Ironhelm - Douglas Niles [126]
"They're a lot closer," he said grimly, looking straight into Erix's eyes. He wanted to dive into the warm pool he saw there, seeking comfort and shelter. But he knew this was not to be.
"What are they?" Erix questioned him earnestly.
She tried to conceal her fright, but was not completely successful.
"I'm not sure. Sorcerous, some kind of black magic things, I'm sure… very powerful, very deadly. They sound, in a way, like a pack of hounds on the hunt, but the noise is too unearthly for that." He took a deep breath and continued.
"Remember when I told you that we'd have to split up if it ever got too dangerous? The time has come. You can't stick with me any longer. I can't outrun those creatures, and when they catch me, it won't be pleasant. I might be able to hold 'em off, but you'll be far safer elsewhere."
She laughed at him then, and Halloran just stared back, not amused. "I mean it! We'll have to split up. It's the only chance you have!"
"Did you ever stop to think that this pack might be chasing me?" she asked, standing up and then helping him to his feet. "Maybe we should just stick together and try to help each other out," Erix suggested.
Halloran looked at her in surprise, ashamed that he had not considered that possibility. He had known since the death of Kachin that Erix had powerful and murderous enemies. Indeed, that attacker had broken off the fight at dawn, exactly when these hounds had ceased their howling the previous night.
Wearily, aching in every joint, they prepared to move out once more. The howling was more distinct than the previous night, yet still somehow indefinably distant.
They plodded along through the rest of the night, and gradually the sound drifted away behind them. But humans and animals both were near the point of total exhaustion when sunrise finally ended the cries of the beastly pursuers.
Finally, just as dawn turned to daylight, the jungle opened slightly into a flat savannah of grass, reeds, and, wondrous miracle, a clear pond! They both splashed into the water as the sun came up, drinking and washing and cooling off.
Only as the first rays lit the ground around them did Halloran look up to see three buzzards wheeling through a lazy circle above them.
"Higher! It needs five more feet!" Daggrande barked at a group of legionnaires who leaned on their spades in exhaustion. With dark looks at the dwarf, they chopped into the earth and shoveled more dirt onto the rampart that now ringed three quarters of Fort Helmsport.
Despite his shouts and curses, the dwarf could not restrain his pride in the work of the legionnaires. In a few short days, they had moved a prodigious amount of earth. Soon they would have a commanding and easily defensible base overlooking a fine natural harbor and a long stretch of the coast of this nation called Payit.
Below them, the little fishing village would never be the same. The wide, once-grassy field surrounding it had been churned to mud. A small smithy had been established near the stream, which now flowed brown and silt-laden into the bay, while black smoke from the forge filtered across the plain. A road, already reduced to a strip of mud, led from the fort to Ulatos. Steady supplies of food-cocoa, mayz, turkeys, venison, all the choicest delicacies of the Payit-arrived daily, and the legion ate well.
As the fort's construction progressed, rocks and earth had also been dumped into the bay, and now a solid jetty extended perhaps a hundred feet from shore. An additional pier, crossing the T of the jetty, took form, and carracks and caravels pulled up to the solid barrier. No longer did all loading and unloading depend upon the ships' small boats.
Daggrande continued his inspection of the rampart. The hilltop would soon be circled by a ten-foot-high dirt wall, with a five-foot deep ditch on the outside. A small opening had been left, free of ditch and wall, but Darien claimed to know a spell that would fill this gap in a moment. Daggrande did not