Heir To The Nova (Book 3) (31 page)

She smiled, her dark eyes glistening. “On the eve of battle, is it not customary for those who are close to make their last will and wishes known to their comrades in the event they should fall in battle? Is that not what friends do for each other?”

By this time, Maya had tears streaming down her face as she answered, “Yes, Bel, that is exactly what friends do.” And she drew the surprised vampire in for an emotional hug. Belrothe blinked and returned the gesture almost reverently, touching my dark elf like she was made of glass. Finally, drying her own tears and composing herself, Bel took a step back.

“Thank you, my dear; however, just to satisfy Ebony’s opinion of me, I do have two selfish requests. First, when this is all over, I would like you to grant back my personal home estate either to me or my successor. We spent many years developing the process to foster safe interaction between vampire and villager. It’s where we take new vampires and train them to live respectfully with humans. The staff who live there, breathing and non-breathing alike, know what to do. It is good work and it deserves to be continued.”

“Done,” I whispered. “Kalah’s memory will be preserved.”

Belrothe nodded gratefully. “Second, if you could find a permanent place for Segmun and his outriders in your army, I would be most appreciative. I know he is very taken with the grandeur of this fortress, and perhaps more so, the charms of some of the wizard girls currently living here.” She grinned sheepishly. “Who knows, he might even survive long enough to marry and father a new generation of Hornaldes.”

“You have my word, Lady.”

She nodded curtly. “Well, I have taken too much of your time already. You two should be in bed, you have a battle to fight tomorrow. I would like to visit Renalla, and it’s a long trip, even for a vampire.”

“I would offer to send you through our portal but…”

Belrothe raised her hand to stop me and looked up appreciatively at the stark white walls towering over us. “No, Alex, as much as I would love to tour your shining fortress, it is not for one such as me. I’m afraid even as old as I am, I wouldn’t last two minutes within her walls, but thank you for the offer. By tomorrow, this wondrous place will be besieged. My liegemen and I will harass the rear lines of the undead as much as possible, plus I still have one Amulet of Tepestra left to collect.”

The vampire took both of Maya’s hands in hers and gave her a stern look. “You, young Queen, need to hold onto this one,” she bobbed her head in my direction, “with all your might and never, ever let go.”

“I promise, Lady Bel,” Maya whispered.

“Goodbye, my child.” And with that, Belrothe performed a formal bow and strode back to her waiting horse. Mounting up, she joined Segmun and his cavalry as they silently picked their way cautiously through the darkness over the bridge and eventually out of sight.

As we returned to the main gate, I turned to Ebony and growled, “Remove the damn bridge!”

..................................................

Maya

Daybreak, just a few hours after admitting Belrothe’s people to the fortress, found me wide-awake yet again. I swear, when this is all over, I am going grab my best pillow (his name is Alex) and sleep soundly for a week. At the moment, my feet dangled over as I sat perched on the very top of the main wall, just off center of the main gate. Ebony sat next to me and four of her guards stood a few steps behind. We watched as humans and dwarves toiled to drag the last of the bridge beams through the main gate. Even using some of the teams of horses that Bel left behind, it was difficult work. At the same time, several earth wizards next to the river bank were destroying the bridge piers; essentially erasing all evidence that a bridge ever existed, save for the road.

I gazed out over the scrub grasses and few hardy alfalfa stems that made up the field stretched out before my eyes, knowing full well that in a few hours it would be a bloody battlefield. At least more blood spilled out here equaled less spilled within the gates of Sky Raven. “So, Winya, how do you think this will play out? Tens of thousands of undead and an army of demons; piece of cake, right?”

“Forget about the undead, Maya. They serve only two purposes; to intimidate the defenders and to bottle us up in the fortress. We all know they would be incinerated their first step inside these walls and the Duke knows it as well.”

“Ok, that still leaves the demons.”

“Yes, and unfortunately, they are a big unknown factor. All we have to go on is what we encountered at Xarparion. There may be many other varieties and strengths that we don’t have a clue about. We’ll have to put them down as a big question mark.”

“Great,” I said sarcastically. “Well, let’s talk strategy then. If the undead are non-issues, that means the demons are his principle strike force. The Duke doesn’t have to feed either of his forces, so supply lines aren’t critical. Are we looking at a battle lasting six months or six hours?”

“Definitely closer to six hours I would wager, my Queen,” Ebony added assertively. “Demons bore easily, and if they aren’t constantly entertained, they will start to wander off to find trouble on their own. That is a big problem for the Duke. From a game strategy viewpoint, a quick, decisive win is preferable to a long, drawn out game of attrition. My money is on the Duke going for a quick win.”

“That means he’ll need an edge or a trick of some sort. He already knows the walls and main gate are impenetrable from his first battle here. So what does that leave us? The secret passage Queen Rialla used?” I questioned.

“It’s too small to transport large numbers, plus both sides know of its existence, so there’s no surprise factor there,”
Winya supplied pensively.

“Ok, he can’t go through the walls or around them, which only leaves flyers going over the walls.”

“I would tend to agree based on the information we have. We should also anticipate a night attack as they will be expecting primarily human defenders who can’t see in the dark.”

“So tonight, we load up the walls with Helios bowmen and dark elf archers carrying the demon killer arrows, with the dwarves and battle Helios on the back ramparts to dispatch any demons that land on the walls. Humans will be held in reserve. Alex, Nia, and I will roam around and plug any gaps or outbreaks. Sky Raven must stand strong…all in agreement?”

“Agreed!”

Alex

Seven days had passed since we returned from our raid on Xarparion and the event where the portals opened and the Helios joined our ranks. It was now mid-afternoon; earlier we had been sent to bed by our handlers to try and get at least a couple hours of sleep. Basically, Maya and I just spooned together with my arms around her. I tucked my face into her silver curls and luxuriated in the scent of her hair. I felt like I had barely closed my eyes when Dusk woke us.

“You two need to see this.”

Groans aside, a few minutes and a long trek back down the tower and across the fortress later, we found ourselves on the ramparts looking down at the largest army ever assembled on the planet. There were tens of thousands of undead, with more moving up from behind to mass at the base of the mountain. Apparently, the Duke no longer cared if his troops were spotted. Of course, he would know there were only two ways in and out of the fortress; the main gatehouse, and the not-so-secret escape passage used by Queen Rialla. Our Tempest bodyguards had already reported that that way out was heavily blocked by demons. Too bad for the Lifebane that we weren’t going to make it easy for him this time, and we had no intention of running.

“Actually, there are three ways out,” Rosa injected into my mind, which Winya heard and passed on to my dark elf. “The portal, but I just checked on it, and something seems to be making it unstable. I don’t know that I would trust it.”

“Does it matter?” Maya huffed uneasily. “Where could you portal to that wouldn’t be ash anyway when the sun explodes? Best lock it down Rosa, we wouldn’t want the Duke to figure out a way to use it against us.”

“Good point,” Rosa returned sadly, and then seemed to mentally wander off to attend to other issues.

Refocusing on the battlefield, it didn’t take raptor vision to see the tsunami that was building. What the eagle keenness did reveal was the large number of demons mixed in with and around the undead horde. I counted at least six different types that I hadn’t encountered before; some had wings, most had horns or some form of goring appendage. Sharp teeth, claws and a bad attitude seemed to be standard issue for all of them. A lot of them were reddish-hued, but black and vomit green were also popular. Suddenly it hit me; I didn’t see a single siege engine being rolled up, or ladders, or siege towers, either. This struck me as a bad sign, and I felt Winya’s level of concern rising through our link.

“Looks like it’s going to be tonight, then,” Maya whispered, still taking in the view.

I heard a familiar buzzing sound and Nia flew into sight, heavily laden with two large cups of some steaming hot liquid. I quickly took the proffered one from her tired little hands.

“Thanks, Mr. Alex. These were maybe just a little too heavy for me,” she panted.

I took a deep breath of the aromatic steam, recognizing Rosa’s brew of the stuff that tastes like dirt, but in a good way. Taking an appreciative sip, I watched Maya take the other cup, and I sighed. Nia cocked her head slightly with a disgusted look on her face.

“Master, yours is bitter and nasty; I don’t see what you like about it. Maya’s is much better.”

“How so?”

“It’s the same as yours, but Rosa added a lot of chocolate and some warm milk to hers so it tastes yummy.”

“Oh, is that why I only have half a cup?” Maya laughed, pointing at the frothy mustache on the face of our adopted daughter.

“Umm, well,” Nia grinned bashfully, “both mugs full were too heavy for me, so I drank some to lighten the load. Oddly, it didn’t seem to help the carry factor much. Sorry, Mom.”

“No matter, little daughter.” Maya smiled broadly, giving Nia a gentle caress across the tops of her wings. “We were just about to go down for a last good meal before the fun starts. Care to join us?”

“Oh, no, I couldn’t possibly. I’m feeling really full at the moment; unless, of course, you think they have strudel with lots of icing!”

We both chuckled and took one last, lingering look. “I just hope we’re ready,” Maya said under her breath.

“We will be,” said Ebony, appearing behind us. “I have a progress update for you. The dwarves have finished their work on the ballista and catapults. The curtain wall bolt shooters are also fully functional. As long as those aren’t destroyed, our people shouldn’t have to worry too much about attacks from the air. Conlan and his personal team are still working on that strange weapon that the Nova need; personally, I don’t think it will be done in time. But Conlan says he and his team will work on it even through the battle if need be.”

With all the commotion and the planning, I had almost forgotten about the tower weapon. In the back of my mind, I hoped we wouldn’t have to depend on it to save the world. It was bad enough having to put untried fifteen-year-old wizards on the firing line, but a weapon that no one even knows what it does? Well, no one but my parents and they weren’t talking.

But for now all we could do was wait and pray things didn’t spiral out of hand.

..................................................

Maya

Nightfall was fast approaching, and the level of pre-battle preparations was reaching a hive-like intensity. And for once in my life, I was actually nervous about all this. Not in the sense of worrying about living or dying, not even about the prospect of the end of the world; after all, if you really think about it, every warrior who falls in battle has their own personal world end. No, what I was most worried about was Alex. One of his great failings is that he cares too much. He feels personally responsible for every person in this fortress. Hell, he would even feel bad if the donkeys were slain. I am just hoping that if things get bad, he will be able to hold it all together.

After our last meal, and yes, there was strudel, I made him go down to the forge for a couple hours and finish a project that Ranny, the water wizard boy from the tournament, and he had been working on all week when they had the time. All I knew was that it had something to do with the twins but not much else, I had been just too busy with Winya and Ebony.

At dusk, I asked Winya to summon my mate, and a few minutes later I felt his warm presence behind me. We were once again standing on the wall surveying the undead mob below that pretty much covered every scrap of ground beyond ballista range. Something was keeping them back just far enough and waiting. Winya had elected not to raise the ballistae emplacements until the charge started and we had some idea of their plan. She did not want some form of trickery to take out her artillery like last time. Just because we couldn’t see siege engines didn’t mean they weren’t out there. We were also secreting the bulk of our Helios forces, with the exception of the Tempests, in the keep hoping the surprise would give us an edge.

However, this plan hinged on the unlikely chance that the Duke or Kerr didn’t already know about the fortress’s new claws. I looked around; the walls weren’t that heavily manned at the moment, at least by a normal fortress’s standards. But knowing that Winya and eighty of her girls held this ground for days against a superior force made me feel better about our chances. We currently had a mix of dark elves, wizards, and dwarves on the ramparts. The Helios would join them as soon as the battle commenced. Our human soldier contingent of about one hundred twenty or so was lined up at the base of the wall, ready to plug holes if necessary. Able-bodied townsfolk and many of Bel’s farmers were assembled just inside the curtain walls with buckets of sand, shovels, and wet hides to fight fires.

“I hope you two are ready,” Alex’s father said shortly after flashing into existence behind us. “This isn’t going to be a fair fight, I can tell you that.”

We turned to face him and found that he was outfitted in ornate golden armor, complete with inlaid filigreed designs featuring celestial events. It looked more ornamental than functional to me; but Alex, being the armor expert, will tell me about it someday, I’m sure. Oreale appeared next to him in another flash of light; and her armor looked more natural, almost organic in nature. It could best be described as shell-like; not all bumpy and crusty like the dream weaver’s true appearance, but thick and smooth like swirled, polished abalone shell. It was incredibly beautiful.

Alex was talking, so I had to snap out of it and listen. “We’re as ready as we’ll ever be, I guess,” he finished and resumed looking out over the battlefield, lost in his own thoughts.

Ranther joined his son at the parapet. “The Kerr is here. I can feel its presence, and the game will start shortly.”

“Game?” Alex questioned harshly. “This is no damn game! People are going to bleed and die here shortly!”

“To the Kerr, it is a game. The game format is really the only way our kind can resolve conflicts without destroying whole galaxies in the process.” He paused, shaking his head ruefully and addressed us both. “Son, Daughter, I would be a blatant hypocrite if I didn’t admit to you that I have played at these types of games as well. But when I met your mother, one of the very mortals whose lives I had so callously spent as mere pawns, even for good, I found I couldn’t do it anymore. I’m sorry. Listen, regardless of what you may think of me right now, time is short and the fate of your world is very much hanging in the balance. The battle will start in a few minutes now. When that time comes, your mother and I will do something that we would never ever consider if it weren’t for the love of our son. Anyway, the dwarves are almost done with the tower weapon, but you need to buy us and them as much time as you can. If at all possible, kill the Lifebane; but at the very least, keep him away from the crystal.

Oreale stepped quietly up behind us and announced, “It’s time, Ranther.” I watched in amazement as she unsheathed a massive two-handed great hammer from behind her back. Alex just gawked in stunned amusement, finally commenting, “A great hammer, Mother?”

“What? You didn’t think you got your skills for smashing things from your father, did you?” she said with a frosty smile. “But right now, I need to take this hammer and bash a certain someone.” She looked back to her husband. “Ready, my love?”

“Yes,” he said as he summoned a long sword and shield to his hands.

“Excellent! You might want to cover your ears everyone, this is going to be loud.” With that, she raised her hammer high into the air and brought it down so hard onto the fortress walls I thought for sure they would crumble. Instead of the expected chips of stone flying everywhere, there was an explosion of light. Beams shot out from the impact spot, and after a few moments, they had completed carving what looked like a formal grid pattern in the clouds.

Suddenly a booming female voice cackled from the sky, “Ah, the game board is all set up and everything!” Looking up, I saw what looked like a woman floating effortlessly in the clouds above us. She or it would have been stunning by human standards, pale, tall, and shapely with waist-length black hair. But with my eagle vision, it was her lava-red eyes that screamed to the world that she was far from human. That, and she radiated dark power, lots of it.

This being could only be the Kerr, the malevolent intent flaring off her in waves made me nauseous. I looked sideways at Alex’s father and whispered, “I thought all others were male?”

“It is,” Ranther grimaced. “He just likes to appear as a female to confuse and distract his opponents.”

“So you know this Kerr? You’ve faced it before?”

He sighed uneasily. “Yes, Maya, many times. He is their most skilled champion.”

“But you’ve beaten him before, right?”

“Well, no, the bastard never loses; but then I’ve never had so much reason to win before either. Plus he’s never had to contend with Oreale,” he gritted and turned his attention back to the Kerr. She looked around a bit with a finger on her chin, a most humanlike affectation.

“Hmm, now let’s see; fortress over there with its pesky defenders, check,” she said pointing at us. “Unstoppable undead army over here, check. Game board? Yep, got that too. Looks like all the pieces are in place. Oh wait, we forgot the spectators to watch the end of your pathetic little world.”

Instantly, thousands of demons appeared in the sky, settling in on the grid Alex’s mother had just made. All of them were hooting and howling encouragement for their undead and demon brethren below.

Alex’s father stepped forward to the edge of the wall. “Call off your demons, Kerr; they have no place in this world or this battle.”

She covered her mouth in feigned surprise. “Cheating? Why I never! I am simply leveling the playing field. After all, an army of only undead would hardly be fun to watch, now would it? Besides, you Nova claim that your nebulia are worth a thousand of our demons. Since this human has one,” she said as she pointed out Alera below the walls, “it would only be equitable for my team to have a thousand demons, don’t you think?”

“No,” said Oreale, “Alera summoned her protector though her own magic. Your demons were not summoned.”

The Kerr smiled in a leering manner and ignored her. “So this is dear, sweet Alera. I’ve actually heard much about you. You have the distinction of being the reward most requested by my demon commanders. Any one, or all of them, would just love the chance to play with you for all eternity. Of course, you might not enjoy the experience as much as they will.”

I could see that Alex was tensing up and becoming angrier by the minute; apparently the Kerr noticed it as well.