by Eric Vall
We arrived at the edge of Lindow within minutes of pulling away from Mayard and his men. Flames arched high into the sky, and it was like we ran straight into a wall of heat as we neared the first houses. I squinted into the smoke and tried to remain calm as we barreled straight into pandemonium.
Dozens of common people ran screaming through the dirt packed roads, and they dove out of our way in terror as Bobbie roared through the chaotic night. As we had approached, I had counted maybe thirty buildings, but it was hard to be sure through the smoke and flames. Now that we were in the thick of it, I kept my head on a swivel as I searched for bandits, but as we traveled deeper into Lindow, the only faces I saw were fleeing and terrified.
Where the hell were they?
We came to the end of a road, and I jerked the handlebars to the left to circle back around through the town. As I did so, a swath of smoke cleared before us, and then I spotted movement on the roof of a house to my right. It was barely more than a flickering shadow, but that shadow had shape and a defined silhouette. My eyes darted to the other buildings, and I noticed while it looked like the whole town was on fire, that wasn’t necessarily true. A handful of houses looked perfectly intact, and they also happened to be placed at strategic intervals throughout Lindow.
“They’re on the rooftops!” I shouted in Aurora’s ear, but just as I did, I caught a flash in my peripherals.
I acted out of pure instinct, and magic burst out of me like a reflex. The ground to the right of me exploded upward in a great wall of stone, and right in the nick of time, too. As it reached eye level, an arrow slammed through the newly formed rock, and flames guttered around its molten tip.
Cayla gasped in my ear, and I heard Aurora curse, but I ignored all of that as I whipped Bobbie around to face of our would-be assassin. I completed the turn and brought the bike to a jarring halt just beyond the wall I had thrown up as a shield. My eyes scanned through the smoke, and I instantly spotted the man standing on a roof twenty-five yards away with his bow still raised.
Between one breath and the next, I jerked my arm up, thumbed back the hammer on my revolver, placed the bandit in my sights, and pulled the trigger. As I did, my magic rushed to the surface again, fueled by my rage, and when the bullet left the barrel, I willed it with all my might to bury itself in the bastard’s heart.
And even through the smoke and flames, I watched in satisfaction as my shot struck true, and the bandit pitched backward off the roof and into darkness.
“Fuck yes,” I snarled as I thumbed back the hammer again. Then I jumped off the bike and spread my arms wide as I eyed the rooftops. “Who’s next!”
There was a beat of stillness, and for that instant, it was like everything fell into slow motion. The flames froze as they devoured houses, and I caught snapshots of the citizens’ faces as they fled in terror around us.
Then everything snapped back into real time, and I watched as a volley of fire arrows streaked down toward us from the left.
I lifted my arm again to summon my powers but, this time, Aurora beat me to it.
She leapt off Bobbie in a single graceful bound, and when she landed on her feet, she lifted her hand toward the flaming arrows and bared her teeth. The wooden projectiles exploded in a shower of splinters and fire, and then Aurora swept her arm to the side, and flames jumped from the house beside us and rocketed through the air in the direction the volley came from. A moment later, the rooftop was on fire, and bandits fell to the ground screaming, wreathed in flame.
It really was a shame that most mages left their home kingdoms to seek tutelage from the Order in Illaria. If there were even a handful in Cedis, they could have wiped out these bandits with ease. King Davit could have hired some to come here, but while I didn’t know the exact price that would cost, I knew that Cedis couldn’t afford much. In lieu of mages though, my guns and new machines would be a good start.
I glanced at Aurora in surprise as she lowered her arm, and she smiled at me darkly.
“We can rebuild these homes later,” she growled. “Right now, I want to make these men suffer.”
“I support you one hundred percent,” I said with a grin.
“As do I,” Cayla added, and I turned in time to watch the princess load a round into the chamber of a rifle with a definitive click.
I looked at the two beautiful, bloodthirsty women, and I thought that I’d rather have no one else by my side while I put bandits six feet under.
Then I glanced around and realized that while the bandits were now probably shocked at our display of power, they wouldn’t remain inactive for long. We needed to go on the offensive.
“Aurora,” I said as I turned to the half-elf. “I want you to stand back to back with Cayla and I. Any bandit moves in your line of vision, put them to flame. We’ll pick the ones off on this side, and Mayard and his men should be surrounding the town as we speak to stop anyone from escaping.”
“Got it,” the Ignis Mage replied with a curt nod, and then she spun around, raised her hands before her, and flames began to dance along her knuckles and wind around her fingertips.
I faced forward again, and my eyes scanned the buildings before me. Most of the citizens seemed to have escaped or were at least in another part of the town because the roads were empty and barren around us.
Well, besides the charred corpses Aurora had thrown in the dirt a moment ago.
“There!” Cayla gasped, and she swung the barrel of her rifle to the far right. I followed her line of sight and watched as several shadows jumped down off the roof and tried to make a run for it.
“Not so fast,” I growled, and I raised my free hand as I summoned up my powers once again.
Thirty yards away, just on the edge of where the last house on this road ended, a stone wall exploded out of the dirt and stretched ten feet into the sky. Some of the bandits stumbled backward and tried to find an alternative escape route, but fires hemmed them in on either side. I watched as one bandit decided to continue forward, and he took a running leap at the wall as he threw down his bow and arrow. His fingers narrowly caught the top lip, and he hung there suspended for a moment before he tried to pull himself up.
I raised my revolver again but before I could squeeze the trigger, a loud bang sounded beside me, and then the wall inches from the bandit’s arm exploded in a shower of rock and debris. The bandit yelped, and his left hand lost its grip. He scrabbled for purchase, but then another retort rang out and, this time, blood splattered the stone wall as a bullet dug its way through his spine. I watched him tumble to the ground, and when he landed, he didn’t get back up again.
I glanced at Cayla beside me in shock. “Nice shot.”
“Thank you,” she snarled as she slammed down the lever to reload the rifle, and her icy blue eyes reflected the flames as she grinned sharply. “Now help me finish them off so we can send Camus Dred our own message.”
“With pleasure.” I grinned and looked back to the remaining bandits trapped against the wall. It seemed they had realized there was no avenue for escape because the five figures turned to face us head-on, and three of them even raised the bows they still held.
It was a valiant attempt but also made in vain.
“This is for Cedis,” I spat as I cocked my revolver again.
Then I brought the gun down toward my right hip, placed my left palm against the hammer, and began to fire. Four bullets left my barrel in quick succession as I fanned the hammer, and each one of them found a home in the center mass of a bandit.
When the gun clicked empty, only one man was left standing, and he had just enough time to shoot his knocked arrow blindly before Cayla fired beside me and caught him right in the throat. The arrow flew wide before it crashed into the dirt.
I glanced at the princess, and by the look of surprise on her face I realized it was a lucky shot, but luck had its uses too. The last bandit teetered on his feet for a moment and scrambled at his throat as blood gushed between his fingers. Then he tripped over one of his fallen comp
anions, and he pitched sideways into the dirt, still and dead.
“Feel good?” I asked as I thumbed the barrel catch on my revolver. The gun snapped in two and ejected six spent shell casings into my waiting hand.
“I do not know if good is the correct word,” Cayla replied with a furrowed brow as she stared at the six new corpses, “but it does feel gratifying to finally stand up to Dred and his men.”
“Do you think Camus is here?” I asked as I surveyed the dead in front of me and the still burning houses around us. I cast a glance over my shoulder to check on Aurora, but the Ignis Mage was busy barbequing some bandits several yards away, and I didn’t want to bother her.
Cayla pursed her lips as she lowered the rifle to her side. “I thought he might be at first since we are so close to Eyton, but this seems… too chaotic for him to risk it. I do not believe he would put himself in such a dangerous and compromising situation. He is too smart for that.”
“Damn,” I cursed as I dumped the empty casings into my left pocket. “Guess that would be too easy, huh?”
“Too easy by half,” the princess grumbled.
I shook my head and then reached into my right pocket to pull out more ammo. While I had been designing the top break, I had considered how I could best improve my reloading time until I could figure out a way to make a gun that held more rounds. In the end, I had decided on a moon clip, a star-shaped piece of metal designed to hold multiple bullets together in a tight circle. With the moon clip, I could quickly load six bullets at once, and I didn’t even have to bother ejecting the bullets from the clip since it slipped inside the cylinder and didn’t impede firing in any way.
So I pulled out one of several moon clips I had made, but when I did, it felt a little heavier than I remembered. I glanced down in confusion only to find Stan dangling from my hand.
“Oh sorry, buddy,” I apologized as I deposited him on my shoulder. “I forgot you were in there.”
The stickman patted at my cheek as if to forgive me, but then he used his other little twig of an arm to point behind me. I frowned, but before I could turn my head, Aurora’s voice cut through the air.
“Mason,” she snapped, and her tone of voice instantly jerked me back into alert mode.
I slammed my moon clip into the cylinder, snapped the revolver closed like I was in an action movie, and spun around.
The half-elf was several feet in front of me and scattered before her were maybe another half dozen corpses, all of them charred and burned to varying degrees. The smell of burnt flesh was thick in the air, and the stench almost made me gag.
But what I noticed most was the bandit that was still standing fifteen yards away, backlit by flame, with a child pulled to his chest and a knife held against a girl’s throat.
“Enough!” the bandit bellowed, and his voice carried out across the smoke ridden air. “Lower your weapons, or this girl dies!”
“I cannot subdue him without endangering her,” Aurora growled out of the side of her mouth. “My powers are more indiscriminate than yours are.”
I stepped in front of the half-elf and raised my own voice. “How about your drop the knife, and I might let you live!”
“I think I have the leverage here,” the bandit called back, and I couldn’t see his face clearly, but I heard the mocking sneer clear as day. I could also hear the girl whimper as he pressed the knife tighter against her throat.
“Oh really?” I replied as anger simmered in my veins.
The smoke had begun to clear as Aurora banked the surrounding fires, and the bandit’s face became a little more visible. He was a raggedy man, with stringy black hair and a shitty goatee, and a few teeth were missing from his bared snarl.
I had more than enough of these bastards and their entitlement, their arrogance, and their cruelty.
It was time for a little karmic payback.
I raised my free hand slightly to about level with my hip, and then I called up my magic once more. It raced through my veins like lava down the side of a volcano, and I willed it to burst forth and shoot across the air toward the bandit. A moment later, the bandit yelped as the handle of his knife grew molten and scalding hot in his grip, and his other arm went slack around the girl’s neck as he dropped the melting knife in the dirt. The child seized the opportunity, ducked out from under his arm, and darted off into the smoke as she screamed for her mother.
The bandit snapped his head up and tried to lunge after her, but she was gone before he could get his bearings again. When he tried to run anyway, I commanded the dirt below his feet to rise up and encase his ankles in stone. He jerked to a stop and nearly pitched over, but caught himself at the last second.
“You were saying?” I shouted out snidely.
The man’s eyes found mine through the haze, and even from this distance, I could see the hate on his face. He knew he was cornered and trapped. He knew there was no way out, and he hated me for it.
“So,” he called back, “you’re the one that’s been killin’ our boys. Roge’s horse returned a few days ago with Roge dead on his back. He had some strange wounds. Stuff we had never seen before.”
“Would you like some matching ones?” I spat.
The bandit ignored my jab and continued talking as if I hadn’t spoken.
“Then,” he said, “we get word that Keld had become impassable. Damn thirty foot stone wall around the whole thing. We’d heard rumors of a mage in Cedis, but the Boss didn’t believe it, and neither did I.”
“Seeing is believing, I guess,” I snarled as I started to walk slowly forward, and Stan wobbled on my shoulder from the movement. “Now why don’t you tell me about this Boss of yours? Mainly, where can I find him?”
“Kiss my ass,” the bandit spat. “You won’t get a word out of me. I’m loyal to Camus Dred. He’s the Boss.”
“Well he might be the boss,” I ground out as I came to a stop ten yards in front of him, “but there’s a new sheriff in town, and I say you’re going to tell me what I want to hear or you’re going to join your buddies in the dirt.”
The word ‘sheriff’ caused the bandit to frown, but after I fanned that revolver, I was in a very Western mood, and it was feeling more and more like high noon.
The bandit sized me up as I stood before him, and he seemed to decide I was lacking because he screwed up his face and spat in the dirt at my feet.
“The Boss isn’t gonna like this,” he said threateningly as he met my eyes again. “We’ve grown accustomed to certain luxuries since the kingdom went to hell. Monsters tearing up the countryside, eating innocent folk. It was chaos, so we decided to grab what we could before the world ended in blood.”
“So you decided to rob and kill your way through Cedis before the monsters beat you to it?” I spat. “How very fucking brave.”
“Only the strong survive,” the bandit replied as he bared his teeth again. “The strong take what they are owed. They take what the weak can’t protect.” Then his eyes skipped past my shoulder, and a lewd smile spread across his face. “And if we had known the princess of Cedis was traveling the countryside, we would have taken her, too. One after another after another. Ooh, how she would have screamed. Of course, Camus would go firs--”
He never got to finish that sentence. Before another filthy word could fall from his mouth, I snapped my revolver up and squeezed the trigger.
His head exploded in a shower of blood and gray matter before he collapsed and crumbled into the dirt, his ankles still encased by rock.
As the retort of the revolver faded out over Lindow, I exhaled sharply and glared down at the corpse at my feet. Then I screwed up my face and spat on his chest.
“Good riddance,” Cayla said as she walked up behind me and placed a hand on my shoulder. “If you hadn’t pulled the trigger, I would have tried very soon.”
I opened my mouth to reply but before I could, a whinny echoed through the night and then Captain Mayard came riding out of the smoke.
“Princess,”
he called as he drew up beside us. Blood and soot were splattered across his cheeks, and his eyes gleamed with the fire of a good fight as he held a large broadsword at his side. “Are you alright?”
“I’m fine, Norick,” Cayla replied as she gestured to the scene around us. “We’ve dealt with the main incursion of bandits here. Did you encounter any trying to escape?”
“A few,” the captain responded with a sharp grin. “They were dealt with. It seems you can handle yourself in battle, Flynt. I must admit, I am actually impressed.”
“Thank you,” I said, “I--”
Before I could finish my sentence, my vision swam suddenly, and the world felt like it tilted beneath my feet. I listed to the side, but Cayla and Aurora were immediately beside me.
“Mason?” the princess inquired, worry in her voice.
“I’m okay,” I rasped as I held my brow. “The adrenaline is fading now, and my body is reminding me that I skipped dinner before using a shit ton of magic.”
“You must rest,” Aurora said with a sharp frown. “You are always pushing yourself too far.”
“Out of necessity though,” I muttered, but I didn’t have the strength to argue with her right now.
The combination of adrenaline and rage had really been my sole fuel as we rode out over the plains and dove headfirst into Lindow. With the bandit threat neutralized, my body was ready to shut down and rest.
“You should return to the castle,” Mayard suggested as he scrutinized me from head to toe. “If you cannot take your loud contraption, some of my men can lend you horses and escort you.”
“No need,” I said with a wave of my hand. “I can make it back to the capital. It’s just a few miles.”
The captain pursed his lips but didn’t argue. “Very well, but I’ll still have at least one of my men accompany you just in case there’s any trouble on the return trip.”
“What will you do, Norick?” Cayla asked as she wrapped an arm around my waist to keep me up.
“My men and I are going to stay here and help the citizens of Lindow recover,” he replied. “We’ll put out the fires and then take stock of what supplies and provisions they need. We’ll also stand guard for the next day or so to make sure Dred’s men don’t return.”