GARVIN WAS SMALL FOR A MINION WARRIOR. BUT WHAThe lacked in stature he more than made up for with courage. He was also resourceful, a good swordsman, and a fast flier. Because of these admirable traits, Traax had suggested him for a vitally important mission. To help him hide in the night sky, his exposed skin and his shiny weapons had been rubbed with charcoal.
The entire Conclave had questioned him for more than an hour before finally agreeing on him as their choice. As he stood on theTammerland ’s moonlit deck, the importance of his impending mission began to sink in. In the finest Minion tradition he was ready to do his best, no matter the cost to himself.
It was nearly midnight of the evening following the failed probe of the Recluse defenses. All the Conclave members were on deck to see Garvin off, as were throngs of anxious Minions and highlander horsemen. Tristan would soon order a group of warriors to conduct a diversionary tactic designed to draw Serena’s servants away from the Recluse. If the diversion failed, Garvin knew that he would probably be killed.
It had taken Faegan and Abbey all day and part of the night to produce the small amount of fluid that he would soon carry. It was precious, they had told him. The highly concentrated formula had exhausted Abbey’s supplies of certain herbs and oils, ensuring that producing another batch would be impossible. The campaign for the Recluse and the future of the Vigors relied on Garvin’s success. There would be no second chance.
Garvin looked to the night sky. TheJin’Sai was standing beside him as they waited for the right time to send him aloft. If a suitable cloud formation formed, Garvin could perhaps use it to hide in. As he looked west, it seemed that he was about to get his wish. He pointed skyward.
“Look there,” he said to the others. “That might do.”
Tristan stared at the passing clouds. They were dense and moving east to west.
“What do you think?” he asked Traax.
Traax nodded. “I agree,” he said. “If we don’t take advantage of this formation, we might not get another one.”
“All right,” Tristan said to Garvin. “Hide in those clouds and travel with them as they move. Stay close enough to their lower edges so that you can see the ground. When the diversion starts, you know what to do.”
Tristan held out the precious glass tube. It was about four inches long by one inch wide. A simple cork secured its top. The dark green formula trapped inside swirled and eddied with a life of its own.
Garvin carefully took the tube from Tristan and secured it in a leather pouch tied around his waist. He clicked his boot heels together.
“I live to serve,” he said quietly. “And I won’t let you down.”
Tristan nodded. “Go,” he said softly. “May the Afterlife be with you.”
Everyone watched Garvin leave the deck and soar into the sky. Following his orders, he headed east and climbed quickly. They soon lost track of him as he approached the cloud formation.
Tristan turned to Ox. “Now comes your turn,” he said. “Take your force and head slowly for the castle’s southern face. Give them plenty of time to see you. When the shrews attack, fight them for a short time, then sound a retreat. We will surely lose some warriors to Serena’s shrews and camouflaged creatures, but that can’t be helped if we’re to give Garvin enough time. Go, and good luck to you.”
Puffing out his barrel chest, Ox clicked his heels together and smiled. He turned to gather his warriors. In moments he and three hundred others had landed on the ground to start skulking toward the moonlit castle.
As he watched them go, Tristan clenched his jaw. There was much about this plan that he didn’t like, but it was the best that he and his Conclave had been able to devise. For Garvin to succeed, Ox and his group had to entice Serena’s creatures far from the Recluse. Even so, Gavin would have to perform his part of it quickly, and without being seen.
Tyranny walked across the deck to stand beside Tristan. Trying to calm her nerves, she produced a cigarillo and lit it. After taking a deep lungful of smoke she reached out to take his arm, then gently tugged him to one side.
“Good luck,” she said simply.
“Thank you,” he said. He gave her a searching look. “No hard feelings about our earlier conversation?” he whispered.
After taking another drag on her cigarillo, she shook her head and tousled her hair. Finally she smiled.
“No hard feelings,” she whispered back. “But I have to be honest with you. I still haven’t given up. One of these days, you’ll come around to my way of thinking.”
Tristan let go a short laugh, then looked back at the Minion warriors moving across the moonlit field. Almost at once the action started.
Shrews by the thousands ominously surfaced the lake surrounding the Recluse. As they snarled wildly, their breath streamed out in ghostly vapors and their teeth and steaming coats glinted in the moonlight. They immediately started thundering across the killing field.
Tristan held his breath as he watched Ox and the warriors staunchly obey their orders. Holding their dreggans high, they stopped advancing and formed a tight phalanx as they braced for the onslaught.
Wait, Tristan thought, as he watched the brave warriors hold their ground. Wait, wait…now!
Like Tristan had willed it from afar, the warriors launched into the air just as the shrews reached them, then started hacking at the monsters from above.
Tristan anxiously raised Tyranny’s spyglass to look closer. Remember your orders, Ox, his mind warned. Don’t remain in the fray for too long!
Just then he saw warriors start disappearing into thin air, and he knew that Serena’s other monsters had left the castle walls to join the attack. That was what he had wanted to happen, but it also added much to the danger his warriors faced.
Sound the retreat! Tristan’s frantic mind begged as his fingers closed harder around the spyglass. You must do it now, before you are completely overcome!
Suddenly he heard the distant bugle call come floating across the field. As the warriors started flying back, Tristan raised the spyglass to the sky.
HIS WINGS FOLDED BEHIND HIS BACK, GARVIN PLUNGEDearthward in a nearly vertical free fall. As ordered, he had waited for the diversion to start before he left his hiding place in the clouds.
Turning his attention from the battle, he focused on his landing place. It was to be on the Recluse’s north side, putting the castle directly between him and the fighting. As he neared the structure he could see that the consuls and Valrenkians had abandoned their posts along guard paths atop three of the four walls. To a man they had gathered on the southern wall top to raucously watch the fighting and to cheer the vicious shrews onward. TheJin’Sai had predicted that their attention would be firmly locked on the killing field, and he had been right.
As he neared the north shore of the lake, Garvin unfolded his wings to slow his descent. He landed silently on the grass, then snapped his wings into place behind his back. Looking around, he quietly drew his dreggan. As the Conclave had hoped, the area on this side of the Recluse seemed deserted. Knowing that there was no time to lose, he used his free hand to remove the glass tube from his waist pouch and silently crept toward the lakeshore.
“For the formula to work, you must pour the contents into the water bit by bit, until it is gone,”Faegan had told him.“Then return the tube to your pouch and leave as quickly as you can.” In the quiet of the night, Garvin started to uncork the tube. Then he heard a soft splashing sound.
He froze, trying to listen. He could hear faint cheering still coming from the southern wall top, but nothing else. Then the splashing sound came again, followed by a low, snarling growl. He cautiously turned to look behind him.
About fifteen meters down the lakeshore, a shrew stood glaring at him. Its coat was wet and steaming in the cool night air. The beast’s breathing was ragged, and blood dripped from a wound in its right shoulder. Garvin quickly gathered that the wound had probably been incurred during yesterday’s failed try to probe the Recluse. Another bloody gash form a Minion dreggan ran vertically between the beast’s dark eyes.
Garvin quickly guessed that the shrew had stayed behind to lick its wounds. Worse, it might be just one of many such wounded monsters taking refuge in the lake. Not one member of the Conclave had taken this possibility into account.
As the shrew stood there snarling at him, Garvin wondered why it didn’t attack. Perhaps it was wounded too badly, or its eyesight had been adversely affected. He had no idea whether shrews could communicate with their masters, but he couldn’t take the chance. The beast had to die. But his mission must come first.
Deciding to risk it, he took a step closer to the shore.
The shrew immediately snarled, louder this time. But it did not move. As he held the shrew’s gaze, Garvin took another step.
The unpredictable shrew snarled, then charged a few paces and stopped again. Despite its wounds, its speed was incredible. As the terrible thing glared at him, its teeth glinted in the moonlight and more blood ran from its shoulder to drip lazily onto the ground.
If he could steal one more pace, Garvin knew that he would be close enough. Holding his breath, he took the final step. Reaching slowly across his body with his sword arm, he tried to uncork the tube without laying down his dreggan. After a few moments the cork wiggled free and Garvin dropped it to the grass. He held the tube at arm’s length and started gradually pouring the wizards’ formula into the lake.
That was when the shrew’s instincts took over, and it charged.
Garvin sidestepped and quickly put his thumb over the open end of the tube. Then he brought his dreggan down and around, aiming for the preexisting wound in the monster’s shoulder. As the shrew went past him he felt a searing pain in his sword arm. The shrew skidded to a stop about five meters away in the slippery grass.
When the shrew turned to face him, Garvin could tell that his aim had been true-the beast’s wound was far deeper and longer than before, and blood was literally spurting from it with each beat of the thing’s dark heart. In truth he didn’t know what was keeping the monster’s front leg attached to its shoulder.
He stole a precious second to glance at the tube. Most of its formula had gone into the lake, but a bit remained in the tube’s curved bottom. With one eye locked on the shrew, he starting dribbling the rest of the formula into the water. But before he could finish, the thing attacked again.
Again he tried to sidestep the shrew, but this time he wasn’t quick enough. The monster brushed against his body, throwing him to the ground on his stomach. To his horror, the tube slipped from his hand but blessedly landed upright in the grass. He lunged for it, but at the same time the shrew bit viciously into his right thigh.
Desperate to recapture the vial, he tried crawling forward. In retaliation the monster thrashed his leg viciously about, and bit deeper into his flesh. He knew that the beast’s strength and size would soon win out, but he had to somehow finish his mission.
Lunging forward with everything he had, he felt his thigh muscles tear away, but the vial finally came into his hand. Turning it upside down, he poured the remaining formula into the lake.
I can die now, he thought, like the warrior I was trained to be.
But then the beast did something amazing. It let him go.
Garvin turned as best he could to look at the shrew. The monster wobbled drunkenly as its jaws loosened from around his thigh. For several tense moments it slowly lifted its awful head and glared at him. Then it collapsed onto its wounded side, dead from blood loss.
His chest heaving, Garvin did his best to stand. The searing pain nearly caused him to faint away, and he dropped the vial. Much of his outer right thigh was gone, some of it still lodged between the shrew’s pointed teeth. His right arm was bleeding badly. He reached under his chest armor to produce two tourniquets, then wound them tightly around his wounds.
He was terribly weak from blood loss, but his wings had not been injured and the fleet was close. Suddenly remembering what Faegan had said about not leaving any evidence behind, Garvin nearly fainted again as he picked up the empty vial and returned it to his waist pouch.
It was all he could do to get airborne. He knew that a direct flight path back to the Black Ships would probably mean the difference between him living or dying. But he dutifully chose to follow orders and backtrack along the more circuitous route that had brought him here. His mind light-headed and his muscles feeling like they were made of lead, Garvin did his best to head west.
After finally crashing to the deck of theTammerland, he lived just long enough to tell his tale.