Hope Sundered

The sun pierced the horizon like a flame and filled the morning sky with its radiance. The few clouds present were stretched thin as they crawled by overhead. On the field below, most of the enemy still slumbered. The glowing red embers of dying campfires dotted the landscape. Lark imagined their daily routine had become as boring as his own, and he found an odd comfort in the thought.

Until the wagons arrived. Laden with dozens of cut trees, stripped and ready to be assembled into scaffolding. Day and night they worked under Zordecai’s ever critical gaze.

“This is your chance, Lark,” Bel’ami told him. “I’ll attempt to goad him into coming closer. Conceal yourself and when I give the signal, fire at will.”

“With pleasure, Sire!” Lark loaded his quiver with his painted arrows and hurried away while Bel’ami positioned himself above the eastern gate. He looked down to see Zordecai glaring back at him with a defiant sneer.

“You don’t honestly think that’ll work, do you?” Bel’ami shouted. “Whatever you build, we’ll torch it as soon as it touches the wall!” Several nearby soldiers gave a rousing cheer at their patriarch’s words.

“You are few, and you are weak!” Zordecai called back, his ominous voice echoing across the field. He strode forward to face Bel’ami with a host of zealots surrounding him. “We are many and we are strong! We are unstoppable!” The Azrahterans took up a wild cheer that seemed to shake the ground.

Bel’ami waited for their bravado to die down. “Unstoppable? Ha! I have with me the man who cut you, and he’s far older than any of my talented guardsmen! We don’t need superior numbers when we have superior skill!”

Fifty paces away, Lark strung his bow and fitted an arrow from a crouching position. He peeked over the wall to get his bearings on his target, and to make sure no one was looking his way. Zordecai’s undivided attention was focused on the patriarch.

He waited until Bel’ami made the slightest of hand gestures, meant only for him. When he was certain he’d judged his distance and angle correctly, Lark took a long, steadying breath and fired. Resisting the urge to stand and see if his missile found its mark, he drew a second arrow immediately and sent it soaring right behind the first.

He knew he’d have a few precious seconds before the Azrahterans realized they were under attack. The more arrows he could put in the air, the better. He pushed aside his lingering grief for Keila as well as his budding attraction to Tanni and drew a third arrow without slowing his rhythm.

He didn’t know how many arrows it would take to drop such a beast of a man. He was aiming with his intuition and firing blind; far different from the spring festival tournament, where he had ample time and a direct line of sight. There’d be no clear shot at Zordecai’s heart, no easy kill.

Lark let a fourth arrow fly. He maintained his crouch despite the protests of his aching body. He felt the pressure of success like the tension in his bowstring. Killing Zordecai could end the siege. Failing could shatter the fragile hopes of the entire city.

⸞ ⸎ ⸟

Zordecai stared up at the shaped blurs dotting the top of the wall. He had no way of discerning one from another, but no one needed to know that. It wouldn’t make a difference anyway; everyone in the city would die. “I’m coming for you, Losigalender!” he called out, wanting his nemesis to know the end was drawing near.

Something sharp and painful stuck the top of his left shoulder a moment later. He cried out, as much in surprise as in pain, and his hand shot up to investigate. He could see the white shaft from the corner of his eye before his hand closed around the foreign object.

He screamed again—out of anger and frustration—once he realized there was an arrow protruding from his flesh. Where had it come from? A heartbeat later a second arrow, appearing once more out of thin air, struck him in the left thigh, just above the knee.

He howled once more. Each materializing missile came with an invisible arrow of fear and confusion, piercing his mind just as the tangible ones were diving into his body. What was happening?

Several soldiers attempted to shield their general while they led him away from the wall. One of them dropped to the ground face first after receiving a white arrow in the back of his neck. Soon Zordecai was out of range. The fourth and fifth arrows sunk harmlessly into the ground where he’d been standing mere seconds ago.

The Wyndhamites along the wall cheered Lark’s success. This was no rumor to dismiss. The legendary general had indeed been wounded, and both sides had borne witness.

⸞ ⸎ ⸟

“Just pull them out!” Zordecai cried through clenched teeth and flying spittle. The pain of embarrassment rivaled the intense burning in his muscles. He braced himself awkwardly on his bed while four men fussed over his wounds, trying to determine the best way to remove the arrows without causing further damage.

The one in his thigh was the easiest. One man held the shaft firmly near the head while another gripped the back end and snapped off the fletching, allowing the arrow to be pulled through. Zordecai grunted and gnashed his teeth but refused to scream as they cleaned and bandaged the hole.

The one lodged between his collarbones proved to be more of a challenge as two of the soldiers attempted to pry it from his shoulder. Out of reflex he took hold of the nearest soldier’s arm, squeezing until he crushed the bone. The man cried out and fell limp in Zordecai’s iron grasp, looking for help from his colleagues, none of which could offer any.

The arrow finally came free, and Zordecai released the soldier’s arm without apology. Two other soldiers ushered the broken man from the tent with haste, leaving another to clean and dress the general’s wound.

After dismissing the last man, Zordecai shakily tied his tent flaps closed and retrieved a small clay jar and square piece of slate from the bottom of his trunk. Taking a seat at his table, he removed the cork stopper and proceeded to shake out the jar’s contents onto the slate, taking care to arrange the white powder into six parallel lines.

Alternating between nostrils, he inhaled each line using a short piece of hollow reed. His heart began to race, and soon the pain in his leg and shoulder quieted to a dull ache. He replaced the stopper and hid the jar beneath several tunics in his trunk.

Though restless he laid down on his bed and stared at the ceiling of his tent. Daylight prevented his surroundings from being completely dark, but he found the dimness comforting. His entire body shivered and twitched with fever, but he no longer felt it.

He wasn’t accustomed to seeing his own blood, and he’d already seen too much this day. The dizziness had also passed, leaving him feeling euphoric. He was Zordecai, General of the Imperial Army, infamous Butcher of Azrahtera, and right hand to Aguliss the Thirteenth.

What he first considered to be humiliating he now saw as proof of his greatness. He’d been stabbed and shot with arrows—and lived! No other man could’ve survived such damage. His mortal wounds would only serve to strengthen his legendary status, he decided. It didn’t matter how many times he was pierced because he couldn’t be killed.

Perhaps he truly was a god.