Daybreak (66 page)

It was half crow and half man — a monster with skin swollen around clumps of glossy black feathers. Sharp bones poked out from its overgrown nose and chin. The growth had so taxed its features that its face seemed lopsided, with one of its shining black eyes perched high above the other. But more unsettling than all of that were the monster’s wounds.

Its bare spots were covered in a patchwork of scratches and scrapes — and there were far more bare patches than there’d been before.

The crow monster hobbled by, moving with its wings and talons in a way that reminded Crevan of a spider crawling across the floor. “What happened?” He blanched at a spot between the monster’s shoulders, where some of its feathers had been torn away — leaving three weeping holes behind.

The crow went straight to Jacob. It filled the room with its shrieks and caws.

“He’d only just landed in the woods when he was set upon by a pack of animals.”

“Wolves?”

“Among other things,” Jacob said with a nod. He listened as the crow shrieked again. “Cats … badgers … a bear and a fox —”

“I don’t need to know about every blasted animal,” Crevan said through his teeth. Even as he glared, his fists began to shake. “What about my patrol?”

“He found their bodies in the swamps. Their armor was melted where it’d been hewn, and their bones were charred black,” Jacob said flatly, as if it was no more interesting a thing than the passing of a cloud.

The steward stepped forward. “Perhaps seeing it for yourself will help, Your Majesty. The crow was carrying this in his talons, when he returned.”

The steward brought his hands out from behind his back and held them towards Crevan. It was the front of a breastplate — and it had indeed been melted. There was an unmistakable weld across its middle, where its bottom half had been cut away.

The oddest thing about it though was the fact that the black dragon was gone from its front. The crest had been smeared into the metal until it resembled nothing more than a blob … and scrawled through the black was a crest he’d hoped to never see again:

An eye with three interlocking triangles at its base, three triangles fanning from its top, and one triangle directly in the center.

The symbol of the Wright.

The fortress of Midlan was a beast without equal. Its eight outer walls towered above the trees, each one stretching the full length of a village. They tore from the ground with indisputable might.

Elena led Braver to the crest of a hill, her jaw dropping further with his every plodding step. The falling sun set the western wall aflame. The light that bounced off its unblemished surface made it glow. For now, the land before her was perfectly illuminated by the glint of the wall.

But when the sun rose, she thought the shadow the wall cast might reach back to touch the Grandforest.

“Well, here we are,” Aerilyn said weakly. Her hand moved to grasp the top of Elena’s arm — as if that was the one thing keeping her from tumbling out of the saddle. “It’s quite … enormous.”

Elena had to swallow the panicked lump in her throat before she could mutter: “Well, what did you expect?”

The truth was that she had no idea what to expect. She had no idea what they were doing.

The news of the Countess’s death had shocked her for a few days. There’d been so many strange feelings swirling inside her heart that she wasn’t sure how to manage them — and it’d made it difficult to pay attention to her companions’ many arguments.

Gwen was desperate to find the Wright — for reasons she refused to tell them. Shamus was furious about his village, and the mercenaries they’d brought from the Grandforest were spoiling for a fight. When their stories came together, they realized a good portion of the King’s army had already been destroyed.

But they never would’ve thought of sacking Midlan, had it not been for Captain Lysander.

“The King is weakened. If we part ways now, Midlan will only turn up at our doors again — stronger and more furious than before. We won’t get a better chance to stop Crevan. There might not ever be such a force gathered together again. And if you want to find Kael,” he’d added, when Gwen started to protest, “I assure you this is the only way to do it. Without the threat of Midlan, Kyleigh will have no reason to run. She’ll come back to us, as she always does — and I’ll bet my sword that she’ll bring the Wright with her.”

He’d passed one of his charming smiles around the men, stoking them into cheers. But Aerilyn seemed far from convinced.

“Wait a moment, aren’t all of you forgetting something? The King has a
dragon
,” she’d said, rolling her eyes in exasperation at their looks. “No matter how many of us there are, we’ll still burn just as —”

“You worry about the soldiers,” Gwen cut in. She’d raised her golden axe and added with a smirk to the wildmen: “Let
us
handle the dragon.”

There’d been so much howling after she spoke that anyone who might’ve had doubts couldn’t squeeze them in edgewise. And so they’d packed their camp and sailed up the coast to Midlan.

“I’m not sure what I expected,” Aerilyn said, still gaping at the walls. “I suppose it makes sense that the King would live somewhere so grand —”

“And un-scalable,
and
completely packed with tinheads,” Elena added, squinting at the telltale glints of armor coming from the ramparts. They were in a rush to get somewhere — the southwestern wall, by the looks of it. “I’m beginning to doubt all of this. I’m beginning to doubt it very seriously.”

“Haven’t you been to Midlan before?”

“No. The Countess would never let me. She was afraid Crevan might figure out what I was, and then he would’ve killed me.”

Aerilyn’s grip twisted. “At least we have the whisperers.”

“The same whisperers who somehow managed to sink one of our boats while playing a
friendly
game of cards? I don’t know if they improve our chances.”

“I’m sure there’s more to the story,” Aerilyn insisted.

Elena didn’t doubt it, but she also didn’t care. All she knew was that the second half of their trip had been considerably more cramped than the first.

Their companions marched nearly half a mile behind them — a strange army made of pirates and mercenaries, with the wildmen and some fishermen from Harborville scattered in between. They’d begun their journey at the shores and seemed to add another few dozen men to their ranks in every village they passed.

But numbers alone wouldn’t be enough to win a fight with Midlan. Their army had swelled to the point that no one knew exactly what it was, or who was in charge of it all. Elena had begun to suspect that half of the new men didn’t even know what they were fighting for.

“I don’t like our chances,” she said again.

“Well, there’ll be plenty of time to worry about that later.” Aerilyn waved a hand at the wall. “How many are there?”

“Too many.”

“Lysander sent us ahead to scout,” Aerilyn said sharply. “And if we’re going to ride out all this way, then we might as well return with something helpful.”

“He sent
me
to scout. You just insisted on coming along. There are so many that I bet they could have the walls dressed with our innards by nightfall — if they were to start right away,” she added, smiling at Aerilyn’s gasp. “If they took the time to
kill
us before they split us open, then it might be closer to midnight.”

“If you aren’t going to take this seriously —”

“Shhh! Shut it.” Elena reached back and clamped a hand over Aerilyn’s mouth, listening intently.

There was a noise coming from the forest on their right — the thick crop of trees that faced the southwestern wall. The noise was too distant to make out what it was, but it’d certainly caught Midlan’s attention. A large number of soldiers were clustered against the ramparts’ edge. Their armor glinted as they began to squirm, jostling for position.

Something was about to happen. Elena could feel it.

She turned Braver and kicked him into a gallop for the trees. They’d just managed to slip beneath a thick canopy of an oak when she heard it: the sound of shrieks and caws, the furious beating of wings.

A cloud of birds erupted from behind Midlan’s towers — hideous monsters that twisted the forms of men with hawks and crows. They rose like the crest of a wave and swooped down, sailing in an arrow’s head for the trees. Their wave spun into a circle when they reached the forest’s heart. They swarmed above its middle, moving steadily towards the open field that led to Midlan.

“Have they seen us?” Aerilyn squeaked.

Elena shook her head. “They’ve got their eyes on something over there. I don’t know what it is,” she added, before Aerilyn could ask, “but I expect we’ll find out in a moment.”

Whatever it was would do well to stay in the trees: the branches clumped together so tight and thick that none of the monsters would risk crashing through it. But the second their prey came out into the open …

Well, that would be a different matter.

They’d been remarkably lucky not to be seen. Elena was about to turn them away when the noises in the woods began to grow. They were coming closer. Soon she could hear the rattle of armor and some deep, panting breaths.

Above all the noise rose a panicked scream: “Open the gates! They’re at our heels — we can’t last much longer!
Open the bloody gates
!”

But for all the shrieking, the soldiers upon the ramparts never moved. The gates stayed sealed. And soon the man’s cry was overcome by something else: an army of footsteps so heavy that they beat thunder from the earth.

The screams grew louder; the thunder swelled. The cloud of birds moved hungrily for the forest’s edge. Braver pawed at the earth and his breath blew from his nostrils in a heated stream. Elena wasn’t sure if it was the noise that froze her, or the ferocity of Aerilyn’s grip.

All at once, soldiers burst from the trees.

It was the ragged remains of a Midlan patrol — a handful of tinheads with holes in their armor and brambles stuck to their trousers. The men who trailed at the rear bore heavy gashes upon their backs. Elena could practically smell the blood wafting from their wounds.

The soldiers at the head shoved each other as they ran, each one desperate to reach the gates; the men at the rear hobbled with their helmets twisted behind them. But it was too late.

Their hunters had already closed the gap.

A man burst from the thicket hardly a pace behind the last soldier. The bellow that tore from his chest matched the thunder of his legs. His thick limbs shone with a layer of blood.

The monstrous scythe he carried made short work of the trailing soldiers. His steps were heavy and sure, his blade hissed through their blood and bones in a deadly stream of attacks. Their bodies had barely crumpled into the grass before he took off after the rest.

“Declan!” When more giants erupted from the forest, Aerilyn’s voice rose to a scream. “No, stop — go back! There are birds! There are
birds
!”

But the giants didn’t seem able to hear her over their battle cries. The monsters waited until the first few ranks had charged out from the trees before they descended.

Crows swarmed, tearing with their beaks and claws. The hawks fell in streaks from the clouds. Some of the giants managed to raise their scythes in time to skewer them. Others were crushed.

Aerilyn shook Elena hard by the shoulders. “We have to help them!”

“We’d be flattened before we could do any good. Once they turn back for the forest, they’ll be safe. I’m sure they’ll turn at any moment.”

A moment passed, and the giants still hadn’t turned. Some of the crows landed at the edge of the trees, using their massive bodies to cut the giants off from safety. They moved in blinks — darting away from the scythes while lashing out with their taloned feet. Above them, the hawks swooped down upon the giants and batted them mercilessly with their wings.

One of the crows struck with such force that its claws punched through a giant’s breastplate. It panicked for a moment, thrashing its wings and stumbling the poor giant in every direction. The fall of a scythe put an end to its flails.

A giant who was a little slighter than the rest ripped its talons free and pulled his rattled companion onto his feet. “Fall back, you clods! Into the trees!” Brend bellowed.

The giants swarmed in around him and tried to shove the crows aside, but the moment their attention was turned elsewhere, the hawks gathered for a plunge. Aerilyn screamed again; the giants didn’t hear her. Just when it looked as if they would be crushed, a line of spear-toting warriors lunged from the woods.

They were clad in blood-red silk adorned with silver mail, and stood at the height of children. The warriors darted forward in a perfect line and thrust their spears as high as they could reach — jabbing the crows in the feathery smalls of their backs.

They screeched in pain, and the giants fell upon them. Their weapons swept across the monsters’ necks and split their twisted heads down their middles. The hawks pulled out of their dives with terrified screams.

Though nearly all of the little warriors fell in with the giants’ retreat, one woman fought against the tide to the open field. Elena recognized her singsong voice immediately:

“No, you must turn back! You are going too near to the castle! They will — let me go!” Nadine cried when Brend scooped her over his shoulder. “He must be stopped!”

“Let me handle the stopping, wee thing,” he grunted.
 

Nadine flailed madly, cursing in her strange tongue. But she couldn’t escape. Brend handed her off to one of the giants and set out towards the field.

The hawks had given up on their prey and had instead turned their wicked yellow eyes upon Declan. He slashed his way through the patrol’s remains, oblivious to the screeching of the swarm about to fall upon him.

“Don’t just stand there —
move
!”

Aerilyn kicked her heels into Braver’s side, shooting them out from under the trees and in the open field. His stocky legs beat the ground as he charged for the soldiers’ flank. Elena felt the weight of eyes upon them and knew they’d caught the hawks’ attention. When one of their shadows darkened the sky, she gripped the reins tightly.