Chapter 4 — Fight
“What does the Sun feel like?” Soranth said, staring up at the sky. Bright lights, he knew, were called stars. Yet none of them were called the Sun.
He sat in his mother’s lap as both of them gazed at the latest system that graced their dark sky. “I’ve never felt it either,” his mother said with a hum, stroking his hair. They were perched at the edge of a bridge that had once led to the throne room. It was the lowest bridge in the castle and one of the few remaining ones that hadn’t completely collapsed under its own weight. This was the closest bridge to Rahab Falls, requiring them to speak louder to be able to be heard over the rush of the waterfall.
“But your father told me it felt like a mother’s embrace, warm and full of love.” She squeezed him in a tight hug, inciting loud squeals. Once they calmed down, Soranth peered up at his mother’s face.
“But how can it take up the whole sky? Look,” he said, pointing at a small star at the edge of the horizon and squinting. “That’s not even bigger than my pinky!”
She laughed warmly and Soranth smiled as he jerked along with her chuckles. “The Sun was very far away, darling, and it certainly didn’t take up the whole sky! It was around this big,” she held up a hand in the sky. The tip of her index finger met the middle of her thumb.
“That’s not big,” Soranth complained.
“Ooooh, I wouldn’t know,” she said with a smile. “It’s much, much bigger than Maraciel.”
“Really?” His whisper was filled with awe.
She nodded. “Much much bigger than Mount Zarphan and Maraciel together.”
He gasped.
“It’s even bigger... than Earth,” the Queen stated dramatically, enjoying her captive audience.
“No way!” Soranth crossed his arms and pouted. “You just making up stories—like you did with Uzza the orc kidnapper!”
Queen Af looked outraged at his suggestion. “I wasn’t making up stories! Chulsa, tell him!”
The anthropod clicked closer, dragging his wings behind with a brushing sound. The Queen and Prince shared a secretive grin—knowing that Chulsa could have chosen to stay silent and was making the noise on purpose.
“I couldn’t help but overhear, my Queen.”
“Oh please, I know you were standing there the whole time. Just come out and join us!”
“To do so would ruin your family time, Your Majesties.”
She scoffed but waited for his reply. “So? Was I right about Uzza?”
“Of course, milady,” her advisor answered serenely.
“No way.” Soranth’s mouth dropped open.
“But it didn’t kidnap children that didn’t go to bed when they were told,” Chulsa continued, earning a glare from the Queen.
“Mere details,” she said with a sniff and ruffled Soranth’s short curls. “That doesn’t mean it didn’t have six huge arms that were as strong as steel and horns as tough as rock!” She attacked and they delved into the fourth tickle war since he woke up. Chulsa sighed and disappeared, as silent as a nagacougar in the night.
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“We’ve been through this,” Soranth coached. “Say it with me: I like Haraldr but I respect his feelings and boundaries. I won’t behead, crucify, amputate or injure him just because I’m angry.”
“I—I like Haraldr,” she whimpered, almost breaking down again. “But I respect hi—hi—his feelings—” Alizar burst into a fresh torrent of tears, collapsing against him for the third time that day.
“Alright,” Soranth said with a heavy sigh. “Maybe that was too much for one day. We’ll continue—er hold that thought.” In all honesty, he had no intention of seeing her ever again after this and she probably knew it too. Instead, he patted her on the back over her wavy curls and said, “Why don’t you tell all of this to Valda instead? I’m sure she’d love to help you out.”
She sniffed and drew back. Her button nose and eyes were red and blotchy as evidence of her unintentionally therapeutic session with Soranth. “You think so? She seemed a little... confused when I tried talking about you.”
“Wait, you guys talked about me? No, that’s okay,” he said, raising his hand to stop her. “I don’t really want to know after all. Don’t worry; I’ve known Valda for years. She acts innocent but deep down...” he trailed off meaningfully.
When he saw her give his suggestion a considering look, Soranth was once again reminded of how similar she and Haraldr were. Both were complete airheads. Of course, that is not to say they had their own talents and strengths but when it came down to it, he could see how the attraction had occurred in the first place.
As if summoned by her name, Valda sauntered into the clearing with a reluctant expression. “Max, the Generals want you.”
“Ah, duty calls. Um. I’m just going to go.” He pointed back over his shoulder at the camp.
“Of course, go ahead,” the chemycus gave him a shaky smile.
“Will you be alright?”
“Y—yeah, don’t worry about me!”
“Valda, stay with her,” he ordered before turning around and marching off. He ignored her spluttered protests, citing it as payback for what her pet had done to his last three bedrooms.
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They broke camp when the remaining fauns arrived, bringing with them carts of food—overflowing wagons of freshly plucked starmelon for the first half of the trip and dried frivan jerky for when they ran out—and supplies to hopefully last them the journey. The first group of soldiers seemed to regain their spirit and darted back and forth, clearing up the campsite quicker than it had taken them to set it up. They gathered at the borders of the Vermillion Plains, the chaotic milling falling into a smooth formation.
Rich soil gave way to dry and cracked ground. The barren wasteland stretched into the distance, tinted by a dusty red haze that hung over the land. They marched onwards with the evergreen Maraciel at their backs.
Clone Chulsa stood by Soranth the entire time, shooting snide remarks about Haraldr’s various physical characteristics. After a previous incident starring Haraldr and the clone along with two dented and thus unusable pots, Valda had been declared mediator. She carried out her duties with ease, ordering Haraldr to help with various chores and giggling in turn when the clone’s commentary resumed.
Soranth easily ignored this byplay, instead choosing to focus on a portable, smaller map the Generals had given him before going to sleep. He traced his finger from the western forests of Maraciel across the quickest and safest route to Mount Zarphan. At the rate they were going, it would take them three days to reach the blackened ground.
He looked back at the army marching behind him. The chemyci formed neat rows of silver-plated warriors with a steady march and stiff backs. The fauns—their army’s only foot soldiers—followed behind them, trailing in groups of warriors. Each group consisted of equal amounts of shield-bearers and sword wielders with ten soldiers in each group, led by Sentinels. The Generals led both their respective troops, standing tall and proud in front of both armies with a Lieutenant each at their sides.
Then there was him and his two companions, who’d only recently been recognised by the Queen as his Lieutenants. This was meant to give them a sense of belonging in the hastily formed army but Soranth could see that it was also what separated them. Ranks, regardless of how few there were, held too much power over the soldiers. Soranth even wondered if their reticence could be a result of the all-powerful image of his mother who bore an almost mystical weight in their people’s hearts.
Either way, the Prince knew he was going to have a hard time encouraging both armies to work together as the newly-appointed Lord Commander of the Royal Army. Sablo and Nathanael, once his teachers, had agreed to it in a closed conference with the Queen. Instead, Soranth deemed it wiser to mirror their silence rather than ask for their personal opinions on his assignment.
However, he knew enough, thanks to clone Chulsa’s excellent spying skills, to recognise that neither army was too happy to have him along, convinced that they had been entrusted with babysitting the ‘young’ Prince. Of course, these were just the younger generation of soldiers who weren’t aware of his true age but they made up more than half of the armies, making his position a very dangerous one to be in.
The red rock they trod upon left dusty stains on their boots and in the air, choking up a trail that could clearly be seen for miles. Time was hard to tell in the vast emptiness of the Vermillion Plains. Soranth looked up, trying to identify changes in the star system. He’d recently been tracking a new constellation he called the Camael triplets. They clustered into a clear trio that had hovered near the edge of the horizon, barely seen over the trees of Maraciel.
Yet here, they were nowhere to be seen.
“Valda,” he said, elbowing her. They had long fallen into the silent rhythm of placing one foot after the other. She jerked up and shot him a quizzical look. “How long do you think we’ve been marching?”
She looked up, eyes automatically searching for the latest constellation she’d been using to track time. Long ago, his father had devised a system that used the stars to count time rather than depend on an unreliable body clock. King Eric approximated the length of time it took for a constellation to travel from one side of the horizon to the other would take one human day. Dividing the sky up into time zones was relatively simple after that —a custom that Maraciel’s citizens inherited after his death.
“Mine should be over there,” Valda stated with a tone of uncertainty. She pointed at the other end of the sky where the constellation she’d been following had been in its last phase. “But... I can’t see it anywhere. Hey!”
Haraldr turned around automatically. “What? Can’t you see I’m doing something important?”
“Well, it can’t be if you’re doing it,” she replied. “Find Varsuth.”
Varsuth was the name Haraldr had bestowed on his constellation, claiming that it formed the image of the most beauteous woman the entire galaxy had ever seen. Neither of the other two had ever found it even though he pointed out details like her the curve of her head, the edge of her shoulder or even the last toe on her right foot.
He obliged and stared at the sky for several full seconds before blanching. “She’s gone. She’s gone!”
“Shut it, you fool!” Valda hissed, shooting a look at the wary troops closest to them.
“Chulsa, call the Generals,” Soranth instructed. “But quietly.”
“Yes sir,” clone Chulsa obeyed with a snap of a mandible. He passed Haraldr on his way, uttering a soft “Stupid and slow, oh joy.”
Soranth had to hold on to the straps of his Lieutenant’s belt to stop him from going after the messenger. The two Generals broke away from their respective armies and raced to get ahead of the group. The soldiers began to look slightly perturbed but a disapproving glare from Valda was quick to fix it.
“Has this happened before?” Nathanael asked in a low voice when they arrived.
Soranth and his Lieutenants shook their heads. Haraldr seemed particularly incensed by the mysterious disappearance of his beautiful Varsuth and stomped along beside them. “I want her back,” he growled.
“There seems to be fewer stars than usual,” Soranth grimaced, patting his morose Lieutenant’s shoulder. “Is there something blocking the sky?”
Had they lived on old Earth, this phenomenon could have easily been explained by rain clouds. Soranth, in his entire lifetime on Maraciel, had never experienced water falling from the sky. It was simply impossible—as his mother explained to him—because the planet had frozen solid. Only Rahab Falls and the rivers that flowed from it like the lifeblood of Maraciel, could transform into rain and that was just enough to form a misty vapour on a particularly cold morning.
“How can something block the sky?” Valda asked, scrunching her nose. In the background, Sablo instructed the neat rows of soldiers to halt for a quick break. The army slowed as Sentinels passed on the General’s orders down the ranks. When they finally came to a halt, it was right next to Boulder Ridge with its sloping incline.
“Look, there!” Haraldr pointed at where a distant Mount Zarphan sat, solidly blocking all the stars behind it. They all turned to look.
It took a while to notice that the triangular shape they had assumed was Mount Zarphan was actually growing bigger, amassing like an ominous harbinger.
“What... is that?”
Soranth didn’t know who spoke but the horrified tone shared his sentiments equally.
“Everyone,” Nathanael said dangerously, his commanding voice increasing in volume so it caught the attention of their soldiers. “DUCK!”
Only then did Soranth catch sight of what the chemycus’ superior eyesight allowed—of wings flapping in unison and bright beady eyes. Frivans. More than he’d ever seen in one place.
Their collective might formed a large cloud of rabbit-like bats with their leathery wings and rounded furry bodies. They looked and were completely harmless individually but when they flocked together, the wind from the strength of their wings almost threatened to tear the weapons out of their very hands. Soranth could hear screaming. The soldiers had followed their Generals’ orders but it was hardly enough to reassure them, especially when the frivans blocked out entire patches of the usually well-illuminated sky.
“Stay calm!” Soranth yelled over the thundering of wings. “They won’t hurt you!”
His words failed to influence the soldiers. Valda had her hands wrapped around her head, her ponytail whipping in the cold rush of the wind. Haraldr had hunched down alongside Sablo with a steady, determined look of concentration. Out of all of them, Nathanael seemed the calmest, his head tucked into the crook of his shoulder and knees slightly bent to take the brunt of the wind.
The massive cloud of frivans shot overhead, grim determination in every beat of wings. They were not inherently fast creatures, something that sent a jolt of worry through Soranth.
“What are they doing?” Valda cried out as the last few dregs of frivans cleared the skies ahead of them. “Were they trying to attack us?”
The silence that fell about the army was pervading in its fear. Soldiers slowly rose up with the help of others, cautious and wary. Nathanael’s shoulders were taut while Sablo had quickly set about the troops in order, instructing and reassuring at the same time.
“No.” Soranth squinted, trying to peer into the darkness. The luminescence of the stars was usually enough to pierce the stiff darkness of the plains but in that instant, it seemed to dull their senses. “I think they were running from something.”
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Cahethal was brimming with energy as usual. The weasel-lizard hybrid territory had expanded greatly ever since they were initially released by King Eric all those systems ago.
They built their homes around the end of the majestic Nahaliel River that swung around in an almost full arc, pooling into a large lake that formed the central hub of Cahethal. Their ancestors had chosen a deeper part of the woods where the starlight was hard to spot through the thick canopy of leaves. The lake, however, created an expanse that the tree crowns couldn’t reach and reflected a tranquil pool of glimmering stars.
Building dens around Cahethal Lake had seemed natural—small underground burrows that helped insulate them against the creeping chill of Earth’s climate. Bright fires illuminated the paths further out from the lake and were carefully tended to by their guardians. Unlike the chemyci and fauns, the hybrids were of a completely peaceful nature.
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Hurting each other was an incomprehensible idea to the self-professed nature lovers. This peaceful disposition made some consider them to be the weakest species of Maraciel. They secluded themselves in their haven of tall trees, only coming forth to trade the precious swathes of fabric they wove for material and resources they couldn’t get themselves. However, news of the invading army had managed to reach even the most isolated species, jolting the younger brethren into dissenting murmurs and strong words.
A loud voice called over the hushed buzz of the gathered crowd, drawing attention with the ease of a natural leader. “Brothers and sisters, we are not alone in this world. We share this forest with others who love just as hard as we do, who live just as voraciously as we do. How can we abandon our fellow people when they need us most? How is it that we can sit here and watch them die? For us!”
The speaker’s slender paws tightened into a fist, grasping in her palm the hearts of everyone watching. Her gestures were as eloquent as her words. Her entire body moved with her speech, shiny black fur glinting in the firelight. A tail whipped restlessly where it hung below the impromptu stage of branches that stood precariously in front of the Cahethal Lake. The tip of it flicked against the surface of the warm water, sending eddies of ripples outwards and disturbing the starlit lake.
“Can we still call ourselves citizens of Maraciel if we refuse to defend it? Can we stand here,” she stomped her foot, making those nearest to the stage flinch, “and say that we deserve to live here? Peace,” she said as she raised her hands to calm the growing unease, “is a motto best lived by in times of peace.”
“But! We are not living in a time of peace.” Her voice raised, pulling the more convinced hybrids into a roaring enthusiasm of approval. “When times change, we have to change with them. And I say, it’s time to change!” The crowd roared.
Satisfied to see her people up in arms, stamping their feet in a wave of determined agreement, the speaker easily hopped off the stage and blended into the crowd. “Great speech, Rasiel!” Blurred faces and voices congratulated her with pats on the back and admiring looks. She accepted it all with a modest smile, nodding her head as she pushed her way to the back.
In the distance, she spotted the one person she was looking for. “Soter!” She called, eagerly gathering up her tail in a practised motion over her arm and running towards him. He met her gaze with a slow smile and opened his arms in greeting. Laughing, Rasiel Amblecrown let her momentum careen straight forth into his arms.
“You spoke beautifully, my love,” he murmured softly into one of the velvety ears perched at the top of her head. She nuzzled at his neck, disturbing his fur to make it stand up. “Stop that,” he said, nudging her away, “I told you it tickles.”
She giggled and accepted the hand that he held out. They turned away from the dispersing crowd and started to walk towards the lake. “I didn’t think you’d do such a good job,” he admitted reluctantly with an abashed smile. “You make me proud.” His paws squeezed hers.
Rasiel felt a familiar surge of lovejoyhappiness rise within her, making her almost tremble from its intensity. “Please Soter, you knew what would happen when you dared me.”
They laughed and stood at the edges of Cahethal Lake, allowing the shallow waters to lap at their feet and tails. “What do you think everyone’s going to do now?” She hummed, looking back at the crowd.
However, he didn’t offer a reply. “Soter?” She turned back to look at him, only to find him staring at the sky above the lake with a frightful intensity. “Soter?” She brushed his arm gently before noticing a movement out of the corner of her eyes. “Wha—” she began, looking out across the familiar lake she’d grown up seeing every day. Almost instantly, Rasiel was struck by the distressing dissonance between what she knew and what her eyes were telling her. Her heart thudded loudly in her chest.
The stars were missing in the reflection.
She looked up as screams began to rent the air. The beautiful shimmering sky had completely disappeared and instead, a large black shadow hung in the air. It was similar to the fire-shadow finger puppets they made when they were young but this was far more menacing. The looming blackness drew closer and she gasped, breaking the spell Soter had been under.
“Rasiel! Move! Go!” He yelled over their people’s screaming as they tried to get away from the shadow demon. She stumbled and tripped over her tail, her mouth and eyes wide open in horror as the shadow swooped down and encased one of her friends in total darkness. She could see the fear in his eyes as the amorphous black creature began with his head and wrapped tightly around his limbs like a ribbon that came to life.
It was Sinta, she recognised the white triangle of fur at the base of his neck that he always boasted about. Faintly, she remembered hearing his approving whistles and cheers over all the others when she got on her soapbox. The creature devoured him, leaving a completely black figure that still bore Sinta’s shape standing amidst the panicking crowd.
Then it separated into hundreds of thin ribbons, reaching out and snagging on every available piece of skin of the hybrids around it. There was no escape. They screamed and fought, stumbling over each other as they tried to get away from the growing plight but only served to infect more hybrids.
“Rasiel, listen to me, we have to go!” Soter shook her shoulders and tried to pull her up but she was too far gone. Too frozen in fear, too deep into watching the pain and suffering of others as they fell under the decaying touch of the monster. It seemed to grow larger with every new victim, rivulets of black winding together to form a sphere in the centre of the crowd.
Before long, all the people in the main crowd had fallen and all that was left was a huge bubble of black. Soter’s voice attracted its attention and the bubble jolted, floating closer and closer.
“Come on Rasiel, please please listen to me,” Soter begged, silver tears trekking down his black fur. She looked up at him blankly and reached up a hand, not even realising what she was doing.
“Don’t cry, Soter,” she said softly, brushing away the tears. He stared down at her and seemed to reach a resigned conclusion.
The monster extended a whip-like ribbon that snapped forward to catch both of them at the same time. Soter wasted no time, pushing her behind him and catching the ribbon with quick reflexes. The decaying touch of the monster spread quickly, crawling up his arms and across his chest.
He turned to face her and mouthed his last words, “I love—”
Perhaps it was sheer luck. Perhaps it was her cruel fate.
Yet when Soter had shoved her behind him, he had consequently pushed her straight into the warm embrace of the lake, the water soaking her fur and filling her lungs when she tried to breathe.
When she finally managed to pull herself out, completely ripped out of her shock, it was to an empty city and flickering firelight.
She screamed.
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“WHAT IS THAT?” Valda screamed over the chaotic battle taking place around them. Or, in their circumstances, it would be more precise to call it a massacre.
The giant swung his two lowermost arms, sending strings of soldiers flying into the distance. Fauns and chemyci alike were unable to even approach it. Spears flew only to be batted away by the six huge arms that protected the beast.
The monster had attacked them without any preamble, ambushing them with a fist that came out of nowhere. It had bright azure skin, bluer than the Nahaliel River that ran through Maraciel. It would have looked human if not for the large, gnarled horns that pierced the sky and of course, the six muscular arms it boasted from its sides. Its legs were squat and short but even a single step could trample a whole unit with ease.
Soldiers ran rampant, trying to escape its long reach and assault it at the same time. Haraldr had disappeared into the fray of the battle. At some point, Soranth recalled seeing his Lieutenant yell a battle cry as he leapt onto the blue giant’s back, only to slide down slick muscles until he was hanging off the creature’s filthy loincloth. He would have laughed at the sight of Haraldr’s traumatised face but he and Valda were too busy dodging the flying arms.
In the giant’s perspective, they probably looked like milling insects that he had to stomp out. The thought of this didn’t really reassure Soranth as he threw his last spear—aiming once again for one of the giant’s eyes. Just like all the previous attempts, the titan slapped it away easily with a flick of a finger.
“It sounds ridiculous,” he said, panting during a break as the giant went after his comrades, “but I think that’s Uzza.”
“Uzza? Uzza, the story your mum tells you to get you to go to bed?” Valda replied incredulously, before whistling for her pet. He pursed his lips. The nagacougar appeared out of the darkness, easily flitting between falling and charging soldiers alike. “Go for the neck, sweetie,” she instructed before turning back to him. “Did she give you any tips?”
“No.” Soranth watched her pet dart up an arm that had just slammed into the ground, crushing a faun and his metal shield as if it was paper. He winced and jumped aside as yet another hand whooshed past to reach for a chemycus. The nagacougar nimbly bounded up to Uzza’s shoulder, sinking sharp canines into the tender nape of the giant’s neck.
Uzza roared, a sound that almost concussed them and as it was, sent the entire army stumbling to its knees. Its right hand reacted automatically, reaching back and slapping its neck. Valda’s pet jumped to the other side of its neck, prompting the giant to reach around with its other hand too. While doing so, all its other arms paused to focus on ridding itself of its pest.
“This is it!” Nathanael shouted from somewhere behind them. “Go go go!” A swarm of troops leapt forth with renewed vigour at his command. Spears pierced, swords sliced and arrows flew.
The giant’s hide was tough but the assault it was under was brutal and finally, a faun managed to draw first blood. It looked back down at them, suddenly taking note of the pinprick of pain on the finger of one of its lowermost arms. Valda’s nagacougar took the chance to take a running leap off one of its elbows and landed safely on the slope of Boulder Ridge.
Lifting its beleaguered arm, Uzza’s craggy forehead furrowed and its cheeks darkened into a portentous midnight blue.
“Everyone retreat!” Soranth yelled, recognising the danger signs. At the back of his mind, the faint stirrings of a plan made itself known. True enough, before they could even take a step backwards, the giant erupted in a tantrum of epic proportions. Uzza lashed out with all six arms in different directions, shaking ground with every stomp of its feet. Those who managed to escape being thrown into the air were sent staggering by the quaking ground.
Soranth could feel the desperation hanging in the air, tightening like the frostbitten fingers of death around his neck. The battle seemed to slow as he took in the people around him. Sablo was near to his right, determination etched in every line of his body as he dragged away his injured troops. The chemycus general had disappeared, most likely attempting to corral the remaining soldiers into formation.
Haraldr was still atop Boulder Ridge and as Soranth looked at him, he suddenly realised the Lieutenant was shouting something. “PRINCE! I’ll distract it!”
Soldiers ran towards Soranth, fear on their faces as Uzza lifted two of its arms. He tried to signal that he had heard Haraldr’s yell but his lungs were too busy straining for air as he too tried to escape Uzza’s onslaught.
“PRIIIINCE!” Haraldr screamed even louder, jogging down the slope.
Soranth grunted as the arm landed a sword’s length away from him, throwing him to the chalky hard ground. He strained to breathe through the cloud of dust but failed. He could feel rips forming in his loose white shirt, the only thing protecting him now was his tight-fitting vest. Coughing miserably, he barely registered Haraldr’s shouts of “I’ll be the distraction! Did you hear me? I’ll distract him!”
For a second, he had to quell a flash of anger. Did Haraldr honestly believe no one heard him? They probably heard it from all the way in the castle. Instead, he used the butt of his sword as leverage to help himself up and hopped out of the way as a group of soldiers charged towards the giant. Haraldr’s ridiculous yelling had suddenly solidified the half-baked plan in his head.
“Everybody, listen to me!” He yelled. Nobody could hear him over the cacophony of screams from the fresh group that just attacked. “I need you to attack below the knees! Attack—below—the knees!” He bellowed to no avail.
Valda landed softly in the dirt next to him. “I’ve got you,” she said before racing towards the bulk of the army. The soldiers were a mess of injured and fresh troops, all at various stages of approaching death. At this rate, death was not only a determined option, but a hastened one. Ranks were no longer of any importance with all available soldiers lending a shoulder to limping comrades.
Rather than stop right in front of where they had gathered, Valda whirled right into the middle of the chaos and demanded for their attention. “LISTEN UP, SOLDIERS!” They looked at her. Injured, moaning and clutching wounds but they still looked at her and it was enough.
“Follow the Prince’s lead! We are all going to hold up our weapons as one and, on my count, throw everything we’ve got BELOW the knees! Got that?” Scattered nods.
“I SAID, YOU GOT THAT?”
“YESSIR!” They thundered back, acting for once like a single unit rather than two separate entities that had reluctantly joined forces. Satisfied, she threw her ponytail over her shoulder and grinned at the Prince. He shot her a deeply gratified look and gave Haraldr, who was still yelling for his attention, a thumbs-up.
Haraldr paused for a second before turning around and racing back up Boulder Ridge. He grabbed the nearest rock—a large stone that was at least half his size—and started dragging it towards the edge. At once, Soranth figured out what his Lieutenant was planning. He eyed the soldiers that were still dragging themselves away from the cantankerous giant and reviewed his suspicions of Uzza. Thus far, the giant’s reactions had been incredibly slow with a child-like naivety that he intended on taking advantage of.
Two seconds later, he was running up the slope himself as if to help Haraldr in his efforts. He could hear the rest of the army following Valda’s orders as they picked up the nearest weapons and readied it to be thrown with a moment’s notice. At the back of his mind, he catalogued how dangerous and stupid his plan was and how incredibly likely it would be that he wouldn’t come out of it alive. Suddenly, a dark shadow brushed up against his leg and he looked down. It was Valda’s pet.
“You’re here to help, boy?” Soranth rubbed its sweat-streaked mane as he waited for the perfect opportunity. The nagacougar mewled and looked up at him with guileless red eyes that he knew couldn’t be trusted. “What do you say: you go right, I go left?”
It hissed.
“You’re right, I’ll go right and you go left.”
Unfortunately, it didn’t get the chance to reply or if it did, Soranth didn’t hear it because Haraldr had finally managed to heave the massive rock upon his shoulders. With a roar that almost rivalled that of Uzza’s, Haraldr flexed incredibly thick cords of muscle and the rock flew overhead. Whatever his sister claimed his brain lacked, his aim more than made up for as the rock connected solidly with Uzza’s forehead.
The giant windmilled its arms, giving Soranth and the nagacougar the opportunity they were waiting for. They hopped on either side as each arm came swinging past, racing each other up the length of its arms, the Prince’s combat boots finding less than secure purchase but still not letting him slip. Valda’s pet easily beat him to the giant’s neck and already started sinking claws deep into the face of the beast. It roared once again and this time, Soranth could not run the risk of falling off so he filled his ears with the first thing he could find at hand—his ripped shirt.
He slid his sword back into its scabbard and pulled out last two daggers that were tucked away in the sides of his combat boots. Inch by agonising inch, he began to mirror the nagacougar’s actions on the other side of the giant’s face, climbing up slowly to their destination. The giant had stopped waving its arms desperately and Soranth could almost feel the heat from its cross-eyed glare as it tried to locate them. The two uppermost arms reached up at the same time, the behemoth ready to slap its own face if it meant getting rid of the pests hanging off it.
“NOW!” Valda screamed and was joined by the roar of warriors as they threw everything they had at the giant, targeting right below its knees. Not even four arms were enough to stop the onslaught. Uzza let both his upper arms drop down to block them—exactly what Soranth had been counting on.
It gave him and the nagacougar time to race up the giant’s monolithic cheeks right up to its eyes. This close, they could even hear the squelching shifts of dilated pupils roving back and forth. He grimaced but didn’t hesitate and neither did his accomplice. Soranth and the nagacougar sank their weapons—daggers and claws respectively—into the vulnerable sclera, tearing and ripping until thick dewdrops of vitreous humour welled out.
The giant’s scream was unlike anything they’d ever heard. Its tortured wails echoed across the plains in an undulating howl that Soranth was saved from thanks to the stuffed cloth in his ears. As the giant reached up to slap its hands over its bleeding eyes, the Prince and the nagacougar quickly made themselves scarce, bounding off the middle arms to get to the ground.
Unexpectedly, Uzza seemed to lose all sense of balance and tripped over its feet as it tried to stumble away from them. With a loud moan, it toppled over in a slow, inevitable motion, landing heavily on its back with its head lying right next to the bottom of Boulder Ridge. Most of the army had moved away by then, cautious of any new aggressive behaviour. Soranth reappeared beside Valda and having abandoned both his daggers, he drew his sword out again.
She patted him on the back as he shot her an adrenaline-high grin. “Well done, my Prince!”
Sablo pushed his way to the front. His hands were covered with the dark red of congealing blood and various scratches up his arms but the smile on his face said it all. Nathanael too had joined them at the front and he nodded approvingly at Soranth. His arm was twisted in an angle that was certain to be broken and the sword by his side had cracked into half where he had tried to cut through the giant’s skin.
“Uuh,” Haraldr’s voice rang out uncertainly, halting their pre-emptive celebrations. They all turned to look at him, even the soldiers who had only just started allowing the tension to bleed out of their shoulders.
The red-skinned Lieutenant was warily eyeing the shaking rocks near the top of the slope. The boulders of varying sizes, some even as large as the giant’s fist. As long as Soranth could remember, they had been resting on the top of Boulder Ridge like waiting minefields. And the vibration of the ground from Uzza’s fall was just enough to tip the weight over.
The first rock that began its decisive descent created a wave in the others until one by one, they all started to roll down the slow incline, gathering speed as they hurtled down. Haraldr panicked and darted to one side of the ledge before running to the other. “It’s too high!”
“Jump! Just jump!” Soranth and Valda began yelling at him, certain that even his thick-skinned nature would not defend him against the rolling projectiles. The rumbling grew as the stones quickly approached level ground, almost halfway down the ridge.
The fear was clear on Haraldr’s face as he too came to the conclusion that he wouldn’t survive the stampede of boulders if he stayed. Gracelessly, he tossed himself over the steep drop and screamed the whole way down, only to be snatched out of the air in the last minute by Valda’s faithful pet. They breathed a sigh of relief.
“The giant!” A soldier behind them choked and Soranth whipped his head to look, hands tightening around his weapon. What he saw made him loosen his grip and assume a puzzled frown. While he had taken the giant’s dullness into consideration when making his plans, he had still assumed that Uzza had some semblance of intelligence.
Yet, there it lay choking on a rock that had flown right down the ridge and straight into its mouth in an awe-inspiring arc.
“Unbelievable,” Valda’s mouth hung wide, mirroring her twin brother unconsciously as he loped over. The stones buried Uzza’s face in a tomb of rock, settling into place as the giant approached the end of its death throes.
“We got lucky,” Nathanael rumbled before turning to face the army. “Soldiers!” He raised his voice and broken sword, commanding attention his way. Soranth cast a measuring eye over the troops. They were disorganised, injured and had just drank their first dose of mortality on the battlefield. They were emboldened by their win but discouraged by their missing comrades. They had already lost a third of their army before the battle even began.
Soranth stared out at them with a grim look. It was all they had left but he knew that somehow, they were going to have to pull through and win the fight, lest Maraciel falls.
xxx
A Visitor’s Guide to Maraciel — by Clone Chulsa
Chemyci are proud warriors who live in the grassy plains of the east. With the incredible strength of their humanoid upper body and speed of their four legs, they’re both our strongest and fastest species.
However, this comes with an equal amount of vanity. Insult a chemycus and you might find it the last thing you do—and you might want to pay attention to this part Haraldr—because they will challenge you to a duel of honour.
In the old world, they would have been called centaurs but their egos refused to accept it, instead inventing a new name during Maraciel’s conception. They—
Chulsa, I hope you’re not insulting our fellow inhabitants of the kingdom. Again.
No, milady, I would never.
Good. Please continue, don’t let me interrupt you.
Ahem. As I was saying, their… creativity meant they refused to accept their given names, hence the wonderfully unique name they have given themselves. Their devotion to their weapons make them excellent blacksmiths and—is she gone? Thank the stars. Why didn’t you warn me?
What? It’s not our fault!
That’s it, lessons are over for today. I’m done with you lot. Get out of my sight.