Chapter 32

32

Not all tests are designed by others.

~ Lord Professor Varhesson, Port Jirador University

Two of the taybarri who’d arrived with Targon’s group rushed to the front gate, roaring through it at the men wielding a battering ram. They paused when they saw the rippling lips and fangs, but more troops crowded them from behind, weapons raised as they urged their comrades to continue. Perhaps reassured by their numbers, the soldiers kept battering, and the rusty hinges creaked, already close to giving.

On the rooftop of the nearby tower, a crack sounded, Targon firing a black-powder weapon into the air. A short blunderbuss, Kaylina thought at first, but it launched something akin to fireworks, and white and blue flashed in the night sky above the castle.

The shot fired, Targon dropped the weapon—or the signaling device?—and picked up his bow. He didn’t aim at the troops with the battering ram or those climbing the courtyard wall. Instead, he picked targets in the crowd. Officers. Mercenary officers, mostly, but he fired at a captain of the Kingdom Guard as well.

The thought of trying to snipe people—especially fellow kingdom subjects—from a distance chilled Kaylina, but the logical part of her admitted it was wise. Targon didn’t have enough arrows to make a dent in the army, but if he could take out key officers—the one answering to the prince, in particular—it might make a difference. At least some members of the army had been listening to Vlerion and hadn’t looked like they wanted to attack.

“We need to help,” Kaylina told the sentinel, her words almost drowned out by the bangs at the gate.

And had she heard a bang at the rear gate too? Yes, an answering taybarri roar sounded behind the keep. Was that Levitke?

Crenoch roared from the wall as he and Vlerion rushed to hack the ropes of men attempting to come over near a corner. Dozens of grappling hooks clinked as they found purchase on the stone.

“Can you destroy those with your beam?” Kaylina asked the sentinel, willing it to take some of the power in her blood if it needed more energy.

Instead of beams, vines grew along the top of the wall, then lowered over the other side, toward the men climbing. Someone screamed, and Kaylina imagined one killing a man. She shuddered at the thought of lending her power to that, but what choice did they have?

Vlerion leaped off Crenoch’s back so they could face in different directions, working independently to keep men from reaching the top of the wall. Targon fired another arrow into the army. The battering ram crashed through the front gate and, with a great screech of metal, tore it off the hinges.

Before the men could run into the courtyard, the taybarri charged them. Further, two beams shot from the sentinel, one buzzing loudly as it passed near Kaylina’s ear. They sped over the heads of the taybarri to strike soldiers in the faces, searing into their brains.

Stomach churning, Kaylina looked away. The sentinel had to strike at places the men weren’t armored, but the goriness made her want to throw up. She was supposed to make mead, not war. She wasn’t meant for this.

Two more beams lanced out. Once they finished their deadly work, Kaylina made herself lean out with her sling. It was a paltry weapon against an army, but she spotted a man who made it to the top of the wall before Vlerion reached him or a vine took him down. He charged at Vlerion. Crenoch had run down the wall in the other direction, snapping at the hands of another man trying to pull himself over.

Vlerion spun, his blade a blur as he defended against a barrage of sword strikes. It didn’t take him long to turn parries into an attack of his own, slipping past the soldier’s defenses and sinking his blade into a vital target. He shoved the man off the wall, then ran to meet two more who were pulling themselves over the top.

His faint humming reached Kaylina’s ears. It struck her as more ominous than ever.

She fired her sling at the man farthest from Vlerion, hitting the soldier in the forehead as he tried to pull himself onto the wall. He lost his grip on the stone and fell back out of sight.

Vlerion reached the other climber, his sword raised, but the man let go, preferring the fall to dealing with him.

Power, the sentinel whispered into Kaylina’s mind, and a vine curled around her ankle.

Startled, she almost jerked away, but she’d offered whatever assistance she could give and nodded. With the vine like a conduit, the sentinel drew energy from her. It needed her power to make more vines, to try to keep men out.

The taybarri were defending the front gate, blocking soldiers from getting through that way. Unfortunately, the troops ordered to climb the wall had countless ropes and grappling hooks.

As Kaylina’s power flowed from her and into the sentinel, it sent out more beams and grew more vines. But her energy drained quickly, her muscles growing weary. She sank to her knees by the window.

War horns blew in the distance. Announcing more men joining the army? Was every soldier in the city—in the province—here to storm the castle?

Kaylina lost sight of Vlerion as he ran down the wall to attack more climbers who’d bypassed the vines to reach the top. Bleakness crept into her, and she leaned her forehead against the cool stone by the window. She only had so much power to give, and there were so many enemies. What happened when the sentinel ran out of energy too?

“Is there any chance my father is around and could help?” she asked. “Sentinel, can you call to him?”

It shared a sense of exasperation. Right, it was already doing everything it could.

An explosion came from inside the castle—from the kitchen. Kaylina jerked her head up.

“Kay!” Frayvar yelled from downstairs.

Fear for her brother slammed into her. It had to be the mercenaries from the catacombs. Or maybe some men had gotten past the taybarri and ranger at the back gate. Either way, she needed to help him.

Muscles weak, Kaylina had to draw her sword and use it like a cane to push herself to her feet.

“Keep fighting, please,” she told the sentinel. “I’ll be back to help.”

She hoped.

When she slid through the hole and landed, her legs gave way, and she fell off the chair she’d been using as a stool. She pitched to the floor, cursing, and willed her body to find more energy.

“Need some help, Kay!” Frayvar yelled.

Another explosion almost drowned him out. That had definitely come from the kitchen—or the pantry leading down to the catacombs.

Teeth gritted, Kaylina pushed herself to her feet. Using the wall for support, she half-ran and half-shambled down the hall toward the stairs.

Explosions erupted outside the castle, and she feared the cannons were targeting the walls—if not Vlerion directly.

Stay alive, she cried silently to him, though she didn’t think he could hear her.

When she reached the bottom of the stairs and turned into the kitchen, one of the rangers was dropping to his knees, four soldiers with axes and swords surging out of the pantry—out of what had been the pantry. The trapdoor had been blown open, the hutch knocked back, and shelves ripped free. Broken jars and dented tins were scattered all over the floor.

Frayvar ran forward with his frying pan and clubbed a man about to run the ranger through. Sevarli hurled a clay pitcher at the chest of another.

Kaylina reached for her sling, but one of the intruders spotted her and rushed in her direction with his sword. He raised it, aiming for her head.

Glad she still held her own sword, Kaylina swept it up in time to block. Canopy parry, Zhani would have called it, to be followed by a tree-cavity thrust. Kaylina did exactly that, stabbing her sword into his torso. Unfortunately, chain mail deflected it, and the man whipped his blade down to attack her again.

She skittered back out of the kitchen, fear giving her limbs new energy, but she barely managed to deflect another blow, this one at her chest. She knocked the man’s sword into the banister at the bottom of the stairs.

“There are more coming up from below!” Sevarli yelled.

“I see them.” The ranger had regained his feet, but he was fighting too many, with his back to a counter, limiting his room to maneuver.

“One got into the dining hall,” Frayvar warned.

Kaylina wanted to glance over her shoulder in that direction to make sure nobody was about to leap out at her, but her foe pressed her, stabbing again toward her chest.

Frustration flooded her veins, and she drew on the dregs of her power as she deflected the attack, imagining druidic magic amplifying her sword and her movements.

Her hand glowed green, and the intruder glanced toward it, the light distracting him. She swept her blade toward his throat. He wasn’t so distracted that he couldn’t parry, but her sword also flashed green. The light stunned him, and he staggered back. She swung again, but his eyes must have been too blinded to see it. Her blade cut into his neck, and she pushed him back.

As he pitched to the floor, someone grabbed her from behind, a strong wrist clamping down on her sword arm.

“Let go,” she snarled, kicking backward.

She clipped her attacker’s leg, but it wasn’t enough to loosen his grip. He pulled her back farther, and a second man appeared, pushing her against the stone wall in the dining hall.

Kaylina twisted her wrist, trying to pull her sword arm free, but she didn’t have enough strength to overcome two men. They were the green-uniformed mercenaries from the catacombs—or maybe they’d come over the wall to get inside. With enemies everywhere, who could tell?

One pressed a dagger to her throat and snarled, “Make that tower stop attacking our people, you cursed druid bitch.”

“We know you control it,” the other said as the sounds of fighting continued from the kitchen. He glanced at her brand, a faint glow still coming from it.

Weariness stacked inside of Kaylina like lead weights, and she didn’t think she could summon more power. She’d given too much to the sentinel.

Frayvar, Sevarli, and the ranger were too busy with their own battle to help her. Kaylina longed to call for Vlerion, but he had to be overwhelmed, dealing with all the attackers outside.

A man’s scream came from the top of the wall near the back gate. Kaylina had no idea if Vlerion, Targon, or the vines had been responsible, but her captors leaned in close, as if she had been. With fury in their eyes, they tightened their grips.

That dagger bit in, drawing a drop of her blood. Fear made her muscles tremble as much as weariness. For the first time, she believed she might not survive the night. They all might die here.

“Make that cursed thing stop, you freak,” the knife man snarled, speaking slowly. “Or I’ll kill you right here.”

“Okay,” she whispered, feeling a drop of her warm blood trickle down her neck. “But I need to concentrate to communicate with the sentinel. The plant. Give me a minute, and don’t?—”

He jerked the knife from her throat but only to stab it into her arm. Kaylina couldn’t keep from screaming as fiery pain erupted from her biceps.

“No minutes.” The man swept the blade back to her throat. “It’s killing our people. Make it stop, now !”

Kaylina closed her eyes, trying not to cry out again, trying to keep tears of pain—and fear—from leaking through her lashes.

A roar sounded in the courtyard, and she didn’t know whether to be hopeful or more afraid. That hadn’t been a taybarri. The beast had arisen.