip my blade back out, and I am turning to stalk my next victim before the man hits the ground.

I become lost in the motions, my people fighting around me. Swinging my sword to remove a soldier’s head from his body. Kicking another to the ground with a blow to the stomach and curling my fingers to drag up a coffin of roots that completely engulf him, fisting my hand so they constrict with crushing force.

People stream all around me in an array of house colors. A woman in Appleshield green and bronze gallops past, hanging low in her seat and slicing through the warrior I had marked as my next victim. I swing low to cut the ankles of another, and when his back hits the ground, I stand and thrust my sword clean through his chest and into the earth beneath.

Abruptly, the crowd thins around me, until the enemy is gone. Then I am surrounded by my army, racing in their pursuit. I grind my teeth. That is the problem with stopping to slaughter the enemy’s tail. They keep moving out of my reach.

There has been so much death, but it is not enough. Each one of these humans is a threat to Keira. Here to kidnap her. Harm her. Force her to marry a mad king. It sets my blood on fire and has rage rippling through my every muscle.

My bloodlust is far from sated.

This butchery has merely whetted my appetite.

A horn blows behind me, deep and long, and it sends a wave of reaction through the foot soldiers and cavalry surrounding me. They slow to a stop. I stride through the crowd to the front line, surrounded by a halo of my Spring Court fae, roughly pulling people out of my way.

The black mass of the enemy is getting away from us, funneling down a large decline in the landscape that leads into a natural bowl. My fingers twitch with the need to pursue them like a savage storm of death and fury, but this is the plan we agreed on.

That horn bellows from behind once more and we form our ranks. The front line of attack is my command post this day.

Edmund gallops past on horseback, sword raised. “Cavalry! With me!” he yells, crafting an air wield to project his voice. “Take your positions!”

The ground thunders as those on horseback circle around the bulk of our mass and line up with Edmund. Satisfaction fills me when Lords Bradford and Adalwolf join him, alongside Countess Lynna. I have little respect for nobility who send their soldiers to war but don’t join the fight for their lands and people.

At the front line, I pace up and down the bulk of our army. “SHIELD WALL!” I roar. “Assemble your ranks!”

The bodies slot into their places before me, row upon neat row, lining up their shields to overlap. This is a human invention, one I had never seen before coming to this realm. I must admit, it would be utterly terrifying to come up against this unprepared. The front row forms a solid wall that reaches from the warriors’ knees to their chins. The row behind them lifts their shields to create a roof that protects the heads of both rows, and the third holds spears over their shoulders, ready to throw.

To the enemy, it would indeed be like attacking a metal wall.

Our horns call out a third time, but there is no response from the other side of the valley. The enemy still swarms down the decline, pooling in the vast, level ground at its depths, as their numbers are slow in racing back up the other side.

This is our chosen battlefield, if we get the timing right.

We have set up a pincer attack between the two sides of this valley, to squeeze the enemy between, but the other half of our forces is yet to arrive. The only other exit is a narrow channel clogged with trees at the base of the bowl, leading back to the south. A choke point we intend to force them down.

I strain my eyes, desperately hoping to see the glint of spear tips on the far hill, but it is empty save for weeds. In the distance, the ruins of Wenchwick Hold look down upon us like a silent, gloomy specter, just out of reach. It is little more than broken shards of towers, lone arches and a stout wall on a rocky incline.

Edmund’s horse prances as his agitation bleeds into it. He pulls away from his unit and canters over. That burning green gaze lands on me. “Your man, Cyprien. How reliable is he?” His features are demonic beneath his helmet, which reveals only his eyes and mouth in harsh angles, with multiple metal horns and spikes rearing up from it. A long ponytail erupts from its crest.

“As reliable as your daughters, who are with him. He’ll be here on time,” I say, with confidence I don’t feel. It is always risky to split an army.

Edmund’s scowl deepens. “It is past time!” He throws out an arm toward the battlefield, which is disappointingly devoid of spilled blood. The enemy is cresting the rise now, a handful reaching the top, but the vast majority are still stuck at its bottom. “The most important element in warfare is timing.”

I roll my shoulders to release the tension building there. “We still have time, Edmund. You need patience.”

His lips peel back in a snarl, but then I see it. The ripple of fear that dances across his face and disappears just as quickly. The terror of a father not knowing where his children are in a slaughter. It is the same beast that has been clawing within my chest, fueling my murderous wrath.

I have no idea if Keira is safe.

If she was attacked on the road when she and Caitlin skirted their force around both armies to meet Cyprien and the fae he recruited from my realm…the thought is more chilling than the thousands in the horde before us, hell-bent on our destruction.

Worse is the knowledge that Keira will join me in this madness. In the vicious hacking and slicing of battle. The stench of fear, the screams for mercy, the red-drenched soil. The constant terror of your life or limbs being torn from you by the enemies all around. I cannot protect her from it. I won’t even have her at my side during the carnage.

This scares me most of all.

“How do you do it?” I move closer to Edmund, snagging his attention from the enemy. “How do you fight a battle not knowing where your daughters are within it? The idea of Keira out there somewhere is driving me to insanity.”

“You and me both.” His voice is husky. “But I would never willingly hold them back.”

We turn back to the enemy scaling that slope. They look like ants.

“Edmund, why did you not train your son to ride to battle with you?” I give him a sidelong glance. “How did you end up with warrior daughters instead?”

He scratches his chin, but doesn’t take his eyes from the horizon. “Diarmuid is a gentle soul, and this sort of mindless slaughter would destroy him. Caitlin was born with my mother’s fire in her heart, and I don’t think any man could hold her back from picking up a sword, so it made sense to teach her how to use it.

“Keira is a complex combination of the two. When she lets someone into her heart, she gives them the power to raise her up or destroy her. She is both stronger and more fragile than she appears. I would give up everything I have to protect her: money, titles, land. Her heart has been shattered once before by the mad king, and I will not allow any man to hurt her again, so tread your path carefully, Aldrin.”

Edmund kicks his horse and rides back to his unit, leaving me to stare after him. Despite everything this man has done to me and my people, I can’t help the respect that blooms within my chest. He doesn’t force his children into molds that would break them.

I stalk to my position in the front line, taking the shield Silvan holds out for me and slotting it in line with the others. It is fucking hot in here, with so many bodies pressed so closely together, and it reeks of the sweat of soldiers waiting to clash with the enemy. The shield over my head rattles against mine as the soldier behind me trembles.

No one warns a new recruit how the wait before the attack twists a warrior’s gut with sickness and sets their nerves on fire. It can be worse than the fight itself.

A horn bellows in the distance, low and drawn-out. It has my stomach somersaulting and my heart racing.

Keira made it. Cyprien is here.

For a moment, I am so overtaken by sharp waves of relief that I don’t care about the reinforcements, only her. It crashes through me like icy buckets of water have been tossed over my head.

I send out my awareness fast and hard toward her, stroking against her mind like a gentle caress, and am rewarded with the pleasure of her soul embracing mine. There is ordered chaos around her as they advance to the crest of that hill. I pull away—she cannot afford the distraction.

Hundreds of enemy soldiers reach the top of the far rise, then freeze. Their lonely silhouettes break all at once, racing back down the slope and into the valley, clashing with their own forces. Anarchy breaks out as those who have seen the other half of our army attempt to shove past their own people, and many go down, crushed beneath friendly boots.

The horns of the North blow a rapid command.

“SHIELD WALL! Advance your march!” I roar, and they comply. It is an art form, to move in unison like this without disrupting our formation. A thousand others around me accompany each step forward, making the soil reverberate beneath our boots.

We slam our short swords against the inside of our shields and the echoing crash that bounces around the valley could almost bring down mountains. A distinct ripple of fear runs through the enemy far below, many turning to look up at us and fleeing from our advance.

Then the warriors pick up their chant. “The North! The North! The North!”

Edmund raises his sword in the air, his horse rearing on two legs and making him look like he belongs in a gods-damned painting. Then he charges his unit forward. Froth flies from the horses’ mouths as they race down the hill.They slice down our enemy, blood spraying in beautiful crimson arcs, the hooves of the warhorses striking and trampling those beneath them.

A spike of jealousy cuts through me as we make our slow descent with careful footing.

“This formation takes too long to get to the good bit,” Silvan growls at my side as we advance down the slope. “I need to cut someone.”

“That makes two of us,” I grunt. “Pool your magic with mine and follow my lead. Let’s break the ground.”

Drake shoots me a devious look from my other side. “It would be my fucking pleasure.”

“Yeah. Nothing would make me happier.” Silvan smiles. It is disturbing.

I link my magic with Silvan’s and Drake’s, thrusting it deep into the soil. I take charge of our brimming power, leaping across roots and through organic deposits in the earth, until my awareness reaches the center of the valley. Hundreds of boots stomp over it, but I continue searching, because I want to make a bang. Literally.

“There! Right fucking there!” Drake yells, and tugs our joint power to the left.

A wagon loaded with black powder sits in the mud, abandoned with a broken axle. It is nowhere near Edmund and his unit, making it a perfect target.

I am vaguely aware of my physical body marching towards the enemy, separate from my consciousness. Of the bodies pressed behind mine, pushing me forward, and the weight of the shield on my arm. We are minutes away from meeting the army, and I am impatient for death.

As one, we thrust our magic deeper into the soil, tearing the earth apart with such force that a ravine suddenly rips open. The liquid fire of my raw magic burns through me and flows from my body to the growing rift, fueling it with my power.

The wagon slams through the broken ground to shatter at the bottom, igniting all that fragile black powder. The earth shakes wildly around it, penetrating to the depth of my soul through my wield. Hot rushes of fire expand outward, incinerating the soldiers unfortunate enough to be running past, and tossing bodies into the air.

Sweat drips down my face as I hold the wield for a little longer. The press of enemy troops pushes those in front of them unwittingly into the ravine in their panic, filling the space with thrashing bodies. As they try to climb out, I release my hold on the magic. The land snaps back into place, crushing hundreds within its depths.

A deep, throaty laugh brings me completely back to my body.

“This is what I am talking about!” Drake yells.

Another handful of minutes, and we will be on the enemy. They are a damned mess, most with their backs to us, attempting to flee. Edmund’s unit is spread across their tail, cutting through them like butter.

“Prepare to engage!” I roar, sending my voice across the front line of the shield wall with an amplifying air wield. “Spears at the ready!”

A cry echoes through the battlefield, and my gaze snaps to the peak of the far ridge. Thousands of warriors on horseback charge down into the valley with lances at the ready, holding streaming banners in Appleshield colors. Kelpies gallop alongside them, standing out with their blue coloring, and I know Kai is in their number.

My heart tumbles as a wave of fae warriors pushes forward after the cavalry. Fire sprites that look like huge, burning torches, tossing fireballs into chaos. Forest nymphs riding the lumbering forms of spriggan. A whole score of high fae in Lord Cedar’s colors.

And then the dragons arrive.