Read Online Warriors [4] Theros Ironfield by Don Perrin - Free Book Online Page B

were taken back to a makeshift aid station in the rear. Here the healers worked their craft, some with arcane herbs and lore, others with brute force of bone-setting and flesh-cutting and the searing brand of cauterization. The healers had much to do this day.
    Those minotaurs they found who were still alive but badly wounded were quickly dispatched. The elves had no regard for minotaur life. The prisoners might be useful for an exchange with the minotaur Supreme Circle for some political concession or other.
    When all the elven wounded had been found and taken to the healers, the soldiers began the monumental task ofburying their own dead, and burning the minotaur corpses.
    Harinburthallas, the elven army commander, ordered one regiment, now numbering less than two hundred elf soldiers, to clear out the minotaur camp. The regimental commander, Llantoes, formed his soldiers into a column, and marched them across the field. They passed the site of the first engagement. The dead had been removed, but the mud was stained red, and a forest of arrows, embedded at the angle of impact, looked like stocks of straw that were bent by the wind. The mud was thick. The soldiers slogged forward.
    Fewer than twenty minotaurs had survived in the rear area, all that was left of a mighty army. Most deserted their posts and disappeared into the woods, looking to get away. Several dozen human slaves lived too, Theros among them.
    Fires burned everywhere. The camp was a complete ruin. From where Theros stood he could see the burning commissary wagons and the quartermaster’s site. He could not see any minotaurs, other than those that had fallen in the brief battle with the elven cavalry.
    Theros leaned on his shovel for a moment to catch his breath. The ground was soft for the first few feet, then turned to a thick, hard-packed clay. Digging was slow.
    The smell of burning wood and canvas permeated the air. The smoke rose up and stained the cloudy sky. To the west was blue sky, but it could be seen only every once in a while through the pall of black, acrid smoke. The smoke caught in Theros’s nose and throat. He tied a piece of cloth around his face to try to block the fumes.
    He bent back to his digging. His young arms rippled with the effort. The blade dug only a few inches into the clay. Theros pried back the shovel, and a brick-sized chunk of clay broke loose. He bent down, picked up the piece, tossed it aside. He repeated the process, again and again.
    He reached a depth of five feet in the trench. Deep enough. And who knew how much more time he would have before the elves found him? He tossed the shovel to the side, and climbed out. Hran lay several feet to the side of the trench.
    Hran weighed close to three hundred and fifty pounds, with his armor and weapons. Theros dragged the body to the newly dug grave and rolled it in. Climbing down into the grave, Theros rearranged the body in the restful pose of death. He closed the eyelids, straightened the body, crossed the arms over the chest. It was not exactly how a minotaur would have honored the dead, but it was as close as the young man knew. He climbed back out, and stood silent.
    The minotaur had been a strict master, but Theros had learned much from him in the past few months.
    “Sargas, hear me,” he began, and said a prayer for Hran.
    * * * * *
    Huluk, the rear guard commander, crouched behind several water barrels. Beside him crouched Nevek, another minotaur warrior.
    Nevek shook his head. “We’ve got to leave. If we don’t leave now, we’ll be killed or captured like the rest.”
    Huluk grunted. “That was our army that was just slaughtered out there. Sargas strike us down! We should have died out there like the rest. We should have fought like the true warriors that they were.”
    “Yes, sir. Look, sir, our army is gone. We have a duty to warn the coastal village and the Supreme Circle. Our honor is in reporting the valiant sacrifice that our warriors made this