Sen blinked. “Oh my.”
I took a mental picture of her face before turning back to the battle. The main skirmish was up ahead. Some skimmers had apparently dropped to the ground, but several redbills flew overhead and clashed with skimmers still in the air. More shots fired from the camp’s barrier wall. It was impossible to tell who among our allies was piloting what. I couldn’t even see Reshi’s large jaspeth. Had they grounded it, or run afoul of a powerful skimmer team?
I ran as fast as I could with Dorian at my side. A ghastly cry cut through the air. I skidded to a stop as a shrieking decay cut off our path, dropping down from the sky. Its jaw unhinged to release a slew of gunk, which slammed into a nearby building. Shouts rose from inside as makers poured out of the building. The acid destroyed part of the walls, leaving a scar in its wake. A maker, male and stout with powerful muscles, turned with two allies to fire a weapon that resembled a crossbow.
It was a crossbow with a thick rope attached to it. The cord ended in a grappling hook. It tried to embed itself in the shrieking decay, but the monster was too fast.
Madness swarmed the camp. Some of our allies, who I recognized from their prominent vests and general lack of hunter-level height, toted around similar crossbows. A Reshi design? I watched a vampire in the distance hook a rope onto the skimmer. The pilot slammed his steering back, and the poor vampire flew into the sky before thinking to disengage. He plummeted to the ground, landing with a groan.
“Bav, disengage! Team Tahn, protect the resources in our stockpile. We need everyone at the entrance,” shouted a familiar voice. My face lifted, searching for the source of that well-known bark of confidence. “Team Grayson, go for the skimmer’s wings. Don’t let the skimmers pull you around like a game.”
Bravi.
If there was one person I was happy to see in charge at the camp, it was her. She effortlessly delivered orders like she’d been doing it all her life. Her precision was impeccable. She was alive and fighting with all her might. My heart felt light with a rush of affection despite the chaotic battle going on. She was really in front of us, finally.
Her short black hair was cut down to an inch. She snarled as another beast descended from the sky, but she was quicker with her crossbow than the others we’d seen. The animal was unlike anything I’d witnessed in the Immortal Plane; it had an almost humanoid form in its legs and trunk, but its beefy black torso ended in a set of leathery bat wings. Three terrible green eyes sat above a wide muzzle. The creature opened its mouth to shriek, revealing a row of sharp, spindly teeth that dripped with saliva.
Bravi glared up at the beast and aimed her crossbow weapon with expert precision. Her grappling hook connected. The cord lit up with sizzles of amber energy as it made contact with the monster’s skin. The bat-like beast wailed in pain, pumping its wings in an attempt to escape. Bravi gritted her fangs together and pulled back hard on her crossbow.
“Get down here,” she shouted, her words interspersed with grunts of effort.
“This one is fascinating,” Sen muttered behind me. Bravi, or the ugly bat? The arbiter mind was a mystery.
I took a step forward, preparing to help Bravi, when a gem blast cut me short. It came from a hunter strapped to the back of the animal. His saddle had blended in expertly. If the other hunters had invisibility, perhaps some of them were cloaked on the monsters and using them as mounts.
Bravi snarled with frustration, but the bat monster put up the perfect amount of resistance. She was fully engaged and unable to fight back. The creature tried to dislodge the cord with his wings as the hunter continued firing. Since he couldn’t get a line on her, he was attempting to sever the cord at an angle, but it made a small target, and the frantic motions of the beast complicated his aim.
Dorian glanced up at the beast and then back to me. He jerked his head in its direction and mimed climbing. Climb up a flying monster I’ve never seen before to punch a shooting hunter off his mount? Only for Bravi.
“Bravi,” Dorian called. She didn’t hear him at first. We both shouted her name as we ran up. She pulled her precious attention away from the monster for a moment and stared at us. Her face froze.
“Let us crawl up the rope,” I told her. Sen trailed behind us, elegantly dodging any blasts that came her way. She watched our exchange with interest.
“You,” Bravi breathed, and nearly dropped her crossbow. For a terrible moment, it looked like the beast might dislodge the cord, but she pulled hard on it while staring at us in disbelief.
“Let us help you,” Dorian said.
Bravi nodded numbly. Dorian stooped. I climbed atop his back without hesitation; we’d perfected our silent communication in the Games.
“Hold the line steady,” Dorian called. Bravi grunted as she pulled it taut using all her strength. I grabbed on to him and took a dagger from my weapons belt. It was nice to feel the cold bite of it in my hand again. The hunter changed his tactic to firing at us, but someone else fired at him from behind. The hunter snarled, his attention diverted as he fought off the new enemy from his rear. We managed to climb the rope in mere seconds thanks to Dorian’s speed. He immediately launched himself at the hunter, while I aimed for the base of the beast’s spine. I held on for dear life at the base of the saddle, which was wide enough to fit four bodies. Had the hunter lost a companion? I looked for the spine. If it’s half humanoid, it’s got to have some vertebrae to cut through.
Bravi grunted as she strained against the beast. I threw my weight behind my knife and slashed it with a furious movement, but one of the wings managed to escape the cord. It smacked me straight in the face. I hissed with pain, but it was almost nice to feel true pain again after our time in the Higher Plane. Adrenaline, pure and without any of the darkness from the curse’s old fix, coursed through me. Dorian tussled with the hunter as I lodged the blade into the black wing.
The wing’s flesh was tough to cut through. I managed to make a four-inch slice across the surface, causing the beast to shriek and lurch to the side. Dorian used the momentum to shove the hunter out of the saddle. He claimed the saddle for himself and reached down for me. The bat monster shuddered beneath us as I grabbed Dorian’s hand, and he pulled me up against him. I heard the cord of Bravi’s crossbow return. We careened toward the ground, and Dorian rolled off the beast as soon as the body struck the dirt, pulling me with him. Dorian wrapped me in his cloak, using the fabric to protect us from flying rocks and debris.
The world swam. I found my bearings and scrambled upward. Sen watched with mild interest. Bravi grinned with deranged glee, and then her mouth opened.
“You absolute lunatics,” she said hoarsely, shaking her head in disbelief. “You’re here. You’re actually here.” Her face hardened, but for a brief moment, her gaze went glassy. She managed a stiff, pissed-off smile. “You have some nerve, showing up in the middle of a battle and taking down my beast. Where the hell have you guys been?” That was when Bravi spotted Sen, who stood over the twitching body of the hunter. His dead muscles pulsed, and Sen stooped to examine the body.
Bravi gave Sen an odd look as the arbiter stared at the hunter’s body. Bravi opened her mouth and then shut it, as if thinking better of wasting time on questioning Sen’s presence right now.
“It’s a long story,” Dorian said. I nodded, feeling a rush of joy just to see Bravi again. “We’ll explain later, but right now we need to warn you. There’s a second wave of hunters on the other side of camp.”
Bravi scoffed. “That’s your reunion present for me?” She cast a doubtful look across the camp, where nothing remained of the hunters but a few scattered corpses.
“They’re just beyond the wall, and apparently the rulers have figured out how to make themselves invisible, so you’re welcome for the information.” I smirked. “And it’s great to see you again.”
Bravi’s face softened. “Of course, I trust you two. Even when this one runs off like he’s king of the world all the time.” She raised a teasing chin in Dori
an’s direction. “I’d follow you guys anywhere, even if I’m utterly furious at the moment. So, invisible hunters?” She placed her fingers in her mouth and released an ear-piercing whistle. A number of wildlings and vampires rushed over to us.
“Team Grayson reporting,” Kono wheezed as he ran up, clutching his side. “One of those skimmers nailed me right in the—” He stopped short when he saw us. “You guys!” He wasn’t originally on Team Grayson with us. I wanted to ask about Gina and Zach, but there was no time.
Bravi lifted a hand. “Kono, grab half of Team Than and anyone with a decent grasp of the crossbow. There’s a second wave of invisible fighters apparently hiding in wait for us.” She called out to the closest watchtower, “Reshi, I need two mechanical jaspeths on the southern end of the camp, if you can spare them.”
Reshi had dismounted her large mechanical jaspeth and was attending to the firing system in one of the raised columns. She spotted us and offered a quick wave. Two wildlings flew toward us on the smaller jaspeths.
Bravi turned to us with a satisfied grin as a group of a dozen Coalition members ran to join us. Their vests might have been torn, their faces worn, but they were ready to fight. I burned with pride. They obviously had been through a lot, but they were still prepared to persevere.
The sight reminded me of why we fought as hard as we did, because we did it together. Sen flickered her gaze between us and Bravi, clearly wielding a calm intrigue in the way that only an arbiter could get away with. Dorian motioned for everyone to follow him. We fell into silence as we moved away from the ongoing chaos. Two more skimmers had fallen. Members of the Coalition were still firing away from the towers at oncoming skimmers.
“Near the wall?” Kono whispered. “I can’t sense anything.”
Fear pricked me. “You won’t. They can cover their auras, but perhaps the makers or the wildlings can sense the magic they’re using.” I threw a glance at one of the wildlings on the jaspeth contraption. It was incredibly silent, despite the wings. He was the one who had helped Kono take out a skimmer earlier. He shook his head.
Okay, that’s not great. Makers and wildlings should have been able to sense magic up close, but not even they felt it. I met Dorian’s gaze with worry in my furrowed brow. We were in the same boat as our allies. What if the hidden team had moved since we’d been in battle?
Sen cleared her throat. “You know, I can sense them. They’re hiding in the trees.” Every head turned toward her. She spoke in her usual borderline dreamy tone. “This is the information you need to protect the camp and initiate our plan, correct?” A maker with feline features leaned forward, openly peering at the sea-green color of Sen’s skin.
Bravi rounded on her. “And who, exactly, are you that you can sense what none of us can?”
“An interested party,” Sen replied blandly. Bravi curled her lips into an aggravated snarl, looking on the verge of saying something Kane-like. I jumped between them and dropped my voice to a whisper. Even if our enemies had retreated to the trees, hunter hearing was excellent.
“We can make introductions later, but we need to move forward. Which way, Sen?”
Bravi pressed her mouth into a skeptical line. Sen scanned the wall in front of us. The tall treetops swayed, flirting just above the edge of the wall. Sen took off toward one of the built-in staircases, and we followed. Bravi directed us to a hidden door in the back wall from the stairs. I imagined a design component originally thought of by the hunters who lived here in case they needed to sneak in or out.
We emerged from the short tunnel. The trees gave away nothing in the distance, but Sen hummed with interest.
“Clever work on their magic,” she muttered, almost complimentary. Even in the dark, I made out the annoyed glares that Bravi and another wildling shot toward our arbiter babysitter. “Oh, they’re coming.”
Gem blasts flew through the air like a sudden storm. A mechanical jaspeth veered to the side. They had come over the wall, too large to fit through the secret door. An invisible force had swiped at one of them and caught the wildling pilot, who yelled in pain. Blood flew through the air. I fell back for a moment as the jaspeths fired in retaliation.
“They’re strong and invisible, apparently.”
“On your right, six inches above eye level.” Sen’s voice was like a ghostly whisper in my ear. I didn’t hesitate, just stabbed where she’d directed, burying my blade with sick satisfaction in the invisible neck of a hunter. The blood… the blood was visible. It sprayed over me as I yanked my hand back. Sen’s warning came just in time. “He’s not dead!”
I jumped back. Long gone was the comforting but weird embrace of stasis. Here, it was all pain and struggle. The vampires around me worked easily. Their senses were electric. The sound of blades sliced through the air. Why no lasers from the hunters? Unless they’d planned to slink into the camp and assassinate us after the fighting started winding down and the Coalition thought they were mostly safe?
“Uppercut punch, like you’re aiming for Un’s proxy. He’s wiped off the blood in the grass.” He was barely visible in my eyes now, like a moving, shadowy smudge of paint.
I bit back a resigned scoff as I did as Sen said. I brought my fist up, and it connected hard with the hunter’s chin. Pain surged through my arm at the contact. I leapt back as Sen called for one of the jaspeths. A stream of blasted energy knocked into my invisible opponent, earning a pained scream from him. I heard the satisfying thump of a heavy body as it tumbled down.
I looked around. Bravi was already bleeding from her face, the wound running dark with her shadowy blood. Her fangs extended fully in the dim light. Kono huffed, nursing a wound. His vest was shredded to tatters. I looked around, a feeling of sudden hopelessness crashing over me.
“Well, I definitely appreciate your news now,” Bravi muttered next to me. “My only question is, how can we make these monsters visible?”
6
Lyra
Months spent in the Higher Plane had done something to me. There, I learned to wield power. There, Dorian and I were more equal in terms of our senses. There, I whipped up tornadoes and threw my well-trained muscles behind them.
Here, I was thrown back into disarray.
Our enemies retreated for a moment. The grass stirred. I strained to hear the sounds of skittering feet. My pulse threatened to overtake my hearing as blood rushed to my face. Bravi swiped blood from her face and sweat from her brow. A maker from our group nursed an injured arm.
“Fall back, Levonia,” Bravi commanded. The maker, three heads taller than me with a broad, wickedly handsome face, nodded. Bravi stuck to the outer wall but lifted her vampire gauntlet to deliver long-range attacks. For a brief second, I surveyed Bravi’s group. The new Team Grayson had certainly changed, but Bravi ordered each and all of them around in a Bryce-like manner. She must’ve spent the last three months training them.
Too long.
Dorian placed his hand over a shallow cut on his chest and snarled as the trees swayed in the wind. He met my gaze squarely and gave a sharp nod. This would be a challenge. We had gotten used to fighting in the Higher Plane, but we were back to the Immortal Plane’s rules. The addition of invisible technology made it harder to use Reshi’s technology.
“Approaching,” Sen shouted.
A maker on the right cried, “This wave has mounts with them. Anachrin.”
Bravi roared. “Spider beasts,” she said when she caught my confused frown. “I hope you’re good with eight legs and teeth.” Great. I’d just gotten away from Un’s spider-dog, and now the Immortal Plane was throwing them at me. Maybe the universe was trying to tell me something. At least the training in the Higher Plane would come in handy.
“On your left, Lyra. The beast approaches, a hunter on top.” Though she stood next to me, Sen’s voice boomed across the field, as if she wasn’t used to the way acoustics worked in the Immortal Plane. For a brief moment, I listened for the sound of clicking legs, remembering how Un’s proxy had found u
s when we tried to rescue Aurora. I wished Bravi had an extra crossbow, because Ruk had taught me to go for the legs with beasts like that.
The wind shifted suddenly as the invisible enemies approached. I lunged forward and dove to the ground, slicing the heavy air beside me. A beast cried in my ear. I heard the crunch of cartilage as bony legs gave way beneath my blade. The anachrin luckily had flimsier parts than the bat-like mount. The spider slumped to the side, but not before I heard the sure thud of a hunter’s feet dismounting.
“To your—”
But Sen was too late. I grunted as a blade made contact with the front of my stomach. It only caught the surface of my skin, but I hadn’t seen my own blood in some time. I threw myself backward, but not before landing my bracer on something hard. Metal clinked, and then the blade appeared in the real world, the cloaking magic falling away. It fell to the ground as I hurriedly retreated.
“Their swords are magicked,” I yelled, before the hunter could land the next blow. “And apparently very heavy.”
The hunter and I came to blows. My invisible enemy had abandoned his sword, but he was better with his hands. His punches were monstrously powerful when I dodged them and worse when they hit. Sen whispered urgent directions to me. I swallowed my brief blip of wounded pride at my sudden dependency. Irrikus had played dirty with this troop. There was no honor in a fight like this. He’s got nothing good in him left.
The hunter managed to push me back, but he tripped over something I couldn’t see. It was with great satisfaction that I remembered his own mount’s body. The wounded spidery beast gave a cry as the heavy hunter landed on it, likely ending the beast’s pain. My bracer felt warm. Lanzon’s stone had evidently warmed up after hitting enough of the hunter’s armor. I didn’t wait for him to struggle back up before I slammed one of Reshi’s knives into what I suspected was his belly. His armor, unmagicked, I sliced through easily, but I still couldn’t see it. Did it have to be dropped off his body to turn visible? Perhaps my stone’s magic had some limitations. The stench of hunter blood filled my nostrils. At least I could see it.
Darklight 7: Darkfall Page 5
