Blood Ties

Morwyn hissed with pain as she gripped her shoulder, the crude black arrow protruding from between her bloody fingers. She could feel from how firmly it was lodged that the crude iron arrowhead had stuck into the bone of her upper arm and she from where she lay she couldn't get enough leverage to pull it out. Eronir slid to her side on his knees, water spraying onto her as he came to a stop and pried her hand away to inspect the wound. Morwyn gritted her teeth against the pain.

“Pull it out!” she shouted.

Eronir gave her an incredulous look.

“I'll break off the shaft and we can-”

Morwyn raised her left arm and called forth her power, the golden glow around her hand illuminating the dark interior of the shelter.

“We don't have time,” she growled angrily. “Pull it out now!”

Eronir's eyes went wide at the sight of her magic but he didn't waste any more time. He braced one palm against her shoulder and gripped the arrow shaft with his other hand then slowly worked it free to avoid losing the arrowhead within her flesh. Morwyn clenched her jaw tight against the searing pain and clamped her golden hand over her shoulder, pouring a burst of power into the wound. She didn't have time to direct the flow carefully. The caravan needed her.

Eronir glanced at the arrow and his lip curled in disgust. He threw the shaft to the ground, grabbed his spear from where he'd dropped it on his way to her, and ran outside after Argoth. Morwyn fought through the pain in her shoulder and heaved herself to her knees before scrambling to recover her fallen bow and arrow. She looked back out in time to see Argoth reach into a pouch on his belt and pull out a small, glowing stone. He shouted a word that she didn't recognize and threw the stone in an arc onto the roof of the shelter. A second later the entire camp and the slopes beyond it were flooded with a pulsing, radiating white light.

What she saw made her chest tighten with fear.

Dozens of arrows littered the camp. They were embedded in the wood of the wagons, caught up in their canvases, scattered across the shale, and protruding from the bodies of panicked, bellowing oxen. Eronir crouched for cover behind a wagon while Argoth stood alone in the open, glaring up at the clifftop with a vicious snarl as arrows rained around him yet none found their mark. He whirled around toward a cacophony of shouts and screams and the clashing of metal to the north and rushed forward with a bellow to meet a threat that Morwyn couldn't see.

Yvonne sprinted from one of the wagons toward the shelter with a terrified halfling cook under each arm, her bow nowhere to be seen. Her eyes were wild with fear as she unceremoniously tossed the poor cooks into the rear of the shelter.

“Well done!” Morwyn said as she knocked an arrow and stepped around the stone wall. She drew and loosed at the thick mass of goblin archers atop the southern cliff, now clearly visible thanks to Argoth's light stone. There was a high-pitched, squealing cry of pain and one of them crashed to the ground nearly a hundred feet below. She stepped back behind cover as several arrows hissed her way in response. Her hit was lucky and hadn't been a fatal one, but it had been enough. The fall had certainly killed the creature.

“What do we do now?” Yvonne asked, heaving for breath.

Morwyn loosed another arrow, missing this time but causing a wave of excited trilling from the goblins as they scrambled out of the way or dove behind rocks for cover. She heard Argoth's ferocious roar and the chirping war cries of goblins at the edge of camp as Eronir rushed out of sight to help him. Half a dozen other members of the caravan followed Lady Trux, moving from wagon to wagon as she directed them toward the shelter while others leapt from their wagons to join the panicked crowd. She breathed a sigh of relief to see Hazel was with her, a medical bag in each hand and a resolute expression on her face.

“Where's your bow?” Morwyn asked, knocking another arrow.

“I dropped it by the cooks' wagon so I could help them!” Yvonne answered, pointing directly to the east. “Should I help more people get to the shelter?”

Morwyn loosed her third arrow and felt a rush of satisfaction as she saw it strike deep into the chest of her target. She briefly glanced back to the cooks who were huddled together as far from the entrance as they could crawl while she considered their options.

“No, stay here. When Trux gets her group inside, I need the two of you to keep those archers' heads down. Gildara too, if she can.” Morwyn handed her own bow to Yvonne. “Will your arrows work with this? I know they're heavier than mine.”

When the elf nodded, Morwyn didn't stick around to discuss it. She took off for the cooks' wagon at a dead sprint, nearly falling as her boot struck a rain-slicked rock at the wrong angle. Arrows zipped past her as she ran, some sailing through the canvas of wagons and met with screams of pain from within. Pushing through her immediate desire to help them, she saw the curve of Yvonne's longbow on the ground and scooped it up as she passed by. She took a precious second to look into the back of the nearest wagon and was relieved to find it empty. The others had likely fallen in with Trux.

The hail of arrows was too intense to return straight across the camp again. Morwyn ducked behind the cooks' wagon for cover and inched her way along. A wounded ox nearly trampled her as she made to sprint to the next wagon and it fell to the ground not far beyond, kicking in death throes as more arrows pierced its flesh. She rushed forward and rounded the corner of the new wagon and felt a surge of terror.

Argoth, Eronir, Gildur, and several other men and women who had been in the wagons on the north side were fighting a desperate melee against a swarm of goblins many times their number. While Eronir and Argoth fought fiercely and fluidly enough to avoid being overwhelmed, the rest were not trained warriors and were only holding by keeping close together and fighting desperately on the flanks while the guards held the center. They couldn't hold for long though as their backs were to the wagon and their improvised shields were savagely battered by the wicked, curved blades and crude mauls that the goblins wielded.

Morwyn nocked one of her arrows on Yvonne's longbow and, struggling to draw it back, loosed a half-powered shot into one of the goblins on the flank. The arrow found its mark but didn't penetrate deeply, a painful distraction at best. Morwyn cursed, unsure of whether to abandon Yvonne's bow and charge in with her sword or to stick to her initial plan. The frost in her core, apparently excited by mortal combat, begged and strained against her will for release.

As she fought to keep the impulse under control an idea struck her. Morwyn channeled the eager frost down her left arm and into Yvonne's bow. Rather than the deep blue of her blade, the frigid magic crawled over the wood in a rime of white frost. She nocked another arrow and raised the bow to draw.

The limbs, frozen completely solid, didn't move an inch.

“Of fucking course,” Morwyn groaned. “Stupid, stupid!”

She struggled to rein in the magic now that it had been unleashed, but after several seconds that felt like an eternity the hoarfrost faded from the bow. She redirected it to the arrow in her right hand instead and was thrilled to see the sharp steel broad-head take on an azure hue. Drawing back as far as she could manage, she loosed the arrow into the side of the goblin horde just as they were beginning to encircle her allies. The shot flew true and struck the nearest creature in the head.

When it made impact, the arrow exploded into a flurry of icy shards that burst through the goblin's helm and into the crowd behind it, shredding iron and flesh alike as if they were made of paper. Gore, bone, and shards of metal shrapnel tore into the goblin ranks. The boom of the explosion rivaled the thunder that had been crashing around them all night and echoed through the mountain pass. For several heartbeats both her enemies and allies alike froze in confusion. Argoth, capitalizing on the moment, tore into the uncertain goblins with renewed fury as Eronir consolidated the civilian defenders and organized them into a tight rank. A moment later the melee was rejoined in a frenzy.

A foreign, wicked pleasure surged through Morwyn at the carnage her magic caused and she shuddered briefly with an uncomfortable, alien joy. Regaining her senses after a moment and not wanting to risk injuring her allies with another shot, Morwyn took off back toward the shelter. Fewer arrows now skipped off the stone or zipped past her, though there were still plenty to keep her running as fast as she could through the oppressive, pouring rain.

When she got back to the shelter she was equal parts heartened to see how many people Trux had managed to gather and devastated by the number of wounds they'd sustained, especially amongst the children. Hazel flew from one injured person to the next, doling out potions and bandages and words of comfort in kind. Morwyn's heart stopped cold when she saw at least one prone body unmoving with several black arrows protruding from their chest. Unable to see who it was or take the time to find out, she cursed under her breath and looked for Yvonne.

She found her alongside a strangely calm Gildara taking turns loosing arrows from behind the wall by the entrance. Trux, crouched beside a gap in the wall at the back corner of the shelter, fired her crossbow. Morwyn pulled Yvonne back as she was about to step forward and exchanged bows with her without a word. The elf was flushed from exertion and her face was twisted with mortal fear, but there was a determination in her eyes that gave Morwyn a boost of courage herself.

She put a hand on the elf's shoulder and gave her a nod of recognition before pushing her way through the crowd of people to get to Trux.

“Is anyone left in the wagons to the east? I didn't make it that way,” she shouted over the noise. Trux launched another bolt and grunted in satisfaction as a goblin wailed in the distance.

“I'm not sure! Grabbed as many folk as I could, but I know we don't have everyone and I have no fuckin' idea what's goin' on with Argoth and Eronir. These bastards have us pinned down, haven't been able to leave the shelter to find out.” The dwarf cranked back her crossbow with practiced speed, slapped a bolt on the rest, and loosed again.

“I've got something that might help with that,” Morwyn snarled with vengeance. “Grab some able-bodied people and get ready to run. Go around the back side and sweep for stragglers.”

Trux, unfazed by the riot of confusion around them, loaded her crossbow once more and nodded.

“Bringin' some of that madness you showed off with the giants?”

Morwyn drew an arrow from her quiver and moved back toward the entrance.

“Something like that.”

Yvonne and Gildara, their quivers nearly empty, ducked back behind the wall as she approached. The sisters gave her strained smiles and nocked new arrows as one.

“I've got seven of them so far,” Gildara said, her voice shaky but a grim pride evident in her words.

“Thirteen for me so far,” Yvonne murmured as she wiped blood from a grazing injury to her cheek. “But we'll run out of arrows long before they run out of bodies.”

Morwyn peeked out from behind the wall and saw that the elf was right. The mountainside above the cliff swarmed with too many goblins to count in a hurry. She pulled the sisters deeper behind cover and paused for a second while she rushed to plan out her next steps.

“Here's what we'll do,” Morwyn panted as she located the sisters' wagon at the center of the southern face. “I'm going to make a distraction. Yvonne, you'll make a break for your wagon to get us more arrows while Gildara stays here and keeps harassing the archers. Make sense?”

Gildara shook her head and took a step forward, her expression defiant.

“No, I'll fetch the arrows. I'm the faster runner, and Yvonne is the better shot.”

Yvonne began to protest but Morwyn shook her head to stop her.

“No time to argue. Are you both ready?”

The sisters nodded and braced themselves against the wall, Gildara at the front.

“What's the distraction?” Yvonne asked as Morwyn took several rapid breaths to prepare herself for action.

“You'll know it when you see it,” she murmured.

Morwyn gave them a silent count to three with the fingers of her right hand then made a mad dash out into the rain, away from the entrance of the shelter to draw attention away from the elves. It worked a little too well and she couldn't stop in the open as she'd planned due to the swarm of arrows that crashed around her, so she ran to crouch behind the far western wagon instead. Projectiles thunked into the wood frame and several skipped along the ground beneath it, nearly catching her in the legs.

With no time to rethink her plan, Morwyn poured a stream of power into her arrow once again, channeling the eager frost for several tense seconds. She drew back as she stepped around the corner and angled the arrow high. This time when she loosed, the frozen fletching of the arrow sliced painfully into her cheek as it leapt from the bow and wobbled slightly through the air before stabilizing. She watched it travel for one second, then two, then three as it sailed through the air. The rain that came into contact with the streak of frost turned instantly to hail and clattered to the ground below. The arrow impacted the mountainside several yards above the lines of archers and detonated with a shockwave that flung ice and stone in every direction.

As she'd hoped the burst of magic triggered a landslide that roared downward with all the fury of nature and crashed through the center of the goblins, sweeping them off the cliff and dashing them against the ground. To her horror she also saw that many of the falling stones landed dangerously close to the circle of wagons with some ricocheting and zipping into them with destructive force. Gildara, empty-handed and sprinting like the wind, dodged and wove her way between the flying rubble and dove into the back of her wagon, reappearing a moment later with several bundles of arrows beneath her arms.

Morwyn raced back toward the shelter, her legs pumping furiously to make the most of the brief reprieve from the incoming arrows. The giddy high of unleashing so much of the frost at once brought a manic smile to her face and for a moment she dared to imagine they were on the brink of turning the tide of the battle. She sprinted to catch up with the laden elf, a losing venture to be sure, but she gave it her best effort regardless.

Gildara was still several paces from the entrance of the shelter when an erratic flight of black arrows rained down toward them. Morwyn's grin turned to open-mouthed horror as a handful of the wicked shafts sank deeply into the elf's body, causing her to stumble and crash to the ground outside the shelter, sliding several feet from the momentum of her charge.

Yvonne stared at the body of her fallen sister with disbelieving shock as Morwyn sprinted forward, grabbing Yvonne by the collar of her tunic and dragging her behind the cover of the wall. Desperately Yvonne flung her bow to the ground and turned her sister face up as Morwyn immediately fell to her knees and prepared to render aid, both hands surging with golden light.

Gildara shuddered and seized, blood gurgling from her mouth and pouring from her numerous wounds. At a glance Morwyn understood that there was nothing that she could do for the woman and it broke her heart. One arrow was lodged sideways through Gildara's neck, several impaled the limbs on her right side, and two were buried to the fletching in her torso. The one arrow that made her wounds mortal sprouted from beneath her arm, the wicked point protruding out the other side with a mixture of deep crimson blood from her heart and frothy pink blood from her lungs. It pumped from the wound, making the small stream she was sprawled across run red. The magic faded from Morwyn's hands as she numbly drew it back into herself, tears streaming down her cheeks and getting lost amongst the raindrops and sweat.

“Do something!” Yvonne screamed in Morwyn's face as she sat there, stupefied. “Gods damn you, do something!”

“I... I can't. Her wounds are too deep...”

Yvonne's explosive tirade and the desperate blows she rained down on Morwyn's shoulder faded into obscurity as her ears rang and her heart pounded painfully in her chest. The next thing she knew she was being hauled to her feet by strong hands beneath her arms. She stumbled but rose unsteadily, her hands shaking as she stared at the still form of Gildara at her feet, her unblinking eyes still locked on her sister.

“She's gone,” Trux shouted, shaking her to get her attention. “But there are others that may yet live. Both of you, snap out of it!”

Yvonne, her face twisted in a wretched combination of devastated grief and wild rage, dashed out into the rain to snatch up the bundles of arrows her sister had died to retrieve. She ripped off the string that bound them and shoved a fistful into her quiver, letting the rest scatter to the ground as she stepped back out into the open without regard and loosed arrow after arrow up toward the clifftop.

Driven back to her senses by Trux's shaking, Morwyn shook her head several times to clear it. She saw Yvonne outside the shelter, screaming abuse at their attackers as she sent deadly shafts their way with others striking around her in return. The shelter was overcrowded now with everyone able to stand pressing themselves against the back wall and dragging the wounded with them. Screams of pain and anguish and the cries of children flooded her ears.

“Get her back in here!” Morwyn shouted to Trux as she drew her sword, her bow forgotten on the bloodstained ground. “I'm going to help Argoth and Eronir!”

Just as Morwyn made to rush forward, the ground beneath the cooks' wagon at the east end of the camp erupted, sending it flying several feet into the air as a monstrous beast burst onto the scene with a savage roar.