The Key to the Warriors (completed)

Chapter 54

54Jackal

We'd arrived ahead of schedule, and good thing too. The water had been getting to me, and it would have made for a poor performance on my part to show up fighting seasickness instead of the Creator.

Haze, Agero, and I had been the first to shore. Forfeiting our plans to stay with the catapults, we'd come in quietly, sneaking up the stairs to the clifftop. From there, Agero had hailed a hand to the approaching ships, and I smiled as the first catapult was sent flying.

"Agero, when the men come ashore, take a couple and find Zyirah before she gives birth. Kill the child."

He crossed his arms, looking indignant. "Since when do you give the orders, Baboon? Last I checked, this is my army."

"It's my war. You want a share of the spoils, then you'll follow my plans."

"Yes, well, see how far that attitude gets you. I take orders from no one."

In no mood for his pride, I waved a flippant hand at him. "Fine, do whatever you want."

He huffed. "I'll go find the girl, but only because I'd rather not endure the Light. Not because you told me to."

"I don't give a rat's ass."

Frowning, he turned back toward the beach, and for a moment we watched as barrel after barrel were sent crashing into the surrounding woods, slowly setting Warrior Hold ablaze. In the distance, the uproar of men could be heard clamoring, the sounds of their footsteps drawing in near as the first of our men came ashore.

"Go!" I shouted to Agero, and without taking the time to even give me a dirty look, he hailed the first two soldiers he saw.

He waited until they had ascended the stairs, then drew them near. "We're looking for a woman. She will either be pregnant, or with an infant. The Creator will likely have her hidden somewhere. When you find them, kill the child."

The men exchanged wary glances that ground on my nerves. Sevorrah's Elite, indeed. Perhaps Agero should have checked the gumption of his men before enlisting them.

He grabbed the both of them by their collars and yanked their focus back to him. "Fifty barbed lashes to the man that hesitates! Now move!"

The men immediately fell into step beside him as he rushed into the standing trees at my left and crouched deep into the underbrush as the footfalls of soldiers sounded at our backs. Grabbing Haze by the edge of his tunic, I yanked him into the bushes at our right, sinking low.

"One sound..." I warned him, and though his eyes were wide, he nodded.

A troop of men suddenly broke through the rubble of the forest, jarring on their feet as the catapults continued to launch. I watched as a barrel went sailing over their heads to crash into the middle of their formation, tossing bodies left and right as the oil spilled to spread the flames through the foliage.

The men shouted, some stopping to smack flames off their comrades, but when it became obvious that they were dead, they reformed and continued on. The stairs creaked with their weight as they made their way to the beach, and I slid on my belly through the shrubs to peek over the edge of the cliff. Hundreds of Sevorrahn men had come ashore. Some had gotten caught up on the iron spikes lining the edge of the water, their lifeless bodies hung over the scraps of metal like torn fabric, the waves washing carelessly over them. Idiots.

Shaking my head, I watched as the rest of the Ceribal men moved their way down the steps. The fighting ensued almost immediately, sword to sword, fist to fist, until the sand was littered with a mess of black, gray and silver armor making the two armies almost indecipherable. If not for the fact that Agero's men sported a small red patch above their hearts bearing the Sevorrahn flag, even I would not be able to tell the men apart.