Brace For the Wolves

by Nathan Thompson

  “But Buddy Wes,” Little Gabby begged. “You just came back!”

  Another howl sounded out. This time it was much closer, although the familiar whispers didn’t accompany it.

  “I know, Gabby,” I shouted back. “But I need you to trust me! Valerie!” I shouted to the oldest of the rescued Earth girls. “I need you to make sure Gabby and everyone else gets safe. Can you do that for me?”

  None of the three other girls had responded to me when I tried to talk to them. They wouldn’t even make eye contact. But now Valerie’s black ponytail whipped around as she looked right at me, nodded once, then ducked her head as she rushed over and picked Little Gabby up in a fireman’s carry.

  “Buddy Wes!” Little Gabby wailed over the older girl’s shoulder. “Don’t leave!”

  Her cry wrenched at me, and once again something angry snarled at me as I turned toward the direction of the monstrous howls. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Karim part from the refugees to come over to me and Weylin draw his bow and stand some distance away.

  “You’re thinking to stand and fight?” Eadric asked as he unslung his warhammer. “To buy time for everyone to escape?”

  “No,” I said darkly. “I’m thinking of killing whatever the hell thought it could terrorize my people and get away with it.”

  I began activating my enhancement spells. Wind whipped around me and powered my feet. Minerals enhanced my bones and skin. And electrical current ran throughout my body. That strange ‘Battleform’ I had used before didn’t activate this time, but all of my spells still felt significantly stronger.

  “Hmph,” Eadric said after regarding me for a moment. “Good enough,” he added with a shrug.

  “Weylin is ensuring that the refugees will still benefit from his travel chant, but he will aid us with his bow,” Karim said as he walked over. He was gripping one of the spears we had looted earlier. “I trust you have no complaint with his tactics.”

  I shook my head. “Not if he helps everyone make it safely. And if he’s nearly as good with his bow as he is with those knives I saw him use.”

  “He’s better,” Karim said with a nod. Then he began tracing more symbols into the air. I began casting Shocking Digits, a spell that allowed me to store an electrical bolt into each finger. Then, in a flash of inspiration, I began casting Shock Bolt, my strongest, slowest, single-target attack spell. The spell required channeling, which meant that I had to both know an opponent was coming and have the time and mana to deal with them. This time, I found I could finish channeling, then hold the entire charge in reserve. Aside from a minor pressure in my mind, it was easy.

  “You’ve become Initiated in Lightning magic,” Karim said in surprise. “Fascinating.”

  Before I could ask him to explain, another howl sounded, much closer.

  And this time I could hear the chant.

  “Traitor-prince, traitor-prince! We smell the blood of the traitor-prince!”

  “Avalon,” I said out loud. “Is there anything we can do to encourage them to go for us, instead of the refugees?”

  “The shelter’s warding circle is already activating. Hostile creatures will find their movement through it to be impeded. Further obstructions are unavailable at this time, and suspected to be unnecessary.”

  “Right,” I said quietly.

  Unlike everyone else, I could understand the chant. It didn’t take a genius to figure out they were after me. Why, I didn’t know, because I had just escaped.

  I’d have to discuss that later. But right now, I had to deal with what had just come in range.

  To my surprise, whatever was howling earlier wasn’t the first to break into view. Dozens of figures that came no higher than my chest were rushing at us from the west edge of the woods. They had black, oily skin with several large patches of brown fur covering their bodies. Their faces were an ugly cross between a deer and human, and they wore loincloths over their private areas.

  My mind-screen overcame its current issues to remind me that these were Wretch-class Hordebeasts. A similar creature had nearly killed me back when I had my first Rise. He was also the one to give me a new name: Traitor-prince.

  They were slightly smaller than that original beast, and had much smaller horns. They made up for it though, with their numbers and by wearing actual armor—small tunics of studded leather. They gripped clubs, short swords, and maces in their fur-covered hands.

  When they saw me, they began hooting and pointing.

  “Traitor-prince! Traitor-prince!”

  “We have found the traitor-prince!”

  Karim turned to look at me.

  “You,” he said quietly. “They have been after you all this time.”

  “Guess so,” I said back grimly.

  “But why?” he persisted. “You have been captured by their leaders for decades. How could they not know where you were all this time?”

  “What?” I asked in surprise. “I don’t understand.”

  The Wretches in the distance were still hooting and hollering their name for me, but they hadn’t come closer yet.

  “They have been chanting that strange name whenever our peoples have battled them. Tray-tor-prins,” Karim pronounced with difficulty.

  “Traitor-prince,” I corrected. “It’s the words “traitor,” and “prince” put together. In my original language.”

  I realized then and there that these creatures had been speaking English the whole time. Back when I battled them in that cave during my first Challenge. During our mad flight to safety. And just now, when they found me again.

  Shock covered the dark man’s face.

  “How, and why would they…”

  He trailed off though, because another howl sounded, and the Hordebeasts began to charge.

  “No time to coordinate,” Karim said quickly. “We don’t know your capabilities, so it’s best if we fight separately.”

  “Not necessarily,” I replied. My Rise-sharpened mind let me remember one of the last awards I had received from my feats in Stellar War: the ability to have at least three people fight with me as a unit. I closed my eyes briefly, then opened them and spoke a word of command.

  “Fight with me, side by side, brother by brother.”

  Something pulsed, and after the three other men made surprised nods I felt them straighten their stances. I somehow knew that Weylin was nocking an arrow in his bow. Karim began forming more symbols that I now knew would shield and enhance us, just as I also knew he would transition to more offensive magic afterwards. Eadric moved forward ahead of me, to better receive the mass of Wretches charging our way. I instinctively knew without bothering to look that he was holding another carved figurine behind his back. He was going to wait until our enemies committed to a route, then he’d throw the figurine at them. It would break like his other figurines, releasing a storm of summoned, sharp rock.

  I got the impression that they had fought like this before, dozens of times, that they were sliding into a familiar strategy that my link to them was making me aware of.

  I could only hope this link worked both ways, but since I knew roughly what they were going to do, then I could at the very least change my actions to support theirs.

  Since I wasn’t fighting alone, I chose to hold off on casting my terrain spells. Instead I tried to make myself as big a threat as possible, by using one of my most destructive multiple-target spells.

  My hands and words ripped out with the Ideal of Air. I spoke and gestured with sharp, tearing phrases and gestures. The spell Friction Slash completed just as quickly as it had when I used it in the dungeon, firing out of my hands in just under three seconds.

  That was the only part of the spell that had stayed the same.

  What had once been a three-feet wide, three-inch thick disk of super-sharp wind was now a four-and-a-half-feet wide, six-inch cylinder of buzzing air current that tore through the rest of the air so fast it left shimmering trails of heat. The attack tore into a tightly packed group of Wret
ches, then tore through them, severing limbs and torsos and raining small splinters of black flesh onto the forest floor.

  The attack’s increased power made me blink. In the past it usually wouldn’t kill an opponent unless they were already injured or I got a lucky hit to the throat. But now the spell was tearing through several armored bodies at once. I shook my head and got my focus back. There were still dozens of charging Wretches still chanting for me despite losing several of their number.

  But they were still dozens of yards away.

  My hands ripped through the arcane motions and created another sharp, hot, current of super-spinny death. I sent it tearing into the pack of midget-savages, but they had begun to spread out enough to where my attack only shredded three of them.

  I heard a brief hiss of surprise from Karim as he saw my attacks, but he remained focused and still completed his own magic. Blue glowing scripts circled around the four of us, and though I couldn’t read them, the word deflect appeared into my mind. A blue screen, similar to the one that had appeared around Karim in his last battle, surrounded me and my three companions. More script circled around me not a moment later, and the word Aim appeared into my mind as well. My grip on my spear felt a little firmer, and the vulnerable spots on the incoming monsters somehow became more noticeable.

  Weylin’s song suddenly changed in pitch, and feathered shafts started sprouting from monster heads.

  The speed of his shots surprised me. I had always pictured aiming a bow as this long, careful process, but instead my elven friend was firing off his weapon like it was a semi-automatic firearm. Wretches went down either screaming or limp. But they were still charging.

  “Traitor-prince! Traitor-prince! Give us back the traitor-prince!”

  “I’m right here, you little shits!” I screamed as I decapitated another three with my third Friction Slash. “Come and get me!”

  Another howl sounded out into the night. The mass of monsters redoubled their chant and continued to charge, despite all the bodies dropping among them.

  “That’s close enough,” Eadric said, and he threw the figurine he had been holding behind his back. The little statue landed right in the midst of a dozen Hordebeasts, breaking on impact with the ground. There was a noise like a thunderclap, and sharp, rocky fragments started whipping up off the ground and stabbing all of the nearby horned monsters over and over. They screamed in pain and tried to get out of the spell’s radius.

  And that was my cue to really get to work.

  My hands twisted together again, and some of the little bastards in front noticed and flinched. But this time I performed one of the last spells Breena taught me: Strong Gust.

  A powerful burst of air knocked the forward Horde back into the radius of Eadric’s broken figurine. Their fall made them collide with other Wretches trying to escape, causing whole groups of them to fall down in piles. Then, as they began to get up, I started to cast one of my favorites: Muddy Earth.

  In the past, this Earth spell would just create a slippery patch of mud beneath the feet of my enemies, making them slide and slip around. But this time a large part of the ground just sank, dropping the Horde to the middle of their shins. They tripped, slipped and tried to slough or crawl through what had now become a death trap of wet ground and sharp flying rocks.

  They didn’t make it.

  The combination of our ranged attacks had probably dropped over two dozen enemies, and more were falling every few seconds to Weylin’s arrows or to Karim’s newly fired glowing darts. But over a dozen of the little monsters had avoided all the violent scary death we had thrown at them and would be upon us in moments. Eadric waited another moment, then swung his hammer around to splatter a horned head when it came in range. Then he stepped back to crack his weapon into another fur-covered temple.

  The dwarven man’s close-range murder art impressed me, but his reach wasn’t that much longer than his enemies and I didn’t like his chances against more than six of them. My spear snapped out as I charged forward, stabbing straight into another Wretch’s lightly armored center mass. To my surprise, the little monster’s vital guard was completely overpowered and I felt my weapon burst clean out of the monster’s back, studded leather not mattering at all.

  The Hordebeast’s eyes widened and glazed upward, and I realized in my shocked state that I had killed in a single blow a type of monster that had pushed me to my very limit just a few Earth months ago. If I had more time I would have been ecstatic. But right now I was mostly just worried about getting the blasted thing off my spear so I could keep fighting with it. Since I didn’t have time to figure it out, I used the polearm as an improvised club to knock the next screaming little monster away, then threw the weapon in front of me, leaped a step back, and drew my silvery short sword left-handed. I took a wide sweep with that weapon as I danced back another step and finally had time to draw the long arming sword I had looted from the dungeon’s guard captain. The quality of the weapon was inferior to the shorter blade, but now I needed reach and stopping power, and this weapon was the least likely to get tangled up in a mass of small furry bodies.

  Now armed with a weapon in each hand, I leaped forward, sweeping my longsword through the neck of a Wretch trying to flank Eadric. Yet another monster’s vital guard was overpowered and my weapon tore straight through flesh, vertebrae and artery. I whipped my weapon around quickly to deal with another Hordebeast, and as I slew it another Wretch jumped right at me. I stabbed into its chest with my silvery blade, catching it in midair. Then my Outer Current spell triggered, and it spasmed its way halfway off of my blade. I brought my foot up to kick it the rest of the way off my weapon. Once again, I underestimated the strength of my blow and the monster went careening into a pack of three others behind it. As they tossed the body off of them and rose shakily back to their feet, I darted into the midst of them, decapitating one with my longsword, shredding the second one’s throat with my shorter blade, and breaking the third one’s shin with my stone-toed boot before bringing both of my blades through its neck.

  I spun around to face the next foe, but we were clear. Just a pile of bodies by my feet and by Eadric, along with the bloody field of savage idiots who thought they could charge a group of four magic-users working in tandem. I was shocked again when I realized none of them had come close to even landing a blow on me.

  Focus, I told myself. The howling monster’s still out there. Protect your girls and the refugees.

  My eyes swept through the woods, and through my link I could feel the other three men do the same.

  “There!” I heard Weylin shout, and my gaze locked onto a shape hanging back just beyond the rest of the woods to our west. Its build suggested it to be a quadruped, but as it locked its shining eyes onto my own it reared up and placed a forepaw onto a nearby tree for balance. It fled in the next moment—it must have seen us prepare to fire at it—but as it did I caught a glimpse of a long, lupine form loping away in great strides. It let out one last howl as it charged away, and once again whispers worked their way to our ears.

  “Traitor-prince.”

  I shook my head, frustrated that an enemy was able to get away and share our position.

  “Avalon, did everyone get clear? Did we lose any of the refugees?”

  “Confirming that all unarmed personnel have safely crossed into defensive perimeter without hostile contact. The new inhabitants have also made peaceful contact with the shelter’s other inhabitants.”

  “Other inhabitants?” I asked in surprise. “What other inhabitants? You never mentioned anyone else was here!”

  “The older inhabitants appear to be refugees that located the shelter some time ago. Time of arrival varies between groups but the oldest group seems to have arrived five Avalonian weeks prior.”

  “How did they get there?” I demanded.

  “Data not found.”

  “What do you mean ‘data not found’?” I shouted in exasperation. “You’re in charge of the whole planet, aren�
�t you? How could something possibly escape your notice?”

  “Lack of contact with Stewardess Starsown has resulted in a shut-down of multiple operating rituals. Foreign contaminants such as the Horde Pits and recent contact with Umbral life-form Cavus has resulted in further deterioration. Surveillance of Avalon’s entire surface is impossible even now and will require further maintenance by the new Lord of Avalon. Avalon will provide more information on said maintenance when opportunities to perform them become available.”

  “Ugh,” I said. “Fine. Let’s just go check on our new friends.”

  Chapter 3: Lasting Through the Night

  “Impressive,” Karim said as he glanced downward at the warding circle theoretically under our feet. I had no idea how he could see it. It was yet another reminder on how I had been neglecting the magical aspects of my training. I could only hope I’d find a way to correct that before it cost me any further. “Even though many of these wards are dormant, the whole circle is still emitting a veil and shield that covers even more area than the High College does back home.”