Running the Gauntlet

 

“Three… two… one… stop,” Arkk said, watching as the sands ran out of a small hourglass.

Savren pulled a small glowstone from the center of a middling ritual circle and quickly began examining it. It took a few minutes to finish and then he still had to pull out a small notebook and scribble down a few numbers.

Arkk occupied his time watching as the landscape shimmered around him. A withered village, run-down and abandoned from the first time Evestani traversed the land, wavered and wobbled. The large fields, currently occupied with more debris and packed-down soil than crops, started misting away into nothingness. It was a depressing sight for a former farmer. Especially so when his gaze crossed the poor animals. Cows, chickens, and pigs had all been slaughtered by Evestani’s army, harvesting their meat and then just leaving the carcasses behind out in the open. It wasn’t quite as bad as salting the land might have been but it certainly did no favors to future attempts at growing crops.

Not that there were any people left here. Arkk didn’t know what had become of them. Perhaps they had evacuated to Elmshadow and beyond. Perhaps they had been slaughtered like the livestock. There were a few human bodies among the animal carcasses, but not enough for a village of this size.

He couldn’t even give them a proper burial.

Without the glowstone in the circle, the land’s true shape came into reality.

It was a pockmark of pits and holes. Lesser Servants scurried across the old village’s farmland, digging to their heart’s content. They burrowed holes into the fields that reached down to a layer of rock deep in the ground. Then, they dug a little deeper, carving out the rock and stone into sharp protruding spikes at the bottoms of each pit.

They left the bodies alone, digging around them. They were careful to not even touch the buildings. The illusory magic Savren had come up with worked poorly when it encompassed too many different materials. Right now, it focused entirely on the top layer of dirt and maybe a scattering of plants. All to hide the deep pits.

Nodding his head as he finished his calculations, Savren looked up to Arkk. “At the current rate of resource reduction, we can sustain the spell’s strength for up to twenty-eight hours.”

“A little over a day,” Arkk said, humming.

Evestani army had small units of scouts moving ahead of the main army. If they suddenly disappeared, the army should grow wary. But he had picked this spot for a reason. This village, which he didn’t even know the name of, occupied just about the only good spot of land for a fair while. To the south, a swamp sprawled out over the terrain. The muck and water would make it difficult and unpleasant for anyone crossing through it. The larger siege engines that Evestani hauled along, as well as their supplies and other carriages and carts, would likely get stuck in it entirely. They wouldn’t be able to use that route.

North of here, the terrain was mostly fine. A bit rocky and uneven for the likes of wheeled carts, but entirely passable for horses and foot soldiers. They would head up that way eventually, and he had plans for that stretch of land, but he wanted them to at least try making their way through this village.

All his hard work in digging out the pitfalls would go to waste otherwise.

“We’ll need to deal with the scouts first and then activate the illusion magic to hide the pitfalls,” Arkk said with a small sigh. “I don’t suppose I can rely on you for that as well, can I?”

“Manipulating the minds of mere mortals to make them miss no mishap should be manageable provided I possess sufficient span to scheme.”

“How long?”

“Ten to thirty minutes per person, pivoting on their perseverance and prefrontal poise.”

Nodding along, Arkk frowned in thought. “We’ll ambush them with gorgon, petrifying them. Can you affect petrified minds?”

“A mind must be malleable to mold.”

“Then we’ll have to unpetrify them, have you work your magic, repetrify them, and drop them off back here, ready to run back and report that nothing ahead of the army is amiss.”

“Workable,” Savren said.

“Good. I’ll contact Khan and get all the gorgon here.”

Arkk looked over the pits once again. The circular holes stretched out practically as far as he could see. There were probably far too many, if he were being honest. It wasn’t like the entire enemy army would continue forward once a few people fell into the pits. But if he could shave off a few of their number, maybe catch a few of their carts and catapults in the pits as well, it would be a victory considering the minor amount of resources it cost to set up.

Most importantly, it would delay them. Delay them long enough to staff Leda’s tower, receive the Prince’s army, and, hopefully, get Agnete back from the Anvil.

They didn’t have long. But every day they bought could only be to their advantage.

“Trigger in… three… two… one.”

The ground underneath Morvin’s feet trembled as he sparked a bit of magic into the ritual circle. A series of alchemical detonations blasted earth into the air in tall geysers of mud and dirt. Trees splintered and exploded. Wildlife, launched into the air, came crashing down in grisly impacts.

And the Evestani army, at the center of it all, disappeared behind clouds of dirt as the plain collapsed inward.

Morvin waited, sighing slightly in relief when the ground he stood on remained intact. There weren’t any explosives buried nearby but Rekk’ar’s words ran through his mind on the subject of accidentally causing a landslide. Fortunately, it seemed he wouldn’t have to worry about that. Now he only had to worry about that golden glow leaking out from behind the clouds of debris.

“We should leave,” Morvin said, grimacing.

“Just a moment,” Gretchen said, standing to the side with the telescoping spyglass pressed to her eye. “We need to confirm the result.”

“The scrying team can do that. Our job is done. Let’s get out of here before they figure out what happened.”

“You sound like we already failed.”

“Of course we did. You think they aren’t ready for this kind of thing? That golden glow means the avatar was here and watching. We’ve already seen it use plenty of protective magic.”

“Yes, but if half the army is buried—”

Gretchen stopped talking abruptly, making Morvin tense. He stared at the dust clouds, fearing the possibility of armored riders charging after them just like at Elmshadow. But, aside from a faint golden glow sufficed throughout the dust, there was no sign of movement.

“Wha—” Morvin started, only to pause as he heard it.

It began as a faint, high-pitched whistle high up in the sky that grew more and more urgent with every passing second. The closest sound he could think of was a keen whistle when the wind blew through a crack in the wall of his hut, something that only happened on the stormiest of days around Porcupine Hill. Even that wasn’t half as sharp and crisp.

Casting his gaze upward at the bright blue midday sky, Morvin squinted against the brightness of the sun. A dark black object, tiny relative to the sky as a whole, plummeted downward. It took a good ten seconds before he realized it was falling in roughly their direction.

The high-pitched howl continued all the while, filling his heart with dread. “Gretchen?”

Gretchen raised a hand. “Electro Deus,” she snapped, arcing a bolt of lightning from her fingers to the rapidly nearing object.

It exploded just as violently as any alchemical bomb that Arkk used. White hot bits of shrapnel scattered in all directions, sizzling as they embedded themselves into the ground around them. Morvin shielded his face with his arms, feeling the heat and force of the blast ripple through the air. Lines of heat scarred across his forearms as he felt warm liquid leak down his elbows. He sucked in his breath but kept his jaw clenched tight.

At his side, Gretchen hissed out in pain. “They know we’re here,” she said in that same hiss. “Or, if they didn’t before, they do now.”

“Let’s leave then,” he said, shakily standing. He plucked a thin bit of metal out of his arm, letting it drop to the ground as he sucked in another pained breath.

“Right,” Gretchen said, cupping her own bleeding arms.

Morvin didn’t wait around for her. The teleportation circle was just behind them. Right at its side, another of those alchemical bombs sat, ready to destroy the teleportation circle to prevent their enemy from using it.

The side of the clay pot was covered in small fletchings of debris. He shared a wary look with Gretchen—if one of those had broken the pot, they wouldn’t be standing around—before twisting the lid to the activation point. With that, he jumped onto the teleportation circle and activated it with a pulse of his magic.

He stumbled out the other side, clearing the circle just in time for Gretchen to appear in a flash of light. She almost immediately collapsed, grasping onto the side of her leg. A steady stream of blood leaked from between her fingers. In a slightly safer environment, he got a better look at her. She had cuts and scrapes all over, covering both her arms—same as him—but also her chest, her legs, and even some of her head. A trickle of blood streamed down her cheeks from a gash on her temple.

He had been crouched down into a small ball while she had been upright, taking that blast.

“You okay?”

“Do I Light-damned look alright?” she swore back, a harsh bite of anger in her voice.

Morvin looked around the new clearing they were in. A fairly desolate stretch of terrain. They were well away from the Evestani army. The teleportation circles were set at their maximum range. If the Evestani army could chase after them in any reasonable amount of time, they would have conquered the Duchy before any resistance could have been raised at the first Elmshadow defense. They were safe. For now, at least.

With a sigh, Morvin stepped forward, uttering the Flesh Weaving incantation.

“When did you learn that?” Gretchen asked, trying to step back only to stumble.

“After Elmshadow. I saw how useful it was when Hale patched me up. Didn’t want to have to rely on her.”

Gretchen didn’t look convinced. “Can you use it as well as she can?”

Morvin took a moment to consider, pinching his wounds closed. If she wasn’t going to let him heal her, fine, but he wasn’t going to sit around in pain. “No,” he said as he sealed together a wound on his shoulder. “But I probably won’t give you scales for skin or a third arm growing off your leg.”

A beat of silence passed with Gretchen doing nothing but staring at him. She finally nodded with a weary puff of breath. “Fair enough,” she said, holding out her arm. A deep gash ran from her wrist to her elbow. Far worse than any wound Morvin had.

It was only then that he realized how pale she was. The gleam of sweat on her brow and her labored breathing wasn’t a good sign either. And she had pulled away from him in that condition?

With a touch of magic at his fingertips, Morvin hurried to fix the worst of her wounds. Hale would probably still look both of them over when they got back, but he could at least keep her alive until then.

“Told you we should have left.”

“We got valuable information on enemy weapon capabilities. They can launch alchemical bombs from afar even with their army half buried in a pit.”

“I’m sure the scrying team saw that too.”

Gretchen slowly shook her head. “They should have been watching the army. They might have seen the explosion in the air—and more when it landed—but they might not have seen what caused it. We did.”

Morvin let the argument drop. He was fairly sure she was just trying to come up with a justification. An excuse. That was just like her. No matter what he argued, she could only be right in the end.

“You think his other ideas will work any better?”

Gretchen scoffed. “Has to, right? Throw a thousand darts at a target and one will stick eventually.”

“Guess we’ll have to see.”

“I’m not trying to destroy them,” Arkk said with a shake of his head. “Not with that avatar there. But we’re experimenting with new magic and weapons here. Besides, if we can whittle down their numbers a little, make sure their spellcasters have to use their magic instead of resting, and damage what morale we can, any advantage works out for our benefit, right? Not to mention delaying them until we can get Agnete back. Things are… a little strange over there at the moment. She’s safe, but…”

Ilya tapped her fingers on her chair’s armrest, frowning at him.

“What?”

Her silver eyes flicked to the board behind his back.

“What?” Arkk asked again, turning to follow her gaze.

The board had a large number of items scrawled over it.

1. Natural Barriers – Landslides, floods, trenches. Assigned – Lesser Servants. TEMPORARY SUCCESS – Forced army to reroute. Additional barriers planned.
2. Mind Magic Demoralization – Fear traps, turncoat traps. Assigned – Savren. PARTIAL SUCCESS – Stopped army completely until avatar showed itself and destroyed traps, turncoat traps caused intra-army fight, few serious injuries.
3. Impenetrable Cube – Xel’atriss magic to create an impassible boundary, trapping the entire enemy army (and avatar) until they starve to death. Assigned – Zullie. FAILURE – orthogonal misalignment.
4. Alchemical Bombs – Detonate bombs as army travels over them. Assigned – Morvin and Gretchen. FAILURE – Protective magic.
5. Supply Line Sabotage – Strike teams, no regular patterns! Assigned – Kia and Claire. FAILURE – No supply lines?
6. Direction Distortion Zone – Xel’atriss magic to shift the idea of forward and backward, making the enemy retreat. Assigned – Zullie. FAILURE – avatar ignored effect and led army through affected area.
7. Mind-Wipe Fog – Exactly what it says. Assigned – Savren. PROJECT DELAYED – Savren forgot where he kept his notes.
8. Natural Barriers with Illusions hiding said barriers – Savren and Lesser Servants. PARTIAL SUCCESS – a small portion of the army fell into death pits, unfortunately, the rest of the army realized what was happening and and waited until the avatar could clear the way.
9. Mirror-Realm Entrapment – Xel’atriss magic to shunt the army into alternate layers of reality. Assigned – Zullie. PROJECT CANCELLED – Accidentally swapped research notes with an alternate reality version, rendering them useless.
10. Poisoned Food Stores – Poison stocks of food left in ‘abandoned’ villages in the army’s path. Assigned – Larry and Lexa. FAILURE – Armies didn’t loot food? Related to lack of supply lines?
11. Maze of Infinite Paths – Xel’atriss magic to entrap the army in an infinitely looping space. Assigned – Zullie. PROJECT CANCELLED – DO NOT ASK. DO NOT SPEAK OF IT.
12. Spread Misinformation – Air drop leaflets containing false or demoralizing messages. Assigned – Ilya, Edvin, and Joanne. FAILURE – Unable to distribute leaflets safely.
13. Leda’s Tower – Requires additional employees. Assigned – Leda and Priscilla. PENDING DEPLOYMENT.
14. Illusory Opposing Army – Create illusion of a massive opposing army standing in their path. Assigned – Arkk, Zullie, and Savren. PENDING DEPLOYMENT.

Arkk looked back to Ilya, noting her deepening frown. “What?”

“Rather than demoralizing the enemy, I’m concerned that we’re demoralizing our side. Only three of the fifteen items on your list have been a success and they all have caveats.”

“It isn’t like everyone in the fortress is aware of all these operations…” Arkk looked back to the board for a moment, frowning at the final item on the list. It was, effectively, a continuation of the earlier mind-related traps that Savren had developed. The biggest difference was that it wasn’t exactly… accurate.

There were some things Arkk needed to keep concealed. Even from Ilya.

If this one worked out… there might not be anything more to this war at all. It could end here and now. At least in terms of the army. He imagined the avatar would still be after him. But an avatar without an army was far more manageable.

If it worked out. That was a fairly large if. The avatar was too versatile to be certain of anything. But if he could cause enough damage, that would work out as well.

One more day and the army would be in the right place…

One more day.