“One down, eighteen to go,” Sero evidently felt the need to keep count.
Daniel sent an alert to every member of Loper’s pack, gave each a mental picture of where he wanted them to be, and sent them from their hiding places to give him the necessary visuals to convey. “Sero, collapse the tunnel,” he said, and then tried to wait patiently while the task was being completed.
The need to hurry was warring with his sense of practicality. The subterranean burrows of the enemy could not be allowed to remain and the visuals the wolves could provide were necessary in order to convey safely in a chaotic environment. The time when he would assume a location is exactly the same way he remembered it was long gone.
By the time the chore was done, the wolves had run to the desired locations much faster than he ever could on two legs. He summoned the potential and conveyed to tunnel eighteen. Sero, not needing to be told, began creating the hole and they sank beneath the ground. While they were descending, Daniel sensed the forest fire spreading south from the border. Spans of trees were in flames. Accomplished of the Serpent Guild behind the catapults were using wind spells to steer the fire forward while other Aakacarns extinguished the blaze after the damage was done so the legions could advance. This did not bode well and Daniel was worried. The yetis were moving through the trees at the speed of a stampede and he estimated it would not belong before they reached the walls of the holding. He smiled in anticipation of their arrival.
The hole reached the appropriate level and Daniel once again sent death at his enemies. The multi-colored light struck and killed them instantly and his assistant promptly destroyed the tunnel. He sensed Carlos walking to the north above ground and focusing energy beneath the surface. It was not as quick as Daniel’s method but it worked.
The fight was far from over, the other tunnels were advancing toward the holding, and the outcome was still in doubt. Could all of them be stopped? The only choice was to press on. After Conveying to the area in front of tunnel seventeen, Sero dug the hole, using Fashioning, and Daniel sent, Die Now, killing the first Aakacarn who was creating the tunnel, and about half the occupants. Several Aakacarns acting in concert had put up a powerful shield and now they and other Accomplisheds were tunneling toward the surface. The men following them wasted no time running from certain death into the forty or so upward escape routes. They all must have felt the harmonic waves from the spell used to kill their comrades in the other tunnel, which meant the people in the remaining tunnels had to be expecting an attack. Daniel could sense shields forming on most of the Aakacarns in every advancing passageway.
Rather than chase down the people on the surface, Daniel decided to continue attacking the main tunnels. He conveyed to tunnel sixteen and instead of casting, Die Now, he placed a hand on the ground and cast, Fashioning, stretched his senses out, and became aware of every bit of dirt and rock between the passage and the fortress, then reformed the space back into solid ground. Death was instantaneous and so was the subterranean explosion of whatever forms the trinitrotoluene had been contained. Many of the Aakacarns had created dome-shaped shields and were still alive. Each was isolated and buried more than thirty cubits beneath the surface. Tarin Conn’s spell, Teleportation, required six bolts of potential and the one and two-bolt Accomplisheds could only cast it by forming a circle and performing in concert, so most of them were truly stuck, but the smart ones will likely remove their shields and begin tunneling to the surface, the rest will eventually suffocate. Daniel had fifteen more tunnels to destroy and then he could spare the resources to rescue the trapped and dying with the idea of taking them as prisoners of war.
The spell, Fashioning, required physical touch and therefore a crescendo could not be used, so all the energy came directly from him without the benefit of amplification. He couldn’t continue to cast such a powerful spell, not fifteen more times. He shook his head in frustration. Not having ever replenishing life force energy was truly hindering his ability to fight effectively. “Sero, I will convey us to the next tunnel and then I want you to reform the thing back into solid ground.”
Sero nodded his head. “I am ready, Maestro.”
Daniel conveyed from one location to the other, with the help of the wolves, and Sero destroyed all of the tunnels on the north side of the hill. It took the Four-bolt a little longer to focus his potential through so many spans of ground to the border and into Pentrosa, yet he got the job done. None of the non-Aakacarns survived the reformation back into solid ground but a fairly large number of Accomplisheds managed to tunnel up to the surface, and all combined there were slightly over a thousand who survived the collapses. This could be a problem if they came to realize who had attacked them and decided to repay the favor. He and Sero would die even if only a tenth of this force came at them. A Maestro level of potential suddenly flared from the area of the original tunnel and all of those Serpents began heading towards Simon, for which Daniel was grateful.
Tunnel number one was nearly at the wall, so he, not needing the eyes of a wolf for this, ran up the hill and then conveyed with Sero to the top of the span-wide structure in a clear space next to Roder Keenan. “Sir Daniel, I am glad to see you,” the Lieutenant said without a sign of shock at the sudden arrival out of thin air. “As you know, most of the Sentinels are with the First Accomplished, ready to defend the Benhannon Naval Facility, and the rest are with the First Lady and Commander Herling on the eastern border. Chief Aid Trenca sensed the invasion and as you can hear in the distance, is engaged in battle. It feels like the fight is coming our way even though I do not yet see it.”
Daniel strongly suspected the man had a touch of Seer in his blood and quickly confirmed for him what was happening and ended with, “The one tunnel Sero and I did not reform is about one hundred eighty strides right over there,” he said while pointing. “We are going to remove it but you need to expect a large number of Aakacarns to escape to the surface. It will take them only a few moments to form shields so kill as many of them as you can before that happens.” The battle was far from over and could still end badly if anyone was to slack off now.
“It will be as you say, Sir Daniel,” the big man replied, and began issuing orders to all of the Guardsmen.
Daniel sprang off the thirty cubit high wall, landing lightly on the ground. Sero stood beside him moments later, having taken the leap without hesitation. “I want you to sink the hole and do the reforming on your own. I am going to focus on killing or capturing anyone who pops up out of the ground,” he told his assistant.
Sero began to glow with potential and was sinking into the ground even before answering, “It will be as you say, Maestro.”
Daniel closed his eyes, relying on Find All to show him the location of his enemies. He could see them shielded, all except the tunnel maker who could not cast both spells at once. Moments later came a deep rumbling, the ground being reshaped, perhaps hundreds of trinitrotoluene containers exploding, and a thousand non-Aakacarns, along with twenty spell-casters, died so fast they would not have had time enough to scream. The eighty surviving Accomplisheds removed their shields, cast their tunneling spells, and that was what Daniel had been waiting for. Using his scanning spell, he sent Die Now from his eyes, fingers, and thumbs through the ground in different directions to twelve Aakacarns, whose tunneling spells winked out along with their life forces. He repeated the effort and managed to kill two more groups of twelve before the rest broke the surface.
About a hundred Lances of light shot from the walls, flying over Daniel’s head, into the closest group of Aakacarns, and puncturing twenty-three of them as they emerged in the flat area between the wall and the south side of the hill. Some of the Accomplisheds were still tunneling up toward the hilltop and others managed to reach the surface on the north-slope and out of physical eyesight.
Sero rose from the hole in the ground while sipping from his canteen. “Maestro, I’ve done what I can from there, what would you have me do now?”
Rather than run
up the hill, Daniel conveyed to the top along with his assistant. “A pair of Aakacarns are about to emerge three paces to our right. I’m going to capture them while you take out as many Accomplisheds as you can. Be discriminant, precise, and narrowly focused. Kill only what you are aiming at.”
“It will be as you say, Maestro,” Sero replied and began focusing energy through his baton at an Aakacarn half way down the hill. Five bolts of potential overwhelmed the shield, killing the cloaked figure, and sent him rolling the rest of the way down.
From the ground in front of Daniel emerged a one-bolt Accomplished of Ducaunan birth, brown hair cut short, dark eyes, and pale in the face. The black-cloaked man was six and three quarter cubits in height and powerfully built. His eyes widened at seeing seven lightning bolts on the helmet of the knight in front of him. Behind him came a plump female Aakacarn, a comely young woman with light brown hair and green eyes.”
Daniel quickly cast, Shield Potential, focusing the energy finer than a strand of spider silk, and tied the Da Capo to his crescendo. “You both are to consider yourselves prisoners of the Atlantan Guild.”
At that moment shaggy white creatures, each about nine cubits high, broke from the trees and came running up the hill. Their faces reminded him of dried boot leather. They ran forward on broad flat feet and with long hairy arms out stretched. All of them were bellowing fierce roars and their open mouths revealed yellow rows of sharp pointed teeth.
Sero possessed so much confidence in his Maestro he did not bother to turn around and look at the pair of Accomplisheds or pay much attention to the screaming horde coming at him. The couple aimed their batons, one at him and the other at Daniel. “It is you who are my prisoner,” the tall man clearly had a different opinion. Perhaps the yetis were making him feel more confident. “Olivia, the great Tarin Conn will reward us richly for capturing the one controlling the spell that binds him.”
Both Serpents suddenly glowed like rainbows as the shields absorbed the energy they attempted to focus. “You did not summon potential,” Olivia said as her eyebrows lifted in wonder. “How is it we are shielded?”
“You are addressing Daniel Benhannon, the Maestro of the Atlantan Guild, and what you have seen is only a fraction of what he can do.” Sero paused in the middle of trying to kill another Serpent. This would be his nineteenth kill from the group who fled the tunnel he recently reformed out of existence. A fire ball shot up the hill, between a pair of yetis, and smack into a forward shield created by the Demfilian-born Accomplished, who sent a beam of light that just missed a yeti and passed through a wolf in order to reach the Aakacarn, and both fell to the ground.
Daniel focused on Lessa and was relieved the alpha female of Loper’s pack was sleeping, which meant the Aakacarn also slept. He sensed the battle taking place three spans to the north. Simon and his team, along with Carlos, who had finished his task and was now directly involved in the surface fighting, had to contend with the thousand Serpents who escaped the other tunnels, and injuries abounded on both sides. Half way up the hill where Daniel stood, Yetis spread out and around, forming into a large defensive circle. This had to be Leah’s way of helping while otherwise occupied. These were the hairy brutes she established mental links with after the battle at Mount Tirana.
“The wolf is only asleep and so is the Serpent I struck,” Sero informed him.
Daniel nodded acknowledgment, even though he already knew the information. It seemed best to encourage rather than discourage communication of such facts against the real possibility he might have missed something important. “Send our three prisoners to Lieutenant Keenan. He can watch them while they nap.”
“How does he think we can take a nap at a time like this?” the tall Aakacarn demanded of his partner.
Olivia eyed Daniel before answering, “Jordan, don’t worry about the how, and just be glad he chose not to kill us.”
The man opened his mouth but Sero’s spell put him and the young woman to sleep before he could say a word. The Serpent who had hidden behind Lessa floated out from behind a tree, up the hill, and then all three prisoners were carried by the assistant’s spell up to the wall. They came down gently beside Roder Keenan. The wolf yawned and came to her feet, having been released from the spell on her.
A thunder crack of sound out of the north announced the arrival of Samuel and twenty of his ISIG operatives. They began attacking the outer fringes of the Serpents battling Simon. A few moments later the Chief Aid, his aids, the Defense Department Accomplisheds assigned to the holding, Carlos, and the Sentinels vanished from the kill zone and appeared in a blast of sound on the hill. The wounded had not appeared with the others and neither were they in the holding. Wherever they went it was beyond the radius of Daniel’s spell. The eight hundred thirty-seven surviving Serpents suddenly had no one to contend with. He sensed them forming up in a circle and a bright flash and thundering crack of displaced air announced their departure. He extended Find All out in a ten span radius. The Aakacarns had returned to the fortress, joining Serpents already there, but the hundred clearing the way for the legions were still advancing. Daniel needed to stop and replace the energy he expended thus far and yet he dared not allow the enemy to advance into his holding. The Soarers reached Simon’s battle site and stayed there, perhaps gathering clues on what had taken place. Hopefully they will choose to help against the remaining hundred Serpents if not the legions. It was a hope not based on faith without evidence to back it.
Daniel leveled his gaze at the Chief Aid. “Seriously, I thought you would have pulled your forces out of there sooner, and where did the wounded people go?”
Simon glanced at the men and women who had fought by his side. “Everyone, Accomplisheds and Sentinels, who were injured have gone to the Health Department facility at Shantear,” he replied immediately, glanced at the smoke rising from where he had been fighting, and then continued his explanation. “That tunnel not only held the largest number of Aakacarns, it was also closest to your holding at the time. The animals in your menagerie must have warned you fairly quickly because we barely began the fighting when you appeared. Frankly, I’m glad you chose to go after the other tunnels rather than join with me. Believe it when I say it took some work on our part to encourage those Aakacarns who escaped the tunnels to come after us rather than you. I don’t think they realized our Maestro had come in person or they might have left us and swarmed you. It was my intention to keep them occupied until all of the tunnels were destroyed. By the way, Sam, here is a spheroid.” A round ball about the size of a grapefruit floated from his hand to the ISIG Conductor.
“Good thinking on providing a distraction away from our Maestro,” Samuel commended him while examining the device. “I sense iron shards inside but cannot get a relatable picture of the other substance in my mind.”
Which was not surprising given the limited amount of people who would have handled the stuff, “It is trinitrotoluene and highly explosive. We encountered it in the heads of the Demfilian ballista bolts,” Daniel explained when Sero kept quiet.
The sound of a thousand whips cracking at once announced the arrival of Leah and one hundred Accomplished of the Defense Department, along with five hundred Sentinels. “Maestro, the Aakadon flotilla has sailed beyond our naval facility, your parents are on the way to Ducanton, and we are here to contend with the legions advancing this way,” she announced. Her eyes seemed to be taking in and analyzing everything around her. “How do you want to proceed?”
Daniel had refrained from taking steps against the Pentrosans while they remained on the other side of the border, but this was the second time they sent legions into Ducaun, and he was not feeling very tolerant at the moment. “I want you and your contingent to attack the legions. Simon and his team will come with me to entertain the occupants of the fortress, along wi..,”
“Me and my operatives should also accompany you,” Samuel interrupted.
It was in his nature to be in a hurry and that sometimes caused Sam to
act or speak prematurely, Daniel reminded himself. He continued to address Leah without so much as glancing at the former Teki. “Along with Samuel and his operatives. Take as many prisoners as you can so the ISIG can gather information that may prove useful. This means we will have to create a hidden facility to hold the captives.”
Leah’s eyes focused on Simon. “You have done well here and I know you will be successful at entertaining the enemies at the fortress. After all, it is not the first time you will have fought at that location. Conductor Cresh, you and I will soon have a meeting to discuss where to put the prisoners. Maestro, all will be as you say.”
Daniel gave her a nod of respect. “The legions have come far enough into Ducaun and we have chores to do, so let’s get at them.”
The First Accomplished and her small army vanished in a flash-bang along with the yetis, and Daniel focused on Letha, the fox, for the necessary visual. “I can convey us there,” Simon and Samuel both said at the same time. They looked each other in the eyes. “You do it,” the Chief Aid told the ISIG Conductor, who nodded agreement, and both of them clearly assumed the decision on who should cast the spell was settled. Daniel had been using his donated potential without taking the time to allow Sero to replenish it, so letting someone else cast the spell was probably a good idea, and so he decided it was better to let their decision stand. He was taking a big enough chance with his life without adding the recklessness of casting unnecessary spells.
The blackness and sensory deprivation in the space between here and there lasted for about three heart beats and then Daniel was standing in the snow facing the huge circular fortress. Samuel had brought them to a broad hill north of the stone fort that provided an excellent view. Daniel sensed the massive stables to be mostly empty, except for grooms and a small number of horses. The number of people occupying the fort with the watch tower on the roof was well into the thousands, two thirds of which were non-Aakacarns he hoped would survive what was about to happen if such could be managed. These were likely support staff and guards. One thousand twenty-three were Aakacarns and by far the most dangerous to contend with.
To Be Grand Maestro (Book 5) Page 28