“Let's go the rest of the way on foot. There's no telling what might be waiting inside the walls,” Rhett said.
“Maybe we should split into two groups—on purpose this time—and come at it from different angles,” Christian suggested.
“I don't think there's very many ways to get inside this thing, and honestly, I think it's better if we don't separate,” Rhett countered.
“We stay together,” Dragar said, opening his door. He set Minna on the ground and reached back in for his shield.
That seemed to end the splitting up debate.
Leaving the map on the dash, she opened the door after handing Rhett his shield. Dracht and Alex disembarked with Christian following in their wake.
The men slid their arms through the brace on the back of the shields and readjusted their swords. Preparing for battle. Evelyn scanned what she could see of the castle and its defensive walls but saw nothing out of the ordinary.
Clouds hung thick and menacing in the sky, diffusing the dismal rays of a sun gone black as death. Nothing about that had changed with the advent of a new morning.
Evelyn wished for a day like the one in Eden, with a warm sun shining mellow rays across a landscape that lifted the spirits. She found it a challenge to keep from sinking into melancholy with the current depressing atmosphere and she suspected she wasn't the only one. Every so often she caught Minna, Alex and Christian glancing at the sky with a similar expression. Rhett, Dracht and Dragar hadn't mentioned it nor given any indication they were bothered by the ever present gloom.
She was sure it worked on their psyches in different ways—they were just better at hiding it.
Rhett took the lead, moving tree to tree, advancing on the gate until there was no more cover to hide by. The last hundred feet he broke into the open and ran for the tower gate. Dracht and Dragar followed with the girls sandwiched between them and Christian, who brought up the rear.
Much to Evelyn's surprise, the tall iron gates weren't locked when they got there. Rhett only had to kick one side to make it swing open. Entering with his sword in hand, shield in front of his body, he swiveled a look through the six acre bailey.
Several buildings sat to the left and right with the main castle beyond at the far end.
A perfect place for an ambush. Evelyn felt the peculiar weight of power along her nerve endings, the same she'd felt when they were close to the Fallen in Jerusalem. Instead of taking a circuitous route along the bailey walls, Rhett chose to go straight across the grass toward the castle, almost in defiance of any traps that might lie in wait behind the smaller structures that had once probably been used as wash houses and extra kitchens.
Thirty feet from the small buildings, five Servants stepped from behind the confines, feral in their armor, swords gripped tight in their hands. From a tall door at the castle itself came not one but two Fallen, striding with purpose down the stone steps to the grounds of the bailey.
Five Servants and two Fallen against four mortal Templars. Evelyn knew they were all staring at a suicide mission here. There was no possible way Rhett and his brethren would win this fight, not even with her and her sister's help.
Rhett pivoted on a boot heel, whispering with an urgency reflected in his eyes. “When we attack, look for other weapons around the bailey. There has to be rope or chain or something else besides the daggers for you to use. It's going to take all of us just to get a shot at the Seal.”
Evelyn glanced down when Rhett slapped the compass into her palm. Her eyes darted back up to his.
“The second they're all distracted, two of you break off and head for the castle. The Seal feels more distant than the Fallen, which means they've left it behind in there somewhere. Get it if you can.” He turned away before anyone could argue or say anything else.
Rhett broke into a jog with Dracht at his side; Dragar and Christian split toward the two end Servants, approaching straight on, apparently ready to engage in confrontation without any further ado.
Alexandra yanked on her sleeve, tugging her to the far side of the bailey while Minna ran the other way, off to look for any kind of weapon.
“Look, there's chains and shackles in the wall over there. Probably used for captives during war. Think we can yank 'em out of the rocks?” Alexandra asked, breathless as they ran for the line of shackles dangling toward the ground.
“We'll make them come out,” Evelyn said. She tucked the compass into the pocket of her pants and grabbed one of the chains when they got there. It hung through a rusted iron ring attached to the wall and she gave it a vicious tug.
The ring didn't budge. Two lengths of chain hung to the ground with open shackles on the ends, and Evelyn improvised, snatching one up. There was at least three feet of chain for each cuff and she bashed the stone around the metal ring, trying to loosen it.
Alex picked up the other and alternated taking cracks. The stone chipped, the ring started to loosen, and three yanks later the metal ring flew free of the wall.
“Do the other one!” Alex shouted.
Evelyn glanced back to see the Templar's engaging the Servants, swords swinging through the air. Two servants for each pairing.
The fifth headed her and Alex's way.
Chapter Seven
Rhett had never deluded himself over odds of his winning or losing a match. He understood luck and skill only went so far, and that certain opponents were simply too powerful to beat on a one on one basis.
It hadn't ever stopped him from taking the bastards on, though, and it wouldn't stop him today. The Servants of the Fallen were a better risk than the Fallen themselves, but they were still broader, taller and stronger than he and his brother put together.
The Fallen, just one, would be a challenge for the four of them to beat, and here there were two.
The odds were not in the Templar's favor.
He fought like they were, driving the Servant he faced off with back another five feet. Their swords clashed overhead and side to side, each man nearly matched in skill. Rhett sliced his blade around then ducked when the Servant spun unexpectedly, swinging to take his head off. The sword whistled a few inches above him. Rhett chopped for the Servant's knees, aiming for the weak spot in the armor. It left him open for attack from the other side, but the Servant leapt out of the way instead, choosing to spare his legs.
Hearing Dracht grunt behind him, he spared a quick glance; his brother, locked in a brace of swords, was in jeopardy of having his throat cut by his own blade. Before he could decide whether he had time to act, a fat two-by-four hurtled out of nowhere and struck the Servant in the back of the head.
Minna.
The Servant staggered forward, lessening the pressure on the locked blades, and that was all it took for Dracht to duck and sling his sword around, stabbing it up under the Fallen's chin and into his skull.
“Rhett!”
Evelyn's scream alerted Rhett that he'd watched a half second too long; before he could take evasive action, the Servant hit him broadside, sending him flying back on his ass. The armor protected him from being sliced in half but pain exploded outward from the point of impact, stunning him.
Dracht whirled, blade singing through the air, driving the Servant back and away.
Rhett scrambled to his feet, wheezing. Barely upright, he heard his name again and went flying ten feet through the air when something that felt like a truck slammed across his back. Landing near one of the smaller structures, face down, sword somewhere out of reach, he watched the world fade to black around him.
†
Wielding six feet of chain with heavy iron shackles at the ends wasn't easy. Evelyn ran toward the fray with Alex at her side just as one of the Fallen nailed Rhett across the back with his sword, sending him flying through the air.
Her knees had taken on that jelly quality the second she'd seen the Servants advance in a line and the closer she got to the fighting, the worse it became. Yet she wouldn't just cower against the wall while the Templars fought to
their death.
There was one Servant between her and Alex and the rest of them. Black haired, black eyed, the Servant stood better than six-five with hulking shoulders and long arms.
Alex started swinging her iron shackle by the chain, around and around, darting out to the side to draw his attention. Which worked; he hunched his shoulders defensively when the girls separated, following Alex who displayed open aggression.
Evelyn didn't know what her sister planned to do, but she looked for an opening to strike. She was going to do this if it killed her. The mantra she'd designed to help overcome these situations ran in the back of her mind like a broken record. Stuck on repeat, the encouraging diatribe spilled over her fear, allowing her to think rather than freeze.
Alex let the shackle wind out, the chain snaking behind it; the Servant blocked the incoming missile easily with a backhand of his sword, letting it wrap around the blade before giving it a sharp yank. Alexandra, unable to let go of the chain in time and still on the run, landed flat on her face.
The Servant stormed toward her, features worked into a tight mask of grim satisfaction. Evelyn picked up speed, racing close, closer, and pitched her shackle just as the Servant sliced his sword around in an attempt to cut her down where she stood.
The chain hit the Servant's leg and wrapped around it twice. Evelyn thought her best shot was to trip the Servant and send it crashing to the ground. As the chain grew taut, gut instinct told her to duck. Cutting through the air overhead, his sword missed her entirely.
Evelyn gave the chain a yank on her way by but the Servant was too heavy to trip. He didn't even stumble.
The chain ripped out of her hands, taking a bit of flesh off her fingers and palms. Good idea in theory; she needed to bind both his legs to topple him.
Recovered from her fall, Alexandra whipped her dagger at the Servant's head. It clanked off the shoulder armor when he struck out for Evelyn again. She lurched backward to avoid the sword, tripping over an exposed rock jutting up from the ground. Landing with a grunt, she scrambled to her feet.
They just weren't doing enough damage. Like gnats nipping at the heels of King Kong, all they did was anger the beast. Evelyn had her dagger and that was all. In the brief pause, she saw Dragar and Christian battling hard against two Servants, barely holding them off, and Minna and Dracht tackling another.
What she saw after that made her blood run cold. One of the Fallen had Rhett by the ankle and was dragging him across the bailey toward the castle.
†
The fighting in the bailey took on that surreal slow motion feel for Evelyn just then. Like she was watching a high definition TV, she saw details in startling clarity: drops of sweat flying off Dragar, Christian gritting his teeth when a sword knocked him down, the deadly stalk of the Fallen, Rhett's body jerking over the ground while the Fallen dragged him by a boot. Dracht went head to head with a Servant, sword flashing like streaks of lightning, moving forward then back when the advantage turned.
No one had died yet, but it was only a matter of time. They couldn't win this battle and she didn't know how they were going to extract themselves from it now. One by one, the Fallen would pick them off until they were gone.
Rhett looked like he might be the first to go. Evelyn broke away from Alexandra and the Servant, running across the bailey toward the altercations. She darted between the two dueling pairs but stopped short when the other Fallen stepped into her path. Behind him was his brethren, taking Rhett God knew where. A sudden protective tide swelled through her.
“Tell him to put Rhett down,” she said to the Fallen. He had the same presence as Ashrael, that sting of power and energy that bowed a person's will and messed with their psyche. Confidence and something less pleasant, a wickedness, stained the air around him. Shanks of brown hair fell over his brow into equally brown eyes—eyes that shrewdly assessed her in ways that made her skin crawl. Then he smiled like she was a child to be pat upon the head and sent off without supper.
“You're in no position to be making demands of anyone,” he reminded her.
The Fallen behind him stopped, used a boot to flip Rhett over like he was a ragdoll, and swung his blade until the point faced down, right over the Templar's throat.
Somewhere behind her, she heard a loud grunt and Christian shouted for his father. Evelyn didn't dare take her eyes off the enormously tall man in front of her to look and see if Dragar just lost his life.
This was it, the end of the battle where the victors slayed the enemy. Not just the end for them but most of humanity who probably wouldn't ever know a war had been waged in their honor. These were the final minutes, the last few breaths and gasps; Evelyn decided she wasn't going down with a passive whimper and yanked her dagger out of her sheath.
Like the rest of them, she would die fighting, at least, and realized belatedly that her knees had stopped trembling sometime between her interaction with the Servant and now. She didn't feel nauseous or shaky or frozen.
Through the gloom and the haze, she saw Rhett reach up to smack the tip of the blade away from his throat and kick a boot out for the Fallen's knee. He'd either been faking it or had regained consciousness to find himself in grave peril.
Evelyn didn't waste her dagger on the Fallen in front of her—who slithered his sword out of its sheath—but threw it with every ounce of strength toward the one standing over Rhett.
Maybe, somehow, it would give Rhett a few more seconds. It had worked once before, it could work again.
She sacrificed herself to try and save him because she knew she wouldn't, couldn't, win against the Fallen before her anyway. It was a worthy cause in her mind.
Kicking a foot out at the sword, she knocked it away and spun around to try and dart around the beast in front of her. Any second she expected to feel the blade pierce her side, her chest, her back. She didn't think the armored shirt was strong enough to deflect that direct kind of blow.
Overhead, a thunderous crack split the sky, lightning streaking through clusters of clouds. She glimpsed Rhett and the Fallen standing over him in a brief struggle, and the shine of the sword she'd batted ineffectually away caught the light overhead, arcing her direction. She hit the ground of her own accord, hoping the sword would miss; she didn't expect the Fallen to suddenly slam into the ground right beside her, the tip of the blade landing on her wrist.
The brown haired, brown eyed Fallen had an arrow through his throat.
Evelyn didn't take time to process the whys and hows. She snatched up the wicked sword and lurched to her feet, running with it toward Rhett. He was dodging stabs of the sword from the Fallen above him, rolling left, rolling right.
A buzz near her ear caused her to swing the blade up and around. She swatted with her free hand, thinking it was a bee or a bug, before something else zinged past again. Two arrows struck the Fallen—one in the head, one in the neck—that stood over Rhett. The giant toppled over, landing with wet gurgles and gasps.
“Rhett!” She arrived just as he scrambled to his feet, snatching up the sword the Fallen dropped. He slung an arm around her and drug her against his chest. One side of his face from jawline to hairline had been scraped raw. Bits of dirt and debris littered his skin.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“I'm fine, I'm fine. I don't know who shot the arrows--” She hugged Rhett with one arm, the heavy sword clutched in her hand.
At the same time, they glanced back over the bailey. Dragar was down along with Minna, as well as every other Servant they'd all been fighting. Dracht, blood running down his temple from his head, crouched with Alexandra near Minna while Christian turned Dragar over.
And standing between, further back near the gate, a black armored Fallen just then lowering his bow.
Chapter Eight
Alexandra wasn't surprised when Evelyn suddenly dashed away from the confrontation toward Rhett. She darted in to grab her dagger off the ground where it bounced off the armor of the Servant, narrowly missing being ha
cked in the side when the tall creature swung his sword from Evelyn—whom he missed—toward her. The one lesson she'd had with Dracht in the training pit wasn't enough to secure her any kind of protection against the Servant, especially considering she only had a short blade instead of a sword. But it didn't mean she couldn't keep this one preoccupied in the hopes Dragar, Christian, Dracht and Minna did better than she and Evelyn had.
Facing off with him, half crouched, circling with the dagger clutched tight in her palm, she feinted left to test his reflexes.
Except he somehow seemed to anticipate her and his sword caught her dagger down by the hilt, sending a shattering vibration up through her wrist. The weapon flew out of her fingers and she clutched her forearm when pain exploded toward her elbow.
She never saw the backhand. Only felt the hard bridge of knuckles when they connected with her cheek.
Head snapping aside, she tasted blood. It knocked her off balance and she staggered three feet to the right. Bastards were much stronger than she'd given them credit for. In that split second, she saw Dragar take a vicious hit between his shoulder blades and saw Dracht get flung onto his back. Minna swung her two-by-four for the Servant's head, wicked nails sticking out of the end, but the Servant caught it before it struck. He yanked it out of Minna's hand and delivered a blow with the other end to her temple.
She crumpled into a heap at its feet.
“Minna!” Fear shot through Alex at the thought her sister was dead.
If there were just two less Servants and one Fallen, they all might stand a breath of a chance. Belligerent and furious, she rounded on the Servant again, only to see that he'd picked up her dagger and had his arm cocked back. Ready to throw.
Thunder crashed overhead and lightning split the sky.
Alexandra had no time to duck or run or anything else; an arrow whizzed past her head and nailed the Servant straight through the throat.
†
Evelyn estimated the new Fallen to be four or five inches over seven feet. He was the biggest Fallen—or Guardian for that matter—she'd ever seen. Even Ashrael wasn't that tall, nor broad. Black hair hung straight to his armored shoulders, offset by olive skin and eyes a shade between hazel and green. Pale, like Rhett's were, to the point of translucence. She could see the unusual color even from here.
Daughters of Eve Collection (Books 1, 2 & 3) Page 56
