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HER SENSES HEIGHTENED by adrenaline and her helmet, Zan heard every hiss of sand, chink of displaced pebble, and crash of distant battle as she made her way laboriously up the stairs with Ravellen on her left shoulder, her arm wrapped around the unconscious adept’s neck, her right hand holding her blaster against Koreth’s ribs.
“I am going to help you,” Koreth said. “You do not have to guard me so diligently.”
While Zan believed the frightened adept, she also knew Koreth’s intentions could change as quickly as the circumstances.
As they ascended to the level right below the surface, the noise told of intense fighting in the corridors above. Zan pushed Koreth a short way in front of her. She spoke through the small grate in the door of the nearest cell. “You in there, can you see me?” she asked. She wanted to be certain Koreth had concealed them.
The prisoner looked around. “Who is there? Why do you so sound so strange? Is that an adept? No, I cannot see you. Let me out! I am Guild Master Derisen’s assistant. Abraxos imprisoned us because we refused to cooperate. Let me out!”
Zan realized that maybe she got lucky. Remiel had said Derisen, master of the Artisans Guild and a Council member, was one of the Covalent they needed to liberate.
Besides, this artisan is pretty damn sturdy looking. I could use his help, but what if he’s lying?
“What is your name?”
“I am Turgel.”
“Turgel. Do you know where they are holding Derisen? We need to release him.”
“Yes! He is at the end of the hall, I believe, in the reinforced cell. I saw Abraxos himself go down there once, so that must be where they are holding the guild master.”
“If you are Derisen’s assistant, you would know what he helped construct for the great warrior Barakiel. Tell me.”
“I will do no such thing.”
“Then you can stay in there.” Zan moved off.
“Wait, wait,” the artisan called. “Guardian help me. Uh, Derisen made a few things: an energy signature scrambler, a highly illegal weapon. But how— ”
“That is enough. Good.”
With a yank, Zan brought Koreth close so she couldn’t run off, looked around to make sure no one else was in the corridor, and told the adept to drop the concealment. She set down Ravellen, switched her blaster to the focused laser, and cut open the cell door. The artisan hurried out. “Thank you, tha— ” He stopped, open-mouthed and wide-eyed. “The weapon! The suit! Guardian save me. You are Barakiel’s bonded mate. And that is the Council president!”
“That is right. I am Zanogara. I am grateful for Derisen’s help with my weapon and my suit. They keep me alive. Now, we need to release him and get Ravellen to safety. She has been drugged. Let us go.”
“Where is Barakiel? Can he help us?”
“He has his own mission. This is Koreth, an adept. Barakiel has threatened her into helping me but we cannot trust her.”
“You can!” Koreth protested. “I want to help Ravellen. How could I live with myself if I did not?”
After a mumbled “whatever” in English, Zan asked Turgel if he was capable of carrying the Council president. He assured her that he was, so she carefully transferred her to his arms. They rushed down the hall. Much to Zan’s relief, there were no guards in the circular antechamber in front of the cell, but she worried they could reappear at any moment.
“Do you know if guards are normally stationed here?” she asked Turgel.
“I think so. Perhaps they joined the fighting above.”
Zan nodded and went to the cell door. She peered through the grate to see a thick-set Covalent with striking magenta eyes hunched on the rock shelf. He spotted her helmeted head.
“What in all the realms?” he said, leaping to his feet.
Stepping away, Zan gestured Turgel towards the grate. He pressed his face close. “It is me, guild master. I am here with Barakiel’s bonded mate. We will release you.”
“Barakiel and his mate! I knew something was happening with all the noise. Thank Balance, thank Balance.”
“Derisen, sir,” Zan said. “We may need you to pull on the door. We will let you know when the time comes.” With one eye on Koreth, she applied her laser to the thick steel but worried they would be unable to open it. It had taken Rainer’s strength to rip out Ravellen’s cell door.
Will two artisans equal one Rainer? Somehow I doubt it.
When the hinges were severed, she set to pushing. Turgel soon joined her, but the door would not budge more than a few millimeters. It moved a few more when Derisen grabbed the handle and pulled, but it did not fall away from the frame. Zan stopped, boiling in frustration.
This is taking too long.
“Would you please allow me to help, Zanogara,” Koreth said in a small, squeaky voice. “A show of good faith.”
Koreth seemed startled by the speed with which Zan whipped her menacing black-helmeted head around. She cringed.
“Do it!” Zan yelled.
The adept got that strange look in her eye, like Zan had often seen in Pellus. Instead of attacking the stubborn steel of the door, she worked on the stone around it. Zan watched it become porous, like pumice.
“If you hit it with your weapon, the stone should fall away,” Koreth announced. Sure enough, the door soon stood like a monolith, surrounded by a space wide enough for Derisen to squeeze through.
“Guild master!” Turgel cried when he noticed Derisen’s bruises and lacerations. “Are you all right?”
“I am fine. They stopped torturing me, no doubt when they captured a higher value target.” He placed a gentle hand on Ravellen. “Perhaps the Council president here.”
“Can you travel quickly, Derisen?” Zan asked. “We need to get Ravellen to safety.”
“Yes, quickly enough, but what in the name of the Balance is going on? I was told your suit and weapon were for defenses purposes, Zanogara, yet here you are in the middle of this chaos.”
“I will tell you as we move. And thank you for your help, Koreth. Can you conceal us again, please? All of us?”
“Yes, it is a simple thing.” When Koreth signaled that she had concealed them, Zan sent her down the corridor and trotted behind her, the adept still in the sights of her weapon. Zan waved Derisen to jog beside her. Turgel followed with Ravellen. As they made their way to the ground level, Zan told Derisen briefly about the offensive. He seemed dumbstruck by the news that Remiel had managed to field a decent-sized force.
“How much time before reinforcements arrive?” he asked.
Zan chanced lowering her weapon for a second to push up her glove and glance at her watch.
God help us. We haven’t got much more than an hour.
“Perhaps a twentieth-turn,” she said. “We need to get Ravellen past the fighting.”
“We are going to try to run the gauntlet of battle? Is that wise? Even concealed, how will we get through? What about the other prisoners?”
“My mate is somewhere below us. He will release the other prisoners, and some of Remiel’s warriors who are fighting above us may survive to help him. As for our mad dash through the battle,” she brandished her weapon, “you know this device well. You helped make it. I can clear a path.”
“Pellus supplied the power. I only worked on its structure.”
“It will clear a path.”
When they reached the ground level, Remiel’s warriors were locked in close-quarter struggles with the dungeon guards. Bodies littered the corridor. No one seemed aware of their presence so Koreth was evidently doing her job, but Zan didn’t see a way past the fighting. She sprinted up beside the adept. “Can I shoot through the concealment?” she asked.
“Yes,” Koreth answered. “But a quick-eyed warrior could trace its burst back to our location and run straight into us in this narrow space.”
“I do not see that I have a choice.”
Her blaster still set on the fine laser, Zan took shots at the guards who grappled with Remiel’s warriors, whom she could identify by the insignia on their armor, scratched and dented though it was. “Oh, thank Christ,” Zan said when her aim landed true. Despite her weapon’s automatic targeting, she’d been afraid she would hit her allies in the shadowy hallway. Shrieks of pain and exclamations bounced off the stone walls, but the warriors were so consumed by grappling with each other they didn’t spare much time to wonder where the shots had come from. When Remiel’s fighters had prevailed with a little help from their hidden friend, Zan asked Koreth to drop the concealment and they raced up the corridor.
“Zanogara!” said one warrior. “Where is your mate?”
“He is below, searching for Jeduthan and the others.
“We will rush down to assist him,” the warrior said, waving over two of his comrades who had similarly finished off their adversaries.
“I would be grateful,” Zan said, “but we have another urgent priority. Turgel, please come here.”
Turgel stepped forward with the unconscious Ravellen. He turned so the warriors could see her battered face.
“Is that— ? Why, it is Council President Ravellen!”
“Yes. She has been drugged,” Zan said. “We need to get her beyond the fighting. Can you help us?”
The warriors drew together, spitting at each other about who would go where until Council Member Derisen identified himself and ordered the three of them to help. Chastened, they surrounded Turgel and Ravellen. Koreth reestablished the concealment and they headed toward the wrecked dungeon doors. On the way, Zan assisted more of Remiel’s fighters with her blaster, happy to give the weary soldiers a chance.
When they emerged from the final corridor into the rotunda before the ruined doors, they found it clogged with enemy fighters, finishing off the last few unfortunate members of Remiel’s contingent who had failed to make it deeper into the corridors before more guards rushed in from other sections of the dungeons. Zan felt lucky to have her helmet as Koreth gagged and the others shielded their noses. She could only imagine the stench as the guards threw corpse after corpse on top of a minced, blood-soaked pile of the dead. When a guard cut off the head of the last warrior standing then mutilated the body, all the tension and fear that had been coursing through Zan’s veins coalesced into a bomb of rage. With a scream that would have made her mate proud, she hit the diamond setting on her weapon and blew apart every guard near the doorway. The blast also took out half the entranceway wall and made it easy for her group to run outside. They cheered to see Remiel’s forces had collapsed the defensive lines, although the gory battle had not subsided and the commander’s warriors seemed slower than their foes. But not Remiel. Zan and company saw her slashing her way towards the thickest clot of enemies with her personal detail beside her, screeching with purpose, trying to save her weary fighters. While many fell, more held on.
The power of conviction. They fight for the Realm. They fight for Pellus.
Judging by an odd sizzle and a buckling of the air that came from where the barrier used to be, Pellus held on as well. The thought of his lonely battle gave Zan a pang, but she told herself she didn’t have time for sentiment, or her worry for Rainer.
Within their concealment in front of the debris-strewn entrance to the Dungeons, she waved her group closer.
“Derisen, Turgel, can you function in this atmosphere? We will have to move fast.”
“It is not comfortable, Zanogara,” Derisen said, “but artisans are made of solid stuff. We will manage.”
They looked across the field, a nauseating mash of blood, body parts, and the excrement of the dying. Zan addressed the nearest warrior. “What do you think? Do you see a way forward?”
“Let us hug the edge to the left side, you see? Along those foothills where the battle of the adepts has caused the warriors to shy away.” She nodded as the warrior gestured to her blaster. “I am glad of your weapon, Zanogara, illegal though it is.”
“We will need it,” she said. She patted its bejeweled surface then brandished it at Koreth, telling her to maintain the concealment at all costs. They moved in a tight clump over the less-crowded side of the battlefield. They had picked their way nearly half the distance to safety when an enemy fighter stumbled into them, flung aside by her own struggle. “What in all the realms?” she shouted. While one of the warriors with Zan made quick work of her, a frightened Koreth fumbled the concealment, and several adversaries charged after them. The warriors poised their swords and the artisans picked up rocks.
“Watch out,” Zan yelled. She stepped in front and took out their attackers with her sapphire setting, which fired on a grid. They fell, but they would not be down for long and others were on the way. Zan ran to Koreth. “Conceal us. Now. Or I will kill you.”
“It is done,” she said, her voice quavering. “We must move.”
They ran, their warrior protectors at the front on either side, with one behind, a classic defensive triangle.
Just when Zan had settled into a steady running rhythm she was momentarily blinded by a flash, followed by a deafening boom. The group turned to find billows of sinister red-glowing dust obscuring the entrance to the dungeons, most likely a salvo in the ongoing battle of the adepts.
Please be all right, Pellus. Please.
“Zanogara, warriors!” Derisen shouted. “Ravellen is stirring. Let us stop to see if we can revive her further.”
With the warriors still in their defensive triangle, the group slowed and backed up against the base of a foothill. Derisen took Ravellen from his assistant and held her up. “Are you all right, my friend? Please shake off your fog. We need your help.”
Ravellen placed her hand against Derisen’s chest and mumbled. A series of loud cracks from over near the dungeons drew their attention. The intact portion of the entranceway had collapsed, kicking up another huge cloud of dust. Ravellen shook her head. “What? What?” she said.
Koreth sobbed and fell at Ravellen’s feet. “Thank Balance, thank balance you are all right. Forgive me, Ravellen, please forgive me. I did not want to. Abraxos made me do it. He threatened my family. Forgive me.”
“Koreth!” Zan barked. “We do not have time for this! Get up!”
“Zanogara,” one of the warriors shouted. “They can see us!”
Sure enough, a contingent of a dozen enemy fighters headed straight for them. As soon as Zan raised her weapon they turned on the speed and spread out. Some scrambled up onto the dirt rise behind them.
“They are trying to surround us!” Zan shouted. She used her opal multitargeting function to slow them down then spun to fire again, but she couldn’t cover three-hundred-and-sixty degrees. The warriors got ready to fight. Zan stuck her weapon in Koreth’s back.
“What did you do?” Zan growled. “Conceal us again or I will kill you.”
“It is not her fault, Zanogara,” Ravellen said, her voice stronger now. “It is me.” Zan wanted to ask her what the fuck she was talking about, but several of Abraxos’ warriors were about to drop on their heads from the dirt rise behind them. She screamed at everyone to back up, switched her weapon to diamond, and blew the entire rise to smithereens. After a concussive roar, a rain of dirt, blood, and body parts fell on the crouching group and the attacking warriors, who slowed their advance, wary after the display of power. Zan turned to Ravellen to find her pale blue eyes—watery and confused a minute ago—had become sharp and cold.
“What did you mean, madam president?” Zan shouted. Though she had meant to ask her question calmly, her voice edged to panic as their enemies closed in.
Before Ravellen answered, her eyes took on that strange quality Zan had seen so often in Pellus. A rumble, followed by loud sucking noises, and Zan watched, amazed, as the ground opened in an irregular ring—like a mote—and swallowed up the attacking warriors. A wind came, gathering soil that whirled faster and faster then descended in a straight line to fill a narrow slice of the mote. Ravellen ran to it.
“Follow me!” she shouted. “Once we are over this bridge, I will conceal and shield us.” Like the others, Zan quickly did as she was told. When they had crossed, the piping on Zan’s suit began to race with bolts of azure and she smelled something like hot iron. Ravellen, still running, led them back the way they had come, then reversed herself in a loop. For a moment, Zan thought Ravellen was still affected by the dire essence, but then she realized her goal was to confuse Abraxos’ forces as to their location.
Crafty little thing.
Ravellen raised her hand to stop the group’s mad dash. “We can proceed more slowly now,” she said. “They cannot see us. Nor will the adepts detect me. I have shielded us, but please stay close. This is difficult to maintain and it is easier if it is smaller.”
They moved forward at an easy trot. “Before, when you said it was not Koreth, it was you,” Zan said to Ravellen, “did you mean the enemy adepts detected you?”
“Yes. I surmise they could spot me as soon as I regained consciousness and my energy signal became more distinct. I am sure they were instructed to be on the alert for my escape as soon as the raid began.”
“I am sure,” Zan said. “Um, forgive me, madam president. I know you have been through a lot, but can you help Pellus? He has been battling at least two adepts for nearly a twelfth-turn.”
“Of course, I will, Zanogara,” Ravellen answered brusquely. “But I was kept drugged for several turns. I need to clear my head and my first duty is to get Guild Master Derisen to safety.” They jogged along without speaking for a time, as the noise of the main battle receded and they grimly surveyed the dead strewn across the plain, the bodies slightly steaming in the frigid air. So many of Remiel’s warriors dead. A ball of dread formed in Zan’s stomach.
How many can possibly be left? Please be alive, commander.
One of the warriors stopped. At first, Zan thought she was overwhelmed by the sight of the dead, but she soon pointed. “The triage area, you see? Down in a gulch behind that outcropping.”
Ravellen nodded. “Lead the way, warrior.” Once they’d resumed, the Council president glanced over at Zan repeatedly before she blurted, “I must say, I am surprised to see you here, Zanogara. I wake to find I have been rescued by Barakiel’s human mate? And he is nowhere to be found. How in the name of Balance did that transpire?”
“I was with my mate until we rescued you but you were unconscious, so we thought I should bring you to safety while he went deeper into the dungeons in search of Jeduthan. We thought it would be better if he went unencumbered.”
“Ah, yes, I see,” Ravellen replied. “That is good. Guild Master Thanis is somewhere down there. As is High Commander Camael.”
“Yes. Barakiel intends to rescue them.”
“I am surprised he would place you in such danger as to be here at all,” Ravellen said.
“He knew I could help.”
“You did! Hmmph. I would not have thought it possible.”
Zan knew Ravellen did not approve of the mighty Barakiel’s choice of mate, so she was thankful the Council president couldn’t see her face, which no doubt showed how it affected her, the thought that she could win her over.
I don’t know why I think it’s important that she accept me, but it is.
When they reached the edge of the gulch, Ravellen dropped their shield and the lead warrior hailed the few sentries. They all went scrabbling down the steep decline, kicking up dust and causing rocks to cascade to the bottom, where injured fighters were doing their best to help each other in the absence of healers. As soon as they were down, Ravellen concealed the entire area.
A thick-set female warrior with amber eyes and a shaved head came forward. “Madam president, Council Member Derisen, we are overjoyed to see you whole. And you, Zanogara.” She bowed to each before she returned her attention to Ravellen. “Would you conceal us, please, madam? We certainly could not repel an attack in our present state.”
“Already done,” Ravellen said, looking around at the uneven rows of wounded, their limbs, heads, and torsos wrapped with fine-mesh gauze that sparked when they stirred. She walked rapidly among the rows staring intensely. Zan realized what she was doing.
Congealing their blood. It will help in the absence of the healers.
“Good,” Ravellen said, walking back to them as the distant sounds of the battle at the dungeons drifted across the gulch. “At least I stopped the bleeding.” She stumbled a little and Derisen grabbed her elbow.
“Ravellen. You must rest! You have been through an ordeal.”
“Perhaps my imprisonment has left me a bit woozy, but there is no time for it.” She shook her head as if to clear her thoughts. “Warrior, you mentioned your present state? What is it? Have you done a head count? How many warriors are capable of retreat should it become necessary?”
“We have some eighty warriors here, madam president. I would say that more than half cannot flee on their own. Some are too injured to walk, even with assistance. We have only twelve less-injured warriors as sentries.”
“Do you have somewhere to go? A base?”
“Yes, madam president. Commander Remiel has directed us to evacuate to the remote base in,” the warrior pulled a slim glowing disk from a compartment in her armor and frowned at what she saw, “less than a twentieth-turn. She had hoped that some warriors would come to assist us.”
“Is the timing significant?”
“Yes. The commander assumes Abraxos sent reinforcements from the city as soon as he learned of our offensive. She estimates they will arrive in a twentieth. It is a cautious estimate, if that is of any comfort.”
“Hardly. If I remember correctly, the commanders place their remote bases deep in the Wasteland.” Ravellen scanned the sky, then addressed Zan. “Well, Zanogara, I am afraid my relief of Pellus will have to wait. I must help the wounded.” She looked at the ground for a moment. “Warrior, can you give us the coordinates of the remote base so we can take the wounded there?”
“Yes, madam president.”
“Good. Koreth! You will begin shuttling the wounded to the remote base while I go to the city to recruit a few navigen travelers to help us. I know which ones are trustworthy.”
Zan placed herself between Ravellen and Koreth. “Madam president, with all due respect, Koreth cannot be trusted. She is in league with Abraxos. We discovered her blocking your cell with a barrier. She could have tried to liberate you. She did not. Barakiel and I threatened her into helping us.” When Ravellen looked sharply at the lesser adept, Koreth fell at the Council president’s feet again, but did not engage in the same histrionics as before.
“It is true, Ravellen. I was a coward. I would not blame you if you vaporized me on the spot.”
To Zan’s surprise, Ravellen laughed. “That would hardly be useful,” she said. “No, we need you.” She turned to Zan. “Your caution is wise, Zanogara, but I know this adept. She was my apprentice. I think my presence and the current circumstances will stiffen her spine. Besides,” she said with a vicious grin, “if she does not perform every task exactly as I say, I will vaporize her.” She cast a withering glance at Koreth, who sniffled and wiped her eyes.
“Please, Ravellen,” Zan said. “At least reverse the duties. Koreth cannot know the location of the remote base.”
“Ah, very well. Koreth will be able to move through the city unconcealed, so perhaps that is best.” She reached her hand down. “Get up, poor thing. Time to go to the city.” Ravellen gave her a few names of navigen travelers. Koreth moved off toward a rift.
“All right,” Ravellen said as she watched her go. “Warrior, please show Guild Master Derisen whom we should bring to the remote base first. Turgel, you help them carry the warriors. You too.” She pointed to the three warriors who had helped them make their way across the battlefield. They all looked at Zan.
“Madam president, would you mind using a few of the sentries for that duty? I would like to return to the dungeons to help Barakiel. I believe these warriors would like to do that as well.”
Ravellen harrumphed and cleared her platinum blond hair away from her dirty, bruised face. “Very well, but there is no need for you to dash across the carnage. I do not know what has happened to the Stream, but the rifts are especially active this turn. I will take you while the others are assembling the first group of wounded. Let us go.” She walked off. Zan and the warriors followed and a short time later, they stood, concealed, in front of the demolished entrance to the dungeons. Ravellen tilted her face to the cliffs, then all around them.
“Zanogara, I do not think the adepts are here any longer. They must have abandoned their effort to maintain the barrier.”
“Perhaps once the warriors from the cliffs penetrated the dungeons they felt it held little strategic value,” one of the warriors said.
“What about Pellus?” Zan said, her voice rising. “He may be injured. Pellus! Where are you!” she shouted. Despite the volume, Ravellen seemed not to hear her. The Council president’s head jerked toward the rubble-strewn entrance, then at the ground in front of it.
“No, no, it’s not that the barrier lacked value. They were needed elsewhere.” Ravellen continued to stare at the ground with her strange adept eyes. They seemed especially haunted, given they were so pale a blue. “Something is happening far beneath our feet. I am not at my best, so it is hard for me to understand what I am seeing, but there are adepts below, and a startling nexus of energy.”
“Rai, er, Barakiel!” Zan exclaimed. “He has found Jeduthan. The trap has been sprung. We have to go.” She ran towards the rough hole leading into the Dungeons, the warriors behind her.
“Wait” Ravellen called. Zan and the warriors turned back to her. “Pellus is below, and Borosen. I recognize their energy signals. You must find Pellus. You will need his help or you will be at the mercy of the other adepts.”
With a nod, Zan and the warriors plunged headlong into the dungeons.