Lukas led the procession of men-at-arms and mages by flame-light, a hundred shadows dancing on the cold walls of the Tower. There they found not four guards, but twenty. More began to funnel out onto the floor from below, some wielding iron-tipped spears, some wielding nothing at all. Amongst their number Lukas spotted the uneasy figure of Mathias, who rushed between a number of the higher ranked attendants and whispered commands in their ears.

“Mathias!” Lukas called out. The Master of the Lower Tower froze at the mention of his name. “Mathias! What is going on? I demand an answer!”

Mathias slithered through the crowd of guards and presented himself to Lukas, bowing low.

“Apologies, Master Lukas. There has been, ah, an… an issue. Yes, an issue. A momentary hassle, no more, I assure you.”

You lying weasel.

“What sort of issue?” he demanded. Watching the man squirm in search of an answer gave Lukas an odd sense of satisfaction.

“There has been a disturbance with the flow of mana, as you might have noticed. And the Tower is powered by mana, you see, and so until this disturbance is corrected then, well… we are without lights.”

“And heat,” Lukas said. His fingers and toes ached from the cold.

Mathias cringed away. “Yes, and heat. Though fear not, Master Mage, we have plenty of fur boots and blankets, as well as enough wool socks and gloves and hats for the entire Tower thrice over. If you will just wait here a moment, I shall have you and your people brought more than–”

“No.” Lukas took a solid step forward so that he was face to face with the attendant, their noses so close that a feather could not be dropped between them. “I have waited patiently for three days, Mathias. I will wait no more. Especially not under these conditions. If Head Servant Laurant does not appear here to discuss matters with me in the next hour, then I will search for him. By force, if necessary. Do you understand my meaning?”

Mathias gave a vigorous nod. “Yes, certainly. Completely understood.”

“Good.”

Taking a step back, Lukas watched as Mathias shrank away into the crowd of guards, all but disappearing.

“Is that alright, Master?” Simon whispered. “This is the Tower of Victory–Azphine’s Tower. These are clergymen.”

Lukas sighed, felt his muscles lax and ache with weariness. He unlaxed them. “I don’t trust them,” he said.

“That doesn’t mean we can fight with them,” Karine added, inching close. Despite her words, there was the unmistakable feeling of mana emanating from her hands.

“No need to fight them. Only to scare them.” The twenty or so guards meant to keep them on their floor lacked confidence, that much was clear. Most shirked away from Lukas’s gaze. Others didn’t even meet his eyes. They wanted to be here even less than he did.

Frightening them off would pose no trouble.

It’s the Stone I’m worried about. He hadn’t noticed it at first, but as the cold creeped in he realized that he could no longer feel the everpresent tickle of mana against his skin.

Flow, Mathias said. Pah! We felt its mana from a mile off! And now there was nothing.

Waiting was a grueling affair, filled with silence and angry muttering and more silence. A silence that ended with a thundering explosion.

There was an uproar from the guards, the crowed of them jostling back and forth in a panic. None knew what to do, nor who to look to.

“What’s happened!?” Lukas demanded. But they were deafened by panic, unable or unwilling to hear him until, with a smidgen of magic, he clapped his hands together, releasing a loud crack like that of splitting stone. Heads turned. “What has happened?”

Another explosion drowned out any answer there might have been, and the floor beneath his feet shook. When it subsided Lukas ran to the stairwell’s outer wall. There laid an arrowslit, closed from the wind by a metal contraption. Opening it, he peered down and saw a host of black specks dotting the white field.

“Amadou!” he called.

“At once, Master,” Amadou replied, shouldering his way through the crowd.

The image of the Tower appeared, and with it a thousand dots that surrounded it. Most were gathered on the northern face, but with each passing moment more and more rounded the Tower. They are surrounding us.

Panicked murmurs spread throughout the Tower’s guards. Even his own men were not immune.

“An invasion,” a man said.

Lukas cackled. When he saw the looks the guards were giving him his laughter doubled in intensity. They think me a madman, he thought. But he wasn’t. He was merely a mage. A mage who had been without an appropriate target in far too long.

“What?” he asked between fits of laughter. “I quite like our odds. Don’t you?”

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

They were frightened now, though more of Lukas than of the invaders outside. As well they should. I’ve needed a good battle.

The magical blizzard had challenged him, but it had also taken from him his mind, his alertness. He had both in spades now. His body jittered with energy and his hands itched with the desire to conjure magic. A sad thing, then, that it was not yet time.

His eyes darted across the room, taking in each and every face. Less than a hundred.

“Arrows?” he asked the closest guard. The man turned, as if hoping to be saved.

“I–” he started.

“Useless. Mathias! Get over here!”

Mathias weaseled his way through the crowd like a frightened child called by his father.

“Yes, Master Lukas?”

“You know your men better than I, and I know war better than anyone here. We need to prepare. We need arrows, so send someone to get them and bring them here. If there are none, make them. Then ensure every capable man and woman has a weapon. Swords, spears, axes, it doesn’t much matter, a wooden stick’ll do them better than nothing. Shields, as well, if you can manage. Do you have combat mages?”

Mathias shook his head.

Lukas grunted in disapproval. Tower of Victory, eh? How does one claim victory with this lot?

“I’ll manage, then. Now go. Oh, and Mathias, if it’s not too much, I believe now would be a proper time to get Laurant’s ass over here for introductions, don’t you think?”

Mathias grimaced, appalled, but nodded nonetheless, disappearing into the crowd once more. The guards were none too happy to hear Lukas give him orders, but he didn’t have time to care. It didn’t much matter, anyways. Over the yelling and taunting he could hear Mathias’s shrill voice barking orders.

“What of us, Master?” Karine asked. Lukas shrugged.

“Prepare yourselves. The basic formula will do.”

“Yes, Master,” the three said in unison. Together, they pointed out a select few knights to accompany them, then set out to find a suitable position.

A powerful trio. Perhaps one day they might even give me some trouble, Lukas thought. With disparate talents honed under Lukas’s watchful eye, the three Argmonts, as it happened, possessed near perfect battle affinity. With any luck I won’t be needed.

Not that he’d allow a battle to happen without his input.

The Tower shook another three times before the arrows arrived. Though there were more than anticipated, Lukas was still discontent to discover that their tips were iron, not steel, and that as often as not the fletching was damaged. Still, it was ammo, and they had more than enough bows to go around.

“Every able man and woman is to take a bow and a quiver of arrows and disperse yourselves to any available arrowslit. Loose at will, I don’t have the time to be giving you lot orders. And don’t expect you’ll be killing too many; they’ll be wearing armor. Your job is to hamper these invaders at every step they take, nothing more. Let me worry about the killing.”

The attendants mumbled and murmured like old gossipers trading secrets. Their complaints heard, Lukas turned from them, intent on peering out the arrowslit and, if circumstances provided, unleashing a volley of lightning at the barbarians below.

Instead he felt a hand on his shoulder, so heavy that it stopped him in his tracks. He turned back and saw a man of age with himself, though blessed with long locks of white hair where Lukas was bald and clean shaven where Lukas had a bristling beard. The man wore robes of purple with white lining; the colors of royalty, some cultures said. Lukas saw why.

“You are?” he asked. He had a guess.

“I am Laurant, Head Servant of the Tower of Victory. And you are Lukas Merveillo, I take it? It is an honor to meet you, Master Mage.”

“The honor is mine, Laurant. Though, I must say, your timing is less than ideal.”

Laurant smirked. “That it is. But you will forgive me; I have had many important matters to attend to these past few months. Matters that have come to a head just recently. All the more reason for me to worry about the happenings outside our walls. I ask you, Master Mage, can you beat them?”

“We have the arrows and, with your attendants, the manpower. But beating them…it is difficult to say. They have magic–” he said, stopping for a passing rumble of the Tower, “–as you might have noticed. But so do we. It is but an issue of which is the greater mage. Or, more precisely, how many they have. There are few greater mages than those in this Tower, I assure you.”

Though quality is meaningless if they have some other strange magic. The trouble with the blizzard still curdled in the back of his mind.

“Your quality as a mage is not in question, Master Lukas,” Laurant said. “The tales of your exploits precede you, and I, for one, am overjoyed to have you on our side. But you may not have my men.”

Lukas squinted at the man. “I beg pardon?”

“My men are needed for another task,” Laurant said plainly.

“The battle has already begun,” Lukas replied.

“As I see. But I have more urgent matters to attend to. And any matters that I need to attend to extend to my people. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?” He grit his teeth. “We’ll all die if we don’t have everyone fighting these scoundrels, do you understand that? All of us. You, me, your people and mine. All dead and left to rot. Or cannibalized, if it behooves whatever wastrels are knocking at our door. Of whom we know nothing about, I might add.”

Laurant did not look convinced.

The Tower shook once more. Dust fell from the ceiling, clouding the air. Lukas almost lost his footing, a pang of pain shooting up his leg. Laurant was unperturbed.

“I assure you that it is fully necessary. In return, you will have full access to every object available within the Tower, as well as access to every floor, something I’m told you were denied before.”

Lukas almost struck the man, if not for another shaking of the Tower. What followed was a terrible rumbling noise that came from below, so strong the very floor beneath them vibrated. Then he heard the screams. They’re already inside.

“What is it, exactly, that requires so much of your effort that you would forsake us all?”

“I suspect you already know, else you would have been…sterner in your approach. And, so long as I have my men, we will not be forsaken, I assure you. Now, what else is needed from me?”

Lukas thought. “The top of the Tower. I know that’s where you intend to go. I have the same intention. Take me there.”

Laurant frowned. “Is that truly necessary?”

“Yes.”

“Fine. Follow me,” Laurant said, turning toward the stairs. “We have little time to argue.”