Shadowborn Page 17

  Kael spotted the first, intercepting the path of a knight who flew backward so he might shoot bolt after bolt of lightning after his chasers. Kael’s wings blazed with light, crossing the distance faster than anyone might dream. The knight dropped low to flee. Losing none of his momentum, Kael curled low in chase. The light on his shield vanished, the tremendous weight coupled with the powerful wings blessed by his blood slamming him into the knight from above. The wings twisted and broke, no match for the steel shield. Kael continued his dive, pushing the knight toward ground. Right before banking back up to safety he reactivated the light of his shield, effortlessly gliding while the frantic, helpless knight plummeted the last few feet, his body rolling and snapping across the grass.

  Bree spotted another knight swooping in to ambush Kael and she shifted her path while raising her gauntlet. A tremendous plume blasted out from her focal prism, washing over him. He continued downward, limp, the ground his new destination. Bree gasped as she felt her blood flooding the prism with power. She had to be careful. Too many more times of that and she’d barely be able to lift her swords.

  Wolf Squad flashed underneath them, flying mere feet above the field below. A trio of knights chased after, their elements unleashing a steady stream with frightening accuracy. Bree didn’t even think, only dove on reflex. Kael followed at a gentler angle. He arrived first, falling into the rear of Wolf Squad before spinning about. His shield flared with light, the barrage of attacks halting before his power. Argus sensed the change immediately and turned, momentarily hovering in place before racing headlong toward the knights. Kael’s shield protected Wolf Squad assault, but the knights had no such aid.

  Suddenly under attack, the knights’ attention focused solely on the battle before them. It couldn’t have been more perfect. Bree dropped through the heart of them, cutting down one knight who tried to break free to the side. Argus’s lances of ice brought down another, and when the final knight flung up a wall of stone to protect herself, Bree arched her back and tore at her from underneath. The knight burst away from her, avoiding the steel of her blades. Bree swung her right blade on instinct, flinging the fire off as a projectile. The slash of flame ripped through the air, catching the fleeing knight across her wings. Gold melted, sending her crashing to the ground.

  The knights were in full retreat now. Argus led the chase, his Wolf Squad fanning out to relay orders to the other squads. Bree fell back and hovered in place, relaxing the muscles in her shoulders and back for a brief moment as she caught her breath. The day was far from over, and she could not risk her energy or body being spent from the initial conflicts. Off in the distance, the other battles fared similarly, the knights retreating to form a tighter defense above Center’s cannons and ground troops.

  Kael flew to join her, the tired smile on his face rapidly vanishing as he pointed past her.

  “Bree, the road!”

  She turned to follow his finger. It took a moment of searching, but there, in the distance, a flood of black filled one of the streets. Bree recognized their uniforms, as well as the glint of silver on their backs.

  “Specters,” she said.

  “An army of them,” Kael added. “We can’t let them through!”

  They must have passed unseen during the chaotic battle. There was no doubt where they traveled. The holy mansion was up ahead, and the specters were dashing full speed for its distant gates. It seemed Marius would not leave Weshern without claiming at least some form of victory.

  “Go get help,” she said, pointing to the fleeting figures of Weshern Seraphim. “I’ll follow the specters!”

  Only Kael could catch up to the rest of Weshern’s forces using his knight wings and light affinity. Her brother waved, then blasted power into his wings to soar off in a trail of light. Bree flew higher into the air to safely watch the wave of specters travel.

  “I’ve waited for this,” Bree said, flexing and closing the focal point of her gauntlet. The last time she faced specters was during the slaughter at Camp Aquila. Dozens of Weshern’s best and brightest, many her friends, had fallen that day.

  Not this time.

  This time, she would have her vengeance.

  CHAPTER

  13

  Kael’s wings didn’t hum. They roared. Wind blasted across his body, a futile protest against his speed as he flew for the nearest group of Weshern Seraphim. No time for patience. He’d seen that look in his sister’s eye. At any moment she might decide she didn’t need reinforcements.

  “Chernor!” he screamed as he flung his legs forward and cut power to his wings. The giant Seraph cocked his head as he slowed his own wings and ordered the rest with him to halt.

  “What is it, kid?” he asked, gesturing to the rest of the Seraphs racing to engage in the next major battle over the ground troops and war machines. “We’ll fall behind and miss out on all the good stuff.”

  Kael flung his arm back to the north.

  “The holy mansion’s under attack!”

  Chernor frowned as he looked to the distance. Four others in Chernor’s group, including Saul and Clara, pulled back from the chase to join their flight leader in hovering.

  “The sky is clear from what I see,” Chernor said.

  “Not the sky,” Kael insisted. “On the ground. An army of specters is almost to the mansion. We need to hold them off.”

  That got his attention.

  “Is your sister following them?” he asked.

  “She is.”

  “Then let’s join her and rain hell down from the goddamn sky.”

  Chernor took lead, Kael falling to the back of their V-shape formation to fly beside Clara. She reached out to take his hand and squeeze it once, but that was it before they both focused back to the battle at hand. They crossed the short mile, rejoining Bree. His sister beckoned them on, impatiently waiting for their arrival.

  “Keep high!” Chernor screamed to them as Bree fell back to the other tail end of the V-formation. “Speed and height are our advantages.”

  The paved road wound below, flanked by rows of homes on the way to the holy mansion. The specters raced ahead of them, at least forty in number. Chernor angled higher, his hand signaling to hold their elements until his order. Kael clenched and unclenched his gauntleted fist, eager yet nervous for the attack. They would not be helpless like most ground troops, reliant on meager arrows to cross the distance. The specters wielded their own gauntlets and prisms; this battle would be far from even, and Kael had a feeling they were not on the favored side.

  Chernor gave the order to attack. Chunks of ice and stone dropped in a steady barrage, punctuated by Chernor’s lightning bolts. It was more than enough to crush the men and women below, but the specters had their own defenses. Two jagged cliffs of stone merged from the concerted effort of multiple specters, rising up from the ground to ram together as a shield. Another wall of ice quickly followed underneath, absorbing the blast of lightning and dispersing it harmlessly. Chernor’s squad’s barrage rained down on the stone, cracking pieces off but unable to pierce through. That which did manage to make it through the cracks in the stone shield had to break the ice next, and often the attack would halt completely.

  Distance kept Kael’s group safe from the specters’ stone and fire, but it meant little to the bolts of lightning ripping through their numbers. The Seraph nearest Chernor cried out as a trio of lightning bolts tore through his neck and chest. His convulsions tilted him downward on a collision course with the rows of homes. More bolts passed frighteningly close, filling Kael’s vision with painful flashes and dots. All pretense of continuing the barrage vanished as Chernor twisted and lifted their formation higher and away from danger. Kael followed, his body tense and his eyes wide as the air around him crackled with yellow and white energy. Only Bree refused to flee, instead diving lower with her wings ablaze with light. Kael fought the instinct to follow. She’d be too far away by the time he turned about. He’d have to trust her.

  Bree’s dive wa
s steep and erratic, her right arm reaching out as if she were attempting to touch the ground. Preparing for a furious blast of fire, no doubt. Kael doubted any defense the specters summoned would withstand her fury, but they gave him no chance to find out. Lightning lashed the air, a sudden storm unleashed upon the clear blue skies. Bree’s speed, coupled with the dive, gave her tremendous maneuverability, but it mattered not when more than a dozen specters greeted her with lightning and flame. Kael’s breath caught in his throat as his sister ducked and weaved, all thought of attack abandoned. She was a fly weaving through a spider’s web. The slightest error would be fatal.

  “Quick!” Chernor shouted as he pulled them up and around to a stop. “Buy the Phoenix time!”

  Their leader braced his arm and let loose a tremendous beam of lightning, balls of flame and ice trailing soon after. The specters summoned another set of walls, and the barrage of attacks ceased as Bree fled. She changed directions to fly several hundred feet higher, then joined the waiting group.

  “There’s too many,” Bree said. “And they’re too accurate.”

  “We can’t just let them go untouched,” Chernor said. “That’s our Archon they’re after. Risking our lives for him is part of the job.”

  “But we don’t need to risk it yet,” Kael said. “We can outrace them to the mansion. One of us can fly the royal family out of danger while the others prepare the defenses.”

  “You can fly my father and mother out,” Clara corrected. “But I’m not going anywhere. If Center wants to send her specters to my home, I’m going to be there to give them a proper greeting.”

  “Then let’s not waste time we don’t have,” Chernor said.

  They flew to the holy mansion, giving the sprinting group of specters a wide berth. Kael glanced over his shoulder, trying to catch sight of the larger engagement of armies. They were but distant colors and dots. Center’s troops were spread out across dozens of miles, and the minor islands likely attacked from multiple locations. The battles he could see were certainly not the only ones. It might take days to fully realize the cost in lives on all sides.

  Chernor’s squad crossed over the outer fence to land directly upon the steps of the holy mansion. Soldiers standing before the heavy doors hurried to open them. Kael let his shield sink into the dirt, its heavy weight returning as he shut off the light elements attached to it.

  “You four stay out here on watch,” Chernor ordered. “Me and Brett will get the Archon and his wife ready for flight somewhere safe. I’d say we have about ten minutes before the specters get here, so don’t get too comfortable.”

  Chernor and Brett didn’t even wait for a salute in response before rushing into the mansion. Kael rubbed at his eyes, and then, with a moment of panic, looked through the thick glass in his left gauntlet. His light prism was pale, much of it cracked and gray. Less than a fifth, by Kael’s estimate. When he checked the additional prisms powering his shield, he found them similarly dull. On the plus side, at least half his ice remained.

  “This shield and these wings are doing a number on my light prisms,” Kael said.

  “Mine’s not in too great a shape, either,” Bree said, popping open the compartment for her light prism. She slid it out and then offered it to Kael. He stared at it for a moment, confused as to her request, until the obvious connection clicked. His blood. He’d used it to repower their prism when they flew far beyond Weshern’s shores to the edges of the dome. With the battle far from over, it made no sense letting their momentary rest go to waste.

  “Oh, right,” Kael said as he removed his gauntlet. “It’s been a long day.”

  “I’d expect it to keep getting longer,” Saul said.

  Kael offered a hand to Bree, trusting her more than himself. She put her prism into his palm, then used the tip of her sword to open a small cut along the bottom of his wrist. He lowered his hand, letting the blood run to his palm and into contact with the first of several light prisms.

  “Mine as well, please,” Clara said, retrieving her own. Kael felt the energy flowing out of him and into the prism, banishing the gray and sealing over the cracks. His blood dried and peeled from the prism’s touch, which turned flawlessly white. He handed it back to Bree, then held up a hand to Clara.

  “Give me a moment,” he said. “Doing that feels a bit like a crazy sprint.”

  She kissed his cheek and did just that. Kael put a bit more of his weight on his shield, staring to the dirt as he waited for his momentary vertigo to pass. A sprint, yes, but not just a sprint. It felt as if something he didn’t understand was siphoning out of him.

  “All right,” he said. “Hand me another.”

  Kael watched the far distant battle as he filled the fourth. The sun was on its downward descent, the red sky highlighting the silver and gold of their wings. Keeping his mind distracted helped with the sudden exhaustion associated with refilling another prism. They were much too far to have any idea what was going on, the wings like little flittering stars, but he did see that four such golden wings had pulled away from the rest. They hovered in place for a long minute, their light steadily growing brighter.

  “They’re on their way here,” Kael said, realizing what was going on. He wanted to run but the dizziness kept him still, so he clutched his shield and pushed his worried sister away.

  “Find Chernor,” he said. “Isaac and Avila need to leave this instant!”

  Bree vanished through the doors. Kael tossed Saul his recharged light element and then began wrapping a cut piece of his pants around his palm as a bandage.

  “It’s only four,” Saul said. “We can take them. There’s no need to panic.”

  Kael flicked power back onto his shield, allowing him to easily lift it from the dirt.

  “We’ll see,” he said. “But I’ve a feeling they know what they’re doing.”

  By the time Chernor and Brett arrived with the royal couple, the specters were closing in on them, as well as the four knights approaching in the sky.

  “I see we have company,” Chernor said, squinting at the knights. “Four’s not too bad. If we’re careful we can take them.”

  “We don’t have time to be careful,” Bree said. “The specters will be with them. If we fly now, they’ll catch us carrying the royal family. If we engage them in the air, the specters will attack the mansion uncontested. If we focus on bringing down the specters, the knights will bring the whole mansion down.”

  “There’s no good options left,” Kael agreed. “We’ll have to lure the specters and the knights inside the mansion and defend it while Isaac and Avila flee.”

  “Flee where?” Saul asked.

  “The tunnels,” Clara said. She hugged both her parents, and accepted their kisses in turn. “Please stay safe, you two.”

  “Make us proud,” Isaac said, saluting them all. “And improper or not for me to ask, please, keep my daughter safe.”

  “We’ll do what we can,” Kael said, forcing a smile.

  The two hurried back inside, soldiers slamming the doors shut behind them. The secret door to the nearby escape home wasn’t too far from the entrance, but it would take them a long while to crawl the tunnel. If the specters flooded the mansion too quickly they might discover the tunnel and pen in the royal family before they could escape. Kael could only hope that, live or die, their group provided enough time.

  “Well, I’m glad you two are done doing all the planning,” Chernor said, lightly punching Kael on the shoulder. “That’ll leave me the easy stuff, like taking out several knights and a few dozen specters.”

  “We need to take positions inside the mansion,” Brett said. Of the five, he looked the most displeased with the change in plans. “Near windows, I’d say. We must whittle at their numbers if we’re to have any chance of survival.”

  “We’re vastly outmatched,” Chernor said, his eyes never leaving the army of specters. “Forget defending doors and windows. It’ll just be a losing battle. I say we let them in uncontested.”
<
br />   “You’d not fight back?” Kael asked, baffled.

  “I never said that,” Chernor snapped. “The far battle looks like it’s going our way, so those specters and knights are on a strict time limit before reinforcements arrive. If we fight, they’ll collapse the whole building down on top of us and hope for the best. But if we sucker them into coming inside, we might have a shot in close quarters.”

  “If they come inside to search, they may not have enough time to retreat safely back to Center,” Clara said.

  “They’re not planning on leaving this island,” Chernor said. “They’re here to kill our Archon and Archoness. Between safe holes, tunnels, and our own elements, there’s too much chance the royal family survives an outside barrage. They won’t risk that failure, not if they have the chance to get up close and personal.”

  “Are you willing to bet your life on it?” Kael asked.

  The big man grinned.

  “Well. Yeah. I wouldn’t be in charge if I wasn’t.”

  It made sense, though the idea of letting Center’s specters walk right into the holy mansion was most unpleasant. If only the specters had been without aerial support. No matter how fast they ran they’d never have kept up with a pair of Seraphim wings.

  “Then let’s do it,” Kael said. He dropped to one knee, pressed his gauntlet to the stone walkway, and then yanked it back. A wall of ice rose from the ground, hiding their movements from the approaching forces of Center. They were not yet through the front doors when the first specter attack plinked against the ice.

  “We won’t win anything close to a fair fight,” Chernor said as they gathered in a circle beside the doors. “Our jobs are to hit and run while retreating farther into the house. Brett and I will take the east wing, Bree and Kael, the west. Saul, Clara, you two will stay deep with the soldiers.”

  “No,” Clara said. “Kael stays with me.”

  Chernor didn’t bother arguing.

  “Fuck it. Fine. Saul, Bree, you two take the east instead. Everyone meet in the middle of the mansion, and if not there, then meet in the heavens so we can stand together before God and tell him he did a piss-poor job protecting us fools down below.”