Cleasby turned his head. He must have heard Betrys or perhaps caught her movement from the corner of his eye. In a flash, Betrys surged from the grass in her beast form, charging toward the blue soldier.
Someone on the wall shouted in alarm. Rather than try to escape or defend himself, Cleasby calmly reached up and flipped down his visor.
Caradoc watched, amused. There was no way the inaccurate lightning weapons would be able to strike Betrys mid-leap, and she would be able to shrug off the more accurate bullets. Cleasby was finished.
Only they didn’t shoot their lightning at Betrys. Instead, they launched their lightning bolts at her target. The clumsy storm weapons had been aimed at where an attacker would inevitably end up. With a deafening roar, arcs of flashing blue lightning engulfed Cleasby, yet he only stood there, motionless, immune as the crackling energy danced across his body and left him unharmed.
The skinwalker wasn’t so lucky. Her momentum carried her directly into the multiple arcs. The blinding flash forced Caradoc to cover his eyes as every lightning weapon on the wall blew Betrys to pieces.
He’d not realized all their rifles had been searching for him, and the repeated flashes of lightning had just illuminated his position.
Guto shouted as he shoved his chief aside. Bullets crashed through the trees, snapping branches and pulverizing trunks. The two of them turned and ran.
As the heavy bullets whizzed past like livid buzzing bees, Caradoc cursed Betrys. Her death was her own fault, but it was doubtful her family would see it that way. Suddenly, there was a wet thud. Guto gasped and sprawled face forward into the pine needles on the ground. He didn’t move again. Snarling, Caradoc went back for his father. He scooped up the elder’s limp form, threw Guto over one shoulder, and fled deeper into the forest.
As Cleasby ran back inside the fort, there was so much lingering static gathered in the metal of his armor that sparks leapt and popped against the wagon wheels. Headhunter shoved the wagon back into place, and Rains tossed him his glaive. He caught the weapon and immediately tried to twist the grip to activate the accumulator. His hands were shaking so badly that it took a few tries to get it to stick, so he gave up. This was probably the fastest his heart had ever beaten. As he lifted his visor, electricity snapped between his gauntlets and his helmet.
“Are they attacking?” he asked.
“Looks like just the one that came at you. Everything else is holding back,” Novak said from her position on the wall as she scanned with her spyglass across the darkened forest. “You boys blasted it to ash.”
“Having us target you was good thinking,” Rains said.
“I figured they would try to rush me. I was hoping to get Caradoc.”
Thorny was still on the wall. “That was fantastic. It isn’t often an officer orders all his men to shoot at him.” The Malcontents heard that and cheered.
“I’m just glad it worked. I know our armor is insulated against galvanic weapons, but reading that in a manual and being on the receiving end of half a dozen storm glaives are two entirely different things.” He was just lucky they’d tried to sneak up on him, rather than just throwing spears at him from the safety of the forest. Cleasby stamped his feet. His boots were still smoking from where the electricity had grounded itself into the earth beneath him.
“So, how was it?” Rains asked.
“Quite the rush actually.” His teeth were chattering. He held out one hand, and it was still shaking so badly that the metal joints rattled. “Did you get Caradoc?”
“Was that the man you were talking to?” Novak asked. Cleasby nodded. “Then yes, I think so. There were two of them. Couldn’t tell which, but I hit one of them.”
For their sake, he hoped it had been Caradoc. If he’d learned anything from their talk, it was that the enemy was truly deadly. He would keep coming until the fort was in splinters, and Cleasby really preferred to not live out the rest of his days in a hole, being fattened up for a Skinwalker feast. “Any chance it was a fatal wound?”
“With these things? Doubt it.”
They needed a plan, fast. “Foundation, follow me. Ranger Novak, I need you, too. Everybody else keep your eyes open.” Cleasby moved toward the bunkhouse. The impacts had been so terrifying, but also so exhilarating, that he had to force himself not to run. He spotted Raus along the way. “I need you, the professor, and anybody you’ve got who understands fortifications and sieges.”
Mind racing, he reached the campfire and immediately began to pace back and forth while he waited for everyone else to catch up. Cleasby used to hate it when Madigan paced; it seemed like the man was always in motion, and back then it had made Cleasby nervous. Now here he was, doing the same thing. But to be fair, he had just been repeatedly struck by lightning. If they lived through this, he was going to personally send a thank you card to Sebastian Nemo for inventing storm armor.
Focus, Cleasby.
Acosta appeared. He might not have been a trusted member of the Malcontents, but he’d killed more people than devil rat fever, so Cleasby was grateful to have the Ordsman’s expertise handy.
“I hate to admit it, Acosta, but you were right. I led you to another crazy battle where the odds are against us and maniacs wait behind every corner.”
“Indeed, Cleasby. Thank you.”
“Next time you have a word with your dark Lady, tell her to take me off her damned list.”
Acosta nodded thoughtfully. “You seem unnerved, Cleasby, and it’s not just from the lightning. This man you spoke to—Caradoc? He troubles you.”
“You think?” Cleasby took off his helmet; the lightning had singed his hair underneath. The others were just arriving around the campfire. “Yes, he ‘troubles’ me. You should have heard what I heard. Not the words but the confidence. That smug bastard thinks he’s going to win. He’s not just a fanatic who can turn into a wolf monster. He thinks he’s right, and he’s so confident he’s better than everyone else that he’s eager to prove it.”
“So, he’s a savage version of Acosta,” Rains suggested.
“Excellent,” Acosta said as he stroked his goatee. “Those are the best kind.”
“Next time, you can negotiate with him.” Cleasby threw up his hands in frustration. Normally, he thought he was a calm man, but he wasn’t feeling particularly calm at this moment. “Get me a map of the area.”
Pangborn looked concerned. “You want a seat, lieutenant? You’re looking a little jittery.”
Cleasby did—his heart felt like it might explode, but he still had work to do. “I need the rest of the 6th and wouldn’t mind an extra warjack or five, but we’ve got what we’ve got.” He didn’t even have a full squad anymore. Hellogand had been stabbed in the leg and, at best, could hop along on one foot, so he’d been left to guard the wounded inside the bunkhouse. The rest of them had a scattering of minor injuries. “Map!”
“I’ve got a map.” Novak was back in uniform. She had a waterproofed map case beneath her cloak. She pulled out a tightly rolled tube as Thornbury dragged over a crate to serve as their map table. She spread it out. “We’re right here.” She pointed at one corner.
Cleasby scowled. Ironhead Station was on the other side of the map. Between his group and the safety of Ironhead was the Clamorgan village. While he didn’t even know for sure if that was where Caradoc came from, they’d first met him near it, so Cleasby preferred not to risk getting close to what might be an enemy base. Granted, that was the best road, but there were other routes back to Ironhead Station.
Rains could tell what Cleasby was thinking. “You think we can make it?”
“With all these wounded and being harried by skinwalkers the whole way? Doubtful.”
“We couldn’t even get all the wounded into the wagons. We’ve lost too many oxen,” Thornbury said. “The logistics to pull off an evacuation are fairly unforgiving.”
“So we either divide our forces to send someone for help, or we all hunker down and brace for a siege,” Rains mused. “W
e’ve got sufficient food and water. When we don’t report in, Ironhead will send someone to check on us. Eventually.”
Cleasby scoffed. “In what, a week, maybe two? Assuming the skinwalkers don’t just pick them off as well, and then what? Another four or five days before Ironhead expects them back?”
Baron Wynn, Clemency Horner, and Raus joined them. The professor still seemed rather shaken up while the other two looked stoic. At first he hadn’t noticed the dwarf next to Raus—the diminutive Rhulic worker disappeared in the ogrun’s shadow. When Cleasby finally saw him, he realized the dwarf was the same one who had fetched the blasting charges for him earlier.
“What’s your name?” Cleasby asked him.
“Dolphs Sternhand. Raus here said you needed an engineer. Been a long time, but I was in the 15th Hammerfall Sappers, the Fighting Badgers.” He said that like it should be impressive. “Maybe you heard of us?”
“No, sorry.”
Cleasby hadn’t meant to hurt his feelings, but the dwarf seemed a little let down. “Well, it has been thirty years, but in my youth, I built some forts and since then, I’ve knocked a few more down. I’ve been digging tunnels for Steelwater Rail ever since. These hands helped dig out half of Ironhead Station.”
“The first good news of the evening,” Thornbury said. “I’m sure the lieutenant would love to hear how we can improve our fortification.”
“This pile of matchsticks? Not gonna happen. I’m surprised it hasn’t fallen down yet. If those things had had a clue earlier, this place would be gone already. Instead, they spent all their time scurrying around the walls and attacking a few of them at a time instead of focusing on breaching. If they’d stacked up on their big ’un, we’d be filling their bellies even now.”
Cleasby had suspected as much. The miners had built this place to keep out animals and various unorganized wild beasts. After speaking with Caradoc, he knew just how coldly rational the skinwalkers could be. Tonight they’d counted on surprise and ferocity; they wouldn’t make the same mistake again.
“With what you’ve got to work with inside,” Cleasby asked, “if we dismantle every structure, what could you do?”
The dwarf seemed unimpressed with the notion. “Truthfully? Improve morale, and that’s about it. Get Raus’ boys sawing and digging holes and at least they’ll feel useful and be too busy to worry. Until the monsters come back and eat us all, at least.”
Raus shrugged. “We are really good at digging holes.”
“I’m also guessing you’re forgetting that if we’re besieged,” Cleasby warned, “and let’s remember these things seem to like to fight at night, you’ll need watch fires burning and lots of them, which means we’ll be burning our wood instead of building with it. If we could get a work crew outside to harvest enough lumber, I could do a lot. But judging by the look on your faces, I’m guessing that’s not much of an option either.”
It was an option, just not a particularly good option. Cleasby didn’t want to split his forces, but someone was going to have to go for help. “What are the chances of a small group eluding the skinwalkers through the woods?” He looked to Novak.
The young ranger shook her head. “Slim to none. My patrol was excellent—not bragging, just stating facts—but these things have noses like hounds. They can track us, and they’ll outrun us.”
“Can’t you lose their scent by wading through a stream or something?” Thornbury asked.
Novak looked like she might laugh, but she swallowed and took the question seriously. “It takes time and effort to throw off skilled trackers. My patrol tried it, but it doesn’t always work.”
Thorny sighed. “Alas, I’ve been reading too many adventure pulps. I knew those things would lead me astray someday.”
“Whenever we shook them, they just spread out and started searching, and because they’re faster through the woods and had the numbers, they’d just range ahead and pick us up again. You heard them howl? It’s got to be how they communicate while they hunt. Once you’re spotted, that sound carries a long way, so they’ll zero right in on you again. I think the only reason I lost them was because they assumed I died in the fall and didn’t bother looking. Sorry, lieutenant. If we’re going to make it out on foot, we’ll need to be prepared to fight them every step of the way.”
“The question is, what do we run out of first: Storm Knights, skinwalkers, or miles?” Rains stated. “Considering how much howling we heard earlier, I don’t like those odds.”
“If we split our forces, each group is half as easy to pick off. There’s nothing to stop them from taking one, then coming back for the other,” Cleasby said, still studying the map. “The bigger the group that strikes out for Ironhead, the less of us there are to defend the fort but the more likely we are to survive.”
“The solution is simple, my friends.” The fire cast ominous shadows across Acosta’s face. “Abandon your wounded.”
“That will not happen,” the professor snapped. “How dare you?”
“It may seem callous to you, nobleman, but it is a simple calculation. Split your meager numbers to futilely save some and lose all, or abandon those who slow you down—who would likely die anyway—and save the remainder. Ugliness does not change truth. You know I am right.” Acosta looked to Cleasby. “The lieutenant understands this. Sometimes you must sacrifice to achieve victory. War is nothing more than a violent form of mathematics.”
The Storm Knights shared an uneasy glance. It may have sounded awful, but Acosta had a point.
Only the mission wasn’t to defeat a foe or seize an objective. It was to keep the expedition alive, and that’s what he intended to do. “We’re not abandoning anyone so casually,” Cleasby said. Rains and Thornbury seemed relieved at his words. Pangborn gave him a knowing nod, as if that decision had never been in question. “End of discussion.”
Acosta nodded thoughtfully. “Perhaps you are not entirely like Madigan after all.”
Rains moved to the map and spent a moment studying it. “So, the real problem is how a small group of us can hold them off in the open for two complete days.”
“Not necessarily.” Novak rotated the map. “It’s two days to Ironhead, less if you can run like a ranger—which I’m assuming none of you heavy infantry types can, no offense—but look at this.” She ran her finger up past the mines, across the northern slope of the mountain, and down the other side. “It’s less than one day to reach civilization.”
“The train tracks,” Rains said as he realized what she was getting at. “Steelwater Rail is busy. There’s got to be trains passing through there all the time.”
“Three per day,” Cleasby said. Rains gave him an incredulous look, but Cleasby dismissed his stare. “I was bored and accidentally memorized the posted schedule during our ride.”
“We can flag one down and ride it into Ironhead.” Novak thumped the map triumphantly. “That’s the track to Orven, so odds are it’ll be carrying ore and pilgrims, but occasionally there’s a troop transport. If we get lucky, we can get reinforcements and come right back here.”
“But there’s no trail on this map,” Rains said. “We don’t even know if that route is passable.”
“Trust me. It’s there,” Novak said. “It’s an old one. Nothing you’d want to try to carry wounded over, treacherous in a few places, but nothing even heavy infantry pavement pounders couldn’t handle. Again, no offense intended.”
“Damn, ranger, how slow do you think we are?” Thornbury demanded. “Never mind. I’m sure the word ‘lumbering’ comes to mind. So, now the question is, how many can we get away with sending without automatically condemning everyone who remains behind to death? The Malcontents are the only ones who’ll have a fighting chance in the open, but without us, everyone else in here is as good as dead as soon as we leave.”
Pangborn had been quietly studying the map, and he spoke for the first time. “I’ve got an idea.” Cleasby paid close attention; Pangborn’s slow spoken drawl often led people to t
he erroneous assumption that he wasn’t bright, but the Malcontents knew that he was extremely perceptive. Pangborn drove one meaty finger into the map. “Right there. I poked my head in while me and Headhunter were on guard duty at the dig. They might be able to tear down this fort, but it’ll take a lot more effort to tear down the whole mountain.”
Cleasby knew exactly what he was pointing at. “The mine. Brilliant!”
Thorny was incredulous. “Just how hard did you get hit in the head earlier, lieutenant?”
“Horner, did your people survey those shafts?”
“Just in passing. I sent a few men down, mostly to check for survivors and to see if they’d stored anything useful inside.”
“I was among those who checked,” Dolphs said. “New dig, there’s only one main line sunk very far. It goes back a couple hundred feet before they hit a rich vein and trashed an exploratory shaft. Quality work, fully supported. Real craftsmanship and care on the supports. The love shows. Definitely had Rhulfolk among them, I’ll tell you that much.”
“There’s only one way in,” Pangborn pointed out. “And it’s narrow enough their big beast isn’t going to squeeze in. Ditch the fort, move into the hole, and barricade the opening.”
Thorny still couldn’t see the tactical advantage. “I thought you hated being underground?”
“I do. But I didn’t say I was going in there. It was dug big enough to fit a laborjack, tops. Headhunter won’t fit, and where he goes, I go.”
“The mine has got possibilities. Anything that tries to come in gets funneled down tight. These skinwalkers are big, they’d only be able to enter one at a time,” Rains mused. “Have a couple of glaives waiting for them, and they’d be hard to dig out.”
“Like a burrow-mawg hiding in a drainage pipe,” Pangborn said proudly.
“It’s solid enough,” Dolphs mused. “Unless those beasties have some mining equipment around that I I’ve not seen yet, they’d have a hard time collapsing it on our heads. Proper application of explosives would do, but they’d need a lot. Say what you will about the Wyrmwalls, but the rock is solid. Not too temperamental at all.”
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