BT IV - Chapter 35

Micah gripped his spear with his right hand, grasping hold of the scepter with his left in order to take mental control over two of the crystal spears that sat in the bandoleer on his back.

“So Princess,” he said tightly, eyes locked on the battle fortress.  “Do we have a contingency plan for this?”

Onboard the floating castle, groups of forgotten began tipping what looked like human bodies over the edge toward Sandrovok’s army below.

“Our battle lines are meaningless against an enemy that can fly,” Micah continued.  “More importantly we only have one high leveled blessed within range.  He will be able to help, but I doubt he has the power to turn the die of the battle on his own.”

The first of the bodies slammed down into the Sandrovok army, detonating as soon as it touched the ground.  The blast didn’t kill many soldiers, those near the source of the explosion soaked up most of the force, but Micah could feel his stomach drop as he watched the distant forgotten dragging more and more bodies to the castle’s walls.

Their dynamics had been reversed.  Sandrovok’s army had been winning the battle because its long ranged weapons could attack with impunity, forcing Pereston to attack recklessly and waste lives.

“Of course we have a contingency plan,” Gwen replied grimly.  “We have a plan for everything.  It just isn’t a good one.”

Explosions began to crackle like firecrackers as corpses detonated across the battlefield.  In their wake, forgotten and daemons swooped down plucking soldiers up into the air where they were ripped apart with contemptuous ease.

“You rouse your companions, and we make a path for you,” she continued, eyes locked on the hovering fortress.  “With any luck, our assault will draw enough attention that the Third Prince will be forced to show itself.  How’s that for your plan?”

Micah reached up and itched the back of his neck with the scepter, jumping slightly at the sensation of the cold metal on his bare skin.

“Frankly,” he replied, “I don’t think I like it.  Your army is getting hammered, and we don’t even have the rest of the high level blessed here to support us.  Attacking on our own isn’t even guaranteed to bring the Prince out.  You’re more or less asking us to charge headlong into a lion’s den in the hope that we will be strong enough to defeat everything in our path, including a an ancient being of unfathomable power.”

“Well too bad,” the Princess said with a bleak grin.  “This actually is the contingency plan, not something we made up on the fly.  The rest of the elites will be here in a couple of minutes, but there job will be to draw fire and distract.  Mother left me with a present that will make sure to draw the Prince out of its cave, for good or ill.  Now the only real hope is to disrupt its battle plan quickly enough that we can throw it off balance.”

“I’m not sure the Prince actually has a plan beyond overwhelming power,” Micah responded, watching another wave of luocas launch themselves from the castle walls, locust wings buzzing as the dove toward the chaotic battlefield.  The Sandrovok army was fighting back, but it was far from enough.  Here and there, a daemon or forgotten fell from the sky, but for every flying attacker that died, an entire squad of blessed was wiped out.

It was like watching hell descend on Karell.  Forgotten, covered head to toe in gore cackled madly as the grabbed soldiers and tore them apart with absurd strength, volleys of spells detonating in the air around them.  Careful formations were scattered by the corpse bombs and constant aerial harassment, forcing soldiers to fight back against more powerful opponents in ones and twos.

Even on the other side of the river, their tentative victory had collapsed as attacks from the air decimated any sense of order that the army might try to restore.  Really, the only place where there was anything approaching organization was in the area surrounding the 4 war lizards.  The 3 mounting catapults were firing shells into the air where they would explode in huge spheres of elemental energy that kept the skies above them more or less clear.

On the ground, the ax wielder was fighting with the tortoise shelled greater daemon.  He wasn’t winning, but with the help of the amulet that Micah had made for him back at the palace, he was still alive, and his attacks were slowly starting to chip away at the monster’s armor.

It was only a matter of time though.  Micah knew that the power sources on his enchantments would only last for 5 minutes.  Long enough to hold off a greater daemon or kill one with the help of a team, but soon the man would be left unprotected.  He likely wouldn’t die instantly, but he would die and it wouldn’t be pretty.  Without an Arcana skill, the monster’s aura would attack the entirety of his being at the same time.  Even if his armor and skin could handle it, the tender membranes of his eyes, throat and lungs would shred themselves and he would die choking on his own blood.

Micah had warned everyone of the dangers of the greater daemons as well as the limitations of the magical tools he had forged, but still the man, one of Gwen’s uncles, fought on.  He knew he was going to die, but if his death could buy another 5 or 10 minutes.

“They’re all going to die,” Micah said quietly, tearing his eyes away from the elderly warrior.  “If we’re lucky they’ll be able to hold the field long enough for high level support to arrive.”

Another wave of corpses were tossed from the castle walls.  Some of the forgotten had strung up an apparatus made of netting that let them swing and throw the bodies to give them extra distance.

“Yes,” Gwendolyn replied, her voice even.  “You yourself said this wasn’t going to be a clean war Micah.  You knew what we were about to do.”

He sighed as a rolling wave of explosions rocked the ground as the bodies began to detonate.  She was right.  He had always known how this battle was going to end, but as hardened as he was from years of training and tragedy, it was still another thing to actually see it born out.

Eris, Esther and Drekt dying in a doomed fight with a luoca in the last timeline was still fresh in Micah’s memory.  He had fought in a doomed war to save humanity’s soul once.  It shouldn’t surprise him that his careful efforts to avoid the past had fallen apart at the last minute, but at the same time-

Micah shook his head, clearing the distressing thoughts.  Worrying wouldn’t change the situation.  The reality of things was that they were outmatched, but the Prince was in the castle above him.  It was impossible for Micah to ignore the malevolent energy pouring off of the daemon.

“You’re right,” he said, squeezing his spear with both hands as he looked up at the castle.  “I don’t like it, but you’re right.  The only change in plans I would suggest is that we injure or disable the unengaged greater daemon as we lead the attack on the castle.”

Gwen cocked her head to the side, lips moving silently as if she were speaking to someone.  Finally she nodded her head, a predatory smile on her face as she addressed him.

“We think that can be arranged.  After all, we did promise a distraction that would draw the Prince out.”

He frowned, tearing his gaze from the slaughter fields and back to the princess.

“What do you mean by that, also since when do you use the royal we, I thought only the Empress did-”

He stopped as magic surged.  The war lizard that Gwen was riding let out a pathetic chirping sound before its flesh began to twist and stretch.  It grew thinner and longer, fat and extraneous bulk disappearing to fuel its transition into a sleek, lethal form.

The scales above its shoulder bulged and shattered, exposing whitish yellow bone that sprang outward, taking the shape of a wing before flesh began to crawl up their length.  Under Micah’s horrified gaze scales and translucent membrane sprouted from the half formed limb, and in a matter of seconds, the creature that had been the lizard sported a pair of large, muscular wings.

It was practically overflowing with the energy of Elsewhere, but there was a strange taste to it.  Almost as if the power had been toned down and modified to avoid the worst of the corrosion created by the daemons.  The beast wasn’t entirely at home on Karell, but at the same time, it wasn’t something completely alien that the planet was actively trying to reject.

The creature turned to contemplate Micah, and there was a strange sense of intelligence in its hand-sized eyes.  This wasn’t a simple dungeon-born monster.  It was like Telivern or Ravi.  Intelligent, but ultimately alien.

Micah inclined his head slightly to the creature before addressing it.

“The Dragon I presume?  I had assumed you would be showing up at some point, but nothing so dramatic.”

The creature let out a low rumbling growl.  The sound should have been threatening, but for some reason it just wasn’t.  Micah couldn’t read it like he could Telivern, but he could feel some of the intent behind the noise.  There was no aggression, only an attempt to communicate.

“We have never used the royal we,” Gwen replied, leaning forward on the daemo’s back to grip 2 of the bone spines that had sprouted from its neck to create a sort of mane or crest.  “There are simply 2 of us present.  Same with my mother.  Any time she used the word ‘we’ it meant that the ancestor was monitoring her through her blessing.”

“As for the ancestor itself,” she continued.  “It says that it felt you touch true power yesterday and requests that you not do so until the critical moment.  The Prince can touch the true power as well, and it has more experience than you.  Your only chance is to take it by surprise.”

“On that we agree.”  Micah locked eyes with the Dragon.  He could see it now, the faint flicker of green flames in the depth of its pupils as it watched him.  “I am fully aware of what the Third Prince is and the magnitude of its power.  I have no faith in defeating it, but as I am now, I think that I have a reasonable chance of success.”

The Dragon let out a rumbling growl.  Once again, there was no heat or anger behind it.

“But-” Gwen began, her eyes widening only for the Dragon to toss its head and make a second deep thrumming noise.

She closed her eyes, taking a deep shuddering breath before she relayed its words.

“The Dragon only wishes to ask one favor.  If you survive and it does not, please protect its children.  It says that its time on Karell has… infected it with sentiment.  It has bound itself to our family, and it asks that we be preserved if possible.”

Micah nodded gravely, stepping forward and laying a single hand on the surprisingly cool scales of the creature’s forehead.

“I promise.”  The words were solemn, carrying a sense of weight and finality to them that almost made Micah stagger.

It lowered its head, pressing the scales against his hand for a second before taking a step backward, a low reverberating note lingering in the back of its throat.

“We-well,” Gwen said hesitantly.  “I guess that’s it.  The ancestor will come to your aid as soon as we are done with the greater daemon.  Hopefully-”

She caught herself, flashing Micah a weak smile.

“Hopefully it will be on time.  We would hate for the world’s last hope to end before we even have a chance to help.”

“Me too.”  Micah almost bit his tongue as he responded.  His words were weak.  Meaningless at a time like this.  He opened his mouth to say something better but the Dragon had broken into a run.  A couple of flaps later and it was in the air, rising through a sky filled with smaller daemons, forgotten, and skeletal birds en route to the second greater daemon.

For good or ill, the die was cast.

He took a deep breath and turned to the rest of his group.  Baron Harris and his scouts were standing in the midst of his guild, his eyes as wide as saucers and mouth agape as he watched the princess fly away.  For a second, Micah considered filling him in on the information that he was missing, but he gave up almost immediately.

The man wouldn’t understand and words would be a waste of time.

He slammed the butt of his spear into the ground, using enough of his body attribute that the resulting thud drew the attention of all of the nearby blessed.

“I suppose you heard my conversation with the princess.”

A moment of silence broken by Trevor’s shout.

“You didn’t even ask her for a goodbye kiss!  You’re losing your touch Micah.”

That broke some of the tension.  Most of the guild chuckled.  Their backs and necks were still tight as they watched the hellscape unfolding around them, but at the very minimum there were weak smiles on their faces.

“Thank you for your contribution Trevor,” Micah said, inclining his head slightly toward his brother.  “I’m not really one for speeches so I’ll keep this brief.  The fight today isn’t one where retreat is an option.  If we lose, every person on Karell will die.  Some sooner than others, but the end of all life is inevitable.  As awful as the situation is, our path forward is clear.  There is a flying castle teeming with enemies, and the architect of our troubles is hiding in it.  If we fight and draw the creature out and defeat it, we win.  If we don’t-”

Micah shrugged.  There really wasn’t much point in hammering that point home.  He’d already said everything that needed to be heard.

“I’m not going to force anyone to go to attack the castle with us.  Of course, if you stay here you’ll have to deal with this battlefield, but whatever you want, the choice is yours.”

The minute he stopped speaking, Trevor and Drekt walked over to stand next to Micah, his brother ducking under one of the floating crystal spears to slap a hand on his shoulder.

“That’s right,” Trevor said cheerfully.  “Remember.  If we die winning this stupid war, we die heroes.  If we survive?  Well, either way the bards won’t forget us for a hundred years.  But if you turn and run?  You’ll be just as dead, just dead and a coward.”

He didn’t even finish before Leeka led Eris and Esther over followed only a fraction of a second later by Ravi and Telivern.  That unleashed the floodgates.  The remaining blessed  walked over to join Micah.  Even Baron Harris, his knuckles white as he gripped the hilt of his sword, forced a stiff smile onto his face as he approached.

It was strangely touching.  Micah had trained his guild until they were strong enough to hold their own against most of the lesser daemons, but he had seen Harris fight.  He had a powerful weapon, but actual combat with the Prince’s forces was a tall order.

“Well,” he said with a grim smile surveying the 80 or so blessed that were willing to take the plunge with him.  “I suppose that I should probably start casting Flight and working on shielding you from the fields produced by those gemstones.”