Nest of Serpents by Curtis Jobling

Author:Curtis Jobling
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780141972305
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2012-05-08T04:00:00+00:00

10

Dark Deeds

It would be dawn soon. Drew sat stiff in the saddle of the white charger, the reins looped around the stump of his left arm, the stars fading in the sky above Stormdale. The horse had been a gift from Baron Hoffman, the oldest of the surviving Staglords. It was a small gesture of gratitude on Hoffman’s part for the courage the young Wolflord had shown in the defence of the city.

The horse stood between the towers of the ruined gatehouse that marked the entrance into Stormdale. With the city still smoking at his back, Drew’s attention was on the battlefield beyond. The routed enemy army was gone, the scene of their siege a wasteland of abandoned tents and war machines; campfires still burned, and equipment and weapons had been left behind in their hasty retreat. Riderless horses wandered through the encampment, pulling at dumped backpacks and trying to worry their contents loose. The moans of the injured and dying drifted through the darkness, as the soldiers of Vermire and Riven cried out for aid. None was forthcoming, at least not presently; Magister Siegfried and his healers were preoccupied with tending the wounded of Stormdale. If any enemy soldiers survived the night there might be compassion in the morning. Drew turned Bravado round, the horse proving pleasingly responsive, and set off back up the main avenue, returning to the castle.

He passed squads of civilians led by Greycloaks, picking their way through the streets, meticulously searching through every building. The odd fugitive from Riven or the Vermirian Guard was found hiding, only to be captured and delivered to the keep for questioning. The knights of Stormdale had already gleaned a good deal of information from their prisoners: the greatest mass of the Catlords’ forces was gathered in the Badlands and the Dalelands. Onyx himself was overseeing command while Field Marshal Tiaz, the Tigerlord, led the army in Omir. Drew hoped that the Hawklords had arrived in Azra in time to assist King Faisal against the staggering enemy force that surrounded his city. He still hoped he might see his friends again, feeling bound to them by their escape from the volcanic island of Scoria and their shared experiences in the gladiatorial arena of the Furnace.

As Drew passed through the gatehouse into the castle, he could see the now familiar figure of Hoffman working alongside survivors, collecting the dead from where they’d fallen in the snow-encrusted courtyard. The white powder was stained dark with the blood of the fallen, men of Stormdale, Vermire and Riven lying alongside one another. While the dead of the Barebones were placed tenderly on to carts to be transported to Brenn’s Temple in the city, the enemy’s bodies were thrown on to a great pyre. The blackest smoke billowed from the corpses of the Crowlords.

Hoffman passed orders on to the work party before staggering across to Drew, taking Bravado’s reins from him. The Stag looked tired, as old as Magister Siegfried, but he wasn’t about to rest while there was work to be done.

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