Chapter 19
Petor dismounted from Mirradon, an older man looked up from the chair he was sitting on, Desari and Valter were off to the side, studying a map.
Valter turned back, his helmet off as he grinned at Petor. “’Look who decided to show up.”
“I was busy trying to eat stone.” Petor patted Mirradon and stored her before moving to where they were checking their map. He tapped his fist against Valter’s and nodded to Desari.
A tension he hadn’t realized was there slid off of his shoulders.
“Good to be back with you two. So, Mya needs a hand?”
“Well we’re done with our jobs and this is going to be one of the tougher fights,” Desari said.
“Okay,” Petor said, studying the map, several locations marked out. “So what are we going to do?”
“We’re going to walk in through the front gate,” Desari said.
He looked back to Valter and they both shrugged. “Alright.”
“Have you lost your mind girl? They are undoubtedly watching the roads and looking for people that could bring them harm,” The older man said.
Petor held up an eyebrow to Valter.
“Ikor, powerful mage from Ilus,” Valter shrugged.
“Don’t let what you would do create an impression of what others would do.” Desari stood and turned towards Ikor. “The Emberclaw clan has owned this port for several decaes. It is one of their strongest and biggest. When they built up their defenses five years back, they added several heat cannons, all of them facing towards the molten sea. They believe that all of their threats will come from the molten sea.”
“It tells us that they will have their best defense, their best fighters facing the molten sea, not over here.”
“There are four of you though!” Ikor stood out of his seat.
“And we’ve turned the direction of this war with just four of us.”
“What could you have possibly done to bring a change to this fight?” Ikor said. “The only way this ends is with one of us dead.”
“Some things take time. If you have options other than annihilation, then the fight can take a drastic turn.”
Petor ignored their byplay and pointed at the map. “What am I looking at here?”
“These three here are their heat storage plants.” Valter pointed them out. “Without them, they can’t use their cannons. These over here are their living quarters. That’s Desari and Ikor’s target. Last is the barrier system.” He tapped on the large building a third of the way into the city away from the molten sea.
“So which one you thinking of taking?” Petor asked.
“Barrier systems, I have an idea to take it out,” Valter said.
“Thought you might,” Petor grinned. “Okay, so I got the heat vats. What we looking at with them?”
“Molten sand held in vats with pipes from the molten sea keeping them warm.” Valter took out a half dozen metal plates with holes at each corner and nails. “I’ve been working on different enchantments. With these ones you activate them, set a timer on them and add in a spell. Timer runs out then the spell activates.”
Petor accepted them “So I used Arcane nova and it turns into a bomb.”
“There you are.” Valter took out another enchanted piece of metal. “This one you can cast a spell into it and then it will keep that spell active. A sustaining enchantment, as long as you keep it powered.”
Petor stored the first set and accepted the second set, adding them to his storage. “Nice, these will be useful. Also makes me happy I learned how to do that shaped explosion thing to better direct the spell’s force.”
“The more we know,” Valter said.
“The stronger the spells will be!” Petor grinned.
Valter shared the grin and stood, his armor unlocking from around him and disappearing into his storage device. Petor did the same, returning to the dust stained clothes underneath.
Valter picked up the map, flicking it clear of dust and stored it.
“You two ready?” Petor asked. Desari had removed her armor, her face nearly her own, her clothes simple farmer garb.
“He’s going to need a set,” Desari jabbed a finger at Ikor.
Petor pulled out another set of clothes and tossed them over. Ikor caught them, coughing at the dust. “This is not going to work.” He complained once he had his breathing under control.
“It did with Ilus.”
That left him spluttering as Desari moved away.
Several minutes later they were on the road. Desari bent like someone who did bone breaking work, would, new wrinkles, one half-blind eye, some warts and heavy streaks of grey and white through her hair rounded out her appearance.
She walked with Ikor, his attempts to try and clean up had been dissuaded. All of them wore large packs they’d rubbed on the ground to cover in dust. Filled with various items. Petor and Valter followed behind as they reached the front gate of the port.
There were several similar groups up ahead at the entrance to the port and just one trader with a near-empty cart.
It didn’t take long for them to reach the front of the line.
“What you here for?” The guard asked, looking them over, grimacing at Desari’s visage.
“We’re looking for work. The Molten Fist want to steal my sons from me and I can’t take it! They’re good strong lads, with good futures ahead of them,” Desari said, her voice lilting and cracking.
“What you do before?”
“I helped at a forge,” Valter said.
“Big lad ain’t yah,” The man chuckled. “You?” He gestured to Petor.
“Farmed, though I don’t got any injuries and I can do labor.”
“Two gold,” The guard said.
“Two gold, I barely got a hundred silvers!” Desari hissed.
Ikor reached into his pocket. Desari kicking him out of sight of the guard.
“Two gold,” The guard huffed, crossing his arms.
“I got the one,” Desari held up her forefinger at the guard.
“Gold and a half.”
Desari worked up her face and threw her hand to the side.
She moved to Valter. “Open your purse, lets see what you got.” Using her body to hide from the guards he pulled out a pouch and she took out her own, taking coins from both to create a small pile in her hand before turning back to the guard.
The guard grimaced at it, cupping his hands to take it all before he gestured them on with his head. “Get going now before I regret it.”
They moved through the gate quickly, reaching the other side.
“Why didn’t you just pay the guard?” Ikor muttered as they left the gates behind.
The walls were cut stone adhered to one another with molten stone. The houses were built similarly. Half melted at their seams. Through windows fought to keep them cool.
“You wouldn’t expect a woman like me to get through without a barter and do you have any gold from the local area?” Desari asked.
Ikor grimaced.
“Well, catch you later, going to see about some jobs down near the docks,” Petor said.
“I’ll head that way too. Warehouses I think,” Valter said.
“Housing I think,” Desari looped her arm into the crook of Ilus’.
They parted ways, Petor and Valter took a side street, storing their bags to better blend in with the locals.
The people were beaten down. They moved to the side of the roads and out the path of anyone wearing the emberclaw symbol as they marched through.
Some one got shaken down by a group of the clan members, others just hurrying past, not looking to make a ruckus.
Three, barely adults kicked the hell out of a boy on the ground, laughing and mocking him. Sadistic glee in their ‘punishment’.
Petor’s eyes flicked to Valter and they turned down the street, Valter blocked the view to the street.
One of them looked up as Petor reached them.
“What you thi—” Petor punched the man in the face, knocking the sneer clear off of it, and denting the wall beside him, breaking off one of his horns. He threw a fist into the belly of another, bending him over and causing him to vomit as he collapsed to the side, he pushed the weak punch aimed at his head to the side and hit the third man in the chest hard enough to crack his sternum. He crumpled in on himself with a pained wheeze.
Petor dropped to a knee, the weave coming easily as he touched the young man’s shoulder, his body was limp.
His brain was swelling like no ones business, skull broken in several places, same as his ribs and his hand, One leg was snapped sideways.
Petor reached out the nerves within the man and numbed them. Then he drained the blood from the man’s brain reconnecting the broken vessels within, bringing down the swelling. He moved parts back into place fusing them, then knitting them back together.
He drew the blood out of the lung and into his veins again, patched that back together. Then a spell that would increase the man’s natural healing speed.
“Going to be hungry.”
Petor released his hold over the man’s nervous system.
Then he moved to the other three men he grabbed them by the shirt, a short and quick blow shattering each of their jaws, leaving two of them mewling. The third he’d punched into the wall barely twitched.
He dragged them behind gabage and dumped them there. The boy they’d been hitting was getting up slowly.
“You saw nothing, tell your family and everyone you know to stay home,” Petor said. He patted Valter on the shoulder. He uncrossed his arms and they walked away from the alleyway.
“Couldn’t help yourself?” Valter said.
“Sometimes I get a twitch every now and then.”
“Didn’t know that the side of good was supposed to be so direct.” Valter looked over with a raised eyebrow.
“I’m making it up as I go along,” Petor shrugged.
Areas where traders might have once filled, were now half filled, food was at least plentiful.
Dozens of towers reached above the normal one or two story buildings, each of them flying the emberclaw banner.
“I’m heading this way,” Valter pointed down the street.
“Catch you later,” Petor said. They bumped fists and split apart. He worked his way to the ports largest heat vats.
Petor crouched down with others on their break from loading and unloading ships. Over a dozen were at port, resting in their cradles.
The port was a shallow indent into the land. On either side were twin towers covered in cannons. At their base was the heat vats. A third was in the middle of the port, the heat used to power the various cranes and other equipment, or to top up the heat vats on the ships at port.
This was the one he studied.
The building was squat, two stories tall with pipes running out of it splitting at the different docks, splitting off at different points.
He pushed off of the wall and headed for the docks, moving along them to reach one of the unused cranes, he kneeled down, checking where it was connected to the dock, using it to look down the stone precipice the dock was mounted to. Metal members reached out to support the dock and its ships, pinned right into the rock. Hundreds of meters below the molten sea roiled.
Unnatural straight lines reached down towards the open lava. Pipes that cut into the rock. He traced a route down to them.
Lets hope this works . He moved back up the dock, slipping behind stacked crates he lowered himself down over the side of the dock, grabbing onto a metal strut with his foot he wrapped his legs around it. Changing his grip he grabbed onto it and slid down under control to the bottom of it. He orientated his feet to the metal beam under his feet, facing the rock wall.
Come on, just like walking along a fallen tree in the forest . He stepped one foot after the other, a gust of wind pushed on him suddenly, he over balanced and started to fall.
He grabbed onto the beam, getting the other hand on it, scrambling for a foothold, the arcane blast spell forming, ready to throw him back up. It would tear him up and it would make everyone look down.
He stopped slipping, his heart hammering in his chest as he quickly wrapped his legs around the beam, then his arms. Good beam, nice beam. Fuck you wind.
He fought through the last of the adrenaline sphincter crushing jitters, reaching as far as he could with his legs and hands, then bringing his legs up till he was scrunched together and doing the same again.
He focused on that, reaching the end of the beam and the stone wall.
Slowly and carefully he got ontop of the beam, shaking the last of the shudders out. He touched the stone, warm to the touch, rough and crude.
“Okay.” He took out a bramble and pushed it into the wall, weaving the plant growth spell. The brambles roots found the cracks in the stone and dug in deep and hard.
He changed the focus, reaching into the limbs of the bramble, using his knowledge of the spike growth he increased their sharpness and turned the thorns thin and hooked, better to dig into the cracks in the stone and hold on.
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He kept the spell enforced growth and alteration active, and increased the growth speed of the limbs to his left and right.
The limbs reached out, waving up and down, the thorns gripping into the stone, secondary thorns sprouting out to secure them.
Sometimes they were higher, sometimes lower. Petor took out one of Valter’s sustaining enchantments and cast the spell into it. The ever burning bramble continued to stretch and grow, reaching the pipes to his left and continue growing.
He used a piece of leather to hold it to his belt, checking it was secure twice before he looked at where the brambles covered the main vat’s pipes.
He cast Root Road, appearing ontop of the pipes, he grabbed onto the rock, the heat of the pipes making him quickly sweat.
They turned under his feet, going into the stone and up to the main vat. They were also silent under his feet. Not drawing in heat .
The were several of them, large enough for him to climb through and just above the molten sea by barely a hundred meters. They were stained and warped from the heat. Petor drew his spear.
Going to get a dagger in the future. He stabbed it into a pipe with one hand, hot air blew up and out of the elbow join he stood on. He held onto the brambles around the pipes against the sudden wind, then worked the blade of his spear through the pipe.
He turned the blade and stabbed it into the pipe again, cutting the top off of the pipe, the air just passing right through instead of going into the rock and up to the vat. He stored his spear and tore free the metal. The metal was hot to the touch, but what would have melted a normal person’s hands was just uncomfortable now. He shoved the section he’d cut away into the pipe going into the rock, sealing it.
“One down.” He got to his feet carefully and set to work on another pipe.
He did the same to all the pipes and recharged Valter’s sustaining enchantment.
The last pipe he stored the section he cut away, the wind had picked up on the last pipe, heading into the rock and up to the heat vat.
He took out the second sustaining enchantment, this time he cast glacial freeze, increasing the cooling effect for a shorter range. The pipe pinged and tinged as it turn warm, to chilly, finally cold and covered in frost, it crawled up the pipe some. He attached the second enchantment plate to the other side of his belt.
That should get them trying to draw in more heat.
He checked where his brambles were. They’d reached one of the docks close to the left tower. His eyes tracked different points along the bramble.
He disappeared from atop the pipes, dropping, he disappeared again, falling again, he disappeared and appeared on the metal beam the brambles had caught onto. He wrapped his arms around the beam.
“Going to work on increasing the range of that one later,” Petor looked at where the tower was, the brambles working their way to the pipes.
It’d take some time still. He got comfortable as it stretched under the docks, spreading along the walls of the port.
***
Valter’s invisibility and silence spells were active, as he waited on the balls of his feet.
A guard opened the door, stepping through it. Valter crossed to the door, about to go through when the guard turned back to someone on the other side.
“Yeah I’m in tomorrow, afternoon though.”
“Lucky bastard, I got the next week of mornings.” Someone else said on the other side of the door.
Valter was so close he could reach out and touch the man.
“Well good luck with that,” The leaving guard shrugged, bored of his task and eager to be anywhere else. He turned, keeping the door open.
Valter stepped through, quickly sidestepping the guard on the other side who caught the closing door and bolted it.
He checked the door, more out of something to do than a true check. A grunt and he turned for the stair cases that went to the top of the wall.
Valter waited till he was up the first set before he moved, walking normally through the open area around the barrier building.
Guards were on the walls. Few were looking in his direction. He cast mage vision, overlaid with his heat vision, no one was inside the building. The doors were just doors.
He went around the building, pushing on doors, finding one with the lock not fully engaged. He slid a piece of metal into the lock and turned it. It unlocked, he cast a second silence spell upon the door, checked around him, everyone was looking away.
He stepped through and closed the door.
He locked it and studied the nearest guards by their body heat. One scratched his face. Another pushed off of the wall and started an imprompt patrol.
Valter moved deeper into the building, the outer rooms had slits to fight out of, a redoubt for defenders if the walls were taken.
Every door got an alarm spell on it he’d need time and no distractions.
Valter used pieces of metal to open the rudimentary locks, reaching the basement quickly.
The floor was a single metal piece with a formation carved into it. It was covered in a decent layer of dust.
Mithril, decent .
He studied it. We’ve got power coming in. He followed the trail into an adjacent room. Some quick work of his crude picks and he was into the room. It was filled with rune carved shelves, a quarter filled with cores.
Valter cast a careful eye over the room. Several different alarm formations that linked back to the other room.
That’s just lazy . He followed them back to the room.
“Remote link.” The alarm system connected to something external. He clicked his tongue, it could also transmit the barrier activation.
The remote link took up one enchantment, the barrier was the second and it was powerful. Coving the city and looping around the port, to create a bubble.
Valter took his time till he understood all of its functions if not what the runes said.
He took out his mithril knife and activated its cutting edge, breaking the runes that would transmit to the remote device, leaving those that would allow that remote device to activate the barrier.
He kneeled on the enchanted pad, taking out his metal book he touched it to the pad, copying it, then he flipped to his working on energy diffusion enchantments and another for a stabilizing enchantment with a instantaneous trigger.
Valter worked quickly, adding the enchantments to the original, grafting their mana channels together.
He weaved together a thermal burst that would gather in air slowly but steadily, ready to be activated. He picked out the point the burst would aim for and cast it into the modified sustaining formation. It felt like he was laying a trap for a mouse and trying to keep his hands out of the way of the parts. The spell settled down, he could sense the wind moving towards the spell only if he was looking for it.
He stood, his back and knees cracking. His eyes moved to the core room, a grin spreading across his face.
The enchantment had plenty of power in its lines to do what he wanted it to.
He moved to the room, a dozen green cores, several of that in various types of yellow and probably a hundred other cores of different colors were stuffed into his storage. The Alarm enchantments remained there, futile and useless.
“Thank you for your donation.” He left the room, locking it he dusted himself off and went back upstairs. He slipped through the door to the open area beyond unnoticed. He withdrew his alarm spells and strode to the nearest stairs. At the top he checked the other side of the wall, the guards nearest him. He slipped over the wall, hanging from it. He readied another invisible spell, just in case and released himself.
He hit the ground without a noise, the spell wobbled dangerously before stabilizing. He quickly jogged away from the barrier building, breathing easier as the tension bled out from his body. His part done.
***
A good dozen ships were being secured in the docks when a flare of blue and green shot into the sky.
Cannons rang out
“Now time for our part,” Desari was wearing her fighting gear once again, her appearance back to normal. Ikor was wearing all of his casting finery as well.
She checked the enchantment on the floor one more time and took the stoppers off of several potions in its center, a purple-red mist rose from the bottles, forming a half-dome at its center.
Bringing out her spell book and opening it to the page she needed.
Her mana weaved into form through her channels, before spreading through the book. Hunter wind wraiths formed from the purple and red mist; apparitions of razor sharp maws and claws. They hung in the cloud, formed from it, immobile. One became a dozen, a dozen doubled and then quadrupled.
They floated within the formation, the potion bottles empty, all of their contents turned into mist for the wraiths.
“Even if their claws and teeth do not kill your targets the poison they’re made from will.” Ikor evaluated with cold understanding.
“You seek to take every advantage you can in war. The Emberclaw clan have plenty of blood upon their hands.” She cocked an eyebrow. “Will you hold back now?”
He gritted his teeth, but stood upon another formation. The rooftop gave them a good view over the city.
Desari cut power to the runes that held the wraiths in place.
The wraiths shot away from the magical circle, components from Mya’s rituals. Several cores silently crumbling as they empowered the creatures hunting down those related to the blood of the Emberclaw clan.
The clouds shifted and swirled, even ash had its own charge.
Wind pulled and shifted, and lightning, thick as a cart dozens of them dropped from above, spreading into tendrils as thick as a man, then a forearm, descending on the emberclaw compounds that housed their barracks and fighting forces.
Desari drew heat from the sky, binding it with mana, and hurled it various buildings.
***
Petor relaxed next to the last tower’s piping, the cooling of the glacial freeze was nice, though the constant droning of fans trying to draw in hot air through the broken pipes was annoying.
He sat on the pipes, he’d repeated what he’d done on the main heat vat to the pipes heading into the two towers.
The systems had chilled, fans had started up to draw in more hot air from the pipes, but drew in only cold air instead, making them pull harder and faster.
Still it would take hours for them to become cold.
“Wish I had a better view,” Petor tilted his foot back and forth on the jagged edge of cut pipe.
Cannon fire rang out.
His ears perked up at something in the distance. His eyes moved side to side, trying to find it again. Lightning .
He straightened and pulled out the one-time enchantment casting his strongest Arcane blast, packing it with a third of his stored mana and setting it for two minutes. He held it into the one remaining open pipe, the wind tearing at it, he released it and it flew up the pipe towards the heat vat.
Petor eyed the brambles under the dock and used root road, he dropped and jumped, dropped and jumped, the motion now more familiar. He sunk into it, moving under the docks in jumps, reaching the central heat vat.
He took out another one-shot and repeated the arcane blast spell, this time putting in half of his total mana and set it for forty seconds before he dropped it into the pipe, pulled by the wind to the heart of the vat.
“Last one.” He set himself, reached out to the world and dragged in mana, leeched it. It bolstered him as he checked the path to the last tower.
He disappeared with a grunt, jumping along the path to the tower. He landed on the last group of pipes breathing heavily before he sighed and started his last casting, he created a spell from all but the little he’d need to make his escape.
He dropped it into the pipe, to be whisked away hopefully into the heat transfer pipes of the vat. Then he focused on the slim bramble that climbed up and away from the tower, up to a nearby dock.
Two jumps and Petor was crouching on the edge of a dock. Noise was everywhere.
Lightning hammered several buildings, tearing through them, blowing their facades off. People screamed and yelled those around the docks ran to their homes. Petor looked along the dock as booms rang out.
Cannons aboard Emberclaw ships fired on the defenses. Fighters wearing different colors rushed the docks, taking everyone by surprise.
A fleet of ships cruised towards the port at full speed.
Smoke and superheated liquid sand blew out of the first tower, climbing to the third story window and spewing outwards.
The main vat barely shuddered, but molten sand shot out of the pipe underneath, draining into the molten sea below.
Petor jogged into the city, heading for the meeting point.
Mist passed through a closed window, forming a wraith that looked over him and then rushed onwards. It was purely silent.
Petor shuddered and kept up the pace. Avoiding the sounds of fighting, yelling and dying.
He reached a street corner, wraiths, darted around a group of guards, their claws and teeth tearing into them. They quickly lost their strength, sinking to their knees, trying to fight the wind. The wraiths were more transparent, they shot in different directions, hunting for any further resistance.
He kept running, reaching a stables near the port’s wall, knocking on it three times, it opened for him, Valter on the other side.
“Desari?”
“On her way I’m guessing,” Valter said, closing the door behind him.
Beams hit several buildings, causing them to shudder, two collapsed.
“Damn, little overkill. Those things are fused stone,” Petor muttered as the gate shut. “I’ll head up to the roof and keep an eye out.”
“Gotcha.”
Petor jumped, his armor wrapping around him as he landed on the second story flat roof of the stables, giving him a pretty unobscured view of the city.
The twin towers weren’t firing. They tried hurling spells and using ballista, but their rate of fire was crap.
The barrier activated covering the port.
A barrage hit the barrier, it stuttered and colored with each hit before collapsing.
The oncoming fleet barely slowed. Fighting filled the streets. Everyone with sense was in their homes or running. The Emberclaw’s were rushing out to the port. To meet the fighting crew that had already docked.
Crews used cannons to help those ashore to smash through their fights and push onward. Smaller and faster craft were released from the fleet, looking like sail birds. They dropped reinforcements across the breadth of the port and on controlled docks, heading back out the fleet to bring in more people.
Knocks on the gate drew his attention after the third wave of fighters.
Desari and Ikor walked in as Valter sealed the gate behind them. Petor moved his hand in greeting, Desari nodded and jumped up to the roof.
“Ships are entering the port now,” He pointed out as the ships spread out, ballista’s fired out piercing arrows with ropes attached to them, crews grabbed devices throwing them on the rope and sliding to the dock to throw away the pieces of metal and join in on the fight.
“Won’t be long now,” Desari said looking over the city.
Petor shook his head and took out some dried food, offering it to Desari, she took some with a nod of thanks. He just threw the first piece when his crystal shook.
He took it out and threaded his mana into it.
“Alright, we still using all this letter crap?” Mya asked.
“You can use your name,” Valter sighed.
“Good, well we’re just about docked, reports here have the armed forces basically decimated, we’re just securing the city now. The last weapons and gear being cleared away. Where you at?”
“We’re at a stables on the edge of town,” Desari pulled out her map to rattle off a series of coordinates.
“Alright, well shouldn’t be too long before I can get free to find you. Nice work on the defenses. Barely had any shots from their defensives towers and their barrier was as useful as a soap bubble,” Mya said.
“How are things on your side?” Petor asked.
“Good, takes some damn coordination though. Sarnai is using ships that we captured fighting the Emberclaws to get into the ports and harass the defenses before her other forces can rush in. She called everyone even her old retired vets in on this. Hired everyone that they wanted, now they got the extra ships. Sounds like all of the attacks are going off without a problem.”
“How long till we can head to Ilus?” Desari asked.
“Just need to secure this place and then we can head off.” Mya clicked her tongue in thought. “Probably tomorrow I would think. Sarnai may have to move ships around to clean up all the ports. Then there’s consolidation and we’re probably going to want to take her along with us if we’re making a deal with Ilus.”
“How long till Cinderstein?” Petor looked at Desari.
“Tomorrow is the last day, at dusk,” Desari said.
They’d gone through the options, for Ilus to survive Cinderstein would have to end. They wouldn’t rest until Ilus was nothing but a husk. He’d read the information, come to understand the volcanic city. Civil was a thin covering they used to hide what they did to one another.
The plots and ploys, murders, blackmail. Anything that they could pull off they did. Using it to crawl over one another to fight at the top. The Ash Sovereigns, seemingly untouchable had changed dozens of times and fought as hard as any other against those that may rise against them.
It was only due to their location and their merciless control over the lower castes that kept everything running.
“Not long left now,” Valter said.
“Look at us, the four horsemen back together again!” Petor could hear the grin in her voice.