Chapter 26 – A Halo of Fury

Adam, Emily, and Oliver ran over the roofs of barracks and bunkers near the southern wall of Eulenschloss, which was packed with troops. Commanders screamed, war horns blared their signals, and squires ran back and forth to deliver messages and distribute supplies like arrows. Heavily armoured tridentiers backed the masses of archers, neatly divided into their military units.

A myrmidon lumbered past. Mobile temples that ranked among the most powerful military units of the Talons of Aves, the animated statues of blue marble stood over fifteen feet tall. Operated by three Novaseers in a complex Instillment Invocation, each myrmidon was capable of impressive feats of Novaseering.

In the distance, the Pure’s line of golden-armed catapults and trebuchets were visible. Perfectly simultaneous, they fired their first volley. A line of burning boulders and brazen censers with white gas lit up the sky as it flew in a wide arch towards Eulenschloss.

The myrmidon near them raised its arms—decorated with mosaics and small statues of saints—and created a massive octagonal screen of Ironglass. The sunlight that shone through the screen, reminiscent of a stained-glass window with holy depictions, coloured the troops beneath it in shades of blue and gold. Here and there along the wall, Talons of Aves jumped up and fired Invocations of Shrike, Ironglass and Marrow to deflect or destroy the incoming projectiles.

But it wasn’t enough.

“LOOK OUT!” Adam screamed, stopping Oliver from jumping to the next building. They rushed back before one of the fired boulders, covered in burning oil, hit the barracks in front of them like a meteorite. With a deafening crash, it obliterated its target, sending bricks and timber flying like pebbles. Dust and rubble rained down before the wounded uttered their screams.

“We have to get down!” Adam roared, ignoring the ringing in his ears.

“On it!” Emily formed an Ironglass chain, wrapped one end around a wide chimney and swung down. Oliver conjured a deep-blue sphere of Gaolom in mid-air. Its gravitational pull allowed Adam and him to safely jump down to street level.

The road between the buildings they had stood on and the wall was in utter chaos. Tight masses of troops, medics, and squires moved in all directions. Although the palpable fear around them was recognizable, there was something off about the people themselves. Walking amongst them, Adam frowned and wondered what it was. Most people’s faces seemed… bland. They were oddly unrecognisable, lacking any individual traits like different haircuts or jewellery. From the size of their noses to their muscle mass, all seemed perfectly average. Adam warily looked around for signs that this might be another illusion.

Among the crowd, which became stranger by the minute, a pubescent squire with red cheeks and straw-blonde hair tripped. He grabbed Adam’s arm to keep balance. As soon as the lad’s fingers touched Adam, a strange ripple emanated through the air from their point of contact. Although no one seemed to react to it, the ripple spread like a shockwave in all directions as far as Adam could see.

Adam gaped at the strange Invocation, or whatever it was. However, everyone ignored it, except for Emily and Oliver.

“By Aves, what did you do?” Adam asked the squire.

The lad, wearing his way too big uniform, seemed like an actual person within the crowd. He clenched Adam’s arm like logwood in the whirling, screaming sea of people around them. With a pale face and untold horror in his eyes, he looked up at Adam. “I… I’m so… sorry, sir!” he stammered. “There were arrows on the ground and I… I…”

Looking into the lad’s terrified eyes, Adam couldn’t imagine he was responsible for the strange ripple effect. Adam remembered starkly how horrifying his own first real fights were. How he was five years old, crying for his mother when other street kids pulled knives at the city guards.

Adam laid a fatherly, reassuring hand on the squire’s shoulder. The poor guy is way too young for this. “That’s okay, don’t worry, but what was—”

“OUT OF OUR WAY!” a broad-shouldered medic boomed. He and other white-robed medics marched past, carrying moaning soldiers on stretchers.

“SWORDSMEN, TO THE WALLS!” a commander thundered, leading his regiment of levied troops in the opposite direction. The squire was dragged along by the throng of bodies and disappeared out of view. I hope he survived this fight…

“What was that Invocation?!” Oliver screamed at Adam, trying to make himself heard over the noise.

Adam shouldered past a pair of militia who carried their wide shields through the masses in the clumsiest ways imaginable. “I don’t know! It happened when he touched me!”

On the wall to the right of them, the counter-attack had begun. Mighty ballistae on the walls shot their bolts into the enemy units. Archers fired volleys of arrows. The few Novaseers stationed in the fortress protected the troops and fired their Invocations whenever they could.

“AND WHO MIGHT YOU BE?!” Out of nowhere, a muscular commander with thick eyebrows grabbed Adam by the coat. “Where’s your uniform, huh?” he spat. “Spy of the Prophet!”

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Red-hot fury surged through Adam. “I’m on your side, I’m part of the Iron Suns!” he said, remembering his old regiment. “Release me!”

The commander beckoned to soldiers behind him and reached for his blade. “Filthy lies! I don’t see a—”

Oliver stepped in between. “I’m an Avurion second class!” he roared, pointing to his polished badge of the Talons of Aves. “This man aids us in a top-secret mission!”

An explosion sounded to the left of them. A massive, round object covered in brown plates hit one of the buildings and rolled down to ground level. Screams erupted all around when the object unrolled. It was an Armistherium; an eighteen-foot-long, armadillo-like creature with the white fur and fangs of a polar fox. From its eyes shone the white light of the Pure. It wore ‘holy’ golden jewellery beside a necklace depicting the Unity and was protected by its massive shell of brown plates.

“WHITEHEARTH KNIGHTS, CHARGE!” an awfully familiar voice bellowed.

Despite the commander holding him, Adam couldn’t resist looking. At the head of knights with blackened armour and ornate battle standards, a young Jeremiah Voheren stormed at the Pure beast. The blonde man was thinner than the version Adam had seen in the Hall of Scents. Although this Jeremiah already had his trademark cauliflower ears, his nose was still straight; the infamous duel between him and Adam hadn’t taken place yet. This was the Jeremiah Adam used to know; a brash but loyal companion who had often covered Adam’s flank when they fought against the Pure. Of course, he fought in this battle as well. Strange times…

As Jeremiah wasn’t a sorcerer but a knight, he had always focused his training on martial arts and the use of armaments to become a formidable warrior. His heavy—and ridiculously expensive—black plate armour was Instilled to disrupt Invocations and provide excellent protection against them. As they hindered Novaseering, similarly Instilled armours were unusable by Talons of Aves, but were ideal for non-sorcerers like Jeremiah.

The Pure Armistherium hissed its war cry and lashed out with its massive paws. Jeremiah caught the blow on his heavy shield and grunted; the claw left grooves over the proud heraldry of his order, the great white hearth at which new members were knighted. Stepping back, he barely evaded the armoured tail of the Pure beast, which lashed out and swiped one of the soldiers off his feet. Jeremiah swung his great mace in return, denting one of the beast’s brown plates.

The commander who still held Adam by the coat stared at the fight with a pale face and glassy eyes.

It took all Adam’s self-constraint not to sock him in the face. “You heard the Avurion! Unleash me!”

Emily stepped in, pointing at her robes of the Talons of Aves. “Do you want us to report to the Archpriest?!”

The soldiers behind the commander looked doubtfully up at him and at the battle with the Armistherium. He grumbled something about corrupt religions before he released Adam and ordered his troops to join Jeremiah and the Whitehearth Knights in the fight. Giving directions at Oliver and Emily, Adam made his way up the buildings and towards Caine’s tower.

In the meantime, the army of the Pure had progressed towards the fortress. Despite the arrows, ballista bolts, and Invocations that rained death on the Pure, they had been able to place ladders on the walls. Three of the Pure’s elegant siege towers had been destroyed by the defenders, their remains stood burning amongst the happily smiling masses of the Pure. However, five other siege towers neared the walls.

The defenders were prepared. Flocks of trained greatowls attacked the Pure who climbed the ladders, pecking at eyes and lashing out with their talons. Archers had left the sections of the wall targeted by ladders and siege towers to make place for the tridentiers, who moved into position. Armoured with chainmail, the tridentiers each carried a single, feathered wooden arch on their back which symbolized a wing and noted their high rank. In a tight phalanx formation, with overlapping shields and tridents outstretched towards the incoming enemy, they were ready to defend the fifteen feet thick wall.

Smiling euphorically, the Pure who managed to reach the top of the wall seemed as relaxed as if they played a game. With flails or ritual scythes in each hand, they threw themselves at the defenders with reckless abandon. Clad in intricate, priestly robes adorned with the Unity, the Pure appeared to their admirers as ‘an army of righteousness, sent to fulfil the Heavenly Plan.’ The Pure slashed around, vaulted, and kicked in wild abandon without any heed for their own safety. Unable to feel pain, many of them kept fighting despite the arrows sticking out of their legs, the gashes through their belly, or even when missing both arms. They literally fought until their bodies physically weren’t able to anymore. Adam recognized a Pure as one of Gotterburg’s old butchers. The serenely smiling, big-bellied man had lost his legs, but kept punching the tridentiers shield wall with one functioning arm.

The siege towers reached the walls, lowered their drawbridges and unleashed Pure knights onto the defenders. Warriors with many years of experience, wearing terribly expensive plate armour underneath their robes and jewelled chains, the knights visibly struck fear into the tridentiers. A spiked, cage-like construct around the knight’s head served as a helm. A long staff with a curved blade, adorned with a flag depicting the Unity, served as a halberd.

The knights laughed with serene joy as they swung their halberds with relentless power. They tore into shields and hacked into helmets. The defending tridentiers screamed and fought with all their might, desperately trying to stay in formation under the monstrous assault. However, even when their tridents found the weak spots in the knight’s armour, the enemy kept fighting with the limbs that remained functional.

The leader of the knights, a dignified grey-haired lady, swung her halberd sideways. Her blow lifted a tridentier off his feet and slammed him into several of his comrades, who tripped and fell. The knight kicked a tridentier who had remained standing with such force he slammed against his comrades behind him, bringing them down as well.

A young tridentier at the back of the formation was the first to flee, bowing his head in shame and terror. Then came another, and another, until all remaining tridentiers of the unit ran for their lives. The knights took the opportunity to claim the section of the wall.

Adam gasped; the younger version of himself and the female warrior who had attacked them ran straight towards the Pure knights. A move nothing short of suicidal; how could two combatants survive against a whole unit of well-equipped knights?

Yet the young Adam roared with a beast-like savagery, his face torn with untold rage. The current Adam’s eyes widened. He felt the blood drain from his face when a crimson vapour appeared around his younger self’s body. A spiked halo of concentric rings, seemingly made of molten metal, appeared above the young Adam’s head.

In that man’s face, there was no doubt, no caution, and no mercy as he charged, undoubtedly using Invocations of the Forbidden Arts.