‘An army of millions with no effective leadership?’
‘I need you, General,’ said Kaspar. ‘The Tsurani need you. I have officers waiting, but not enough of them. I have one experienced commander who has led men in the field and can conduct brilliant tactics and who has a brilliant grasp of logistics: Erik von Darkmoor. I am not being vain when I tell you I am his equal. But I need a strategist. If you can come to Kelewan and help them mount a defence, you’ll understand what type of soldier you’ll find ready to do your bidding. They are tough, loyal and fearless. But I need a high command and I need a full staff in place. And I need it soon.’
‘How soon?’
Something in Kaspar’s belt pouch buzzed, and Kaspar pulled it out rapidly. It was a signalling device given to him by an artificer on Sorcerer’s Island, at Miranda’s instruction. Every member with military training had one, from Kaspar down to the boys serving with him, Servan, Jommy, and the others.
Key officers in Roldem, Rillanon, Krondor and other cities would have their devices buzzing. It meant that word had reached Miranda that the Dasati had begun their invasion of Kelewan.
Kaspar looked steadily at the General. ‘I need you now.’
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN - Invasion
THE WOMAN SCREAMED.
‘Help me!’ she cried, clutching her baby to her chest. She was covered in blood and spattered with an orange fluid unrecognizable to the scouts.
Their horses pawed the ground nervously as the woman neared. One scout dismounted and halted the wide-eyed woman and looked at her baby. With a single shake of his head he indicated to his companion the child was not sleeping, but dead.
With an equally curt gesture the still-mounted rider indicated he would move away and leave his companion to direct the woman to the south, where the army was mustering. There were healing priests there who would do what they could for the woman. Others would say a prayer for the baby.
The dismounted rider tried to calm the woman and the other moved his steed up the northern road. The report that a small village in the foothills of the mountains had been razed had reached them two days ago. Word had been sent south by fast rider and then by magical means to the Holy City. In a few hours, the order to muster had been given, and warriors from every house and clan in the north had answered the call. The gathering point was a small outpost closest to the reported incursion, a small fort housing cavalry from House Ambucar. The small cavalry detachment, some of the finest horsemen in the Empire, had the duty to patrol the foothills to the north.
The outpost’s primary duty over the centuries had been to prevent raids by the migratory Thūn to the north, so they were in a good position to respond to the Dasati incursion. The rider pushed his horse up a steep rise to a crest and looked to the north. Part of his normal patrol area, this road and the village that had nestled in a vale below were as familiar to him as his own son’s face. Most buildings were intact, though two were burning at the far side of the village square, erected around the common well. The scout surmised the fires had been the result of overturned cook fires, perhaps, else the other buildings in the village would also be ablaze.
The woman he had met on the road was the only proof this village had been occupied. One hundred twenty or more men, women, and children, all serving House Ambucar were gone. An experienced tracker, the scout quickly ascertained what had just happened.
The village had been struck by a raiding party of mounted men… if that’s what they were, he considered, for the tracks in the dust were made by no animal he had seen before; neither horse or needra or Thūn warrior made those marks in the dirt. He ranged around the village a few more minutes, then saw drag marks. For a moment he was confused, then he realized the villagers had been trussed up in large nets and dragged away.
He was too old and experienced a scout to doubt his own eyes, but nothing of this made sense. As a young soldier he had served a tour in a garrison across the Sea of Blood and had fought against slavers from the lost tribes of Tsubar, those malignant dwarves who used human as slave labour. You wouldn’t drag valuable slaves, risking injury and death; you’d truss them up in a coffle or herd them aboard waiting wagons.