Isle of Wysteria: The Monolith Crumbles

by Aaron Lee Yeager

  “Make for the exit, best possible speed.”

  Free of its encumbrance, the Eriia kicked his tail and looped around, speeding out the way they came, the other four following close behind.

  The entire cave inhaled like a living thing, and seawater began pouring in from channels from every direction. Sensing their presence, the acidic waters rose up to grab at them. Prince Francisque and the other Mesdans released a gale of frost, freezing the tentacles before they could reach them.

  Just as the waters met in the center of the chamber, the mine hit the floor and exploded with a titanic crack. Twisting energies shot out in every direction, expanding in a wave that folded into itself like a helix. The reds twisted together with the blues, the oranges threaded themselves with the purples, the greens wove themselves together with the yellows. For a second, nothing happened, the rushing waters covered the magical smoke, then a force emerged from beneath the water, and all become light--whiter than pure white, brighter than the sun.

  The waters were thrown back. As the Eriia slipped back through the mouth of Isha, the waters behind rushed up to meet them, spurred forward by the explosion.

  “Must go faster,” Captain Sykes cautioned as the boiling waters gained on them with frightening speed.

  Layla fell to her knees, her face slick with sweat. “It’s too much,” she panted, straining to keep her magic flowing into the animal.

  Their speed began to slow. Princess Turion and the other Articeians summoned a sonic blast and fired it behind them, simultaneously propelling the whales forward and beating back the rushing waters.

  “Lighten the load, lose everything,” Captain Sykes ordered. The crew began frantically unhooking their cannons, kicking them over the side of the howdah. They threw their rifles and the ammo. They even emptied the contents of their pockets, knowing that every ounce could make the difference between their escape and their deaths. The other Eriia crews did likewise.

  Inside the cavern, the mine’s light expended itself, and the truestone lining the walls fell away like scales, reduced to dust by the powerful synthesis. In an instant, millions of tiles disintegrated, revealing vulnerable bedrock at the island’s heart.

  The waters receded and shrieked in delight as they ate and tore into the rock, licking and lapping, biting and clawing, consuming it with astonishing ravenousness.

  The cave network bucked and shuddered as if it were alive. The walls pinched and convulsed around the Eriia, shaking free many of the tiles that had not been damaged, revealing fresh stone beneath. The walls cracked, the rock shifted, the entire island quaked as millions of gallons of seawater feasted upon its unprotected core.

  Water rushed at them from a tunnel to the left, but the Mesdans froze it in place. Water surged in at them from the right, but the Articeians beat it back with a sonic wave. The tunnel before them cracked and shifted, nearly cutting them off completely. The Eriia slipped though, the waters behind pushing them through like a nozzle.

  The four whales went right, then left, then right again. Far up ahead, a glimmer of sunlight shone like a jewel at the end of the tunnel.

  “Look out!”

  The gurgling waters sprayed up behind them with frightening speed, violently growing into long acidic fingers.

  “Push it back!”

  Their bodies shaking with exertion, Princess Turino and Prince Francisque led the others in firing a magical burst, freezing and slamming back the waters together.

  As the Eriia weaved through the pillars that had attacked them on the way in, the glow of sunlight grew steadily brighter.

  “We’re going to make it,” Iarti cheered.

  Suddenly the Mesdans and the Articeians fell to the deck, screaming in agony as their magic was torn away from them. Stonemasters above at the exit worked their magic and the rock pinched closed.

  The Eriia were forced to stop just a dozen feet from freedom, the half frozen enraged waters coming up beneath them.

  “Blast it open!”

  The crew looked around. “We jettisoned the guns and ammo,” Berrimar yelled.

  “What do we do?” Avid asked, looking at her captain.

  Captain Sykes looked down at the rapidly approaching waters. He straightened his uniform, and gave the smartest, most sincere salute of his career.

  “Ladies and gentlemen. It has been my deepest honor to serve with you.”

  With grim determination, they straightened their backs and returned his salute, tears on their faces.

  Exhausted, Layla placed her hands over her heart.

  Ryin…I….

  The waters hit the remaining Eriia and slammed against the collapsed exit, dissolving them and their crews instantly.

  * * *

  From the command platform, Athel watched as both islands imploded, crumbling low into bowl shapes as the cave networks inside crumbled to pieces.

  “They did it!” Kahn Alakaneezer screamed. Many others took up the call, and a round of cheers rose up.“How many made it out?” Athel asked, fearing the answer.

  Rachael lowered her spyglass sadly. “None.”

  Athel felt her heart flinch in pain. She knelt down before King Turino, who was still suffering from the effects of what Celina had just done to him and the other Articeians in the fleet.

  She reached out to touch him, but then hesitated. “I’m…I’m so sorry about your daughter.”

  He coughed painfully, his monocle shattering on the deck. He reached up and gripped her arm tightly. “Just promise me that she didn’t die in vain,” he choked, his eyes red with grief. “Promise me her sacrifice was worth it.”

  Athel remembered Privet, and her heart felt like it would break.

  “I…promise,” she said softly, not sure if she believed it herself.

  Athel rose up again as the task force cheered.

  “Their second ring of defense is broken. All transports to the central isle at flank speed!” she called out.

  “AYE!” they shouted in unison.

  The fleet of Eriia moved cautiously between the two shattered islands, fearing an attack from the remaining defenders, but none came. The Stonemasters were busy running about, sealing up fissures where seawater was welling up and spraying to the surface. A few of the howdah crews requested permission to fire on the exposed defenders, but Athel bade them to hold their fire. They were no longer a threat.

  “What will happen to those islands?” Talliun asked curiously as they flew by.

  Athel watched them sadly. “Unless the Rubric is lifted, within a few weeks those islands will be completely consumed. Our doom is now their doom. They will either help us lift the curse, or they will die along with us.”

  Talliun shook her head. “It never ceases to impress me how well you do that.”

  “Do what?”

  “Get people to switch sides.”

  “They haven’t switched sides yet.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  Athel looked out at the shattered buildings, the broken farmlands, the ruined town centers, the twisted railroad tracks, the flattened schoolhouses. “It’s a simple trick,” she whispered to herself, surveying the damage. She looked over collapsed schoolyards, crumbled playgrounds, mangled neighborhoods. “Any villain can do it.”

  The fleet of Eriia left the inner ring behind. Before them, lay the misty and clouded shores of Boeth itself. It was a gloomy place, a place of frowning cliffs and short stunted trees. A place of icy breath and sharp black rock. It was so different from the way it had always been described to her, Athel wondered for a moment if they might have gone the wrong way.

  But when the cliffs changed shape, there could be no doubt. The dark rock opened itself up like a clam, revealing a line of massive steel trebuchets, each one twice as large as an Eriia.

  Athel placed her hand on the Spiritweaver’s shoulder. “Fire al
l.”

  The howdahs roared to life. In an instant, ten thousand shells struck out as one, but they never reached their target. They impacted a barrier before the trebuchets, previously unseen. The dark magics strained and buckled beneath the barrage, but did not break.

  “That’s the first time we’ve seen them use void magic,” Talliun noted. “I thought we’d see it sooner.”

  Athel scanned the defenses carefully. “They’re holding back; this is far too light. Something’s not right here.”

  A second volley was fired, impacting the barrier as before. Athel watched as the green lightning from their shells ran along the surface. The field flickered for miles in both directions.

  “It’s protecting the entire island,” she realized, her eyes growing wide.

  Even Talliun found it impossible to keep her composure. “How many…how many lives must it have taken to create such a thing?”

  “A number beyond reckoning,” Andolf said sickly. “The air here is thick with grief. There are almost no natural spirits left. Those weary few that remain whisper that the Stonemasters have been strengthening this wall for generations.”

  Athel’s eyes flicked about worriedly, her keen mind running through hundreds of different scenarios, weighing each one. “We weren’t expecting this; I’ll need a minute to plan.”

  A third volley did as little as the first two. Slowly, the fleet was approaching the wall, drawing near to the range of the trebuchets.

  Kahn Alakaneezer stepped up and cracked his knuckles. “Let my people handle this.”

  “But…”

  “Relax. I’ve fought many wars, and attacked plenty of fortifications, and I’ll tell you right now, I don’t care which island they come from, all designers make the same mistake when creating their defenses.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “They always assume the attack won’t come from their own weapons.”

  All eyes were on Athel as she thought, running the simulation in her mind. “All right, do it.”

  The mighty Kahn stepped to the front of the command platform, while Athel arranged the fleet into three great lines, stacked atop one another. On each Eriia, the Isolites aboard positioned themselves at the forefront.

  “Hear me, you disgusting rock-munchers!” Alakaneezer bellowed, his claws outstretched. “You foul pit-licking pizzle! You loggerheaded, ratsbane-eating gudgeon! You are churlish, sack-infected miscreants! Fobbing pigsties, rump-fed, cowardly skainsmate; lard-ridden mammering dewberries, rooting, gluttonous. Nut-hooked hogs, diseased toenails, a swag-bellied blemish on all of Aetria!”

  Talliun leaned in as the Kahn continued. “Is there a point to all this? Is this a man thing?”

  “He’s making them angry,” Athel noted.

  “Yeah, I got that, but why?”

  Athel gave her a sidelong glance. “So they will attack us with such overwhelming power that it will wipe out our entire invasion force in one blow, of course.”

  Athel placed her hand on Andolf’s shoulder. “Tighten up the lines. Form up so tightly they’ll be able to hit us all at once.

  Talliun looked at her as if she had gone mad.

  “…you spleeny, smooth-tongued, agatering, knotty-pated, puke-stockings!” the Kahn concluded.

  The curses and swearing from the defenders was livid even at this distance. They spat, they made obscene gestures with their hands and feet. Some were so enraged they threw their helmets, for all the good it did.

  The line of trebuchets cranked back to their maximum draw, and enormous, crystalline explosives were loaded into place. As one, the siege machines snapped upwards, and the impossibly heavy projectiles rose up into the air towards the task force. The bombs slipped effortlessly through the field, then dark magics were cast on them. They split into more bombs, not as an illusion, but actually doubling and quadrupling. There were so many, the sky became darkened.

  Talliun backed away. “Okay, that’s a new trick.”

  The bombs exploded before the task force, an expanding shockwave so massive that it created a tidal wave beneath it. The skies became red as the massive fireball grew towards the fleet of sky-whales like a black sun.

  Talliun took another step backwards. “Shouldn’t we run?”

  Kahn Alakaneezer gave a fangy grin. “Gotcha.”

  The warriors of Iso clapped their paws together, and the shockwave of fire was drawn into their bodies. The energy sucked in, as if through thousands of invisible straws. Talliun marveled as they drank deeply of the sea of fire. It grew weaker as it approached them, images of skulls and bones amid the dark flames. Just as it reached them, it faded and was absorbed completely, leaving the invasion force completely unharmed.

  For a moment, all was quiet, the defenders frozen like bewildered statues.

  The Isolites threw their hands forward, and released the explosion again, directing all the fire, all the energy, all the destructive potential into a single fixed point in the barrier before them.

  The heat and noise was unreal. Everyone had to duck for cover, feeling as if they would ignite just by looking at the black fire.

  The void barrier shrieked and buckled, pushed inwards by forces dozens of times larger than had ever been expected. Black skulls and bones amid the flames smashed against the wall. The air was filled with a million screaming voices, children and parents, all crying out in horror. The focused blast hit deeper and deeper, plunging into the quivering barrier like a spear. The Isolites roared, adding their own strength to the attack.

  The barrier was thrust inwards to its breaking point--then there was a crack like thunder and the barrier was punched though, a sickly, torn dripping gap ripped into its festering surface.

  The scattered Stonemasters poked their heads up from behind their parapets, disbelief on their faces.

  “All forward!” Athel commanded, outstretching her hand. “Open fire!”

  The glowing form of Odensire appeared to punish his people, but the task force ignored him, flying right through his cloudy form and blasting away at the cliff defenses. Even as he robbed the Isolites of their powers, they howled their war cries, firing and reloading their cannons as fast as they could.

  Green balls of lighting impacted over the trebuchets and their crews, knocking them senseless. The fleet moved inside the ruined barrier and swept up over the cliffs, finally viewing the smooth black pyramid they had been searching for. The monolith lay beyond; between them a network of defensive bunkers, trenches, and siege emplacements.

  A volley of sparkling rockets struck out, destroying three of the Eriia before Athel could get them to duck back behind the cliffs.

  “All soldiers disembark!” She commanded. “Take out those launchers!”

  The Alliance soldiers grabbed their rifles and leapt to the sharp rocks below.

  “For Aetria!” Athel shouted.

  “FOR AETRIA!” the soldiers cheered in return.

  Half a million men and women from nearly every island in the world, but wearing one uniform, and waving one flag, scampered over the cliffs and into the valley below.

  Mines detonated beneath their feet, cutting huge swaths in their ranks, but on they came.

  Mortars and rockets fired at them, exploding in the air, releasing a torrent of remorseless iron. The sounds of their screams managed to overpower even the sounds of the cannon roaring around them.

  Smoke filled the air, made red by the blood of those who were falling. The sky grew grey with fumes, the air caustic in their throats with the unspeakable scent of burning flesh.

  King Vilmas unfurled his wings and glided with his men from the tip of the cliff, snatching Stonemasters from atop their towers, and snapping the cables that held up the rocket launchers with their beaks. A warbow from another tower peppered them, and he caught a trio of darts in his wing. He fell amid the parapets, clutching his wounds,
just as an adjacent siege cannon leveled and fired against his tower, tearing it to pieces and engulfing him and his men in flame.

  Alliance soldiers ran along the trenches, firing their crossbows up at the vision slits to the bunkers, forcing the defenders to back off and pinch them shut. The earth beneath the attackers became an enemy, thrusting upwards in daggers of jagged rock. The valley became a forest of thrusting volcanic knives, but on they fought.

  Regent Kowless turned a corner, a trio of explosives tossed at his feet. Faster than thought, he scooped them up and tossed them back over the walls. A quick, crackling explosion the sent a trio of defenders flying back down into the trench. A rocket exploded overhead, and Kowless was punctured in the shoulder, the white-hot iron crunching through his shiny shell and pulping the flesh underneath. He fell to the ground in agony, clutching his shoulder, just as four more shots pierced his chest, and his body went still.

  The men and woman of the invasion force pushed forward through the hail of explosions and shrapnel, their banners pocketed with dozens of holes. When a banner bearer fell, another would grab it again and carry it forward. The people of Aetria surged as one, fighting for their homes, their children, their freedom, their very lives, undaunted by the horrible casualties being inflicted upon them.

  Kaiser Duncan jumped to one side, barely missing a torrent of boiling oil that was dumped on them from the murder holes above. His prosthetic arm flipped open into a saber and he caught the blow of a Stonemaster’s axe. His gears straining, he pushed the man back and forced him to the ground, a quick punch from his metal hand knocking the defender out cold. An explosive charge was thrown from above and detonated, smashing him and his men against the walls. The stone of the walls grew into a bed of needles, running him through from head to toe.

  Great fissures opened up in the ground, deep crags like throats, running down deeply into heated rivers of magma. Hundreds of soldiers fell down into their depths, swallowed whole by the ground opening up beneath them.

  Precept Nolocauss wedged his body beneath the barrel of a siege cannon, forcing the nozzle upwards just in time. The canister shot sailed over the heads of those behind him, shredding the foothills beyond, even as his shoulder sizzled where it touched the red-hot metal.