Chapter 9

We were unceremoniously ripped awake from a very deep sleep some time later by shouting and the sound of the castle's metal alarm being rung. We both bolted upright in the dark, and I quickly went to the arrow slit window facing the bawn to hear what was going on. I could see a fire in the bawn and men rushing to the walls.

"WOLVES!!" I heard someone shout. "Wolves are attacking the village!" There was a pounding on the screen wall, as I quickly dressed, since we had gone to bed naked. Sunshine was also in the process of dressing.

"Master Ken, Master Ken!!" I heard between the pounding on the doors. I hurried over and opened one of the doors while using the spell to light the Magic-powered lamp near it.

"There are wolves attacking the cattle, sheep, and pigs as well as the people in the village," a hastily dressed Eamon told me while regaining his breathe after I had opened the door.

"Does this happen often?" I asked.

"There are occasional problems with wolves, but nothing like what the guards have seen this time. There must be a huge pack of them, as the guards have seen over twenty already," he told me.

"I'll go there immediately and deal with them," I told him.

"How can you do that alone? It will take time to ready the guards to attack them," he told me.

"I will use my Magic. Have the guards man the walls, and I will drive them toward the castle. The bowmen should be able to take them down," I told him, as Sunshine joined us.

"I'm going with you!" she told me.

"You should remain here," I told her, but meant somewhere that it was safe.

"These are my people, and many will be injured. I WILL GO!" she told me defiantly. I saw that she was both serious and concerned about the people as well as the animals.

"All right," I told her, and took her hand plus Eamon's and transferred all of us to the bawn.

"Get things organized here, Eamon," I told him, as I released his hand, and transferred Sunshine and myself to the Village Chief's house.

There were two large gray wolves there attacking the door when we materialized behind them. I had already cast my wards, and quickly raised both arms, as I activated my Magic beams. I thought 'cut', and the beams shot out of the finger of both of my hands like laser beams, as I brought my hands down with a chopping motion, cutting both wolves in half.

"Chief O'Carroll are you in there," I shouted.

"Yes! Are the wolves gone?" came the reply.

"They're dead," I announced, and the door was flung open revealing not only the Village Chief, but his family and a number of others, many of whom were injured.

"I'll work here. Send the others to me here," Sunshine told me confidently, as she entered the house to begin working on the injured.

"Where are the majority of the wolves?" I was asking the Village Chief at the same time.

"Around the cattle and sheep pens mostly. There are some wards there, but I don't know how long they will keep this many wolves out," he told me, before adding, "There are also some wolves still going about in the village. More than the two that you killed here."

"I'll go deal with the ones at the pens. Can you gather the other men? We'll drive the survivors toward the castle. The bowmen there are waiting for them," I told him.

"I will gather whoever I can. At least the last quarter moon is still up and providing some light, or we could never fight them," he told me.

"Light torches to drive them with, many torches," I told him, as I hurried toward the pens where I could hear the sounds of wolves and cattle. I had no trouble seeing in the low level of light provided by the last quarter moon.

As I neared the cattle pens the sounds of many wolves in a frenzy increased along with the frantic sounds from the cows and the sheep. The pens for the pigs were separate and there was a small building that they could retreat into. The wards that I could sense here were weak and certainly wouldn't keep this many wolves out for much longer. There were certainly many that I could see, at least a dozen or more on this side of the pens alone.

I again activated my Magic beams, as I raised my hands, and then sent individual beams of Magic force into each of the wolves. I had killed more than half of those on this side of the pens before they became aware of me and what I was doing. They all turned then with snarls and charged at me. I cut them down having changed my Magic beams to cutting beams with just a thought.

They never even got near me, and I had my wards activated in any case. I was ready to transfer to the other side of the pens when the wolves from there came charging around the end of the pens to aid the others and came straight at me. I was busy with my beams and didn't have time to count, but was later told that I had killed well over two dozen wolves there near the pens.

Villagers with torches appeared as I was dispatching the last of the wolves.

"There were others in the village," Chief O'Carroll told me, as he hobbled up to me. I could see that he had been bitten on the leg. I noticed that many of the men and some women with him had pitchforks, the ends of which were stained a dark color.

"Some are escaping," he told me as he reached me, out of breath.

"In what direction?" I asked.

"Towards the castle," he added.

"All right. Let's keep the pressure on them and drive them into the bowmen's range," I told them, before grabbing one of the other men's arms.

"Take the Village Chief and any other wounded to his house to have their wounds cared for. The Mage is there," I told him before turning to the others.

"Let's chase those wolves toward the castle," I told those remaining. The Chief and two others were taken to have their wounds treated, as the remainder formed a line on either side of me with their torches and pitch forks to chase after the remaining wolves.

It wasn't a difficult task, as the wolves outran us easily, but kept heading right for the walls of the castle, as if it were a safe haven. They soon discovered their mistake as the archers on the walls loosed arrow after arrow into them. I managed to pick off several that tried to escape with tight beams of Magic energy that cut them down. It's possible that a few escaped, but most of them were killed. The people with me just stared at the scene in total disbelief.

"My Lord, what of the skins?" one of the men, who seemed to be some kind of a leader, asked once all of the wolves had stopped moving.

"What about the skins?" I asked.

"They are very valuable, and should be collected immediately," he told me with a strange look on his face in the moon light.

"All right. Set some men to doing that, and I will want a couple of men to go with me to the pens to help with taking care of any injured animals there," I told him.

"And the wolves there?" he asked confused.

"Skin them also if the hides are so valuable," I told him.

"You don't want them?" he asked in shocked surprise.

"No, not especially," I told him.

"But ... but the Lord of the Castle has always taken the greater part of the profit from the hides," he told me in surprise.

"I have no need of the money, but I'm sure that some of those bowmen will want to be talking with you about who gets some of the profit from the hides," I told him. A number of the men had already moved toward the now still forms on the ground with knives out, and there were torches visible at the gates of the bawn, as others came to join them.

The man that I had been talking with sent several men with me to check on the animals in the pens. I stopped at the Village Chief's house to check on Sunshine. She seemed to have things there well in hand, and I only stayed long enough to tell her that I was going to the pens to check on the animals. She indicated that she would join me there later.

Arriving at the pens, we found men there already skinning the wolves by torch light. My men and I entered the pens carefully and began checking the animals, many of who were still frantic, as they could still smell the dead wolves and their blood.

There were a number of younger cows and calves that had been injured when the larger animals had crowded them into the walls of the barn in their fright and I needed to repair some legs and bruised sides. Several cows had been bitten by the wolves where the wards had been the weakest. Two had been killed by wolves that had breached the weak wards at the gate. They would be butchered and cooked or preserved.

The sheep were in a similar situation. Some of the lambs had been injured in the crowding and a number of the older animal had been bitten. Two sheep and a ram had been killed, but all in all they had gotten off very lucky for being attacked by such a large wolf pack. At the pig house one large sow had been bitten, and I took care of her. I was strengthening the wards around and between the pens when Sunshine arrived.

"How are the wounded?" I asked.

"The men are all right. There was a child, a girl, who was in very bad shape. I wasn't sure that I could help her, but when I looked at her injuries, the solution became immediately apparent, and I was able to heal her. I never knew how to do that before," she told me, but seemed disturbed.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"There were two of the old people brought in. They were terribly mauled by the wolves. I tried to save them, but nothing that I tried worked for them, and I had to stop. There were other who needed my help just as badly. The two old people died. I COULDN'T SAVE THEM," she wailed in tears of despair as her whole body shook. I took her in my arms and held her for a long time, as she cried in misery.

"Sometimes there is nothing that we can do. We are Mages and Sorcerers and can do much, but there are some things that even we cannot do," I told her quietly, and continued to hold her.

"The things that you did for the child were taught you by the 'Book of Dreams'," I told her after a bit. "It still has much to teach you."

"It is a most wondrous book then," she told me quietly. Her body had finally stopped shaking, and her breathing had evened out. We started back to the castle then. Along the way we stopped at the Village Chief's house again. He limped out the door when he saw us approaching.

"Thank you, my Lord!" he said, as he approached us. "My Son told me what you have done about the pelts. Are you sure that you don't want the money from their sale?" he asked in doubt.

"No, that is all right. Use the money to improve the village," I told him.

"Thank you, my Lord. You are a most generous Master," he told us with a bow. I just smiled at him, but noticed that Sunshine was frowning. We had walked some little distance before she spoke.

"Those wolf pelts are very valuable, especially so many of them. It is the Lord's right to take at least half of what they will fetch. From what I heard while tending the injured, you personally killed many of them by yourself, and are entitled to the other half for those. Are you sure that you want to give up that much money?" she asked with a frown.

"My sweet Sunshine, my family is quite wealthy as is my clan. I don't need the small sum that the wolf pelts will bring, but the villagers will be able to improve their lives with the money," I told her, as we neared the gates to the castle. There were men with torches on guard there now. I could hear them call someone as we approached.

"A good morning to you, my Lord," Captain O'Carroll said coming out to greet us, as we approached.