We continue until I spot what appears to be a staircase carved from the pale, smooth concrete of the wall. From the corner of my eye, I see Sully’s head whip toward mine.
“There’s our way down into the camp,” he whispers. The vaguest hint of a smirk curls one side of his mouth. He then alerts the others and clips his head toward the recess. Ahead of me, I see the rippling muscles in Andris’ arms bulge and flex in anticipation of conflict. Arnost rolls his shoulders and crosses his arms over his chest, revealing thick cords at his back that are barely concealed by the fabric of his shirt. Derrick, not to be out done, bends at his high waist and stretches, touching his toes. Sully quirks a brow at me and I suppress an inappropriate giggle. We’re headed into battle. If Derrick needs his long, frog-like legs limber then so be it.
Ignoring the display, I turn and look between Rion and Killian. “You two stay up here and keep us covered.”
Both men nod in acquiescence.
Derrick straightens, and all of us clutch our weapons tightly as we descend the staircase. Tall steps wind in a helix formation. As we round one of many curvatures, we find ourselves face to face with three Urthmen. Shock etches their horrid features, and before any of them can draw a weapon, I slash the air horizontally, opening the one closest to me at his throat. A bloody chasm carved by my blade forms. The Urthman stumbles backward. Sully slips past his falling form and collars another, driving his blade under the Urthman’s chin. While he lower’s the dying fiend to the ground, Arnost grips the last Urthman by the back of his head and thrusts him face-first into the stone wall. A loud thud echoes, along with the sound of splintering bone.
Stepping around the three lifeless Urthmen, we quickly scramble down the remaining steps. We find ourselves in what more closely resembles a city than a camp. My eyes dart, roaming in every direction. Immediately, my gaze lands on an oversized wheel affixed just to the right of the gap in the wall.
Tapping Sully, I say, “Look there,” as I point to the wheel.
His gaze narrows then zeroes in on it. “That opens the gate,” he mumbles more to himself than to me. “It must.” His eyes continue to take in the intricacies of the mechanism. “If we take out the two guards posted beside it,” he makes mention of the Urthmen lingering close by. “Then we could turn it, open the gate and our people can flood the city.”
I scan the surrounding area. Urthmen are everywhere. Any conflict between us and the Urthmen posted at the wheel would be noticed and announce our arrival.
“Rion and Killian,” I breathe as a thought races through my brain.
Though I haven’t spoken a coherent sentence, Sully knows exactly what I’m talking about. His eyes widen. “The archers are in perfect position to off the guards as quietly as possible.”
I turn and look up and over my shoulder at Rion and Killian. “I’ll give them the signal.”
Gesturing with my hand, they aim their weapons at the guards by the wheel. Within seconds, arrows trill through the ether with deadly speed, piercing the hearts of both Urthmen. When the guards fall, we dash from the stairwell.
The five of us make it to the wheel and each grabs a spoke within the massive circle. Even with all of us turning, the wheel is a challenge, barely budging at first then twisting begrudgingly. As we work, panicked shouts rip through the night. Dark shapes appear in the distance, too numerous to count, but I estimate there are dozens of Urthmen rushing in our direction.
Seeing them advance, a cold wave of awareness washes over me. I release the spoke I hold and say, “Keep turning,” before I sprint headlong toward the Urthmen.
“Avery, no!” Sully cries. He releases the wheel and follows me.
The first Urthman I reach swings for my head. I sidestep his swipe and plunge my sword into his gut. I chance a look over my shoulder and see that Derrick, Andris and Arnost are making progress. Exerting their collective might, the gate is shifting. A sliver of silvery moonlight slips through the crack. My fleeting glance keeps my hope afloat, a tricky endeavor, for roughly ten Urthmen attack. Swinging their clubs and blades wildly, their assault is uncoordinated. I carve the air with my sword, twisting and dodging blow after blow. But the more I fight, the more Urthmen appear. The sting of a blade dragging across my calf causes my knees to buckle for a split-second, and then a club blasts against my back. Pain explodes along my spine, branching out like innumerable needled stabs that travel the length of my arms and legs. I lurch forward, losing my footing, and fall to the ground. I expect to die before my next breath. When I don’t, I raise my head and try to push up onto all fours, but numbing pain prohibits me. A flurry of Urthmen surrounds me. I wonder why they aren’t attacking, why I’m still alive. Seconds later, Sully lands beside me. I dare to look at him, fearing with every fiber of my being that I will watch him lose his life the instant our eyes connect. But I don’t. I see molten sable eyes, hope glittering in their depths. And I see chaos, Urthmen running to and fro, and in many cases into one another. Beyond it, the source comes into view. The gates have parted. Hundreds of my people pour in, causing Urthmen to scatter.
Backing away from the gate—and us—shock is etched in the face of every Urthman. Bells sound. A roar of shouts crashes like tidal a wave. Urthmen spill from every doorway, but as soon as they encounter the humans hurrying toward them, they are struck down.
The rest of the archers who traveled with us begin making their way to the top of the wall. Arrows fly through the air, the whir and hiss of their flight fills the night sky, eclipsing the light of the moon temporarily before hitting their intended targets.
Staggering to my feet, I swing my blade once again, killing as many Urthmen as I can. Pain still screams through my back and warmth flows from my leg. Before long, my blade becomes too heavy to wield. My limbs feel as if they’re made of stone. I drop to my knees, collapsing to the ground. Darkness teases at the edge of my vision. I’m vaguely aware of Sully beside me, of the rich warmth of his voice as it envelops me in a safe embrace.
“Come on, Avery. Stay with me,” he says.
The scent of him surrounds me. I force my eyes to stay open and watch as he removes his shirt, tearing it and wrapping my leg in it to slow the bleeding.
While he tends to me, I spot an Urthman approaching, sword drawn and aimed at Sully’s back.
Adrenaline floods my system. With strength and energy I didn’t think I had, I spring to my feet and lunge forward, gripping my sword tightly as I ram it forward. “No!” I scream from a deep and primal place fiercely committed to protecting the man I love.
Metal clangs with metal, ringing out in a deafening clash, as I block the Urthman’s blade and launch mine through his dark heart, all of it happening in the space of a heartbeat. The Urthman’s mouth rounds on a silent scream then he stumbles backward. I’m left panting and heaving ragged breaths born of pure panic, pure fear.
Panting, ragged breaths give way to blurred vision and dizziness. I blink several times in a futile attempt to right the whirling world around me. But nothing helps. Humans and Urthmen alike waver in and out of focus. The terrible ache of my body, the piercing pain in my back and the grunts and cries of flesh colliding with flesh merges to form a murmured symphony. The ground tilts violently then rushes to meet my chin.
Darkness fills my field of vision, and oblivion wraps me in a cocoon of unconsciousness.
Chapter 6
Insistent pounding at my temples tears me from the comforts of unconsciousness. I’m suddenly aware of the terrible ache of my body, the piercing pain that radiates from my back to each limb until it ends at my skull. Murmured words are whispered around me. Muddled and indecipherable, I can’t hear what’s being said. Only that one frantic and worried voice rises above the nervous conversations. I recognize it instantly, and it snaps through my veins like a bolt of lightning. June. The voice belongs to my sister, June. Sputtering briefly before taking off at a gallop, my heart pounds and urges my body into motion. I force heavy eyelids to open. Groggy and jumbled at first,
a mess of dark shapes blurs together. But soon it focuses to a razor-sharp point, along with a pain in my forehead equally knifelike. My eyelashes flutter several times. I peek through them and see her, see that a crowd of people is behind her a bit farther away. Will, Oliver and Riley are among them, a point that fills me with relief. My relief is compounded tenfold when another face comes into focus. Near and watching me with intensity that links his brows, Sully hovers over me with a worried expression carving his chiseled features.
“Hi,” I mutter as I try to lift my head. My voice is rough and raspy, my throat parched.
“Avery! She’s waking!” Sully addresses me first then everyone else present. He places his face close to mine. Warmth sweeps through my body at the sight of his crooked smile. His familiar scent of spice and male diffuses from him, filling me with comfort.
I want to ask him if I was dreaming when I watched his long fingers pull a needle through the skin of my calf, tuck it back into my flesh over and over in tiny stitches. I want to know if it was his voice I heard, his faint words, ephemeral and haunting, mere wisps that I clung to like a lifeline, but my esophagus feels as if it’s lined with sand.
“Avery!” June squeals and pushes past Sully. “You’re awake! Thank goodness!” She hugs me and kisses my forehead.
Struggling against sluggish muscles, I lift myself up onto my elbows. Sully hands me a glass of water, and I drink it down slowly. The room and the people around me waver in and out of focus briefly. But thanks to bright light radiating from indoor fixtures mounted on the ceiling, I’m able to make out that I’m inside a structure of some sort.
“Electricity,” I mumble. “They have electricity?”
Sully’s eyes, the softest brown, fall on me. “Yes, the whole city does. Solar panels are on the rooftops of every building.”
His worlds swirl in my brain, nebulous and ephemeral as fair-weather clouds, and my attention returns to the details of the room.
Smooth walls surround me, and furniture, though sparse, is positioned along the perimeter of the space. Being indoors, the fact that June is here, and that no one is panicking, and a number of other details are significant; I know they are. Their meaning dances at the edges of my brain, teasing me. Frustrated, I squeeze my eyes shut. When I open them again, I peer down at my legs and cringe. Ugly black strings crisscross an equally ugly maroon slash on my left calf. My brow lowers. Perhaps I hadn’t dreamed it at all. Perhaps I’d been drifting in and out of consciousness. Pointing and flexing my toes, white-hot pain flares from the stitched gash. An involuntary whimper slips past my lips.
“Whoa, take it easy there.” Warm hands gently guide my shoulders back to the soft surface I lie upon. “You were out for a while.”
“Sully, is she okay?” June’s voice is laced with worry.
“I’m okay,” I answer. “And you don’t need to talk about me like I’m not here.” I force a smile for my sister’s sake then clear my throat. “How long was I out for? What happened?” I ask.
June looks at Sully who makes a strange sound that is halfway between a laugh and a snort. “Uh, let’s see, where do I begin?” He scratches his chin and shakes his head. “One Urthman opened up your calf from your ankle to your knee. Then another caught you in the back with his club.”
His words spark something in my mind. Nebulous puzzle pieces begin to shift into place, clicking and moving until they form a coherent memory.
“In spite of all that, you still managed to get up and kill three or four more of them—banged up and bleeding as you were—as soon as the gate opened,” Sully continues. “You collapsed after that. You’ve been out for a few hours.” His voice catches.
The gate. The slave camp. I led my people to overtake the Urthmen stronghold. The recollection comes into razor-sharp focus.
The memory is interrupted, however, when Sully leans close and brushes his fingertips across my forehead. I notice that his hands tremble.
I jerk my head back a bit so that I can look at his face. It’s a challenge, especially when his lips are so near to mine, and that movement of any kind thus far has resulted in pain screaming through every cell in my body. “Sully, are you all right?”
He nods, his jaw set, but he doesn’t meet my gaze.
“Hey, it’s me.” My voice is still hoarse and foreign to my own ears.
His eyes dart from left to right then study my face for a long moment. “I thought I lost you.” A faint tremor spikes his words. His lips press together and his brow lowers as if he’s suppressing a great surge of emotions.
Gripping his hand and interlacing my fingers with his, I say, “I’m here. You won’t lose me.” While I realize it is a promise I can’t necessarily keep, especially since it’s only a matter of time before King Leon’s army finds us, I don’t know what else to say. I never want June to suffer the pain of losing me, and now that feeling has been extended to Sully, as well.
His brown eyes shine and he swallows hard.
After several seconds, I break the strain of silence laden with unsaid promises. “Did we win?” I ask in a feeble attempt to shift the center of attention away from me.
“The city is ours.” A broad smile curves his lips, deepening the single dimple at the center of his right cheek.
I’m tempted to grip his face in my hands and kiss his dimple, kiss his entire face, but I don’t. Such a display feels wrong given the circumstances and the presence of so many others. Instead, I focus on our victory. The time to show affection will come soon. “How many humans were freed?”
Sully rakes a hand through his hair. “It’s hard to say for sure. I mean, I didn’t count them or anything.” He flashes his trademark half-smile. I twist my mouth to one side playfully and arc a brow. “Sheesh, you sew a girl back together and she still gives ya the stink-eye!” he jokes and recoils as though I’ve levelled a lethal glower his way. I close my eyes and shake my head. “Okay, okay,” he throws his hands in the air in mock surrender, “back to business. Uh, if I had to guess, I’d say twenty-thousand people live here and were kept as slaves.”
Twenty-thousand. It takes a moment to process the number. But processing that number is sidelined by another question, one that I am loath to ask but that presses me. “How many did we lose?” Any fatalities among my people weigh heavily on me. If our losses were great, the twenty-thousand will mean far less. A casualty of war and the grief that follows has a way of lessening any conquest, no matter how small or grand.
“Not many. But I’ll find out the exact number and get back to you.”
Respects are always paid to the next of kin and the life lost is honored properly. Knowing this fully, Sully understands that I must be informed of the name of each person who has perished.
“Once the gate was opened our army took the city quickly. There were far more humans here than Urthmen,” Sully goes on.
“How many more?” I ask.
“Humans more than doubled Urthmen.”
His statement shocks me. It’s hard for me to imagine outnumbering Urthmen ever. Orchestrating a rebellion seems like a natural progression, an instinctive move. Yet it wasn’t; a detail I don’t understand. I lift myself up to a sitting position and lean forward. Fortunately, I’m greeted by less pain than earlier. “And they were able to prevent an uprising despite being outnumbered?”
“I know,” Sully says, following my line of thought. “It doesn’t make sense on the surface. If it were you or me, it’d be a no-brainer. Revolt would be like breathing. But from what I’ve heard once you meet the people here, you’ll see they weren’t in a position to fight back. Their spirits are, I don’t know, broken or something.” He leans back and looks over his shoulder before leaning toward me again and lowering his voice. “Remember how Tom and Sarah were when we found them?”
Though Sarah is gone, the memory of what she was like is vivid. When we first found her and her brother, they were convinced of the Urthmen’s superiority, brainwashed. The notion that Will and I had battled them a
nd won was inconceivable to them. In hindsight, I realize that when a person is forced to accept a set of beliefs from birth without any other chance of hearing an alternate opinion or theory, without any chance of enlightenment, he can only believe what he’s told. In hindsight, I feel guilty for finding both Sarah and Tom insufferable initially.
“Oh I do remember what they were like,” I say with a sigh. “And getting these people on board to fight will be a challenge. Readying them to fight will be even harder.” I pause and chew my lower lip, contemplating our circumstances. “Do you think they’ll join our cause?”
“I’d like to think they would, I haven’t met with any of them yet” he shrugs and answers.
“Their twenty-thousand plus our fifteen would bring us up to thirty-five thousand. We’d actually stand a chance against King Leon’s army.”
“Avery, I’ve heard his army has more than a hundred-thousand troops,” Sully says quietly. I can’t help but hear the regret in his tone.
“Let them bring their hundred-thousand.” I tip my chin in defiance of the potential odds. “Our people fight with more than blind hatred. They fight for their right to live. They fight for their future.”
“I know they do. But Avery, you have to understand, these people are scared.” He gestures beyond us, to the city that once housed slaves. His words are measured, his tone gentle. “They don’t know what it means to fight for anything. They’ve existed here as servants to Urthmen since birth.” He pauses and pinches the bridge of his nose, clamping his eyes shut. His concern is evident. Unfortunately, so is his doubt. “I’m worried we won’t be able to ignite a fire in them, the incentive to move on.” When his eyes open and he lifts his head, he says, “I think you should talk to them.”
The Rise of Azlyn (Book 4): Planet Urth, no. 4 Page 7