Chapter One Hundred and Four
The Cold Breath of Fate
Michael had been standing at the battlements all night. It had taken three guards to keep him from descending the walls, and it was going on the third day he’d not truly slept. He even tried conjuring a vision through his Arcancy to see through Carter and James’ eyes but his exhaustion stopped him before he could hone in. He tried endlessly until Jack found him in a puddle of his own blood and made him swear to stop.
The forges of Fort Guardian rang out into the forum, and the ever-changing light of the Immortal Flame shone through its many windows and open-ceiling like some foreign sun was rising within its walls.
After Sarah’s declaration of what they’d found, Jack ordered all weapons to be enchanted with the Flame. Soon they discovered most armaments only needed to be heated by the divine tool to harbour its properties and within half an hour and assembly line had been established.
Jack had also spent most of the night standing at the battlements. Partly out of fear that Michael might jump over them, but mostly knowing their act of provocation would rightly invoke a reaction from Nikereus.
After watching him stand in anxiety for hours on end, Klaryah decided she’d been sitting idly too long. Newly healed of her bruising and concussion, the assassin took an Immortal Flamed longbow arrow, climbed the battlements atop the gate, and fired the whistling projectile into the frontlines of Nikereus’ array, striking one unfortunate Obthraie to the ground.
The Soiltorn melted dead and a chorus of disbelief and anger arose from all sides.
“Are you trying to get this war started early?”
“What are you thinking?”
“You bloody idiot!”
Eventually Klaryah had enough. “Shut up! And witness my brilliance, won’t you?”
After waiting a long moment, they stared and stared and kept on staring but neither did the corpse resurrect nor did the armies of Nikereus come forward.
Klaryah smiled and looked to everyone in turn. “Nikereus will come when they’re ready. So, rather than drip with sweat out of fear of the future, let us stay in the present.” With that, she bowed atop the ramparts, giving Nikereus’ entire army the middle-finger, before walking back down to the ramparts, wherein she found Jack.
As soon as she filled him in, a long argument ensued, regarding threatening the safety of everyone in the fortress, at which point Klaryah tiredly informed him, “Jack, if Nikereus wanted this war to start early, they would’ve already. I’ll remind you, that you and your Legacies declared all out war last night and Nikereus chose not to pursue you. I don’t suspect one arrow will make the difference. Do you?”
Jack begrudgingly admitted she was right, and as soon as he could order them, nearly everyone remaining in the fortress was summoned to assist with enchanting the fortress armoury.
No one bothered asking Michael.
He stood looking out over the dormant fields of enemies as heavy footsteps sounded behind him. Michael didn’t have to turn to know it was Sidney and Flinn. Sid stepped lightly but she wore heavy boots, and Flinn had something of a bored trudge which caused him to drag his feet.
The Mhairian warrioress stepped to his side and her face was plainly unsure of how to proceed. The small amount of her hair which had grown back was already thick at the root. “Jack sent me. He wants to be sure that you won’t do anything stupid when Nikereus does whatever their planning to do. Because they will do something.”
Flinn swatted her arm and scowled at her, stepping swiftly to Michael’s other side. “But you know, maybe the bastard will just hold them hostage. They’re no use...”
“Dead?” Michael offered weakly.
Sidney and Flinn stood in quiet concern before the younger woman said, “Look, Mikey, Jack has a plan... It’s something of a long shot, but if it looks like it won’t be a huge risk, then he’ll give it the go-ahead.”
Michael turned to her sharply with wide, tired eyes. “What is it? Can I help?”
Flinn leaned awkwardly on his spear. “We don’t even know what it is, but he told us he knew you’d ask, and to say ‘No’. He’ll handle it.”
Michael turned back to the battlements, leaning heavily on the cold stone as the wind and weight inside him made his eyes glisten. As he stared off over the armies, a low howling sounded from one end of the enormous, enemy garrison to the other, picking up more cries as it carried through the valley. Before long, the very wind itself was swallowed by dark, mournful calls of wolves.
Michael looked to Flinn and Sidney with pale-faced dread, and they both tore in opposite directions, sounding various fortress bells, shouting orders, and sending messengers.
Before long, Jack and Klaryah tore up the steps with Sarah, Oliver, Aroha, Nichole, and Rose following swiftly. They saw Michael and crowded around as dozens and dozens of archers fell into place and the ballistae hummed, swivelling on-target.
Jack idly pulled his crossbow off his back, watching while Nikereus’ array began splitting at the centre, forming a wide walkway down the centre of their encampment right up to the entrance of their central command tent.
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The canvas doors were cast open and from them walked out two far taller Obthraie warriors, each wrapped in dark armour with long spears clutched in several of their hands.
From the first set of steps, Jack frowned with surprise. “They’re not bewitched… look at them.”
Sidney peered down and shook her head. “Must want their lieutenants to be as sharp as possible.”
Jack opened to his mouth to agree when a third Soiltorn emerged dragging a clearly Draendican figure through the mud with a sack over their head. They were limp, but whether it was from death of unconsciousness, they couldn’t tell.
Michael clamped his hand to his mouth as gasps flooded down the line of defenders and Jack shouted, “Steady!”
Oliver stepped closer to the rampart and shook his head. “Gods no.”
The dark lieutenant brought the body forward and dropped it ten feet shy of the magical snare-line, before smiling coldly up the Legacies and awaiting the others. Before long, two other Obthraie brought out the three other Legacies from the acquisition unit, all hooded and gagged, it seemed, forcing them to their knees at the edge of the traps.
Jack cast the volume magic to his lips and waited, gripping his crossbow as he eyed the situation carefully.
Michael grabbed his arm and whispered, “Jack, we need to do something!”
Jack turned straight past Michael and looked to Sarah, staring nervously over the brimming war before her. “You sure?”
Michael frowned as she nodded and tightened her sword belt. “What?” Michael asked.
“He’s my brother. I’m sure.”
Jack nodded and tightly clapped his hand around hers, whispering, “Good luck.”
Before Michael could ask any questions, Sarah turned and tore down the steps, leaving him and the other Legacies in bewilderment as Jack turned back to face the massing host.
“Jack, tell me what your plan is.”
Jack looked at the young man and put his free hand on his shoulder. “Michael. I’m going to need you to trust me.”
Finally, the command tent was cast open again and out stepped Nikereus, draped in a long, dark cloak overtop their thin, shadowy armour. They walked all the way down to the front of their array and stepped up to the three prisoners on their knees and the limp body rolled out in front of them.
Nikereus sighed dramatically and cast their own voice-enhancement. “What a dreadful waste. Really...” They then waved lazily to the body, and one of Nikereus’ lieutenants sharply paced over to it.
When they pulled the hood free, there was no gasp, or screams, or great wave of distress. There was merely true silence. Not the silence one gets when others to stop talking. Not even the silence one gets when a musician finishes for the night, and final cord of their instrument rolls out. But a cold, hollow kind of silence, like when the sun goes down on a day of misery, and you think perhaps the worst is over, only to realise you still have to survive the night.
Jack looked at Archie’s, pale, freckled face and then to Nikereus. All he could feel was the weight of his crossbow slung across his back. He wanted to do it then and there, but his hand trembled so much it would throw off his aim.
Nikereus looked up at the battlements with their slender, stone lips, moving into a gentle smile. They looked down to the surviving three hostages, largely indistinguishable from the sacks pulled over their heads and gestured to them casually, before announcing, “Your Guardian wouldn’t play along when I tried this game last night... but you seem like the kind of person whose made hard decisions. McKennedy, isn’t it?”
Jack gritted his teeth and swallowed the first thing which came to his mind. “Hillborn tell you that?”
“He told me a great deal. Though, I take it he’d be standing where you are if he’d been more careful, no?” Nikereus reached into their dark cloak and drew out Archie’s bright curving sword.
Michael heard more footsteps behind and saw Willem and Lain sprinting up to the battlement.
They pushed through the lines of crossbows and archers and looked out over the edge to see their friend lying cold on the ground.
Lain strangled a sob and clamped her hand over her mouth as Willem stared glassily down at him. The mute boy’s hand then shot out toward a crossbow as Lain and Avery muscled him away. He struggled, weeping and screaming out wordless noises, and kept trying to reach the crossbow as his body trembled. Before long, Willem threw Avery and Lain aside and crumbled to the floor of the battlements, weeping and tearing his hair.
Jack glanced from the grieving boy to the stone commander and used every grasp of his willpower not to lose his mind to rage. “Hillborn will have to face his judgement eventually.”
The lordly Soiltorn huffed and asked, “I hope you don’t intend on leaving it to Khasm? Trust me, the Dark Creator isn’t so fierce minded as they once were.”
Jack shouldered his crossbow and shook his head. “No. He can deal with the gods after he’s dealt with me.” The maceman took a slow, hard breath and glanced over to Klaryah who made a slow distinct gesture out of sight. Keep them talking, she seemed to say.
Jack knew the plan and asked, “What will it take for you to return those Legacies to us?”
Nikereus tilted their head, as though amused. “Simple. Choose one to stay here and you may have the others.”
Jack felt the entire fortresses’ eyes fall on him. He glanced angrily to his feet before catching Michael’s wounded face, hollow with dread. Jack looked to Sidney and saw her looking down over the three Legacies before settling for a disturbed, shamefaced silence. Flinn seemed torn between holding onto his spear and leaving to be at his ballista. Lain sat with Willem, holding the weeping boy, while Avery stood staring at the weapon Archie had forged in the hands of his murderer. Nichole and Aroha both stood at Oliver’s side, looking tenderly to him as he stared numbly down to the boy who’d saved him.
Jack raised his head and looked down at the unending array of soldiers and then glanced to Nikereus.
Nikereus’ smile glittered across their face as thunder rolled through the clear blue sky. “Ah, even the weather seems capable of answering me, when you are not, McKennedy. You and Amekot seem to have your similarities, after all.”
The thunder rumbled again, and high in a cloud far above the valley, emerald lightning flashed, and Jack glanced up just in time to see it vanish. Jack finally said, “I think you’ll find the weather speaks for me.”
A column of violent green electricity blew in from the heavens as Raeken’s roar filled the valley, and Sarah shouted in Garganii while straddling the dragon’s back. The dragon and his rider landed in a slam down on top of two of the lieutenants, crushing them instantly to oblivion before Raeken cast out a bright, bubbling spray across the crowd, frightening everything back several paces and soaking many in coats of smoking acid.
Nikereus wove their hands together, commanding a contingent of their army to storm in between themselves and Drakonian’s acidic wave, sealing themselves off from danger.
Sarah leapt from the dragon’s back, ripped off their sack-hoods and barked, “Get on, now!” She slashed free their binds and she sprinted to Archie’s body.
The moment of shocked ended as quickly as it started. The entire army of Obthraie ploughed forward as Carter hoisted James, pale as death but still alive, up onto Raeken’s back and turned to help Carlisla.
Jack bellowed atop the walls, “Covering fire!”
The entire fortress shook as a volley of lightning ballistae launched, a cloud of arrows loosed, and storm of crossbow bolts fired and fell toward the armies of Nikereus like the vengeful hand of God.