by Rachel Aaron
“Be ready to charge on my command,” she ordered, bracing her feet as Katana’s cast neared completion.
“Are you mad?” Garrond cried, leaning over the battlements. “You would destroy us, the holy Order of the Golden Sun, out of spite?”
“You put us in this position!” Tina yelled back. “Don’t like it, then let us in!”
“You truly are monsters,” the commander said scornfully. “We are the first and best line of defense against the ghostfire! If this fortress falls, the whole continent will be put at risk!”
“That’s not my fault!” Tina cried. “You’re the one trying to throw us to the undead! Of course I’m going to fight back!” She pointed over her shoulder at the raid. “I would do anything, kick anyone’s ass, to keep my people alive another day! I will climb up there and feed you to Grel’Darm piece by piece if that’s what it takes to save the Roughnecks! I’m all in on this, asshole, and if you don’t want to find out how bad I can get, you will shut your face and open the damn gate!”
Commander Garrond stepped back in alarm, and Tina risked a glance at the Sorcerer. “How many more seconds, Katana?”
“Not sure,” he replied, sweat dripping down his face as he struggled to control the massive wave of fire forming in his hands. “But if this really is a bluff, he’d better fall for it soon, ’cause I don’t know if I can hold this much longer.”
“You ignorant, arrogant—” Garrond cut off mid-insult, squinting over her head toward the eastern horizon as though he’d just spotted something behind them. From the way his red face turned pale, Tina could guess what it was.
“Fine,” the commander said, his voice as bitter as ash as he changed his tune. “Unlike you, I work for the greater good. Call off your fire, put down your weapons, and you may enter our fortress.”
Tina let out a huge breath of relief and motioned for Katana to stop casting. The Sorcerer dropped his hands with a gasp, and the stone of her skin flashed hot as the fiery magic fell away. Ahead of them, the fortress’s enormous wooden gates swung open with a grinding sound to reveal the outer gate yard: a boxed-in stone corridor that ran between the protruding front gatekeep Garrond was standing on top of and the square body of the main fortress.
The space between the outer gatekeep and inner defenses was roughly a hundred feet, or as long as two tractor-trailer trucks parked nose to bumper. It was half again as wide, but the heavy stone walls made the large space feel narrow. At the end was another, even more heavily reinforced inner gate that led into the keep itself, but it was currently closed. To reach it, Tina and her raiders would have to walk through the front gates, under the giant stone gatekeep with its massive towers and hundreds of archers, and between the walls that connected the keep to its front gate. Huge, thick, stone walls whose battlements were also bristling with soldiers.
The whole thing reeked of a trap. Once they were inside, all Garrond would have to do was close the front gate, and they’d be cornered, stuck like rats in a stone box while archers rained fire down on them from all sides. There was no other way into the fortress, though, so Tina crushed her fears and marched forward, striding proudly through the fort’s giant front doors as she waved for the rest to follow her.
The raid obeyed faster than it had all day, practically running through the front gate into the inner yard. As they piled inside, the back of Tina’s neck began to prickle. Now that she was right below them, she couldn’t help but notice just how many soldiers had packed themselves onto the walls. She’d been questing out of this fortress for a year now. It never had more than a few dozen guards, even during special events. She’d thought it was strange seeing so many soldiers on top of the gatekeep, but now that she was in the fortress with walls on all sides, there had to be close to a thousand people looking down at the raid from the surrounding battlements, making her wonder if distance wasn’t the only thing that had expanded when FFO had changed.
When they were all inside, Garrond gave the command to close the outer gates and vanished down the stairs. Tina assumed this was so he could go open the inner gates for them, but when the commander appeared again, he was standing on one of the yard’s interior battlements, leering down at her from the front of the biggest archer gallery Tina had ever seen.
“I have let you into our fortress, as agreed,” he said coldly. “If you wish to proceed, however, you must disarm.” He waved his hand, and the soldiers beside him began lowering wooden supply crates into the yard on ropes. “Place your weapons in the boxes, and we’ll discuss opening the inner gates.”
The words weren’t out of his mouth before the raid exploded in protest.
“No way!”
“It took me a year to get this bow!”
“He’s gonna kill us!”
“Screw this! Let’s try the swamp!”
“Shut up!” Tina roared, her huge voice bouncing off the stone. When the raid fell silent, she glared up at Garrond. “It’s not an unreasonable request. We’re an invading army, after all. But we’re not giving up our weapons forever. When will we get them back?”
The paladin’s lips curled into a smile beneath his black mustache. “When you leave.”
Tina didn’t like the way he said that, but she didn’t have much of a choice. If she showed hesitation or confusion here, it could mean their deaths. If Garrond needed to hold their weapons for security to make himself feel safe while they were passing through, Tina could handle that, and if he screwed them over, all they had to do was rush the portal and get to Bastion. It would suck to lose their best weapons, but everyone had spares in the bank. More importantly, they’d be out of the Deadlands, which meant they’d finally be safe.
That was a prize Tina was willing to risk anything for, so she drew her sword and walked over to one of the boxes the guards had lowered down. As she reached out to place it inside, though, something in her chest clenched. Her red-glowing sword was from Sanguilar, the Once King’s Blood General. It was the best tanking sword in the game, and she’d gotten a rare roll that had maxed out its stats. It was a priceless treasure that had taken months of weekly raiding to get, and even though this whole thing had been her idea, setting it down in the chest, future fate unknown, was harder than she’d expected.
“Your shield as well,” Garrond said when Tina stepped back.
Tina shot him an angry look, and the commander’s face hardened. “I know how tanks work,” he growled. “Your shield as well, stonekin, or no one gets in.”
Cursing under her breath, Tina stripped off her shield and wedged it into the box. Letting it go felt like giving up an arm, but she’d made this bed of nails. She would lie in it just like everyone else.
“There,” she said, holding up her empty hands. “Satisfied?” When Garrond nodded, Tina looked back at her raiders. “Weapons in the boxes, everyone. This is how we get to Bastion.”
Her order bounced off the tall walls, but SilentBlayde was the only one who moved. He strode over and made a good show of placing his beloved silver swords into the chest, but though his movements said “chipper,” his eyes were more worried than Tina had ever seen.
Anders went next, then Neko. Killbox, however, clutched his ax. “I don’t know about this, Roxxy,” he whispered when she glared at him. “This shit stinks.”
“Same,” Zen said angrily. “I’m not giving up my bow. We’ll be defenseless.”
Above them, Tina heard Garrond clear his throat, and suddenly, the air was full of the creak of bowstrings as the archers on the walls took aim. Zen was reaching for an arrow of her own when Tina grabbed her hand. “I’m keeping my word,” she growled, baring her marble teeth. “I said I’d get everyone to Bastion alive. This is how that happens. I’ve already paid the price. Now put your weapons in the damn box so we can get out of here.”
Zen stumbled when she let go, clutching her bow until the enchanted wood creaked. The look in her eyes had Tina bracing to take an arrow, but Zen didn’t attack. Shooting Tina a glare that said this would never b
e forgotten or forgiven, she walked over to the box and knelt down, laying her bow down beside SB’s swords as gently as a mother putting down her baby.
When she was done, Killbox stepped up. Like Tina’s shield, his giant ax didn’t really fit, and he didn’t bother trying to make it. He just dropped it in the pile and stepped back, making way for the next player.
One by one, the raid shuffled forward and placed their weapons in the boxes. No one would meet Tina’s eyes, but in a way, that was a relief, because it meant she didn’t have to face any of them, either. When it was finally over, she turned back to Garrond. “It’s done,” she said bitterly. “Now let us in.”
Garrond’s lips curled in a thin smile beneath his bushy mustache as the chests full of top-tier weapons were hauled up and out of sight. When they were safely stowed on top of the walls, the fortress’s inner doors swung open to reveal the parade yard of the main base, which was much bigger than Tina remembered.
Back in the game, the Order’s fort had been suitably large for its importance, but it was still only a quest hub. This new fortress, though, was enormous. Other than the front gatekeep, which stuck off the fortress’s eastern wall like a gooseneck, it was a perfect square of sixty-foot-tall white stone walls. Inside the walls’ protection, the base itself was a miniature city of heavy stone buildings. Back in the game, these had been mostly shacks for quest givers and profession huts. Now there were multiple barracks, storage houses, smithies, workshops, a full temple to the Sun, and several other structures Tina had no idea about. Everything looked as though it had been built to withstand orbital bombardment rather than to be lived in, but what really gave her pause was the legit army of Order soldiers waiting for them in the giant, well-lit, smooth paved yard at the fortress’s center.
That made her stop cold. She’d known the Order was bigger, but this was ridiculous. Forget the thousand she’d seen crammed onto the walls. There had to be at least two thousand soldiers standing in formation in front of them now. The giant yard was so packed, the players barely had room to cram themselves inside before the massive inner gates swung shut, sealing the raid inside the fort with an echoing clang.
Heart pounding, Tina forced herself to ignore all the new enemies and find their target. Thankfully, despite all the other changes, the marble shrine that held the Bastion portal was still where it had always been just off the main yard to their left. She was sucking in a breath to give the order to rush it when she noticed something was wrong.
The room inside the shrine’s entranceway was empty. Empty and dark. Usually, the multicolored light from the portal reflected off the shrine’s white walls, making the whole place glow like the inside of a rave. Now, though, Tina didn’t see so much as a torch inside. But it wasn’t until Commander Garrond came down from the battlements with that hateful smile on his face that the truth finally hit her. There was no portal to Bastion. Only the blank space where one had once been.
A sword to the stomach would have been less painful. Tina shook in her armor, fighting to keep control as the commander stepped in front of her in all his towering white-and-gold glory. Like most boss-level NPCs, he was incredibly tall for a human. Not as tall as her stonekin, of course, but with her whole body sagging in despair at the missing portal, he felt miles bigger. A true monster, and she’d played right into his hands.
“Still going to fight us out of spite?” he asked with a superior sneer.
“Hey!” yelled someone behind her. “Where’s the portal to Bastion?”
“That?” Garrond said, glancing around Tina at the raid. “With the world in chaos, we couldn’t very well leave a back door to Bastion open on the Once King’s doorstep. We closed it down yesterday, and it won’t be reopened until we’re safe again.”
No one said a word. They didn’t have to. Tina could feel the news crushing them just as it had crushed her. Several people actually collapsed where they stood, their legs giving out as their last hopes vanished, making Garrond’s smile even wider.
“You may camp here in the courtyard while we fight,” he said dismissively. “When the undead threat is defeated, we’ll discuss your surrender. I sent all the players who woke up here to Bastion in chains to face the King’s justice. Your fate will be the same. Try anything, and we will slaughter you where you stand.”
Tina had no witty comeback this time as Garrond turned and walked off. Part of her wanted to blame the commander for being an unreasonable bastard, but she’d never been good at lying, even to herself, and she knew who really was at fault. It was her. It was all her. She’d fucked up again.
Her eyes squeezed shut. Zen was right. The warning signs had been all over the walls, but she’d been so focused on getting everyone through that damn portal that she’d ignored what was in front of her eyes. Even the swamp would have been better than the trap she’d just walked them into.
How could she have been so blind? Even if Grel hadn’t given up, the Rangers could have scavenged them food that didn’t need cooking. There was also a Schtumple trading post in the middle of the zone that always had mounts for sale. Possible irrational hatred of players aside, Schtumples could always be trusted to choose trade over murder. Why hadn’t she thought of that? They couldn’t sail a boat, but she probably could have bought passage with some of the precious herbs or items still in their backpacks.
Tina shook her head in disgust. There were so many things she should have considered, so much more she should have thought through, and now it was too late. They were locked in, weaponless, helpless, and it was all her fault.
With that truth hammering in her head, Tina took a deep breath and turned to face the raid she’d failed. As expected given how hard she’d pushed them, everyone was on the ground. They looked up when she turned around, staring at her with a mixture of desperation, betrayal, and despair. On a normal day, Tina might have been able to take that. Now, with her own exhaustion and guilt pulling on her like boat anchors, she couldn’t even keep her head up.
They deserved to know, she realized with a pang. They’d trusted her, and she’d failed them. There was no way she could make that up, but she could at least tell them why. It wouldn’t be kind to her ego, but that pain was the least of what she deserved for letting them down, so Tina forced herself to lift her head one last time to finally tell the truth.
“I have a confession to make,” she said, prying the words out of her tightening throat. “Back at the Dead Mountain, before the rest of you recovered, I got someone killed. I don’t know if any of you noticed the headless Sorcerer lying by the roadside in our rush to get out, but if you did, well, that body was on me.”
A tense stillness descended upon the raid, and Tina forced herself to keep going. “I have no excuses,” she said. “I was up, I was armed, I saw the monster coming. I should have picked it up, that’s the tank’s job, but I screwed up. I let the monster walk right past me, and he died.”
Saying it out loud hurt even more than she’d expected. In front of her, the raid was as silent as the dead she’d left. She couldn’t read their faces, as she didn’t want to. It wasn’t finished, though, so though it felt like pulling out barbed arrows, Tina forced herself to keep going.
“That’s why I’ve been riding you all so hard,” she explained. “I knew what was at stake back then. I knew death was real, and I was desperate to get us all away from the Dead Mountain before anyone else got killed. I thought I was doing what was necessary to save everyone, but then David died too, and I…”
She stopped, blinking hard. “I messed up,” she went on at last. “My friend died because I was a lousy leader who made too many mistakes. I’m so sorry I treated you all so badly. I don’t think you’re idiots, and I shouldn’t have treated you like I did. I should have yelled less and listened more. I know that now. I knew it before, it was just…every time you balked, I saw that Sorcerer’s head rolling on the ground, or David vanishing beneath Grel’s club. I couldn’t let that happen again, so I kept pushing, and now I’ve push
ed us off the cliff.”
It wasn’t until the words were out of her mouth that Tina realized how true they were. The shock of it was enough to send her to her knees. Her armor rang like a gong when she hit the stone, but Tina barely heard it. Her eyes were on the raid, on the people who’d given her trust after trust only to watch her break it over and over. Every time she’d played the monster, she’d told herself that the end would make up for it. Now the end was here, and she had nothing to give them except regrets.
“I’m sorry,” she said, her stone voice cracking. “This is all my fault. I lost our gear. I almost got us all killed, again, and there’s not even a portal. We would have been safer if we’d stayed on the road, but I…” She swallowed. “I’m sorry.”
She held her breath, waiting for the accusations, but no one said a thing. Several people just turned away and wrapped themselves up in their cloaks. Tina didn’t know if it was out of disgust or just fatigue, but the silence stung worse than any words could. Zen was the only one who didn’t turn her back. She stood up and marched to the front of the raid, her perfect elven features stark with fury as she hauled back and slapped Tina hard across the face.
“That’s for breaking your promise,” she said, clutching her hand. Then she turned on her heel and walked back to the other Rangers, dropping down against the wall with her knees up and her face pressed into them.
Tina raised a hand to her cheek. A slap from an unarmed Ranger shouldn’t have hurt, but she’d felt it all the way through her skull. It still stung, and she had a feeling it would for a long, long time. She was trying to get used to the pain when SilentBlayde rose to his feet.