by Russ Linton
“You hearing that?”
Araceli squinted into the dark, nodding.
I didn’t know much Spanish, but these words I could hear were familiar. I’d heard them recently, recited by Caleb and his team of reenactors with the same command and authority.
“They keep powder on site for their demos, don’t they?”
The alchemist’s eyes went wide.
“FUEGO!” came the shout from the walls.
Plumes of flame belched in scattered succession along the full length of the fortress walls. Before the pounding of sound even reached us, we were on the move. We sprinted across the lot, the rumble of cannons rolling across the blacktop like thunder. Cannonballs struck and we raced through a sudden fog of asphalt shrapnel and molten metal shards.
The shortest path to cover had us sliding in right beside Atofo. I’d come in feet first and scrambled to put my back to the wall.
“CAW CAW!” he cried, his face twisted in frustration. “Soldiers up there. With cannons.”
“You could’ve just said there were dudes with cannons!”
A late incoming round struck and Atofo clamped his hat down and crouched lower. “Too obvious, don’t you think? Besides, how many sieges have you been on again?”
I heard the commands restart up top. Their reload and fire routine had to be a dozen steps but these guys were going double time from Caleb and crew. Araceli slipped a vial from her belt and tossed me one. She offered one to Atofo who sneered at her spirit-less magic. She twitched an eyebrow and put it away.
“Once you get to the wall, rub this on your hands,” she told me.
She’d already placed a hand on the top of the barricade ready to vault. I grabbed her arm. “Hold up. The ritual, you never said what we need to do.”
“I’ve got it covered. I’m going to use the chapel for the ceremony. Any interruptions could jeopardize the casting. You focus on controlling the fortress.”
She launched over the barricade. I rose to a crouch to shout after her and saw on the top of the barricade, she’d left Caleb’ badge. I snatched it up.
“You need the items to complete the spell!”
“You’ll need them! In the dungeons. I’ll let you know when!” She kept running then quickly disappeared as she dropped into the moat.
Dungeons. More time in the hole. Not looking forward to that.
“About your mojo, Chemo,” Atofo said, eyeing the swirl of shadow. “It isn’t doing us any favors.” His eyes followed the tendrils of darkness skyward where they wove through the parking lot lights.
“FUEGO!”
We both hurdled the barricade and hit a dead sprint, my Timbs chewing up the grass and Atofo’s bare feet whispering noiselessly. Cannon fire shuddered through the soft earth and rebounded along the Castillo. Heavy shot reduced the wall behind us into a spray of coquina and mortar. Turf spewed to the left like a volcanic eruption. I lost sight of Atofo in a swirl of smoke as he plunged into the shallow moat.
Araceli had already popped up on the other side. She was scaling a corner where the main gate recessed from the extended battlements, hands clinging like a spider, feet digging against the pitted surface.
I went to hop the next barricade before the moat and my boot caught the top edge. What would’ve been a rough slide turned into headlong flailing.
I hit the ground hard, swallowed by darkness. Floodlights didn’t reach the bottom of the dry moat. I lay there, pressed into the musty ground. The fading echo of cannon fire rolled around the trench. Blood hit my tongue, not from deep in my chest but from a busted lip. I pushed myself up and spit out a mouthful of grass.
No floodlights down here, I could see through the darkness like an overcast day. The vial Araceli had given me was smashed against the base of the gatehouse. I scrambled to it. Could I still scrape enough off the stone?
Give yourself to the ancient ways. Ways untainted by the folly of civilization or the subjugation of your people.
“My people? We can argue about who those are later, but the folks at Fort Mose agreed to help bring this fort down. Where are they? You keeping them away? I heard them, but I don’t see any backup.”
The people of Fort Mose offered to assist Kibaga, not Eustace Grant. Stop fighting. Be my vessel and we will right the world.
Demon? I guess. Araceli talked like he was going to possess me. But I’d called to him for a reason — to borrow his power. To use that mojo, I needed to open up just a little more.
“I agree, but you don’t own me, Kibaga. Nobody owns Ace.”
We shall see.
Shadow swept up the sides of the moat, filling the trench. My feet disappeared and I backed away as a cold, plunging sensation rose with the shadows. Even with no breath in my lungs, I stretched my neck to stay above the surface.
When the darkness crested above my head, my feet rose off the ground. I floated out of the moat, above the gatehouse. Impenetrable dark rose with me.
From up here, the Castillo’s defenses were wide open. The men at their gun decks stared blindly toward the parking lot, even their dead eyes unable to see. They’d started reloading, some trying to push through in the pitch black and follow the shouted commands.
Francisco and his people crouched behind the outer barricade in a single line stretching around the fortress. Black soldiers in borrowed Spanish uniforms held their muskets, primed and ready to fire. Timucuans crouched at the ready with spears and bows. Sarjo prowled with a brutal looking machete in her grip, no fancy basket or guard protecting her hands. Her eyes were cast upward to me. To Kibaga.
The grounds fell silent. Atofo made the only noise, scuffling up the side of the Castillo under panting breaths and Timucuan obscenities. He was making decent time, but not magical spider climb time. Araceli had already slipped down into the courtyard, unseen.
I whipped the Shaw Sword from its scabbard. The ring of steel echoed off the fortifications. The defender’s heads swung blindly my way. At least one shouted at his men to adjust their cannon upward. I laughed but it wasn’t my laughter. Instead, a deep, resonant mocking reverberated through the grounds, playing bent with the whole world.
“Draw my people into bondage under your false god? Demand their sacrifice? You who have been convinced of the sanctity of your own souls above those you call savage and slave? Hear me! This testament to your dying civilization shall fall today! Each and every stone, crushed. The walls rendered into the dust and sand from where they came. We free not only those trapped inside, but we free those bound to shed their blood for your greed. We defy your pathetic bid at immortality! So speaks Kibaga!”
Every word tugged at my soul. All were things I’d wanted to believe, or wanted to say. Secret prayers said when my frustration overflowed while living free remained an unanswered prayer for so many.
But they weren’t my words. And as they came off my lips, I knew Kibaga intended to grind this monument to dust.
The cannon team who’d been adjusting their aim finally let loose. I watched as a cluster of iron shot scattered from the burst of flame. My brain shouted to take cover but Kibaga? He was ready to catch a searing round to prove something.
I wasn’t feeling it. Kibaga didn’t care. He held me right there in the line of fire.
Time almost slowed. I was about to be splattered across the parking lot. Smartass dead guys had loaded up with grape shot. Shotguns playing duck hunt with this bird.
Fired blind, the cluster grouped mostly off-target, but one of the three-inch iron balls was on course. Kibaga’s pride, bravado, maybe just his desire to cause everybody pain, kept me from moving.
First time I’d been shot at? Third grade. I was on the playground with one of my friends, Marvin. We were on the swings, trying to get them to wrap around. Crazy ideas we could ride them full circle. We became friends because both our Mommas had given us terrible ass names. I called him Marv because he liked it better.
Marv died somewhere on the upswing.
The shots hadn’t been mea
nt for us. A deal gone bad half a block away ended with guns. I heard the pop — we all knew the pop — and his limp body was sailing off the swings.
Nothing proved by that shit. Just a dead kid nobody talked about on TV. Could’ve been me. Izaak.
Naw, Kibaga. Your war glory bullshit might be older than history, older than any neighborhood or trench, but it wasn’t gonna happen in my town. Your power was mine to wield, not the other way.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Kibaga put in his place, I slid to the side. The shot sailed wide, wrapped in a scorching wind. I floated for a second in the wake, feeling around my mind, probing to make sure all my thoughts were my own, not some vengeful god’s.
All me. I had control. I had a sword. I had an army.
And I could fly.
Cannoneers blinded and reloading, I raised my saber and shouted down to Francisco, “CHARGE!”
His men unleashed a salvo of cover fire as the ones armed with swords and spears swarmed the first barricade. Under Kibaga’s cloak, they were barely shadows, their features etched in a crazy photo negative dream. They screamed across the grounds and flowed into the moat. Cannon fire smashed into the back ranks, scattering men and women into dissipating mist, but mostly chewing up empty sidewalk and rolling harmlessly into the parking lot.
One stray shot skipped across asphalt toward the far back where Bubonic slumped. That shot went wide. But it was already too late. A heavy cannonball, maybe even from the first volley, sat on her sagging hood, trickles of smoke rising from the engine.
No. Huh-uh. We are not having any of that.
I wheeled and swept toward the ramparts in a dive to make an osprey jealous.
Sword out front, I impaled the first soldier and drove him to the ground. The rest of his cannon squad reacted to the noise and I went for the closest one, the guy with the big ‘ol matchstick. He made a swat and I cleaved his stick in two before sending his head tumbling off the ramparts.
Arms wrapped me up. I threw my head back viciously, repeatedly, until the next soldier stumbled and let go, his face a shattered mess. A turn, a feint, another quick stab and violent twist of the blade, and he fell too.
As I turned to face the rest of the forces on the wall, the Fort Mose shadow brigade swept over the battlements behind me.
They moved among the defenders like a deadly smoke, suffocating and enveloping their victims. Swords and spears slashed out of the fog. Fleeing enemies were dragged back inside by their long coats, kicking and fighting.
The spirit army wasn’t invincible. I watched a native overextended with his spear and take a bayonet in the stomach, the attacker twisting and dragging the blade. Guts didn’t spill, but a light shone through like a parted curtain, consuming the spirit warrior as he cried skyward. A black soldier burned out as a musket ball caught him in the face. Another went up like a flare when a primed cannon fired.
But we were winning.
Despite this inner fight to keep Kibaga in check, I smiled at the destruction. Undead in Spanish uniforms toppled into the moat and fell into ash heaps. One pitched into the courtyard and I drifted forward to watch, waiting to see him explode into scattered bones and dust.
Below, hundreds of muskets had been raised, ready to fire.
“Take cover!” I shouted.
Even firing blind, they’d hit someone. I didn’t get the magical concepts, but the weapons of the undead had some effect on the spirit army. Banished back to Fort Mose? That was my only guess.
Whatever, they’d shown up for me, least I could do is level the field.
“Kibaga! Do your thing!”
More of the warrior spirit surged into my chest. Distant drums sounded, a call to battle matching my own heart, beat for beat. This time, I was ready to accept the incoming fire. I felt an unbridled joy as I put my arms out. Was it mine?
Their command to fire came as a seismic rumble shook the wall. Heavy coquina bricks and slabs tore free along the whole length. Mortar cracked and sprayed in chalky clouds. The slabs tilted upward, forming a makeshift shield of levitating stone.
Musket balls whizzed past and sparked on the stone. Kibaga, in his wisdom, had left me wide open, the shield forming a line from my outstretched arms. I heard shots zip through my coat. Felt the wash of heat against my scalp. None found their target.
Magic? Luck? No idea what kind of game Kibaga was playing here, but he wasn’t finished.
After the last muzzle flare, the final billow of smoke to join the fog of gunfire, Kibaga laughed. I threw my arms forward and the hovering stones launched into the courtyard.
I dove downward with them, sword in the lead, just another meteor in this here storm. Bodies exploded into grave dust as bricks crushed heads and caved in chests. The ash mingled with the gunpowder on the air creating a cloud not even Kibaga could see in. But I moved among the survivors, emerging from the smoke and fading away as more fell to my blade. When the air cleared, I stood there, surrounded by rubble and old bones, grinning up at the ramparts.
Battle still raged up top with the remnants of the wall defenders. They’d have sacrificed plenty of their own in that musket fire. Undead, they didn’t care. And they knew something we didn’t know.
Even as they fell, more poured from the barracks rooms like some kind of video game spawner. Could be the same ones, over and over, an endless stream waking from a nightmare where they’d just died in an attack and were ready to rush to the defense of the Castillo again.
My smile faltered. Reality started to overwhelm the battle urge. Already a fresh group of soldiers was rushing for the stairs to take on the Fort Mose brigade.
How the hell did I control this fort? Buy time for Araceli to do her thing?
I paused to contain Kibaga. He wanted even more. More of me. More release of his power, but I couldn’t have it. It felt dangerous. Like standing arms spread in front of a firing squad dangerous. And the wall? Damn. Nobody’s throwing some spackle on that and calling it good.
I took to the sky and found Francisco in the thick of the battle. Sword raised, he called out to his troops, sending a contingent to hold the stairs while he finished off the remaining forces on the battlements. Sarjo was close by and she wore a joyless smile as she hacked a soldier to bits, ash clinging to her every swing in a dusty fan.
“Francisco!” I shouted. He turned and threw up a salute. “None of that, I said. Have you seen Atofo? Or an alchemist climbing around like a spider monkey?”
“No alchemists. I did see Atofo. He was one of the first into the courtyard.” I glanced toward the pincushion of steel bayonets assembling below. “But I haven’t seen him since.”
Francisco shouted at a group who’d readied spears and bayonets to start an assault on the stairs. A second group reloaded muskets and nocked bows to provide fire support while another squad wrestled with the heavy cannons, turning them on the interior of the fort. The man looked like he had the scene under control.
I risked the musket fire and walked to the edge. I’d been inside those barracks. No way they held this many men.
“How do we stop their advance?”
“They’ll die, and keep dying so it seems,” he said, annoyed, as Sarjo dropped a cannonball on a squirming undead’s face to reduce it to ash, “to fulfill their duty.” He barked another order for his musketeers to hold their fire. “But armies often break when their orders stop coming, eh?” He smiled grimly and patted my chest as he waded back into the fight.
“Make your way to the barracks,” I called after him. “I’ll cut off the head of this snake.”
Take out Colonel Marti? I could handle that. I owed him a beatdown.
Francisco was already up with his men at the stairs, brandishing his sword, shouting encouragement in Spanish, French, the long lost Timucuan tongue and even the words of his and Sarjo’s ancestors. Undead defenders marched up the wide staircase and the Fort Mose commander ordered his unit of flanking musketeers to fire into their ranks. More soldiers crumpled into dust and
rotted uniforms, bones skittering down the stone steps.
I launched from the ramparts, swooping low over raised bayonets and pikes. Officer’s quarters, that’s where I’d seen Colonel Marti before. I wasn’t on his level yet with the sword swinging, but, juiced up on Kibaga, I had the edge.
More than an edge, I had hope. I hadn’t felt this good in years. Atofo had kept me alive, but I didn’t realize how much I’d been beat down by the disease. Without any of that mess in my system, I was all good. Better than good. This was me in my prime and then some. Strength, speed, the whole package. Things I used to need a bloodlust trance to find were right here for the taking.
The officer’s quarters weren’t just an exhibit anymore. This battle had kicked off a reenactment centuries in the making. Two fully uniformed soldiers sat at the table playing cards.
“This what y’all officers do while your men are out there dying?”
The guy closest to the door never had a chance. The demon slayer pierced his heart from behind and pinned his fanned cards to his palm. I ripped the blade free and his surprised face collapsed in a downpour of dust.
The other had time to raise a pistol. Cocked and loaded, he must’ve been expecting his boy here to do him dirty. Just my luck to walk in on that kind of game.
He fired. Point blank and all I had to do was flinch. The musket ball went whistling past my ear. Even with Kibaga contained, he’d upgraded the reflexes. I found myself wishing I had my Emperor Scorpion. Show this clown what a real gun was like.
Officer One Shot wasn’t done. As soon as he squeezed the trigger, he dropped the gun and flipped the table. A beast of a dude, he charged the doorway holding the wooden table like a shield.
Draggin’ or not on Kibaga’s power, his momentum forced me back outside. The long table wedged against the door jamb with a loud smack.
“Serving a warrant, you feel me?” I raised my foot and landed a solid straight leg kick. Boards shattered under my warrior strength and the improvised barricade came apart. “You don’t want to be in my way.”