The Warrior Camp

Photo by Егор Камелев on Unsplash

The deep voice hauled Fallon to his feet and pushed him out the tent. He winced at the contact with his scarred shoulders. The Listening woman was gone. Pale gray spread across the eastern sky. Fallon was in the warrior camp! 

To his left, a Fae warrior sat astride a Sprint, a spider like creature at least ten feet tall. Its eight long legs were covered with barbed hair that could cut through tall meadow grass. They had strapped several Ibik hides around the oval body to deflect a wounding sword stroke from below. 

The creature fidgeted below its Fae rider. She had not melded her will with the Sprint. Fallon looked about him. The warriors, their attendants and apprentices moved about in preparation for battle but not with the one melded mind of those who had consumed energy. He was confused.

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“Strap him to the Sprint,” deep voice said and pushed him forward to a group of soldiers. “He will lead us into battle,” he laughed. How did he understand the speech, Fallon wondered? The Fae rider held the head reins taut so that the 4’ mandibles did not slice them all.

The smell of the spidery beast made Fallon vomit. They lashed his outstretched arms and legs into the harness a few feet below the sex gland of the creature and the pasty liquid oozed onto his head. His only consolation was the certainty of his death. His belly was well within range of the killing stroke from one of his fellow warriors. 

The army moved forward and up a rise of rock and spring wildflowers. Hanging from the front of the Sprint, Fallon watched the flowers fall as the beast’s legs stepped through the grass. To his right and left he counted eight of the Sprints. He couldn’t see all the warriors but guessed that there were at least 8 dozen.  The Fae would use the Sprints as battle stations, launching their arrows and throwing axes as the two armies approached each other.

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The sun had cleared the hills to their right when they reached the crest of the hill. He raised his head to look at the far slope. His vision was blurred by sweat, blood and sex paste but what he saw advancing toward them caused his heart to leap with joy. From his soul erupted a maniacal laugh and he looked down at the soldiers below him. “They will slaughter you,” he called in a hoarse exultant voice and gesticulated with one unbound hand. “ Look, they move as one. One mind. One sword! They have eaten energy!”

Two soldiers turned to look at him. “How do you know our language?” One said. Fallon tried to shrug and felt the bite of the bird’s talons in his shoulder muscles. “You might as well kill me now. They will cut you down. Every last one of you and your hoary beasts. They will cut my ties and I will stand victorious on the putrefying body of this hell creature!”

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