Pandora's Box: Land of Strife: Pandora's Box Series, Book 1

by S. Y. Lee

  Themba stumbled towards Leo until he was a few feet away and the American shoved the last waterskin into his arms. Themba was speechless. Caitlin had taken his reluctance as a sign of chivalry and declined it. The only way for him to get out of the journey was to admit he was too scared to. Unfortunately for him, he was also too embarrassed to say that out loud.

  “That’s settled then,” Jessica said, and everyone in the room, except Themba, nodded.

  Chapter 85

  It was chaos out in the streets of Thelmont. People were scampering in all directions. Some went towards their houses and shelter. Others had grabbed their own weapons and headed to the walls and the main gates of the city to join the fight. David almost fell over a couple of times as he carried his sister in his arms and walked as fast as he could. Every few steps he took, somebody would bump against his shoulder or nearly crash directly into him, and he relied on Alister to clear a path for him.

  Sarah’s eyes were half-closed. The cuts on her body weren’t deep, but she had lost a lot of blood and they needed to get her somewhere to bandage her wounds and allow her to rest. They didn’t know where else to go, so they headed back to the inn where they knew Elin’s room would be available no matter how frantic it got. Even during an attack on the city, nobody would dare infringe upon a wizard who shot fire from her palms at will.

  The Red Pine wasn’t far away and they were soon through the front door, though the innkeeper stopped Alister as he stepped in. The entryway of the inn was too low for the lanky man, and he had to bend down and lower his head in order to get in. It was crowded inside, practically to capacity, and David saw many worried faces as he entered. Some people were hurt and bleeding, possibly as a result of the stampede that followed the loud explosions.

  The innkeeper was arguing with Alister, who was trying to force some gold coins into his hands to let them in, until the old man saw the injured Sarah in David’s arms. He recognized the twins as associates of Elin and promptly let them in while refusing Alister’s payment.

  “How badly is she hurt?” the innkeeper asked David.

  “She’s lost a lot of blood but I think she’ll be okay as long as we get her bandaged up.”

  “Good. Good. Bring her up to the room. We’re almost out of bandages but I’ll find some and bring them to you. And some water and food,” the innkeeper replied, and doubled back just as he was walking away to get the supplies. “What about the wizard? Where is she?”

  David just wanted to get his sister laid down and he honestly had no idea where the wizard was by now. It was quite possible she had fled the city through the tunnel, but that news might cause the innkeeper to turn them away, so he simply said, “I don’t know. I last saw her in the castle.” It was the truth and the innkeeper seemed to take comfort in David’s answer.

  *

  “Where did David and Sarah go?” Caitlin asked as she jogged alongside Elin.

  Karine was slightly ahead of them and she barked orders at any guards that tried to stop them. While she had only recently joined the city’s guard, Cohl had given her a badge for her uniform that conveyed her superior rank to others. It was a blue bird that looked like a hawk. The elf shepherded them out of the castle, where it didn’t appear that the guards were specifically looking for them, but word had spread by now that the young king had been assassinated.

  “They must have returned to the inn to get Sarah some help,” Elin responded. She looked behind her as they exited the castle, making sure there were no guards in pursuit. Apart from the throngs of people running around in mass hysteria, they could hear swords clashing in the distance and the shouts and screams of combat. There was no doubt that Thelmont was in the midst of an armed conflict.

  They kept running until they arrived at a fork in the road that Caitlin recognized. She turned right, towards the inn where they had come from earlier, but stopped when she saw the other two women heading left.

  “Didn’t you say they went back to the inn?”

  “Yes, but we need to go see what’s going on and help the guards. The city must not fall, or else everybody in it will either succumb to darkness or be killed.” Elin stopped as they watched Karine run off without waiting for them.

  “What should I do?” Caitlin asked. She had been through a number of difficult and bizarre situations since waking up in this world, but this was the gravest one yet. Now, she was stuck in the middle of a warzone with no idea what to do or how to act. She wasn’t even entirely sure which side she was on. The only people she knew she could trust were currently unavailable. Four of them had disappeared into a dark tunnel under the castle, while the other two were likely seeking refuge at the inn.

  “Can you heal?”

  “No.”

  “Then you’re no use to Sarah right now. They’re not going anywhere anytime soon. So, you need to ask yourself if you’ll fight, for them, for yourself, and for all the innocent lives within this wall. As far as I know, we all share the same fate.” Elin sounded calm and reassuring, but her eyes constantly darted around for any signs of danger. She looked over to the gates of the city where the sounds of fighting were loudest. She was anxious to join the mix.

  Caitlin considered the wizard’s words. She was right, of course. There was nothing she could do to help Sarah at the moment and she already had her brother and the strange Alister by her side. Once again, Caitlin was being presented with a stark choice. She had chosen to go after Keela and Edan when she could have gone back to the cabin. She had chosen to join the Dark Flame so that they could be free. She had chosen to defy the Dark Flame and fight against them to save Jen, her father, and the residents who lived in the valley. Each time, she had chosen the more difficult route, but she knew she had made the right decisions. The stakes were higher this time, but her heart stayed true.

  “Okay. Let’s go fight,” Caitlin said through gritted teeth. “By the way, I’m good with a bow and arrow. Turns out I’m like William Tell.”

  “Who?”

  “Uh… Never mind. I’m just really good. Trust me.”

  *

  The scene at the gates was frenzied. While they hadn’t seen any damage to it from afar, as they got closer, it was evident that the gates had been breached. There was a huge, gaping hole in the bottom half of the gates and the edges of the hole looked like the metal had been melted through. It had to be the result of at least one of the numerous explosions that they had heard.

  The guards were trying to fight back a swamp of attackers who had entered through the hole, and bodies from both sides were starting to pile up in the middle of the two forces. The uniformed guards formed a semi-circle around the gates, as more guards and even some civilians joined in to reinforce the human barrier. Facing them were the would-be invaders who came in all shapes and forms, though most of them wore dark clothes. Some foamed at the mouth, consumed with the sole objective of meeting flesh with blade, while others looked more in control of their own actions and fought measuredly.

  It was easy to spot Karine, who had somehow made it to the front of the line. Her twin blades cut swiftly through her opponents as she severed limb after limb, only to have more enemies take the place of the fallen.

  “What are these people?” Caitlin asked in disbelief. She couldn’t make sense of who these attackers were or why they were doing this. Many of them were red-eyed and their skin looked pale and green at the same time, like they were afflicted with a disease. But that wasn’t what scared her. It was the fact that they fought with no abandon or sense of pain or fear. If someone lost a hand, the other would come swinging even if it held no weapon. That wasn’t normal.

  “They’re tainted, driven to madness and rage by the Blood Throne. He who sits on it directs their rage. The others, well, they’ve pledged themselves to his cause,” Elin said. She wasn’t looking to join the fight just yet as she surveyed the situation. This wasn’t the only place where fighting was occurring. The walls that encompassed Thelmont had been breached at several locations,
and guards struggled to contain each one. Every now and then, someone would manage to get by the defenders and into the city. These stray attackers were toughest to pursue as they rampaged the streets and swung their weapons indiscriminately until they were stopped.

  “We need to go up. That’s the only way we can turn the tide before the city is overwhelmed,” the wizard said as she started towards the section of the wall left of the main gates. Caitlin followed while looking up to see the backs of many guards along the wall who were shouting, shooting arrows, and launching projectiles of any kind. The top of the wall had to be at least ten stories high, and she saw zigzagging stairs that went all the way up.

  When they got to the stairs, Elin saw a silver-haired man in a guard’s uniform and hugged him. His uniform was bloodied although he appeared to be unharmed. The sword in his hand looked battered and scratched, like someone had tried to stick it in a garbage disposal.

  “Cohl! The king is dead!”

  “So I’ve heard. I also heard a rumor that you might have had a hand in that,” the man remarked, before shouting orders at some guards nearby to join the fighting around the gates.

  “It was Qasper.”

  “The goblin? Are you sure? No, it doesn’t matter now. If we can’t withstand this attack, then all is lost. Who’s this? Another apprentice of yours?” The man pointed at Caitlin with his sword and she watched blood drip off the edge.

  “Her name is Caitlin. She’s good with a bow—”

  “Good! Get her up on the wall! They could use some help. Elin, will you stand with us? We don’t have a fighting chance without you.”

  “Of course. Let’s get to higher ground. I’ll be most effective with the advantage.”

  Cohl led them up the stairs and they had to run. Caitlin had trained for triathlons and swim meets before, so climbing stairs wasn’t a big challenge for her, although it had been a while since she had last done so. To her surprise, the demure looking Elin had no problem keeping up and when they reached the top, she breathed normally while Caitlin leaned over the edge of the wall and panted. She was so out of breath that it took a while for her to see what was beyond the walls.

  There were hordes of soldiers and other men and creatures of many creeds, much like the attackers she had seen on the ground, and she couldn’t tell how many there were. She could see them in all directions as they circled the city and she estimated there were at least a few thousand of them. She saw giant catapults, contraptions she had only seen in movies or dramatic medieval documentaries, that were being loaded with huge rocks and wooden barrels. This was a siege of epic proportions.

  Caitlin was stunned and paralyzed with fear when she felt something being shoved into her arms. It was Cohl, the guard, and he was handing her a bow and some quivers full of arrows. Caitlin noticed that there was blood on one of the quivers as she took them from Cohl, and she looked along the wall where there were several bodies of fallen and wounded guards. Elin was crouching down and tending to one of them.

  “Duck!” Cohl called out and he pulled her down. Arrows whizzed over their heads. She looked at him as her heart pounded so hard she thought it might burst out of her chest. Adrenaline was coursing through her body like she had never experienced before. Cohl gave her a pat on the shoulder and shrugged as he got to his feet. There was no time for words of comfort. “Take out as many of them as you can,” he said, and then he ran off along the wall.

  Chapter 86

  There was no light. They walked in complete darkness, careful not to go too fast without sight as the tunnel curved and bent. It had been a while since they had entered the tunnel under the castle, though there was no way of knowing exactly how long it had been. They would walk for a long time, then rest for some food and water, and take sips of the concoction prepared by Elin to protect them from the influence of Gormore. It tasted like ordinary water. After that, they would lie down and sleep on the cold, hard ground until one of them woke up. That person would be in charge of waking the group and they would commence walking again until they were too tired to continue. They had slept four times already.

  Leo and Eva held hands in the darkness, walking together in the front while Jessica and Themba followed. They chatted to pass the time, each talking about their lives back home and what they would do when they got back.

  Leo and Eva’s lives were pretty normal and unexciting, and they were both interested to hear more about Themba’s hometown and his dreams of becoming an archeologist. It was a perspective that neither of them could empathize with and the young man’s humble aspirations and stories of how he supported his sister were quite uplifting for the group to hear.

  Jessica’s personal story was intriguing as well, since she held the dual role of being an assistant to one of the richest men in the world —their world— while also being a descendant of the mythological Pandora. Leo found it most fascinating as he quizzed her about her family history and origin. She wasn’t able to offer much insight apart from her own personal stories and memories. Her mother had told her about their lineage when she turned eighteen, as her grandmother had done so for her mother at the same age, but the facts were vague and generic. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe her, but it opened up the possibility of so much more. He wondered if other fabled figures such as Hercules were real too, and whether his progeny roamed the earth with superhuman strength that was passed down from generation to generation.

  Jessica had one confession to make, though it wasn’t to anyone in particular in the group. It was something she wanted to get off her chest. While her employer was indeed an avid collector of fine art and history, she had used his name and resources to fund an unsanctioned excavation in Greece after doing much research on the whereabouts of Pandora’s box in the aftermath of her visions. Eva tried inquiring about the visions, but Jessica couldn’t elaborate further than the prophecy that she remembered about the trials that humanity would face. It was like a dream, or nightmare, she said, and she could never fully recall every detail of the visions, even though they were vivid and lifelike when she had them.

  By the fifth time they woke up in the darkness, they had exhausted all topics of conversation and just resumed walking in silence.

  “It doesn’t feel like there’s an end of this, Leo,” Eva whispered, after a long time without speaking. She felt Leo squeeze her hand in response.

  “There has to be.”

  Chapter 87

  She waited patiently, perched over the wall with a black cape draped over her for warmth and to blend in with the dark. The sun was beginning to rise to her left, although she had been awake for a while. Moments ago, she had spotted the lone figure moving through the shadows from their encampment towards the wall. It slowly climbed over some corpses that had been lying there for days, and she pulled back and made a minor adjustment as it crept into the line of sight of the tip of her arrow. Caitlin exhaled and released her fingers, watching the thin black line zip through the air away from her.

  The shadowy figure stopped moving and collapsed.

  There was a stir in the enemy camp and fires started to light up even as rays of sunlight shone through the clouds. Hostilities were about to resume after a brief night of respite. It had been seven days since the initial wave of attacks, and the ranks of the attackers were boosted every day by a seemingly unending number of reinforcements. This morning, Caitlin saw new banners that represented some of those who had just arrived to join the siege. She recognized the crimson colors from far away and wondered if Clera was readying the Dark Flame for an assault.

  In the immediate aftermath of the initial attack, it had taken the forces of Thelmont some time to get their act together in the ensuing chaos. News of the king’s death had spread like wildfire throughout the city, though the cause of it varied depending on who you asked. Some said he passed away peacefully after a long illness, while others claimed he was killed by an assassin who made it past the wall, through all the guards, and deep into the castle. Only a handful
of people, Caitlin included, knew the truth.

  Furthermore, the council was in no condition to command the city’s forces in the king’s stead. Apart from Opilia, who had been killed by the goblin Qasper in the confusion, it seemed that several members of the council had been targeted in the initial attack. Many of the attackers who had breached the tall walls of Thelmont not only slaughtered innocent civilians in the streets, but they knew precisely where to find the council members. Only three members of the council remained and one was critically injured.

  In the absence of the crown and representatives of the citizens, the guards and those who could take up arms needed a leader. That burden fell on the shoulders of several high-ranking officers of the Thelmont Guard, who each held the mantle until they perished on the battlefield. After four days, it had fallen to Cohl to take the helm and he had so far managed to stay alive with the help of his good friend Elin. Together, the military leader and wizard worked seamlessly to plug all the holes in the wall and set up a schedule for the guards so that they stayed alert and fresh for combat at all times.

  Elin had been instrumental in securing the wall that protected the city. Where the damage had been the worst, she used her magic to obstruct the potential means of entry. At some places, she erected a thick wall of ice that didn’t melt under the sun. At others, she would collapse a nearby building that had been evacuated into the way of the breach, until there was no way for the attackers to get through.

  The damage to the main city gates had been the most severe and difficult to cover up, so legions of guards stood in front of it day and night, as wave after wave of attackers attempted to take the city by sheer force. Under Cohl’s tireless command, the city’s forces managed to persevere and formed an impenetrable barrier, while he personally led a contingent of brave fighters, that included the skilled Karine, out of the city every day to beat the enemy back.