by Travis Bughi
Walking in full view, through the middle of the market square, were nine fully armored and armed Knights of Lucifan.
Each knight was covered from head to toe in plated armor, polished to a glistening shine that reflected the sun’s light. Only their faces were exposed with their face guards raised so the people could see the determination in every knight’s young face. On each knights’ back was slung a heavy shield shaped like a kite, and each carried a simple longsword in front of them at waist height with the tip pointed straight up toward the sky with a rigidity born of professional practice. They marched without any verbal commands, striking their plated boots on the ground both in perfect rhythm and at an equal pace to each other. Duncan led, keeping two paces ahead of the rest. Behind him, the remaining eight knights walked in two rows, four abreast. Emily recognized Neil in the front, left center and all of them together as the knights that had saved her outside Borgan’s bank many months ago.
They were Gavin’s squad.
“So much for stealth,” Abe said.
Around them, the crowds of Lucifan watched the knights march and backed away from them as if they carried either a divine aura or a plague. They looked not only shocked, but fearful, and many began to look around as if expecting a horde of ogres to descend upon the outcasts at any moment. If such an event was imminent, the knights looked neither aware nor worried. At the head of the group, Duncan diverted his eyes long enough to recognize Rautor and Harvok and nod at them.
“This is it,” Emily said. “My word, this is it.”
“Give them all you’ve got,” Abe said.
“I will.” Emily nodded to her brother. “And one more thing. If I don’t come back from this, you need to take Mother and Father and run, okay? Leave everything, take what money you’ve made from gunslinging, and get away. Go as far as the edge of Angor if you have to. When you were knocked out, Heliena made me a promise that if I didn’t come quietly, then she’d go after my family next. So, if this doesn’t pan out, dive deep into the Great Plains and stay there.”
“What? Damn it, alright. I got it.”
He blurted out that last part because the knights were approaching fast. The crowd continued to part for them like a wave, and so Abe headed back down the alley in an effort to remain hidden. Just as the knights reached the alley, the minotaurs stepped out to flank Duncan and walk with him. They drew their gargantuan metal mallets, and the crowd withdrew even further.
People were practically diving out of the way now, and Emily had an easy enough time slipping into the gap and taking up position behind the knights. She drew her bow and tapped her quiver of arrows. There were thirty there, and if she could help, she planned on using every single one of them. The hunting knife at her waist slapped softly against her thigh, giving her a feeling of comfort that she couldn’t quite describe.
The knights, now accompanied by two minotaurs and one amazon, turned hushed voices into a few full on yelps. Some cried out when they saw what was coming and scurried out of the way. Their way was clear except for a single cart headed by a leprechaun, but she had the good sense to direct her unicorn down the nearest side street with enough grace to avoid tipping the cart over. As they swept by the leprechaun, she gave them a hateful stare but made no attempt to shout out. She had her merchandise to consider.
And they marched onwards. The crowds continued to divide, but then gathered and followed behind them until finally the tower, the angels’ tower, was before them in all its glory.
“Halt!” Duncan commanded.
The knights, minotaurs, and Emily stopped a short charge away from the metal doors blocking their entrance. Directly in front of those doors were two ogres that were practically stunned out of their wits. The wooden clubs in their hands hung limply as they gazed upon a scene not witnessed for months, and if the minotaurs were included, then possibly not seen ever. One of them gathered himself together quicker than the other and banged a large purple hand on the metal door, all the while never taking his eyes off of the force before him.
“Shields!” Duncan bellowed. “Present!”
In unison, the knights unslung their shields and strapped them onto their left arms. Once done, they brought them up and held them in front with their longswords now held at the ready in their right hands only.
“Knights!” Duncan took in a deep breath. “Ch—”
Duncan stopped mid-command as the front doors cracked open and Doles, the ever watchful aide, poked his head out into the open air. He and Duncan locked eyes, and a look of surprise showed on both their faces.
Doles recovered first.
“Macalister!” Doles shouted, stepping out from behind the door and marching to stand in front of the ogres. “What are you doing? I demand to know the meaning of this! What, Neil? Mathew? What are you all . . . you were exiled from duty! You all were! Duncan, why did you bring them here? And how did they get that equipment? Oh no! You gave it to them! And to think I vouched for you when Sir Mark decided to demote you to quartermaster! I never should have done that! I thought you were better than that, Macalister! Your father, angels bless his soul, what would he think if he saw you here now? And your mother! Why, I never! O’Conner will have you flogged for this!”
“DOLES!” Duncan shouted.
Doles shut his mouth tight, cutting off his rant mid thought as the weight of command in Duncan’s voice hit him.
“Move your lazy, fat, useless arse,” Duncan said.
Doles appeared a moment away from taking offense to that comment, but then his eyes flicked from Duncan to the two hammer-wielding minotaurs on either side of him and then back to the ogres, and a moment of clarity flooded over his face. He turned back to Duncan and made an ‘O’ shape with his mouth.
“Right,” he said, and promptly turned to walk off down the street.
“Knights!” Duncan yelled. “Face plates!”
Doles continued to walk away, keeping his hands behind his back and his face pointed towards the sky. The ogres watched him leave, a look of total confusion on their faces. They still hadn’t been given an order.
The knights used their sword hands to drop their face coverings, protecting themselves and obscuring their identities. Ahead, the two ogres looked lost and fearful. Their eyes kept twitching from side to side, their bodies unsure and shuffling. They were confused to say the least. They weren’t paid nearly enough to face such odds, but the fear of a vampire’s wrath made them weigh their options a tad too long.
“Charge!”
Chapter 20
The ogres planted their feet and leveled their weapons.
A mere fraction of a second later, the minotaurs touched off the ground.
They weighed absurdly more than the knights, even with the full plate armor, but had muscle enough to churn out a deadly charge at nearly any distance. Emily knew that well enough. A cloud of dust kicked up under each minotaur hoof as Harvok and Rautor propelled themselves to lethal speeds almost instantly.
The ogre on the left, the one charged by Harvok, tried to repel the attack by bringing his club down in a vicious swing meant to connect with the minotaur’s skull. He was too slow, though, and as his arms went up, Harvok’s horns pierced the ogre’s chest, ramming him into the wall and causing the club to smack harmlessly onto Harvok’s back. With a head jerk, Harvok tossed the ogre off his horns and to the ground. He then finished the job by bringing his hammer down onto the ogre’s chest.
The ogre on the right fared much better at first. He jumped out of the way of Rautor’s charge, just barely avoiding the blow, and Rautor shouldered the metal door with enough force to make the entire thing shake, obliterating the awkward silence of the minotaurs’ charge. The ogre didn’t miss a beat, though, and brought up his club to make a full sideways swing that would have crushed any human into the door.
But Rautor was not alone. Emily’s arrow soared past the charging knights, its silence clouded further by sounds of battle. The ogre never saw it coming, and before his swing
gained power, the arrow found his neck.
The ogre gasped and clenched his throat as his club swung loosely toward the minotaur. Rautor caught the feeble blow with his forearm and the club slid down his hairy arm. Rautor responded in kind by bring his hammer up from the ground with one arm. The metal head connected with the ogre’s chin and flung the beast into the air, where he crashed to the ground and did not try to get back up. Rautor took no chances, though, and brought the hammer down on the creature’s head.
Rautor turned and gave a short nod to Emily, and she nodded back and nocked another arrow.
“Inside! Go! Go!” Duncan yelled.
The knights, no longer an organized unit of marching perfection, came to a screeching halt before the metal doors. Two of them grabbed the handles and pulled the doors wide open. Duncan rushed in first, leading the charge, with his squad less than a pace behind him. The minotaurs nodded to Emily, and she went in next, followed by the minotaurs who shut the metal door and barred it. Emily didn’t notice, though. She was a bit distracted by what was in front of her.
The angels’ tower was theirs no longer. The big hall on the first floor had once been a meeting area for business affairs and other governmental disputes. There had been lines, tables, chairs, desks, and many other things Emily did not fully comprehend, but somehow innately understood were important to the functionality of a lawful city. In the center, five sculptures of the angels supported the massive ceiling, which bore a painting of Lucifan. The room had been, for a lack of a better word, clerical. The angelic statues still stood. But now, rather than peering down upon working citizens, they looked upon the new enforcers of Count Drowin’s rule: ogres.
The purple beasts had turned the massive cathedral into their living quarters. The old knights’ quarters, made to accompany humans, must not have suited their needs, and a tyrannical government never requires the same amount of paperwork as a fair and balanced one.
The desks were being used as beds for those not sleeping on the floor. The chairs were mostly broken, either destroyed by an attempted use or in a fit of rage. The tables were now reserved for eating and the leftover remains that came when one tried to cram an absurd amount of food down the gullet. The smell was a mix of rotting food, sweat, and urine that made Emily crinkle her nose. Truthfully, she’d smelled worse, but not by much.
Of the one hundred ogres that could be crammed into the space, only twenty were present. Five were sleeping, four were at a table fighting over a slab of behemoth meat, six were sharpening weapons, two were coming down the stairs from the angels’ old throne room, and three were stripping off their armor. It didn’t take long after Emily’s group entered for their expressions to change from surprise to eager aggression.
“Where’s Gavin?” Emily asked.
“In the dungeon below,” Duncan replied. “The entrance is on the other side.”
“After you,” Harvok said, “human.”
Duncan drew a breath and hesitated for a moment. The ogres stood. Some reached for and hefted the large weapons common to them, but a few merely raised their fists. Confident in their numbers, they let wicked smiles creep around their upward facing tusks and started taking heavy steps forward, one bare foot at a time. Duncan exhaled.
“Forward!” he shouted, raising his sword.
The knights bellowed and thrust their swords into the air. With the heavy clang of metal boots striking stone, the battle started.
The ogres roared back and charged, followed shortly by the minotaurs, whose war cry vibrated within Emily’s chest. She alone stood quietly and let her bow do the shouting for her. The first arrow was released with an accuracy that had won her the admiration of an elf, and the wooden shaft sunk into an ogre’s right eye. Her hand went up, and she grabbed two arrows, nocked them, and then loosed them into the air. She was practiced this time, slowly exhaling with every shot and keeping her cool. Both arrows found targets, striking one ogre in the calf and another in the right shoulder. Her hand was at her quiver again when the opposing groups clashed in the center of the room.
Duncan charged his first ogre, who swung at him with a double-headed axe, but he’d swung too high, and Duncan passed harmlessly under it. His shield struck the ogre’s stomach and chest with all the weight of a fully-plated human running at a dead sprint. The force transferred just as Duncan intended, and the ogre’s body toppled back to the floor, where his heart was pierced by Duncan’s longsword.
The other knights struck their targets, and Emily waited precious seconds to make every shot count. Her patience paid off as she saw one knight misjudge the ogre he’d chosen to challenge. The knight tried to mimic Duncan by ramming his opponent with his shield, but this enemy was not easily fooled, and rather than risk a faulty swing, the ogre lowered his shoulder and met the knight’s shield with his own charge.
For as heavy as the knight was, the charging ogre was heavier, and the knight bounced back as if he’d struck a stone wall, sprawling to the floor helpless and dazed. As the young man tried to recover from the nerve-racking blow, the ogre was raising his heavy blade to crush him. And he would have, too, had it not been for a well-placed arrow that appeared between his eyes. The ogre toppled to the floor, and Emily drew another arrow. To her left, she made eye contact with two ogres who realized what she was doing. In the eyes of one of the ogres, Emily recognized the intelligent look of a leader.
“Get her!” the ogre commanded. Harvok rammed his bloodied horns into the creature’s chest, silencing him, but the order had been given. To Emily’s right, she saw three ogres break off from their current fight to charge her down.
“Damn it!” She brought her nocked arrow to her cheek.
She released it, and one of the ogres went down. He’d been one of the ones to recently awake from sleep, and so his bare chest absorbed the lethal arrow.
The two remaining ogres were getting closer. She’d only have time for one more shot, she realized, so she drew two arrows and pulled them back. Just as she did so, though, one of the two dropped back behind his ally, and both of Emily’s arrows hit that front one. He roared and gurgled his last breath, crashing to the ground just paces away from her, and behind him, the last ogre leapt over the partner he’d used as a shield and brought his massive axe up for a brutal strike.
Emily hopped back, and the metal blade crashed into solid stone at her feet. She immediately had a hand to an arrow in her quiver, but this ogre was smart and gave her no time to draw it. No sooner than it had sent chunks of stone flying, the axe was back up and cleaving the air toward Emily’s head. She let go of the arrow and dropped back, letting the axe pass her by harmlessly, but the moment she did, her opponent swung the axe again.
She was unprepared for such agility from an ogre, and she ducked because there was no time for anything else. As she crouched down, the ogre responded with a swift kick right to her chest. It had been a half kick, not full power, because the ogre was still trying to balance his axe, but it still felt like she’d taken a punch from a viking. Emily bounced back to the ground, losing her bow at the same time. As the ogre brought his axe down to the finish the job, Emily somersaulted backwards—one-handed, so the other could hold her arrows in her quiver—and then vaulted to her feet. She released the arrows and drew her knife.
“Die, little one!” the ogre roared as his axe struck nothing but stone again.
“You first!” Emily shouted back.
She leapt forwards, ready to plunge the knife into the ogre’s heart, but he used his arm as a shield, and blood flowed as Emily buried her blade there. He attempted to smack her with the arm, but she’d already ducked, and the swinging motion of his arm only served to help free her knife. The ogre tried to step back to get enough room to swing his axe, but Emily was the faster one now, and she rammed her knife into his chest.
She put all her weight into it, and the ogre fell backwards. She went with him, and as they crashed to the ground, Emily yanked her knife out and rammed it into his neck to make sure
he was dead.
“Little one,” she mocked and stood up.
“Emily!” Duncan yelled.
Emily looked up and saw the fight was over. One of the knights was on the ground, but seemed to be only injured. He had a hand on his leg where his armor was cracked, showing the force of the blow he’d taken and how the metal plates had likely saved his life. Around both Harvok and Rautor were piles of dead ogres, showing quite clearly where most of the killing had taken place. The minotaurs looked to be in rough shape, though. Harvok’s left arm was red with blood, and Rautor was leaning heavily on one leg.
“Come on!” Duncan yelled.
Emily grabbed up her bow and sprinted to the other side of the room. Most of the knights were already there, those who weren’t helping the injured one, and they funneled into the doorway. The minotaurs nodded to Emily as she ran past them, and then they turned a watchful eye to the stairway that led up to the angels’ old throne room. Neither of them moved, though. They seemed to be wisely reserving their strength.
As she reached the door, she wiped her knife clean on a nearby bedsheet and then sheathed it. She ducked inside after a slight pause when, from below, she heard a scuffle followed by the roar of an ogre.
Emily darted inside and took an immediate right down a flight of torch-lit stairs. They led underground to a room with six cells created by vertical iron bars. At the foot of the stairs, Duncan and the others stood around a dead ogre with several sword wounds, and Neil held a ring of keys in his hands. Beyond them, in one of the cells, was Gavin, standing tall, up against the bars. The rest of the jail was empty. It seemed that if the ogres were catching any criminals, they either held them elsewhere or weren’t so good at keeping them alive.
“What is this? Duncan?” Gavin yelled in disbelief. “What are you all doing here?”
“Saving your ungrateful life, sir,” Neil shouted back.
“You’re damn right I’m ungrateful,” Gavin started and then paused as he looked beyond them. “Emily? You came as well?”
