13 Devine Anger
Greenbrook
Mother Moon was high in the sky, but dark clouds covered her face. Greenbrook had an anxiousness of the dark that he hadn’t felt since becoming the future chief. Without Mother Moon’s soft light to comfort him, he felt the stirrings of longing for Father Sun’s warmth. But he pushed it down- he couldn’t afford Mother Moon’s wrath. Greenbrook stood guard at the south edge of the village, lined up with 15 outer defenders under his leadership. Chief Firmstone stood with his command of warriors on the inside of the village, where the fighting would be the most harsh and chaotic. Greenbrook almost wished that he was on the inside. At least that style of warfare he understood. He gripped his spear tighter.
Spears were desert weapons, designed for cutting through clear stretches of air to pierce targets up to 21 yards away. Unfortunately, the trees and foliage of the forest congested the space and made throwing spears impossible. On top of that, the magic that the forest exhaled covered everything in a purple fog. Sure, Greenbrook was learning to ignore it, but it still made it hard to see targets clearly. He wasn’t sure how Trail was such a good shot. The mist made the forest more intimidating, so Greenbrook kept his spear for the familiar comfort it gave him. It was as warm as the sun.
The spear stuck up behind his body-length shield like the ears of a jackrabbit, letting every attacker know that he was the unsure future chief. The men around him had grumbled when he refused to put the spear back in his cabin. Greenbrook had never felt more alone, or so unsure about the loyalty of his defenders. Would they even listen to him? The fear only made him cling to his spear more tightly. To distract himself from that, he let his mind go back about an hour, to the sunset Fire.
As soon as night had fallen, Chief Firmstone had stood before the Messenger Fire and told him that they were at war. As soon as the words had been said, a freezing ripple passed through the gathered People. Almost everyone shuddered. Chief Firmstone, as the perpetrator of the ungranted war, had frozen with Mother Moon’s anger. After a moment, he’d looked up with surprise at the then-uncovered moon. Then he turned to his People, who were still recovering from the shock of their Mother’s wrath.
“Mother Moon will be merciful to us,” he’d said, “We will not be destroyed by Forest Glade. Many of us will fall, but the People of Western Forest as a whole will survive.”
Recalling that prophecy, Greenbrook’s mind was comforted against the anxieties he had about this war. Aunt Forest herself was against them. That meant that their food sources would become distant and hidden. Forest Glade’s warriors would grow stronger as Western Forest’s warriors grew weak with hunger. Aunt Forest would withhold as much magic from them as she could. But it was comforting to know that Western Forest, the People of the Moon, would not fall. Chief Firmstone, the perpetrator, would have to, but his People wouldn’t.
One minute.
Two minutes.
Two and a half minutes.
Two and three quarters of a minute.
Three min-
The arrows came like a waterfall of death from the trees. The defenders raised their shields in defense, but not as one. No human fought in a group- each man fought individually. That was the only way to gain honor.
With the shields raised, the defenders’ views were limited to what was directly next to them. Forest Glade knew it, so the attacking warriors took the advantage and flowed from the dark forest into the village. The first warrior to pass Greenbrook extended his knife to nick him in the leg as he went. Greenbrook stumbled and tried to move his spear around to get him back, but the warrior was already gone. After five more had done the same, Greenbrook placed his spear on the ground and readied a knife of magic. Two of the seven others that passed him fell when he shot the magic at their chests, but the other five were either nicked or missed completely.
After the rush of internal fighters, a Western Forest warrior ran up and ducked behind Greenbrook’s shield. In the moonlight, Greenbrook recognised Trail. Trail flashed a grin up at him and drew his longbow. He aimed it into the canopy of the trees.
“Their archers are up there. I’ll try to hit them as you walk towards them. Keep us both safe with that shield, desert boy,” he said.
Greenbrook nodded and began to walk forward. It was only after a few steps that the nickname Trail used for him really sunk in. It had never rung so true before. Greenbrook, despite his name change and chief training, was still a desert boy at heart. A clueless, blind, terrified desert boy fighting alone in a claustrophobic forest. A desert boy used to running and wielding his spear with no heavy defense. It was no wonder the People of different biomes never fought each other. Neither could make a dent in the other.
That feeling wasn’t helped by his shield. Holding the deerskin-covered bark strip was made much harder than it should be because of the force of the arrows hitting it. It was making his already exhausted arm bruise. As the arrows kept coming, Greenbrook put up a thin shield of magic an inch above the deerskin one. He hoped that that would lessen the force of the arrows.
Trail noticed and raised an eyebrow at Greenbrook. Greenbrook was sure he was making fun of him in his mind. Instead, Trail refocused on trying to hit Forest Glade archers. When he hit one, he let out a soft whoop.
“There shouldn’t be that many more to go,” he said.
Confused, Greenbrook chanced a glance around. The other defenders had archers, too, so he assumed that Trail was talking about their combined effort to stop the barrage. Despite the effort, though, there were only a few enemy archers on the ground. There were more people of Western Forest lying there than there were of Forest Glade. Aunt Forest was protecting her warriors well. That’s why their archers were in the trees, Greenbrook guessed. There, they were in close contact with their patron.
'We won’t win out here. The only place we have a chance is out of the archers’ range,' Greenbrook thought.
“Aunt Forest is protecting them! We won’t succeed here!” he said to the remaining defenders, “Retreat into the village, out of the archers’ range!”
“What are you doing?!” Trail whispered.
He was too late, though, as the other defenders recognised Greenbrook’s voice. They hesitated, but one by one, they obeyed. A cheer went up from the trees at the retreat. But no one left the trees to attack the village directly.
'Probably to keep us trapped inside.'
The thought startled Greenbrook. It wasn’t his- he hadn’t even thought of this all being a trap.
No wonder Trail is mad at me, he thought as he glanced at the forest-born next to him.
The other warriors seemed nervous, too. Greenbrook glanced up at Mother Moon and hoped that she would use him to help her People survive. He didn’t want to be part of their destruction. Then, directing his energy to the problem at hand, Greenbrook turned to his warriors with an air of authority.
“Each of you pairs take a house and hide behind it. The archer will take the left side and the shieldman the side facing the Fire pit. Archers, watch the people that pass by on your side. Kill enemies, cover friends. Shieldmen, defend the archers from any enemies on this side that are trying to attack. Spread the order to the pairs near you that didn’t hear me. I want this to be around the whole village,” he said.
Trail’s expression went from angry to surprised. The other warriors seemed to be curious or surprised about this new move as well. But they obeyed and took their places, calling to the other defenders who still were facing the archers at their part of the perimeter. They had lost so many defenders that Greenbrook had to rearrange the defenses from one house per pair to three per pair. Once they were all in place, there was one extra shieldman that had no archer.
“Go fight with the other warriors,” Greenbrook told him, “Or pick another to swap out with.”
The young man nodded and smirked, then ran into the rest of the battle.
The defenders had set up their line along the inner houses that surrounded the center Fire pit. That’s where all of the internal warriors were fighting hand-to-hand, or trying to burn down cabins. Greenbrook had trapped the enemies inside, similar to how the enemy archers had trapped him. It could also trick the warriors into thinking all their archers were killed.
As he thought over the strategic move he’d just made, Greenbrook realised that Mother Moon really had helped him. His heart swelled with gratitude. He’d have to thank her when he got the chance.
