The King's Watch (The Adventures of Carmen Delarosa Book 2)

by Kody Boye

  Well, Carmen thought. We’re on our own.

  Not on their own—at least, not in the sense that it was just the six of them. In total there numbered thirteen, all heavily-armed with swords or maces or cudgels and blunderbusses, and the mage within their midst was a both a Firebringer and a Seer, who would undoubtedly protect them and engage directly with Xaspraine Paddox. Realistically, they shouldn’t have had anything to worry about.

  But it’s not us we have to be concerned over, Carmen thought, thinking of the prisoners and the family she had promised to do her best to save.

  She reached down, took hold of her mace, and drew it from her side before reaching back and fumbling with her shield.

  Once armed, she took a step forward to stand beside Ignatius. “Sir,” she said.

  “Carmen,” he replied.

  “Do you have any idea about what we’ll do come time we arrive?”

  “Listen up!” Ignatis said, loud enough to be heard but not so loud that his voice echoed along the stonework. “Given that the city guards are the most heavily-armed, they will lead the charge into whatever facility Xaspraine’s bandit clan has forged for themselves, and will protect Kairan at all costs. Should you happen to see the mage, do not engage directly with him; and should you happen to see any prisoners, please do not let your emotions betray you. Our first order of business is to take out these bandits who are plaguing the Roads, then rescue the men and women who have been abducted from the Plainsview homestead. Understand?”

  “Understood,” the men and the Fifth Battalion said in chorus.

  Knowing that the last part of the speech had specifically been for her, Carmen merely nodded.

  Ignatius adjusted his hold on the halberd and beckoned them onward with a wave. “Let us go,” he said. “We should hopefully reach their dwelling by nightfall. Kairan.”

  “Please,” the mage said, stepping before the group. “Follow behind me as closely as you can.”

  After lifting his hand to make them pause, the mage conjured upon the tip of one finger an orb of red light and waved it into the distance before them.

  They then filed into a single line and began their advance into the darkness.

  - - -

  The intricate system of caves that were known to extend for miles beyond their initial entry from the level below were soon revealed. Nondescript, save for the markings of habitation along the stonework and near the walls, the blank entryway was unguarded and held no door that would have kept any intruder from entering.

  This is either a trap, Carmen thought, or a very stupid idea on their part.

  She took the helm, followed shortly by the mage—she with her tower shield and the mage with his magically-sparked hand. Anna and another sharpshooter flanked them, and were pursued shortly by the rest of the group. Together, they formed an impenetrable wall—which, Carmen hoped, would be enough to guide them through the darkness.

  “I’m going to extinguish my light now,” Kairan said. “They won’t be dwelling in the darkness, so keep an eye out for firelight.”

  Though Carmen desperately wanted to protest this new development, she bit the inside of her cheek to keep from whimpering as they were thrust into the darkness.

  Knowing that she could easily wander into rocks or the sides of the narrow cave’s walls, she extended her mace to guide her as they rounded a curve in the terrain and began to make their way forward.

  Carmen waited, with bated breath, for something to materialize.

  When she caught sight of firelight around the bend in the corner, she cursed and came to a complete halt.

  Someone bumped into her.

  “Stop,” she hissed.

  “What’re you,” someone added.

  Carmen raised her shield just in time to shield her face from the firelight.

  A shot rang out.

  The individual went down.

  The mage conjured a magicked shield just as a series of shouts began to rise in the distance. “Go,” he said. “Run.”

  So she did—rounding the body, jumping over the rocks that came into view as they neared the threshold lit by firelight, then raising her shield as she drew closer. A figure came forward and she did little but ram her shield into it in order to keep moving, then spun and slammed her mace into the face of a thinly-armored Dwarf man who had just raised his sword to cut her down.

  A series of shots rang out.

  Carmen ducked, raised her shield, and spun to examine her surroundings.

  The area resembled a military outpost in that the exterior campsite was like a simply-guarded courtyard, within the center of which burned a glassfire, while beyond there appeared an additional threshold in which two Dwarven men stood guard. Several sharpshooters lined a heightened level and were taking aim to fire at the newcomers when Kairan raised a hand and blasted them with a wave of fire.

  Screams echoed throughout the cavern.

  The people fell.

  The guards below scrambled.

  Carmen ran forward, shoved all her weight into her advance, and slammed one of them into the wall, instantly pinning him in place.

  He struggled.

  She fought.

  She brought her mace up over his head and clipped him in his eye with the hilt before driving the head down atop his skull.

  She turned, briefly, to examine the fighting going on around her, before stealing into the threshold.

  Though she knew separating herself from the group would only prove dangerous, she had to keep advancing, if only to find Cabara or Xaspraine before they did even more damage.

  She stole through the narrow passageway and rounded a torch-lit corner just in time to come into contact with two poleaxemen. She raised her shield, deflected the beak of one of the halberds, then slammed her mace down atop one of the advancing weapons.

  “Carmen!” Stella cried.

  Carmen flung herself back as Stella charged down the hallway.

  A shot rang out, bringing one of the advancing poleaxemen down and startling the other into a run.

  Stella ran him through with her sword before drawing it free from his twitching corpse. “What do you think you’re doing?” she asked as she turned to face Carmen. “You could’ve gotten yourself killed.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Carmen replied. “We need to move.”

  At that Stella gave no argument.

  Joined by Anna—who, with her expert marksmanship, had managed to turn the tide of battle—the women progressed up the threshold, dodging around corners and pursuing those few soldiers who wished to trifle with them. They engaged in no direct battle, as the further they walked the tighter the space became, and soon Carmen was forced to abandon her shield in order to progress, as she could not hold it steadily in front of her without it scraping the walls.

  Anna kept her gun steady.

  Stella offered to take the lead.

  “No,” Carmen said. “I’m fine. Let’s just keep going.”

  Behind them, a series of footsteps entered the threshold.

  Anna spun, fired a shot, yelled, “RUN!”

  Carmen and Stella did.

  She heard the cries of a woman as she fired her gun before the sound of armored men fell to the floor.

  She burst out into an open room and rolled to the side to avoid being sprayed with blue fire.

  Stella was not so lucky.

  The woman screamed as the flames overtook her person, as they attempted to wrought themselves across her body and as they burned at the exposed layers of her skin. She instantly dropped to the floor and rolled—as they were all taught as Dwarven children—but nothing worked.

  “XASPRAINE!” Carmen screamed. “PICK ON SOMEONE YOUR OWN SIZE!”

  A plume of blue fire extended toward Carmen.

  She ducked, rolled, then grabbed Stella’s trembling body and pulled her behind a series of cargo boxes. “Are you ok?” she whispered.

  “I’m fine,” the woman replied, though it was obvious by the tone in her voice
that she had been injured. “Go, Carmen. Don’t worry about me.”

  Carmen patted her friend’s shoulder before bursting out into the open.

  She avoided the plumes of fire as she honed in on Xaspraine’s emaciated frame, his gaunt, clean-shaven cheeks malevolent in the light of the blue flames spouting from his hands. She ducked, rolled, jumped over camping supplies and even dove behind a box at one point, nearly knocking the wind out of herself as the heavy armor impacted with her poor soft flesh. She rolled, then, and hopped to her feet just in time to see a familiar face.

  Cabara.

  The woman screamed as she launched herself with her twin daggers at Carmen.

  She deflected the first blow, but the second landed firmly on her arm, scraping against her metal armor and threatening to slip up the exposed underside of her arm.

  She screamed.

  She lunged.

  She drove the point of her mace into the woman’s gut.

  Cabara’s momentum allowed Carmen to bring her mace around and slam it into the woman’s shoulder.

  The spy whom Carmen had entrusted to return the people of the Plainsview homestead unharmed spun to the floor and landed face-down.

  Carmen didn’t hesitate to rear her mace back and slam it down atop the woman’s head.

  As bone crunched beneath her strike, giving away to brain matter and bloodied hair, Carmen raised her eyes and found Xaspraine advancing toward her, his flame-lined hand echoing with iridescent blue waves. “You must be the drake slayer,” he said as he fired a shot off—not intending to hit her, but merely spook her as it barreled over her shoulder and struck a pot hanging from the far wall. “I knew I recognized that mace.”

  “How did you know?” Carmen asked.

  “That the drake slayer bore a weapon of untold beauty?” the man laughed. “Word spreads, girl—especially in the Far Roads.”

  “Where are my people?” she asked.

  “Your people?” Xaspraine chuckled. “Why all of a sudden are they your people?”

  “Because you took them from their homes and killed one of them.”

  “I assure you—they’re perfectly fine. Well, all except one. He begged to be let go, but I told him he had a purpose beyond death. He just didn’t realize what it would be until I took my sword and cut his head off.”

  Carmen screamed and lunged.

  A blast of concentrated air sent her flying back onto the hard ground.

  Her breath lost, her fingers twitching around her mace, she struggled to right herself as the mage advanced. “Don’t even try it,” the man replied. “You’re nothing compared to me.”

  “I might not be,” Carmen replied. “But she is.”

  “What?” Xaspraine asked.

  Stella reared her sword back and sliced the man down the back.

  Xaspraine screamed.

  He turned, thrust his hands out, and sent the broadswordswoman sailing into the nearby wall.

  Injured beyond compare, the man fell to a knee and reached back to finger at the wound extending from his shoulderblade all the way down to his tailbone. “FUCK!” he screamed. “BITCH!”

  A plume of red fire appeared from the darkness.

  Blue flame quickly dispelled it.

  The next time it came, the firestorm lit the room in shades of pink, red and orange.

  Carmen rolled to the side to avoid being bombarded by flame and looked turned her head as Xaspraine was consumed by flame.

  “DAMN YOU!” the man screamed as he shrouded himself in blue flame, deflecting the bombarding red flames that attempted to ensconce him within their grasp. “DAMN YOU CARMEN DELAROSA!”

  The man turned and fired a shot of blue flame at her.

  Carmen ducked behind a crate before it could impact with her body.

  Flame licked her brow, singing her hair.

  The insane mage’s screams echoed throughout the enclosed space as his body, warped with blue and assaulting red flame, engaged in battle with the firebringer nearby.

  Carmen grabbed a pot and threw it at the enraged man’s body.

  It melted before it could impact.

  Shit, she thought as a geyser of flame flew toward her head. Shit!

  She ducked just before it could hit her square in the face.

  She scrambled away, crawling on her hands and knees and rolling to avoid further attack from the man’s blue fire.

  As she came to a stone column, she rounded its figure and took a moment to regain her breath before peering out from around the corner.

  It was obvious that Xaspraine was waning. His chest heaving, his eyes filled with rage, his skin was beginning to flake from where the flames were just barely missing its surface and his hair was turning white from the sheer effort of magical energy alone. Kairan, meanwhile, appeared to have not broken a sweat, and as he advanced upon the bandit mage, overpowering him with thought and magic alone, he drew from his side a simple sword and extended it toward the bandit. “This ends now,” he then said.

  He screamed.

  He lunged.

  He thrust the sword into the man’s gut.

  Xaspraine screamed one last time before his body exploded in a spray of gore.

  Breathless, Carmen could only watch as the mage dropped the smoldering sword to the ground. “Are you all right?” he asked, turning to face her.

  “I’m fine,” Carmen said, standing. “It’s her you should be worried about.”

  The slow rise and fall of Stella’s chest confirmed that she was still alive, but how injured she was Carmen couldn’t tell. The impact could’ve easily broken her back—and may have, for all she knew.

  Please, she thought. Thor, Loki, Hel, Ymir. Let her be safe.

  She pushed herself to her feet and listened keenly to the sound of fading fighting in the distance, then stepped toward another threshold as Kairan advanced upon Stella.

  “Will you be all right by yourself?” he asked.

  “I’ll be fine,” Carmen said. “I just need to find the prisoners.”

  “We’re in here!” someone cried.

  “Help us!” a woman screamed. “Please! Help us!”

  “Everything’s all right,” Carmen replied. “This is Carmen Delarosa of the King’s Watch. I am pleased to inform you that you are now being rescued.”

  Cheers sounded from the other room.

  Carmen closed her eyes.

  She took only a moment to brace herself for what was to come before stepping forward.

  Epilogue

  Stella was in far worse condition than Carmen could’ve ever anticipated. With a broken back, several broken ribs and an arm that lay at an awkward angle, she had to be carried from the inside of the facility and then to the outside where the airship was busy loading the remaining prisoners onto its deck. She rolled in and out of consciousness, mostly to thank Carmen for saving her life, but Carmen couldn’t look at her without feeling guilty.

  She may never walk again, she thought, closing her eyes. All because she saved me.

  She reached down, took the woman’s good hand, and squeezed before several of her armed compatriots lifted her over the side of and then onto the ship.

  “Are you all right?” Ignatius asked as he came up behind her.

  “I’m fine,” Carmen replied, reaching up to brush a hand along her singed forehead. “It’s Stella I’m worried about.”

  “She’ll be fine,” Ignatius replied.

  “She may never walk again,” Carmen said.

  “That isn’t something you need to concern yourself about. It isn’t your fault.”

  “It sure feels like it is,” Carmen sighed.

  She looked on at the airship and the multitude of people upon it, at the guards and the dead bandits they pulled to the edge of the nearby platform to knock into the abyss below. Everyone was accounted for, with no deaths on their side and minor injuries, save Stella’s. Cabara and Xaspraine were dead. The prisoners were safely upon the airship and would soon be returned to Dorenborough fo
r whatever treatment they need be provided.

  All in all, their mission had gone almost perfectly.

  We only lost one, she thought, sighing.

  Though she had shed tears for Colby before, she shed another here and now—for the fact that, in her first few weeks within the King’s Watch, a friend had died and another had possibly been crippled from her injuries.

  Was this the way her life was bound to be now, after all this time—of fighting, vengeance, and death? She wasn’t sure if she could take it.

  She opened her eyes to find Ignatius staring back at her, his kind, gentle gaze reassuring in that it grounded her to the real world while not persecuting her for the emotions she so openly displayed. “You did well, Carmen,” he said, reaching out to brace his hand along her arm. “You are, without a doubt, one of the bravest women I’ve ever known.”

  “Thank you,” she replied, leaning into his side as they began to make their way toward the airship.

  “You think you’ll stick around with the Watch after this?” he asked.

  “I know I will,” Carmen replied.

  She couldn’t lie—wouldn’t, especially not in the face of so much tragedy.

  She had finally found purpose in life.

  These battles, these lives, these deaths—the people she had saved and the men she had lost.

  If, through her participation in the King’s Watch, she could make the world a better place, she was damn well going to try and do it.

  In the back of her mind, she knew she’d made the right decision.

  With Ignatius’ help, Carmen boarded the airship and braced herself for the next five years.

  Though they would be long, she knew they’d be worth it.

  THE END

  Carmen’s adventures don’t end here!

  Watch out for the next installment, The Rat’s Request

  Coming 2017

  You can subscribe to Kody’s mailing list to be updated on its release by tapping here.

  Want more dark fantasy set in Carmen’s world?

  Then start reading The Brotherhood Saga today!

  In this dark fantasy series, we follow a young man named Odin—who, having been born a mage and incapable of controlling his powers, is forced to hide his gifts from his adoptive father for fear of persecution. His lifelong dream of enlisting in the military seems like an impossibility until he’s discovered by a high court mage. This unexpected opportunity gives him the chance to train amongst the royal family, and thrusts him into a life he could’ve never imagined.