by David Meyer
Harlop swung his legs over the side. His feet found a rung and he gave it a little push, testing it. Finding it sturdy, he slid his full weight onto it.
The guy took a deep breath, then started to descend the ladder. After he’d gone ten feet, a second person followed him. Then a third person started down the rungs.
Wisely, Stanner had left the upper rungs intact, so as to give the Banished a false sense of confidence. And from the looks of things, it had worked.
The fourth person swung his legs into view. He started to lower his sandals to a rung.
Then something cracked.
Eighty feet up, one of the rungs, partially sawed through, snapped in half. As the metal bar disintegrated, the third climber grabbed for another rung. But that one broke as well. Uttering a horrible scream, he fell.
Plummeting downward, he struck the second climber, who was busy trying to navigate his way past a very weak section of rungs. More bars broke and the second climber fell as well.
Fifty feet above the ground, the two climbers slammed into Harlop. The sudden impact jarred him loose. He fumbled for a grip, but the bar he chose broke off in his hand.
From there, the second and third climbers fell hard. They slammed into the five-foot-deep pile of sand and crashed right through it.
As for Harlop, he also fell, but managed to slow his decent by grabbing at bars on the way down. Finally, he smashed into the sand. Like the other two men, he sank into the auburn grains, disappearing from view. For a moment, all was still. Then he emerged. Dazed and bloodied, he crawled out of the pile. He rolled down the soft slope, chest heaving for air.
“Get the ladder,” Titus ordered, bursting out of the shadows. “I’ll take care of Harlop.”
Stanner and his team rushed out from their hiding spots. They hustled across a stretch of flat sand. Reaching the now-broken ladder, they swiftly pulled it down.
Meanwhile, Titus charged forward. Harlop heard the footsteps and twisted his neck in that direction. His face was streaked and bloodied. His eyes, tearing up from terrible pain, swirled in weird fashion.
The man looked like he might faint. But he sat up anyway.
Titus’ legs pumped. His arms swung back and forth in perfect rhythm. Picking up speed, he cut the distance in half.
Harlop clawed his way to the top of the sand pile. His gaze went to the wall. A short distance away, he spotted the recently-fabricated signal-blocker.
Titus reached the foot of the drifting sand pile. His sandals crunched as he hurried up the soft slope.
Harlop fumbled inside of his cloak. Producing an object, he scrambled toward the signal-blocker.
Moonlight struck the item clenched tightly in his fingers. It glinted and Titus could see it was a dagger.
Harlop reached the signal-blocker. Fierce coughs racked his body and he began spitting up blood. Even so, he raised the blade high above his head.
Putting on a burst of speed, Titus rammed into the man’s back.
Jarred, Harlop lost his balance. Gasping, coughing, he tried to adjust, to swing his blade at the machine.
Titus grabbed the man’s wrist. Pouring on the strength, he forced the dagger onto a different path.
“Uhhh.” Harlop wheezed as the sharp blade sliced into his belly. Weakly, he tried to pull it back out again.
Titus backed up a step, then snapped a kick at the hilt, driving the blade even deeper into flesh.
Crying out, his voice full of unthinkable agony, Harlop crumbled to the sand.
Titus whirled around, saw Sanza directing the three soldiers on where to place the ladder. Stanner, meanwhile, knelt on the sand dune, right where the other two climbers had fallen.
“Are they still there?” Titus asked.
“Yes, Sir. They’re both dead.” Stanner reached into the sand. Tensing his muscles, he started to pull one of the bodies out of the dune.
“Leave them for now,” Titus said. “We’ll deal with them later. If we live that long.”
“Yes, Sir.”
He swung back to face Harlop. The man lay flat on the sand. His eyes were clouded over. His limbs shifted slightly as he wheezed in halting gasps of air.
Face contorted with pain, Harlop lifted his head off of the dune. Then his strength ran out and he sagged back to the sand. He chuckled, which caused his body to break into a hacking fit.
“Something funny?” Titus inquired.
“Yeah. The fact that you think you’ve won.”
He cocked his head.
“This isn’t over, Titus. That … that thing out there … it’s not going to stop. Not for anything. You might as well die now. Save yourself the trouble.”
“Thanks, but I’ll pass.”
“She’s going to cover the gate with sand. Ramps on both sides. My people will come rushing over the top. You won’t be able to stop them. You … you …” His voice trailed off into incoherent mumbling. Slowly, the life drained from his eyes.
Leaving the body, Titus hiked down the slope. Stanner, Sanza, and the three soldiers stood close by, their gaze focused on the wall.
Titus twisted around. He looked up just in time to see a shadowy head vanish behind the massive structure.
The fourth guy, he realized. He wasn’t on the ladder when the rungs started to break.
Three of the Banished were now dead. But the fourth man had lived to tell the tale. Soon, he’d return to Dargon, to Cormella. He’d tell them what had happened. Cormella would then focus her efforts on burying the gate.
And there wasn’t a thing Titus could do to stop her.
Chapter 54
“So, she’s going to bury our gate. Then Dargon and his people can cross over it.” Sanza sighed as she hiked alongside Titus. “We can’t hold them off forever.”
“I know.”
“So, what’s our backup plan?”
“Our what?” he asked.
“Our backup plan.” She shot him a look. “Surely, you’ve got one.”
“I don’t even have a regular plan.”
She exhaled. “Say the Banished get inside Natica. Say they turn off a signal-blocker. Then what?”
“Then we die.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.” He came to a halt. “Make no mistake about it. If those signal-blockers fall, we’re all dead.”
She frowned.
Titus waited for Stanner and the other soldiers to pass by. Once they were out of hearing range, he gave Sanza a hard look.
“We can’t fight Cormella.”
“I know.”
“All we can do is run. But there’s nowhere to go.” He exhaled. “Even if we escape into the hinterlands, they’ll just come after us. Plus, we’d have to leave Luminosity behind.”
“Maybe we can—” Her mouth clamped shut as a ferocious, awful shriek roiled the sky.
Titus heard the storm of sand pound its way across the hinterlands. Grabbing Sanza, he pulled her back from the winding, drifting sand dune. Glancing up, he waited for even more sand to pour over the top of the wall. Waited for it to crash down upon the fort’s interior.
As he waited, he caught sight of a signal-blocker. “What happens if she covers the machines with sand?” he asked. “Will they short out?”
“No,” she replied. “They’re sealed tight. Plus, they’re real solid. The vast majority of our signal-blockers withstood Dargon’s tank without any problems.”
“What about the one that broke?”
“It only broke because the wall broke. A couple of heavy chunks fell and crushed it.”
He focused on the wall, waiting for the torrent of grains. But only a few specks appeared. As they settled onto the dune, he furrowed his brow. It had definitely sounded like another sand blast.
So, where was all of the sand?
He broke into a run. He kept up the pace all the way to the massive gate. When he finally slowed down, he saw looks of pure shock donning the faces of his fellow residents.
Before, sand had covered
some sixty feet of the gate, ramping outward in either direction. Now, the opposing ramps stood close to one hundred feet tall. Only a few feet of metal bars remained.
Cormella’s horrendous shriek rang out again, striking terror deep into Titus’ heart. The ground quaked beneath his sandals. Brutal wind, carrying with it an untold amount of sand, zoomed toward Natica.
With a furious frenzy, tons of sand blasted over the top of the gate. Titus and the others scurried backward as it raced down the ramp.
The auburn sand kept coming, causing the ramp to grow taller and longer. He was forced to backpedal even farther in response. All the while, he kept his gaze locked on the top of the gate.
And then, it vanished.
In its place was sand. Endless sand.
The sand began to shift, to move, to sink a bit. Then a couple of shadowy silhouettes, illuminated by moonlight, appeared. Slogging forward, they reached the peak, the point where the ramp began to descend.
“This is our home.” Titus reached for his sword. Turning around, he stared at his people. He saw Cutter and the relatives, standing tall. Private Stubbels and his supporters were armed and ready to fight. For the moment, Natica stood as one. “Protect it at all costs!”
Chapter 55
Stanner, accompanied by a mix of soldiers and civilians, charged up the ramp. They greeted the first wave of the Banished, ganging up on them, knocking them down, and ending them quickly.
But a second wave soon arrived. Some forty members of the Banished poured over the top of the ramp. They went to work, swiftly backing up the first wave and establishing a strong front line.
Stanner was forced to a standstill. The Banished, fueled by a third wave, proceeded to press forward, driving the Naticans back.
Titus surged onto the ramp, entering the fray. A blade flashed in the moonlight. He lifted his in the nick of time, parrying the blow.
Stepping back, he eyed his attacker. It was one of his former privates, Ruck Webster. Unlike Harlop, Ruck had started out as a pretty good guy. Good, but lazy. At a young age, he’d developed a well-earned reputation as shiftless, one that only grew as he got older. Eventually, failure to show up for duty one too many times had caused him to run afoul of the Code of Conduct.
“Everyone’s itching to get a shot at you,” Ruck said with a light scowl. “Guess I got lucky.”
“Yeah.” Titus flicked his blade in well-practiced fashion, cutting through the man’s cloak and slicing into his chest. “Lucky you.”
Ruck reeled back, his face expressing pain. Looking for help, his gaze went to several hard-fought battles between Naticans and the Banished. His expression morphed into one of shock.
The last time the two sides had met, the Banished had held the upper hand. They’d crushed Natica’s best soldiers in combat while slaughtering countless civilians.
The tables hadn’t turned. Not completely. But six months of brutal trips into the hinterlands, combined with lots of heavy labor and extensive training, had transformed Natica’s people into a veritable war machine. As a result, the two sides were now closely matched.
“What’s the matter, Ruck?” Titus asked. “Having second thoughts?”
“Hardly.” He swung back to face Titus. His cloak hung in tatters. Blood oozed from a long line of sliced skin, stretching from his left shoulder down to his right waist. “I’m still going to—” His tough-guy voice turned into gurgled squeaks as Titus’ sword penetrated his heart.
Titus yanked his blade out of the guy’s chest, letting him fall to the ramp. Just in time, too. For at that moment, Hoca Stevens took a vicious swing at him.
He got his blade up, narrowly deflecting the blow. With his free hand, he gave her a shove, forcing her back a few feet.
He planted himself, adopted a fighting pose. Meanwhile, he kept one eye on the rest of the battlefield. Primarily, he watched the Banished, watched their movements, made sure they didn’t get too far down the ramp. Made sure none of them got close to a signal-blocker.
Swords clashed noisily up and down the ramp. But it wasn’t all blades and blood. He also saw several furious wrestling matches. Stubbels kicked the legs out from under Buxtel Bryant. Cutter tackled Izafob Green to the ramp, then exchanged rights and lefts with the guy. Meanwhile, Vacon Jormay took down Yerdon with a kick to the kneecap.
Seeing Yerdon in trouble lit a fire under Titus. He stalked across the ramp, ready to help his fellow Natican.
But Hoca stepped in his way.
A normal fighter might’ve approached him with caution. But not Hoca. She came forward with soft, confident footsteps.
In her heyday, she’d been widely seen as the most beautiful woman in all of Natica. But the Code of Conduct gave no quarter to good looks. So, when she began stealing things, banishment was inevitable. The weird thing, though, was that she never used the stuff she stole. She just hid the items in her sandbed and other places within her apartment. It was almost like she’d stolen them just for the sake of it.
“Sorry, Titus. I didn’t know that was you.” Her voice was syrupy-sweet. “You look good. Especially those shoulders.”
He frowned. She had this way of talking that could make a guy feel like he was all that mattered. Add in her flowing black hair, soft eyes, and a physique that even a loose-fitting cloak couldn’t hide, and she was nearly impossible to resist.
She stopped just a foot away. Still holding her sword, she stared up at him, shyly, with soft, moist, brown eyes.
He could’ve ended her right then and there. But he just couldn’t bring himself to do it. It felt … wrong. Like an affront to whatever deity had sculpted her so perfectly out of the primordial clay.
He lowered his blade. “Leave. Now.”
“But why would I leave?” Her eyes got bigger. “Everything I want is right here.”
Heart pounding, he took a step back. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
A smile danced across her plump lips as she stepped right up to him. Tentatively, she reached out, touched his sword hand. “Then don’t.”
And that was when he saw it. A tiny flash of light. It came from her other side, from her left hand.
With a flick of her wrist, she produced her blade. Moonlight glinted off of it and he could see it was stained with blood.
He stepped back. Raised his sword.
Her blade clashed against his with tremendous force. The jolting impact sent him back a full foot.
Her eyes became hard and dry. Her visage turned ugly as her lips twisted into a mean scowl. Reaching into her cloak, she produced a dagger.
Armed with two blades, she flew at him, twisting and spinning, jabbing and thrusting.
He backed up, deflecting her jabs and blocking her thrusts. “Nice performance,” he said. “I almost believed it.”
Her smile returned. Once again, her eyes took on that soft, moist look. “You should believe it,” she said between thrusts. “I meant every word.”
He continued to parry her attacks, not letting his guard down for an instant. “Then why are you trying to kill me?”
She laughed.
He wasn’t sure if she was crazy or just acting like it. Either way, she made him highly uneasy.
“Hoca.” Out of nowhere, Sanza appeared. Holding a sword in either hand, she glared at the woman.
Hoca’s expression darkened. They’d been bitter rivals once upon a time. Clearly, the years had done little to quell their mutual hatred.
Sanza pressed forward. She slashed her blade twice. The second blow knocked Hoca’s sword right out of her hands. The woman uttered a little yelp, then scurried back up the ramp to retrieve it. Sanza trekked after her.
Titus glanced back at Vacon. The man knelt next to a sprawled-out Yerdon. He clutched Yerdon’s hair, lifted his head off of the sand. “Show yourself, Renda,” he screamed.
Titus hoofed it across the sand.
Yerdon, dazed and bloodied, opened his eyes a smidgeon. “She’s dead,” he whispered.
Vacon scow
led. “You’d better be lying.”
Titus saw the look in the guy’s face and didn’t like it. He shifted into high gear.
Yerdon coughed up some blood. “I’m not.”
“How’d she die?”
“Don’t … recall.”
Vacon aimed his sword at the guy’s neck. “Are you sure about that?”
He exhaled. “It … was Spoka.”
“Spoka Apion?”
Yerdon nodded.
Almost … there. With four gigantic steps, Titus closed the gap. Pushing off the sand, he leapt at the man.
At the exact same moment, Vacon rammed the blade deep into Yerdon’s throat.
Titus tackled him. They rolled down the ramp, punching and swinging blades at each other.
He got to his feet. Then he pulled Vacon up with him and kept pulling, yanking the man, causing him to fall again and go tumbling down still more of the ramp.
Rising up, Vacon stormed across the angled sand. Not at Titus though.
He was heading toward Private Apion.
He came up behind her, socked her in the head with his hilt. She dropped her blade and went down hard, slamming into the sand. “Did you kill her?” he yelled.
Apion, rubbing her skull, rolled onto her back. She stared up at Vacon with blurry, guilt-ridden eyes.
“That was … I was supposed to …” He finished off the thought with a horrible growl. Then he lifted his sword.
Cowering, she covered herself up.
Titus ran right up to Vacon. This time, he didn’t bother with a tackle. Instead, he slashed his blade across the small of the man’s back.
Dropping his sword, Vacon reared back in pain.
Titus completed the stroke. Then he rammed his blade into the man’s shoulder blades.
Vacon slumped to the sand, dead to the world.
Apion uncovered her head. She looked at the man’s lifeless form. Then she glanced at Titus. “Thanks.” A second later, she added a, “Sir.”
He helped her to her feet. “You’re welcome, Private.”
She hustled off to rejoin the fighting.
Turning around, he surveyed the battlefield. His gaze went all the way up the ramp, to the very peak.