Daughter of Moth (The Moth Saga, Book 4) (31 page)

The enemy covered the land in a
carpet of black steel. A hundred thousand troops or more hid the
plains, chanting, waving the Radian banners. Dark mages rode upon
dark mounts. Siege towers rolled forth, topped with steel, as tall as
the city walls. Catapults and trebuchets rolled into formation, their
boulders ready to fire. A great wheeled cannon rolled among them,
forged as an iron buffalo; Torin had seen these weapons in Eloria but
never in the lands of sunlight. And still more enemies flowed across
the bridge, a never-ending stream like gushing oil.

"Death," Prince Omry
whispered, standing at Torin's side upon the gatehouse.

Torin closed his eyes for only a
moment.

I
love you, Koyee. I love you, Madori. I miss you and love you both so
much. I wish I could tell you that one last time.

He forced himself to take a
deep, shuddering breath.

Again.

Again.

He opened his eyes, looked at
Prince Omry, and held the young man's arm.

"Death," he agreed.
"But first war. We die here, but not without a fight. We go down
firing our arrows, swinging our swords, and singing of our home."

The prince nodded, his eyes
damp, and raised his sword upon the wall. Around them, a hundred
archers emerged to nock arrows and tug back their bowstrings.

Ahead in the fields, the
trebuchets and catapults swung. Boulders, arrows, and blasts of dark
magic flew toward the city of Kingswall.

 
 
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE:
GRAVES

Lord Serin stood among the trees,
smiling thinly as he examined the Elorian prisoners.

"Men!" he said. "Step
forth. Hand them their shovels."

Five Radian soldiers emerged
from the forest. Three held loaded crossbows, pointing them at the
outcast students. Two other soldiers tossed down long leather
bundles; they thumped against the ground and unfolded, revealing many
shovels.

"What are you doing here,
Serin?" Madori spat out. Her ankles and wrists still chained,
she hobbled closer to him. "Go back to your lair and leave us."

The tall lord burst into
laughter. He looked over his shoulder and spoke to the shadows. "You
were right about her, my daughter! She's a vicious little thing. I do
admire the scars on her cheeks. Your work, no doubt?"

"But of course." A
sweet smile on her lips, Lari stepped out from the forest, holding a
crossbow. She aimed the weapon at Madori. "And I will hurt her
worse if she tries to escape."

Madori sneered and made to leap
at Lari, but the girl placed her finger against the trigger. The
crossbow creaked and Madori froze, glaring at the girl and her
father.

"Very good," Lari
said, still smiling sweetly. "You will stand still. If you try
to attack me, you will die. If you try to escape, you will die. You
and your nightcrawler friends will do as we command." Her voice
rose to a shout. "Dig!"

Madori growled, looking between
daughter to father. "How about you two go suck on rotten eggs?"

Lord Serin sighed and nodded
toward his daughter. Lari grinned, raised her crossbow, and fired.

An Elorian student—a studious
boy named Shen—clutched his chest, a quarrel in his heart. He
gasped, gazed at Madori, then fell.

Other Elorians screamed. Madori
began to rush toward the fallen boy. Jitomi hissed and stepped toward
Lari, hands crackling with magic. Soldiers laughed.

"Freeze!" Serin
barked. "Any one of you nightcrawler scum moves an inch, unless
it's to dig, your death will follow. Lari, if anyone else causes
trouble, fire again. Fire at random." Serin's lips peeled back
in a horrible grin. "Now, nightcrawlers, you will behave. Lift
the shovels and begin to dig. Dig a trench here on the roadside. Go!"

Glancing around nervously, some
weeping, the Elorians lifted their shovels. They approached the
roadside and began to dig. Only Madori stood still, chin raised.

"I can't dig with these
chains on me," she said, glaring at Serin.

He snapped his fingers, and her
chains shattered and fell to the ground.

Madori brought her arms forward.
After being chained for so long, her muscles screamed in protest, and
blood covered her wrists. She was free! She could lunge at Lari and
Serin. She could fight. She could—

Lari fired her crossbow. The
quarrel whizzed by Madori's head.

"Dig!" the girl
shouted, already loading another quarrel. "Dig or the next one
hits your twisted mongrel heart."

Grumbling, her belly knotting
with fear, Madori grabbed a shovel and joined the others. They dug
along the roadside. Whenever Madori glanced over her shoulder, the
soldiers raised their crossbows, and Lari shook her head while
smiling her sweet smile. Madori returned her eyes to her work. The
ditch was soon a foot deep, several feet wide.

Madori took a deep breath,
summoning her magic. She was hurt, weary, and famished, and she
doubted she had enough magic to fight with. But she could muster a
little trick she had learned in her classrooms, a way to speak to her
classmates without the professors hearing. Though her head blazed
with pain, she chose and claimed the air between her and Jitomi. She
formed an invisible barrier to block sound waves, then spoke softly.

"Jitomi!"

Digging beside her, he glanced
at her. She saw in his eyes that he recognized her magic; they had
often communicated like this in Professor Atratus's class. He
whispered, allowing his words to reach her ear but not cross the
magical barrier toward the Radians.

"Madori, I don't like this.
We're digging our own graves."

She wouldn't look at him as she
spoke. "I think so too. We have to attack them. Do you have
enough magic in you to thicken this barrier of air? To block their
crossbow quarrels?"

He nodded, an almost
imperceptible movement. "Yes. Joined with your magic, yes. We'll
create the barrier, then bolt into the trees."

"No." Madori tossed a
shovel of dirt across her shoulder. "If we run, they'll track
us. They'll catch us. We fight them."

Jitomi glanced over his
shoulder, then back at her. "There are ten of them. Too many."

"Only two are mages—Lari
and her father. The other eight are dumb soldiers. There are
twenty-five of us and—"

A whip cracked. A soldier
shouted behind them. "Get back to shoveling! Faster!"

Madori grunted and shoveled
faster. She risked a glance at Jitomi and spoke before her shield of
air could deteriorate, letting her voice through to the enemy.

"Pass the word on,"
Madori said. "On my signal, we raise barriers of air. The magic
will block the first round of crossbow quarrels. Before the enemy can
load again, we bang them with shovels."

Jitomi nodded and turned toward
the Elorian beside him, conveying the information. The ditch was two
feet deep by the time Jitomi glanced back toward her. He spoke two
words, each one cold and hard as a blade.

"We're ready."

Madori took a deep breath,
tossed a shovelful of dirt over her head, and spun toward the
soldiers on the road.

"Now!" she shouted.

She claimed the air. She
thickened her barrier. At her side, her fellow Elorians spun with
her, and the air thrummed and solidified, forming an opaque shield.

The Radians fired their
crossbows.

The air rippled like a pond
under hail, wobbling as the quarrels slammed into the force field.
The bolts shattered. Shards of metal and wood flew. Several shards
passed the barrier and hit Madori's body, cutting her skin but not
sinking deeper. The shield of air vanished, and the Radians began to
load more quarrels.

Madori and the Elorians charged
at them, shovels swinging.

A flash of fear filled Lari's
eyes, bringing a smile to Madori's lips; she couldn't wait to slam
her shovel into that pretty face. Lord Serin, however, smiled too—a
smile lush with cruelty, amusement, and a hint of admiration.

Forget
about Lari,
Madori told herself. She screamed and charged toward Serin.
I
go after the big fish.

She lunged toward the lord,
shovel swinging, as he thrust his sword toward her.

The enemy covered the land,
spreading into the horizon, a sea of steel surging forth.

Their catapults swung. Their
trebuchets twanged. From the ranks of enemy troops, dozens of
boulders hurtled through the air, bristly with metal spikes.

Torin stood upon the walls of
his city, hundreds of soldiers stretching to his sides. Protector of
Kingswall, he raised his sword and cried at the top of his lungs.

"Archers! Fire!"

Around him, a hundred archers
loosed their arrows. Whistles filled the air. A hundred glinting
shards flew upward, reached their zenith, then plunged down toward
the enemy. Below upon the fields, shields rose. Arrows slammed into
wood. Three men fell dead, maybe four. Jeers rose from the enemy
troops.

With a rumbling like thunder,
the enemy's boulders slammed into the city of Kingswall.

One stone crashed into the wall
beneath Torin, cracking the stone. The battlements shook. Another
boulder sailed over his head, and Torin looked over his shoulder to
see a steeple snap, tilt, and slam down to drive into the street.
Other boulders slammed into houses, crashing through tiled roofs.

"Trebuchets, fire!"
Torin shouted.

The contraptions of wood, metal,
and rope twanged upon the city ramparts. Flaming barrels flew from
the battlements of Kingswall, spinning and shrieking, to crash into
the enemy below. Magerian troops fell, fire blazing across them.

"Archers!" Torin
shouted and more arrows sailed.

Fire crackled in the field.
Smoke rose. With a blast of smoke and flame, the buffalo cannon
fired. The world seemed to shake. The cannon ball, large as a
boulder, slammed into a turret only paces away from Torin. The tower
crumbled. Bricks rained and archers fell. Dust filled the air. The
blast nearly knocked Torin off the wall.

Mules grunted in the fields,
clad in steel, tugging forth siege towers of wood and metal. Enemy
archers stood upon them, firing onto the walls. Arrows flew around
Torin, and one slammed into his shield. Another grazed his helmet. He
fired his bow, hitting an enemy archer upon a siege engine. A
trebuchet swung at his side, slamming its boulder into another
engine, scattering wood and enemy soldiers.

One wooden tower reached the
wall, and a plank slammed down. Magerian swordsmen rushed onto the
battlements. Torin ran toward them, sword swinging, and locked blades
with an enemy soldier. With a kick and thrust of his shield, he sent
the man tumbling off the wall. More Magerians surged from the siege
engine, and Torin snarled as he fought, slaying men, sending them
crashing down. His comrades fought at his sides.

"Burn the siege engine!"
Torin shouted over his shoulder. Men stood there with torches,
lighting the wooden trebuchet projectiles. "Bring fire!"

Men rushed forth, holding
torches and pots of oil. Cauldrons tilted over the battlements.
Bubbling oil crackled over a siege engine. Torches fell, landed upon
the wood, and the wooden tower burst into flames like a pyre. Torin
stepped back and shielded his eyes from the heat. Those Magerian
troops still in the engine screamed, engulfed in fire.

The tower collapsed but Torin
found no rest. The buffalo cannon fired a second time, and another
turret crumbled and fell off the wall. More catapult boulders sailed
overhead. In the city, roofs shattered and houses crumbled. A domed
temple crashed down, scattering bricks. Smoke, dust, and fire covered
the city.

Through the screams of battle,
shrieks of arrows, and roars of fire rose a deep chant. The voices
boomed across the battlefield. Torin's heart sank.

"The mages," he
muttered.

He stared between two merlons
and a chill gripped him. The enemy troops parted below like a
splitting sea. Down the path rode a hundred black horses, and upon
them sat a hundred mages clad in black robes and hoods. At their lead
rode the captain of Mageria's forces, the towering Gehena, his four
arms raised like serpents about to strike. Swordsmen and archers
chanted at the mages' sides, raising their swords and bows, cheering
on their champions.

Torin turned back toward his
men.

"Archers!" he shouted.
"Aim at the mages! Slay the mages!"

He fired his own bow. His arrow
sailed toward the mages, burst into flame in mid-air, and
disintegrated. A hundred other arrows followed his, only to suffer
the same fate.

The mages halted outside the
city gates. At their lead, Gehena raised his head, his red eyes
crackling like flames, staring straight at Torin. His four hands
collected smoke and fire, forging them, coiling them into the shape
of a great champion. Behind the captain, the lesser mages added their
own smoke to the creation. The creature took shape in the fields—a
great buffalo, large as a ship, its horns formed of countless metal
shards. The ghostly animal shrieked, an unearthly sound, and charged.

Arrows rained upon the creature,
passing through its smoke. The astral horns, each like a battering
ram, slammed into the city gates.

The walls shook.

The doors smashed.

The gates of Kingswall
shattered.

The mages moved aside. Cheering
for victory, the enemy troops surged into the city.

It
is lost,
Torin knew, looking down to see the enemy racing into the inner
courtyard.
The
city has fallen. The city will be our graveyard.

The world became a dream—a
nightmare of smoke, blood, wounds, steel, arrows, death. They fought
in the streets. They fought in homes, upon roofs, in the ruins of
shattered temples. More and more Ardishmen fell, and ever the
Magerians stormed forth, filling the streets like poison seeping
through arteries. Torin fought for a turn, maybe more, ever falling
back as the enemy claimed street by street. With blood, fire, and
shattering stones, the city of Kingswall crumbled.