Page 88 of Into the West

Some levitated the cartridges gently into place. Some apported them—apportation worked a lot like the Fetching Gift, except that any mage who had learned the spell could do it. As a rule, it was meant for short distances, but in this case the spell had enough range. It didn’t take long for the mages to start dropping cartridges in choice places; what did take some care was placing the cartridges far enough away from each other for maximum damage. While they were placing the cartridges, Kordas kept an eye on the Forest; it may have appeared to have “healed” almost instantly from the damage it had taken—but from the uncoordinated way in which the trees in the spot were thrashing, it hadn’t actually recovered. Meanwhile, Delia’s face was completely expressionless, her eyes narrowed in concentration.

“We’re hurting them!” Kordas yelled, and a few guards cheered at that, while one audibly asked, “Them? Just how many forests are here?” Kordas shot him a baleful eye, then turned back to business. He knew his levitation skills were not all that good, but—maybe my aim is good enough. And although he didn’t have a bow on him, he did have his Spitter and a pouch full of projectiles and cartridges. If it can take down one source of rage and hate, it can take down another. He grinned to himself for a moment, kissed his Spitter, loaded it, sighted on the trigger point of the planted canister nearest him, and carefully squeezed the trigger, at the same time that Delia aimed and fired her crossbow.

POOM-POOM!

Two canisters going off side by side made a much bigger hole in the thing than he would have expected, and the trees went wild. Delia was triply faster at reloading than he was, but once he’d reloaded, another two cartridges went up with an equally satisfying result.

Three more, and the Forest abruptly pulled back from the wall, and he dared to hope.

But then it did something he hadn’t expected. Staying at a distance from the wall, the thing split into two, and began to encircle them. It’s smart enough to know not to cluster up when an explosive is in play. And to keep a part of itself out of our apparent range.

“Fuck!” Jonaton swore. He grabbed the knife off his belt and cut off his fancy gown at the knee, tossed the bottom aside, and made a sprint to the right.

“Some of you follow Jonaton!” Kordas barked. “Sai, you, you, and you—” He pointed at three of the guards. “Support Delia! The rest with me!”

He sprinted to his left, followed by guards and mages, and the ever-present Rose. He left a trio of one mage and two guards at intervals along the wall until he ended up at the back of the Vale and met with Jonaton.

The Forest had already beaten them there. The Vale was completely encircled too.

The POOMs of cartridges going off echoed back and forth around the Vale, as the Valdemarans who were not part of the guard either sought shelter or came to the foot of the wall to offer any help they could. Someone brought up casks of the Tayledras’s hard brandy to the foot of the wall, and before Kordas could shout at him not to be daft, he called up “Lad! This’ll burn!”

Dear gods, it will! The Tayledras had introduced them all at the Midwinter celebration to a game that consisted of snatching nuts with your bare hand out of a bowl of burning brandy, and he knew from that, as well as drinking it, that the stuff was potent—and flammable! He gestured to the people below to bring casks up—and this time, there was no finessing about. The trees had closed in to direct contact with the maze wall, and beat upon it. Footing on the parapets became slippery while the trees beat upon the structure, and it was increasingly unnerving when they began their disorienting screams again, and the pounding upon the walls took on rhythms. Can’t say I like that, Kordas thought. This thing hasn’t even breached the wall and it’s beating us up. Out of mood, off balance, distracting noises, frightened, and we aren’t even sure what kind of fight we can ultimately put up. After a prompt, Rose smashed in the top of a cask, and splashed the contents over every part of the Forest she could reach.

“Baron Kordas, I believe they should be on fire,” Rose said, with a hint of humor.

“Right you are, Rose,” Kordas replied. “You read my mind.” He grounded his magic, thrust out his hand, gathered power from the ley-line below, and lit off a fireball.

The result was gratifying; with a whoompf, the brandy ignited, and the trees caught fire, thrashing in agony.

But once again, the feeling of triumph was short-lived, because the damned things began lobbing chunks of snow and mud at the flames, putting them out.

If they’re fighting fire, they aren’t fighting us. “More brandy! Bring torches!” he ordered. “They can’t keep putting it out!”

Then the sky split open; a jagged lance of lightning arced down out of the clouds to a point outside the wall to his right and a peal of thunder that shook him to his core left him half blind and breathless. The weather mages were at work, somehow managing to generate lightning out of the blizzard clouds pushed back by their snow-clearing. Within seconds he saw smoke roiling up from the other side of the wall. Try being resistant against that, Forest. Nothing comes away unharmed from lightning!

But would all of this be enough?

They were merely humans, and every time a human did anything, but especially magic, there was a cost in energy and endurance. Battling the sound, shaking, emotional assaults, and simple fear tired people out even faster. This thing seemingly had no such limits—or at least, it was so huge that its limits were far past those of simple human beings. They were also depending on a finite supply of Poomer cartridges, brandy, and other weapons that were going to run out. Their enemy, the Forest, was a weapon, and now it split into six equidistant sections against the maze wall’s perimeter and shuffled side to side.

Someone apported a cartridge into a nest of trees right below him. He detonated it, but this time the hole filled in faster than it had before. He saw then that the trees were grouped more closely together than they had been, forming tight clumps that joined their canopy together, resisting the blast. They were hurt, but now it was mainly upper-level leaves that blew apart.

Another pair of lightning bolts arced down, and thunder rattled even the “stone” of the wall.

We’re not winning. We’re barely holding our own. And if this thing starts to think . . .

“Kordas, we are losing people on top of the wall,” Rose said, shouting into his thunder-deafened ears. “Where there are no mages, the trees are snatching people right from the top.”

The sounds of anguished screams came from the right and left.

“Get that brandy to everyone!” he ordered. “Let’s burn this damned thing to the ground!”

He said that . . . but behind his façade was pure despair. Because out on the edges of the clumps he saw new trees—growing.

And something horrific occurred to him.

What if the thing underground here, the thing that had made the wall he was standing on and was growing a manor for him, was akin to the Forest?

What if the Forest could feed off it?