by P. G. Thomas
The six crossbow teams started talking to their neighbors, and the center teams announced they would bait the trap, and for the others to fire in succession. The adjacent elf shooters turned their deer ears to the center crews, listening to the directions that the first team received, repeating them with minor modifications. While the first was tracking a target, the two others targeted hope. The first bolt flew as the other gunners counted to two and four respectively, waiting for the beast to react to the first threat. Then at the desired time, pulled the trigger to release their bolts. The beasts watching the first bolts ducked their heads, dodged the second, but the third wooden missile connected. While one plummeted to the ground with a large bolt impaling its head, the second was only injured. Then all six teams focused on the last that was heading to the town, and all fired in a quick sequence. While it tried to turn, to dodge, the firing pattern of the bolts was too tight, and it also fell from the sky.
Just as they were about to cheer, Ramy screamed out, “IT IS NOT OVER YET,” and he pointed to two more airborne threats heading their way.
*******
John and Steve saw the first beast step forward, watched it react to the pain, as its huge foot started to accept the unbearable weight of its massive body. When it tried to shift its weight, with only four legs, it had no options, and it came crashing down, much like the second. Some of the trollmares that rode on their backs jumped, but not far enough, as the tremendous weight of the huge beast crushed them.
John called to the wall captain, “Get me an update.”
*******
When a bald eagle landed, a naked Zack appeared looking at Ramy, “There going under the walls again, and you don’t want to know how many.”
Ramy pulled the horn off of his belt, blowing several quick blasts, and the dwarves started to line the streets.
“IT IS GOING TO CRASH INSIDE THE TOWN.”
Turning, Ramy saw the wounded flying trollmare with more clinging to its back plummeting towards them, “Champion, this wall is yours.”
*******
“Unchosen, our wall is secure, but the north is still threatened—” the captain of the wall paused, listened to the alarm horn, “The town is about to be invaded.”
John shook his head, “You coming, Steve?” Then both slid down the ladder.
“Wait,” the wall captain called, “there is an update—”
It was too late since John and Steve were already racing back to the gate.
*******
Logan looked at the five who had fought so hard, who were now so scared that most had wet themselves, cowering behind the wall being too afraid to look over it anymore. He felt the breeze, feeling his arms burn, and then a white light filled his eyes, making him scream. When he looked down, the tattoos were back. Standing, he looked at the two large beasts, their backs being a blazing inferno, causing them to roar in pain, and he began rubbing the red feather tattoo. Raising both arms level with the ground, two small balls of fire formed in his hands, and the five scared youths raised themselves up to watch what was about to happen. The fiery death jettisoned out of his hands, finding the bellowing mouths of the behemoths, and exploded with so much force that everybody in the town heard the twin explosions.
Logan looked at the five, whose eyes were wide in amazement. His eyes were dilated, the irises nothing but a thin ring of coral around his large black orbs. “I am back. Go seek Safety as you have done well, and Sister thanks you.” Then he ran down the walkway, blasting any trollmares he saw moving in the garden.
Horac looked at his smaller friends, “That is the Bastard who taught me everything I know. There are still a few standing out there, and I feel like some practice.” The five stepped up to the wall, picked their targets, and were surprised at the size of their balls of fire.
*******
John and Steve were heading towards the north wall, but when they heard the two explosions, John changed his direction to the east gate.
Steve called out, “I thought you said Logan needed help?”
“Not anymore, Sister’s back!”
Running through the poorly planned streets, they finally arrived at the main one, and at the far end, John saw the flying trollmare crash to the ground, ejecting the horrors that clung to its back. The dwarves were advancing to meet the abnormal collection of trollmares, and as she stopped at the main street, John spotted Lauren.
“Damn it, Kid, this isn’t good.”
When the ground began to boil up in a dozen or more spots, burrowing trollmares crawled out.
“BOHICA, KID!”
John turned to Steve.
“Bend over, here it comes again. Damn it, Kid, the situation is FUBAR. Trust me, you don’t want to know what it means, just do whatever you did on the wall.”
“I can’t, I might kill the dwarves.”
“It’s called collateral damage. More will live!”
“Dwarf helps dwarf. They don’t hurt each other!”
*******
Logan arrived at the front wall where one trollmare was still flying in the sky, evading the legendary marksmanship of the elf archers, and then he saw the battle taking place on the main street.
Eric looked at him, “Go help them, we’ll get this one.”
Walking over to the ladder, he smiled, “Aim at the ground,” but before Eric could ask why, Logan slammed his fist into the wall with great force, causing a powerful downburst to smash the remaining flying trollmare to the ground.
*******
Horror filled the eyes of John and Steve with two of the trollmares advancing on Lauren. Four of the Granite Guardians and their blood wolves moved forward, fighting the obscenities, each taking turns distracting one, getting it to make a mistake, leaving an opening. When it did, another would react, attack, and then chop the head from the beast.
More were moving towards Lauren when they heard the screams from the east gate. At the same time, they heard a commotion from the west. John shook his head, “Sons of a bitch, what now?”
Down the street, two dozen mithril armed and armored dwarves, waving axes and the unconventional metal blades, raced towards the east on the back of blood wolves. As John looked up the street, he saw a portal wink out, and hiding behind the statue of Alron, Gayne peered out to watch.
The burrowing trollmares were no match for the specially armed and trained dwarves, who quickly dispatched them, and then rushed towards the gate, helping the others with the horrors that had survived the crash into the town.
Several minutes later, Ramy called out, “Get the Earth Mothers! We have injured.” Five minutes later, he called out again, “Where are the Earth Mothers?”
Chapter 14
A giant wolf jumped off the walkway, rocketed down the street at a blistering speed, and nearly knocked over Lauren when it rounded the corner. John and Steve raced back to the house along with Lauren with her Granite Guardians giving chase.
They arrived just when the four-legged blur entered the open doorway, and outside of it, six wolves laid dead or whimpering. Mixed in with them, five Earth Guards laid motionless on the ground and four more bodies that all presumed were assassins. At the bottom of the stairs Zack found another one, dead, and inside the large room, a second with a dead Earth Guard.
Gingaar was kneeling beside Nur, applying pressure to several deep bloody red wounds, trying to stop the flow of gushing blood. “Zack, find me bandages as she bleeds badly.”
Behind the Earth Mothers, two large polar bears had a pair of assassins pinned to the ground, bleeding from animal bites to their arms. On the other side of the room, two withered husks laid, which bore a resemblance to mummified midlanders.
Transforming, Zack began ripping up whatever he could find to make the necessary dressings, which would stop the bleeding from the one he loved. When Ramy entered, he was hard-pressed to determine what had happened. Ryan, Logan, and two members of the Town Watch, who had followed him in, also shared the same confusion.
Aft
er Zack had given Gingaar the makeshift bandages, he walked over to where the polar bears had the two bleeding assassins trapped under their massive paws. “WHY DID YOU DO THIS?” However, neither man responded to his angry outburst.
Gingaar called out to Ryan, “Take her upstairs, quickly, as I need more space to work.”
Bending down, Ryan picked up Nur, navigating his way towards the stairs.
Ramy gave his head a quick shake, forcing the confusion out, and then walked over. “Do you mind if I question them?”
Zack bent down, sniffed around them, “Go ahead, but as for what happened to Vink and Ecoz, their scents are on these bast—murderers. When you’re done, bring them back because I want to introduce them to my zoo.”
Ramy looked at the two severely injured men, “Earth Mother, can you do something to heal them?”
Gingaar was almost out of the door, “No.”
“I understand. Then something for the pain as we will have to amputate their lower arms or hands.”
They heard her reply from the stairs, “No.”
“Then we will do it old school.” Ramy turned to one of his men, “Go tell them to have a dwarf barber-surgeon meet us at the Watch Station but come right back, and do not let anybody else enter this house.” He then turned to Logan, “I hear you have your powers back. Do you want to help? We will need to cauterize the wounds, so they do not bleed to death.”
“Cauterize, what’s that?”
“We need to apply heat to the wounds to stop the bleeding.” After Logan nodded, Ramy called to his men, “We need to take these two to the station for questioning,” but they would not approach the angry bears. Going over to a far door, he opened it, calling out to them, “You two, in here.” Even though the bears were not pleased, they did as requested, and Ramy closed it once they were both inside. When he turned around, his men had wrapped tourniquets around the bloody stumps and dangling appendages to stop the bleeding. They had also secured their useless arms or stumps, attaching a length of rope around their feet, prohibiting any attempts to flee. He approached his men, “If either of you ever mentions what you saw down here, I will make you weed the garden in front of this town. Do I make myself perfectly clear? I do not care how drunk you get, or what your women promise you. You will forget everything you ever saw down here.” While they were good men, who he trusted, he was unaware if they made the connection that the bears were the children of Zack, and he had passed on his legacy.
After the watch had forced the assassins up the stairs, Lauren entered the room looking for Sam and Hope. When they heard her voice, they opened the door and rushed to her, both in tears. She pulled them close. “Are you two okay?” In between sobs, she heard their wet replies of ‘yes,’ but it took another ten minutes before they calmed down enough to talk.
Hope pushed away her tears with the palms of her hands, “Is Mom—is she going to be okay?”
Lauren knelt down, “Gingaar—Earth Mother is looking after her, so she’ll be fine,” but as she said it, she saw Sam looking at the large pool of blood on the floor. Standing, she placed her hands on their shoulders, “Let’s go upstairs to talk.” Once in the front room, she sat them down on the couch, finding a towel so they could wipe away their tears and blow their noses, and then she saw Ryan walk down the stairs. Telling them to stay seated, she went over to him, “How’s Nur?”
“She has some serious injuries, but Gingaar is using a gift from Mother to force them closed, and she said Nur will be okay, but some of those cuts were deep.”
“If Gingaar said she’ll be okay, then she will be.”
“It’s going to take her some time to heal,” replied Ryan. “Trust me, been there.”
Lauren, walking back over to the children, kneeled in front of them, “Your Mom will be fine, but you two will have to eat your Dad’s cooking for a while.”
Both children smiled weakly.
“I do not mean to interrupt, but I need to get back to the station,” advised Ramy. “Can you tell me what happened?”
Hope elbowed Sam in the ribs
“When the fight started, Mom told us to go to the basement, and when she came down, locked us in that room. She always did when the troubles seemed bad, but we had chewed a hole in the ceiling a couple of months ago, so we did as she said. We heard the fight upstairs, and then we heard Noyce fighting them on the stairs. When we heard the door open, we peaked into the room.” Tears started to well up in Sam’s eyes, “Noyce was good, one of the best, but he was wounded, and we saw them kill him.” He sat down and started crying.
Hope, pushing back her tears, took a deep breath, “We saw them attack Mom, and they were going to kill her. So we jumped from the ceiling, changed into polar bears and attacked them. We can actually change faster than Dad can, and then we heard two behind us. Earth Mother stepped out of the wall, raised her staff level with the ground, and said, ‘Does grow old.’ When the two dropped their swords, they shriveled up like grapes on a vine. Then everybody else came in.”
“Not what I was expecting to hear,” advised Ramy, “I will post some members of the Watch out front to make sure nothing else happens.”
Lauren turned to the two children, “You sound older?”
“Please do not tell our parents,” replied Hope, “but we only act like little kids. It makes them smile.”
“I don’t understand.”
“We heard them a few years back when they talked about how fast we were growing up.” Sam shrugged his shoulders. “Mom talked about how she was a child for so long, and how she was looking forward to the same with her children, so we decided to act our birth ages.”
Lauren was surprised at the change, “How old are you?”
“We don’t know,” replied Sam. “Mom is part elf, and they seem to live forever. Dad is—well, you know, and animals mature faster.”
“Your secret is safe with me. Let’s go upstairs, and I’ll check with Earth Mother to see if you can have a quick visit with your Mom. Just remember that she has most likely given her something to help her sleep, so she can heal faster. The last time I was hurt that bad, I had to sleep for several days, so I don’t want you to be upset at what you see.”
They both nodded in agreement.
Once upstairs, Lauren entered the room, closing the door behind her. Talking quietly with Gingaar for a few minutes, they then stuffed the blood soaked bandages under the bed, concealing any other gruesome sights as well. Upon receiving confirmation that Nur would pull through, she went back out into the hall. “Now, I’m going to open the door so you can see your Mom, but Earth Mother is still busy working on her, so we’ll just look from here.” Then she opened it, counted to ten, so that both children could see their Mom breathing, hoping the image would not invade their dreams. After taking the children to their rooms, she went to the front of the house to update the rest. Also present were several helpers and vets, who attended the injured or dead. On the street lay the four dead assassins, and on the porch, the dead Earth Guards, all of which Steve was examining one-by-one. When two wagons pulled up, they loaded the two wounded Earth Guards into one, and the injured wolves into a second.
Lauren, shaking her head, sat down on the porch, trying to dislodge the confusion.
A dwarf rode up on a blood wolf, dismounted, “Ironhouse answered the call.”
Eric stepped forward, “Ironhouse always does. What’s your name, brother?”
“Edrock Ironhouse, Captain of Trollmare Slayers.”
“Please thank the Master Weapon Smith for us,” advised John.
“Dwarf helps dwarf, as it is written in granite. For seven days, we will stay here, and then we are guaranteed passage back to Ironhouse. With me, five will remain, and here I will stay to arrange training for new slayers. If we are blessed, we will train much; our skills hone, our blades dull.”
John looked at the metal blade the dwarf carried, which was not as fine as the named blades given to the Granite Guardians. Edrock noticed, “Working mod
els while Master Weapon Smith does complete weapons final. In days of seven, new weapons promised we are.” He looked down at the fallen Earth Guards, “Warriors brave fall they did. With Mother, they now are.”
“We need to bury them,” advised Lauren, wiping away tears.
“Earth Mother Ironhouse, tell me of the honored ground, and I will make the preparations.”
She cupped her head in her hands, “There’s a statue of Alron in the center of town, maybe there?”
“Alron the Greatest. Our tributes we will pay and make ready the ground.”
“The wolves also, please. Their sacrifice should be honored.”
“As Earth Mother Ironhouse commands. My men and brothers I will find.” Then Edrock rode back into town.
A wagon pulled up for the dead assassins, and John, seeing Steve arguing with the driver, went over. “What’s wrong?”
“This guy is going to throw the bodies outside of the walls.”
“So?”
“I want to hear what they have to say first.”
“Steve, you do know they’re dead?”
“The dead talk, Kid. You just have to know the right questions and what to listen for.”
John looked at the driver, “Can you take them down to the Watch station?”
The driver nodded, “When I get them there, do I put them in a cell or in chains?”
“I’ll help and go with you,” replied Steve.
Gingaar walked out of the house, “Earth Mother is stable. Her husband tends to her, but I need to see the other battle injured and shall return later.” Walking down the street, she was aware that for the first time, in a long time, she walked alone, and her pace slowed down.
Lauren called out, “Wait, Earth Mother! I’ll go with you!” As she jogged over, the Granite Guardians took to their blood wolves, riding in formation around them both.
*******
John wandered through the once quiet town, seeing the dead carried away, and the wounded being treated, as he headed to the front gate where he climbed the ladder. From the top of the wall, he watched the dwarves, going into the garden to complete their gruesome task of beheading the odd beasts. However, some were so large that teams of dwarves struggled with saws to complete the task. He looked back up the street, which now had insects feeding in the pools of blood, wondering how they would ever survive a similar attack. The missing triplets, his goddaughters, were on the other side of the world, but here they needed magic to survive. If they went back to the Bright Coast, what little magic they had would go with them. He thought of his calcium to potassium spell, pulled a mithril tipped arrow out of a quiver, concentrated on the atomic structures of the two elements, and tasked the magic.
