A vertical beam of white light shot straight up into the sky, slowly rotating around and around. Everyone was mesmerized, but as the shock of the beacon’s beauty began to wear off, Zetta noticed that she really didn’t feel any different. Not stronger. Not faster.
She jumped in place, but barely got off the ground, just like always.
Nothing had changed.
“It’s not working,” Cora called down to Zetta. “I think we’re missing a step.”
“What do you mean, it’s not working?” Zetta said, scaling the pyramid. The polished precious blocks were slippery beneath her boots. She stepped up carefully, then stood beside Cora as they both looked at the diagram in Zetta’s mother’s notebook. It seemed as if everything was set up correctly. Zetta flipped the page, but it was the last one in the notebook. “Umm…”
Zetta felt pressure mounting in her chest. Everyone was staring at her, expecting her to know what to do. She could figure it out. She just needed time. Unfortunately, that was the one thing she didn’t have. From up here on top of the pyramid, she could see right over the barrier wall.
The raid had arrived, close enough that Zetta could just barely make out the scowls on the gray faces. The raid captain carried their pillager banner high, and she could feel the pyramid slightly trembling under her feet as the ravagers stomped forward in unison. The raid horn trumpeted, announcing the illagers’ attack. All was so silent within the great wall surrounding Sienna Dunes that Zetta could hear her heart beating like a pickaxe smashing stone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Seconds later, the bell tower starting ringing. Things had seemed so orderly a few minutes ago with everyone working together to prepare for the raid, but now everything devolved into chaos. Screaming and crying came from all directions, and Captain Zayden’s ragtag army had trouble keeping in formation.
Benjamin the slime harvester dropped his sword twice, like he’d forgotten how to use it. Zetta imagined he must have slayed thousands of slime cubes over the years, and now here he was, his nerves completely rattled.
Zetta understood, though. Slow-bouncing cubes of slime really weren’t that big of a threat, and they were certainly easy to outrun if one got surrounded. But there was no outrunning the threat that was on their horizon. Over a hundred illagers and their band of hostile mobs were steadily walking toward Sienna Dunes. It was almost like a slow-motion wreck, giving everyone within the town plenty of time to worry and wonder and panic.
Rayne and Ashton arrived a few minutes later, panting and out of breath.
“We can’t find the dragon,” Ashton said, his voice cracking. Zetta could see the pain in his deep brown eyes. “We looked everywhere. We called for it. It’s gone.”
“Oh no. Maybe it went looking for you again,” Zetta said, laying a hand on her cousin’s shoulder to comfort him. She turned her head up to the sky, hoping that at this very moment, the dragon would swoop down and spray the entire raid in its purple poison. She didn’t want to admit that there was an equal chance that it had gotten fed up with being left behind and tricked and chased, and had flown off in search of a quieter life. A life that didn’t involve a group of well-meaning friends and a town that wanted to hunt it down.
“Yeah, probably,” Ashton said. He didn’t sound any more convinced than Zetta was.
“We’ll have to do the best we can without it,” Zetta said. She handed Rayne her last poison arrow.
Rayne’s smile was thin. “Just one?” they asked, examining the arrow. The arrowhead was green instead of white, and tiny magic particles glistened in the air around it. “I was expecting at least a dozen or so.”
“One is all you’ll need,” Zetta said, pulling the enchanted bow out next and quickly handing it over before she found some unexpected way to destroy it.
Rayne looked like they were going to faint. “An enchanted bow? Thank you!”
“Thank Captain Zayden. Later. Right now, we’ve got a town to defend, and I still need to figure out how to get that beacon working. The instructions just stop, but I know my mother took great notes. I know this isn’t a mistake.”
“Umm…” Ashton said, pulling out his notebook and opening it up. “You probably want to look at this…”
Zetta shooed him away. “Sorry, Ashton. I don’t have time for your mob sketches right now.”
“It’s not a mob sketch.” He pushed the page in front of Zetta. It wasn’t a mob sketch. It was a sketch of the beacon, with instructions on how to activate it.
Zetta flipped Ashton’s old notebook closed. It was nearly identical to her mother’s. “Where’d you get this?”
“Found it in your closet a couple years ago when you were babysitting me. Or supposed to be babysitting me. You fell asleep.”
Zetta shook her head, but she didn’t have time to be exasperated by her little cousin. She sprinted over to her dad and handed him the notebook. He took it, read the page over, and then fed an iron ingot into the beacon.
A hard breeze whipped past Zetta, like a magical shockwave that made her eyes flutter. Not soon after, she felt the familiar gift of strength, only this time it felt more natural. There wasn’t that deep desire to show off. She was simply filled with a need to do the most good she could with this extra boost.
Rift ran over to his contraptions, and Rayne climbed the rickety ladder up to the top of one of the watchtowers. As everyone took their places, Zetta looked at Ashton. Without the dragon to command, he didn’t really have anything to do. “Ashton, why don’t you help the mayor gather up everyone who’s not fighting and get them into the vault. Especially Nana and Papa. You know how stubborn they are.”
He sighed and nodded, then took off.
“I thought you said there were about a hundred of them,” Rayne called from the watchtower, arrow notched, eyes trained hard on their bow sight.
“There were,” Zetta said, climbing up to join them. She quickly estimated the enemy’s numbers from her spot in the tower. There seemed to be closer to two hundred illagers now, and nearly a dozen ravagers were among the enemy mobs. “They must have had some other clans join them.”
“That’s okay,” Rayne said. “Our plan is still solid. It just might take a little longer.”
Zetta nodded, like she believed this. They had infinite hope. Infinite faith. And now they had infinite arrows. The fight would be tough, but they were as prepared as they could be. Plus, the mob was about to walk right into the blast path of the TNT cannon.
“Rift, are you ready?” Captain Zayden called from the next tower over.
“Yes, sir!” Rift yelled from his spot next to the cannon. Zetta still couldn’t believe the mayor had approved it. Somehow, it made her feel ill knowing the mayor thought they were so desperate. “Just say the word!”
In the next instant, the captain swiped his hand down and yelled, “Fire TNT cannons!”
Rift lit the double-barreled cannon, then stepped back as the red TNT sticks started flashing. Almost simultaneously, two TNT blocks were expelled from the contraption at a tremendous speed, heading straight for the mob. The illagers didn’t have time to react to the attack. The TNT exploded right on contact, perfectly timed. A cloud of dust and debris filled the air. Everyone in the towers cheered, but as the sandy haze started to dissipate, the townspeople saw that the raid was still heavy in number. The TNT cannons should have had a bigger effect than that. They’d landed perfectly.
Zetta couldn’t understand what had gone wrong, until she saw the pointed black hats in the raid, surrounded by a thick fog of red particles. Witches. They were tossing splash potions left and right to heal their ranks.
“Fire TNT cannons!” Captain Zayden said again.
Again, the cannons fired flawlessly, but this time the raiders were ready. They’d spread out. The cannons decimated another twenty illagers, but the rest of the raid held steady. The third TNT
shot sailed right over their heads, doing minimal damage. Rift looked dejected, head hanging low. Maybe the cannon hadn’t been as effective as he’d hoped. But it had still done damage, and those illagers had to be scared. That was worth something.
The raiders were now too close to attempt another shot from the cannon, but that meant they were in range of the best archers.
Rayne let off three arrows, each sinking into its target, an enraged vindicator. Right as the third arrow landed, the vindicator blinked away in a puff of smoke. “Nice shot,” Zetta said, noticing Rayne was using regular arrows. “But what happened to the poison-tipped arrows?”
“The infinity shot doesn’t work on tipped arrows, but this bow is so powerful, I don’t even need them,” Rayne said, voice full of determination. They notched another arrow. “One down, only a hundred and fifty or so left to go.”
“Aim for the ones with weapons first,” Captain Zayden said. “Ready the arrow launcher!”
Zetta didn’t want to disturb her friend further, so she looked over at Rift, who was now racing to the control panel of his arrow launcher. There were four levers, one to control each launcher. He pulled the lever to activate all four of the contraptions. Trails of red dust glowed, then moments later, the firing started. Arrows flew out at an alarming pace, so many of them, Zetta couldn’t follow a single one. They started landing, but since the raiders were so spread out, they ended up striking the ground more often than the enemy.
The pillagers were close enough to return fire, their crossbows aimed high at the towers. An arrow whizzed past Zetta and stuck into the roof of the tower. Another hit her in the shoulder. Before she could yell out in pain, she felt the effects of the beacon wash over her like a warm bath, and instantly she was healed. She plucked the arrow from her arm, and tossed it aside, unbothered.
Now the raiders were close enough that even the greenest archers with the most minimal skills were hitting their targets. Zetta was able to start tossing poison splash potions, but with the witches doing the same with healing potions, the effects were canceled out.
Instead of wasting another potion, Zetta sat back and took time to really observe their enemy. Captain Zayden had ordered the archers to take out the raiders with weapons first, which was leaving those weird illagers in the robes virtually untouched. But as Zetta looked deep into their mesmerizing green eyes, she knew this decision had been a mistake.
“We need to target those illagers in the robes,” she called out to Captain Zayden. “They’re up to something. I can feel it.” Why else would they seem so at ease in the face of so much fighting?
Captain Zayden looked out into the surge of raiders, and he must have seen it, too, the calm on their gray faces hiding the danger those crossed arms held. “Change of plans,” he barked to his fighters. “Take out the illagers in the robes first!” He glanced back at Zetta, a look of awe on his face. “Good call, Zetta. If you ever need a favor from me, just say the—”
“They’re summoning something!” screamed one of the fighters. The robed illagers had stopped their march and had lifted their arms, waving them about in big circles. Fanged teeth erupted from the ground, some of them traveling under the wall and biting at the fighters standing nearby. Zetta had never seen anything like it. Those hungry maws surged up from nowhere, ready for flesh. Ready for vengeance. The townspeople were terrified, but the beacon had them regenerating and healed up in no time.
The robed illagers began summoning again, and suddenly, the air was filled with a flock of pale gray birds that started dive-bombing the towers. Not birds, Zetta saw as they got closer, but creepy little winged demons carrying the tiniest of swords. They were so small, Zetta almost forgot to be afraid of them, but then one of them swooped in and smacked her in the forehead with its sword, which, though tiny, hurt like the full-sized version.
“Ow!” she shouted, swatting the thing away like an insect. But more were coming. She pulled out an axe from her pack and starting hacking away at them, trying to vanquish the little nuisances quickly so Rayne and the other archers wouldn’t be distracted. One of them nicked Rayne in the back, causing them to misfire their bow and nearly hit Captain Zayden in the next tower over.
“Sorry!” Rayne shouted. Rayne and the other archers spent the next few moments picking the vexing creatures from the sky with well-placed arrows. Then Rayne took aim at a robed illager who was in the middle of casting another spell. The arrows ripped right through that gold-trimmed robe, and soon, the illager was no more.
But there were many, many more of them. And now they were next to the wall.
“My bow’s down to half durability,” Rayne yelled, exasperated.
“Already?” Zetta said. She checked each of the chests in the tower. The potions were running low, too. She grabbed one. “Let’s work together then. I’ll toss, you aim and take out the weakened enemies before the witches get a chance to heal them.”
Rayne nodded, and together the friends started picking off the other robed mobs, until screams started coming from the ground below. Zetta rushed to the side of the tower and looked down. A small army was gathered close to the wall, prepared to defend the area in case of a breach, but now they were in a panic as fanged mouths punctured through the sand again and snapped at their feet.
Zetta shook her head, then lobbed more potions at the robed illagers. There were only a few of them left now. Rayne finished them off, but not even a second later, one of the ravagers crashed through their terracotta wall.
Terracotta chunks rained down, creating an abstract mosaic of color in the sand. Zetta would have thought it pretty, if it hadn’t spelled certain doom for the people of Sienna Dunes.
Fighting broke out beneath the tower. Captain Zayden shouted out orders and somehow got the frazzled army back into ranks. They drew their stone swords and battled witches and pillagers and vindicators and ravagers. For a moment, it looked like they were holding their own, but more and more mobs continued to spill through the opening in the wall. The beacon was helping, but it could only do so much as the fighting started to spread out past the range of its effects.
Zetta dropped the last few healing and regeneration potions she had on Captain Zayden and his fighters, and it was helping, but even with the beacon’s strength boost, it soon became obvious that she was just delaying the inevitable. No one had wanted to say it out loud, but they were simply outnumbered and outmatched.
“Retreat!” yelled Captain Zayden. The word was simple, but it ripped a hole in Zetta’s soul. Maybe her hope wasn’t infinite after all.
The tower shook beneath her feet. She looked down again, and this time saw a ravager ramming its head into the base of the tower. It was made of brittle terracotta, too, and wouldn’t hold forever. In fact, as the floor beneath Zetta had already started to crack, she wasn’t even sure if it would hold the next few seconds.
Then the floor wasn’t beneath her at all, just terracotta dust and air, and the next thing she knew, the tower was collapsing, and she was falling with it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Everything was black. Everything hurt. Zetta felt the debris around her shifting. Then the broken blocks above her were being lifted away. Soon she felt cool air on her face and hands tugging her to safety. She hoped they were tugging her to safety.
“I’ve got you.” It was Rift’s voice. “We’re retreating to the vault. We’ll be safe in there.”
He sounded defeated, but Zetta knew they’d be safe in the vault. The walls were made of iron blocks, and not even an enraged ravager could pound its way through it. Zetta wiped the dust and gunk from her eyes. When she opened them, she saw Rift staring at her. Rayne was right behind him, bloody and scraped up, but otherwise okay.
Together, the friends slipped away toward the town hall, trying to ignore the destruction and the cries of the last line of fighters going up against impossible odds, swinging their swo
rds at the endless raid so they could buy time for the rest of the townspeople to get to safety.
The friends ambled up the stairs of the town hall, then went to the back of the building where the vault was. The doors were wide open, and the whole town was crammed inside.
“Where’s Ashton?” was Zetta’s first clear thought. Inside, family members were seeking one another out. Zetta shook off the pain in her bones and stood on her tiptoes, looking over heads in hopes of spotting Ashton.
Over the din of frantic conversation, Zetta could still hear Captain Zayden calling for retreat. He was getting closer now. That was that. The fighting was over. Sienna Dunes was there for the illagers’ taking. Would they steal their valuables? Destroy their buildings? Would they ever leave?
Finally, Zetta let out a sigh of relief as she saw her cousin. He was looking frantic, even for someone who’d just been through an attack.
“Ashton!” Zetta screamed out. She ran over and pulled him into a tight hug. “Are you okay?”
He shook his head. “No. I mean, I’m fine. But I can’t find Nana and Papa. They should have been here. They said they were coming when I went to the farm to fetch them and sent me ahead. But I’ve looked. So many times. They’re not here. Your dad’s not here either.”
Dad could still possibly be held up with Captain Zayden and the other fighters, but Ashton was right: Nana and Papa should have already been in the vault.
Captain Zayden arrived, ushering in the last of the fighters. Zetta’s father was not among them. The mayor started to pull the lever to close the iron block doors.
“Wait!” Zetta said to Mayor Maxine. “My grandparents and father, they’re not in here.”
“We can’t wait,” the mayor replied, her voice soft and full of remorse, even in this time of terror. “We gave warnings. We have to close the doors now.”
Zetta knew how stubborn her grandparents were. She had a feeling they wouldn’t leave their farm. It had been their home for decades, and no way would they give it up without a fight. Zetta and Ashton exchanged looks. They both knew what they had to do.
The Dragon: An Official Minecraft Novel Page 17