Percival tried to get the girl out but she refused. He was at least relieved to know that the princess was alive. He had a hard time believing the Emma wench had tried to kill her though. An offer to take the girl off her hands was rejected.
He threatened to smoke her out but she laughed. “You'd be endangering me. I don't think that works,” she said with a laugh.
He gnashed his teeth together. The slip of a girl was right, damn her!
“You are going to get hungry in there,” he growled.
“I've got food for a couple of days,” Zara replied. “I admit the little bitch will go hungry though. She could stand to lose some weight; she's been getting fat.”
There was a muffled indignant cry, one he could just barely make out.
“Oh yes, you have! You've been eating the rations meant for me no doubt. You've grown fat and lazy.”
The knight shook his head at the byplay.
“I don't have time for this,” he growled as he stormed down the stairs. Olaf was right; she'd open the door when she was ready. She'd pay then though; he didn't care about Fenton and Rasmussen's desire to keep her “unsullied.” He fully intended to get some revenge.
Chapter 48
Zara watched the sun set. “Nightfall,” she murmured, arms crossed as she stared out the window. She turned to her prisoner and took a seat on the bed, dangling her feet in front of the girl laying on the floor.
The girl had struggled but had stopped after a while. She puffed, cheeks red, occasionally glaring at her or flicking her impotent fingers or feet. Zara had wiped up most of the blood so she wasn't such a bloody mess to look at. The imps had licked up the blood on the floor, much to Emma's fear and disgust.
“So, I suppose I should get some rest. The question is, what do I do with you?” Zara asked, sticking her worn slippers in front of the girl's mouth. She got an idea and grinned. “Oh, I know,” she said in a venomous tone of voice.
It sent shivers down the spine of the imprisoned girl. One way or another she was going to see someone get revenge. She just hadn't realized it would be the princess upon her.
~~~^~~~
Tendra watched the militia barracks, giving occasional soft reports of patrol movements with the radio. It was tonight; it had to be. She hunkered down. She had no idea what she'd do after everything went crazy. No, strike that, she did. She'd find a nice quiet place and hide until they had something else for her to do. There was no way she wanted to get caught up in the fighting. That wasn't her job.
~~~^~~~
Cadius was eager for something to happen. When he heard Tendra calling out patrol movements, he offered to set fires on the far side of the city. He was been denied and told to watch for movements in the city. That burned but he knew he had to play by the rules.
~~~^~~~
Licinius surveyed the company in the cavern. Topside, in the ruins of the farmhouse, a point team with a spotter and sniper in the loft watched a patrol pass. They had nailed down the timing despite the reports from the spies. He was not impressed; the militia was slovenly and stupid.
Each time they passed, he moved a small maniple out in the dark dimly lit streets. With so little wood and candles, not many lit the streets. The windows were barricaded with shutters so only a little light escaped. With the clouds overhead, it was hard to see for some people.
The maniple stayed in the shadows, moving to where one of the spies had set up a safe house near the castle.
Once Tycho and Zane signaled him that they were in position, he used the HAM radio to call in the next phase.
~~~^~~~
“Let's see if this works,” Fergus, the pilot of the improvised bomber, said. He did a practice run, lining up on where he wanted the fire to go, and then did a long bank and loop.
“Now we do it for real,” he said as he keyed the intercom. “We'll do one test pass, then the second,” he ordered.
When they were lined up, he called it out. The flight engineer turned bomber triggered the door and then the bomb rack.
The first bomb went out the door and corrected as the fins stabilized it. A small propeller in the back spun fast with the force of the wind, winding up the timer. When the timer hit its point, it opened the first part of the bomb to spray powder into the air. The bomb cut through it as the powder drifted down.
The bomb struck the frozen ground southeast of the city. It went up in a fireball of napalm, setting off the drifting powder above into a titanic explosion that melted the snow and scorched the ground. It knocked over anything near and terrified anything awake in the area into stampeding away. The resounding boom echoing off of the city wall startled everyone awake.
The plane did a bank loop and then came back for round two, a long stream of smaller bombs filled with napalm that they put down parallel to the wall.
“That should wake them up,” Fergus said smugly.
“Door closed. We're done here,” the flight engineer said. “Think they'll let us drop those on something real next time?”
“Who knows,” Fergus replied as he set course for home and climbed. “It's in the hands of the troops now,” he said, waggling the wings once before heading off.
~~~^~~~
All eyes turned to the fire fearfully. Stephan was awoken by the series of explosions. He cursed and turned the militia out. Half were set up for crowd control or to deal with the hunt of the saboteur while the others were ready to fight any fires.
This time they had to catch the bastard. They just had to! He was looking forward to setting the guy ablaze in an example to others not to try his antics.
His mate groaned but got up when he slapped her ample ass and got dressed as well.
~~~^~~~
Zara was startled awake by many in the capital. She looked to her prisoner and noted the girl was still where she'd left her, kneeling on the stool with her head craned up and held by the improvised noose. The other end of the bed sheet was tied to the rafter above. If the girl struggled, she would have hung herself. Not a bad fate considering the conniving and things she'd done, but Zara wanted her to pay a bit more for her crimes. She definitely wanted the girl to see everything she'd worked for go up in smoke.
The second explosion made her throw the tattered stained duvet aside and rush to the window. She saw the line of flames outside the capital and stared, awed by the sight of it like just about everyone else. She had a better vantage point than some given her elevation.
It came with the knowledge of what she was hearing in the sky as the thunder from the explosions petered out. She looked up to the night sky, but it was cloudy. She couldn't see the aircraft. She knew it was there though, up there somewhere, circling like a predator.
~~~^~~~
Dominus Fenton had finally gotten to sleep with one of his mistresses when the explosions went off. He threw himself upright, knocking the girl aside, then reached up and pulled his blindfold off.
He looked out the window, one of the rare ones still sporting glass though it was cracked from a bullet hole, and saw the fire.
“That bastard!” he snarled as he pushed the sleepy woman aside to climb out of bed. He hissed as his bare feet missed the slippers and hit the tile floor instead.
He threw a robe on, then a cloak and stormed out.
~~~^~~~
Percival had been asleep when the explosions went off, but he'd woken and had been partially dressed by the time he was out the door. When he flung his door open, he found himself inviting chaos in. The castle was a bedlam as people demanded to know what was going on. He found he was one among many, no matter his exalted rank.
When he got things sorted out, he directed the castle's firefighting team to rush out with a maniple to help put the fire out. But then he started to get conflicting reports and grew confused about what was going on.
~~~^~~~
Tendra wondered what the hell the plan was when the bombs went off. She briefly wondered if Cadius had screwed things up. When she saw movement, she dutifully rep
orted the barracks coming alive. A few minutes later she reported that the militia was marshalling and moving out.
She made a note that they were headed down the street to the southeast, not to the castle.
~~~^~~~
Herb heard the explosion and cringed. His room had a small window; he went to it in time to see the shape of something fly by, then something fall out its rear. From the sound, it was an aircraft.
The window was leather scraped to near transparency. He used a stolen blade to pry it open to look outside in time to see the aircraft bank away. He grinned.
~~~^~~~
The explosions and stamping of feet woke the prisoners in the dungeons. Augustus grinned in the dark to the others. “Something has them boiling,” he murmured.
“Can't be good for them,” a miles muttered. “I love it,” he said a beat later.
~~~^~~~
Augustus snorted.
Squad 1 of Platoon 1 moved into the castle's outermost wall opposite side of fires. They crossed the berms and frozen moat and then crouched in the shadows of the wall. Spotters with the snipers in the buildings nearby reported that the guards were all looking to the southeast at the dying fires.
Dozens of people were milling about on that side of the castle. A few had gone up to the top of the keep. The windows were filled with people looking in that direction.
In other words, the wrong way.
The squad threw up grappling hooks with climbing ropes. The point men went up fast and then dropped a rope ladder back down.
~~~^~~~
Horacius grinned as the bomb went off. It had startled them too, even though they'd seen the plane go overhead. But the commandos were in motion.
They used air cannons to shoot lines up to the crenellations. He was the first up once the hook was seated.
He ended up having a bit of trouble though; the murder holes pushed the crenellations out from the wall. But he managed to slither through the gap and then check the area. As expected, everyone was looking at the fires on the opposite side of the castle.
He tugged on the hook and then made sure it was more secure for the next man. Once that was done, he lowered the rope he'd had around his torso through the murder hole a few paces away and secured the other end to the stonework. He saw the line jerk taught and knew the next two men were on their way up so he turned to security of the area.
~~~^~~~
Once the second pair were on the way up, the point moved to the nearest guards and took them out with garrotes and suppressor fire. As the rest of the squad came up, they cleared that side of the battlements quickly and quietly but a startled groom in the courtyard near the barn called out when a body fell onto a roof.
The first two squads were dressed in all black. The other squads were dressed in winter camo. They were carrying more gear; some had litters of gear. One squad was detailed to bring gear to them. Once the assault was underway, they were detailed with getting the gear up and into the castle and then securing it. Many of the miles would be shedding their rucks and gear to lighten their load and make it easier to fight the moment they got the chance. They would need a secure area for that too.
People in the area turned to see crouching shadows moving, attacking and killing the guards as they went. Many didn't survive to call out. Some questioned the moving shadows too long, thinking their eyes were lying to them.
The Duluthians had shown how surprise, cunning, and ruthlessness could overwhelm a superior armed force. Now the Imperium showed them what they had learned over the past year of intense training as they began to take the castle back.
Fire discipline was key. They had assault weapons with silencers. They fired one or two shots for distant kills; otherwise, they relied on blackened blades, garrotes, or hand-to-hand to take an opponent down.
The servants and people on the ramparts screamed and cowered, trapped by the wraiths attacking them from behind. Those watching from the windows turned and looked out the windows behind them. They were given a view they didn't expect when they got there. They were suddenly horrified by what they were seeing, shadows out of myth and legends attacking their people. Bells and screams went out in the night alerting others of the danger.
With the alarm out, the company switched into overdrive. Squads flowed up the ladders as quickly as possible even as guards rushed out into the courtyard and battlements. They had known it would be a risk to wake everyone with the bombs, but the distraction was effective. No one was looking in their direction despite the hysterical groom and others.
Platoon 1 went to secure the gate house from the top down. Platoon 2 finished sweeping the battlements and then set up two sniper positions to cover the courtyard and road leading to the gate. The snipers ignored the cold frozen stone under them as they laid on it and began to pick off armed people in the courtyard.
People being shot in the courtyard threw others into a panic. They had no idea what was going on and how it was happening. Some stampeded out of the castle, others inside. Not many of the armed troops made it.
Platoon 3, led by Zane, took on the keep, securing a side door even as guards rushed to open the main door to find out what was going on.
Additional platoons began to line up at the castle wall to scale it. But once the net reported the gatehouse was secure, Licinius sent the rest around the side streets to the main gate to get in faster.
They ran headlong into a crowd of people in the courtyard and the first firefight began.
~~~^~~~
Squad 2 of Platoon 2 had an important objective, find the dungeons and the prisoners once the gate was secured. The point took fire from someone with a pistol, reeling back and clutching at his arm.
A flashbang was thrown, and the shooter screamed in terror at the explosion in his face. The rest of the squad filed past the wounded man to secure the shooter and others.
When they got to the jail, they didn't bother asking for surrender. A single shot killed the man holding a torch. The miles who took the shot stomped the fire out quickly with others while one worked on the lock. The prisoners called out, at first in surprise and fear, then in excitement at the rescue.
~~~^~~~
Augustus rose weakly with the others and grinned as a black clad soldier dropped down, swept the room with a professional air with his weapon, and then nodded to them.
“Princeps?” the miles asked.
“Here,” Augustus said, holding up his chained wrists.
The miles turned to him. “We'll have them taken care of in a moment. Who has the bolt cutters?” he demanded up to the opening below.
A second miles dropped them into his hands, and he took them and held out the biting end. “You can deal with the manacles later. Let's get you out of those chains and back into the fight.”
“Excellent,” the captain growled, extending his wrists.
~~~^~~~
Horacius realized they couldn't get through the stout door without blowing it. So, he went to a neighboring room that had been cleared, opened the window, attached a line to a fixture and then to his harness, and then swung out onto the ledge. There was just enough toe on the ledge to make it happen.
He primed a flashbang grenade and tossed it through the arrow slit. It hit the wood shutter within, fell, and then rolled under the shutter into the room.
The people within the room turned just in time for the grenade to go off.
He had turned away from the blast of light and noise. He grinned as the screams and bellows began, then someone clawed at the door to the hallway and opened it. Smoke came out from the top of the arrow slit. When he heard the all-clear, he swung back into the room. "Next?" he asked with a grin.
~~~^~~~
Once the remaining troops were inside, Squad 1 dropped the portcullis and raised the gate. They left a couple of the former Imperial prisoners to guard the room and then went with the others to secure the rest of the castle.
~~~^~~~
“What's the plan?” Augustus demanded
just as a black-faced Tycho joined him.
“We get you, the princess, secure the castle, and then hold out until relieved,” Tycho replied, checking him over. He even handed over a ration bar and canteen.
The princeps took it with a shaky hand and ate the ration quickly, then drank the beer. He knew he wanted to be in the thick of the fighting but he was weak. So were most of the other prisoners. “We'll cover your rear,” the guard captain said, stepping aside as a miles pushed a prisoner in. He didn't even wince as the prisoner was dumped down into the dungeon pit without ceremony. They heard a groan so they at least knew he'd more or less survived the fall.
The second guy was luckier; he had someone soft to fall on. The others managed to get down as quickly as they could.
Hostage Rescue (Princess Rescue Inc Book 2) Page 63
