Trail of Broken Hearts...

[Charles]

OOC: Continued from Through the Fire and the Flames

"Silas."

"Charles." The uneasy truce between the two former foes had settled a little in the weeks since they first had attempted to kill each other. Charles had a very calming effect on most people, when he wasn't crushing their bones or pulping flesh with his trademark warhammer.

"There are undead nearby. Thinking undead."

"Undead don't think Charles. If they did, we would both be dead by now."

"You know from experience that I can sense things with working minds. These things are thinking, and they aren't alive. They're hunting us Silas."

The terrain didn't lend itself well to stalking, barring the vague nearness of the Red forest, nearly two miles distant, the gently rolling hills they were traversing with Charles' massive horse Traveler, and Silas' quietly acquired mount, as yet unnamed, were horrible if you didn't want to be seen. It was all open sky, with not a patch of woods in sight, barring the aforementioned Red Forest. The current patch of ground they were on was flatter than Silas' last employer, and anything within Charles' sensing range was supposedly in visual range as well. That leant credence to the smaller man's objections about the psion being able to sense them. The sudden waft of corruption on the breeze, however, dispelled any thoughts the warrior might have had about arguing further.

"Well, damn. I seem to owe you yet another meal when we reach town. That makes what, three now?"

"Four. I told you you'd miscount your debt at some pooint, and that makes 4 total meals you owe me."

"Wait, if I miscounted my debt I'd either owe you five meals or three. So I owe you 5?"

"Nope, but you do owe me four now. You counted right the first time. I'm psychic, not prescient."

"Whatever. If you're done fleecing me out of hard earned cash, I'd like to know what we're going to do about these undead that think."

"Keep moving, and pitch camp. I'll keep a semi-watch all night, even when you're on watch for real. When the mind is watchful, the body may rest. Until they attack, I won't wake up, or do anything out of the ordinary."

"Alright then, and when they do attack?"

"Standard operating procedure. I hit them with my hammer, they die, you stab them repeatedly, they die, and we go about our merry way, free of any threat from your former master for the time being." The mage hunter couldn't prove that Drizighar was behind the stalkers and attacks that had plagued him forthe last few weeks, but he knew the erstwhile necromancer was still alive, and due to his previous connection with the Drows mind(mentally raping someone three times in less than an hour tends to leave its mark), he could ascertain that the drow had somehow reached Eluriand. That may have been where his Familiar was when the drow died. Who could tell with these mage sorts. All Charles knew was that he had talents that made them easy prey, and he capitalized on that power as much as possible. To address the current threat, he dismounted, and slowly rotated in a circle, sensing every nuance of thought within the area. The scan, deep and narrow, was very enlightening. He found two more groups shadowing them, one from the cover of the forest, just within visual range at this point, another from their far side, behind a line of low hills, or so he thought, and the group behind them, sticking doggedly to their trail like hounds....

"Silas."

"Charles." He had a feeling where this was going, and he was going to likely hit the slab of meat and brains next to him if the psion said what he expected.

"There are undead nearby, thinking undead." The gauntlet rang off the breastplate of Charles' armor, and he simply laughed. "Allow me to rephrase that then. There are undead nearby, three groups of thinking undead." That got the soldiers attention fast.

"Xem'zund has three packs of thinking undead hunting us down?"

"That is an accurate summation. And I have a suspicion what they are."

"Oh really?" His companion radiated skepticism. He knew what his new ally's limits were. Mind reading was one of them.

"You remember there were three "legions" employed by Drizighar. Den Caedo, Gelicus, and Clades?" He was likely butchering the names, but it wasn't important now.

Silas remembered all too well. He had been the leader of the abortive attack on the massive warrior next to him, and was lucky to still be alive. Almost 50 of the troops that had attacked the human juggernaut were reduced to so much bone and ragged flesh. He grunted in assent.

"Your comrades are following us. Only the Lycanthropes of Clades could trac us likwe this, for so long and so well. There are undead with them, or possibly they are undead that retain their minds somehow. The remnants of Den Caedo must have been revived from their very ashes by the Necromancer Himself, and are likely the troop in the Red Forest, shadowing us in greatest numbers. Those to the west are likely others from Clades, once again survivors or turned undead."

"That is all wonderful supposition, barring one minor fact." He was right. The logic was internally valid, and solid enough on its face, except for a glaring weakness. "The necromancer has no need to trouble himself with us. We are at best flys in the ointment, at worst not even worth noticing."

"He troubles himself with many things that don't need his attention. He's a maniac, it is in his nature."

The friendly bickering continued iover the miles, until they dismounted and set up camp. Charles had at first trusted the man out of instinct. Later he had learned exactly why Silas fought for Xem'zund. He and the rest of hs soldiers recieved a choice. Fight for him, and maybe not die now or later, or fight against him, and die immediately. Theirvillages borderd dangerously close to the Red Forest, and there was no refusing when the man was so close. Thus Silas and his comrades ended up at the Aleraran border, facing the strangely impossible odds of one man against more than two hundred. They lost, out maneuvered, out muscled, and finally outmaged by their opponent. The losses had been heavy, and he would never tell Silas exactly why the Zombies had turned on his troops, but he was thankful it had saved his life to some extent. He had recieved a plethora of minor wonds during the battle that were still healing. The worst of which was a broken hand, gained as he punched a man in the face with his gauntleted fist, crushing the mans skull, and popping a pathetic finger bone the wrong way. That was then. Now Charles trusted him totally. Silas was loyal to two things above all rlse, and it showed. He was loyal to his family and town, which is why he fought for the dark lord in the first place, and he was loyal to his comrades, which was why he had taken up the mentalists offer of possible revenge and nearly guaranteed death.

The camp was ready fast, and the hulking mind mage began to build a fire pit and fire, removing earth from the ground and ringing the pit with the earth he took out, before laying wood and kindling into the hole, and lighting it with ease. He was fond of fire, and could make it in so many different ways.

The two traveling companions went to sleep, one on, one off, working in watch shifts to make sure nothing caught them totally unawares. The only hard part was sleeping in mail, which would punish him horribly in the morning. The night passed, hour by hour, and the two changed watches, waiting for an attack from undead beasts that was sure to come with time.

[Charles]

"Silas."

The warrior sighed quietly before answering.

"Yes Charles?" It had been several days since the first sighting of the trailing undead, and it waswearing on Silas' nerves. Charles was calm as ever, knowing what was going on helped him more than it helped his companion.

"The troops in the forest are moving, away from us. This is your territory. What's nearby?"

"There's a vilage, maybe five miles off, just under the eaves of the forest. Some of my soldiers were from this area. Maybe five of them are still around."

"Could they have made it back by now?" Charles was beginning to understand what was happening. The Undead hadn't been able to get close enough to attack these last few nights. Now they were going to force their hand.

"We've been moving slowly. Both of us were pretty badly hurt, and we never passed them. As long as they were together, nothing between here and there should have been able to stop them." Silas was confident in the ability of his soldiers to defeat any bands of roving undead they encountered.

"The undead have given up on ambushing us. They're going to force out hand. They're attacking the village. I'm sure you feel obligated to help them, and I can't say I disagree. If I'd killed those bastards the first time, it wouldn't have come down to this."

"Well, if they're going to attack, let's bloody well move!" Silas put words to action, spurring his horse up to a gallop, and trusting Charles to follow.

Charles shouted something incoherent, and urged Traveler up to a full gallop himself. The horse was massive, and it covered ground like only a beast of its size could. Eating up the gap between the other horse within a short time.

"Silas! Don't just run in there!" Charles had to shout to be heard over the whipping of the wind as they tore across the plains and towards the forest. Behind them, the two groups that had been shadowing them finally showed themselves. They were smaller than Charles had expected. Fifteen in one group, ten in the flankers, hopefully the group ahead of them was equally small, and they could deal with the attack, before being forced to face down the converging lycanthropes and zombies.

Treehome Village, The Red Forest, Raiaera:

The first zombies shambled into sight without much notice. They had sent their soldiers off to fight the damn Necromancer's war, the undead passed through all the time. The first few townsfolk died without ever knowing what was coming. The next ones they met were harder prey. Woodsplitting axes and hammers smashed bodies and crushed bones. The five former soldiers had indeed made it back. One died almost immediately, with his scythe buried in a zombies skull, as its neighbor struck him down. The other four wasted no time. The men sprinted off to their homes, retrieving swords and shields, and charged nearly as rapidly back into the battle. The townsfolk and their tools were destroying the undead nearly as fast as the undead were destroying them, but there were more zombies than there were townsfolk, and the end was coming rapidly. Swords hacked apart zombies with ruthless efficiency, and shields lashed about, maiming with the same abandon as their bladed opposites. The four former soldiers were more dangerous to the attacking undead than the entire rest of the town combined.

"RUN! Get out of here!" The soldiers were screaming at their friends and relatives to escape the deathtrap this town was going to become. They backed together into a four sided defense, shields overlapping as the undead converged around them, and the townsfolk fled for their lives. Swords licked out to take off arms, legs, heads, and other body parts at will. The crushing mass of zombies was going to overwhelm them eventually. It was finally obvious exactly what they were facing. The first undead werewolf landed on a mans shield, and was flung bodily backward. It had lost a lot of weight, and it couldn't throw him to the ground just by its impact anymore. It was the dead from their last battle. Some fifty zombies created by someone to destroy the survivors of the battles.

For nearly five minutes the four held strong against the press, using the mass to their advantage and limiting the number of enemies that could effectively fight them at once. Eventually a hit landed though, and the man staggered as his leg collapsed out from underneath him. As the zombies closed in on the weakened formation, seven thick bladed daggers tore down an entire rank of the undead in rapid succession. Charles had acted as soon as he was in range, throwing the daggers from their sheaths by hand, and flinging them on towards their targets with his mind soon thereafter. Each one lodged itself in a zombies head, as the attack went unobserved, and undodged. The mace in his hand smashed skulls from horseback as he and Silas drove into the side of the undead assault like a vengeful hammer. Normally he would be a hopeless warior on a horse, but the undead hadn't even registered their presence yet, and he could destroy them with near impunity.

"Silas! Get closer! I'm out of daggers, and they're out of range for me to move them again!" Silas carried his own pair of daggers, and if he flung them, Charles could take ruthless advantage again, and plant them in the skulls of nearby undead. The only problem was that he was on the other side of the formation, his machete-like Falchion hacking apart undead while Charles smashed them with his mace. The hammer was safely strapped to his back, useless from horseback since it required two hands to swing effectively.

The three soldiers in the center nearly panicked as they saw the massive figure in iron plate on horseback coming toward them, until he called out to their captain, and they looked aside to see the second mounted man coming closer. As one they hammered out with their shields, knocking the undead around them back, and following the gap it made, blades leading. Their companion was safe, Charles was in range now, and the first daggers quivered in their targets as he pulled them laboriously out of the skulls of the beasts, to send them flying into nearby enemies one by one. His nose was already bleeding from the exertion he was putting out, but keeping as many people alive as possible was an absolute necessity. Suddenly, between the efforts of the soldiers, the massive psion, and Silas, the village was cleared of everything but twitching dismembered limbs and smashed bodies.

"Charles!" Silas was yelling for the massive warrior to come examine his fallen soldier. He didn't technically know anything about first aid, but he knew that Charles healed faster than anyone he had ever met. His hand had been useless only three days ago, and his arm had been a crippled ruin. Now they were both intact enough to fight a full battle. The injury in the soldier's leg was bad. The muscles in his leg had been severed, and he collapsed when any weight was on it.

"Silas, I can't do anything. I might be able to hold it closed while someone sewed the wound shut, but I don't have any powers to heal." He sighed in regret. He knew exactly what was likely to happen after this. If the werewolves and remaining undead didn't strike now, they would hound them all the way to Anebrilith, with the civilians in tow.

"Do it then. He can still fight if we get him fixed upo fast enough. Nothing else we can arm him with a crossbow and mount him on a horse. We need all the fighters we can get." One of the soldiers knew something of healing injuries, and he could sew the wound shut.

"Alright Silas, I don't make any promises." He reached out carefully with his mind, to keep excess hands out of the sawbones way, and grabbed lightly on the torn flesh. Using the utmost care, he pulled the destroyed muscle back together, and waited patiently. The two remaining soldiers pinned their comrade to the ground, and let the ad hoc healer get to his work. The needle and thread stitched the torn flesh back together, but he couldn't pretend that it was likely the man would survive the week.

[Charles]

"Fifty zombies destroyed?" The Lycanthrope was upset to say the least.

"Azo, we have that many ten times again throughout the forest."

"That doesn't matter you fool. They defeated fifty of our zombies with just 5 soldiers and that psion. They'll gather soldiers as they go, and no force in the world will have the numbers to defeat them, unless we commit evertything to a single attack, when they have refugees in tow. But without losing more zombies, I cannot create the situation I need..."

The Lycanthrope captain of Legion Clades and his second chatted quietly among themselves. They had been told to fix their masters mistake, and destroy the traitors in Den Caedo, as well as the psionicist that had beaten them so soundly. When a lieutenant of the Necromancer directs you to do something, you do it very quickly. If you fail, he'll probably tell you to do it again. When that happens, your rotting corpse has no choice but to obey. If you fail again, well, you're already damned anyway. The eternity of torment as a plaything shouldn't be so bad...

Treehome Village, Red Forest-

The sewing was done. It was just a question of time now. He would either heal or not. He would likely never walk again without help.

"Den Caedo. I'm afraid it looks like we aren't done yet."

"Captain? I don't follow..." The man had been a squad commander when they were fighting for the necromancer. Now he was a farmer. He thought that it most certainly was over. Zombies dead, village saved, end of story.

"Do you think the necromancer will just give up now that we've killed his zombies? Or do you think he'll send more and more, until we're all dead? There are more than a hundred of us scattered in the villages along this stretch of forest, and we have to rally, and cut our way out. Either towards Anebrilith or back towards Alerar. They're both death traps, but at least at Anebrilith we might get our families through the necromancer's lines and into the city. They could escape from there."

"Captain..." The man faltered, unsure of what to say. He wanted his family safe, his children safe, but he wanted the fighting to simply end. "Sir... We'll follow where you lead."

"Good. Gather up the draft beasts, carts, and similar. We need to gather supplies to move this many people. Ready torches and brands, and all the flammables you can find. We are going to burn this village, and the wood for a hundred yards out, to the ground if we can."

"I...yes sir. We'll get to it."

The townsfolk hadn't fled far. They heard when the combat stopped, and they heard the voices. They came trickling back into the square, watching the 5 soldiers move about and gather what they needed. Some of the farmers pitched in. It was a village of some 40 people, but they were hardy folk, and even the women were strong enough to help. It was going to take a few hours, but the refugee train would be ready and on the way by a few hours past noon. The high sun was dim and gray here back in the woods, but they still worked quickly in the shade under the trees, desperate to flee this damned place.

"Silas, come here a moment." Charles toed one of the zombies bodies. Its skull was smashed, but its armor and weapon were sound. Many of the others were the same way. Injuries to limbs or heads, not many to torsos. "Have your men collect the armor and weapons from the undead. We can train anyone willing. We have some time to make them soldiers. It'll be weeks before we have everyone from your old troop back together, even if we do manage to save them all. Teaching the villagers to fight will likely be the only thing that saves us. But only adolescent men or older. Women without any children can learn too, but if they have families we can't be sending them out front to fight when we try to break through the lines."

"Charles, it takes a long time to train a swordsman. They'll be passable against undead, but against anything living, they'll be so much water in a boiler, flashing away at the first sign of heat. I can teach them to kill zombies in a few weeks, but the death rate will be wretched. We'll lose most of them in combat."

"They don't fight unless they have to, but the numbers will be telling. We can fight through a weak point in the enemy lines with them, but it won't be much else." Silas sighed heavily as Charles spoke.

"It won't be pretty. I don't have a village we can recruit from you know. They're all long since destroyed. We slaughtered the last of them back at the foothills when Gelicus went mad."

The two moved apart after that, Silas and his soldiers stripping the undead of weapons and armor, while Charles helped oversee the villagers with the wounded soldier as a sort of twisted aide de camp. It was almost time to leave, and the torches burned bright and hot in the cool air. Charles started the affair with his own inimmitable flair. The hammer swund once, and the blacksmiths forge shattered, spreading blazing coals across the shop. It was involved before he made it out the door. The nearby trees had been soaked in oil and heaped with brush and dung. He wasn't going to get the hundred yards he wanted, but there would still be a noticeable hole in the forest, and maybe the blaze would spread a bit. Houses caught next. Thatched rooves and timber walls with pitch caulking burned merrily as the entire village went up as a pyre, burning undead and dead alike. The survivors and soldiers were running down the road to catch up to the refugee train. It wasn't very big. Perhaps 5 wagons or carts, laden with supplies and weapons, and as many old and children as they could bear.

[Charles]

"So, Silas, what exactly are we looking at?"

"There are seven more villages we were drawn from, all the way from here to Anebrilith. I'm betting that Clades will keep getting reinforced, and that we'll have to fight an undending stream of zombies, probably at least fifty, same as last time, in each fight. Don't be surprised if we meet more though. They're ruthless. And we'll start seeing living lycanthropes when he gets desperate." The smaller soldier shrugged inside his armor. "We'll deal with it. Barring unforeseen circumstances we'll get reinforced every time. And we're looking at ten or fifteen men every time, plus the "soldiers" that I'm training every night."

"So we're looking at between seventy and some one hundred men that are trained soldiers, and another 3-400 more untrained or half-trained troops?"

"Somewhat less than that I'm afraid. Of the populace of those villages, I think maybe 200 will actually be able to fight. I would say that 250 would be the upper limit of what we could expect, if we included teenagers and older men."

"They're both still strong enough to swing a weapon aren't they? As long as they can be trained to fight, we'll be fine."

The two companions chatted as they rode at the head of the caravan. They were riding point, and the soldiers were covering their flanks and rear. It wasn't the best setup, but it was the only way they could keep the pathfinders in front. Charles could sense if an attack was coming anyway. It wasn't going to matter if they were at the back or front. No attack was faster than the speed of thought.

_________

"Keep your guard up! Jorey, if you can stop an attack from a human, you can beat an undead." Silas shouted directions to his "trainees" in the dusky air, drilling them with swords they had taken from the undead and then blunted with Charles hammer, and a little help from the smith. "Remember! We aren't just fighting for our lives, we're fighting for everyone's. We cannot run. We cannot falter, we cannot surrender. The dead show no mercy. They sack everything, and kill everyone." Silas' one clever stroke in this, or so he thought, was that he had disallowed any man who had no close relatives among the refugees from being a candidate for the front line. They were all receiving training, but when the time came, the men, and women with families would be put in the line of fire. Brothers, husbands, sisters, mothers, fathers. He didn't want soldiers. He didn't have time for soldiers. He wanted warriors, berserkers, fighters. He had to trade survivability for brutality, and it was reflected in his training regimen. Everyone was badly bruised, except for a few naturals, who had managed to avoid the worst of any hits they took. He knew that most if not all of his ad hoc soldiers would die cutting their way through the ranks of the undead, just to give a bare few hundred a chance to escape to the last haven in Raiaera.

The sounds of clashing metal and grunting fighters continued well into the night, until Silas finally called a halt. "You're all making progress. It's only been three days, but we're definitely getting there. Some of you could probably take on undead now, but we're going to keep you in reserve as long as possible. You will not fight the enemy until we meet the main army. When w do reach that army, I will not lie to you. Most, if not all of you, will die. You will fight, and bleed, and scream and die for your parents, siblings, children, and grandchildren. You will lay down your lives so your families can live. We will be fighting right alongside you. Our soldiers will be right next to you, fighting for the same purpose. We need you alive for as long as possible. You are the point of our spear, and you will be the only thing standing between your families and the hordes of the necromancer."

The would be soldiers had been chatting amongst themselves when he started speaking. Now they were deadly silent. The sheer enormity of their task weighed heavily upon their shoulders. They had to fight and die for their families, and they knew beyond any doubt that if they didn't fight as hard as they could, and consequently die as hard as they could, then everyone they loved would die with them.