by Ben Wolf
“Well?” Calum asked.
“I saw two Saurians and one man, plus three more men on the roof,” Lilly said. “And about fifty-five slaves.”
Falcroné nodded. “I can confirm all of that, but I saw another Saurian inside in addition to the two that Lilly saw.”
“That makes eight of them, including Oren.” Magnus crouched down. “This is definitely doable, if we can be surreptitious. Those three Saurians and Oren himself concern me the most. Vandorian would never have granted him such a position of authority if he were not worthy of the job. He will not be an easy foe to defeat.”
“What do you want to do?” Calum asked.
“I anticipate I will need help in defeating Oren. I want Axel and Falcroné with me on that. The rest of you must release the slaves and find a way to overcome the guards.”
Lilly nodded. The plan was sound enough, and it left a little room for improvising if need be. Together with Kanton and Calum—and maybe Riley, if he could keep from running off again—Lilly believed they could get the job done.
“If we can reach the slaves, I imagine they’ll help us fight,” Kanton said. “I know I would.”
“They pushed a cart of mining tools into the fortress behind the slaves.” Lilly motioned toward the fortress with her head. “We can arm them with those.”
“Perfect.” Magnus smirked. “Even a simple pickax can be effective in the right hands.”
Axel matched Magnus’s smirk, and Calum nodded.
“The only question that remains is our approach. Riley, you are the stealth expert. What do you suggest?”
Before Riley could say anything, Axel held up his hand. “Whoa, wait a minute. He’s not coming with, is he? He’ll just run away again as soon as it gets too hot in there.”
Riley growled, and Lilly considered joining him.
“We’ve been through this already, Axel,” Calum said. “And we’re not going through it again. Riley is still useful to this group, and if he wants to, he’s coming along. Crystal?”
Axel scowled at him and sighed. “Yeah, clear. He’s not gonna be in my group anyway, so he can’t get me killed by not watching my back.”
Calum ignored him and turned back to Riley. “How do you want to do this?”
“Thank you.” Riley glared at Axel for a long moment, then faced the fortress. “It’s exposed, right out in the open. That’ll make the approach a pain. Did you see any other entrances besides the main door?”
“Entrances, no,” Falcroné said. “Other than some windows and a hatch on the roof for the guards to get in and out, no.”
“Alright. We’ve got enough manpower—and the right kinds of manpower—to get in there all but unnoticed, even though the place is exposed.”
“What does that mean?” Axel asked.
Riley turned his head toward him. “It means shut up, and I’ll tell you. Lilly and Falcroné need to take out the guards on the roof first. Once they’re down, we can creep over to the fortress easily enough. You don’t even have to be good at stealth to pull that off.” He stared at Axel again. “And that’s a huge advantage since some of us don’t know the meaning of the word.”
Lilly didn’t bother to conceal her smirk. Riley’s sarcasm was her favorite thing about him.
Axel folded his arms and leaned forward. “At least I don’t run from fights.”
“Stop it, both of you.” Calum looked at Riley. “Continue, please.”
“From there it’s just a matter of sneaking inside without them hearing. The roof access seems like a natural place, but it’ll be too hard to get all of us up there. I don’t think the three Windgales combined could get Magnus up there, for example.
“Climbing isn’t a quiet option, either, but if the three of you can get at least Calum and me onto the roof, then we can go in from the top. Then we’ll meet you at the main entrance and let you inside.”
“No problem.” Falcroné grinned. “We’ll get you up there, easy.”
“From there, just try to take the guards by surprise if you can, and bring them down quietly. If even one of them hollers, we’re all in trouble.” Riley sat up straight and tilted his head. “Any questions?”
Calum smiled. “Let’s go free some slaves.”
Calum wished he’d been close enough to see how they did it, but even from far away, he got the gist of what happened in the five seconds it took Lilly and Falcroné to deal with the guards on the roof. Two of Lilly’s arrows had combined with two quick slashes from Falcroné’s blade to silence the three of them for good.
Then Falcroné picked up one of the torches from the roof and darted through the air a few times to signal Calum and the others to head for the fortress.
Within minutes, Riley, Kanton, Lilly, and Calum all stood on the roof while Magnus, Axel, and Falcroné headed for the main doors.
A rope ladder lay on the roof next to the hatch door, and Calum pushed it away, but as he reached to open the hatch, he hesitated. When Lilly hovered directly over it with an arrow nocked in her bow, Calum subdued his nerves and quietly opened the hatch.
Riley poked his head down into the hatch for a moment, then he came back up. “Clear.”
Calum nodded. “Can you get down there?”
Riley shook his head. “Not quietly. The drop is too far for me to land without making too much noise, especially with this shoulder armor on. Falling from this height wouldn’t feel great, either. You’ll have to use the rope ladder to get down there, and these two will have to lower me down since I don’t have opposable thumbs.”
“Let’s do it,” Calum said. “I’ll go last.”
Riley put his forepaws on Kanton’s shoulders, and Lilly held him around his waist, and they squeezed together, making a Riley sandwich, and lowered down through the hatch. Once they gave Calum the all clear, he lowered the rope ladder and climbed down as quietly as he could.
From that platform they descended down to the floor. A pair of torches illuminated the room, empty aside from the rope ladder and two beds stacked on top of each other. The door on the south end of the room was shut.
“Walk softly, Calum,” Riley whispered. “The Windgales can hover. You can’t, and your boots are noisy. Watch your step.”
“Got it,” Calum replied.
The floor creaked on his very first step, and Riley glared at him. Calum shrugged and kept going. He couldn’t know where the floor would and wouldn’t creak.
They made it through the door and into an open walkway that led in two opposite directions. Two wooden staircases, one on each end of the walkway, led down to the first floor where the main entrance fed into the lobby.
Riley nodded to Lilly, who hovered over the rail that lined the edge of the walkway. She checked below to make sure no one was around and then dropped down. Calum and Kanton peered over the edge of the rail and watched her unbolt the doors. Magnus, Axel, and Falcroné filtered inside in total silence.
Riley trotted past each of the rooms to Calum’s right, then nodded to him, and Calum followed, stealing a glance in each one. They were empty, too. He crept down the staircase behind Riley and met up with the others on the first floor.
“Maybe they’re eating dinner or something?” Calum murmured.
“Makes sense. It is just after sundown.” Kanton’s hushed tone matched Calum’s.
“Or there’s a lower level,” Riley whispered. “There isn’t anywhere to hide the prisoners up on the second floor.”
Something stirred behind them, and they whirled around. Lilly nocked an arrow in her bow, and Calum’s hand went to the hilt of his sword.
Toward the back of the lobby, a large cage with black iron bars extended up to the ceiling, but Calum couldn’t see anyone inside the deep shadows within. If anyone was in there, they’d get whoever it was out once they freed the slaves on the lower level.
“There is a staircase toward the back of this room.” Magnus motioned to an opening in the floor next to the cage. “If you find Oren, stay down there, and we w
ill confront him together. I suspect he is in the room to the right of that cage with several of his guards, though.”
On the opposite side of the lobby, a wall of vertical logs partitioned almost a third of the first floor into a separate room. The tool cart, loaded full of mining equipment, sat in the corner immediately to the right of the main doors.
Though the setting differed from his life at the quarry, the heavy oppression of the place still felt all too familiar to Calum. But he could deal with his memories later.
First, he and his friends had to walk past that room to get downstairs. At least the door was closed; as long as they stayed quiet, it shouldn’t be a problem.
“Go ahead,” Falcroné urged. “We won’t make our move until you get downstairs.”
Riley started forward before Calum could respond, so Calum kept quiet and just followed. They descended down the stairs, Riley leading, into the dark basement under the fortress.
Several torches lined the walls of the lower level, which amounted to nothing more than a dungeon. Some of the original slaves had probably carved the lower level out of the red rock specifically for that reason.
A row of iron cages lined the basement’s square perimeter. Even in the low light, Calum could see dozens of people inside—people of every race and type. Eager to get to work freeing them, he started toward the nearest cage.
“Calum, wait!” Riley hissed.
A dark figure emerged from the shadows and swung his blade at Calum’s head.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Axel bristled. Together with Falcroné and Magnus, he stood ready to kick open a door to a room that held three Saurians, one man, and one Sobek—at least according to Lilly and Falcroné’s scouting report. Who knew what they would actually face once they made it inside?
Too late now.
Magnus held up two fingers, then three, and then he threw his entire weight against the door.
Wood snapped, and the meager door all but shattered. Falcroné darted inside first and slit the throat of one of the two Saurians in the room. Axel charged in behind Magnus and jammed his blade into the chest of a man who came at him with a sword.
Magnus parried the second Saurian’s sword then lashed his blade straight down, cleaving into the Saurian’s skull. He dropped to the floor, dead.
Axel smirked. They were doing better than he’d expected.
Then a green-and-brown mass slammed into Magnus.
The impact sent him careening into the wall next to the door, and his body snapped through it as if the logs were little more than dried sticks. He landed on the dirt floor about where Axel had stood before they broke through the door.
Oren stood in the center of the room and drew a curved sword, but it wasn’t the ragged-looking one he’d drawn back at the Sky Fortress.
This one was bright blue, just like Magnus’s armor.
Magnus pushed himself up to his feet and stepped back into the room through the hole in the wall. The pain in his chest from Oren’s blow had already begun to fade.
“You’re gonna pay for this, bugs.” Oren hissed at Magnus, then eyed Falcroné and Axel. “All three o’ ya.”
Magnus noted Oren’s blue blade. Even without a Blood Ore sword, Oren made a formidable foe, but with a weapon equal to Magnus’s, Oren could very well win the fight.
Even so, Magnus remained undeterred. “Your slave trade ends tonight, Oren.”
Oren tilted his head and gave an expression caught somewhere between a sneer and a snarl. It was hard to tell for all the scars on his face. “Ohhh, I recognize you now. You’re Vandorian’s kid brother. Speaking o’ brothers, you done killed mine, ain’t you?”
“Your brother and his Saurians attacked us. We gave him plenty of opportunities to let us pass, but he refused.”
The Saurian whose throat Falcroné had cut crawled across the floor and groped at Oren’s legs.
“Izzat right?” Oren shook his head and looked down at the Saurian. “That’s not what I ’eard from Jerome, ’ere. But now you’ve cut ’is froat, so we can’t ask him again, can we, my babies?”
Falcroné smirked. “You can blame that one on me.”
“I saw you do it, an’ I do blame you.” Instead of helping Jerome, Oren kicked him down and ran him through. Once Jerome stopped convulsing and lay still, Oren pulled his sword out of his chest and glared at Magnus. “Now we really can’t ask ’im. So I gets to believe whatever I wanna believe, an’ we’ll just ’ave to come to some sort of… agreement.”
Magnus growled at him.
“As for Vandorian, he’ll pay me a hefty sum if I bring you to ’im—or if I lock you up ’ere ’til the next time he arrives.”
Magnus stared at the dead Saurian at Oren’s feet. He’d just finished off one of his own soldiers instead of trying to help him. What kind of sick person did that?
“What’re you gawkin’ at, li’l brother?” Oren smirked at Magnus. “I know you’ve seen a murder before, ’ey? Namely, your father?”
Magnus shifted his grip on his sword. Oren was trying to get inside his head. “Enough idle chatter. Will you fight, or will you continue to stall?”
Oren waved him away with his free hand, but he didn’t lower his sword. Instead, he turned toward Axel.
“An’ what’re you lookin’ at, ya bug?” Oren hissed.
“Nothing.” Axel smirked just like Oren had a moment earlier. “I’m just really looking forward to making a new pair of boots outta your ugly hide after you’re dead.”
Oren’s eyes narrowed, and instead of facing Magnus, he stormed toward Axel with a roar.
Lilly’s arrow knocked the Saurian off-balance, but his sword still crashed down on Calum’s left arm with incredible force. Had he not been wearing armor, the blow would’ve severed his arm. As it was, pain ratcheted through his bones from his shoulder down to his fingertips, and he hit the ground hard.
The Saurian’s foot landed next to Calum’s head. When he looked up, the Saurian had raised his blade for another swing. Despite his injured arm, Calum twisted around and held his own sword up in time to block. Even so, the strike sent jarring vibrations through his left arm, nearly as bad as the first hit.
The Saurian kept pushing his sword down, closer and closer to Calum’s chest, and Calum couldn’t push it away. As usual, he was too weak to do much of anything, and his weakened arm wasn’t helping at all.
Kanton’s spearhead zipped into view and hooked the Saurian’s sword, which began to rise thanks to Kanton’s help. Mostly thanks to his right arm, Calum gave the sword one last shove and then rolled away from the Saurian, and his sword clanged against the stone floor.
The Saurian flailed his free arm and sent Kanton flying across the room. Kanton smacked into the bars on one of the cages and dropped to the floor, either stunned or unconscious—Calum couldn’t tell.
As soon as the Saurian turned around, he caught an arrow in his throat from Lilly, then another to his exposed chest. He roared, ripped the arrows out, and leaped toward her, but she darted away from his grasp. More enraged than ever, the Saurian returned his attention to Calum.
Calum recovered his footing and waited for the Saurian to come at him instead of pursuing him. Once the Saurian closed to within striking distance of Calum, he swung his sword in a wide arc. Unwilling to parry, given his left arm’s condition, Calum backed away from the swipe and the one that followed.
The Saurian hefted his sword over his head again, and Lilly shot another arrow. It lodged in the left side of his stomach just above his belt, and the Saurian winced and abandoned his strike. When the Saurian reached for it, Calum lurched forward and drove his sword into the Saurian’s gut.
The Saurian dropped his sword, but he also clamped his hand on Calum’s wrist, anchoring him in place. Then he grabbed Calum’s throat with his other hand and lifted him into the air.
The Saurian began to squeeze.
Calum tried to pull his sword free, and he tried to pry the Saurian’s thick fingers away fr
om his neck, but neither tactic worked. Calum felt as if his head was about to pop off his neck.
Kanton zoomed into view, spear-first. As its tip knifed into the Saurian’s side, he released his grip on Calum. The Saurian swatted Kanton away again, but the spear remained lodged in his flank. Then Lilly drew her sword from its sheath and jammed it into the Saurian’s flesh at the base of his neck.
He roared and convulsed wildly, but he didn’t stop trying to fight them. No matter what they did, the Saurian wouldn’t go down.
Had Falcroné not tackled Axel out of the way, Oren would have crushed him. They landed on the floor in a tangled heap of armored limbs and exchanged quick glares, but Axel gave Falcroné a nod nonetheless.
They could have a stare-down some other time. Right now, they had a bigger problem to deal with.
As the two of them pushed to their feet, Magnus traded blows with Oren, who moved faster than Axel knew a Saurian could. He efficiently parried Magnus’s blows then threw several counterattacks in quick succession. Magnus fielded most of them, but one of them clanged against the scales on his left arm, and he recoiled.
“In some trouble, are ya, Magnus?” Oren scoffed. “This blade’s Blood Ore, jus’ like yours. It’s sharp enough to rend even your fine scales.”
“You talk far too much.” Magnus rubbed the spot where Oren had hit him, then he advanced again.
Falcroné swooped around the room and came up behind Oren with his blade out. Still flying fast, he jabbed it at the back of Oren’s head, but Oren ducked and Falcroné crashed into Magnus instead. The impact all but leveled Falcroné, but it only knocked Magnus off-balance.
Oren took advantage of the situation and shoved Magnus back through the same hole in the wall which he’d broken through, and he kicked Falcroné to the side. That left Axel alone to face him.
Oren chuckled. “You babies make me laugh, thinkin’ you can best me. You’re all gonna die—if you’re lucky. Otherwise, it’s the chasm f’you. All o’ you.”