Archangel’s Ascension

by Pablo Andrés Wunderlich Padilla

  “I’ll stay,” Lulita offered. “And you be on the alert in case I shout, eh?”

  Leandro laughed. “So be it.”

  The general and the mage went inside, and Lulita remained alone, scanning the horizon. On the plain, there still shone the flames which were burning the corpses. When that fire went out, they would be in darkness. After the surprise attack had severely wounded the first wave of men, the wyverns had retreated.

  “Hello, ma’am?”

  Lulita found a group of soldiers about fifteen years old at her back, but she could tell by their looks that they were no longer children.

  “Hello there, soldier. How can I help you?”

  “Well, we’ve disposed of the dead. We’ve come for your orders.” There was fatigue in their faces, a need for food and rest.

  “Check that every tower is ready for a possible attack, then go and have something to eat.”

  The boys’ eyes lit up. Another of them cleared his throat. “What’s that cloud?”

  “It’s part of Némaldon’s strategy: cover the sky and use the darkness to gain the advantage.”

  “We’re going to win, aren’t we? We’ve never lost in Kathanas.”

  “I don’t know,” Lulita replied.

  The boys ran off, leaving a clatter of boots echoing on the stone.

  The drawbridges came down to connect the rock towers. They were long reinforced planks without handrails, so narrow that they only allowed one person to pass at a time.

  The volunteers at the infirmary were already dealing with the wounded they could save. To the dying, they gave Burgmansia milk to induce eternal sleep. Then, under strict orders from the general, they threw them over the cliffs.

  The old lady looked out at the horizon once again where the black wall was reorganizing itself for the next attack.

  ***

  Inside the Lookout, in the duke’s room, the sacristan watched the poetic display of the blackness. He had put on his black cassock. Several of the duke’s wives had given him enough pleasure, and he did not wish for more.

  He had witnessed Strangelus’ spell, which had revived his interest in the Conjuring Arts. He regretted having had to leave Rummbold Fagraz’s book behind; it would have been a great help now. His eyes turned to the duke, and he could not help thinking that fate had put this man in his path to offer him new possibilities such as wanton sex, ambition, and insatiable lust.

  “Excellent,” the mad duke said exultantly. He was attired in his best armor. “Let the enemy come, let him come. I’m ready to meet him in hell.”

  He had donned a metal helmet, decorated with gold braids like a crown. On top of the helmet shone a silver spear tip, more decorative than functional, that gave the helmet an impressive air. The shoulder pads, armbands, gauntlets, breastplate, and the other metal pieces which covered his body were purple, the favored color of the Roam family. In the center of the breastplate was the family coat of arms, showing the sword buried in one of the rock towers.

  “Let those sons of bitches come,” he repeated. “They’ve no idea what’s waiting for them. With my Sword of Zarathás, we’ll defeat them!”

  “So it shall be, my lord,” Argbralius said. “So it shall be.”

  In the eyes of the sacristan, black energy was still shining.

  Chapter XXV – Kathanas VI

  The cloud which covered the sky was so thick, so dark, it was impossible to tell whether it was day or night. In the castles, soldiers and citizens were planning the defense for the next attack.

  “We’ve been waiting for more than four hundred years,” an older soldier was telling Leandro. “Training our children and our children’s children to react all together against an invasion on this scale. Only a massive, well-prepared army would dare attack Kathanas.”

  His name was Kelei. He wore his white hair very short, cropped to the scalp, and his face was perfectly shaved. He wore a simple white cotton tunic.

  “I have to admit that the city has a very effective system of defense,” the general said.

  “Certainly. But not many know our systems and structure. We’re isolated from the Empire despite being in the middle of it. Ironic, isn’t it? But we’re happy this way. The government doesn’t bother us, and travelers don’t stay too long. Troubadours leave as soon as they realize that our women would cut their balls off if they tried to force them. Tramps and bandits don’t even come close, as there’s no citizen here who doesn’t know how to defend himself. We all have a good eye for picking out a villain. And if one of them gets as far as committing a crime, he’s given the dead foot.”

  “The what?”

  “His foot is cut off with a hot machete so he can never run away again. But it’s been many years since we last gave a dead foot. Honesty shines here.”

  “I’m glad your soldiers are so well-trained,” the general said as he was led to the dining room.

  It had been a modest victory, but they had to prepare for the next attack with good food. All around them, adults, children, and elders were wearing cotton tunics, ready to put on their armor. In the dining room, several soldiers were laughing heartily as they drank and ate roast ribs of veal, chicken legs, or pigeon breasts. The meat was plentiful in this city of warriors.

  The general took his seat, and a servant—who was a soldier helping in the kitchen—handed him a tray of beef ribs roasted on a wood fire. The general sank his teeth into the meat with a healthy appetite. Kelei smiled at him warmly. He went on to select a pork rib and devoured it while, with his other hand, he reached for a slice of bread and a jug of rose water.

  Leandro did not utter so much as a word as he enjoyed the meat and left the bones on his plate one by one. He even licked his fingers and felt rather ashamed to think of the example he was setting. But in that dining room, everyone was eating just as voraciously.

  “It’s a stroke of luck that you’re here, General,” said Kelei. “Our duke, although we respect him, wouldn’t have won the battle.” He was thoughtful for a moment. “I don’t know whether you’ve realized, but in Kathanas we don’t mourn for long. We don’t bury our dead and weep for them for days. No, we celebrate the life those dead lived with tears, obviously, but never for more than a day. Never!” He picked up his jug of rose water and raised it in a toast: “To Kathanas!”

  “Kathanas! Kathanas! Kathanas!” the soldiers chorused.

  Kelei smiled.

  “Fate comes to meet us. Let’s greet her with the grace of the Gods, for if death should come to us, let her at least find us fighting for the life we so love and not for the life we avoid living out of fear. Are you ready, General, to lead us to an epic battle? Tomorrow’s troubadours will sing of our effort, inns and bars will echo with verses which will bring this moment to life again. We’ll become legendary.”

  The general felt a cold sweat. Everybody in the dining room was hanging on his reaction. He swallowed. He remembered his wife, his children; he had to go on, even if it were only for them. He knew the enemy was going to have recourse to black magic.

  He unsheathed his sword and raised it. “Death to those sons of bitches!”

  “Kathanas! Kathanas! Kathanas!”

  Chapter XXVI – Kathanas VII

  The battle broke out again. The second wave of terror reached the rock towers, filled with orcs, duj, and voj, who were running in a frenzied stampede. They were bringing war machines with them, new tools that would allow them to break the rock and continue digging. Warhogs were ridden by the smaller duj.

  “Blood and victory!” the general exhorted his men in the face of the deluge of demons.

  The catapults launched their loads of rock and barrels of fermented fat on the field, which was still faintly illuminated by burning bodies.

  Strangelus came to the aid of the warriors. He was without his hat, and his face was paler than ever.

  “Leandro! Everybody’s to release arrows when I give the word!”

  The general turned to the mage curiously. The old man w
as moving his hands in circles, shaping a ball of blue energy. The head mage was uttering words of power, harnessing it from the deep well of mana in his soul. Mana was no mysterious energy; it was the source of life itself. That was why every time a caster conjured a spell, he consumed himself.

  “Now!”

  The general gave the order. “Volley!”

  “Asaeta!” the mage yelled.

  In the darkness, it was impossible to see the arrows flying high. The mage stamped heavily on the floor. “Electra!” he cried the last word of the incantation and launched the ball of energy into the air.

  The sphere reached the arrows, and instantly the sky was illuminated in blue. Below, the monsters were paralyzed, as were the defenders of the Empire.

  In the duke’s room, Thoragón Roam, his butler Darcy, and his much-revered priest Argbralius of Ágamgor witnessed the outburst of light and arrows. The duke was enthralled by a spectacle that was both charming and brilliant. Argbralius longed for the power to create spells as beautiful as this and wished he could join in the battle and massacre the enemy with the sword of Zarathás. He wanted to transport himself. He was filled with hatred.

  Outside, arrows were raining down on the vanguard of the Némaldine attack, and the bodies started to burn. Every time an arrow hit its target, a blue fire issued from the body and burst into flames of the same color, with a blinding intensity. The Field of Flora was lit up in brilliant blue.

  “Kathanas! Kathanas! Kathanas!” the soldiers cried as they reloaded bows and catapults.

  “Master!” screamed Elgahar.

  Strangelus had collapsed. His face was ashen, as though he were dying.

  “It’s the price to be paid for such a powerful spell, my pupil… Potion. The purple one,” stammered the mage. The pupil reached into his master’s toga and pulled out the purple potion in a small glass container. The head mage drank from it and seemed to recover some color.

  “You must know how to use potions and make them for yourself. If you are to become a powerful mage, you must use potions to recover, or your life will be shorter than a soldier’s.”

  Elgahar knew this very well. His master had warned him more than once. The Conjuring Arts demanded a price in terms of life energy, and Strangelus had used much of his vitality to launch this offensive. Seeing his master’s suffering, Elgahar pulled himself together; however badly wounded he might be, he would not be defeated. He could not resort to the Conjuring Arts, but at least he could use his sword.

  More than a third of the evil army’s second wave was burning in the blue flames, but there were still thousands more advancing mercilessly, trampling their comrades with the sole purpose of destroying the city and the Empire.

  Thanks to the blue light, the defenders were able to see that the orcs were about to collide with the base of the rock towers. The stampede sounded like a ship crashing against a reef. They took up their tools and started to hack at the rock. This time, it would not be so simple to face them down below since the war machines, too, were advancing; at their passing, they tore apart the dead and wounded, creating a pulp of flesh and viscera. The rocks launched by the catapults destroyed some of those machines, but there were too many of them, and they would soon reach the towers.

  “Wyverns!” came a soldier’s warning.

  The beast came down on him and sank its jaws into the unfortunate man.

  “Wyverns!” Deathslayer repeated.

  “Raise the bridges!”

  The first war machine crashed against one of the towers. Several orcs came out from inside the machine and hurled hooks at the wall. When the ropes were tense, they began to climb.

  The other war machines proceeded in the same way. The balance, which had tilted in favor of the Empire's forces, was beginning to go the other way. They were hugely outnumbered by the Némaldines.

  ***

  Inside the rock towers, Dartos had prepared the battalions in charge of facing the enemy when they finally managed to penetrate the rock, which would not take them long now. The tower most directly affected would be the central one.

  The secret passages and entrances were guarded by another battalion, though there would not be enough of them if the Némaldines found them.

  The soldiers waited, tense and aware of each blow on the rock.

  “It’s time to give it our all, comrades,” Dartos said.

  He trusted that the narrowness of the staircase would act as a funnel to contain the enemy. A cold sweat ran down his back. All around was a smell of fear and unease. The sound of the hammers was coming closer all the time. It seemed the wall would collapse any minute. Death would be upon them soon, but not without stiff resistance.

  Dartos had been born and raised in Kathanas. He had learned to forge metal armor in the great furnaces and to wield several weapons. He had married and had children who were also now preparing to defend the city; at least two of them had died, but that was the defenders’ fate, and he knew that one day he would see them again in the Deep Azure of the Heavens.

  “This is where they’ll come. Here, and only here.”

  Dartos turned round to see a big man covered with a hood. He could only see his jaw and a bare chest with a large tattoo. In his right hand, he carried an ax. His golden skin revealed him as a Wild Man. It was not often that Kathanas saw one of these. None of its civilians had seen a Wild Man up close before.

  “Concentrate all your men on this rock tower, just this one.”

  “But—” Dartos stuttered. “The strategy is—"

  “There won’t be another chance,” the man repeated, calmly but firmly. “As soon as they open that hole, they’ll come flooding in. Call the men from the other towers.”

  Dartos turned to one of his soldiers. “Go and do as he says.”

  The soldier hesitated for a moment, then ran off upstairs. “They’re coming! Get ready!”

  “Kathanas! Kathanas! Kathanas!"

  The hammering echoed like war drums. Tom, tom, tom. Like bells tolling for the dead. And then, it happened.

  A layer of dust fell from the ceiling and a blue light shone through. The wall fragmented into cracks. A black eye peered in, and Dartos pierced it with the tip of his sword. Another curious orc put his eye to the hole, and a soldier stabbed it with his spear. The rubble began to crumble, and the hole grew larger and larger. An arm came through brandishing a sword, and the Wild Man cut it off with a swift blow of his ax. Another arm. Stones. Fire. An orc showed half of his body, croaking like an enraged beast. The Wild Man decapitated it.

  More stones, more fire, more orcs. The hole opened, and another orc passed through. A voj pushed it and hit the rock. The hole grew larger. The voj ran inside to meet three spears and a sword. Then an orc followed by a duj. They were killed off easily. More came in while their comrades continued to hack. The cave filled with corpses with the men fighting almost crammed together, inhaling the breath of the orcs. And then the hacking stopped.

  There was a crash of heads and bodies. Teeth gnawed at flesh, swords hacked off limbs and necks. Monsters and soldiers fell. The two torches which had lit the cavern went out, buried among the remains of the dead. In the darkness, both sides renewed their pressure; judging by the screams of monsters and humans, they could tell that their forces were well-balanced.

  The air was filled with a smell of eucalyptus, which the orcs loathed. There came the sound of a blade which hissed and tore unceasingly.

  Dartos was paralyzed. In that darkness, he was afraid to misjudge his strokes and kill one of his men. The orcs had a better sense of smell than humans, which gave them the advantage.

  A pair of eyes gleamed in front of him.

  “Aaah! Aaahh!” a soldier howled, overcome by fear. “They’re eating me! Aaah!”

  “Nooooo! They bite!” cried another.

  More red eyes everywhere.

  “Retreat!” the Wild Man ordered. “Necromancer!”

  Word spread like panic. The soldiers ran to escape from this cavern,
which stank of innards and blood. Dartos noticed that the Wild Man had not fled with them, but he paid no more attention as something even worse was going on. The enemy had infiltrated. The dead had risen and taken control of the battle.

  ***

  Leandro brought down a murderer of the Brotherhood of the Crows with a stab in the leg and another directly to the face. He had been scratched by a poisoned dagger; it had barely torn his skin, but he was already feeling the effect of the poison in his veins. Leandro reached inside the crow’s garments and yanked off the pendant.

  He had lost all sense of time. What with the furious fighting and the black cloud that covered the sky, it was impossible to be clear about the hours' passing. Dark spots were approaching the rock towers. Before he could give any orders, he saw a hundred wyverns flying over the towers, spewing acid and burning up soldiers. On landing, the riders dismounted, and another hand-to-hand battle began. Leandro dodged a sword which was about to cut him in half. He counterattacked, and they both struggled until an Empire soldier stabbed the rider through with a spear.

  ***

  Lulita swung her ax on all sides, bringing down orcs and cutting the ropes of the ones who were climbing. The rows of monsters waiting their turn were endless. The blue fire was going out and the dead were piling up on the ground at the same time. The acid from the wyverns was extinguishing the beacons. They wanted the darkness to be absolute.

  Lombardo also fought ceaselessly with the sword Savarb had given him, but with little hope.

  The enemy advanced, and the Empire fell back.

  ***

  Lomans wielded his morning star with one hand and his sword with the other. He was used to fighting against orcs and knew that those beasts were not particularly intelligent, and he had learned to feint so that they would grow trustful and lower their guard. He had a voj in front of him as big as he was himself. The captain managed to bring him down, but the monster had bitten off part of his forearm. Before he could recover, a voj charged at him. Lomans reacted in time and smashed the iron ball into its skull.