“That’s not going to happen,” I growled, lifting my sword between us.
“You will tell me!” he roared, coming at me again.
He slashed twice. I managed to block both of the blows. When a third came, I disappeared and reappeared right behind the man. I got over the momentary confusion and kicked him in the back of the leg. His knee buckled, but he was able to keep his feet by stumbling forward.
The whole teleportation thing was crazy and nearly impossible to describe. It felt a lot like going through the gateway. Instead of the feeling of being torn apart at a molecular level and drifting through space for an undetermined time before being put back together, now it happened in an instant. It was definitely weird to be looking at one thing and in the next second, I looked at something completely different.
Daresh spun on the spot and charged again. “I’ll rip her to pieces!”
I had no doubt he would do as he threatened. I wouldn’t allow that. I wouldn’t allow anything to happen to Aoife ever again.
His swing came in hard and fast, but wild. I knocked his blade to the side and brought mine under his hands like he had done to me earlier. He hopped back, avoiding my slash. I winked out of sight and reappeared to his side. I jabbed the point of my sword at his hip. He skipped out of the way, but I winked to his other side before he could recover.
He twirled to avoid my strike and roared. “Kill her!”
I spun to look at the top of the wall. Daresh’s soldiers stared on in shock before one found his senses and realized the yelled order was for them. He turned to Aoife, gripping his poleaxe tighter.
“No!” I yelled. I winked from the ground to the wall. I knocked the weapon to the side with my sword and punched the soldier in the face. He staggered back and fell from the wall.
“Gaige,” Aoife began, but I wasn’t listening.
I was done with Daresh. Done with Delicia. Done with Alisundi. I was going to put an end to this once and for all. I didn’t think about it. I couldn’t afford to. I winked back to the ground, appearing behind Daresh. Before he could turn, I buried the blade into his back. It slid through surprisingly easy.
Daresh gurgled and stepped forward, turning to expose the tip poking out his chest. He stared at it before looking at me. “I will return my people to…”
The light fled from his eyes and he slumped to the ground.
I stared at the sword skewering the man. My breaths came in short, shallow gasps. Did I just kill a man? I took a hesitant step back, looking toward the wall. The soldiers there watched below with slack jaws and unbelieving faces.
“Kill him!” one of them called.
The dozens of the warriors reached for the cylinder tubes at their belts. The steam powered guns were highly inaccurate, but with that many fired at me, there was no doubt at least a few would find their target.
“Stop!” Aoife yelled.
The soldiers stopped before they could fire the weapons. I felt it, too. I had been about to wink out of the way, but I just couldn’t.
Aoife gripped the wall and her face tightened in concentration. The soldiers looked confused that they couldn’t follow through with killing me. Some started looking at the weapons in their hands, then to their prisoners—Aoife, Seanna, and the members of the Underground.
The emotions Aoife radiated reached me. I felt…free. Like I no longer had something controlling every aspect of my life. Like I was in control of myself for the first time in my life.
They felt it, too. Poleaxes wavered. Guns lowered. They turned from Daresh’s body to Aoife standing in their midst.
Brande was the first to gain her wits. She turned toward those standing with her on the wall. “Soldiers…citizens of Delicia. For untold centuries, we have been under the thumb of Daresh’s evil whims. He has done everything he could to keep us in fear of him and in fear of each other. That time has passed! Look what he has brought us to!” She pointed at something on the wall. Joost’s brother. “Turning brother on brother.” Her finger swung out to the plains. “Look what he has brought to our gates!”
Some of the soldiers turned each way while others only hung their heads.
“He has brought ruin on us. Under his rule, we faced nothing but death. But now, we have the chance to stand up to this threat as true Delicians instead of puppets of Daresh. We have a chance to live for the first time in our lives.” She raised her rough voice to make sure they all heard her. “We will not survive the night unless we move past the evil of Daresh’s rule and work together! Soldiers and Underground together for Delicia!”
32
DEATH FROM ABOVE
“That is quite the trick,” Brande said once I stood on the wall with them again.
Daresh’s soldiers milled around. They didn’t know what to do. They avoided looking us and each other in the eye like the shame of following such a devious man was too much for them to deal with.
“How?” was all Seanna managed.
“I have no idea,” I replied, rubbing the tingling wrist tattoos. “Right now, I think we have more pressing problems.”
We all turned towards the plains. The ever-growing army of Balataur was terrifying in itself, but what really clinched my bowels were the spots circling over the army. We had the walls of Delicia to help protect against the ground forces, but the city was exposed to an aerial attack.
Brande saw the same issue. She grabbed the closest soldier. “Who is the commander here?”
The man seemed to have troubles deciding if he should make a bigger deal out of his dead leader’s body lying just outside the gates, the approaching army, or the tall woman with a fist full of uniform. Or maybe it was the confused, messed up feelings Aoife had instilled in him.
Lucky for him, a man with impressive patterns of swirls on his jerkin stepped forward. “I’m commander of, er,” he hesitated, his eyes sliding to Daresh’s body and back, “Delicia’s army.”
“What’s your name, soldier?” she demanded.
The man straightened, standing a little taller. He was an older man, maybe in his late forties. He sported a neatly trimmed, grey beard and scar on his neck just under the jawline that looked oddly like a rope burn that hadn’t healed completely. “I am High Commander Eetu.”
Brande pointed at the body with a sword still stuck in it. “Is that going to be a problem,” she swung the finger to the army, “or is that?”
Eetu didn’t have to consider it. “The army, Ma’am.”
“Good,” Brande said with a nod and pointed toward the sky. “We need to come up with some way to defend against those.”
High Commander Eetu’s face paled a bit when he glanced at the metal dragons circling the army. “I don’t think we’re prepared for anything like that.”
“I suggest you and your commanders put those thick heads together and figure something out,” she said. “I’ll also need a battalion of your men to start warning the rest of Delicia of the impending danger.”
I looked out over the town. Just before everything went down, the city had become like a ghost town, but now—as if sensing something big had happened—the people of Delicia were tentatively wandering into the streets to find out exactly what was going on.
“They’ll need somewhere to go,” I said, eyeing the dilapidated structures nearest the wall. Just a cross look from one of those metal dragons would send them crumbling to the ground.
Brande nodded and shook her head in frustration. “Even before most of our underground bunkers were discovered and destroyed, there’s no way we could have housed everyone.”
“I know somewhere they can go,” Seanna said, stepping forward. “At least a large portion of them.”
“Where?” Commander Eetu asked.
The Ashling pointed a slender finger toward the center of town where the Circle of Atlas rose on its hill to overlook the city. It was a massive structure—way more than what Daresh needed for himself and his bodyguards. Solidly built, too. It could withstand an assault for a while, but for
how long? Where would people go if the place was penetrated?
I shook my head. “We’ll be trapped rats in there. Brande, where did that tunnel come out?”
The tall woman turned to get her bearings before pointing south of the coming army.
Eetu looked a little shocked. “Tunnel?”
“Can we escape without being seen?” I asked, ignoring the man.
“Some, not all,” she replied. “If too many people pour from the hole, I doubt it will escape the notice of those things.” She nodded toward the sky.
“Women and children only,” Aoife said. She still looked pale from the knock on the head but smiled as she stepped beside me. She took my hand in hers.
Eetu nodded his agreement. “That is the best course of action. We will stay and distract the army while they escape.”
“Where will they go?” I asked.
“To the forest,” Seanna said.
“Will your people accept them?” I said.
“They will if Jae goes with them with my word.”
I wasn’t so sure about that. The Ashlings made it clear they didn’t like us humans. Even I had just been a tool for them and as such, was allowed to dine with them.
Seanna must have seen the skepticism on my face. “They owe you much. Even if they are hesitant, I’m positive the Mother Tree will allow it and my parents won’t have a choice.”
“It’s the only sensible option,” Brande said.
“I’ll go get Jae,” Seanna offered.
“Joost will guide you back to the hideaway.”
The man jumped at the sound of his own name. He glanced around and nodded like he hadn’t heard a thing until then.
“You better retrieve our other friend, too,” I suggested.
Seanna nodded and the climbed the stairs down into the city.
“Commander?” Brande said.
“Right!” he replied. He spun on a heel and started barking out orders.
The dazed men around us jumped to obey, thankful to have something to do to distract their minds from the loss of their leader and the newfound freedom that came with it.
Brande grabbed Isaak and made their way down into the city as well to start moving the people towards the walls to defend it, to the Circle of Atlas to shore up its defenses, or towards the tunnel to get out of the city.
I turned to look at the coming hoard.
“What are you doing?” Aoife asked.
I gathered her into my arms and held her tight. At first, she was stunned, but put her arms around me, too.
“Uh, what are you doing?” she asked again in another context.
“I’m getting tired of thinking you dead,” I muttered.
“I’m fine,” she said. “Just a killer headache.”
I sighed and stepped back from the embrace. “I have to go talk to him.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Who?”
“Lortmore,” I jerked a head toward the army.
“No, you don’t,” she said.
“He wants Daresh,” I said. “He doesn’t care anything about Delicia. Maybe I can talk him into turning back if he knows Daresh is dead.”
“In this past year, I’ve heard a lot about the cruelty of that man,” Aoife said. “How do you know he will just let you walk into his army and walk out?”
“I won’t be walking.”
Realization dawned on her face. “This thing…”
“Brand new to me,” I said. I brought a hand up to show her the swirl tattoo. “It has something to do with being a Gatekeeper.”
“I thought you weren’t one anymore.”
“I’m not. At least, I don’t think I am.” I shook my head. “This is something similar, but very different. It’s related.”
“So, you can just teleport at will?”
“Apparently.”
“That’s convenient.”
“I don’t know how it works or the range I have, but the fight it triggered out of desperation—a will to live. After the first couple times, I started to actually control it.”
“This is a really dumb idea,” she said. She lifted the ragged ends of my shirt and examined the slash across my stomach. It had stopped bleeding.
“Aren’t all our ideas dumb?” I laughed.
She moved her hand to my chest. “Pretty much. I think yours are stupider, though.”
“I’m not the one who led an entire army of aliens through a portal with no escape on the other side.”
“And yet I escaped.” She winked.
“You’ll have to tell me how sometime.”
“Come back from that,” she jerked a head toward the plains, “and I will.”
“Count on it.”
“Thank you,” she said. “For coming for me.” She put her hand on my face, pushed up onto her toes, and pressed her lips briefly against mine.
“Don’t thank me until I get us both back to Earth.”
I thought I saw something in her eyes, but let distraction take over. I turned to the wall and gauged the distance. I couldn’t see anything but a big blob of shapes moving, so I’d have to get close enough to try to find where Lortmore was in the mess.
I glanced at Aoife. “Be right back.” I winked out.
***
Of course, I misjudged the distance to the army. I found myself standing a mere fifty yards from the Balataurs leading the way. They spotted me instantly and made to rush me. I winked out of existence again.
And popped right in the middle of the hoard. I gagged on the smell of cattle and dust in the air. I turned a circle while the Balataur around me were too stunned to find a human in their mists to react. I spotted what I was looking for and winked.
I made a brief appearance on top of the steam-powered wagon—just long enough to lean over to look in a window and wink inside. I sat on a bench opposite Lortmore.
The man’s eyes widened in shock. He reached for a small axe propped against the bench beside him.
“Wait!” I said, holding out a hand. “I’m here to talk.”
“How did you do that?” he growled. “Is that how you escaped capture?”
“Not quite,” I said. “I’ve come to tell you something.”
“What?” His eyes slide around, searching for some kind of trick or attack.
“Daresh is dead.”
Those cold eyes snapped to me.
“I killed him this morning.”
His eyes slid to my sliced shirt but remained silent.
“In a duel. Delicia is free.”
He leaned back in the seat, folding his hands in his lap. “You came here to tell me this? Why?”
“Well,” I faltered. “I just thought you came here to put an end to Daresh. Since he is already, er, ended, I thought…”
“That I would turn my army around and just go home?” he laughed.
“Well…”
“It is a disappointment to not have Daresh’s death as a prize, but there is a much bigger one to be won.”
“But, I thought—”
“Doesn’t matter what you thought, boy. My Balataur need their fun. They’ll find plenty of it within those city walls, I think.” He looked out the window, completely disregarding me as a threat. To tell the truth, I wasn’t much of one. I hadn’t brought any weapons with me. “I’ll let them have their fun here, raze the place to the ground, and then we’ll travel on to the real prize.”
I couldn’t imagine what he could be talking about until something somebody had told me a year ago. “The mines.”
Lortmore nodded. “With magic dwindling on this world, it will become even more dependent on metal. I intend to be the one to profit from it.”
“So, you’re going to what, murder thousands—tens of thousands—of people for wealth and power?”
“What better reason is there?”
“It won’t work,” I said. “We’ll stop you right here.”
He laughed. “You do that, boy. But, I dare say you won’t have to worry about watching these people you h
old so dear die a horrible, gurgling death.”
He lunged for the axe, but I winked from the carriage and appeared at the base of Delicia’s wall. I teleported myself up to stand next to Aoife.
“Well?” she asked.
“We need to prepare the best we can.” I turned to her. “It’s going to get real bloody real soon.”
***
The blood came a lot sooner than I thought. Aoife and I watched from the wall as the army neared. When they were a couple miles out, the metal dragons broke their circling pattern and beat their wings toward Delicia. A shout went up around the soldiers on the wall, yelling back into the city. I think the intent was for those coming out of their homes to seek shelter underground or in the Circle to go back inside. Instead, they panicked.
A lot of the soldiers did as well. They pushed and jostled each other to get off the wall. A few even fell off when they didn’t move fast enough.
The dragons covered the rest of the way with terrifying speed. I turned to drag Aoife off the wall, but too many soldiers knotted between us and the closest stairway down.
“We need to get off this wall,” I yelled over the growing shouts from the soldiers and the citizens below.
“It’s too late,” Aoife said.
I turned and followed her eyes. The dragons bore down on us, flying low and fast. I froze. My mind turned to mush unable to make my body move. It was Aoife who saved me from having my head taken off. She yanked me to the stone wall just as the monsters buzzed by, plowing a large portion of the soldiers from the wall.
A few seconds later, an explosion sounded just below our field of vision. Dust and debris plumed into the air above the city along with the fireball. That’s when the screaming started.
33
WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHING
More of the dragons flew over the wall, ignoring it completely. Their ultimate goal quickly became apparent. Explosions sounded throughout the city, followed by billowing smoke and debris climbing into the sky as if in slow motion. Screams rose up with it.
“We have to get off this wall,” I said.
Easier said than done. There were more than a dozen soldiers panicking between us and the stairs. Just like their recently deceased leader, the guards of Delicia proved to be nothing but overinflated bullies. They had plenty of guts to crush Delicians beneath their thumbs, but when faced with real opposition, they crumpled like an old tin can.
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