by Rosie Scott
“Terran has no gods left to aid him,” Cyrus reminded me. “Your long pursuit of him will soon be over, Kai. You'll be able to breathe easier again.”
“That's the idea,” I agreed.
“What about Cicero?” Nyx piped up, her words muffled from around a bite of venison. “Isn't he in Sera?”
“Nope,” Calder replied. “Cicero's long gone. Interrogations I handled in Comercio yielded us a lot of information about it. Apparently, Terran offered Cicero a place in his army years ago. Cicero acted interested before he disappeared. Nobody knows where he went.”
“Cicero's annoyingly intelligent; he knows better than to stay in Sera,” I said. “Cicero grew in power due to the Battle of Hallmar. He might still grow in power with every bit of anger Terran harbors for me due to his false intel. Cicero got the chaos he wanted and continues to feed off it while running to stay safe from my wrath. As he said years ago in Eteri, we will feed off each other's powers for as long as we live. Cicero will have a hand in future wars. Mark my words.”
“Said with just an edge of bitterness,” Cyrus teased.
“Oh, and you love the man,” I blurted.
Cyrus chuckled and shook his head. “After the war, I will keep an eye out for him just as much as you, Kai.”
“After the war,” I repeated with emphasis. “It seems so close now, doesn't it?”
“It is close,” Hasani pointed out. “Once Sera is yours you'll be queen, sister. And it doesn't sound like it'll put up much of a fight. The journey was long and treacherous, but I pray the results will be worth it to you.”
“It's already worth it to me,” I replied. “Over the years I've gained the strength and power to match my drive, and all of you have been there with me to see and encourage it. Words cannot describe how thankful I am to everyone here for your support. I couldn't have made it this far without it.”
“Something tells me you would have found a way regardless,” Cyrus replied, looking at me with camaraderie and admiration. “I've been happy to share in this with you, and I look forward to our times together in the future. Your journey doesn't end here, Kai. Just one chapter of it.”
“There are limitless chapters for the likes of necromancers,” Uriel added with a smile. “I feel lucky to have met you, Kai. I will forever be able to brag that I lived during the age of magical discovery and was friends with the woman at its center. You have expanded my mind in many respects with your wisdom and curiosity.”
“I only wish I could have been a part of all this sooner,” Dax said thoughtfully. “It's been a pleasure, Kai.”
“Well, I won't speak like this is goodbye because it isn't,” Zephyr said perkily. “I'll badger you before long about letting us breed the griffons in Sera. We lost so many in this war, and gods know Kirek won't be sending any over.”
“You won't have to badger me for long,” I replied. “It's a good idea. We'll figure out a trade.”
Zephyr grinned and leaned past Dax to slap Cyrus on the arm. “I'll breed a flying unit to put Eteri's to shame, boss.”
“As long as you handle it and I don't have to,” Cyrus replied, making Zephyr chuckle.
“It's been enlightening working with everyone here,” Hasani said, motioning to the entire table. “When I met Kai years ago, I thought she would bring us war and ruin. She brought war, but Nahara is stronger than ever before and I feel I've grown with it. I never imagined I would sit at a table with multiple world leaders like this in the middle of Chairel of all places. I hope Kai's method of immortality allows me to enjoy all this a little longer through my dual casters because I look forward to building partnerships with all of you.”
“I will ally with you no questions asked, friend,” Cyrus offered. “May we grow together in advance of the rising threat in the east.”
“By the time the dwarves grow powerful enough in the beastlands to cause trouble, I'll likely be dead regardless of extending my lifespan,” Hasani surmised. “But I pray that my children and their children will lead Nahara to greatness in my stead. I'll negotiate with you after Sera, Cyrus.”
I smiled as I watched two of my greatest friends agree to diplomacy. The world would continue evolving even after the war in new and interesting ways in direct response to my actions; I looked forward to living long enough to see the results.
Forty-three
23rd of High Star, 432
Sera.
The city of magic revealed its splendor in waves of stone buildings beneath relentless rays of sunlight and cerulean skies. From such a distance, Sera's walls didn't appear to contain it, for they were far shorter than the structural tiers that attempted to conquer the mountainside.
The Seran University was a sprawling maze that covered the northernmost point of Sera like a hat. In the years since the massacre, they had rebuilt the destroyed sections of the upper tiers. The university now had multiple towers that rivaled the lowest clouds clinging to the tip of the mountain like a saving grace. While Maggie and her team prepared our long-ranged cannons to fire in the waving grasses ahead, I kept my focus on the university where I'd grown up, desperate for proof that Sirius saw my massive armies out on the plains as he hid from me like a coward. As a child, I'd often felt a cold chill or an ache in my gut when Sirius would be near or speak to me. I felt the same ache now, but instead of intimidation, it was a mixture of satisfaction and anticipation. I was jittery with the desire to spill Sirius's blood after so many years of fantasizing about it.
I nudged Azazel's side and pointed at the distant university. “Are we being watched?”
Azazel huffed with amusement and replied, “Most likely. My eyes are good, but not that good.”
Cerin put his arms around my waist from behind and leaned his head on my shoulder. He nuzzled my face and said, “Don't fret, Kai. Even if Sirius isn't watching, he knows all too well we're here. He is thinking long and hard about the day he crossed you, and he's comparing his riches-to-rags army to ours and cursing his doomed fate.”
A tingle of pleasure traveled down my spine at hearing those words, and I turned my face to catch my lover's lips with my own. Cerin returned the open affection with gusto, ignoring Nyx's playful scoff of disgust.
“While I ignore this bullshit,” Nyx began, motioning to us, “I'm just going to assume Sirius is watching.” She stretched her dark arms out before her, dramatically raising both middle fingers and waving them in a childish dance.
My laughter broke the kiss with Cerin. Holter jovially teased, “Now he's terrified.”
Nyx raised her eyebrows and dropped her arms. “I'm still not happy about being here, Kai. Just looking at the damn place makes me want to vomit.”
“It does kinda have a pretentious look to it,” Calder mused, throwing his latest cigarette to the ground and squashing it. “Look at me, look at me!” he mocked. “I'm pretty!” As we chuckled, he pointed at the bottom tier of the city, gliding his finger over the horizon. “Look at that, love. The only army they have left is guarding the wall, and it's puny. We've broken them down, one step at a time.” He reached over and squeezed my shoulder a few times fondly. “Feels good, doesn't it?”
“Amazing,” I agreed.
Maggie turned from setting her cannon team up on the plains. She spread her arms wide as she walked over grasses glimmering in the light breeze and announced, “These babies are ready to blow!”
“Maggie,” Cerin protested in jest, “cut down on the eroticism.”
Maggie chortled. “Nah, love! I'm just lookin' for things like that to say now that ya've been naggin' me for it.”
I turned to look over the armies separated into units on the grasslands. Lifting my war horn, I blew a quick double-toot to get their attention. When all Sentinels and kings looked in my direction, I raised an arm and gave a thumbs up. One by one, they returned the gesture, signaling a readiness to march. Switching my gaze back to Maggie, I said, “Let's take down that wall.”
Maggie grinned. “Gladly.”
Maggi
e returned to her team. There were six long-ranged cannons, five of which were taken from the Defense of Olympia in 427. The sixth cannon was Maggie's own creation using the others as a guide that she'd built during our time in Hallmar. Since there was an even number of artillery, the engineer split the unit into two. Three cannons aimed at Sera's left gate, while the others aimed at the right.
“Left unit!” Maggie called. “Fire!”
The crack of cannon fire split the air as the three weapons fired in quick succession. The shells hurtled toward Sera's western gate in streaks of silver. I held my breath as I waited for them to hit.
BOOM!
The first shell hit directly to the left of the gate in an explosion of stone and dust. The wall crumbled on either side of the impact until the metal gate was loose and bent, only hanging on by its opposite side. An egregious squeak reverberated over the fields as the entryway protested its weaknesses, and when the next shell eviscerated the other side of the wall, the gate fell in billows of grit.
“Right unit!” Maggie shouted next, throwing her arm forward. “Fire!”
Three cannons expelled their ammunition, and the right gate subsequently exploded into iron shrapnel. Chairel soldiers guarding either side of it backed away from the damage, though they stayed on the wall so they could bombard our armies when we filed through.
Maggie's teams reloaded the cannons and fired again and again, breaking down Sera's defenses until they were worthless. The gate my friends and I escaped through fifteen years earlier was a pile of rubble. While most of the defensive force had avoided the hits, the fields were spotted with bodies, soot, and splashes of blood from the unluckiest of soldiers. Sera's wall was one of the most impressive ever built, but thanks to the ingenuity of our foes and my foresight in wanting dwarven siege weapons for this takeover, it caved easily to our pressure.
“Kai!” Maggie turned to me. The crate of shells she'd prepared was still half-full. “Do ya want me to keep firin', or are we good?”
I scanned over the wall. The two gaps in it were far wider than the gates had been, revealing multiple defended streets of the city within. I surmised that whole units of our army could file through at once in the right formation.
“We are good to go, Maggie,” I informed her. “Fantastic job! Fall back and prepare to march.”
On the plains south of Sera, the allied armies were ready to advance in the formations we'd agreed to weeks ago in Kilgor. The units of Marcus, Cyrus, Dax, and Hasani formed the western army with Rek and thousands of Calder's non-beastmen infantry in tow. Uriel, Zephyr, Calder, and my armies prepared to infiltrate the eastern gate of Sera. Hades's location was unknown. The eastern army was largest due to Calder's high population of beastmen, but my army would separate from the rest once we were in the city. Sera was already weakened and cornered; by focusing on killing Terran and Sirius, I could prevent many casualties and force the city's surrender.
I returned to the forefront of my unit with the other Renegades, and Calder returned to his. Calder shouted out orders for his beastmen to transform, and the crackling of skeletal systems and screeching of agonized cries burst into the air alongside red mists. The three remaining dragon-kin hulked on the exterior of his army, smears of blood marring the metallic sheen of their scales.
As the cries of the changing army died down, Cerin's rough voice filled a short silence. “This is it.”
Excitement filled my chest and I smiled, my eyes on the Seran University. “It is. Let's finish it.” I untied the war horn from my belt and lifted it to my lips for the last time in the legendary War of Necromancers.
HUUURRRNNNNN!
Our armies advanced, the hum of tens of thousands of footsteps shaking through Arrayis like the bass of a foreboding song. The once-intimidating city of Sera cowered behind its broken protections and enfeebled army. The sun cast its blinding light over the towers and sprawling hallways of the Seran University, all too willing to be an accomplice to murder by pointing out my hopeful victims. Buoyant clouds swept through cerulean skies, casting moving shadows over neighborhoods below.
It was a beautiful day for battle. Then again, wasn't it always? The anxiousness in my gut earlier evolved into a thrilling buzz. The end of the war was near, and I looked forward to finishing it. Somehow, most of my friends had made it through Chairel's greatest challenges alive, and all that was left was one battle that already appeared it would be the easiest yet.
Fearful farmers and their families watched our armies march past their land from afar. As I'd deduced, they'd been forced to stay out of Sera to produce its food reserves. While some of their land had recent corpses from our wall attack, their other buildings and fields were unharmed. We left them be other than to raise the dead as we came across casualties. Some of the civilians watched the rising corpses with apprehension, but once they realized the dead wanted nothing to do with them, they calmed.
The western and eastern armies breached Sera at the same time with Marcus and Calder's units at the forefront. Though I couldn't see the beastmen from over the heads of the units between us, I heard their cries echoing out from under the flashes of colorful elements that Seran mages rained over them from the nearest wall. The three dragon-kin flew ahead, hovering over cluttered intersections and segments of the wall to thin the defensive forces with onslaughts of metal. Azazel had suggested a strategy to Calder weeks earlier to use the dragon-kin for creating stoppages in the movements of the enemy army. Evidently, Calder listened to the suggestion and trained the dragon-kin accordingly; one of the lethal beastmen hovered in the air over the main street ahead, blocking our foe's maneuverability and preventing them from surrounding our armies as we entered the city through the break.
Far in the west, Marcus and the giants spread through the first roads of Sera, their minds also set on being a blockade to inhibit the Seran Army's movements. Marcus stayed just inside the breach and swiped his spiked club over the entire wall, knocking dozens of soldiers back from the rubble so they couldn't target invading friendlies with spells.
As the giants and beastmen flooded through either gap, they infiltrated Sera's streets to flank the defensive force and keep it confined to the wall. Trapped and now flanked, the most flustered troops tried their luck against our greater numbers and rising corpses, and the frontlines were in a brawl of flashing talons and bursts of magic.
Directly following Calder's unit was Uriel's. The Sentinel ordered his mages to bolster the beastmen with protections. Alteration shields and double-shields surrounded many beasts, ensuring maximum defenses against the magic of the Serans. As hard as Sirius's men fought, their progress against us was slow or non-existent.
Zephyr's army broke into the city next, and she led her men to the left to contain enemies between the east and west gaps. The Sentinel ordered her men back at a safe distance before disabling a handful of foes with chain lightning. Smoke rose from rattling bodies as she dispelled the magic, and her silver eyes brightened as a life and death dual caster passed on a high to their general.
As I led my army over blocks of broken stone and slivers of iron lattice, the new height from walking up the rubble gave me insight into just how empty the walls were on either side. There were puddles of blood and scorched stone, but necromancers had raised all corpses to flank the Serans even on the wall. The panic of Sirius's defense force was tangible in the air as the tingling energy of terrified shouts and exuding body heat from profusely sweating men.
“Remind me why we were so terrified of Sera,” Nyx commented, noting the rapidly degrading Seran Army.
“Because it was once known as the hardest city to infiltrate,” I replied, a bout of pride and satisfaction rising in my chest. “Thanks to building great armies, procuring siege weapons, and wearing down their forces in Comercio, we will be the first to succeed. This is a historic day.”
“You say that like it's special,” Azazel commented, lifting his bow to shoot an arrow at a woman hacking at an ally's shield with a sword. Afte
r she fell dead, he added, “Many days have been historic in this war with you in charge, Kai. Today is just one of many military achievements to add to your list. You'll have to up your game.”
“You challenge me to be better even when I am the best at something,” I mused, noting his teasing smile.
“Perhaps I'm simply bored and rely on you to give me entertainment with your wars and flashy spells,” Azazel jested.
“Well, aren't you impossible to please?” Nyx quipped.
On the other side of the rubble, Sera opened to us. Since we were the last army to enter, our allies already contained most of the defensive force at the wall on either side. Many men stopped fighting against our larger army and held their hands up in surrender. The cobblestone streets ahead were eerily quiet and empty. No reinforcements came from the upper tiers because the city had none left to give. Civilians locked themselves in their homes and businesses to wait out the battle. Far up the incline of the main street, a stray dog trotted out from an alley and stopped to look over the ruckus happening at the wall. Moments later, it jogged across the road and disappeared between two buildings, deciding it was best not to get involved.
The streets hugging the wall swarmed with allies that surrounded our foes and accepted their surrender. I couldn't lead my army through the chaos, and my allies seemed capable of handling these forces alone. My focus was on getting to the Seran University, and there were three routes there: directly up the main streets of Sera, or by climbing either side of the wall and following it until it dead-ended into the west and east ends of the building. Since men surrounded the walls, I chose to take the direct route.
I led my army forward, past Zephyr's unit on the left and the others on the right. Much like the dwarven artwork on the doors of Narangar that showed dwarves walking a path to the heavens, this wide main road led to my resolution. The sun still shone over the university like a beacon in case I somehow lost my way. We passed one intersection, then two, the structures around us rattling with our march.
