The Battle of Bloodneck Valley - A Short Story for FinishtheStory

The Contest: https://steemit.com/finishthestory/@bananafish/finish-the-story-contest-week-30

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The Battle of Bloodneck Valley

by @dirge

Shog, called the Bonecrusher by his people, knew they’d lost when human horns roared across the battlefield. The Imperiate had come after all, to aid their elven allies of the Alish’tae Republic. Shog’s people, orcs of the Galak Tribe, so named after the mountain upon which they’d once lived, fought hard and well. But they fought alone.

Orcs no allies. Not even their Gods, the Old Ones, cared anymore.

As the morning sun crept above the clouds, illuminating the blood soaked fields, the Imperiate horsemen charged out from the forest. Muk’nola, matriarch of the Galaks, sounded her war horn, signalling the retreat. But it would be too late, Shog knew. Those horsemen would slaughter them as they fled. Their children, next.

An elf, empowered by the sense of looming victory, stormed forward from their line, straight towards Shog. He parried the elf’s longsword then heaved his mighty hammer, Breaker of Worlds, in a perfect arc. It smashed upon the elf’s helmeted skull, and he proved his namesake for the countless time. The elf’s head exploded in bone and carnage.

“Back!” he heard. “Fall back!” In disarray, the others around him fled towards Bloodneck Valley, where they’d encamped. Their position fell. Shog screamed to maintain the line but knew the day was lost. His people fled. He had no choice but to follow.

He reached the camp, already nearly moving again, fleeing up the valley to the highlands. Shog, exhausted, reached Zee-zee, his daughter, and Gheelah, his love. Gheelah had already packed their yurt and few remaining possessions. “Flee!” he shouted to her.

“And you?” Gheelah asked.

“I stay to hold them back.”

In typical orcish fashion, their utter devotion, love and mutual respect expressed itself only in their shared gaze, never in public, spoken word. He gripped her hand. He told Zee-zee to be strong. Gheelah nodded. Then the doy galloped away with the rest of the fleeing, broken host.

Muk-nola, matriarch, rallied the remaining Galak warriors. They reformed to a single line. Bloodneck Valley was narrow. Rocky. Layered with crimson colored clay. The land elevated as it led to the Highlands, their only advantage.

Maybe at the height of the tribe’s strength, before the humans had come with their purges and stolen their land, before the elves had arrived to ‘cleanse the world of evil’, maybe they would have been strong enough. But Shog saw they had a few hundred left. A few hundred to hold a line against an entire battalion of Imperiate horsemen and Alish’tae swordsmen, the latter no doubt already being reinforced.

The ‘Fair Folk’ would aim to eradicate the Galak now, as they fled.

Shog marched up to Muk-nola. She hailed him. “Yog-Sothoth burns in us,” she said.

“Yog-Sothoth hasn’t given a shit about us since Galak Mountain ceased its fire,” Shog replied.

Imperiate horns loomed. The sun flared, blinding Shog for a moment. Another disadvantage. The ground rumbled with the cavalry charge.

“Either way. I’ll crush his soul in hell. Right after I’m done with these Fair Folk.”

Muk-nola replied with a shout. "Hold!" she pointed east. "Last 20 retreat up and find boulders and small trees to throw. Now you bullheads!!." Then pointing west she declared."You last 20. Same. The rest pick up stones boulders, trees, horses and THROW. You, you.." She pointed out sixteen warriors including Shog. "Defend us as we back up!"

As the sixteen warriors stalked out to face the front runners Muk-nola picked up stone almost as big as a man screamed a battle cry which was taken up along the line. The pounding of hooves was drowned out by the inhuman scream from hundreds of blood lusty throats. Shog felt his body literally charge up, skin prickling with bunched up power and anticipation. He eyed the three horses streaking ahead of the line, squaring his shoulders, his hammer held in front of his massive chest he started to lope down hill. "GHRRUUHAAA"

In minutes the cavalry line was decimated, their run stopped short; the fight now a melee. Orcs being few in number the periodic rain of trees and boulders and now javelins and men and horses affected them less. Any general- human, elf or orc; would have been proud to watch the orcs in steady retreat up the narrowing way- The Neck. A treacherous crooked pass between craggy mountain slopes that gave the valley its name - Bloodneck Valley.

Shog was battered and bloody but a surprising amount of blood was not his. Except for a gash in his left side he had not suffered any serious wounds. He was one of three, as they fought back to back against a tide of soldiers with spears and swords. However many they killed and maimed the soldiers kept coming. Then he heard a grunt of pain behind him and a prick to his back. A spear clean through thought Shog as he defended against two swords, looking at a soldier lowering his spear to charge at him. Zee-zee be well Shog roared in defiance his face to the sky but no spear came.

A horse had startled and fumbled the spearman. Shog now in frenzy picked up one of the swordsman and threw him into the soldiers to his left. Then he pushed the horse in front of him over, blocking the sword of the rider with his hammer. He would have crushed a few skulls with his hammer now raised in both hands when a volley of arrows struck him. Fair Folk.

Shog looked uphill, The Neck was almost full of stones and felled trees, Orcs were bounding up slope throwing in stones trying to completely block the Neck while horsemen and soldiers chased them. The arrows had missed his eyes and his right side, the massive hammer acting like a shield. Mother Galak now is the time. Sighting the group of elves about 200 yards away he lowered his head and started a run. "Gruuhaa. Gruuhaa. Gruuhaa." Another bloody orc joined him on his left."Gruuhaa. Gruuhaa." The sight of two unstoppable orcs red with blood and gore, holding massive hammers, score of arrows sticking out of them and the terrible ominous war cry was too much for humans and horses. A path way cleared with soldiers hurriedly stumbling away in shock at the ferocity of the frenzied run and horses shying to step up. For a few moments even the elves were mesmerized by the deathly spectacle.

Three sharp blows on the elven horn pierced the battlefield. "Hasten To The Prince!". The orcs were just a few feet away from the now tightly grouped elves when the arrows started to thud into their bodies. The orc on the left was the first to stumble, his hammer swinging a complete circle hitting the almost dead Shog in the back. The blow was weak but it was enough to propel him a few feet further even as a spear found his eye. Was it super human strength or the spasm of a dying body one cannot say but the Bonecrusher killed two elven guards. The first one a broken neck and the second a collapsed chest. While Shog himself barrelled into the prince's horse, quite dead before he fell.

The few orcs that has retreated to safety of the Neck would call this " The Battle of sixteen warriors." They tell their children that the elf prince still has nightmares about the Bonecrusher.

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