Loyalty and War

by Devon Vesper

  “Thank you for letting me know.” Thyran frowned as his eyes took on a faraway look. “I will scry to try and get an idea of how many are coming, and what directions they are coming from, and send Aesriphos out to cut them off. Worry not, Child. We will still be here when you return.”

  “Good.” Then Valis grimaced. “How is Papa doing?”

  “He is well,” Thyran said. “I just returned from visiting him. He is progressing with astounding results. He’s already shuffling around between his bedroom and the sitting room with help. He can’t go much farther, but he is able to walk with assistance.

  “Kerac is doing remarkably well in his physical therapy. He has expressed that he wishes to be able to take care of Darolen, himself, once you return with him, so he is pushing himself hard in his therapy, sometimes against the Master Healer’s wishes. But he is progressing, and Firil is proud of his efforts.”

  Valis let out a relieved sigh and smiled. “Thank you. Tell him I’m thinking of him, and I hope to be home as soon as possible. Once we restock at Setira, we’re heading to Ges to help the anchor team after Angas Braywar. I had a vision that they will be killed and captured without help.”

  “I approve of this deviation from your original plan,” Thyran said, his voice grave and his eyes hard. “Thank you for taking them into consideration.”

  Valis frowned. “I couldn’t just leave them to die, Thyran.”

  “No, I meant scrying after them.”

  “Oh.” Valis cleared his throat. “I thought that was you. Apparently, Sovras interrupted my scry with Father with images from the three anchor teams. It showed me what I think is the future of all three. The first two succeed. The one for Braywar fails with four dead and two captured unless we intervene. After I saw the future, I saw the present where they are still riding toward their intended target.”

  Thyran smirked. “Leave it to Sovras to find a way to help us.” He shook his head, the amused expression never leaving his face or eyes. “In any case, take care and get home safe, my boy. Your Papa misses you, and frankly, so do I.”

  “I miss you, too, Thyran.”

  “Be safe.”

  “We will.”

  With that, Thyran ended the scry and Valis snapped his pocket watch shut. He glanced back and saw the scouts mounting back up, and took that as a sign to get back on his own horse. Once he had his pocket watch stowed away and got settled into his saddle, he called back. “Get ready to ride!”

  The call traveled from one Aesriphos to the next and on down the line. It was time to attack.

  Valis ordered a contingent of their army to stay behind with the wagons that carried their supplies, protected in an impenetrable shield that made then invisible. Everyone else, he led into the attack.

  Without the wagons to hold them back, they rode hard over the hills, their invisibility and soundproofing shield still in place. Once Valis reached the city’s limit and a good number of his forces had entered, he shot the shield up to cover the entire city, remembering the limits from his aerial view scrying session.

  Once that shield snapped in place, he added a thought to one-way impermeability, keeping everyone inside, then added invisibility to keep the shield from being seen by anyone else and broke it off from himself so he could concentrate on the battle ahead.

  So far, it seemed that their presence wasn’t yet known. Valis rode hard toward the center of the city, following their laymen into what he hoped would be an easy battle. But nothing in Valis’s life had ever been easy.

  The moment they reached the city’s center, the shouts of alarm rose and like a plague of locusts, the Qos adherents poured from every building to join the fray.

  Valis only hoped it wouldn’t take long. Seeing them pour into the city’s center brought on a feeling of dread the likes of which Valis had never before felt.

  It was time to get bloody.

  Chapter Four

  “Shields up!”

  Valis felt every person in his magic-wielding army snap their shields into place. Valis vaulted off his horse to get into the thick of battle, his sword drawn the moment his feet hit the cobblestones. Tavros rushed to his side, and together they rushed the enemy.

  “Break their shields!” Valis shouted above the din.

  Magic started flying in the next instant, both gold streaks and black lightning. The entire scene felt almost surreal. The tall, sand-colored buildings that surrounded the town square hemmed in the forces of both sides, leaving stragglers to go down side streets to continue the fight. Valis could only spare them a small bit of his attention as Aesriphos went in pursuit of those who fled, trying to keep them away from the shield’s edges so no one could raise the alarm about the trap.

  Letting go of that thread of thought, Valis put his full focus on what was in front of him. Horses screamed. The Kalutakeni mounts bashed against black-veined shields with their powerful hooves while the others fled toward the outskirts. Valis gave a thought to reconnecting the city’s shield to himself and added in the parameter that any with black magic could not escape, but all others could leave. That would allow the horses to escape, and give the Aesriphos time to regroup if things went sideways.

  Once he had the parameters in place, he broke the shield off from himself again and laid stasis to a woman who lost her shield under Tavros’s attacks. “Laymen, carry the dead and those in stasis from the field!”

  It would drastically help if they didn’t have to crawl over bodies while fighting, or so Valis hoped.

  The Qos adherents looked like a black sea, lightning cracking over the waves, accentuating their blood-red tabards. Valis had never seen so many before, and his stomach pitted hard. Thankfully, it didn’t feel precognitive. More like an “Oh shit, we’re in trouble,” kind of anxiety.

  Bodies clashed. The Qos adherents’ initial surprise at the attack didn’t last long before they hardened into a fighting force that far surpassed the skill level of those Valis and his friends had battled at Tigak.

  Valis tried to keep his mind on the battle, but it kept wandering. How many people were dying around him? How many of his friends would make it out of this alive? How were they supposed to beat this kind of force? Where were all these Qos adherents coming from? How long would this battle last?

  “Where’s your head?” Tavros shouted as he blocked a sword aiming for Valis’s neck.

  Only then did Valis realize he’d let his shield drop on accident. Tavros had expanded his personal shield to keep Valis protected, but his focus was so honed in on their attackers that it kept flickering on and off as he swung his sword and sent volleys of magic. Valis snapped his shield back up and joined the fray.

  One Qos adherent almost got a shot in while Valis and Tavros’s shields were down. Stomach in his throat, Valis forced his mind back into the battle and away from his insecurities and fears. Or, at least, he tried.

  Valis scanned the area in front of them and grabbed Tavros’s wrist. “Come on. I’m phasing us. Be ready. We’re too clogged here.”

  “Ready.”

  With a thought, Valis and Tavros were at the back of the Qos adherents’ forces. Valis immediately started blasting down shields, leaving Tavros to lay stasis on whoever dropped their shields first. Then Valis had a thought. He shouted at Tavros, “Wait here and do what you can. Don’t let them kill you. I’ll be right back.”

  “Where the fuck are you going? Stay with me.”

  Valis’s heart throbbed hard. “I’ll be right back. Trust me!”

  “Fine. Hurry.”

  Valis disappeared from his side in the next breath, reappearing in the center of a mass of Aesriphos who were stuck in place. “Grab onto me and your partners! Now!”

  He waited only a few moments. But as he looked around, about sixteen people grabbed hold of him. Their free hands held tight to their partners. That would have to be enough. With the next thought, he and his group appeared behind Tavros and Valis retook his position.

  “Good. You didn’t die.”


  “And you brought reinforcements.”

  “Better than fighting the ass-end by ourselves.”

  “True.”

  The banter stopped as soon as more Qos adherents realized they were being attacked from behind. Some turned almost as a unit. Cries of alarm arose from their ranks. Soon more turned, and Valis wondered just how smart of an idea this had been. From a quick count, he’d only brought around thirty people with him, and with the masses turning toward them, he didn’t know how they were going to do this.

  “Focus!” Tavros shouted. “Valis, you have to focus!”

  Fuck. He was doing it again. Why wouldn’t his mind stay on task?

  Volleys of black magic streamed toward them like a fierce storm, rending the air with the acrid smell of black magic and charred bodies. Valis shattered as many shields as he could. He felt the burn of holy gold magic streaming around his body, some laying stasis. Others trying to shatter shields.

  The mayhem continued, and Valis still felt like he was drowning. Nothing made sense. Nothing felt real. Bodies hit the ground with sickening thuds as they either died or glowed with the stasis spell, but Valis felt nothing.

  At first, he thought he was about to be overcome with a vision. But the longer he fought, the less likely that appeared because the vision never came. It was starting to worry him. All he could do was try to keep up with the attacks while shielding those beside and behind him so that their ranks wouldn’t fall.

  And it scared him because this had never happened before.

  One Qos adherent broke off from the rest and charged at Valis. Valis focused on him, blasting his shield to nothing and laid the stasis spell in almost the same instant. Then another charged, and another. Soon the whole back of the Qos army charged, and Valis braced for impact. He added another layer of one-way permanence to his shield and watched in horror as the first wave bounced off, but those behind them crashed into the first bodies, sending gore into the air as heads got crushed, necks snapped, and bodies got trampled.

  Valis fought to blast all their shields at once, but it wasn’t working. They were at a stalemate, and Valis scrambled to figure out what to do. With them all pressed in like this, there was no room to maneuver.

  Then a thought hit him, and Valis grinned. It made those closest to his shield blanch white as all the blood drained from their faces. In a quick move, Valis tossed a shield over the Qos adherents. With a mental shove, he created a golden lightning storm inside, using the shield itself to cast the spells to break the enemies’ shields. Within moments, that whole section laid motionless in heaps and piles of people as Valis cast the stasis spell on the entire group at once.

  But the move cost him. Valis stumbled. He’d used too much magic at once. Now he felt drained, even though magic still swirled within him in vast quantities. His magic wasn’t drained, but he was.

  “Good job!” Tavros called. “Think you can do that a dozen or so more times?”

  Valis shook his head. “No. I’m not feeling well. It drained me too fast. My body’s struggling to catch up.”

  “Fuck.”

  Yeah. Valis had that thought, too. He had to keep going, though. He had to push through. One more time. He could get one more section down before—

  “Don’t you even fucking think about it!” Tavros shouted. “No, Valis.”

  With a single nod, Valis promised that he wouldn’t. It would be a stupid move that could cost him his life, and that of his husband. What would happen if he fell here? What would happen if his body just shut down?

  Fuck! He was doing it again! While Valis struggled to gain control of his mind, he threw more bolts, shattered more shields, tried to do more. But with each passing moment, the more he tried, the less control he had over his mind.

  Worried, Valis had the thought that he should just give up. If he gave up, everything would be better. If he gave up, his friends would be safe. If he just gave up, he could save at least his husband.

  And then he met a set of blue eyes that flashed with mirth from across the battlefield. While everyone moved around her, that one woman stayed absolutely still, her eyes locked onto Valis.

  Scrambling, Valis erected a shield around his mind and locked it down tight. Suddenly his scrambled thoughts reordered themselves as if they had been tangled in a web that he just wiped away.

  Focusing on those blue eyes that had gone from mirth to murder, Valis blasted her shield to nothing. As he went to lay the stasis spell, another shield popped up. It seemed this woman was a Patron Priest of Qos or higher. Either that or someone else was keeping her shielded. From this far away, Valis couldn’t tell, and he couldn’t see anyone focusing on that singular woman amid all the chaos.

  Just to be sure, Valis shielded Tavros’s mind, too. Once he felt it lock into place, he shouted for his husband to hear. “There’s a mind controller in their ranks. Follow my bolt and lay the stasis spell as soon as her shield shatters.”

  “Got it!”

  Valis grinned at her, heightening her fury. He felt her trying to break the shield around his mind. Felt her sending waves of pain that would have brought him to his knees, but bounced helplessly off the barrier. As Valis gathered his wits, he sent a bolt flying. Tavros’s stasis spell was only a second behind.

  In the next breath, her face transformed from fury to shock and froze like that as she fell to the ground.

  A roar of rage echoed around the square, bouncing off the buildings that hemmed everyone in. A man started pushing his way through the throng of people toward Valis, pure hate in his eyes. Either that was the woman’s lover, or he was close to her in some other way. It didn’t matter. Valis shattered his shield with his next bolt. Tavros threw the stasis spell. He hit the floor just like the others.

  But when Valis glanced up, there were even more Qos adherents than before. Either some had stayed hidden inside the buildings, or they had translocated in. That last option terrified Valis because if they could translocate, that would change the battle completely.

  Then he saw people streaming out of the buildings and got his answer. Had they hidden in cellars? They would have to check later. For now, Valis got busy trying to shatter as many shields as he could. But still, the fear remained. Just how large were their numbers if the scouts had counted around four hundred, but more were pouring out of houses, shops, and common buildings with each passing second?

  Shoving the fear aside, Valis called above the din. “Aesriphos, shatter their shields as a unit!”

  The attacks ramped up in intensity. Golden light streamed from every Aesriphos under his command. Valis could feel the excitement in the air. They thought they were about to win this battle, but Valis still had a healthy amount of doubt. This battle was far from over because people were still streaming out of the buildings, leaving Valis to wonder where they had been hiding. Even though the buildings were several stories tall, they could still only hold so many. Couldn’t they?”

  As shields fell, Valis tossed a blanket stasis spell over the Qos adherents, watching them as they fell like autumn leaves. A second later, the fatigue Valis had experienced with the dome he’d thrown over that one batch kicked in again.

  With a groan, Valis fell back into line with Tavros.

  “What’s wrong?” Tavros asked as he threw another bolt of golden light toward the horde.

  “The fatigue is hitting worse. I can’t cast spells like that anymore without fainting.” Valis pushed his long blond hair over his shoulder and wiped the sweat from his eyes, hoping that was the reason they were blurry. If his vision failed, he was fucked.

  “Think I can siphon off you?”

  “Try it,” Valis said. “Just be ready in case I yell at you to stop.”

  “Got it.”

  Then Valis felt the drain. After a few moments, Valis felt slightly better. Was he just getting overloaded? Then he realized he had been draining the black magic from everyone’s shields into himself without realizing it. He could see the streams of black now, runnin
g from every golden shield and straight to Valis’s chest. And with that realization, Valis groaned.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Just realized something. Keep going. I feel fine.”

  While Tavros focused on the horde, Valis focused on their shield, renewing it on occasion if it started getting weak, and moving it as those near him moved so everyone could see the battle that waged before them.

  It felt like Valis was stuck in thick, cloying mud. His fatigue weighed him down to the point where he could barely hear the sounds of battle over the ringing in his ears. His vision kept blurring on and off as if he had a pounding headache, but without the pain. He heard his pulse pounding in his ears. Each limb felt as if they were weighed down by pounds of lead. It got so bad that Valis wished he could sit down, but he knew it wasn’t from Tavros draining him. That actually made things marginally better.

  “Valis!” Tavros screamed when Valis stumbled.

  “I’ll be fine. It’s not because of the drain!”

  “Bullshit!”

  “Tav, keep going! I’m fine. It’s just fatigue from those two spells. I promise!”

  “Fuck!” Tavros yelled. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

  Valis shared his sentiments but forced himself to pay attention. Someone was coming toward them, and Valis had to spare enough of his energy to take care of them.

  But then someone else hit them, and Valis cursed. He was too slow. In this battle, he was a liability. But if he stopped the drain, his army’s shields would shatter, and he’d lose too many people to continue with their main mission. He wasn’t about to risk that. He had to rescue Darolen at all cost.

  “What is wrong with you?” Tavros demanded. Still, even with berating Valis, Tavros kept his focus broad and did his part to help their ranks deal with the Qos adherents from behind. “Tell me!”

  “I’m draining all the Qos adherents’ magic. And I’m doing it by absorbing it from everyone’s shields. It’s a bit much to handle, but I need the magic going forward, and it’s keeping their magic from breaking our army’s shields. It’s also weakening the Qos adherents. I can’t stop.”