The floating islands in the Plane of Wind were very high in the sky. However, the density of the air remained constant, so the airships would have been able to reach that altitude if time was not a factor. In fact, the airships were far too slow to ascend that high. The Ayaru airship captains seemed to have come to the same conclusion, because they remained at about the level of their own portal far to the south. Instead, two long lanes of fighter jets connected the enemy airships to the flying castle, with the jets in each lane flying in opposite directions.
Ingrid flew very high in the sky, so high that those fighters looked like tiny dots. Ivan wanted to approach the enemy from behind the great tower to avoid detection. Half the fighters were deployed on this mission, about fifty of them, and they flew in formations of five airplanes in a line. Ingrid was flying some ways behind these formations. In spite of the extreme height, which Ivan had calculated to be about seventy thousand feet, the towers of the castle went half again as high. The floating island below was quite large, about the size of a city, and the entire island was covered by the sprawling white palace.
The magenta orb began to pulse, and the man's voice said: "The winds around the tower are too violent. We can't fly near it. Divert around the tower and prepare to engage the enemy."
The ocular demons in the enemy airplanes no doubt saw the airplanes taking a wide arc around the tower. This caused some confusion along the lanes of enemy fighters, as they began to frantically flee away from the castle. The bright flames of missiles flashed near the tower, creating long trails of smoke through the sky, like gray rain. There were explosions far below.
"Give chase," the voice from the orb said. "We have the altitude advantage. If the enemy fires a missile at you, defend by flying up, not down."
One of the lanes formed a long curve and those fighters began to retreat along with the lane already moving in that direction. The unfortunate fighters caught near the castle were quickly destroyed. Most of the friendly fighters stayed at a high altitude. However, a few formations descended to get a better look at the castle. Ingrid joined them.
The castle did not quite reach the edge of the floating island, leaving a small lip of grass just outside the walls. Ingrid needed to be quite close to see that the castle was made entirely from polished white marble laced with veins of turquoise. The outside surface of the tower was not completely smooth, but featured a subtle wave-like pattern. The pillars that supported the rooftops were like twisted ribbons of marble. The castle featured no straight lines that Ingrid could see.
There were gardens in a courtyard in the center. There was an inverted pool of dark water above each garden. Waterfalls flowed up into the sky from those pools, as with the edge of the ocean. Along one edge of the floating island the field of grass was long, thin, and mostly flat. There were enemy fighter jets and other aircraft parked on that strip of grass.
There were also people. Not just a few people, but hundreds. Ingrid's formation flew a low pass over the courtyard, and Ingrid could see that the people down there were wearing gold, burgundy, and white uniforms. They also wore masks, divided into two colors along a vertical line. They seemed to be fighting against the Ayaruans, who were trying to retreat in panic. There were also burn marks on the white tiles and in the grass, with the charred remains of bodies and weapons nearby.
"Vaska?" Ingrid said to the second of her Colored Orbs.
"What do you see?" Vaska asked.
If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.
"There are people living here. And it looks like the Ayaruans are attacking them."
"The Marines just left, they will arrive in about a half hour."
One of the fighter jets on the field started moving, which quickly earned it a Dark-Three missile from one of the fighters in Ingrid's formation. It didn't even have time to line up before it exploded, hurling flaming debris clear off the edge of the island. The Ayaruans still ran for their fighters, gambling with the chance to be shot by a missile rather than face the hordes of masked men inside the castle.
Far to the south the Ayaruans had regrouped and organized their fighters into a long battle line. They were attempting to climb to the same level as the Imperial fighters. Dozens of bright lights rose slowly in the distance as the Fire Elementals burned the air at maximum intensity.
"They are turning back to face us," Ingrid said. "The enemy fighter jets. They must really want what's on this island."
"Or perhaps they really do not want us to find something on this island," Vaska said.
Lines began to cross the sky as the two lines of fighter jets started lobbing missiles at each other.
"Demon, what is happening up there?" Ingrid asked.
The enemy is defending by dropping towards the sand, the ocular demon said. They must not have any experience fighting in this Plane. The enemy is taking heavy casualties.
The Marines did take about a half hour to arrive. They flew in dozens of high-winged airplanes and a handful of the type with the large propellers, which Vaska had called tilt-rotors. They were escorted by a squadron of ten more fighter jets, though by the time they arrived the enemy remnants of the Ayaruan forces had been completely eliminated. One by one they lined up to land, while the tilt-rotors remained in the air, waiting for a chance to land somewhere inside the castle grounds.
By the time Ingrid could line up for a landing, the Marines had already begun their assault on the masked people inside the castle. There appeared to always be a headwind blowing along that little stretch of grass, making it an ideal spot to land. The airplane was equipped with a nifty ladder-like square rod with rungs alternating down the length, which folded out from under the canopy. After landing, Ingrid deployed the device and stepped down onto the grass.
Outside the airplane, the wind was quite strong. Ingrid could hear gunshots from inside the castle, as well as men screaming. There was an opening in the wall with two of those twisted-ribbon pillars supporting a lumpy roof. More Marines, wearing ornate black uniforms trimmed in red, ran across the grass into the structure. Glenice was waiting near the opening.
"We are clearing out the castle now," Glenice said. "They have Air Elementals that we have not seen before, and it is taking some time to figure out how to counter them."
"Who are these people?" Ingrid asked.
"We don't know. We captured a few of them, they are being held just inside. However, they do not speak any language that we know about."
Glenice led Ingrid into the structure. It was much larger than it looked from the air. The walls were at least fifty feet high, the inverted pools of water had massive waves churning on the dark surface, and the trees in the gardens were at least a hundred feet tall. And the central tower was dizzying to look at from below.
They arrived at a row of prisoners chained together who all wore masks with different colors. One was white-black, one was white-gold, and the last one gold-burgundy. They all wore the same white robes and golden jewelry.
Suddenly, Paranoid appeared in her full plate-armor form, and stabbed her blade of light through the man with the gold-burgundy mask.
"What?" Ingrid said. "Stop! I command you to stop!"
The Elemental ignored her command, and proceeded to stab the man with the white-gold mask. This caused the woman with the white-black mask to panic and thrash about. Glenice drew her saber and smashed through the chains connecting the woman to the other two men, who were being consumed with golden light. She shoved the woman away, into the arms of one of the Marines guarding them, just in time to dodge the next swing by the Light Elemental.
Follow that woman, she must die, Paranoid said.
"Absolutely not," Ingrid said.
"Your Elemental has gone rogue," Glenice said. "You should go back to your fighter jet, and go far away from these people. We need to be able to question them alive."
Ingrid nodded and then left. "What was that?" she demanded.
Paranoid said nothing.