Fallen Star

by Ivan Kal

  The first assault had been beaten back…but Vin wondered how many more there would be.

  * * * *

  It was late afternoon when the horns sounded again and another assault began. Vin had stayed at the wall, sitting with the defenders and wondering what they were thinking. No one spoke to him; in fact, few even spoke at all. They were all tired and weary from the carnage they had seen. For his part, Vin had taken the time to cycle and replenish his outer core. By the time the second assault arrived, he was as good as new.

  The Lashians had rolled in more of their siege equipment replacing the ones destroyed. Although the battle at the wall had largely stopped, it hadn’t really ended. Vin’s net caught Kyarra and the Lashian fragment-bearer clashing in the sky above them. A few times Kyarra managed to drop lightning down on the enemy army, and a few times the fragment-bearer managed to hurl ice at the wall. In both cases, mages interfered. In the air, Kyarra and Orvanon were both countering each other’s magic. Vin was impressed by that; he had even thought about going out and trying to find Orvanon while he was distracted, but he had retreated to the back of their army with their Grand Marshal. Vin was confident in his abilities, but not enough that he thought he could pass by an army of more than twenty thousand alone, kill a fragment-bearer all the while avoiding enemy soldiers and mages, and then running back. Perhaps if he was on the seventh step of the Path, but not now.

  Vin got to his feet and climbed the wall, watching as the bombardment started again. Master Jeressi did the same thing he had before, and activated the defenses. The Lashian army reached the wall and the same battle began again. Vin defended Jeressi and killed those who got close enough to his portion of the wall. Then he had only a moment to react as his net at the edge of the Lashian war-machine line caught something familiar. He moved quickly, grabbing Master Jeressi by the waist, ignoring the man’s surprise and Wind Stepped away just as the attack hit. They fell down among the defenders at least twenty paces away and Vin pulled his blades back inside, hiding their presence and hopefully making it harder for the enemy to see where Jeressi was. A beam of light punched through the battlements where they had been standing, the stone itself melting as the beam punched through to hit the other wall behind it. It lasted about three seconds, and then it was silent.

  Vin recognized the Arashan light weapon. Gathering light aura, the device combined it with fire aura and unleashed it as a terrifying beam that burned through almost anything. Two more beams fired at different portions of the wall, and Vin saw a foolish mage try to stop it. It broke his shield like it was nothing, consuming him in the process.

  Vin saw the massive weapons in the distance—they looked something like large bottles turned on their side, with glyphs engraved all over them. He hadn’t noticed them before, but the Arashan had ways of hiding things from spirit artists, so he wasn’t surprised. There were four of them and he could see the glyphs glowing in sequence, telling him that they were readying to fire again. Thankfully, at least they couldn’t fire often.

  But they had another problem. While Vin had saved Jeressi’s life, the defenses of the wall had faltered, and boulders and balls of fire struck the wall. Jeressi cursed and concentrated, refocusing the fire, but the damage had already been done.

  Vin glared at the Arashan weapons. He had suspected that they would join in the attack, but he hoped they wouldn’t have so soon. Then Vin saw a massive bulge come out of the bay to his left. He saw water rise to three, then four times the size of the Tourran walls, and then it moved toward the Lashian army. Vin had known that Kyarra had wards in the harbor, but it looked like they had extended that to the rest of the bay—or at least this portion of it.

  Vin could feel Orvanon weave great spells, and then a wall of ice formed in front of the Lashian army as tall as Kyarra’s wall of water. They smashed into each other, and portions of the water were freezing, but on other side the wall of ice broke, and water fell on the Lashian troops. Those who were closer to the beach had gotten completely swallowed by it, and one of the Arashan weapons was washed away before Orvanon raised more walls to protect the army. The water wall broke apart and was repelled by the city’s walls, the water draining back to the bay, but Vin was certain that the Lashians had lost a lot of troops.

  Then the wall of ice that remained cracked, and Vin’s eyes widened as boulder-sized pieces of ice started flying toward the wall.

  He doubted that Jeressi could stop them all.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  KYARRA

  Present

  Kyarra struggled against the power of the other fragment-bearer. Orvanon was better than her, that was for sure, but she had the defenses of the city helping her, as well as thousands of wards that the Eternal Souls of the past had created and enchanted all over Tourran to level the playing field. She hadn’t done much to help her defenders, but she was trying. Every single lightning bolt that passed through Orvanon’s counter magic was a victory for her. The wall’s defenses were performing as well as she had hoped, and she was glad to have invested into building them.

  Now they only needed to hold out. But every time a boulder managed to get through the defenses and hit the wall, Kyarra winced, wanting to activate their greatest defense, but both Atiok and Jeressi had urged her not to. It hadn’t been tested, and they didn’t know if it could hold for long. Better that they bleed the enemy before they resorted to using it. She had agreed, under protest—but she knew that her people were dying.

  The harbor behind the battle was also filled with activity, ships in a state of constant motion as people tried to escape the city. Kyarra didn’t blame them, but they were so unorganized that they were closing up the passage from the harbor.

  But she couldn’t worry about that. Instead, she could only focus on the battle. Mentally, she was drained—she had been engaged in a duel against Orvanon from the moment she cast the lightning barrage. She had been lucky that no one had noticed her moving clouds and preparing that spell. It had done a lot of damage to the Lashians.

  Now it was the repeat of the morning battle. The Lashians attacked, and her people defended. Then, as if called by her thoughts, something else happened: a beam of light shot from the enemy army, hitting her wall. She could see it burning as she looked through a telescope. Her breath froze in her throat as the defenses faltered. She feared that Jeressi, and maybe even Vin, had just died in an instant. But then the defenses resumed as boulders fell on the wall, breaking against it as two more beams struck. She had never seen or heard about such a weapon, but she could see that they were extremely dangerous, and she knew that she needed to stop them. None of her spells from the air were getting through, so she had no choice but to use one of her trump cards. She hadn’t wanted to do that so early, but she hoped that Orvanon was distracted enough for it to work.

  She focused on her bracelet and the ward stone there, reaching through it and into the bay beyond her city. She found the wards and filled them with power before casting the spells that moved the water of the bay itself. A wall of water started to rise and she grunted as she moved her hand over the Lashian army, moving the water wall with it. The wards hadn’t been made for finer tuned spells and control like those in the harbor, but she had made them oversized to compensate.

  She watched as her wall started falling on the Lashian army, and then she saw ice spread out of the center of their position. She watched as her wall was stopped in its tracks, but she pushed more power in it, cracking the ice wall in places and dropping a wall of water on the Lashian soldiers’ heads.

  But her power wasn’t enough—Orvanon summoned ice walls that robbed her attack of momentum and then stole from her as some of her wall turned to ice. She had done damage, but it wasn’t nearly what she could’ve done had Orvanon not been there.

  Kyarra was breathing quickly. That work had taken a lot out of her, but at least she had given her people some respite.

  “Your Majesty? Are you all right?” Atiok asked.

  Kyarra nodded her
head, not having the breath to respond. She watched the wall as the battle continued.

  Then she saw the ice crack, the sound of it so loud even she heard it in the center of the city. Her eyes widened as hundreds of small boulders of ice flew at her. Some hit the wall, but others, guided by Orvanon’s power, flew deeper, falling into the city itself. She realized that she had stopped countering Orvanon’s spells; she had been so tired that she’d forgotten. Kyarra saw an ice boulder smash into the roof of a house, then another and another. There was such devastation that horror gripped her.

  She snapped herself out of it and turned around. Commander Atiok saw her and opened his mouth, but Kyarra wasn’t waiting anymore. She reached the platform at the center of the roof and slid her staff into the slot on the ground. She put her hand on a plate next to it and activated the spell. A blinding light exploded out of her fragment and power surged through it and into the wards. Outside, she could see the three towers on the edges of her city light up with power. Then three pillars of light exploded toward the sky, one from each tower, and a moment later the beams curved and leaned over her city, meeting in the middle just over her head.

  Walls of light spread from the three beams, covering her city with a massive protective shield powered by her fragment of power. She knew that it would close down the city, and if any ship was unlucky to be on the boundary of the shield it would be cut in half. But she had no choice—she couldn’t watch her people die.

  Kyarra was breathing heavily from the effort of guiding so much power, but now that it was mostly autonomous, she dropped to the floor. Atiok caught her and yelled for a chair, then he shuffled her into it. She looked over the roof at the light wall protecting her city.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  NARZARAH

  Present

  Narzarah watched as the city they, or rather their allies, were attacking sprung a shield of anima around it. It looked brilliant in the darkening sky, a half sphere of light. The Lashians fired their weapons, but to little effect. They even fired the two of the three Light cannons his people provided them at the wall, and the result was the same. He wondered how long it would take them to realize that they wouldn’t be able to get through with such weak weapons.

  “She didn’t have that last time,” Ashara said from his right. Narzarah was sitting inside his pavilion with the front opened up on a remote hill, overlooking the battle with Ashara, Xhao Wa Lei, and Xiang Hao Ming-Li. The three were his most powerful warriors, and while they weren’t yet ready for command, they would be in time—and what better way to learn than by staying close to him. What Narzarah had offered to Vin long ago he had meant: the spirit artists were one of the greatest foes the Arashan Host had ever faced, and those who joined them deserved a respected place in it by his side.

  Narzarah turned his head to look at the other, seeing Ming-Li glaring at Ashara. I will need to take care of that, but not now.

  “They had clearly prepared,” Lei said. His and Ashara’s relationship had progressed well. Ashara saw him as both a mentor and a close ally—which was to be expected, seeing as they had been fighting together for almost five years.

  “It is impressive that they have managed to create a shield of that size. The information our agents gathered made me believe that magic is not as advanced on this world as on some others,” Narzarah said.

  “You have encountered something like this before?” Lei asked.

  Narzarah nodded his head. “Of course. Many worlds have such shields.”

  Lei bowed his head in thanks and turned to look back at the city and the Lashians’ futile attempts to break through.

  “We should’ve gone with the Lashians,” Ming-Li nearly growled. “We could’ve taken that wall in minutes, even with Vin there.”

  Narzarah glanced at the woman. He could see her impertinence and impatience. She had been with a Host for only a short time before she was transported to this world, and Narzarah hadn’t had the time to teach her how the Host acted in situations such as this.

  “The Lashians were displeased at the death of their fragment-bearer. They wanted blood,” Narzarah said.

  “Well, they didn’t get any. They have barely scratched that wall with an entire day of fighting,” Ming-Li argued.

  “We are here as their allies. We can only act when they ask,” Narzarah said.

  Ming-Li rounded on him. “Why are we still playing this game? We could’ve taken the land surrounding the gate and waited until the connection stabilized. We have no need for the Lashians anymore.”

  Narzarah nearly laughed, but he contained himself. He was her Commander, and it was his job to teach her. “This isn’t the first world we have invaded, as well you know.” He gave her hard look. “But,” Narzarah continued, “since you wish to learn, there is more to conquering a world than simply wiping out everything. Your world was the exception, not the rule. Your people did not want to bow, as their honor demanded that they never do so. We were forced to do something that the Host rarely does: wipe a world clean of its inhabitants. Usually we conquer the world with people still on it for the Arashan to rule. This world is vast; we need to be careful how we approach things. The Lashian Empire is one of the more powerful nations on this world, which is why they were approached, but they couldn’t stand against an entire world. Neither can we, not until we have enough troops on this side to match the entire world and the gate is stable enough such that we can bring in more troops.”

  Ming-Li didn’t look convinced. She huffed and turned her eyes toward the city.

  Narzarah did the same. He noticed riders coming up toward their camp, and he stood. “It looks like it is time.”

  The others looked at him confused.

  “Time for what?” Ashara asked.

  “It appears that our Lashian allies have realized that they can’t get through the shield. So they are finally ready to ask for our help.” Narzarah pointed at the Lashian riders. “Come with me. Let’s go meet them.”

  * * * *

  Narzarah stood at the head of the Lashian army as his troops marched forward and got into position next to the Lashians. A step behind him stood his three Champions, who watched the city. Up close, the shield filled the sky.

  The Grand Marshal had called Narzarah and asked if the Arashan had anything that could help them get through the shield, and Narzarah had informed him that they did indeed have something. The Grand Marshal immediately demanded the Arashan hand the weapon over, and it was only because Narzarah had a great amount of patience that he hadn’t struck the man down there and then. Of course, it was to be expected—the Lashians were arrogant and they believed the Arashan to be some kind of otherworldly demons that were bound to act by the contract they had signed. A stupid and superstitious belief, but one that Narzarah had fostered.

  Narzarah agreed, provided that the Lashians agreed to allow his army to join in the assault that followed. He knew that the Lashians had a grudge against this city, but Narzarah would rather they be done with it quickly. He had no wish to hold a siege for months, allowing the world to get a handle on the situation.

  After some discussion, the Grand Marshal agreed, and so they arrived. Night had fallen and torches and mage lights illuminated the army. Narzarah looked at the shield around the city, his hand on his blade, activating its power. His eyes saw the anima flowing through the shield, the matrix that crafted it. He saw its weak points. Slowly, he pulled his blade from its scabbard and walked a few steps forward ahead of the army. The shield protected the city, but it also prevented them from attacking through it. He could see the faces of the people on the walls, and he wondered what they were thinking. In the end, it didn’t matter.

  He raised his long curved sword up above his head. The thick blade shimmered and then caught on fire. Dark, violet flames engulfed it and Narzarah concentrated, pulling power from his fragment and pushing it into the blade. The intensity of the flames increased so much so that the color darkened and wisps of black appeared in the crackling wa
ves of the fire. He stood there, motionless for a long time. The power from his blade blasted ambient anima around him, outward, flattening the grass beneath his feet and sending dust and wind circling around him.

  Then, as he felt the power reach its peak, Narzarah gave the city one last glance, feeling sorry for all those souls inside of it. But the Arashan mission was to conquer worlds for their god, to bring order and progress to all mortals. For such a lofty goal, sacrifices were a necessity.

  Power extended from his sword up into the sky as tall as the city’s shield itself, the violet and black flame churning into a pillar of fire. Then Narzarah slashed down toward the city with his blade, the pillar following. It cut through the shield like it wasn’t even there, violet and black anima exploding at the point of contact outward across the shield’s surface, breaking it apart. His blade, made out of fire, reached the wall, and it cracked and exploded on impact at least fifty paces wide, and the impact of his blade widened the further it reached into the city. The first wall was gone for fifty paces, and another fifty on each side as the impact explosion blew it all apart. Behind it the second wall met the same fate, crumbling under the weight of Narzarah’s power. His blade of fire extended into the city for another half a league, and he could see the explosions extend and damage the city for much farther than that. His blade’s fire disappeared and Narzarah watched as the shield around the city fell, looking as if it was being burnt away.

  The violet fire in the city turned to red and then orange as the influence of his blade no longer fueled it.

  Satisfied, Narzarah turned to the combined army. He saw the Grand Marshal look at Narzarah with a calm mask on his face, as the man next to him, a fragment-bearer, looked both impressed and jealous in equal measure. The Lashian soldiers had a mix of fear and excitement written all over theirs.