Fortress Al-Mir

Priscilla circled Elmshadow Burg high over its tallest building. High enough that it would have been difficult to see the burg. However, that wasn’t because of pure distance. Today was an overcast day. The clouds were low and dark. Or so she had heard before departing the tower.

It wasn’t like visibility mattered to Priscilla.

Still, Priscilla wiped at her face, grimacing at the feeling. Although winter was over, it was still chilly out. An ice dragonoid didn’t care about the temperature much but, combined with the moisture from the cloud constantly spraying against her face, Priscilla had to admit some level of discomfort. It reminded her of Umasab, a water dragon who… had died long ago.

The constant spray reminded her of him. His teasing. His casual laugh. His laborious breaths. His blood flowed freely from his heart, ignoring his pitiful attempts at controlling the liquid.

Three times in the past, Priscilla had fought. She had waged wars. The first, immediately following the Calamity, had been a war of aggression and rage, with no focus and no goal aside from inflicting pain upon the perpetrators of the Calamity. She had claimed a [HEART] for herself and, together with dozens of dragonoids and full dragons, cut a burning scar across the world.

There was nothing left of that scar. A thousand years was enough to heal many wounds. Cities had rebuilt. People returned and spread out. Rivers, though rerouted, settled and their new positions became the norm.

Yet, some of hers had perished. They didn’t heal. They didn’t return.

A scant fifty years after, Priscilla, though blinded and confused, had seen the stars shift. The dragon the humans called Gorethorn the Jinx had enacted great magics to bend the reality of the world. Priscilla had rallied her fellows to fight once more.

Only for the combined might of the Light, the Glory, and the Gold to slap them into the ground.

Some of hers had perished once again.

Two hundred years after that, the stars shifted once again. Priscilla had rallied and fought and bled and failed.

How long had it been since then? How long had she sat alone on the mountaintop, waiting and watching for signs of others who might be able to fix this broken world? Five hundred… six hundred… seven hundred years? More? For hundreds of years, she sat in silence.

Now, their numbers had been reduced to… well… to just her. Priscilla knew of at least one other dragonoid still alive, but she had abandoned the call. No one else was here. So either they had ignored the signs or they were dead.

Now, she was working with a human. That rankled. More than once, she had considered just taking his [HEART] for her own. It wouldn’t work. Her heart was cold and dead. Attempting to become a keeper once again would see her destroyed completely. The temptation was there regardless.

Now, things were different. Priscilla hadn’t kept up with the goings on of the world below during her time on the mountaintop, but what little she had seen and heard since her descent spoke volumes. The Light, the Gold, and the Glory were separated and decidedly ununified. In the times since she last fought, the three had fought among themselves. Or their followers had, which was roughly the same thing in the end.

While the current Keeper was an ignorant backwoods hunter, that simple state of the enemy factions alone gave him a far better chance than she had ever had—and thus, gave her a far better chance.

Even if his odds were low, he was still providing this opportunity.

A slight shift in the Stars served as her signal. Whether or not Arkk wanted her to act now wasn’t relevant. Priscilla pulled her wings tight and angled herself downward, sending her into a steep dive.

Opportunities like this were things she couldn’t pass up. For while Priscilla hated humans in general, she detested the ones who worshipped their gods. A whole city full of them?

The elemental crucible in the heart of her chest stirred as Priscilla unhinged her jaw.

“The dragonoid started early,” Rekk’ar grunted, lowering the telescoping lens from his eye. He leaned over one of the scrying pits, squinting at the crystal ball within as if to confirm what he had seen out the window.

Arkk frowned but shrugged. “Well, better than late. Or not starting at all. It wasn’t like we had an effective way of signaling her.”

“Think they’ll fall for it?”

“Don’t think it matters. If dragonoids are half as destructive as I’ve been led to believe, they can’t ignore her. With Evestani having concentrated all their forces on our side of the burg, having her attack from behind is going to force them to withdraw at least some of their soldiers.”

“Unless the avatar deals with her.”

Arkk couldn’t help the wince. “I don’t think that will happen. If it does, we can move in, fully committing knowing that we won’t have to face another of those large blasts or an impenetrable magical shield.”

“At the cost of the dragonoid?”

“Our presence and the threat we represent should keep her safe. If it doesn’t… Priscilla has an odd way of sensing the world around her. If anyone can preemptively move out of the way, it would be her.”

Rekk’ar shrugged and brought the spyglass back to his eye. “No skin off my back, I suppose.”

“I’d be more worried about the man in golden armor. He beat down Priscilla before using just his fists, grabbing her out of the sky when she swooped down to investigate an oddity that the ‘Stars’ warned her about.”

Rekk’ar just grunted an acknowledgment.

“In any case,” Arkk continued, “her starting early isn’t a problem. Tunnels are still being dug but we weren’t going to have people attack immediately. Have to give Evestani a chance to spread their forces thin.”

Agnete shivered despite herself.

Elmshadow Burg reverted a few weeks into the heart of winter. A thick layer of ice and snow ravaged the outer wall of the burg and several of the inner buildings. What had once been farmland, trampled and left untended, was a solid slate of ice. It was a rather impressive showing, in Agnete’s opinion. It would have been more impressive if the brunt of the attack had swept through the center of the burg rather than the fields outside, but she supposed she shouldn’t fault the blind dragonoid for being a little off in her aim.

At least she managed to get the back of the burg instead of the front. Or, worse, miss it entirely.

Agnete cracked her neck back and forth, sending a series of pops echoing off the rocky hills around the south side of the burg.

The signal hadn’t come yet but Agnete started to stride out into the open anyway. It wouldn’t do to be outshone by a glorified winter storm.

This, perhaps, was the first time she ever felt able to go all-out. With the inquisitors, she had been limited, chained almost literally. Joining with Arkk had been freeing but, at the same time, limiting in other ways. There were always people around. Flames and flesh just didn’t mix. She always had to hold herself back.

Being with Arkk brought along the surprise that she was actually able to hold herself back. Something about the magic of Fortress Al-Mir had freed her from the madness of the cleansing flame. Which, she was sure, her newfound allies appreciated to no end.

Today, Agnete stood alone. She was one of the few who had been identified as safe to engage. Relatively speaking. Given her earlier feat of deflecting one of those golden beams, the hope was that she could pull off that trick once again.

Never mind the fact that she had been knocked out entirely for days…

Agnete walked the short distance between the tunnel exit and the burg walls. There was little need to hide. While Priscilla attacked the north-west side of the burg, most eyes would be on her. The few that weren’t wouldn’t be able to react before…

Breathing deep, Agnete let her magic go. Like the bellows of a forge breathing fresh air over a few simmering embers, she let her breath out.

Flames erupted around her. She hadn’t bothered wearing clothes, knowing they would be burned off the moment she acted. All around her, weeds and plants that had survived dormant through the winter turned to ash. A wooden shack, built up against the wall, collapsed in on itself as flames surged forward. The shack didn’t provide even a moment of pause.

The wall itself exploded into the burg as her flames took hold. Bits of burning stone flew into the air, sailing outward. The flames on the normally inflammable bricks and rock only intensified, turning the stone molten and white-hot before they crashed into more buildings inside the burg. Each stone exploded on impact. Fire rippled out from the crash sites, exploding outward as they sent more bits of burning stone through the air.

A wide grin lit up Agnete’s face as she strode further into the burg.

“That flame witch started early too.”

Arkk sighed. “Protector, if you would be so kind as to signal the battlecasters and the bombardment team.”

“Understood.”

“The golden barrier has gone up!”

“Stop casting!”

Morvin removed his hands from the ritual array, complying with Gretchen’s command. Using the hem of his tunic, he wiped away a good deal of sweat from his forehead. The Prismatic Firestorm ritual had a bit of magical leakage somewhere in its array. Morvin wasn’t knowledgeable enough in ritual construction to identify the faults, but he could feel the effects.

Prismatic Firestorm was a specialty bombardment ritual developed by the Duke’s Grand Guard at the tail end of the last war. It called down a storm of magical fire in a spectrum of colors, each with its own unique property. Red flames burned as normal but blue flames splashed out into a flood of water, white flames froze, green flames corroded, and yellow flames created intense gusts of wind that typically agitated the other colors. It was a chaotic spell that wasn’t particularly discriminatory.

He wasn’t sure if the fault was in their version of the ritual or if it existed in the original, but every time the ritual produced a different color, some slight effect leaked out into the air around the ritual instead of the target location. Luckily, it was a problem they had known about beforehand.

Being surprised by a sudden flame igniting in the middle of the attack would have gone poorly.

“They’re on their way.”

“What?” Morvin glanced up to find Gretchen nervously biting at her lip. “Who?”

Instead of an answer, Gretchen just pointed, handing over a spyglass as she did so.

They were set up in the rocky hills north of Elmshadow Burg, just barely within range of the spell. The rituals weren’t meant to be dismantled and moved like this. The tower was supposed to have been their permanent home. Nevertheless, the new plan called for them to be moved, and, being one of the bombardment engineers, Morvin had to follow.

He felt… undefended. It was just him, Gretchen, and the looming presence of the Protector out here at the mouth of a tunnel that led back to the tower. The ritual required direct access to the sky, so they couldn’t just cast from underground. He understood that much. Still, would it have killed them to send a few guards as backup?

And now, raising the spyglass to his eye, he just about wet himself.

Elmshadow Burg stood in the distance, obviously scarred from the battles it had seen. Both from older battles and the current conflict that was just breaking out. Mostly the ice dragonoid laying on the… ice. Flames erupted in the distance on the other side of the burg. Although some ice and fire had gotten around the edges, the majority of the burg now sported a semi-transparent dome of gold, protecting it from further bombardment.

Although an imposing sight, that was the good news. The golden dome meant no golden rays. Arkk had specifically directed everyone into small groups to make each group less appealing of a target. The golden dome was what they had hoped for.

Horse riders by the dozen were charging forth from the walls of Elmshadow Burg. Absolutely the opposite of what Morvin had hoped for.

“They figured out where we were this fast?” he hissed, trying to keep his voice steady. He wasn’t sure that he succeeded. “What was the point in setting up behind these trees?”

He turned to find Gretchen crouched over the ritual array. The metal rings, linked in on themselves, turned slightly as she recalibrated the circle.

“Distance?” she called out.

“You’re recalibrating now? We need to get out of here!” They had the tunnel. They could escape. Arkk could teleport them directly in an emergency—and this was sure feeling like an emergency. He could even teleport the ritual circle and glowstones. That was how they got them out here.

“Distance!” Gretchen shouted, not looking up.

Gnawing on the inside of his cheek, Morvin turned back to the burg. He brought up the spyglass and tried to measure. “T… three thousand paces. Maybe?” They were charging. Hard. And they had already been moving before he first spotted them, maybe before the golden dome had even gone up. How fast would it be before they reached them at that rate? Three minutes? One per thousand paces?

Behind him, he heard the grinding of the targeting gears as Gretchen readjusted the ritual circle. It wasn’t meant for such close distances.

“Shout when they’re at a thousand paces.”

“A thousand? If you’re going to attack, do it now! Don’t wait… Oh Light…”

Reaching deep within himself, he felt for that link that connected him to Company Al-Mir. The one that had sprung up when he first joined. Arkk had told them all to tug on that if they were in trouble and this was trouble.

Wrapping a metaphorical hand around it like it was the reins of a horse, he yanked and then braced himself, fully expecting that disorientation that came with a sudden relocation.

None came.

He stood on the hill, near a lone tree, still watching those horses approach. Was Arkk busy? Focused on something else? “Oh Light! We need to—”

“How far?”

“A thousand five hundred… four hundred… three—”

“Close enough!” Gretchen shouted, slamming her hand down on the activation sigil.

The air around them turned humid and then plunged into a sudden chill, followed quickly by a heavy breeze blowing outward from the circle, a sweltering heat, and a rise in humidity. The sensation leaking from the ritual circle swapped back and forth, accompanied by brief flashes from the glowstones powering the array, randomly altering the environment.

Like falling stars, columns of flame crashed down from the sky on the hills ahead of Morvin. The spell couldn’t be targeted precisely. Just focused on a general area about the size of a village marketplace.

The first dozen horse riders charged straight through, clearing the area of effect well in advance of the first column striking the ground. Those behind weren’t so lucky.

A small tide of water covered the ground just before a sheet of ice spread out from the white flames. That alone sent five horses skidding about as they lost their traction. Two more erupted into short-lived flames before the wind threw them from their startled mounts. A third wasn’t so lucky as to have the flames extinguished.

But it wasn’t enough. The riders started evading the falling flames with the majority simply swinging wide around the area of effect to avoid it entirely. Barely a third fell to the siege spell.

It was made for buildings and burgs, not riders.

“Gretchen, we…” He paused, remembering one other thing Arkk mentioned. “Electro Deus!” he shouted, swinging a hand forward.

Blinding blue lightning crackled forward, soaring through the air until it slammed into the leader of the group. Morvin thought he had been aiming for the rider, but at the last moment, it veered down and struck the horse straight in its flat face. The hair burned and the skin blackened in an instant. It took two more steps forward before its knees buckled, skinning itself against the rocky ground as it ejected its rider.

Morvin sagged in sudden exhaustion but forced himself upright. He had been told that he had more magical potential than most, but also that that wasn’t saying much. Still, during training with Zullie before her incident, he had managed a full three lightning bolts before the exhaustion was too much to overcome.

“Electro Deus!” Gretchen shouted at his side, flinging forward a bolt of her own. Her bolt caught the shield of one of the armored riders. The crackling electricity jumped from the shield to the armor of the man who held it but, if it affected him, he sure didn’t show it. The horse felt it, though it didn’t fry, it did buck, throwing its rider.

“Electro Deus!” Morvin shouted again. This time, he made sure to aim for the horse. If the riders had some kind of magical protection in their armor, getting rid of their horses was their best bet for surviving just a little longer.

It was too late to run. Far too late. He had to hope that Arkk would notice them and help.

Morvin launched another bolt, then one more. Maybe it was the adrenaline or simply knowing that if he didn’t stop the riders, he was a dead man, but he managed a fifth bolt after that. Gretchen managed four before she sagged, panting and sweating.

The Protector moved. Morvin had almost forgotten about it. It normally just stood there, looming and staring without blinking—the creepy thing. But now, with Morvin and Gretchen barely able to move, it used its long legs to step directly over them. Just in time to meet the first rider that made it to them.

The rider leveled his pike at the Protector. The speartip glanced off the hardened carapace.

Morvin could hear the startled shriek as the Protector grasped the rider by the head in one of its four hands, kicking the horse out from under him. The horse crashed into another, sending it and its rider to the ground. All while the Protector swung the man it had grasped at a third rider. The sound of bones breaking filled the air.

Morvin didn’t get to watch the fight any further.

He almost threw up from the sudden relocation. The air changed. It was the comfortably warm air of the Walking Fortress. Gretchen landed on the ground beside him, too exhausted to prop herself up. She did vomit, spilling her last meal on the ground.

“Sorry about the delay,” Arkk said. He looked… angry. Thunderously so. His eyes blazed brighter than Morvin had ever seen. “There were complications.” Morvin waited for more but that was the only explanation he was getting. “You did well. Rest for now,” he said.

Again, the world around Morvin shifted as he popped into the barracks. Everything within was piled up on one side of the room for some reason but Morvin didn’t get a chance to consider why.

The second teleport was too much for him. Exhausted, nerves strained from the attack, and feeling sick from the smell of Gretchen’s vomit, he couldn’t help himself. He emptied his stomach on the floor of the barracks.