A Charge of Valor

“It is a very generous offer. Do not ponder it long.”

With that, Andronicus turned and stormed off.

The Silesians all gradually turned and looked back at each other.

Srog stepped forward.

“Fellow Silesians!” boomed Srog, to a huge, growing crowd of warriors, looking more serious than Kendrick had ever seen him. “Andronicus has attacked our very finest, our most cherished leader. The daughter of our beloved king MacGil, and a great Queen in her own right. He has attacked each and every one of us. He has tried to put a stain on our honor – but he has only stained his own!”

“AYE!” screamed the crowd, the men stirring, each grasping the hilts of their swords, fire in their eyes.

“Kendrick,” Srog said, turning to him. “What do you propose?”

Kendrick slowly looked into the eyes of all the men before them.

“WE ATTACK!” Kendrick screamed, fire in his veins.

The crowd screamed back in approval, a thicker and thicker crowd, fearlessness in their eyes. Each and every one of these people, he saw, was ready to fight to the death.

“WE DIE LIKE MEN, AND NOT LIKE DOGS!” Kendrick screamed again.

“AYE!” screamed back the crowd.

“WE WILL FIGHT FOR GWENDOLYN! FOR ALL OF OUR MOTHERS AND SISTERS AND WIVES!”

“AYE!”

“FOR GWENDOLYN!” Kendrick screamed.

“FOR GWENDOLYN!” the crowd screamed back.

The crowd roared in ecstasy, growing thicker with each passing moment.

With one final shout, they followed Kendrick and Srog as they led the way up the narrow landing, higher and higher, for Upper Silesia. The time had come to show Andronicus what the Silver was made of.

Chapter Seven

Thor stood with Reece, O’Connor, Elden, Conven, Indra and Krohn at the mouth of the river, all of them looking down at Conval’s corpse. The mood in the air was somber. Thor felt it himself, the weight of it on his chest, pulling him down, as he stared down at his Legion brother. Conval. Dead. It did not seem possible. There had been six of them together on this journey for as long as Thor could remember. He had never imagined there would be five. It made him feel his mortality.

Thor thought of all the times that Conval had been there for him, remembered how he had always been there, every step of his journey, from the first day Thor had joined the Legion. He was like a brother to him. Conval had always stuck up for Thor, had always had a good word for him; unlike some of the others, he had accepted Thor as a friend from the very beginning. To see him lying there dead – and especially as a result of Thor’s mistakes – made Thor feel sick to his stomach. If he had never trusted those three brothers, perhaps Conval would be standing alive today.

Thor could not think of Conval without Conven, the two identical twins, inseparable, always completing each other’s thoughts. He could not imagine the pain Conven was feeling. Conven looked as if he was not in his right mind anymore; the happy, carefree Conven he once knew seemed to have departed in a single stroke.

They all still stood at the edge of the battlefield where it had taken place, the Empire corpses piled up around them. They stood there, rooted, looking down at Conval, none of them willing to move on until they had given him a proper burial. They had found some choice furs on some Empire officers, had stripped them, and had wrapped Conval’s corpse in them. They had placed him on a small boat, the one they had used to get here, and his body lay in it, long, stiff, facing the sky. A warrior’s burial. Conval already seemed so frozen, his body stiff and blue, as if he had never lived.

They had been standing there for Thor did not know how long, each of them lost in their own sorrows, none wanting to see his body go. Indra moved her palm over Conval’s head in small circles, chanting something in a language that Thor did not understand, her eyes closed. He could tell how much she cared for him as she conducted the solemn funeral service, and Thor felt a sense of peace at the sound. None of the boys knew what to say, and they all stood there glumly, silent, letting Indra lead the service.

Finally, Indra finished and took a step back. Conven stepped forward, tears running down his cheeks, and knelt down beside his brother. He reached out and lay a hand on his, bowing his head.

Conven reached out and gave the boat a shove. It bobbed out into the still waters of the river, and then, as if the tides understood, the current suddenly picked up, pulling the boat away, slowly, gently. It drifted farther and farther away from the group, Krohn whining as it went. Out of nowhere there arose a mist, and it consumed the boat. It disappeared.

Thor felt as if his body, too, had been sucked into the underworld.

Slowly, the boys turned to each other and looked out, past the battlefield, and to the terrains beyond it. Behind them was the underworld from which they came; to one side was a vast plain of grass; and to the other side was an empty wasteland, a hard-baked desert. They stood at a crossroads.

Thor turned to Indra.

“To reach Neversink, we must cross that desert?” Thor asked.

She nodded.

“Is there no other way?” he asked.

She shook her head.

“There are other ways, but less direct. You would lose weeks. If you hope to beat the thieves, it is your only way.”

The others stared long and hard at it, the suns baking off it, rippling in waves.

“It looks unforgiving,” Reece said, coming up beside Thor.

“I know of no one who has ever crossed it and lived,” Indra said. “It is vast, filled with hostile creatures.”

“We don’t have enough provisions,” O’Connor said. “We wouldn’t make it.”

“Yet it is the way to the Sword,” Thor said.

“Assuming the Sword still exists,” Elden said.

“If the thieves have reached Neversink,” Indra said, “then your precious Sword is lost forever. You would risk your lives for a dream. The best thing you can do now is turn back to the Ring.”

“We will not turn back,” Thor said, determined.

“Especially not now,” Conven added, stepping forward, his eyes alight with fire and grief.

“We will find that Sword or die trying,” Reece said.

Indra shook her head and sighed.

“I didn’t expect any other answer from you boys,” she said. “Foolhardy to the last.”

* * *

Thor marched side by side with the others through the wasteland, squinting into the harsh sun, gasping in the relentless heat. He’d thought he would be thrilled to be rid of the underworld, of its ever-present gloom, of being unable to see the suns. But he had gone from one extreme to the other. Here, in this desert, there was nothing but sun: yellow sun and yellow sky, all beaming down on him and nowhere to go. His head hurt, and he was feeling dizzy. He was dragging his feet, and felt as if he had been marching a lifetime; as he looked over, he saw the others were, too.

They had been trekking half a day, and he did not know how they could possibly continue to keep this up. He looked over at Indra, holding her hood over her head, and wondered if she had been right. Maybe they had been foolhardy to attempt this. But he had vowed to find the Sword – and what choice did they have?

As they went, their feet stirred up clouds of dust, swirling everywhere, making it even harder to breathe. On the horizon there sat nothing but more sunbaked dirt, everything flat as far as the eye could see. There wasn’t the slightest glimmer of structure, or road, or mountain – or anything. Nothing but desert. Thor felt as if they had come to the very end of the world.