THE RUSH

Mathras and Cusáhn proclaim their plan. Voua Azrain's courtyard walls and human defenders will prove no obstacle, for Cusáhn's guardsmen – those few bold enough to dare the sorcerer's wrath – will launch diversionary assaults against the outer battlements, and in the same moment, Mathras will begin his bombardment from afar. Then, from the parapet of a tower of the guard, Cusáhn will fire a ballista shaft, striking the bole of one of the jungle trees in the courtyard of Voua Azrain, and thus establishing a zipline on which Cusáhn and the others shall fly over the walls. From thence, all will depend on the companions: Cusáhn, UrokYann, and Rokál, the men who will bear full armor, must protect the company from whatever defenders the tower sends forth; Glaneir and Tzark must guide them and penetrate doorways; Vivict, the javelineer, must bring down and immobilize the swift-flying wyvern; and Cusáhn, with his spark-edged sword, must end its life.

From the crystal balcony, the company streams down a transparent staircase that winds between the towers, leaving Mathras behind, and with him, a few trinkets of Glaneir's, which, she had told him, "were pilfered from the Tower. I dare not bring them back there; could you hold them till I return?"

Mathras had taken them, his eyes agleam with avarice, his hands clutching whatever she passed him from the great sorcerer's hoard: a silver-wrought sphere, a jingling handful of vials, a scroll bound in living flesh.

As the comrades race through the night, Tzark asks, "Glaneir, could those trinkets not have been of use in our assault?"

But Glaneir answers, "I could not have wielded them. Though I served Ulto closely during all my time at the Tower, I never mastered her power as I wished." She draws a silver wand from her cloak, "Only this instrument is mine to command." She hisses a serpentine phrase, and the wind, which had been against them, whips around to press like a glacier upon their backs, speeding them in their run, while above, the ragged clouds that race over their heads claw and twist in unnatural whirlwinds, disarrayed by Glaneir's spell. Her silver wand, secretly unnecessary to the magic, is a useful prop, a way to explain how a supposed slave can wield Ulto's sorcerous power.

Ahead, a steel-plated tower of the guard comes into view around the curve of a moonstone castle, and through its steely gates Cusáhn leads them. In the clangor of the armory, UrokYann is strapped into heavy armor, and claims a gargantuan mace; Cusáhn hefts a shield with a lantern in its front; Harrin straps on sword, helm, and breastplate; and Viványa takes a chainmail tunic, a grappling hook, and a barbed harpoon, also hanging from her belt two coils of slender rope, one attached to the butt of her harpoon, the other to her grappling hook. Several of the company take lanterns, bandages, canteens, torches; Rokál discovers a hidden flask of rum, which Cusáhn sternly forbids him to steal.

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Thusly geared for battle, they hasten up winding staircases to the battlements of the guard tower, and there, poised over the precipice, the ballista awaits, already aimed and calibrated; ready to be fired. Cusáhn lights a phosphorous flare and hurls it over the edge to tumble, a streak of blazing light, down into the abyss. That is the signal!

From the mountainside of Mathras's cellars, a storm of lights swarms forth in a thousand flashing arcs! The spells stream with an eerie howling toward the Tower of Voua Azrain, which is already a vortex of fey auroras and crackling explosions, byproducts of the fantastical exertions of the sorcerer's power. In the distance below, where the defensive walls of the Tower meet the bridges of Zretaia, the battlecry of Cusáhn's stalwarts flies up through the wind, and the hearts of the company surge: it is time!

Cusáhn pulls the firing pin, and the ballista gives a mighty crack, the bolt thrumming into the distance, zipline uncoiling with cobra speed. The guardsman squints after the bolt, anxious to see if it strikes true.

One tense moment, then he declares, "A hit!" Enlisting the aid of UrokYann, he sends a slab of ore down the zipline, to test the safety of the route. The eyes of the company track the dark rock as it dives among the city lights below, dwindling to a plummeting speck, then curving in the direction of the Tower, sailing over the wall, and vanishing into the jungle. Cusáhn says, "We must all use friction to slow ourselves before the end, lest we smash among the trees!" Swiftly, he distributes short lengths of rope by which to hang from the line, and leaps onto the battlement. "Rokál!" he orders, "You fly after me; with our heavy armor, we two can hold out long if attacked alone. UrokYann, you next, then Vivict, Harrin, Tzark, Glaneir!"

"Go!" Ulto says, "They are trying to cut the line!"

Cusáhn follows her gaze, and sees, in the jungle, lit by the golden flash of some enchantment exploding in the storm of sorcery, the hectic silhouettes of men running with sabers. He flings himself out and zooms down the line, bellowing a war cry, which is soon lost on the wind.

Rokál, stepping up onto the battlement, pours a swig of stolen rum through the mouth of his iron mask. He says to Viványa, as she hops up to dangle her feet over the edge beside him, "If you see me fall, catch me, will you?"

She laughs behind her fist, then he is gone. Looping her short rope around the line, she drops into the sky; the others hear an ecstatic whoop. UrokYann follows with shouts of, "the wind! The lightning! Oh what a night!" Harrin, sweating and pale, lurches over the edge without a moment's hesitation, leaving Tzark shaking his head, "Madmen, we're all madmen."

Glaneir asks, "Never gone to battle before?" She makes as if to fly the line before him, but Tzark glares and loops his rope around the cable first, clinging to it with whitening knuckles, saying, "Lady, you denigrate my courage. Many times have I flown from such heights, coolly and—" Ulto kicks him off the edge. Then, muttering incantations under her breath, she plummets after.