Gama crashed through the battered remnants of the tavern door, wings in tight like a missile. The ashraven’s claws gouged furrows in the rock as it halted its momentum.

As soon as they stopped, Rook lept from the bird, running her hands over the sooty black feathers, slick in places with blood from the hail of arrows and earthen projectiles.

Rook sighed. Gama was not mortally wounded, but it had been foolish to fly her past so many soldiers. It had been foolish to bring anyone else into the village. Rook was so used to the ashraven’s speed and agility in the air, that the rider hadn’t thought the Earthbreakers would pose a serious threat to her mount as long as Gama was airborne. Now Rook knew better, but she still held out hope that her avian companion wouldn’t pay for the silly human’s mistake.

At least the villagers had chosen the tavern as their final stand. It was large enough for Gama to remain under cover with the rest of them. Rook surveyed the room, trying to appraise herself of the situation and start thinking a way out of this tight corner. Heedless of the onslaught, against all sane, rational thought, some of the defenders still bore bows, and shot futile arrows from the windows between bludgeonings. Many of them were children from the ridgeline, and Rook recognized the moss-covered girl who had done such amazing things to hold that ridge against what the chief now realized, were very long odds.

“Duu,” said Rook taking ahold of the girl, “Can you bend up some roots to protect us?”

The girl looked lost, in a daze, as she clung to the wolfboar by her side for support and stared at a dead or dying man in the corner. Rook supposed that was reasonable given all that had happened. Duu was just a girl after all. But she was also the people’s last hope.

Rook shook the girl, “Duu! Can your treebending help us?”

Duu looked up as if noticing Rook for the first time. The question sank in, and Duu shook her head. “It takes hours to grow roots,” Duu said, “And there’s nothing but solid rock beneath us now.”

Rook’s face softened and she released her desperate grip on the girl, settled for gently cupping her shoulders, “You did very well, do you know that? You’re a brave girl and we’re all very proud of you.”

Duu nodded her head absently, as if she barely registered the chief’s praise, or didn’t particularly care.

Rook grimaced and her eyes lingered on the little treebender, but the chief still had a job to do. She turned to another man, covered in blood from a gash across his brow and a section of his scalp hacked open from behind. It was Rune beneath all that blood, the village’s very mediocre carpenter. Some vestigial part of her mind had registered the fact, but they didn’t need a carpenter right now, they needed a strategist. And Rune had always been half decent at organizing workers for a job larger than he could handle alone. Now, he seemed to be organizing some sort of defense and was readying a sword in hand.

“You have a plan, Rune?” asked Rook.

“We pick a point and drive into it like a wedge, split the encirclement just enough to flee into the glaciers.”

Rook looked out a window as a girl with blood covering exactly half of her face – Kara was her name; a sweet girl – sent an arrow sailing up to the edge of the caldera. It was on line, but it eventually fell well short of the higher target.

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“There are too many of them up there,” said Rook, “We won’t even make it to the caldera before we’re riddled with rocks and arrows.”

“My wife and baby are in the cellar,” Rune snarled, “You want us to just lay down and-”

“Of course not,” Rook cut him off, “But we have to be smarter than that. Does the cellar lead to any of the tunnels?”

“We chose this cellar specifically because we knew no boneshifters would pop up out of it.”

“Damn. Ok, just give me a second to think. Don’t do anything stupid in the meantime.”

“I’ve got nothing but time,” Rune said sarcastically, grinding his teeth as another boulder slammed into a wall. The idle villagers had taken to leaning against the walls in hopes that they could keep them from caving inward under the onslaught. There were so few of them left, they couldn’t even line the walls of the tavern. It was just a few months ago they had considered expanding it because the village had grown too large to meet in here during feasts and celebrations.

Two villagers were just bracing the remnants of the door back into place, when it burst open and Fenri fell through, the limp form of Halvard slung across his back.

“Fenri?” Rook asked in surprise, “Where in the shadows’ name have you been?”

“Don’t say that,” Fenri shivered, “Don’t swear by them. They took the bodies of the boneshifters and turned against us. Everyone’s dead down there, Rook. Everyone but me and…”

Fenri paused to pass a hand over Halvard, who was unconscious.

“Who? The shadows?” Rook asked.

Fenri nodded, still looking over his companion, who bled from so many wounds it was impossible to tell which should be treated first. They looked like boneshifter wounds, which was to say they looked animal, but if what Fenri said was true…

“Will the shadows fight for us?” Rook said suddenly.

Fenri looked up at her, horrified. “Noo,” the word came out quavering, “But they might fight for our bodies once we’re dead.”

“So the tunnels are closed to us, too then,” Rook said, biting a lip.

“I wouldn’t go back down there if you held a sword to my throat. Death is better than what those shadows have in store.”

Rook cursed.

Boulder after boulder slammed into the walls and Rook’s mind raced down every avenue. Every plan, every exit was blocked. These Earthbreakers were thorough if nothing else, squeezing in on them like a stone gauntlet. They weren’t just fighters. They were soldiers. This wasn’t a chaotic warband, farmers and hunters who came together when necessity or opportunity presented itself. Her village wasn’t being raided, it was being professionally, systematically wiped out.

The lump in the pit of her stomach grew larger as she realized all was lost.

As a chief, the only decision left to her was how could she earn her people an easy death. Let the roof cave in on them? No, there were children in the cellar who would panic and suffocate? Surrender and submit themselves to Lu Gun’s mercy? The man had none, and he would torture the survivors in every way he knew how before putting them to sword. Trust the shadows to uphold their bargain and protect them? Rook snorted at that. They had already broken it, or at least exploited some flaw in logic to keep from actually helping her people.

Rune’s charge was futile, but it was the only way it would be quick. They would be cut down almost instantly, probably wouldn’t even make it to the next house on foot, and Gama probably wouldn’t even get off the ground. Yet death by rock and missile was the best death they could hope for at this point.

“Ok, Rune. Charge it is. Put your family on Gama. Keep the others tight behind me and… damn, Rune, I won’t lie to you; this has a snowball’s chance in a forge of working.”

“But that’s a chance, right?”

“Who knows,” said Rook, “But at least this way, maybe the lightbender knows to cut his losses and run. And he ends up with a hell of a story to tell. At least he can say, in the end, that Shadow Ridge never gave up.”

“Better than letting the roof fall in on us.”

Another volley of boulders rolled into a single wall, and the joins of the roof gave an audible crack.

“My thoughts exactly,” said Rook, “Everybody out! The roof’s caving!”