A Dragon's Ascension - Ed Greenwood [25]
With a wordless nod the procurer turned, summoning Sarasper with a jerk of his head, and thrust the wooden pole up the rock face, at the lowest of the Melted.
It was just out of reach, and Craer swung the pole hastily down and around to catch the shoulder of one of the Melted in the road and smash him sideways into his two fellows, as they stood slashing at Hawkril's parrying warsword.
In a flash Hawkril bent and chopped low at the other side of the stumbling trio-and they went over together like a collapsing haystack. Craer leaped into the pile with his dagger in one hand and the pole in the other, hacking like a madman.
There was a sudden great roar of flame from the writhing heap of bodies, and the procurer tumbled hastily back out of the sudden inferno by vaulting with his pole-scorched and smiling fiercely.
"So a watching mage wants us cooked, hey?" He thrust the blackened, flaming end of the pole up the cliff again, and this time managed to deal the legs of the lowest Melted a solid blow.
It slipped, clawing vines and rock, and fell-and the procurer and Sarasper pounced on it, caught hold of a boot and an elbow, and threw as hard as they could.
In the same dead silence the Melted whirled past Hawkril like a rag doll, and crashed into the blazing heap of its fellows. Two more Melted were trying to push past this small conflagration, but were being held back by great swings of Hawkril's warsword, which threatened to sweep them into the flames even if they parried it to avoid losing limbs.
Craer glanced back up at the rock face and the Melted still standing above it, and then at those stiffly striding around the blazing heap in the road, seeking to outflank Hawkril, and called, "Raulin-still clear?"
"Yes!" the young bard shouted. Craer nodded and cried, "Fall back, everyone! Hawk, draw back beyond the rock face!"
The armaragor growled his dislike of butchering walking dead men, but stepped back a reluctant pace-and as he did, the Melted poured forward, coming out of the trees in numbers, now.
Craer was still looking up, smoldering pole in hand, as he waved the others back along the road. What he'd been awaiting befell almost immediately: a Melted sprang from the rocks, seeking to land atop Sarasper.
With a brittle smile the procurer darted to just the right place, planted himself-and held firm as the plunging warrior impaled himself on the sapling. It shivered, splintered, and then collapsed in the process, and Craer sprang back just before the Melted burst into flame.
Another Melted jumped or fell from the rock face, and the panting procurer sprinted to Hawkril's side to guard the retreating armaragor's flank, and then to turn suddenly, and call, "Embra! Now!"
The Lady Overduke raised both hands over her head, snarled something intricate and hissing, and then flung her arms forward as if she was hurling a flour sack down to someone waiting below. Craer and Hawkril threw themselves off the road into the trees as Embra's shapely hands came down.
Flames roiled forth from the empty air in front of the sorceress, a great snarling flood of fire that plucked Melted from the rock face, caused two more to fall from the trees above the rocks, and swept over everything on the road.
There were sudden bursts of fire here and there as whoever was controlling the staggering dead men caused them to burst apart in flame, hoping to catch one of the Four.
Embra smiled grimly, and tugged at her fire as if she was clawing at an invisible quilt or fishnet in the air, seeking to drag it back and-
Sweep the last Melted from atop the rocks, scorching the leaves there with a loud crackling, to plunge in that same dead silence down