Chapter Thirty-one

The enemy had a fucking frost giant. Wilder felt the blood drain from his face as he saw the enormous creature lurch towards their front line, crushing men and monsters alike beneath its great bare feet.

Panicked screams echoed through the forces. He braced himself. There was no way their lines would hold in the face of this.

‘Now might be the time for storm magic,' Adrienne shouted from further afield.

Wilder was inclined to agree. Their numbers were dwindling, and of those who remained, many were frozen to the spot in terror, as black ice creeped across the gory landscape like a disease.

Slitting the throat of a nearby howler and gutting the next, Wilder sized up the frost giant with a deepening sense of dread. It was not the kind that was easily herded into the mountains with fire, as he and Talemir had once done in their younger days. Though it hadn't been cursed like the howlers and arachnes, it was controlled by darkness nonetheless. A thick leash of shadow was lashed around the poor creature's throat. Two more cords enslaved its wrists, while obsidian bled from its eyes.

It lurched towards them, its movements sluggish with resistance, as though someone in the distance were manipulating its movements, making it no more than a puppet to inflict destruction.

Which was exactly what the beast did. Its enormous spiked club cleaved through their forces in a bloody wave. Wilder knew he would remember the sight for the rest of his life – men impaled on the spikes, barrelling through their own forces.

They had to stop it before the battle was lost, before all that was left of their units was pulverised gore in the snow.

Carving his way through enemy lines and shoving his own men out of the way to close the gap between him and the giant, Wilder looked to the archers. On the ridge, Cal was leading the unit, a volley of arrows spearing through the air towards the creature. But the shadow that leashed the beast swallowed the assault in a billowing mass of darkness, protecting the giant.

There was only one thing for it.

Wilder scanned the skies. Spotting Talemir flying overhead, he whistled, loud and sharp enough to cut through the tumult. Wilder signalled to him, praying to the Furies that Tal understood.

The Shadow Prince came soaring towards him, hand outstretched, and Wilder only had a second to brace himself and hold out his own hand before Tal's wrapped around his forearm.

Suddenly he was airborne, Talemir's wings beating hard above him while his former mentor flew them straight towards the frost giant. Icy wind whipped around them and arrows soared past in terrifying proximity. Wilder only hoped Cal's aim was as good as everyone said.

As he hung onto Tal with one hand, Wilder's focus homed in on the enormous creature, searching for weak spots in its flesh as it drove its club through another entire unit of the midrealms' forces. With the way it was moving, its arms swinging across its chest, it would be near impossible to pierce its heart.

Which meant there was only one place he could strike.

The air grew even colder, and he realised they were gaining height, flying high above the madness now, closing in on the frost giant from above.

‘You're up, Apprentice,' Talemir called down to him, and let him go.

Stifling a shout, Wilder fell through the air. Decades of training kept his limbs from flailing as he plummeted, not towards the blackened ice, but towards the frost giant. A thrill surged through him, blood roaring in his ears.

He landed hard on the creature's shoulder, immediately scrambling to find purchase as the beast staggered forward with a thunderous bellow. The shadows around its throat and wrists compounded in a burst of darkness, ribbons of onyx power surging straight for Wilder, already tempting his worst nightmares to the surface.

With a shout, Talemir was there, slicing through the shadows with his twin swords, his wings beating furiously to keep him aloft as he defended Wilder. Terrence soared into view, talons poised for damage. The hawk clawed at the monster's eyes with a vengeance.

Gripping the rag the giant wore, Wilder managed to get himself upright on the moving creature as it careened across the battlefield. Slashing through more tendrils of shadow that attempted to wrench him off the giant, Wilder threw himself at the beast's head, climbing up the back of its thick neck, using its lank hair as rope.

He fought back disgust and disbelief at what he was doing as he reached the crown of the giant's skull. It was flailing beneath him now, fighting the shadows at its wrists to reach up and rip him from its head. More dark power came for Wilder, digging into his memories and bringing every horror to the forefront of his mind. But the frost giant beneath him grounded him in a surreal reality, and he gripped a handful of its hair to steady himself, to hang on.

Clutching his sword with his other hand, Wilder took a deep breath, and speared his blade into the creature's shoulder. The roar that followed could have flattened the surrounding mountains.

Wilder pushed his weapon deeper into the tendons, causing the beast to twist, allowing him to direct the impact towards Artos' forces as he and the giant hurtled towards the ground.

Wrenching his blade from its flesh, Wilder aimed and, with all his might, drove the blade into the creature's brain from above.

Hot blood spewed from the wound, covering Wilder in a stream.

Suddenly, the frost giant was falling, and Wilder wrenched on its hair. At the last moment, he leapt from it, the impact as he hit the frozen earth making his teeth sing and his knees jar as he skidded across the black ice.

‘Holy fucking shit,' Torj's voice sounded nearby.

Wilder could only watch; time seemed to slow as the frost giant's corpse collided with the ground, decimating two entire units of the enemy's force, crushing soldiers beneath its hulking body, sending a wave of aftershocks through the army.

Wilder felt Torj at his side. His fellow Warsword motioned to the blood coating his new armour, his face and his hair.

‘Not yours?' was all the Bear Slayer said.

‘Not mine.'

‘Good.' Torj slammed his hammer into a howler's face with a sickening crunch, and launched himself back into the fray.

Panting, Wilder surveyed the sea of monsters and carnage. A loud mechanical groan echoed across the front line. Wiping the blood from his eyes, he shuddered as he spotted the source – a long-armed catapult being loaded on the enemy's side, ready to blow more holes in their ranks.