Shadow Warrior (Sky Raiders Book 3)

by Michelle Diener

  He nodded. “They don't want us taken by surprise, but they're not extending all the help they can. They want to see exactly what they would be facing if they decided to stay and mine more ore, and we turned against them.”

  “You sound satisfied,” Aidan said.

  “Because I don't think they'd have told me this if they hadn't worked out a way to bring down the other sky raider mothership.”

  “You think they're preparing to attack?”

  Garek shrugged. “It's a guess, but yes.”

  They watched the escarpment for a while.

  “I think I see something odd.” Aidan pointed. “Can you fly over that area, near to the valley mouth?”

  Garek eased them over the hill and hovered over the spot.

  “What's that?” Dix cupped her hands on either side of her face. “It's like the ground is flapping.”

  “Can you stir some air down below?” Aidan asked, and Garek called his Change, swirling air just above ground level.

  “It's cloth. A large piece of cloth--” Dix gasped. “There's a group of guards underneath that cloth. They're holding it over their heads. It looks exactly like the ground around them.”

  “Yes.” Aidan sounded awestruck. “There's about fifty guards hiding underneath.”

  “Where there's one, there's probably more.” Garek flicked his gaze to the skies. “Just keep watch for sky craft, too. They told us it was going to be a coordinated attack.”

  He swooped the sky craft down the escarpment, feeling the joy of gathering air beneath him and then he sent it flying toward the three armies camp.

  Three pieces of ground lifted up like lids on some strange box, to reveal the troops beneath.

  “Three.” Aidan shook his head in disgust. “And what is that cloth? Could they really have made it themselves?”

  “You think the sky raiders gave it to them?” Dix's gaze was fixed below.

  Garek circled the troops, most of whom where protecting their eyes from the wind-blasted dust by turning away.

  “That's right.” Aidan's voice was grim. “We see you.”

  One of the fabric coverings ripped loose and flew away, and Garek caught it on an updraft, lifted it up higher, and then drew it back over the hill with the sky craft so he could hover over Taya again.

  He let the fabric drop near the camp.

  “They're running for the valley mouth now.” Dix studied the terrain. “They're not backing down.”

  “Time to get back on the ground.” Garek moved back to the landing spot, but he kept high so Dix and Aidan could see as much as possible.

  Aidan swore.

  “What?”

  “I just saw something move. I think a battalion is already through the valley mouth. That's why the others didn't give up, they know a team already snuck through.”

  Garek tipped the sky craft forward and went back to where Taya stood. There seemed to be nothing and no one between her and the valley mouth.

  “I'm sure I saw something.” Aidan scanned the ground.

  Garek forced himself to hold back, to preserve energy, because he wanted to send a gale down the valley, but instead he used the same swirling, circular wind he'd used on the escarpment.

  And then he punched a little more power into it.

  A large piece of cloth fluttered, then was ripped up by the wind, and a group of forty or so guards were exposed in the open, about halfway between the camp and the valley mouth.

  About five hundred feet from where Taya stood with Hanson.

  “How many of the Iron Guard are down there?” He moved to a point between the three armies battalion and Taya, ready to set down and block the way.

  “It looks like most of them. Maybe seventy?”

  The panic he was feeling subsided a little. Hanson could prevail with much worse odds than that.

  And they certainly looked ready to take on anything. They'd seen the battalion, and their weapons were drawn.

  The three armies team weren't faring as well. Some were moving back, as if to run, others were moving forward.

  Whoever was in command took a few minutes to get them back in a cohesive group.

  “Sky craft.” Dix was looking up, face grim. “Two of them.”

  A frisson of fear for Taya ran down his spine, but there were multiple threats here, and Taya had proven over and over again she was up to a fight with the sky raiders.

  He made the only sensible choice. “It's better for Taya and the Iron Guard to deal with the sky craft. We'll tackle the three armies group.”

  “Just the three of us?” Aidan stared at him.

  Garek sent him a grin. “No. Just Dix and me. We need you to keep the water shield on the sky craft.”

  He flew low over the three armies battalion and turned the sky craft to face them as he landed in front of them, barring their way to Taya.

  Dix looked down the valley toward the camp. “My people are coming.”

  Garek locked gazes with her, and she nodded in understanding.

  They would have to assume help wouldn't come. If the sky raiders were overhead, most of the guards could be taken down by white lightning.

  He opened the door and Dix swung down, face already set.

  He followed her, jumping out and landing lightly beside her.

  Aidan watched them from the door, pulling the water from their clothes and hair and leaving them dry.

  Garek was sure he was wishing now he'd brought the other guards to hold the water shield so he could join them.

  The princeling would have to sit this one out.

  The scream of engines overhead grew louder as the sky raiders dipped low.

  A jagged flash of white lightning blinded, despite the Star still being in the sky, however low it had sunk.

  In the wake of the strike, a whole group of Dix's guards went down.

  Garek saw the reaction to the attack of some of the three armies group.

  Shock.

  The swirl of air and dust around him, the beginnings of guards in the group calling their Change, cut off as their attention switched to the fallen Dartalians.

  “Traitors.” Dix must have seen their hesitation too, because she capitalized on it. She moved right, and Garek moved left.

  She had her sword out, but Garek preferred to work without weapons.

  “Look long and hard at the result of your betrayal, traitors. You will never look another Baritan in the eye when this is over. How could you ever describe the day you collaborated with the sky raiders to bring down fellow Illians? What could you say about this that will bring you even a scrap of glory?” Dix lifted her sword double-handed, brought it up in front of her.

  Her words were having an effect, and then a second lightning strike made almost everyone flinch as the other sky craft dived down.

  As another tight unit of Dix's guards fell, some of the three armies started looking a little wild-eyed.

  “Time to pay the price of betrayal.” Dix was being relentless. Garek could hear the fury and the outrage in her voice. She raised her sword, and as she did, she called her Change and tore loose the soil from under the guards' feet.

  Garek caught it in the air and exploded it in all directions.

  There were screams and cries as eyes were blinded.

  Dix looked over at him, and he saluted her, and then with a cry, they both ran straight at the battalion.

  Chapter 34

  It looked like Garek and whoever was with him in the sky craft were planning to take on the three armies group that had managed to sneak there way up the valley by themselves.

  Taya forced herself to only glance at them as Garek landed, because overhead sky craft engines were whining.

  “I think our practice session has become real.” Hanson's eyes were trained upward.

  “Grab an arrow.” Kima was standing by the big water-filled wooden drum that held the arrows, and she started handing them out.

  “Your spears are still at the camp?” As Hanson turned to her, one
of the sky craft dipped down and a flicker of intense white light blinded her.

  Taya closed her eyes to clear them and felt for her knives. Pulled them out. It would be better to have her spears, which were at the camp, but she had brought down a sky craft with less.

  Dix was shouting something at the guards in the three armies battalion, and when Taya opened her eyes, she saw whatever the Dartalian general was saying had some of them all but spinning; turning to look at the downed Dartalian guards, turning again to face the sky craft and Garek and Dix.

  The second sky craft blasted across the valley, and Taya thought she sensed the air compress a moment before a thin flicker of light seemed to split the sky.

  “More of Dix's guards are down. Aim and fire.” Hanson had already notched an arrow in her crossbow, and she fired as she shouted her order.

  Taya heard the whistle as thirty arrows arced upward and chased the sky craft that buzzed overhead, but it was going very, very fast.

  She turned, saw the first craft was on a second run, coming down the valley, low and fast.

  She threw both knives straight upward, focusing on height and speed, rather than power, so she could intercept the ship as it flew over her.

  She was much better at this game now.

  She didn't aim to pierce the skin of the craft. Without Garek giving her an extra push, she didn't think she could.

  Her timing was just right, the knives intercepted the ship and she pressed them up against the bottom of the craft.

  It tipped left suddenly, then right, the movements panicked rather than smooth, the pilot desperate to change course.

  The shadow ore warning bells in the ship must be ringing.

  She couldn't see what was happening behind her with the Iron Guard, but she heard a second round of arrows being released, and then the engines on the sky craft they were targeting cut off, sparked again, cut off.

  At least some of the small shadow-ore coated arrow heads must have pierced the ship. It should never have taken another run at them.

  The sky craft she'd targeted faltered, and she pulled on the knives, sliding them along the undercarriage, hopefully damaging every system, every part of the engine close enough to be affected.

  The sky craft had righted and was now climbing at a steep angle, but she held on, feeling the strain of manipulating the ore from so far. By now, she was happy just to keep the knives in contact with the ship, and then, from one moment to the next, there was silence as its engines cut off.

  She called her knives back, and as she waited for them, she caught sight of the ship the Iron Guard had targeted trying to gain height and heard its engines misfire.

  The weight of her knives falling into her hands snapped her attention back to her own sky craft.

  It was coming down.

  It had stalled at its steep angle, and now if fell, silently and end over end, like a coin falling from a toss.

  “Run.” Etta pushed her and she stumbled to the side, turned and ran toward Garek and Dix.

  The Iron Guard was scattering, some of them running beside her, eyes up.

  She tripped, and forced herself to look ahead, narrowing her eyes to work out what she was seeing in front of her.

  There was a cloud of sand hanging in the air, and inside it she could see bodies flailing, falling, staggering.

  “It's coming!” The shout right beside her ear made her heart leap, and she turned her head, stumbled to a stop as the ship hit the ground just north of where they'd been standing.

  It crumpled on impact, the dull thud as it hit the ground rattling her bones.

  She turned away as a massive spray of earth shot up and rained down on them, crouching and putting her arms over her head.

  There was a high-pitched screech of metal and rock, and then the ship toppled over slowly, and a second, less intense, thump vibrated the ground beneath her feet.

  She stood, put her knives back in their sheaths, and brushed off the dark, rich soil of the valley which coated her from head to foot. When she turned back to the strange sand storm, the dust had cleared.

  Garek was looking over at her, face streaked with dirt, standing amongst a pile of bodies. Some were groaning, some were very still.

  Dix walked up to him, her eyes wide as she took in the sky craft, upside down and completely destroyed.

  Her sword was bloody, and there was dirt and blood on her face.

  She said something, and Garek turned his head to her, gave her a salute, and then they clasped hands in a guard handshake.

  “They destroyed that whole unit. By themselves.” The guard beside her spoke in a hushed voice.

  “That's the general of Dartalia, and the general of West Lathor,” Taya said. “Of course they did.”

  Chapter 35

  It wasn't over.

  Garek spun away from Taya to face the oncoming threat—the three other units he'd exposed on the escarpment.

  They'd made it through the mouth of the valley, and the way they stood, frozen in place, told him they had seen Taya bring down the sky craft.

  To his right, the engines of the second sky craft finally shut off completely and it slammed into the side of the hill in an explosion of orange, green and purple flames.

  Satisfaction welled up in him. He had vowed to bring them all down, make them all burn, for taking Taya.

  The throat-catching smell of strange materials burning was like the sweetest perfume.

  One of the guards at his feet turned a little to see the carnage, but most of them lay still. He'd warned them what would happen if they tried to move, and he'd only had to make good on his promise once to have complete compliance.

  Dix had been a little more . . . vigorous . . . with her half of the unit. More lay dead on her side, but then, this was her land to defend.

  There was movement behind him, and he glanced back to see Taya striding forward, Aidan just behind her.

  Susa and Varn, along with the other two councilors, were walking down, too, accompanied by six guards.

  Dix glanced back, frowning, but Susa must have signaled her determination to come to the front, because she subsided, taking a wider stance beside him, her focus back on the enemy.

  “Your liege is safe,” Garek murmured to her. “We've got Taya, the whole Iron Guard, and you and me.”

  Her lips twitched.

  She must be near burn-out—he certainly was—but he would dig deep for a little more energy to take on the guards in front of them. Especially the pinch-faced man who broke free of the huddle and strode toward them across the wide space of flat field.

  Taya reached his side, her face serious, her movements business-like, but her hand brushed his lightly in hello. She was lightly sprinkled with the dark soil of the valley. He looked down at where their hands touched.

  So was he.

  The man storming across the open space toward them stumbled, and Garek saw it was Taya he was focused on, his gaze fixed on her face.

  Taya stiffened and drew herself taller.

  “You!” The three armies commander pointed at Taya, and then bent low and scooped something off the ground, reaching for the bow strapped to his back as he straightened. “I thought we were rid of you weeks ago.”

  He notched an arrow in a fast, practiced move, and Garek saw him shimmer around the edges as he called his Change. It had to be an air Change, because the arrow shot forward far faster than it should have been able to and it was aimed straight at Taya.

  Garek lunged into its path, already calling his Change to knock it aside, but it stopped in midair just in front of his face.

  He blinked. Stepped to one side and angled a look at Taya.

  She shook her head at him, clearly irritated he had stepped into the arrow's path.

  A gleam of dark purple reflected off the arrowhead and he realized it was one of the Iron Guard arrows dipped in shadow ore that had fallen to the ground during the attack.

  He started to laugh.

  Taya turned the arrow ar
ound, spinning it like a weathervane so it was facing back the way it had come.

  “Let me?” Garek asked.

  She flicked him a sidelong look.

  “Please?”

  She nodded, and let go of her hold.

  Garek caught the arrow as it dropped, and sent it straight back.

  The man was staring, mouth open, at the arrow, but when he realized what Garek intended he started to turn, to run.

  The arrow slammed into his shoulder.

  “Who is that?” Garek asked her as the commander cried out, hand going to where the arrow protruded from the join between his arm and chest.

  “He's one of the guards from Luf who was working with Habred. He and his partner were the two guards on the road out of Luf who forced me to get into the sky craft with the sky raiders.”

  Garek felt a far-off roar in his ears.

  Things were coming together.

  He had wanted to be face to face with the two who had forced Taya to put herself back into sky raider hands since he'd heard about it.

  He looked across at the commander, caught his eye, and began to starve him of air.

  He choked, and Garek could see the shock on his face. He was already in pain because of the arrow, and it took him a moment to counter with an air Change of his own.

  When that didn't work and he was desperate, the troops around him started to raise their weapons in panic, pointing them in all directions, and Taya brushed her hand against his again, to get him to stop.

  He did it reluctantly, but she was right. Someone else might get hurt with so many armed and on edge. There would be plenty of time later for revenge.

  He waited for the commander to wheeze in a few breaths and stagger back to his feet.

  “Your allies are defeated.” Garek gestured toward the burning wreck on the hillside. “Your way is still barred. Surrender.”

  Shocked faces stared at him, mouths slack.

  A man stepped out of the crowd around the commander. “We have a larger army than yours on the escarpment. Why would we surrender?”