Excerpt From The Mad Scholar's Wall—

No one said a word as we approached the gates of the citadel. At first, we were silent because of the weight pressing down on our minds.

It was not mental power but the simple expectation of thousands. The atmosphere turned increasingly solemn the closer to the gates we came.

And when we arrived, we came to a stop looking up at the mural carved onto the doors.

Three groups of figures were carved into the bottom sections of the gates. One was tall and thin, the second was muscular, and the third was smaller than the rest. In the center of the three groups, one coming from a forest, one from an unending city, and the last from the mountains, were three individuals standing together.

Above all the figures in the background stretched a tree covering the majority of the fifty-foot gate. Its branches reached into the walls beyond the gates.

We stopped before the gates, and a wave of regret exploded from High King Areekail. Even though the sun was high in the sky, the world turned dark, and breathing almost didn't seem worth the effort. Like it was better to lie down and die.

After a while, High King Areekail spoke, his words resounding in the air with power. "We built these citadels, this city, to be the greatest achievement of our race. And yet, all it is now is a testament to our eternal sin. An act that will forever stain our souls, even as it was an act of redemption."

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Most of my attention was focused on my grip as I tried to ignore the water splashing my face and slipping into my handholds, making them slick. The increasingly intense burn in my forearms as I squeezed the roughly hacked-out wood was not helping.

It wasn't like I was riding the log while desperately trying to stay on through a section of rapids, either. I was slowly bobbing on the river, with the other logs that made up the raft floating around me, some of which had multiple passengers clinging to them, like mine.

We weren't even moving yet, as we were waiting for the beastkin attack on the Triad to start. Which was super annoying, as the flowing water splashed me more often! And I couldn't even complain about it. I mentally grumbled to myself.

The others were far more exhausted than me, and none of them were saying or sending a word of complaint in the mental network. A reasonable fear that they would be left on the shore for beastkin to find may have been keeping the not-so-fish fish quiet. What should I call them now? They arn—

The beat of the beastkin drums changed, and my heart started racing in expectation.

My head snapped up as I forgot my little game of trying to keep my head an inch above the shifting surface of the water without it going up my nose. And if anyone asked, I was winning.

Looking at the distant walls of the Triad and its bridges, I saw… the siege towers slowly moving forward.

Eyes sweeping across the sunstone-lit battlements of the closest forts and the armies outside the walls illuminated by the distant bursts of fire, I searched for activity. As seconds passed with nothing happening, I felt my body begin to shake and a hollow feeling in my gut.

"Calm," Said a mental voice sending out waves of relaxation and patients. "We still have a while to wait. Go over every piece of your equipment. If you already have, focus on your part in the plan, and stay relaxed."

The words helped, but my hands tightened and loosened on the log as I tried to stop my body from shaking as I came down from the rush of adrenalin.

Try as I might, I could not return to my previous forced indifference. The beat of the beastkin war drums was too loud in my ears, mirroring my heart.

I was unarmored, barely armed, and exhausted. The only point in my favor was the knights fed us.

But that does not change the fact I am… broken. I haven't looked into myself and actively avoided doing so, but I can feel the truth. Something was off. Different.

The pulse I released nearly knocked me unconscious with information overload. It was like, for a moment, I could see every piece of the world. Like I had a perception sphere covering the entire river…

More than that, my tendril was… too strong. I was trying to knock the stone into the river, not smash it into dust. I couldn't trust my own powers.

And that was nothing compared to my mental aversion to using them. At the moment, pulling mental energy from my core was like snorting chili powder, a burning lava tearing its way through my body.

With all that, I was still better off than the others.

The time of our probable death was steadily approaching. We had better odds than running through the forest, but that did not change the grim reality.

My eyes stung as I held them open, watching the steady progress of the towers before sliding them to the empty river running between the Triad. Only to grate back the other way a moment later.

I knew the river barges existed. I saw them. It was not a dream.

We would have been killed if the raft had passed the boats during the day or night. So the boats had to be in front of us.

And yet, there was nothing to see on the river.

I could see figures on the walls of the Middle Fort, and they weren't acting concerned.

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If they saw a bowl-shaped hollow in the water, I had to think they would do something about it. And there was also the wake of the boats in the water and the sounds those on board were making, but no one did a thing. Like there was nothing to notice.

Because, to every sense, the boats didn't exist.

Watching the steady advance of the beastkin, I could not help my body from tensing.

Then the siege towers stopped, and I hoped they would turn around and leave. There was no reasoning behind the daydream, but it still burned in my heart.

Dashing my fantasies, the ground before the walls of the Northern and Western Forts rose halfway up their length in a matter of seconds, and the hoards of beastkin charged forward as the drums rapidly pounded in my ears a moment later.

"Hold on." said a voice with calm resolve in my head.

It took a moment or two before I processed the words and looked away from the charging beastkin. When the log lurched forward, my hands clamped down on instinct, keeping me in place.

What met my gaze as I looked into the growing wind was not what I expected.

The water ripped by below, my right leg skimming the surface as the log reached a speed a couple times faster than a sprinting man.

It's not enough, I thought.

Trying to keep my leg out of the water and prevent drag, I lifted my body with my left leg hooked over the log, but I could not get it all the way clear as my leg kept on slipping. Water whipping by, I felt the water tearing at my pants leg, skating over the water.

My muscles burned, the water spray was like needles, and the bark bit into my skin, but it was just discomfort. And discomfort was nothing to a legionary.

The beastkin had done far more than I had thought possible. More than anyone would think possible. And finally, after all of their surprises, the beastkin resembled the swarms told in legends.

Streams of flesh charging forward. The only difference was these streams were following a path that ignored our defenses. That's a pretty big difference, though.

As their armies assaulted the walls of the Northern and Western Forts, a couple hundred yards past the walls, a line of beastkin were running off the banks of the river into the water.

Except they weren't.

It was like looking into a thick fog, but instead of a wall of white, it was not existing at all and faintly visible.

The beastkin were running onto flat-top barges on both sides of the river. They were basically hulls wide and deep enough to remain stable as hundreds ran over their decks.

Which was exactly what was happening.

How they built the number of barges needed to span the distance between hundreds of feet outside the walls, paralleling the walls on shore until they reached the heart of the Triad — and doing all that while moving them into position without anyone knowing — was beyond me.

I thought it would be the few ships I saw packed to bursting. A few hundred beastkin — maybe a thousand — assaulting the walls of the Middle Fort. Even if the beastkin took the fort with the help of their magic, we could come swooping back in, taking it right back.

But the last of my hope vanished as a ripple ran through the shell hiding the river barges from sight. I could see the boats running all the way to the Middle Fort for an instant.

Thousands charged forward along the boats, ready to capitalize on any opening those in of them might make.

Two pillars of water rose up from the water, hovering above the walls before plunging forward. I could hear the echoes of the crash over the increasing roar of battle and wind in my ears.

The wind slashed at my eyes, but I would not look away. I watched every second as the ladders rose and fell onto the bridges, already packed with beastkin.

All I could do was believe the legionaries would hold. That the defenders would not be overrun until we cut off the beastkin's advance.

From the corners of my eyes, the land was flashing by faster than the time I rode a galloping horse. And yet, minutes were steadily ticking by.

The beastkin were rushing up the length of the ladder, arrows were flying, and we were still traveling.

Move faster! I raged within my mind holding onto the log as the knights pushed it forward.

Finally, the drop-off, demarking the change from the grasslands to the river, vanished. In its place were the slightly fading in and out-of-sight shapes of the boats as we slid past them one after another.

We might not have the magic to stand an arm's reach of the beastkin and remain invisible, but good old darkness and miss perceptions worked just as well. No one looked for what they assumed didn't exist, and with the lights, flashes of fire, and lighting bursting to life over the area, creating plenty of dark shadows, even their night vision will take a hit.

A hundred yards into the double line of boats, I heard the sound of wood cracking. It was like a bolt of lightning struck behind me, but no light lit up the sky.

Another and another cracking sound rang out, and my lips parted in a cold smile.

I imagined the beastkin running across the barges as five-foot sections of two feet in diameter logs smashed into the boats at the water line. Logs that were going even faster than I currently was.

The barges would buck to the side from the impact, throwing beastkin into the river towards shore before settling back the other way as the mortal wound in the hull let the water rush in. Those in the boat might make it to the next, and even the ones who go down with the ship won't drown, but the flood of feral beastkin to the ladders would be decreased to a trickle.

Continuing down the line of ships, more sounds of braking wood sounded for a few more seconds, then it all stopped. I still heard the thumps and cracking of logs, but the smaller but still noticeable cracks of the boards of the boats were gone. Or so small that I didn't notice.

I did not look back, but I could guess the beastkin erected some kind of barrier to protect the boats. Because the slightly fuzzy air around the ships vanished.

For a moment, I thought I saw figures on the wall pointing down at the river.

Whatever the beastkin did, it was too late. I could not say how many of the boats sank, but I would bet my life some had, and with the boats went their pressure.

The beastkin might know someone had spotted and attacked them, but they were not yet looking at the water. Even if someone looked over the railing right now, they would be too late again.

"Brace yourself." Send a feminine voice in my head. My body tensed on impulse, but in the moment before the knight acted, I let my body go limp. The crossed belts over my chest were yanked backward and up, flinging my body into the air.

Holding my hands to the sides, I kept my body balanced as I watched the water ten feet below. Then my feet slipped over the deck railing, clearing it by less than a foot, as I landed with a crouch. To my sides were a dozen others, most of whom were on the raft with me, the rest being knights.

I was already pulling out the spear strapped to my back, "Duck."

Not questioning the command, I dropped to my stomach. A moment later, the log I was riding sailed over my head, smashing into the beastkin that had started to turn towards us, teeth bared.

The log did not completely clear the deck, but only a few dozen beastkin remained of the hundred on deck a second before.

Not stopping, I watched the log swig up, then come crashing down off the flat-top river barge behind ours, slamming through the deck and out the bottom.

The beastkin on the barge with us had looks of shock at the sudden turn of events, and I could see them hesitating to act.

Bared my teeth as I got up, pulled out my spear, and charged them before they could regain their senses.