The squad hurried as best they could across the ice. The spiked boots kept them upright, but their pace was a crawl. Each step had to be careful and calculated just to keep their balance. Quill struggled to keep up as he always had. He'd just gotten used to trudging through the snow and now the world felt like glass beneath his feet.
He glanced to his left and saw the main force in the distance. Nearly two thousand Order soldiers marched into Grelneer's Pass. The frontline was comprised of two rows of men linking shields to create a wall. Behind them was a smaller contingent of archers, each with arrows knocked but not yet drawn. Bringing up the rear were five catapults made of the Frostwood's distinct ashy white lumber. They rolled forward on their iron-rimmed wheels, each with a team of men straining at their ropes.
War horns sounded throughout the pass and men belted chants. They made an effort to be as loud and boisterous as possible. Every Hallowbound they managed to attract gave the Bloodletter squads an easier path.
Quill’s squad had crossed barely a fifth of the river. His lungs burned, and his legs threatened to buckle with every step. It was almost funny, he thought, how much effort they were spending just to reach the place he feared most.
Yoran ran beside him breathing heavy and loudly. The big man clutched his side where he'd taken a nasty wound against the Rankers. Quill could see crimson seeping through his armor and clothes, but there was no time to stop and heal. There was no time for bandages or rest. On this day, there wasn't even time to die.
The main force had fully marched onto the ice now, horns and shouts still bellowing across the frozen expanse. But Quill's eyes were drawn to the other side of the pass. The blackened trees and leaves had stopped their swaying and shifting. The wind had ceased. For a moment, the whole world stopped, like the last thread of a frayed rope straining to hold up an enormous weight.
And then it snapped.
The wind screamed across the pass, threatening to knock Quill back. Snow and hail poured down as the gates of heaved were thrown open above them. A torrent of nightmares burst from the tree line like mad dogs from a cage. Hundreds—no thousands—of Hallowbound sprinted, crawled, burrowed and slithered forth.
Quill gazed into Hell itself.
Hallowbound he'd seen—Needlemaws, Grinners, Rankers, and Overseers—were mixed with new horrors. He saw a giant frowning, gray-skinned face crying black blood. Instead of a neck or body, it was attached to a wheel of legs and arms, snapping and cracking as it rolled toward the men. There were long, gray snakes with no heads. They sported bat-like wings, some flying, some slithering on their bellies. A twenty-foot-tall giant with no head or arms lurched forward. Its torso was one giant gaping maw, with hundreds of tiny hands and fingers desperately trying to escape it. A crab-like creature with spiked claws and human heads where its eyes should have been. Some creatures danced, some screamed, others roared, and some made no noise at all. But they all filled Quill with horrible dread.
The snow and ice began to block Quill's view, but he managed to see The Order halt and prepare to meet the oncoming horde. Arrows flew. Shields were raised. Orders shouted and catapults loaded. Five great orbs, cloaked in otherworldly blue flame, arced slowly through the sky—like the meteor showers Quill had seen as a child. They crashed down into the Hallowbound army and exploded with a thunderous impact. They left craters in the ice and giant pillars of blue fire. Dozens of Hallowbound were consumed on impact, and dozens more burned from the aftermath.
The last image Quill saw before his view was swallowed by the weather was the moment before The Order's frontline collided with the Hallowbound.
"Eyes up!" Cross shouted. "We get across, nothing else matters!"
Quill realized he’d been holding his breath through the entire spectacle—and made the mistake of sucking in a mouthful of snow. He coughed, trying to regain his composure, lungs burning worse than ever. The weather wasn’t as impenetrable as the blizzard they’d faced days prior—they could at least see their immediate surroundings—but the far side of the pass was now gone from sight.
Minutes passed like hours as they pushed forward. Quill kept his eyes forward, praying to any god who would listen for the tree line to appear.
Then came the rumbling.
The ice beneath his feet began to tremble. A grating, crunching sound filled the air. Everyone slowed their pace, scanning the ice.
"What the hell is that?" Slim said between ragged breaths.
Blade paid them no mind. He moved forward with single-minded purpose, as if drawn by some unnatural force. Then the rest of the squad saw it. Black dots appeared beneath the ice. As the shapes grew in size, the rumbling intensified, and the sound grew louder—like something beneath the surface was ready to burst.
"Bilebloods!" Deckard shouted. "Their blood burns—don’t let it touch you!"
"ARMS!" Cross roared, drawing steel.
Quill stepped back from the nearest shape, stumbling until Yoran caught his arm and hauled him upright. The men drew their weapons just as the sound reached its crescendo. A geyser of black liquid exploded from the ice a dozen feet away. It hissed and bubbled as it pooled on the surface, instantly dissolving the ice it touched—eating through it like it wasn’t even there.
From within the geyser burst a figure—longer than a man, but slender. It had no legs; instead, its lower half coiled like a serpent, ending in a broad, fin-like tail. Its upper torso was vaguely human, though grey and slick with the same black ooze it had erupted through. Six spiderlike appendages jutted from its torso, wriggling with a mind of their own. Its head resembled a lizard's, with a wide jaw, sharp teeth, and a forked tongue flicking in and out.
Then it opened its mouth—and another jet of black acid shot forward, forcing Slim to dive out of the way.
The spray splashed wildly, forcing the squad back. Cross stood closest to the blast, calmly lifting his cloak to shield himself. As the fabric began to sizzle and melt, he tore it free and flung it aside.
Quill saw the indecision on the Sergant's face—and understood why. If they stopped to fight, they could win. But more were coming. They didn't have the luxury of time. What they needed was a brief moment. A distraction of some sort... but there was no one close. Blade would make it across if they held the line. Was that enough? Killing these Hallowbound didn't matter. What mattered was getting across. The best choice—the only choice—was...
A roar.
A flash of steel.
A spray of black blood.
A groan of pain.
Wil.
He had charged the creature, mid-spray. His sword had cleaved a wide gash along the creature's side that now leaked bubbling, black ooze that sizzled as it hit the ice. Wil gripped his blade with two hands, slicing in a wild arc and severing three of the Bileblood's spiderlike limbs. Then he lunged forward, driving his blade deep into it's torso and tearing upward. As he drew the blade out, blood sprayed in an arc and the creature jolted and spasmed before collapsing into a heap of hissing acid.
"GOOOOO!" Wil shouted, voice twisted with anguish.
Quill watched as the knight’s skin began to melt—his flesh sloughing from his bones under the spray of acid. Wil let out a blood-curdling, inhuman scream, but he did not fall. He turned his back to the squad, just as two more geysers of black acid burst from the ice.
Cross sheathed his blades and turned. "Move men! We get across—now!"
The squad followed orders, breaking into a full sprint with every ounce of might they had left.
Quill ran.
But he looked back.
He couldn't help it.
Wil stood, trembling, using a shaky arm to retrieve the shield from his back. He spread his arms wide, as if welcoming the Bilebloods as they exploded from the ice. He was covered in the black acid—his armor, his flesh, his life melting away with every second. But he did not collapse. He did not fall to his knees. He did not curse his luck, or the Hallowbound, or the gods. He didn't even cry out from the pain. Instead he stepped toward the enemy.
Say one thing for William Fontel, High Knight of Storovan: say he was exactly who he wanted to be, in the end.
Somehow through the wind and the heavy breathing and the sizzling acid, Quill heard the knight speak. He swore he'd read it before, in some grand epic tale. Was it a book? A story from he'd heard? Or was it just something that the finest knight in all of Storovan said in his final moment?
"O, hallowed darkness, have ye come to claim me at last? To draw out the life that yet flows through me? Come then. Supp from my flesh and see if it is to your liking, and I will do the same."
Wil charged the Hallowbound just as they disappeared from Quill’s sight in the haze of swirling ice and snow.
Quill blinked away burning tears and pushed on, head down. He wouldn't let Wil die for nothing. He had to give meaning to the sacrifice—they all did.
After a few minutes at such a hard sprint, the men slowed to a pace they could keep. They had caught back up to Blade, who didn't seem like he'd even noticed what had happened. His weapons were still drawn, but he showed no sign of discomfort or worry. He wasn't even breathing heavy.
Is this what it takes to defeat such horror? Quill wondered. Men who aren't men?
"There!" Cross shouted.
Quill raised his eyes to see that the tree line in sight. Another hundred feet and they'd have made it. But as they neared, Quill got a horrible sinking feeling in his gut.
This wasn't the goal. It was only part of the way.
They burst into the tree line, off of the frozen river, feet plunging into snow. They were surrounded by trees with dark black veins running through their bark. Their black leaves created an impenetrable canopy above them, casting a darkness akin to twilight. The weather was calmer here, like the tree's warded off the ice and wind.
But Quill felt trapped, like they'd just walked into a jail cell they would never get out of.
But they hadn't been forced here, this was where they wanted to be.
They didn't care about getting out.
They were here to end it.
