by J A Stone
“HOLD! You are on private property!” one of the men exclaimed. Brooke held a palm upwards.
“Tell Lord Thaddeus, Erza Brooke seeks asylum here. I have escaped custody in Tibor with two others, he knows me.”
The Chief studied Brooke hard, addressing one of his guards. “Send a rider in fast,” he then gave the former Knights an index finger. “You three stay right where you are, we’ll know soon enough,” he spoke confidently as the whole of his south wall crew came to his side—ten men total.
They heard the pony pounding sod across the green, but when they looked down the road from the gate there was no rider. The Gate Chief turned back to the three Knights when the thin tip of a Foil protruded from his neck and disappeared. Steel blades found each man silently, sending all to the deck—gate crew secured in seconds.
Emili Swift, Alorica and Snow appeared from behind the fallen. Robert John Stone walked to the gate from the inside, hefting a massive steel beam with a cork-wrapped handle and fresh blood across the edge of the blunt tip.
“C’mon, Missus British needs back-up,” said the giant in his deep bass voice.
They ran as fast as they could for the inner gate to the massive hundred-foot wall that loomed before them—reaching up to the star, moon and mother-planet filled sky.
Fifty feet to the side, at a point not seen from above, Bigfoot Bob settled in, setting the steel beam down, shaking his massive arms, loosening up. Emili Swift pointed to the exact spot to strike, and then joined Brooke, Garrett, Fenton, Alorica and Tom Snow—taking positions on opposing sides of the gate doors.
Robert began, the very first strike vibrating the entire wall. Twelve rhythmically timed hits and the exterior steel was already telegraphing the sonic disruption, conducting the vibrations throughout the metal and rock. Seconds later, the doors burst open at ground level.
Men and women rushed out with weapons drawn, but the Team kept them bottlenecked in, two and three at a time coming through the threshold, the sharp rings of bladed weapons sparking and chiming to the steady hammer of Bigfoot on the weakest point of the immense structure.
Now the wall was visibly shaking, sections of the steel emitting huge cracks, the south side of the structure beginning to groan as the castle horns wailed in the background.
“Thaddy knows we’re home!” Emili shouted, driving her Longsword through a soldier’s chest and then kicking the torso away.
“Back up, back up, BACK UP!” Brooke howled out. The Team broke contact just in time as huge sections of steel and igneous rock crashed down into the gateway, crushing everyone and sealing the Team on the wrong side.
“Was that supposed to happen?” Snow scratched his head with the cup of his Longfoil. He watched the undulating wall, amazed at what was happening, when a cleft formed more than a hundred feet long, jagging upwards, gouging open with a thunderous scream from the infrastructure. The great wall, a masterpiece of solid engineering, imploded on itself, listing away from the Team.
“YAAAAA!” Bigfoot Bob struck one last time and backed away as the huge section fell forward, crushing and mangling the assembled force on the other side.
“That’s what I’m TALKIN ABOUT!” Captain Swift smiled like the kid she was just last year and followed with; “Go, go, go!” to the rest.
They climbed over the wreckage, Bigfoot leading the way, dropping the massive club and yanking a double-bladed axe from his wide back, amputating the head of his first opponent before the man could get within his own arm’s reach.
They formed a wedge and slowly moved through the survivors towards the main tower of the palace.
One hundred feet below the grass, Warfell and Shadoweye put the Geologist and Thaddeus’ Chief down silently, continuing onward, working their way into position beneath the main castle tower, and hopefully for Danica, the steps leading out of the dungeon.
As before, Team One edged along the walls in opposing pairs with Shadoweye threading the needle. The whole process was just too slow for Warfell—absolute torture. Lighted areas were few and far, leaving most of the catacomb system in the dark or near dark, like a permanent state of fade.
The ceiling and walls were well cared for, meaning Dwarven influence. Warfell assumed the palace staff was killed during the sack. She wondered if Thaddeus had any Dwarves in his employ. She hoped the Gravari Brothers survived to take care of the system. An unkempt dungeon beneath one’s feet invites disease, vermin—snakes.
A soft tap on her shoulder brought Danica back from the daydream. The horns were sounding above. Shadoweye held a splayed hand back again and the Team remained motionless as a small crew of miners hustled through a tunnel just beyond the shadows—Dwarves, just as Warfell suspected. Several armed humans followed with shouts. A moment later, Shadoweye rose from a crouch and relaxed her composure. She addressed the group aloud.
“Okay, they’ve all gone topside.”
British moved to the center, striking a flare, tossing it down the pathway.
“Everyone move out—time to go see the man of the house.” As British said the words, her people involuntarily reclaimed a wall when the thunder of the massive structure coming down above shook the tunnel like an earthquake. Danica kept her eyes on the ceiling, silently praying to die beneath a sword and not untold kilotons of rock and soil.
Stealth time was over, they ran with weapons drawn.
“Here!” Logos pointed to an upwards stairwell, struck another flare and slung the bright green stick upwards—clear—they moved.
The upper levels were very well lit by argon tubes, carpeted and otherwise indistinguishable from a building in a city. There were chamber doors to conference rooms and luxury apartments everywhere now. A door opened as the Team approached.
“HEY!” a soldier shouted, striking the deck a second later with a thrown dagger protruding from an eye socket.
“Hey yourself,” Soulless told the dead man as she jogged by, snatching her blade back.
Another wide stairwell, the last steps ending in a closed door. They heard shouting on the other side. Team One approached the iron doors, pressing ears to the metal…
“They’ve breeched the wall! I need ten of you below, take the tunnel to Thaddeus and STAY WITH HIM, Go!” The locks on the doors rattled and Team One scattered like roaches in the light as a small squad of heavily armed men and women poured down the stairs—the doors left open behind them.
Warfell looked up to the light—the way out. Everything in her mind and body was screaming at her to jump into the fray topside, slay them all, and take the castle up there. Nevertheless, her heart knew British would follow the men headed straight for the target, the reason they were there! She knew Shadoweye would stay below too which meant Soulless as well. She damn sure couldn’t lead three non-violent Dwarves to their deaths.
“Dammit!” Danica whispered to herself, though everyone heard. Much to her surprise, British walked into the light and spoke aloud.
“Soulless, take the Gravari boys and follow. When they get to the door, take them out quietly. Wait at that door for the prize. When the door opens, kill anyone who comes through—use the guns at that point, here,” British handed Jaime a long barreled pistol. “Tawnee with me and Danica.”
Soulless looked to her Master and Tawnee smiled.
“You can do it. Keep these boys alive.”
“On it,” the teenager replied with pride and disappeared into the dark.
“Girls? Shall we?” British threw back her cape, exposing the Westbury Scimitar, the Coralo Machete and the ornate handle of the Blunderbuss.
“We shall boss. You know Jaime will open the door,” Warfell hefted her Thronesword and pulled a dagger for her free hand, reversing the grip.
“Yeah I know,” British took the steps into the light. Soldiers were hustling and gathering everywhere—there were many more than a hundred. “We’re gonna beat her there, I’ve been here before too, follow me!” she ran into the expansive ground level followed by a grateful Warfell and t
he Assassin whose real name was Tawnee.
They met immediate opposition but never stopped moving, choosing to strike and dodge around the confused palace squatters. British ran a woman through with the Scimitar and bolted down an empty hall as Danica and Tawnee pushed, shoved and slashed a path in a futile attempt to keep up with the pixie.
Out front, Emili swung her Longsword with everything she had, desperately fending off two men at once. Next to her Garrett was in trouble as well, clearly the enemy’s strength was gravely underestimated.
Alorica drove through an adversary with a Longsword forged in her husband’s foundry. She kept pace with the grifter, Tom Snow. Snow was good with the Longfoil, damn good. He sliced through armored opponents like they were standing still, naked. In the hands of a masterful wielder, the Foil is the natural bane of plate armor, the thin tip capable of finding every critical crease or separation point in the set. Longswords bash away and cut in, whereas the Foil stabs into the cracks and then slashes like lightning across faces, undefended necks and hands. They both saw Swift and Garrett faltering and rushed to their sides.
Well into the massive first level of the palace’s largest tower, Erza Brooke fought side by side with Fenton. In the center, Bigfoot Bob batted men and women away with the axe. He screamed when he caught a glimpse of Warfell’s black tipped platinum hair across the chamber, disappearing down a hall.
“THEY’RE HERE!” he smiled and turned to see a brave man with a shotgun. The soldier fired, covering Bigfoot’s left arm with red dots. He wailed and chopped the man in two, dropping the axe afterwards and falling to one knee. Robert John Stone had never experienced that kind of pain before. No time! He picked up his weapon with the right arm and kept swinging, clenching the wounded arm tight to his side.
Like wolves after an easy kill, the skilled mercenaries swarmed him, covering Bigfoot in swinging arms and flashing steel.
Less than twenty feet beneath Robert John Stone, Soulless took her first man down with a well-thrown dagger. She threw another and the second to the last man in line fell. Three men stopped and turned on the girl. The clash of steel sent sparks into the dark, as Soulless strafed both arms side to side, smacking away blades and stabbing deep. Three more down. The Dwarves were with her, silent, unseen, she could feel them. She moved on, knowing the last five guardsmen would not stop until they reached Thaddeus. She had to end them quietly. Ahead, they turned down a dimly lit tunnel and Jaime Weathers knew that they were there.
She rounded the corner at full speed, her feet sliding out from under her as she thrust the left shoulder backwards, narrowly avoiding a crossbow bolt. Soulless slid to the opposing wall and sprang away from it straight for the closest man; a woman actually, a woman with an extended Cutlass.
British Fey found herself completely cut off from Warfell and Shadoweye; surrounded by men intent on holding the line to a specific hall with a double door. She knew it was the door.
“BOYS! WAIT!” the four-foot tall woman with a perpetual baby face held open palms to the armored men behind and before her, somehow having sheathed the Machete and Scimitar.
“Do you know who I am?” she asked the crowd, sending an involuntary crackle of terror through each. She looked beyond the men behind her to see Warfell and the Assassin creeping in against the walls, she flashed forward and smiled a wicked grin.
British spun about like a ballerina and drew her blades once again, coming to a stop in a crouching stance, arms spread wide, wolf-like eyes reaching her adversaries with the gaze of insane fury, shoving the tactile fear down every throat, gripping each heart with an iron fist.
Then it happened…
Twenty paces behind, Warfell moved from the wall and placed a hand on Shadoweye’s shoulder, shaking her head no.
“Don’t watch sweetie,” Danica then closed her eyes tight to the screams, the muffled grunts, the stifled wails and pleas for mercy…
A brief moment later, Danica opened to see Shadoweye in utter shock, breath gone, eyes wide in disbelief. Of course she watched, burning the images into her mind’s eye, a brutal lifetime of horror lived in just seconds.
“Never think you have seen it all,” Warfell whispered again and then snapped back to business, stepping over the mangled corpses and addressing British calmly. “You okay boss?”
British nodded yes, giving a quick glance to Shadoweye with a blood-speckled face and then turning towards the double doors.
Below, the Gravari Dwarves listened intently to the steel door. Thaddeus was alone inside. Logos climbed over the bodies to Soulless and whispered in her ear.
“He is alone in there, you are amazing Soulless.”
“Jaime, you can call me Jaime,” she reached behind her back and drew the long barreled pistol that British gave her, checking the clip and quietly snapping it back into place. Above them, they heard something massive crash down to the floor of the ground level.
“Bigfoot?” Ethos whispered the question.
“Hope not,” Jaime answered as dust cascaded down. Logos left her side and placed an ear to the door once more. Once alone Jaime pulled her vest forward to see her bloody abdomen, not good—not good at all.
Topside, Robert John Stone hit the deck hard. He’d been stabbed, shot and beaten but his thoughts were only on British and Danica. They should have been scared to death of him, but they weren’t. They believed in him, a faith that Robert had long since lost.
Something happened in the heart of the brute. Was it love? Happiness? Even Bigfoot did not know. He shrugged two men off and rose to a stand amid the battle, swinging with two fists the size of most men’s heads. Face after face, one after another. He felt and heard the necks snap and the facial bones cracking as he bashed his way bare handed through startled opponents. Within seconds, they were outright running from him. Near the central archway, Bigfoot snatched a man away from Captain Swift, breaking him and throwing the body into his comrades, toppling them all. He scrambled across the ground floor like a boy chasing chickens in a barnyard—grabbing those he could catch and twisting, tossing the bodies aside like rag dolls.
Brooke, Fenton, Swift, Alorica and Garrett all rallied to the eight-footer with shouts—the tide just turned.
The castle was clearing—those left realizing the battle was lost, running for their lives across the lawns over the broken wall and onto the grassy plains.
As the clamor of the battle subsided in the distance, British approached the door and knocked as Warfell and Shadoweye took positions on either side.
“Hey in there! You the man of the house? It’s the Daughter of the Aequitas Caelum. I’m selling cookies for my school, ya decent? Takin’ a shit?”
Warfell giggled with a pig-snort—couldn’t help it.
“Just you Ghost Daughter!” they heard the response from within.
“Boss?” Warfell admonished.
“Got it partner,” British reassured.
The door slowly opened forward. Thaddeus sat alone on a leather chair with a pistol in each hand, waiting for the inevitable.
“Close the door,” he stated plain.
British pushed the door back without taking her browns from Thaddeus. She calculated. The target was ten paces away, too far for the Blunderbuss. He might could get her with one or both of the pistols. Then she noticed in her peripheral vision, a tapestry on the wall peel back ever so slightly, revealing a tattooed face behind a barrel, and a spreading circle of blood on the floor beneath. British held Thaddeus’ eyes and smiled warmly.
“Looks like you got the jump on me,” she opened her empty hands, enticing her mark.
“So Atria hires you, I should’ve known. Killing me will not stop the civil war—it will only hasten it,” he replied.
“Forget the civil war, I’m here for Gwyneth and the Master Knight—Soulless sack him.”
‘BOOM!’ the pistol called out in a deafening voice as bright red fluid struck the wall. Thaddeus slumped sideways, his face half gone, sliding down to the fine carpet.
<
br /> “I cast thee away,” Soulless whispered under her breath.
“I like that—yours?” British remarked, rushing to Jaime’s side as Warfell and Tawnee burst through the doorway.
“You really like it? I think it should be lower, like, I cast thee,” she said with a deeper tone, dropping the pistol as British helped her to a padded sofa.
“And eyebrows down, cast thee,” British mimicked her precisely and both girls laughed, Jaime wincing in pain. British carefully pulled back the vest and sucked air through her teeth as Danica and Tawnee came to their side. “Damn kiddo,” she applied pressure and kissed Jaime on the side of her head as she held her.
By the time the morning equi-fade began to brighten the celestial sky, the Platinum Palace was under the control of Warfell, Fey and the Already Dead. More than a hundred of the enemy deserted, fleeing for their lives—the remainder lay cold where they were slain.
When the dust settled, both Teams gathered on the greens just outside the main palace tower. Shadoweye carried a weak but very alive Soulless in her arms.
Before anyone could speak, Robert John Stone knelt down before Danica and British, looking more like a giant mummy than a living man, red spots already appearing all over his heavily bandaged body, he spoke humbly…
“I am ready,” he lowered his head for the execution he was certain was coming. Bigfoot was more frightened than he had ever been in his life! The air seemed to crackle with static energy from the big man’s nerves. Robert braced, and then he heard a voice, the voice of the Ghost.
By my decree, this man, Robert John Stone shall never be harmed, do you understand me Daughter?
“I do Father, on my life I shall be his Guardian—his protector,” British smiled wide and the big man looked up, turning his head sideways.
“No Sir, that needs to be flipped over,” Bigfoot moved opposing palms upside down. “Nothing gets through to me.”