I looked out over the town. The castle's wards were still holding for now, but even I realized that that wouldn't go for too much longer. It had been just over a week since the city wards had failed and the fighting had started in earnest, and we were losing, badly.

Our enemies had known the city well, and had plenty of contacts within. They knew which noble houses were likely to surrender in hopes of getting a better deal with them, and which they'd have to destroy. Their strikes had been surgical and violent, wiping out the strongest leaders still present in the walls.

We had gotten a few wins. Lord Fallon had been away from the central duchies, trying to stomp out some rebels in the north when they'd arrived, and he seemed our best chance for relief from this assault. We'd also managed to take out several of their units, mostly non-magic using soldiers, and some of the rebels who were still assisting them.

I sighed and turned, Dean Lorrae had opted to join us in the castle. Normally this would be unthinkable, as he would need to stay with his charges until the end, but he was too valuable a target and much needed to reinforce our defenses in real time. The current plan was to keep the students at the school until its wards started to fall, then evacuate en masse. Hopefully most of them could escape.

"How much longer can we hold?" I asked, looking over towards the old man who normally wore a mischievous smile.

"That depends. A few days more at most, but I'll admit that that's a generous estimate. I've already started holding my mana for when we have to flee."

"I'd prefer to fight."

"I know you would lad, but there's an army out there, and regardless of how good you are, you can't fight an army on your own. No, it's wiser now to hold them in case Fallon makes it back, or to escape and see if we can't go find him."

"You're right, but we'll have to leave so many behind if we run. Don't you have family too? I know my cousins and friends will likely be killed or at least held after."

"I've a few grand kids, but they can take care of themselves. Well, some of them can, a few... Sadly not all of my children's children turned out well."

In the middle of our conversation there was a brilliant light that flew up over the city. The pale green projectile flew higher and higher until just below the clouds. Once there it exploded with an ear-shattering noise. That was a first, whatever it was certainly had some energy to it, but had not come even near the castle. It also looked like something our wards would stop with ease, so I saw no point to their doing it.

"Their attack... missed?" I mused, cocking my head a bit.

"That wasn't an attack my prince. We should get to the courtyard." Lorrae looked over towards two of the nearby servants. "You, go and inform their Majesties of where we're headed, and quick, and you lass, to the princess, fast as you can."

I watched the pair rush off as Lorrae began to move. It was unknown to most, but the courtyard was our evacuation spot. It was secured by a separate set of protections from the rest of the palace and readied for Lorrae's plan.

It took us only a few moments to get there, and once we had he began to cast. The spell he was making was one unlike any I'd seen before and several of the intricacies would have been lost on even a skilled caster. I could do nothing but stand back and wait.

And wait... and wait... and wait...

I looked around, there was only one knight here with me for the moment, he my guard for the day. "Where are my parents? Or my sister, they should all be here by now." Something seemed wrong.

Two things happened in quick succession. First a blast of water slammed one of the nearby towers, the one I'd been in only moments ago, sending debris flying. Second there was an explosion from deep in the castle, one that shook everything nearby. Lorrae was still casting and didn't flinch.

"Stay here and guard him with your life, we'll need the exit ready," I said to the guard as I turned and sped off. He sputtered and tried to follow but he was skilled at surviving and protecting, not speed and I easily left the courtyard before he had a chance to stop me.

I ran through the halls of the palace like an arrow loosed, the edges of the world starting to blur as I moved. There was no time to spare as I bolted towards my parents chambers, dodging past servants, almost all of the knights were already at the walls for defense.

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The guards who should have been standing outside the royal chambers lay dead on the ground, the doors they had stood before burst open. Inside the results of the explosion could be seen, scars from a lightning bomb slashed the walls. The king, his crown fallen to the ground lay there. He'd not died from the blast it seemed, but rather a knife that bloomed under his chin, pointing up into his skull.

The queen had survived too but was being held aloft by the neck by some kind of magical tentacle or rope. A girl the prince knew vaguely stood before her, one of his sister's retainers. The obvious source of the spell.

"Aw... no more? How disappointing." I barely registered her as she cast my mother's corpse aside, tutting.

My sword, an enchanted blade gifted by an elven ambassador appeared in my hand as I screamed in incoherent rage. The blade burning a brilliant blue as it drank some of my mana. I bolted at the caster who had barely the time to turn as I bore down on her frail form.

Her spell was faster through, turning and speeding at me at an almost impossible rate. Several passes were made in the course of only a few seconds. She lost several of her little tentacle ropes, as my blade slashed through them and my mana burned against hers. In that time though she had a moment to fall back and begin focusing on me properly.

She didn't have power, but she did have skill. This, what was her name? Gwenna? Could cast under pressure and in ways that would irk even the most skilled of battlemages. None of her spells had the pressure that one would expect, but they were cast perfectly and with extreme speed.

Had I not screamed to alert her, or not rushed in blindly in anger I would have easily overpowered her before she could do anything about it. She was no physical user and didn't have the reaction speed to do much with as short of an alert as she might have gotten. Foolishly I hadn't used any stealth, giving her the moments she needed to react.

On our third pass she managed to hit me with some kind of force, knocking me back a little. That was enough for her to get those bloody ropes in play and well around me. It took all of them to wrap me up, but they did, holding tight to my limbs as the last wrapped around my throat.

"Aww... so close, you nearly had me there little prince. Too bad, too bad. Now look at me, I like to see..." As she was taunting, walking towards me she stopped looking down.

Below her arm, in the area of her ribs a small stick protruded. As she gasped a second joined it. I watched the girl stumble a bit, her eyes wide at the intruders poking out from her dress. Not only had she focused her all on me, but she'd devoted all of her little spell to hold me in place. Now she grasped and reached, trying to pull out a pair of crossbow bolts.

I could see that I was not alone in having come to check on the royal couple. In the doorway stood a man who looked more like a snake, holding some monstrous contraption with two slots for quarrels.

Emil ran over to me as the wizard's spell failed. She was busy with trying to deal with her own issues. With one of my arms over his shoulder he began to drag me out of the room, moving as fast as he could. I was still gasping for breath as we made it to the end of the hall and he helped me down the stairs.

"Need to kill her, she killed..."

"No sire, we need to go. The castle's wards are down and we don't have the time to waste. We must flee now. If it is any consolation, I doubt she'll survive."

At this point my legs were working a bit better and I could help as we moved. I didn't like it, but he was right, there was little else I could do here.

"That monster will probably just pull them out and plug the holes. Should have cut off her head."

"Ah, perhaps, but what about the poison?" I could hear the amusement in the man's voice as he waxed, almost gleefully, on the situation.

I looked at the spymaster and tried not to laugh. No self-respecting knight or battlemage used poison. Even among common soldiers it would be derided. Emil though wasn't a knight, or a battlemage, or a priest, or any kind of mage at all. He was a commoner, and had no issues with anything that worked.

A few people had thought us mad to have a commoner as our spymaster, and in such a proximity to us. Mostly those were nobles and the like who objected to them on a fundamental level. On the other hand he was simply the best at what he did, and loyal to the royal family for all we'd done for him.

Once I'd recovered enough I picked the man up and took him with me as I ran back to the courtyard. We arrived in moments to find it much as I'd left it, one knight and one caster. The old wizard looked at me as I approached.

"Where are...?" he began.

"Not coming, get us out." I said sadly, from my voice I could tell he understood.

"Very well, everyone close in."

Normally the knight would have been left behind, Emil too, but as the rest of the royal family was not joining us, there was no reason not to take them. As the spell released forming a shell around us I thought hard. I'd known my sister had some issues with me, but murdering our parents seemed too much. She had either totally betrayed us, or was captured, or perhaps dead. It didn't matter which now, but I'd need to find out.

The shell that encircled us now looked not unlike an opaque egg. As it came together I felt a sort of weightlessness overtake me, and then we began to speed up. Up and up we went, letting the castle shrink below us as we climbed towards the bright white clouds. I could see the whole city as we turned, flying at incredible speed northwards and away from the doomed capital of Lithere. It didn't even feel like we were moving, just seeing it all pass below.

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I was dizzy, and incredibly angry as I pulled on the damn bolts that arrogant little bastard had shot me with. I was going to kill him. First I'd wring that little prince's neck then I would skin the spy. Perhaps I could stretch it out and use it for a book cover when I was done? Questions for later.

I'd even fallen over while they fled, the disgrace. First thing was first though, I needed to stop my bleeding. That was easy enough in the short term, and a small covering of force wrapped around the shafts. I'd tried to pull them out at first but they were deep, and a few touches had reminded me how bad of an idea that would be.

As I tried to rise I found I was having trouble moving. Arms and legs were fine, but curling myself, I just couldn't. That was no good, had he hit something? Just one more sin to his name, but no matter, I could just use magic.

A little mana gone and I floated up, able to get my feet below me again and tried to walk forwards. It was hard and I was short of breath as I made a few paces, then faltered again. Once more I stumbled and fell.

This was bad, very bad. I felt a cold fear creep up my spine as I considered my options. I seemed to be hurt far worse than just a simple wound. What to do, what to do... I just needed to stay where I was, we'd won, and soon our forces would get here and heal me. Yes, that was it, just keep the bleeding down and I'd be fine.

I gasped, it was so hard to breathe, like someone was pressing on my chest. I pulled and pulled but I just couldn't get the air to go in, the muscles wouldn't move. The cold fear washed over me as I realized that something was very wrong. I needed a healer and now. I tried to rise again and couldn't, tried to scream, for only a bare squeak to escape.

I thrashed, trying to get attention. The pain was growing by the moment, spreading through my chest as I focused all of my will on just pulling in one more breath. Without thinking my hands grasped for my chest and legs kicked. I was so scared, it hurt so bad.

In only a few moments I found I couldn't move my arms or legs either. The pain was all consuming and I wept as numb fear took me. The only thing I could hear was the deafening beating of my heart.

Papa, big brother, help me.

The beating stopped.