Brace For the Wolves

by Nathan Thompson

  I reached for a sarcastic retort, panted as I realized I couldn't find one, and brought my weapon up in a diagonal swing. I was that tired, the back of my mind thought.

  Again he met my attack with another of his claws, this time a vortex of air accompanying his swing. Again we knocked each other away. I slammed a boot down to arrest my backward momentum, and the act shot another ache through my body that my enhanced stamina failed to fully suppress. And as I locked eyes with my giant foe, I knew he did not share my fatigue.

  Fortunately, neither did Virtus.

  A pair of massive javelins slammed into Cess' torso, and he roared in pain as he turned to face an additional foe. Virtus was just a few inches shorter in his armor than the Spawn, so when he slammed into the giant horse-faced thing the monster rocked back, scrambling several steps before he slammed his own foot down for balance. Virtus began stabbing with his stone short sword, pumping three times into the monster's torso. With a roar, the monster grabbed his shield with one hand and wrenched it out of the way.

  “Old relic!” Cess hissed. “You tossed your power away too!”

  “Not my power,” the skeleton said quietly, stabbing the gaunt giant again. “Just my hunger.”

  Cess let out an inarticulate, neighing roar, and swung his free limb back around, the hand burning with an oily sick flame.

  And since I wasn't stupid, just tired, I took that moment to swing my weapon again. This time I swung above the magic and hacked into his elbow, ripping the cleaver free in another shower of dirty black blood. Cess screamed again as he pulled his arm back, half of it dangling by a strip of wrinkled skin. He heaved and knocked Virtus away, but before he could finish turning I had stepped to his wounded side and hacked, then stabbed my weapon into the biggest hole I could find. I couldn't even tell if it was one Virtus or I had made, and I was too tired to care. But I did care enough to jam my weapon into Cess as deeply as I could. Cess' working hand swung at me, but this time Virtus rushed back and deflected for me, knocking the limb out of the way with his shield and checking a stab of his own when he sensed my intent through the mind-link.

  I placed one of my hands on the metal blade of my weapon and discharged my Outer Current spell. Cess arched his back, and then his torso began to writhe and dance. I kept my body low and tried to move with him, twisting my weapon around inside of him as much as I could while my spell ran its course. Near the end he struggled enough to knock me away with one of his three remaining limbs. I rolled achingly back to my feet. As I rose I saw Virtus jam his short blade into the base of the monster's back and began to yank it upwards. Cess knocked him away with an elbow, then sank to his knees. He glared at me as he fell.

  “You will either die or end us all, traitor-prince,” the monster said flatly, as black blood began to leak between his molars.

  “Probably both,” I said as I nodded tiredly, then fired my charged lightning bolt into his head. His half-horse, half-human skull jerked upward, and as he did so I ran forward, grabbed my cleaver, yanked it free, and put the last of my energy into a heavy, horizontal swing.

  A jarring impact later, the head of a creature that had tried his hardest to understand, rescue, and then murder me, rolled onto the bank of the lake.

  I sagged and swayed, finally leaning on my weapon for support. I need to see if the other two Spawn are still disabled.

  Two more massive fireballs answered that question for me.

  I should have been faster. There was no real excuse. I should have snapped my head around immediately after killing Cess to look at the next threat, like Stell, and Breena, and whoever gave me a basic foundation in fighting, trained me to do. Instead I spent a second I didn't have on feeling tired and pitiful, and I was about to pay the price for it.

  But Virtus paid it for me.

  The giant skeleton knocked me to the ground, then hunched behind his shield and made himself as small a target as possible. The two giant balls of oil and heat still collided with him, and I heard a surprisingly human cry from something that shouldn't have been alive to begin with. He flew backwards into a tumble, still burning despite being only bone and bronze armor.

  I had to have more mana than anyone else right now, so I reached for a healing spell. Ironically, my Water healing spell would do nothing for a being without any blood and I didn't have any other Water spells that could peacefully put the fire out without also attacking Virtus, so I fell back on my Healing Wind spell and cast it as quickly and forcefully as I could. I could feel it help Virtus slightly, and the fire dimmed a good bit, but it still burned and I didn't have time to help him with two powerful Horde about to fire another blast.

  “Breena!” I shouted, a panicked edge in my voice.

  I glanced over at her and the others. Weylin and Karim were on their knees, blood leaking out of their noses from pushing their magic far past their mana pool, something not normally possible. Eadric was still standing, but he swayed with an unfocused look in his now-bloodshot eyes. Breena swayed side-to-side in the air, no longer hovering in one place, her glow fading.

  “Sorry... Wes,” she said weakly, her wings beating slower and slower every second. “Thought it would... work better.”

  Her flapping slowed, and she started to drift downward.

  She was apologizing, trying to cover for my mistake. Right before we all died.

  I screamed in exhausted rage and frustration, turning around and firing five finger-bolts each at my last two enemies. My last two out of the hundreds we had already killed today, the last two I was hoping we could deal with before we could finally catch a break and rest. My darts of lightning slammed into them, apparently interrupting their spell. I dropped my cleaver, raced forward to catch Breena for the second time in a single day, and began casting Healing Wind one-handed at Virtus, trying to help his vital guard outlast the unnatural fire.

  “Guineve,” Breena said softly in my arms. “Call Guineve... she can help...now.”

  “GUINEVE!” I screamed out as loud as I could. “GUINEVE!”

  The surviving Spawn had begun casting again. Their horse-like skulls glared at me as fire wrapped around their oily hands. I could tell they were about to start that stupid chant again. And that made me even more tired.

  I tried to act, in case Guineve wasn't ready. In case the person we were supposed to save couldn't save us instead. But I was so tired that I fumbled the spell motions for a Friction Slice.

  I had been stupid, all day. Running straight off of adrenaline. And now we were about to pay the price for it. Unless someone else could fix my mistake.

  Something moved through the fog. In the distance, I barely noticed the crystal in the middle of the lake brighten. Then I saw the form inside the crystal jerk, as if in surprise. The head swiveled around and looked straight at me. Then the body straightened out, and the jewel inside began to spin very rapidly and rise high into the air. Cess' fellow Spawn swiveled to look at what was happening, shielding their eyes from the bright light. Then the woman in the whirling diamond flexed out, as if she was unleashing a scream of rage, and the crystal shattered into massive burning chunks that tumbled straight at the remaining Horde. Before they could escape, the blazing shards pierced and ignited their bodies, immediately burning their oily hands to ash and scorching the rest of their bodies into screaming, and then silent, charred husks that crumpled to the ground.

  As the light began to fade I looked up and saw Guineve, tall, raven-haired, pale-skinned, regal and beautiful, maintaining her proud bearing even as she hung dozens of feet in the air.

  Then her head and shoulders went limp, and she began to tumble downward.

  “Wes,” Breena whispered in my arm. “Here. Go catch her.”

  She placed a tired hand on my elbow, and knowledge of the spell Water Walk swept over me. I kneeled down, carefully deposited one woman onto the ground, then raced across the water to catch a second one. Come on, Wes, I tiredly told myself. Third catch of the day. You can do this.

  Especially
since this recent mess is all your fault.

  Then I managed to stop self-recriminating and poured on as much speed as I could, the water splashing under me but somehow still holding firm. I did my best to judge the angle of her descent. The good news was that she was high enough to give me time to race to the center of the lake. The bad news was that she was, well, so high up in the air that I could race to the center of the lake. I had better damn well catch her.

  You're wearing hard metal, idiot. Get out the cloak and extra padding you brought just in case.

  Right. Thanks brain.

  Another happy accident later and I had made it out to the center of the lake. Guineve's body was still covered in glowing mist, so it was hard to predict her fall. I spread out Tovius' cloak and the other blankets I still had with me, and tried my best to watch her descent. She seemed to move her hands as she fell, revealing that she wasn't quite unconscious. A moment later her descent slowed. I breathed a sigh of relief, skidded a few inches on the water, and then caught her slowly descending body with the red cape, rocking backwards to better absorb the impact of her fall. She grunted softly as she landed, and then I noted she was shivering. And that she actually wasn't covered in glowing mist. She wasn't really covered at all.

  Stop gawking and cover her up, asshole! the non-tired portion of my brain shouted at me, and I swore my cerebrum managed to smack the back of my own head. I wrapped the cold, pale, beautiful woman who had just saved my life up and gently and thoroughly as I could, then headed for the shore, hoping my spell would last long enough for me to make it.

  “Wes,” the ivory-skinned woman said softly, still not opening her eyes.

  “Wes,” she repeated, and I finally realized it was a question.

  “Yeah, Guineve,” I said softly. “I'm here. I got you.”

  “Stell… where is Stell?” she asked, eyes still closed.

  “She’s hiding, but safe,” I assured her. “She used magic to talk to me last night. I’ll go after her as soon as I can.”

  “Good,” she finally said, and then was silent for a moment as I ran across the water.

  “You... came back. For me,” she said next as she rocked her head. I felt one of her hands clasp at the part of the cloak touching my chest.

  “Yeah, Guineve,” I replied gently, “Like I said I would. But I'm sorry it took so long.”

  The hand on my chest suddenly clenched, and I felt her squeeze me even through the chainmail.

  “Idiot,” she hissed, and I finally realized tears were trying to leak out of her screwed-shut eyes.

  “Fair enough,” I replied tiredly with a nod. “Not apologizing, though.”

  She squeezed my chest even tighter.

  “Thank you,” she said softly, and then she relaxed in my grip.

  Carrying a tall, carefully wrapped woman while running over water and being dead exhausted is extremely difficult. If my coordination hadn't been enhanced to superhuman heights, I'd never have pulled it off. As it was though, my feet pierced through the water just as I reached the ankle-deep portion of the lake.

  Virtus was slowly rising to his feet, bones and armor slightly blackened. Weylin and Karim were trembling but back on their feet as well. Eadric looked fine except for the heavy breaths coming in and out of his broad chest. I looked and saw Breena, shrunk down to her smallest size, in Karim's hands. She smiled weakly at me.

  “Guineve,” she said softly. “You're alright.”

  “Yes, Breena.” Guineve smiled back. “I'm here now. It's going to be okay.”

  “I know.” Breena smiled wider. “I'm here now, too.”

  Watching the two woman tiredly comfort each other was too much. They were too fragile, I was too fragile, and we all needed to get back. And we needed to rescue all the people I had left at that Horde Pit, and then blow it up on the way back.

  I can't do that, my brain argued. I'm too tired.

  But we wouldn't get another opportunity like this.

  The Pits would be reinforced after this. And they'd probably start spawning like crazy now, which means we'd eventually get overrun.

  But they still can't enter the Shelter, my brain argued back. And maybe it was right. But they'd have enough forces to keep us locked down, and then we couldn't go help the other worlds.

  But Guineve can just heal and then...

  I told my brain to stop with the 'buts.' I had no idea how long she would take to heal and I didn't know what would happen to the people in the Pit if we kept waiting to help them.

  All I knew is that I wouldn't get another chance like this.

  “Is everyone alright?” I asked suddenly. It was a stupid but necessary question. I felt everyone process it through the mind-link, nodding as they decided they could go a little further.

  That was good, because I needed them to.

  “Are you all completely tapped out of mana?” I asked next.

  More shaking heads. But to my surprise, Karim nodded.

  “We're out,” he said forcefully. “We just can't realize it yet. We've overreached that badly.”

  “Do you need to rest for a moment and get some of it back?” I asked.

  “No,” he replied. “That won't work anymore. The pools for our vital guard, stamina and mana can only be refreshed a finite number of times per day. The only way to restore them after that point is a full night's rest. With the possible exception of Breena, the next spell any of us cast will not only fail but also create a damaging feedback. And that's going to be the case no matter what kind of magic gets used—Ideal, shaping, scribing, anything.”

  I swore under my breath.

  “Alright then,” I replied, trying to think. “I think I have enough in me for one more spell—”

  “You probably don't,” Karim interrupted bluntly.

  “I think I have enough in me for one more round of sharp sticks and harsh language then,” I snapped, and then took a breath. “Sorry. The Horde Pit's on the way back anyway. We'll make a decision when we get to it.”

  I tried to remember whether or not I had thrown my stored lightning bolt in the last fight, and couldn't. “Virtus, how are you doing?” I asked the undead warrior.

  “Repairing,” the skeleton hissed. “Took most of the mana in Tovius' amulet, but my armor and I will finish healing as soon as we leave.”

  Well, that was great. I screwed up and my first employee had to blow half of his signing bonus just to survive my mistake.

  And I might be about to make another one. But if I sat here and kept thinking about it I get more tired, more dumb, and I'd probably wind up dropping Guineve.

  “If resting won't help us anymore, then we should move out. If the Horde Pit's clear, and we can find a way to get the people out, we'll pull them clear. Then we'll destroy the Pit and go home.”

  I got a bunch of uncomfortable nods. No one was pointing out the obvious problems with my plan. But everyone seemed to be locking on the word 'home' so I decided I had to just roll with it.

  “Um,” I added at the last minute. “Does anyone want to help me carry Guineve?”

  Her hand squeezed hard enough on my chest to feel a pinch right through the mail. “Never mind,” I winced. “I got her. Let's go.”

  We began what was like our seventh or eighth freaking jog of the day. Our enhanced bodies still made the run doable, but now that our stamina pools weren't really regenerating it hurt like hell. I had never even paid attention to my stamina pool before this. It had always lasted long enough through a fight, and it didn't ruin me like running out of mana or vital guard points did. Just another reminder of the consequences of my choice. After this I'd have to find a way to cram in a two-week vacation and still have enough to time to stop six or seven apocalypses.