As the light of day faded from Stormwater Castle the horde fell silent and the everburning fires that accompanied them disappeared, darkening the night

On the battlement Princess Jade, wrapped in in a coating of ironskin and a simple tunic shivered.

Beside her a cultivator in a large white gown peered into a ball of glowing light. The man looked up, stone-faced, and handed Jade the ball.

‘She took it in her hands. The orb had no weight, and the tips of her fingers felt nothing. But through it she could see hundreds of their enemy marching into the lake.

The dark water closed around the swords of the creatures and bubbles rose to the surface.

Jade tossed the orb back to the cultivator and gestured to her signaller.

‘They’re in the water.’

‘Swimming?’

‘Walking underneath I think.’

‘Oh…’

‘Let the crews know we’re going to use the iron dragons, okay?’

‘Okay.’

The signaller’s apprentice raised a blue light and across the island soldiers pumped tubes full of flammable liquid.

A muted silence filled the air and anticipation hummed through the streets. Jade’s forehead throbbed and the roof of her mouth was dry. She tried to lick it but the pain wouldn’t go away.

Ripples moved on the lake surface, showing the trail of the horde.

‘Hey, what’s that?’

The cultivator with the ball, Jai, was pointing at a large ripple further to the east. Whitewash foamed around it.

‘That doesn’t look like them…’ Jade said.

‘No, it’s way too big.’

The little ripples were almost at the shore now. Jade jerked her eyes away from the large ripple and flashed her hand at the signaller. At once a hundred iron dragons flamed to life spreading flaming oil across the surface of the water.

The oil burnt bright and Jade blinked in the light it gave off as the water beneath it started to boil.

‘Good job,’ she told the signaller, ‘that should hold them down there for a while.’

On the edge of the flame a black, dripping head emerged. The creature seemed to be sniffing the air. Testing it with a forked tongue.

Then it gave a roar. Five hundred heads rose up through the centre of the burning flames. Water and burning oil dripped from their skin as they walked towards the shore without a whimper.

Jade wrapped her fist around the hilt of her sword, ‘Send in the barge.’

The signaller sent a purple lantern up the mast beside him and from the eastern side of the island came drumming then a swift-moving wooden barge with sheets of spiked metal bolted to its sides.

Kiu, the captain of the barge, put down his telescope and turned to his sailors.

‘The lantern is lit. Lower the blades.’

Sets of razor-sharp blades that had been mounted to the side of the ship were lowered into place so they almost skimmed the top of the water. Forty oars dipped into place as the drummer at the front of the boat gave them rhythm.

From above Princess Jade closed her eyes and drew the wind to her. It swirled around her hands and legs and nearly lifted her off the ground. She stretched out her palms towards the barge and watched as the wind whipped up an arrow behind it accelerating the boat.

On board, Kiu fought the wheel of the ship to bring it around the rocky shore. Saltwater slashed his face as the prow of the ship lined up with the horde emerging from the water.

They were almost upon the flame when the boat jerked to a halt. Kiu was thrown forward, tearing the wheel from its housing and smashing his head on the side of the mast.

Hot blood dripped from the wound and stung his eye as he sat up. His first mate, Twiggle, was beside him, pulling his leg from a window.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

‘What happened captain?’

‘We’re beached.’ Kiu said, ‘must’ve hit a new reef or…’

Twiggle was shaking his bald head, ‘I’ve sailed this harbour for near on sixty years. There’s no reef here.’

‘What the hell is going on?’

Kiu pushed himself to his feet, checking one leg, then the other. From below there were shouts from the oarsmen. They had been travelling quick… not everyone would be so lucky.

Kiu ran to the prow of the ship and peered over the edge where the water was foaming. Twiggle wasn’t far behind him.

‘Is it the horde?’

From the depths a large worm-like shape moved. It stroked the side of the ship. A shiprat scurried past Kiu and launched itself into the water below, then another, and another. Splash, Splash, Splash. They swarmed the deck as they ran to escape into the water below.

‘It doesn’t look like the horde, Kiu said, ‘it’s more like-’

The ship broke in half as eight tentacles wrapped around its body and crushed it inward. Men screamed as a pair of eyes the size of whales rose above them. The boat was hoisted like a toy, then came crashing down beneath the surface leaving only a trail of bubbles and foaming water.

On shore, the signalman vomited. His legs gave way beneath him. He stretched out his hands in front of him and muttered.

‘I am sorry, I am sorry, I am sorry. Please forgive us. Please forgive us.’

Jade looked around her, all the locals were on their knees praying to the kraken.

‘The horde must’ve woken it.’ her father said, ‘and it is not happy.’

On the beach below a pair of the horde’s warriors emerged on their steeds wearing flame-like capes. The one on the left let out a howl as it disembowelled two soldiers with its black spear. Jade’s men rushed the other’s lion-steed, sinking their swords deep into its flesh as black blood oozed like oil from it. The beast gave a growl and ripped one soldier's head off, crunching down on it, helmet and all.

The rider leapt from his beast and hit the ground with a roll no one that large should ever have been able to pull off. Two soldiers thrust their spears at it and the creature accepted the spears straight through its chest. It ran towards the spearmen, with the spears still embedded and with a single slice separated their heads from their necks. Four swordsmen stabbed it in the back and lost their swords as the creature spun in a powerful arc to kick a blonde-haired soldier in the face with the sharp, spiky toe of its boot, sending first a sprinkle of blood, then his body onto the ground below. The horde pulled out one of the swords embedded in its chest and used it like a scythe to slit the throats of the soldiers as they tried to run away. Above it, arrows whistled as they embedded themselves in the chests of the dripping horde.

The creature reached the wall and started to climb, punching its fists through the stone blocks to get a grip, just as it reached the top, as its hand closed around the neck of a boy who was shooting it in the face with an arrow a giant tentacle rose up from the depths and swung in an arc across the battlefield to slap against the wall of the keep. Shlap… The ground beneath the defenders rumbled and they toppled back as cracks spread up the wall.

The horde soldier and its brethren were squashed flat against the wall like eggs. The suckers on the kraken’s limb clung to them as it pulled them down into the watery depths.

‘On your feet!’ Princess Jade shouted at the soldiers cowering before the kraken.

‘But the kraken has risen commander, there is no way we can-’

‘The kraken has just given you a sign. It's dragging your enemy to a watery grave. It wants you to fight!’

‘But it also sunk our biggest ship.’

‘Obviously it was confused. Look, if we carry on like we are we’re going to die anyway, why not face them… why not…’

She was cut off by the scream of the signalman’s apprentice as he jumped to his death from the castle walls. The people around Jade followed him with their eyes then turned to her.

Jade bit her lip, ‘’Father?’

‘I’m no use Jade, these people aren’t fighters, those who have had training chose to be posted to this backwater for a reason.

‘Okay… I’ll go myself.’

Jade gestured to the five remaining cultivators in her army and they followed her with a single nod of their heads.

The castle was split into three levels - they were on the top level and the horde were pouring through the lowest level killing and burning all within their sights even as the kraken hoisted their comrades and Jade’s soldiers into the rows of teeth that inhabited its mouth.

Jade tripped over a line of steps, and smashed her elbow on the door of a house on the middle level. Jai pulled the back of her robe and she scrambled to her feet.

‘You okay commander?’

‘Always.’

She looked back at what she’d tripped on - a line of fishing net that some idiot had placed in her way. The pain in her knee blossomed into an idea in her head.

‘Grab that net.’

She rushed forward as Jai and another cultivator hoisted the net from the steps.

Jade marched towards the wall that separated the middle and lower sections of the island.

Below her, the horde were tearing soldiers apart limb by limb. Pieces of orange fabric were stained with bright red blood as they flapped in the slight wind of the shore. Further out on the lake’s surface bodies of the horde floated swollen and disfigured by the tentacles of the Kraken.

‘So they can be killed,’ Jade said, ‘that is all I need to know.’

She took in the level she stood on - it was occupied by the markets and craftsmen. Discarded picks and chisels lay on tables while rotten turnips from some far-off land lay beneath a grocer’s booth.

There were three long corridors leading up to the highest level of the island where her father waited - and she was one of only six cultivators left.

‘String up those nets along each corridor,’ she told her small team, ‘hunt amongst the stores, we need oil and water.’

The cultivators scrambled to fix the nets in place. Jai unearthed four massive clay jugs filled with oil. They placed a jug in each of the corridors with the extra one remaining on the steps to the top level.

They climbed the rooves above the corridors and waited, crouching, waiting for the horde to finish its slaughter below.