Niall : A Prologue

There weren't always dragons in the valley, Joren thought as they trotted past the massive corpse of a Blue Ridgeback.

Of course, with so much conflict raging in the south the stench of blood on the wind is enough to lure even the Black Drakes of the Fell Coast to the far north, He thought.

Joren raised his hand to shield his eyes from the sun while he searched the endless blue void as he had done at least forty times in the last hour alone. Sweat pooled on his brow and trickled into his eyes, blurring everything for a moment before wiping it away with the back of his hand. He was just about to give up looking when for a brief moment something cast a shadow across his face, momentarily blocking out the sun before disappearing behind its blinding light again.

His eyes searched the empty air slowly back and forth for a moment and then he saw it again, a brief flickering of the sun so fast he could have imagined it. Suddenly, a voice further back in the line called out.

“A bird!”

Joren grabbed at the piece of paper that was stuck in the space between the front of the saddle and the horse beneath him. Just then a rider broke from the line further behind him and trotted up beside him.

“Word for you.” Garen said almost impatiently, a messenger hawk perched on his armguard.

Joren could tell he was anticipating the bird’s arrival almost as much as he had been. After their defeat at the River Sunde three and a half days ago, their company was forced to flee to the north into the harsh, wind-spun lands of the Agra Desert with many of them wounded. All the while a company of Emir Hunar’s men pursued them only a day behind. Among the men Joren led in the battle at the river, only eight including himself were of the Black Targe company.

The rest, a total of one hundred and sixteen men, were a collection of men at arms, hunters, sellswords, farmer’s sons, and any other man of fighting age behoven to the Valley Lords in the north. Only, almost a third had been killed in the battle, and another ten or twenty succumbed to their wounds in the following days. Each man bloodied, exhausted and caked in the sand that had clung to their sweat creating dark lines that ran down their faces and bodies.

Water was in short supply and food was almost nonexistent. Each day the men would butcher the horses that had become lame from an injury or had collapsed from heat exhaustion, unable to continue climbing the high dunes that stretched in every direction. If not for a small wellspring they had found by chance a day ago doubtless many more would have died. However the spring ended up being the territory of a spotted desert basilisk who killed two of the horses drinking from the spring before anyone had a chance to react and then three of the men who fought to take it down.

The basilisk hid almost completely submerged in the spring and grabbed one of the horses by the hind leg, tearing it from its body. As the other horses reared and fled the basilisk clawed at the belly of another, spilling its insides and turning the shallow water dark red. As the men moved to slay the beast, the basilisk whipped its spiked tail around and cleaved the head off of one man instantly and slammed a clawed foot down on another, piercing their mail through the shoulder and holding them down under the surface of the water. A third man’s head and torso was caved in by the creature’s powerful jaws when the man ran a spear into its side and it turned on him before he could draw his sword.

After being wounded, the basilisk attempted to flee but was slowed in its retreat. Four riders with spears and long axes charged across the shallow water and descended on it, chopping and stabbing at its back and hind legs until it fell. The basilisk rolled onto its back and wildly kicked and roared until two of the riders dismounted and brought their long axes down on its head and neck, finally killing it. In the end the spring had saved them and the basilisk provided a greater source of food then the meager soldier’s rations of hard bread and salt beef, but these boons came at a great cost.

That night, Joren had ordered the remaining horses to be kept within the circle of their camp and doubled the watch. Still, by morning two more men were missing, pieces of their arms and armor found near blood stained sand and deep grooves leading to large disturbed areas of sand as if the desert itself swallowed them whole.

Joren had ordered any able bodied man left to give up their horses to the wounded and those who could not walk. Some of the men who were conscripted in areas immediately surrounding the desert had knowledge of the various plants scattered throughout, and were able to gather some which could be used to ease the pain of some of the men who were in dire condition. Joren knew they would not be able to save them without a Diviner or at the very least a town with a healer. Only the nearest town was four days’ ride to the west and even if they did make it before they perished in the desert, Hunar’s host would no doubt catch them there before they could prepare themselves for a defense.

Joren considered this heavily, the most he could do now was offer anything that could make them more comfortable and soften their transition into death. Each time another one died their bodies were carried in carts and wagons and on the backs of horses until they made camp for the night where they would be cremated on makeshift pyres and the soldiers who kept to their faiths would muster whatever prayers and rites they could. And each night, more names would be added to the list of fallen.

Joren scanned the message the messenger hawk had brought, his eyes moving rapidly from line to line. Garen sat stiffly in his saddle waiting with fixed concentration for him to finish.

“He wants us to fight.” Joren said with a hint of malice and disbelief.

Garen let that hang for a moment before turning to look back at the line of battered and beaten men shambling onward with their heads hung and feet barely able to keep them upright. He looked back at Joren and saw his face had darkened and had grown stiff. “It would mean the death of us all.” He said in a low tone, a slight gurgling sound from the back of his throat behind dry cracked lips as he spoke.

Joren lowered his brow and moved his fingers to grab the space between his eyes as he always did when he was thinking.

Garen held his gaze on Joren for a moment and then spoke, “Shall I call for the men to stop? There was a bluff of hard stone we passed a few hours ago that we could fortify, we could catch Hunar’s men between—”

“No,” Joren interrupted, still holding his brow. Suddenly, he opened the parchment he was holding and pulled a quil and small corked vial of black ink from a saddle bag and began to write using the front of his saddle as a surface. Garen looked sternly at Joren and with curious anticipation. After a moment, Joren finished writing and shook the parchment to dry the ink before rolling it up and handing it over to Garen. “Send this with the messenger hawk immediately and call for the line to stop once we’ve reached the next valley.”

“It will be done.” Garen said, tucking the rolled parchment into his brigandine and turning his horse to ride towards the back of the line again, galloping this time as if with new purpose.

Joren turned to face the sun once more only this time instead of shielding his eyes, he closed them and tried to make out the shapes in the dark of his eyelids and thought it was funny, how much they started to look like her.