Warlord

by Robert J. Crane

  He went higher than a titan’s head before pausing to take stock of the situation. The battle was well underway, titans storming around the arena and finding plenty of Sanctuary forces to occupy their attention. Cyrus watched Belkan deal a stabbing blow to a titan that was running past him, dropping his foe to the ground and pursuing with an attack to the exposed back of its neck. Belkan’s swordsmanship made up for his lack of speed, and it only took one hearty stab to render the titan dead.

  Odellan shot past Cyrus just below, circling a titan as though he were a fly, striking swiftly, a dozen cuts already opened on the raging titan’s rough face. Blood streamed down into its eyes and it swung blindly, hitting one of its fellows and leveling them as Nyad peppered the falling titan with multiple fire spells to the face. Cyrus caught a glimpse of skin dissolving, black smoke pouring off its face as its hair caught fire and traveled up until it reached the creature’s helm. Its flailing hands knocked aside the metal cap, and it spun wildly, trying and failing to get away from the fire that was scorching it. Cyrus saw that it was dead without knowing it quite yet. It fell a moment later, its fight ended.

  Cyrus focused his attention on Talikartin, picking him out ahead. The titan war leader was swinging wildly at Terian, who circled without landing a blow in the seconds Cyrus watched. He started forward to join the fray, but lightning passed underneath him and caught a titan full in the face as it leapt up to attack him. The blast caused it to draw its hands down to react to the sudden pain, and its attack fell far short. When Cyrus flicked a look to the origin of the lightning, he saw Larana dart away, casting a massive fire spell that she hurled into a knot of three titans. It became a swirling inferno, a tornado of fire that seemed to draw all three of them in as surely as if they were falling into a crevasse at its center.

  Cyrus sprang toward Talikartin, who was watching Terian carefully, the two of them trying to gain the measure of each other. He was committed when a familiar cry from his right tore his attention away.

  Vara.

  He swung around to see the paladin in the hands of Emperor Razeel, clutched tightly in his grip, her sword knocked away. The Emperor squeezed her and the sound of her armor creaking reached even Cyrus’s ears. The battle seemed to pause as everyone drew a breath, and Cyrus felt rage and acute terror rip through him with the force of a sword blow.

  “I see I have your attention,” Razeel said with a fearsome grin. He brandished Vara as though he were holding a trophy, and she hammered uselessly at his fist. “We see now what you prize above all, hollow man. You are nothing but armor and a sword, no true believer in war.” Razeel’s knuckles went white as he squeezed Vara tighter. “I wonder if you will still care so much for her in pieces?”

  And before Cyrus could move, Razeel thrust Vara up to his mouth and clamped his teeth down on her arm. Vara shrieked in pain as the Emperor of the titans found the joint of her armor, and the world around Cyrus seemed to hold completely still as fear and fury raged impotently inside him.

  39.

  Razeel laughed through clenched teeth, and the sound of Vara’s armor straining under the power of his bite filled the air in the arena. The smell of death and gore was heavy in this place of sacrifice. Time slowed to a stop as Cyrus watched helplessly from a distance.

  Vara, for her part, cut off her scream as soon as she realized she was doing it, and Cyrus locked eyes with her across the wide gulf of sand and bone between them. The braziers lit in the viewing area cast the whole arena in a burning orange light. When Cyrus looked into Vara’s eyes, he saw—

  He saw—

  Fury?

  Her lips moved almost imperceptibly as Razeel clenched down tighter, and Cyrus remembered that while Vara did not have Praelior to give her exceptional speed, she did possess armor with more than a little enchantment of its own, rather than a sword to give her aid—

  Vara’s force blast spell sprung forth from the hand trapped in Razeel’s mouth. When not trapped, Cyrus had seen her use of the spell bowl over countless men, growing in power from a merely stunning force when he had first seen it to something now approaching lethality. He knew, for his part, that he would not have cared to be on the receiving end of it ever, but especially not at this point in her evolution as a spellcaster.

  Unleashed inside the mouth of the Emperor Razeel, the force she let loose was trapped with nowhere to go. Cyrus watched the Emperor’s eyes widen just a hint as he felt the first impact inside his mouth—

  -and then his head exploded in a blast of blood, bone and tissue that reminded Cyrus of a fountain erupting after long disuse, disgusting ichor spraying up and out in every direction.

  A silence fell over the arena as Vara dropped out of Razeel’s now-lifeless grip. She hit the ground and rolled, springing to her feet as the white light of her healing spell danced over her, her armor stained with the evidence of her kill. She swept her sword back into her hand and dodged the Emperor’s corpse as he toppled like a felled tree, the rattle of his armor against the bones on the arena floor a thunderous sound, echoing into the silence. “Idiot!” Vara said, a curse spoken in relief and anger.

  “That’s not gonna be something you can heal with a spell,” Terian said dryly, breaking the spigot of silence wide open and unleashing a torrent of titan fury.

  The titans moved in a complete lack of battle order, a frenzy unleashed by the rage of seeing their leader killed. Cyrus tore his gaze from Terian and Talikartin to Vara, who now had the attention of every single titan in the room. “Shit!” Cyrus breathed and broke into a dead run toward her, trying to beat the flood of titans heading her way.

  Cyrus stabbed blindly as he scrambled to reach her, flying over the shoulders of countless enemies. He aimed for the neck but did not watch to see if he hit, paying more attention to his running than his swordplay. Vara, for her part, was already somewhere in the swarm below, bereft of a Falcon’s Essence spell. He could no longer see her under the crashing wave of titan backplates and helms, he could only try and carve his way through the onslaught to her.

  She just killed the Emperor of Kortran.

  She’ll be fine.

  I dearly hope.

  Please … let her be fine.

  He swung hard on the exposed back of a titan neck, breaking a vertebra but failing to end the beast. The titan, did, however, stumble hard to his side, knocking over a wave of titans pushing against him. Cyrus counted it as a victory, albeit a small one, and then jabbed his sword more carefully on his next attack against the back of a titan’s head, planting his blade between the spinal joints and causing the titan to drop with barely a grunt, tripping those following behind as the beast was rolled over like a spinning log underfoot.

  There were at least eight titans between Cyrus and Vara, in his estimation, and the sweat was stinging his eyes as he made to close that gap. He caught a flash of crimson robes beneath him and saw Scuddar In’shara standing off with one of the titans, drawing it away and engaging it in single combat with his scimitar. It looked like a ridiculous mismatch, but the man of the desert was holding his own easily, his blade spinning as he moved, dancing out of the way of attacks and inflicting more than a fair amount of damage of his own, parrying every strike of the titan and drawing more blood with each exchange. The titan’s arms were red to the elbows, and it roared at Scuddar as it came on once again, this time losing a finger in its attack.

  Cyrus had no more time to watch, however mesmerizing Scuddar’s fighting style might have been. He charged forward, watching as arrows flew beneath him, spanging off the helm of the titan immediately beneath him. He saw Gareth atop the shoulder of another titan for just a second, drawing and shooting as it did a double take at his appearance. The elf leapt as the titan moved to deal with the ranger’s menace, and the titan ended up smacking himself on the shoulder hard enough to cause him to cry out. Gareth, for his part, had leapt to the shoulder of the next titan in line, his flawless balance keeping him upright as he drew again and fired. Without a Falcon’s Essence sp
ell?

  That elf is crazy.

  Cyrus ran on, encouraged by the realization that there was, at least, some help. He reached the front of the line, nearing panic, and had his sword in the wrong hand to even strike a blow at the last titan as he breezed past, running on air. Instead, he caught the nape of the helm, the flowing bit of steel that protected against attacks to the back of the wearer’s head. He slapped its edge as he went by, knocking the helm forward. The front, normally designed to rest on the titan’s forehead, fell down to cover his eyes as Cyrus ran past, not stopping to deal a deathblow.

  He paused as he looked down at the spectacle below. A wave of emotion hit him as large as the titan advance, relief of a sort that was as unexpected as any titan ambush.

  Vara was attacking the knee of a titan below, the one he’d blinded, holding back the advance on this front. The titan stumbled, all those behind him halted as they butted against his back. Cyrus moved with fleet feet, avoiding the inevitable fall of the creature. It was still blinded by his handiwork as it came down to its knees, and Vara leapt to finish it with a practiced cut across the throat.

  Others were coming to the side, though, and this was the most surprising sight of all, Cyrus thought. Fortin held that line, somehow having cut through under the ranks of the titans to Vara’s side, with another standing just behind him. Andren stood in the rock giant’s shadow, a short sword in his hand and a wary look on his face. When he saw Cyrus he waved quickly with the sword, beckoning him down.

  “Looks like you’ve got it under control here,” Cyrus said as they backed closer to the arena wall. The tier above them was empty in the Emperor’s box, and Razeel’s corpse was off to the side, still headless. Terian was right; no healer can fix that.

  “Don’t use it as an excuse not to help!” Vara cried as a titan fell next to her, tripped by the corpse of her last kill. She buried her blade in its temple, and it roared, so she struck it again. This time it fell silent and stayed that way.

  “Do you need a healing spell?” Andren asked, waving a hand at him. Light danced from his fingers and a curious tingle ran over Cyrus’s body. “Just in case.”

  “I’m fine,” Cyrus said, turning to face a roaring titan as it leapt over the fallen bodies of the last two comers. When it landed, Cyrus found himself face-to-breastplate, as inopportune a place to be as any, so he ran higher as he saw Vara go low, spearing it with her sword in the side of the hip while Cyrus distracted it and drew a furious backhand that missed him so closely the wave of air that followed in its wake spun him around, disorienting him.

  When he came back around, Cyrus swung at the face lunging toward him. He caught it below the eye with Praelior, withdrew the sword, and went back again, this time at the eye itself. Landing it prompted a howl, and the titan started to sink. Cyrus planted his blade squarely in the middle of the forehead as it dropped. It moaned like a troll as it died, falling backwards, probably breaking its knees as it folded over.

  “This is getting out of hand!” Vara shouted as another came forth. Cyrus was too quick for this one, however. He went for its face; it flinched and started to dodge back, dragging its head away and leaving its beefy neck exposed at a forty-five degree angle. Cyrus swung and was rewarded with the familiar splash of red spray and the titan fell over exactly like its comrades.

  The battle.

  Oh, Bellarum, the battle.

  Perhaps I have missed this.

  As the titans before him scrambled over the growing mound of their own dead to mount another attack, Cyrus used the spare seconds to look back toward the entry to the arena. The tunnel still seemed jammed with the Army of Sanctuary, but hints of the war that must have been going on out in the city beyond were suggested by the ripples of motion through the forces Cyrus could see.

  He caught a glimpse of Larana weaving through the air still hurling spells, and Curatio standing his ground, a bright blaze of lightning blasting from his fingers, rendering his face in flashes of white. “What the hell, Curatio,” Cyrus muttered. “Not even trying to hide it anymore.”

  There was a roar from within the tunnel, and Cyrus watched a thousand bright lights flash into existence. It took a moment for his mind to interpret what he was seeing. Wizard teleportation orbs? The flashes of the spell energy taking hold as people seized the orbs and disappeared in a burst of light began a moment later and ran through the tunnel. It seemed to move in lines, until the entirety of the army up to the corps fighting around Curatio disappeared.

  “What the—?” Cyrus breathed, blinking in astonishment. I didn’t call the retreat! What’s going on here?

  Titan feet appeared at the farthest reach of the tunnel that Cyrus could see, following fast behind a small figure running at top speed ahead of them. Cyrus noted the flash of robes and realized it was Ryin, sprinting with an alacrity Cyrus was not used to seeing from the druid, the hem of his robes whipping behind him. He did not stop until he reached the knotted circle of Sanctuary defenders around Curatio, at which point he turned and held a hand up to his throat, voice coming out amplified by some spell that Cyrus did not know.

  “KORTRAN IS BURNING,” Ayend’s voice sounded, “OUR ARMY OUTSIDE HAS WITHDRAWN SAFELY, THOUGH ONLY BARELY. THE ENTIRETY OF THE TITAN ARMY IS NOW SWARMING THE TUNNEL.” He locked eyes with Cyrus and the electricity he communicated was as potent as one of Curatio’s bolts of lightning.

  The entire rest of the titan army? Coming here? Cyrus swallowed heavily as the action slowed for a moment. That explains the retreat; without heavy spellcaster support our normal armies can’t stand against that. He swept a gaze over the arena and saw more than a little fresh blood in the gaps between titans where he could see sand. Hell, we’ve got some of our best here and we’re still having a time of it …

  “Sound retreat!” Cyrus called, bellowing out over the carnage of the battle. “Let’s get the hell out of here while we can!”

  A scream of rage followed Cyrus’s order, and he swung his head round to find Talikartin still swiping ineffectually at Terian. The guardian yelled something, a shout of some word in the titan language that Cyrus did not understand, and a ripple ran through the scene of the battle.

  “Cyrus!” Vara cried. “Get down here, now!”

  He spun to look at her, catching sight of Terian diving for the ground as well, running in a steep dive to join them. Cyrus did not think, did not ponder, merely acted, and ran as swiftly as he could toward Vara.

  He was only ten feet above the ground when the titan cessation spell draped itself over the battlefield and stripped the Falcon’s Essence from him.

  Cyrus hit the ground with a hard thump as Vara left it in a leap. He watched her sail through the air gracefully, once more striking down an attacking titan with a swipe of her sword so perfectly aimed that the titan did not even manage a riposte. She used his breastplate as a springboard to return to the ground, landing only a few feet away as Cyrus struggled back to standing.

  “You all right?” Vara asked, tugging at his arm and helping him return to steadiness.

  “Not really,” Cyrus said, back to a balance a moment later. He looked at the formidable odds arrayed against them, and realized that without Falcon’s Essence, he could no longer even survey the full battlefield of the arena. He was limited by the mob of titans in front of him, so numerous that they blotted out any view of Curatio or the rest of the Sanctuary force still standing.

  If they’re still standing.

  With a breath of horror, the full weight of what had happened slammed home on Cyrus as the next wave of titans moved in on him and his small party. With a cessation spell over the battlefield with the tyrants, we’re trapped here among them.

  No fire to burn them.

  No lightning to drive them back.

  And no teleportation to get us out of here … alive.

  40.

  How do you find a wizard with no vestments? Cyrus wondered as he drove his blade into a swiping hand, cleaving two fingers loose and causing the tit
an attacker to stagger past Cyrus. He nicked the back of the titan’s leg as it passed, and it tripped into the hard stone wall of the first tier, the clang of its helm upon impact ringing through the air over the clamor of battle.

  If I were aloft, I could just look for the big bastards chanting under their breath, he thought, moving to finish the titan that he’d just knocked over. He aimed for the neck as usual and was rewarded in the same way as always, though this time he mostly managed to dodge the stream. He did not, however, manage to duck under the panicked titan’s hand as it reached to staunch the flow of its lifeblood, and the clipping strike sent Cyrus spinning into Andren.

  “Oof!” Andren cried as Cyrus slammed into him, knocking them both to the ground. Cyrus was the first to recover, pushing up on one arm. “Watch where you’re going!” Andren said, looking more than a bit put out.

  “Thanks for the soft landing,” Cyrus said, adjusting his helm slightly before turning to get back to the battle. “Let me know if you see any wizards.”

  “These titans all look the bloody same!” Andren called as Cyrus watched Fortin tear the knee off a titan and then smash the bone into the jaw of the very same enemy, like a small shield.

  “Exactly my problem,” Cyrus muttered, finding himself with a brand new challenger as he staggered to the left to cover their flank while Vara dealt with a titan that came right up the middle at them. No vestments, no robes. They all seem to be wearing armor, at least all that I’ve seen. He plunged a sword through a slow-moving titan’s knee and did some kneecap removal of his own, though his was incomplete and left hanging, unlike Fortin’s. “Is the cessation spell still on us?”

  Andren’s answer came back a second later, nearing panic. “Yes!”

  “Okay,” Cyrus said, taking on his next challenger as Terian came staggering out from between the legs of the titan at him. The dark elf swung his axe and sent the titan stumbling. Cyrus narrowly avoided being caught under the enormous thing, the creature’s hip clipping him as he dodged its shadow.