To Nathan, that meant he should minimize conflict with her. As he had said earlier to the others, a drawn-out siege was risky due to the possibility of intervention by the rest of the Federation. More than that, he worried about losing Champions. He had asked for Leopold’s help to prevent exactly that, but the only real way to protect everybody was to neutralize Seraph. That meant Nathan needed to put his plan into motion as soon as possible.
Despite his concerns, Seraph didn’t make a move on the first day. Night fell uneventfully.
The next morning, Nathan ordered the soldiers to line up in formation in front of the walls. Without siege weapons, many of the soldiers shifted uneasily. They wanted to know why they were out here already. Charging the fortress was suicide. They lacked their siege engines. How could they scale the walls? How could they bring them down?
A dome of light shimmered over the fortress, reminding everybody of the futility of beginning the assault unprepared. To Nathan, it was a reminder of why he needed to move fast. The protective field of magic was further empowered by the binding stone within the fortress. Although inactive, the binding stone would still be tethered into the force field and make it stronger than found at a typical stronghold. Even Sen’s magic would struggle to punch through the fortress’s protective barrier.
That meant the siege engines his soldiers were building were useless. New tactics were necessary. Fei, Sen, Sunstorm, and the others met with Nathan in front of the army.
“The fortress may not look like much, but I’m worried that you’re underestimating it,” Leopold said.
“Really? What makes you think that? The fact that we’re going to attack the fortress without a single weapon capable of punching through its walls, maybe?” Anna said sarcastically. She shot a cutting look at Nathan.
Nathan ignored her. He waved a hand toward the highway in the distance. “If we’re able to seize Fort Taubrum, we’ll have cut off one of the largest highways that the Federation uses to transport goods along the Gharrick Mountains up to Forselle Valley. This fortress is of vital importance to the Federation.”
“We know,” Anna said. “You even told us why we need to hurry. But you can tell me to ‘rush, rush, rush’ until my ears bleed without making any difference. The siege engines need more time to be built.”
“It’s because we lack time that we can’t wait for siege engines,” Nathan said. “Fortunately, we have the means to get into the fortress without them.” He looked meaningfully at Leopold.
Leopold’s eyebrows raised. The others looked at him, and he shrugged in return.
“I suppose he’s not wrong,” Leopold said. “The walls and protective field are too strong to get through without siege engines—and we would definitely need siege engines strengthened with powerful magic—but the gate is another matter. I have enough power available from my binding stones to punch through the front gate, if necessary. For me, however, the question is: is it necessary?” Leopold gave Nathan a piercing look.
“Isn’t getting into the fortress our highest priority?” Anna asked, seemingly confused.
“Blowing through a magically reinforced gate uses a lot of power that I’d rather save,” Leopold said with a smile.
“Power that I’m guessing that you’d rather save for fighting Seraph. At least, that’s what I’m assuming comes next.” Vera grimaced at the thought of fighting a Champion that had been hyped up to be far more powerful than anyone she had fought previously.
Nathan nodded. Almost everybody understood the reason why Leopold was wary to use so much power to simply get into the fortress. Anna still seemed somewhat confused, but she seemed to understand that the gap in her knowledge was caused by her inexperience with sorcery and warfare, so she let it slide. Although she forced a promise from Leopold and Nathan to explain how the details later. Right now, they didn’t care to explain everything.
Plus, Anna was likely to understand much better after the battle with Seraph.
Federation soldiers wandered across the battlements of the fortress as they watched. There weren’t as many of them as Nathan expected. He wondered if Seraph had committed far more of her forces to the planned ambush at the tower than she should have. Or perhaps she had sent many of her forces away. After all, she surely knew that what really mattered now was the battle between Champions.
Whatever the case, Nathan’s battle plan trundled into motion. Leopold took up his position in front of the main gate. Accompanying him were most of the other Champions and sorcerers. Anna took a position in the back of the army, as expected. Nominally, she commanded this army. That kept her out of harm’s way, which is where she needed to be once Seraph started unleashing her full power.
Fei and Sunstorm stuck with Nathan up until the start of the battle. They seemed aware that he was up to something. Minutes before the battle was due to start, Leopold wandered up to Nathan. His eyes lingered on the two Champions who almost clung to the younger Bastion.
“Are you sure about your plan?” Leopold asked. His poker face smile was firmly in place. His eyes held no judgment, but that meant nothing. For all Nathan knew, Leopold wanted Nathan to back away from his foolhardy plan and join the main assault.
“It will minimize casualties,” Nathan said.
“You’re taking both of them?” Leopold nodded at both Fei and Sunstorm.
Nathan gave Sunstorm a push forward. She stumbled and looked back at him in surprise. With a nod, Nathan indicated that she should join Leopold’s force.
“You want Fei?” Sunstorm asked, an undercurrent of hurt in her voice.
“Normally, I’d take you for this sort of mission,” Nathan said, one of his hands ruffling Fei’s hair. “But you can last longer in open battle. Your gems are built for endurance, and you know how to handle Seraph. Whereas Fei here need to be topped up every few minutes of battle. I’m a little worried about her should she get into a fight with Seraph.”
Fei scowled at Nathan and jumped away. She had been enjoying his attention, but she became unhappy the moment that he mentioned that he was “babysitting” her. Leopold and Nathan chuckled.
A hand appeared in front of Nathan. He looked down, surprised to see that it was Leopold’s. Looking back up, he saw the old man looking unusually serious.
“For good luck,” Leopold said. His poker face smile was gone. In place of it was a genuine smile.
Nathan took his hand and had an unusually firm handshake. When he pulled his hand back he had to shake the feeling back into it.
“Just be careful when you’re in there,” Leopold said. “I don’t know what you think you know, but what you’re about to wrangle with is more dangerous than you think. I’m betting you’re about to play with fire, and many people have died doing that half-assed.” Having said his piece, Leopold accompanied Sunstorm to the front line.
Nathan stared after the retreating Bastion. Had the old man worked out his plan? It seemed unlikely. Then again, what else could Nathan be up to? Nathan wondered if Leopold had attempted this trick in the past. Or perhaps he knew other Bastions who had tried the same thing.
The difference between Nathan and all those other Bastions was that Nathan had the advantage of knowledge from the future.
“Are you really that worried about me?” Fei asked. Her tone sounded unimpressed, even though her words gave the impression that she wanted affection.
“It’s not that I’m worried about you,” Nathan said. “Rather, I need a Champion to defend me should I run into Seraph. But I also need every Champion to help Leopold at the front gate. My plan is to spend as little time fighting Seraph as possible and she’s more likely to focus on holding the fortress gates. But if I do run into her, I need a highly capable Champion to help me fend off a duogem Champion.”
“But you said—” Fei began to say.
“And I meant it,” Nathan continued. “Your sapphire gem is powerful, but you can’t use it for long in a battle. Whereas Sunstorm, Sen, and the others can fight for much longer period
s of time without my help. If you’re close to me, then I can top you up whenever necessary.”
Fay pouted and looked away. His words hurt her. There was no escaping that fact, but they needed to be said. Her capability as a Champion improved rapidly, and she had come a very long way since the nervous beastkin he had encountered when he first arrived at Gharrick Pass. Coddling her did her no favors. She wanted to be a powerful and famous Champion. Nathan knew she had the potential to be a trigem Champion, but achieving that potential meant that she needed to face reality.
“You’re thinking about this the wrong way,” Nathan said, trying to think of a way to get his message across but blunt the hurt. “Everybody has weaknesses. That is an escapable fact. What makes us strong is understanding our weaknesses and how to prevent others from exploiting them against us. Right now, you’re extremely powerful in short bursts. That means that so long as you’re close to me, then very few Champions can defeat you in one-on-one combat. On the other hand, that means you cannot get into extended fights when you’re not close to me. That does not make you weak. Rather, it means that you need to pick your battles.”
“But what if I have no choice but to get into a battle when I’m away from you?” Fei asked, looking up at him.
“Then you need to find a way to handle fights in those circumstances. A battle does not start the moment that you cross swords with your opponent. It is about positioning, about framing, about taking control of a battlefield, and about maximizing your strengths while ensuring your opponent’s weaknesses are exposed.”
Nathan wasn’t sure Fei got his point, but she wasn’t stupid. Simple sometimes, but she had always been the most reliable Champion in his roster for a reason. She had earned her position as the trigem Champion who most often pulled him out of the fire.
As if to prove him right, Fei nodded at him, a look of understanding on her face. She licked her lips and looked up at the fortress walls.
“That’s why you’re in such a rush, isn’t it?” Fei said. “You’re setting up this battle to prevent Seraph from gaining an advantage over you. This plan of yours is a hidden strength of yours that nobody knows about, but you’ll lose your opportunity if the Federation intervenes. Right?”
Nathan smiled and reached out the hand to ruffle her hair again. Before he could touch her, Fei ducked to the side and looked at him with a triumphant grin. He relented. Although her rapidly moving tail looked awfully inviting.
The two of them continued to wait. Leopold should have attacked by now, but maybe he was waiting for something. He was an experienced Bastion, so Nathan didn’t intervene.
What did worry Nathan was the low number of enemy soldiers on the walls. By this point, Seraph must have known that an attack was imminent. This was no drill or intimidation tactic. Nathan planned to attack. Had she seen through his plan and knew that they intended to attack the gate and nothing else?
If she had, then she wasn’t showing it. There was still no sign of Seraph in the flesh.
“Why hasn’t Seraph showed herself?” Fei asked.
“I’m not sure. By this point she should have responded to one of our actions.” Nathan shrugged.
“Does that mean she’s not here?” Fei’s eyes widened.
“That’s unlikely. And by unlikely, I mean very, very unlikely,” Nathan said with a grimace. “She’s an experienced Champion, and that means she has her own tricks up her sleeve. I’m assuming that she’s up to something.”
For Seraph to have abandoned Fort Taubrum would mean that the Federation loses a sizeable chunk of their territory. As Nathan said earlier, this fortress protected the highway that cut north-south along the Gharrick Mountains. A lot of merchant traffic used this highway.
Without the fortress’s protection, the Federation merchants would have to take a longer route to get to Forselle Valley. Several nations had borders that touched Forselle Valley, not just the Empire and the Federation. It was a major crossroads. If the merchants had to take the long route to get there, then their costs would rise. Higher costs meant lower profits.
No doubt the regents behind this war were furious over the Empire’s counterattack. Not only did they have an expensive war on their hands, but their existing profits were about to fall. Other regents would be furious once they learned the full extent of their losses. The Federation would have no choice but to negotiate with the Empire if they could not take back this land.
So Nathan considered it impossible for Seraph to have already retreated. Doing so would make her a pariah in her nation. Torneus, her backer, would hunt her down for failing him so badly. In such a situation, she was better off trying to hold off the Empire while hoping that Torneus sends reinforcements soon enough.
Nathan shielded his eyes with his hand and looked toward Leopold’s position. He saw the old Bastion raising his sword into the air. A crack sounded across the battlefield. A cry rung out across the Empire ranks.
The assault had begun. Fort Taubrum was about to fall.
Chapter 42
Seraph finished the last of her paperwork. Placing the last piece of paper on top of her neatly stacked pile of finished forms, she took a moment to look over her handiwork.
Since she moved here under Theus, Seraph oversaw the entire province. This paperwork had been a constant companion. Now all of it lay completed. No more would arrive in her inbox. No more tax estimations; no more monthly reports for the regent; no more pointless status reports for Theus; no more updates to file from the guard captains of the province.
Seraph was alone, as she had been for some time. Her errand boy was long gone. A skeleton crew of soldiers remained to protect the fort. She had sent the rest home weeks ago.
The stares she had received had been questioning when she had ordered so many of them to neighboring forts and towns. Even she had wondered if she was being rash, but events proved that she was right. This new Bastion from the Empire, Nathan Straub, was not an easy foe to reckon with. As she had suspected—despite Torneus’s belief otherwise—Nair had proven unreliable as an ally.
When the signal came during the battle over Nair’s tower, Seraph had ignored it. Something had felt wrong about the battle. For one thing, it didn’t seem right that Nair could defeat a Bastion by herself. Sunstorm had failed in her place. How could a sorceress like Nair succeed where a trained assassin like Sunstorm fail?
Minutes later—when Nair spells tore apart the Federation soldiers—Seraph felt vindicated, if empty.
Being right meant nothing if she didn’t gain anything.
Outside, Seraph heard jeers from the Empire’s troops. An assault must be beginning, she realized. It was earlier than she expected. Much earlier.
She had checked earlier in the day but saw only siege engines in the early stages of construction. That can only mean one thing: the Bastions were going to deploy their might. A reckless approach, but the only one they had.
The halls of the keep were empty as Seraph walked down them. Fort Taubrum had never been well furnished at the best of times, but she had ordered the few decorations to be taken away by the retreating soldiers. The walls stood bare, the lights off, and not a soul stirred in the place.
The ground shook. Dust fell from the ceiling, and Seraph felt her balance shift. Something struck the outer gate with such ferocity to shake the keep itself. Despite this, Seraph maintained her leisurely pace. She walked slowly and surely down the halls, taking in the sights of the keep that had been her home for over a year.
At the end of every chapter of her life, Seraph wondered what she could do differently in the next chapter. She considered it a chance to ruminate on what mistakes she could avoid next time.
Ironic, she thought, that this time she had made the greatest mistakes but had no chance to correct them. Her reflection on the past was purely for self-indulgent reasons. Her last chance to reflect on her life before she went out to face her end like a warrior.
By the time she made it to a balcony overseeing the outer fortress
, the gate had fallen. Dust billowed upward from the outer courtyard. Yelling, shouting, screaming. A cacophony of voices and battle filled the air. Seraph drank it in.
She spotted the glitter of gems. Enemy Champions.
Ducking back inside, she grabbed her prized weapons from the racks in the nearby armory. These consisted of a pair of polished wooden clubs with handles sticking out of from the sides. In her homeland, they were known as tonfas. She held them by the handles, and they protected her forearms during normal usage.
Now armed, Seraph charged back outside. She leaped down from the balcony. The dry dirt rose up to meet her, and she hit the ground in a roll. The battle surrounded her as she rose to her feet. Federation soldiers charged forward to defend the gate but found themselves pushed back. Dozens of Empire soldiers in dark uniforms surged through the wide-open hole that been torn through the wrought iron doors.
Seraph stepped forward and swung one of her arms across the air in a cutting motion. One of the jades implanted in her collarbone glimmered. The dust cloud rising in the air vanished in an instant.
Her vision restored, Seraph quickly found her targets. Behind the Empire soldiers were the enemy Champions. And more importantly, an enemy Bastion. The scouts had noted the presence of a powerful and important man at the battle of Nair’s tower. She hadn’t believed them, but now she had visual proof.
Leopold Tyrim himself, in the flesh. If she took his head, even Torneus couldn’t touch her. She would have slain the most powerful Bastion in the Anfang Empire.
Around him were other Champions and sorcerers. Some dust clung to the ground, so Seraph couldn’t get a good look at them. But she saw at least one Champion through the cloud. The glittering gems in her chest were a dead giveaway.
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