Undermind

Garrain stroked the egg reverently. Such a tiny thing compared to the vast form of her mother, whose serpentine neck coiled about them both.

What strange fate awaited their nestling? Would she be alvesse or dracken, or an altogether different creature? Whatever she became, she would be theirs, and he couldn’t wait to welcome her into this world.

“It’s good timing, I suppose, that you brought her forth this morn,” he spoke into Nuille’s ear. “Now you won’t be restricted to dracken form. Although I’m certain this form will be of great use in the battle to come.”

At his mention of the word ‘battle,’ Nuille raised her head, and bared her teeth, and a small wisp of smoke emerged from her nostrils. Yes, she would be a formidable weapon indeed. He didn’t like to think of his lifemate as a weapon, but when it came to this battle, they needed every advantage they could get.

Her form shimmered, and drew inward. Wings became arms. Red-gold scales became dappled green-gold skin. Then he was looking into achingly familiar amber-coloured eyes.

Nuille stood shakily, blinking in the morning light. “That was…” Her words came out as a growl. She coughed, and tried again. “That was an experience. I can’t say laying an egg was ever high on the list of things I thought I’d be doing this mildsummer. Although I’m certain it was less painful than the usual birthing.”

He drew her close, enjoying the touch of her skin against him.

She gently pushed him away. “Not now, ardonis. We need to get our nestling underground. And then I’m taking a quick bath. I’m disgusting right now.”

“You have never looked more resplendent,” he countered. “Though you are quite right that we should see to her safety above all else.”

Safety was a relative concept on a branch that was about to be put to the flame by drackens and Chosen. The best they could do was to leave her in the safekeeping of someone who would be taking shelter beneath the surface of the arbor, beyond the reach of any drackens. Throughout the hills and plains of northern Lumium, and beneath Ambiellar, there were a plethora of crevices and caves and tunnels they could hide in. Here, as on Ciendil, there were larger caverns and immense hollows further beneath the surface. But those were not readily accessible this far north. There wasn’t time to push further south into contested territory. Without Saskia or Ruhildi here to aid them, it would be a battle of attrition, and they’d more than likely find themselves caught between the high alvari loyalists and the drackens. So these smaller, shallower tunnels would have to do.

Such tunnels were only a partial protection, because although the drackens couldn’t enter them, their riders could. There really was no guaranteed safe haven. All they could do was choose wisely, and hope for the best.

The walls of Ambiellar would be no defence against drackens, and the city was a huge, obvious target. Some of Ambiellar’s inhabitants had already fled into the hills, but many were remaining behind to defend their homes, aided by Illiur’s legions. Garrain wasn’t about to entrust the safety of his progeny to those gallant, desperate dunderbirds.

No, the site they’d selected was beneath an unassuming hill as far from the city as they could reasonably go. There were no major landmarks nearby. Nothing that might tempt anyone to search there. He could only hope it would be enough.

“I will take good care of her,” the oracle, Wuishe, assured them as she gingerly took hold of the egg, swaddled in a nest of blankets. She’d keep the egg warm, and provide a final defence in the unlikely event the enemy came this way.

“Thank you ever so much for doing this,” said Nuille.

“No problemo,” said the oracle, speaking the words from Saskia’s world as if they were her own. “It’s not as if I would be much use up there on the surface. At least here, I can do something worthwhile.”

Bidding Wuishe farewell, they took a quick dip in a stream, then Nuille shifted into dracken form once more, and bore him into the northern hills, where ‘delay teams,’ as Baldreg called them, were waiting.

There were hundreds of these teams scattered across northern Lumium, ready to strike at their foes from the shadows, and run or hide when they came under attack. They couldn’t hope to defeat such an overwhelming force in a direct confrontation, but they were hoping to be enough of a nuisance to slow their enemy’s advance and divert them away from Ambiellar, buying Saskia the time she needed to come to their rescue.

Some of their most powerful defenders had gathered in these hills. To the far east, Vask’s squadron of trow roptir riders circled a rocky hilltop. If they were fast enough, they might be able to lead their foes on a chase away from the city and surrounding settlements, and perhaps bring down a dracken or two along the way.

Somewhere down on the ground lurked teams of high alvari shadowmasters and quickdraws, hidden under their powerful concealment magic.

Hanging in the air over a steep, rocky gorge was the airship, Hindenburger, flown by none other than Dallim. No-one expected the Hindenburger to survive the battle—though if all went to plan, Dallim would no longer be inside the airship when it went down. It was there simply to provide a tempting target for the drackens, luring them into the ravine, where a trap awaited them. Kveld and the other stoneshapers and engineers were hard at work fortifying the cliffs and tunnels for the coming battle. Small windows had been carved into the sides of the cliffs. Inside, they’d placed some of the trow net-flingers, as well as a few of the new weapons. Cannons, they were called, and they were as deadly as they were noisy.

Standing atop the lip of the ravine, Baldreg looked up at them as they flew past. “Your child-to-be is safe?” he asked, speaking clearly into Garrain’s ears, despite the distance separating them.

“As safe as one can be, given the circumstances,” said Garrain. He looked out across the gorge. “I hope this works.”

“You ken as well as I do that nothing ever goes quite according to plan,” said Baldreg. “I’ll consider it a success if we can just slay a fistful of them afore…”

“I plan to do better than that,” said Garrain. “And remember, our goal is to delay them until Saskia can get here. Don’t cast aside your lives in a futile last stand. If the battle turns, take your dwarrows and flee into the tunnels.”

“You forget you’re speaking to one of the Vindicals,” said Baldreg. “We invented such tactics.”

Garrain inclined his head down at the dwarrow. Though he never spoke it aloud, Garrain often wondered how much of the old Baldreg had been stripped away during his brief time as a Chosen. He had most definitely changed, but was he still Baldreg?

They flew onward to a grove of tall trees, above which swarmed cruel-beaked birds and buzzing thorasps, with their gossamer wings and long, coiled stingers. These had answered the call of the beastmasters, Vannach and Cargard. Only with the vast bounty of Saskia’s essence to draw on, could the brothers command a swarm so large, and across such a great distance. Garrain ached a little at the realisation that most of these innocent creatures would be seared from the sky in the coming battle.

Inside the grove, Sionne and Yasmithe, their fellow greenhands, were reshaping trees into weapons of war. The trees of Lumium were smaller and sparser than Ciendil’s forests had been, before the Great Winter, but they had their own kind of majesty. The song of life was vibrant as ever here. It was a shame to disturb the natural balance of the grove, but if they did not, then many other trees would surely burn.

Landing just outside the grove, Garrain and Nuille stepped through the trees to prepare their own contribution to the battle. Roots splayed wide, gripping tightly to the soil. Trunks stretched, elongated, and flexed, lowering their crowns all the way down to the ground. The branches of their crowns fused together into huge bowls, within which coalesced pools of murky green liquid. That liquid was a form of life, but a dark, malevolent kind. It would bring death upon any creature of flesh and blood who came into contact with it.

These were similar to the catapults his people had used in sieges for many a span. But Garrain had added a small, but vicious tweak to the spell.

Vannach came near, his four eyes blinking. “I’m not sure I want to know. Can they hit a dracken?”

“If the drackens fly low enough,” said Garrain.

“We’ll make sure they do.”

Garrain and Nuille weren’t finished yet. There were other, more radical spells he’d invented in the days since their flight from the Crown of the World. If he’d had these spells at the time, how different might that battle have turned out? The trows wouldn’t have won, but they might have exacted a greater toll on their enemy before they fell.

Half a bell later, a voice sounded in his ear. And from the way Nuille stiffened beside him, he could tell she heard the same voice. Saskia’s voice.

“It’s showtime, guys. The forward lookouts are seeing a huge swarm of drackens coming up from the northwest side of the trunk. It’ll take us a little while longer to reach you. So just hold out as long as you can, take cover when you can’t, and please don’t die.”

“We’ll make you proud, Caesitor,” said Baldreg. “And if we do have to make a one-way journey to the Halls Beyond, we’ll be taking a lot of those bastards with us.”

“There are drackens in the Halls Beyond?” said Kveld.

“There will be after today,” said Baldreg.

“You can have them,” said Vannach. “We forest alvari keep our Vale of Echoes pristine and dracken-free.”

Nuille let out a low growl.

Vannach gave a nervous laugh. “Except for a certain terrifying, shapeshifted alvesse.”

“I, for one, have no intention of dying,” said Velandir. Saskia’s favourite among their new allies, was not with the other shadowmasters—having elected to stay behind in Ambiellar. Velandir didn’t give his reasons, but Garrain suspected it was so he could keep an eye on the regent, Illiur.

Nuille bore him once more into the air—though she kept low enough for them to retain control over their new weapons on the ground. In the distance, black stormclouds gathered. Thousands of frostlings had gathered in the north, where they formed the first line of defence against the drackenflight.

The little terrors had lost their queen, half of their minds, and their bond to Saskia, but their ice magic and their will to fight the Arbordeus were as strong as ever. Frostling tempests from Ciendil, with the help of their local cousins on the ground, would be driving hail and snow and sleet into the faces of the enemy, blocking their sight and slowing their advance. He just wished he could see what transpired behind those clouds.

“Dogramit.” Saskia’s voice sounded in his ears. “Get under cover, little guys!”

“What’s happening?” asked Nuille.

“Abellion’s forces have better intel than I’d hoped,” said Saskia. “They’re going for the frostlings on the ground with pinpoint accuracy, even though they shouldn’t be able to see crap. It’s almost as if…could they have an oracle with them?”

“Deus!” said Garrain. “The Primordial, Xonroth.”

“Oh…crap,” said Saskia. “He has the power of multiple worldseeds, doesn’t he? As well as whatever magic a Chosen adds to the mix. So why not farsight too?”

A shiver of unease found its way into Garrain’s stomach. If the Primordial was an oracle, then his sight might extend deep inside the arbor. He might be able to see where Wuishe hid the egg. Garrain tried to reassure himself that there were limits to what an oracle could see. Not even Saskia, the most powerful oracle ever to walk the arbor, could see everywhere at once.

They waited while the approaching storm marked the enemy’s passage across the northern plains. The clouds seemed to be thinning as they drew closer. Frostling tempests were nimble and quick, but not fast enough, it seemed, to escape the drackens’ wrath. By the time the drackens reached the northern hills, Garrain could see their dark silhouettes against the roiling sky. Several of the drackens broke off the main group, soaring straight toward their grove, lured by the sight of Nuille in the air. More followed a moment later. Garrain counted eleven of them.

Having the enemy split their forces was perhaps the best outcome they could have hoped for. Few enough drackens that they stood a fighting chance, but enough to take some of the burden off the city.

Landing back in the grove, Garrain spread his awareness out among his altered trees, readying them for action. Nuille stood beside him; a comforting presence—and a tremendous power in her own right.

Though few weapons could strike a dracken from this vantage, his were different, and he also had the assistance of Saskia’s farstriker magic—her ‘aiming interface,’ as she called it.

Throughout the forest, branches creaked and groaned, straining almost to the breaking point. And then, as one, they released.

Hundreds of spears shot skyward, fired by trees that had been reshaped into enormous ballistae. Hardened by magic, the spear tips sunk deep into dracken flesh.

Flapping torn wings, one of the drackens plunged to the ground, where the trows swept over it—and its unfortunate skarakh riders. Other drackens wheeled about in the air, and dove for Garrain and Nuille.

He spotted skarakh, alvari, and even a trow among the enemy riders. Garrain grimaced at the sight. What kind of trow would ally with the Arbordeus after what he did to Grongarg? He didn’t have time to follow up on that thought, because flame gathered on the tips of skarakh staffs, and a rain of burning arrows fell upon him.

Garrain sliced them out of the air with Trowbane, and turned his attention to his other trees. Now that the drackens were lower and closer, he could put the spore-flingers to work.

A burst of snapping trunks send globules of roiling green liquid streaking up at the incoming drackens. The spores splashed across drackens and riders alike—and began to burrow into their flesh.

At the very same moment, three skarakh pyrourgists sent fireballs streaking down at him.

Suddenly, his sight was filled with golden scales and flapping wings. He felt a moment of panicked confusion, expecting his entry into the Vale of Echoes to be swift and painful, until he realised this dracken was Nuille, who had transformed in an instant, and coiled her body protectively around him.

Flames billowed across her back, and she shuddered in obvious pain. Fire drackens weren’t entirely immune to fire, and nor was she. He just prayed she wouldn’t be too badly hurt by it.

The fire sputtered and died. Her talons closed around him, and she bore him into the sky.

As the ground fell away beneath him, he caught sight of three drackens thrashing about down there, roaring and smashing up trees. Shoots of green sprouted from their backs, spraying bright blood across the burning forest. He shuddered, unnerved by the effectiveness of his own spell. That was one spell he’d been reticent to test on a living creature.

Another six drackens were coming in hot pursuit. Two of those were clearly injured, and lagging behind the rest. As he watched, a screeching, buzzing swarm swept over the rearmost drackens. Vannach and Cargard stood amidst the burning trees, firing arrow after searing arrow into the maelstrom.

Roaring, the drackens smothered the air—and ground—in flame.

“Vannach, Cargard, Sionne,” said Saskia sombrely in his ears, speaking the names of the fallen.

“They died well,” said Garrain, though he was having trouble believing his own words. There was no such thing as a good death.

Together, the beastmasters and the creatures they commanded had slain the two injured drackens. That left four, who were still in pursuit of the largest and most tempting target—Nuille. Garrain and Yasmithe scrambled up onto her back, avoiding the parts that looked scorched. Welts had formed between the scales of her flank. They looked painful, but not life-threatening.

He and Yasmithe summoned scorching sap between their fingers, and at the same moment hurled it into the face of the trow rider who had been about to fire her crossbow at them. “Let’s see if we can trick them twice,” he said. “Take us down into the ravine, Nuille. Are you ready for more, Baldreg?”

“Aye, we’re ready,” growled the dwarrow.

The wreckage of Dallim’s airship, the Hindenburger, lay at the base of the gorge, alongside the broken bodies of several drackens. Had Dallim managed to get out in time? A portion of a cliff wall had been melted, and still glowed red with the lingering heat of drackenfire. Most of the cannons in other locations remained intact. He hoped they’d be enough.

Nuille dropped into a steep dive, plunging to the bottom of the ravine, and only arresting her fall at the last moment. The drackens followed close behind. Foolish riders. They’d failed to learn from the demise of their fellows.

Cannons thundered across the cliff’s edge. The drackens bellowed and struggled to rise up and away. It was a futile effort. Their scaly hides were tough, but no living thing could survive against that onslaught. Moments later, it was done, and they lay twisted and broken in the river at the base of the ravine.

Nuille rose up out of the ravine to the sound of raucous cheering. The cliffside dwarrows raised their hands in salute. Garrain dipped his head at them, returning the gesture of respect.

Approaching from the east, Queen Vask’s trows were pursuing a faltering dracken, shooting it over and over with poisoned bolts, while the queen herself clung to its neck, sawing at its throat with a loop of metal wire. The great beast’s flames sputtered out, and it plunged toward the ground. At the last moment before it struck, Vask leapt onto a passing roptir, and the pair hurtled skyward.

“For Cloudtop!” came their distant shouts. “For Goldclaw! For Riverside! For Cramjaw! For Grongarg!” That last shout, they repeated over and over. Grongarg may have fallen, but the trows would rise again.

“Great job everyone, but don’t go overboard with the celebrations just yet,” said Saskia. “The bulk of the enemy force is heading straight for Ambiellar, as we expected.”

“We have another problem,” said Velandir, speaking in a subdued voice. “A host of loyalists have encircled the city. It seems the southern factions have finally resolved their differences and banded together. There’s no way out for us now. Between the loyalists and the drackens, we don’t stand a chance.”

“You should have gotten everyone out of the city afore it came to this,” growled Baldreg.

“I tried!” said Velandir. “Believe me, I tried. My people are nothing if not stubborn. They’d rather die than lose their homes.”

“Now they’ll lose their homes and their lives,” said Baldreg.

“Rather than complain about what should have been, how about we try to help?” said Saskia.

“What do you think we’ve been doing?” growled Baldreg. “Playing dice?”

“I’ve been playing dice,” said Vanglebrower, one of the stoneshapers. As the silence stretched, he gave an embarrassed cough. “What? We’ve spent most of the day just sitting around waiting for them to come to us. What else was I meant to do?”

“I will go to Ambiellar,” said Nuille, who now stood tending to her own injured back. “I can get some of them out.”

“Naturally, I will accompany you, my light,” said Garrain.

Nuille’s eyes tilted back—an expression that reminded him of Saskia. “Naturally.”

“My squadron will go as well,” said Queen Vask, who had just recently become Saskia’s vassal. “We can’t carry as many as a dracken can, and we won’t be as stealthy as the greenhands, but if we are fast enough, we could pluck a few alvari fools from rooftops and fly them to safety.”

“If you can get us close, we stoneshapers can evacuate the ones trapped in the tunnels beneath the city,” suggested Kveld.

“My team can help with that,” said Jolen, one of the shadowmasters.

Baldreg grunted. “If you have any drackens on your tail, draw them here to us. Our cannons will make short work of them.”

“Thank you, everyone,” said Saskia. “I know you’ve suffered some losses. And there will be more, I’m sure. But you’re doing great. Just try to hold it together just a little longer, and I’ll be there with dragons.”

Nuille carried Garrain, Kveld, Jolen and their respective teams over the hills toward Ambiellar.

In the distance, he spotted the drackens swarming over a small settlement just north of the city, putting every building to the flame. Garrain felt a surge of unwelcome relief at the sight. On the one hand, it was terrible for the people of that village. On the other hand, even a small delay would give them time to get into the city before the drackens arrived.

Nuille landed the hills just outside the city. From there, they would proceed on foot, under cover of concealment magic. Two shadowmasters went with the stoneshapers, while one—Jolen himself—accompanied Garrain and Nuille past the loyalists gathering outside the city walls. They could conceal themselves with their own shade walker spells, but they couldn’t do this while carrying equipment. Nor could they conceal anyone else, if needed, or work many of their other spells at the same time. So his presence was a welcome addition.

They were nearly at the walls when Velandir spoke again. “More bad news, I’m afraid. Illiur, the regent, has just thrown in with the loyalists. It seems he fears the drackens more than he fears you, Saskia. If the legions fall behind him, they will easily take the whole city.”

“I knew I shouldn’t have trusted him,” said Saskia. “I’ll disable the magic of any vassal I catch fighting against us. It’s hard to tell which side is which at the moment, though. I don’t think they even know, themselves. They keep changing colour.”

Scaling the city walls, Garrain came upon the disturbing sight of a row of guards turning their bows into the city, murdering an alvar who had been hunkered down in a nearby canal. Most of the cannons and ballistae along the walls and atop the towers had been abandoned, leaving the city wide open to an attack from the skies.

“Utter folly,” muttered Jolen beside him. “Illiur deserves a seat of pikes in the blackest pits of Tarkanon for this.”

Garrain had never heard of Tarkanon, but if it was as unpleasant as it sounded, it was too good a place for the regent.

The high alvari on the wall were marked in orange on his map, so there was no question who were the enemy at this moment. He felt a stirring of magic on the air, and a moment later, six alvari had fallen, leaking blood from every pore.

Nuille, briefly exposed by her spell, wavered and vanished once more. The three of them descended the steps, and crept deeper into the city. Around every corner they found signs of trouble. Broken bodies scattered across the garden paths. Burning buildings. Armed alvari dashing hither and thither. Alvessi and nestlings peeking from windows and huddled under bridges. Why had they not taken cover underground already?

Nuille called out for them to join her, offering passage out of the city. Some approached tentatively. Most refused—some more rudely than others. Those who accepted their offer, they would try to help. The rest, they would ignore and move on. There was no other way.

Near the east gate, they found a large band of lightly armoured alvari fighting off a column of legionnaires, while arrows rained down on them from a nearby rooftop garden. With barely a thought, Garrain awakened the plants of the garden. Several short, sharp shrieks rang out as his thorny shrubs carried out their grim task.

“Thank you for your assistance, greenhand,” said the leader of the band. “It’s a deusfucked mess in here. And the drackens haven’t even shown up yet.”

“They’ll be here any moment now,” said Garrain. “Come with us, and we’ll get you out of here.”

A shriek sounded behind him. Garrain turned in time to see a roptir pluck an alvesse out of a tree and carry her away. Screaming, she beat at its talons with her fists. The trows, it seemed, weren’t asking for consent from those they rescued.

Something bright and hot streaked overhead, and slammed into a tower with a deafening crash. Masonry and burning pitch fell at their backs, crushing and setting ablaze trees and bushes at the rear. Garrain bade the burning plants to separate themselves from the rest, and dunk themselves in a canal.

“They have siege engines,” warned Saskia, belatedly.

“Oh really?” said Velandir. “I would never have noticed.”

“We’re running out of time,” said Garrain. “Can you get to us, Velandir?”

“Moving as fast as we can,” said the shadowmaster. “I have some younglings with me. How many of us can you carry?”

“I’m not sure,” said Nuille. “Alvari are much lighter than trows… Perhaps forty?”

Forty out of thousands, thought Garrain grimly.

Further south, they came upon a young nestling wailing over his injured mother. Nuille stopped to tend to the alvesse’s injuries.

“Thank you!” gasped the alvesse as the bloody gash across her neck faded. “I—”

Her words were drowned out by a cacophonous boom, as another ball of destruction smashed into a wall, showering the city with flaming debris.

At the same moment, the south gate swung open, and in poured a host of shouting alvari.

“The guards just let the bastards in,” growled Velandir.

“Where are you?” breathed Garrain.

“Nearly there,” said Velandir. “I can see you. Hello, Jolen.”

A shadow passed overhead, and he froze at the sound of wingbeats drawing closer.

“Drackens!” someone shouted redundantly.

Atop a distant tower, he caught sight of a group of alvari, waving a white flag. Abellion’s colours.

“Illiur,” hissed Velandir. “That cretin thinks he can placate the Arbordeus, after betraying him once already.”

Several drackens drew close to the tower, and hovered there for ten long heartbeats, while Illiur gesticulated to them, and shouted words too distant for Garrain to hear.

The drackens drew back their long necks, opened their mouths wide—and smothered the tower in flame. Slowly, it began to wilt, until nothing remained but a burning column of molten stone.

“It was no less than he deserved,” said Velandir, appearing suddenly out of the shadows, flanked by a small group of wide-eyed nestlings and fledglings, and an elder alvesse.

Nuille abruptly expanded into an enormous red-scaled dracken. Some of the high alvari stepped back in shock. Most of Ambiellar’s residents had seen her dracken form before, but they’d never witnessed her shifting into it.

“Get on,” said Garrain, urging them forward. “Hurry now.”

In short order, all of the passengers were clinging to Nuille’s back, and she was lifting into the sky.

All around them, drackens were swarming across the city, and the flames—the flames were coming from every direction. By some mercy of fate—and more than a little skill on her part—Nuille managed to weave her way between the plumes of fire and beating wings and snapping teeth.

Then they were soaring over the walls and across the vast host gathered outside.

The drackens came over the walls just behind them, and in their pursuit, they unleashed plumes of fire down upon the unsuspecting loyalists, consuming them by the hundreds. Confusion rippled through the alvari ranks. Then outright panic.

“Why would Abellion do that?” asked Garrain, unable to keep the disbelief out of his voice. “They’re his allies.”

No-one offered an answer. But it was plain for all to see that the drackens and their riders considered all of Lumium their enemies. If they weren’t stopped, everything would burn.

The drackens soon broke off their pursuit, and returned to their razing of the city, and the slaughter of its inhabitants.

As Nuille carried them swiftly north, the sky, already dark with smoke, grew darker. The boom of distant thunder shook the air.

And in the midst of the gathering storm, azure wings thrummed and crackled, and lit up the clouds.