Chapter 30 #2
I find Ana astride her horse in a pool of water, her eyes fixed on a spot in the distance. It takes me just a second to absorb the scene—the white-caped figure surrounded by bearers, the arrow in his hand—and I understand that she was trying to reach Caledon before he completed the ritual.
But she failed.
I take a step toward her, only to have her blocked from my vision by a blinding flash of light emanating from the Grand Bearer.
It’s barely faded before I’m charging toward Ana, grabbing her from her horse and bundling her back toward mine.
I feel her shock through the mooring, dulling her reactions.
“We have to go, Ana. NOW.”
My priority is her. Always. And right now, an immortal maniac is just opening his eyes onto a new world. I’m sure he’d love for his first divine act to be killing us both. But he hasn’t seen us yet, and that’s our advantage.
“He did it,” Ana says, her voice dazed even across the mooring. “He really did it.”
“Which means we need to get distance between him and us as fast as possible. Then we can decide what to do next,” I say as I climb onto my horse and pull her up behind me.
Her guard, surrounded by freshly slain cleavers, gather around us.
Drisha has a nasty burn on the side of his face, but otherwise seems alert, his eyes on Ana.
“We must regroup, my queen,” he says. “We’ll head back to the border. You have to protect yourself now, for the sake of Trova.”
Hyllus’s voice sounds in my ear, carried to me by his aesteri power.
“He’s controlling the trees.”
I whip my head around to see Caledon moving across the clearing along the edge of the pools. He’s still about a hundred yards away, a sea of soldiers between us and him, but even from here it’s impossible to miss the effect he’s having on the trees around him.
The giants aren’t just swaying angrily, as they were before.
Now, their movement has turned unnatural, as if they’re being puppeteered by an invisible hand.
Branches twist and stretch down to the ground as roots explode from the earth, snaking toward our soldiers.
Like the limbs of a hungry octopus, they coil around the Trovians, yanking them off their feet.
The soldiers’ screams are snatched from the air as they’re dragged into the dense undergrowth of the forest.
Hyllus is right—Caledon must be doing it, because the forest is ignoring the Temple forces, leaving them unharmed. Most of Ana’s forces are brave souls who try to keep fighting even as they dodge the trees’ attacks, but a few begin to peel off, fleeing from the clearing.
Caledon simply strolls through the chaos. He’d look utterly relaxed if it weren’t for the mad, gleeful light in his eyes. He reaches out and touches a nearby soldier fighting a cleric. The man immediately arches in pain and seconds later falls to the ground dead.
One of his comrades turns, swinging his sword at the Grand Bearer.
Dread rises up in me as Caledon catches the blade with his hand, wrenching it from the soldier’s grasp and using it to run the man through.
Caledon drops the blade, showing no sign of injury or pain, as if the metal was no more threat to him than a feather.
He really is invincible now.
The trees at our end of the clearing still seem to be under their own control, but I know we need to leave before that changes. Right now, Caledon is focused on the battle around him, distracted by the chance to flex his new powers, but if he gets much closer and notices us, we’re in trouble.
I start to back up my horse, Drisha taking his cue to turn his men around, but when I glance over my shoulder to check Caledon’s position, I see a figure breaking off from the shifting battle. A man with chestnut hair forces his horse into a gallop, straight toward the Grand Bearer.
No. A spike of fear runs through me as I watch his foolish charge, sword raised, face fixed with an expression of grim determination. Alastor’s a dozen feet behind him on his horse, his own features twisted with fear, arm outstretched like he could stop the man he loves in his tracks.
“What’s happening?” Ana demands, knowing my eyesight is much better than hers. “What do you see? Is that Harman?”
He’s waited his whole life for this moment—his chance to face down the Temple’s leader.
“We have to do something,” Ana shouts, pummeling on my back to make me move my horse in her brother’s direction.
“We’d never get there in time,” I tell her miserably. Even Alastor knows he can’t, as I see my friend’s mouth open in a desperate yell.
Yet as we watch, it’s as if time slows down, and I see every tiny detail of the next few seconds.
Caledon turns his head toward Harman. Harman raises his sword, mouth opening in a righteous battle cry.
The Grand Bearer blinks up at the leader of the Hand, then looks at something approaching over Harman’s shoulder.
Out of nowhere, a tree branch—twice as thick as a man—comes swinging down toward him.
It hits Harman across the torso and keeps moving, ripping him from his horse until he’s flying across the clearing, landing in a crumpled heap.
“Harman!” Ana screams, and the pain I feel ripping through her hurts me like I too have been struck.
“We have to call for a retreat,” I tell her. “He’ll kill everyone if you don’t give the order.”
“Alright,” she sobs, violently wiping away her tears. “Captain Drisha, call for a retreat. We’ll regroup at the encampment.”
“Very good, my queen,” he says, turning to one of the guards.
“Send the message along the line, tell them the archers will cover the foot soldiers. They can at least stay out of reach of the trees.”
“Yes, Captain,” she says, cupping her hand over her mouth and beginning to whisper. I watch as lieutenants across the clearing lift their heads, the woman’s aesteri magic carrying the message to them. Then the cry goes up across the Trovian forces:
“Retreat! Fall back!”
“What about Harman? We have to go help him,” Ana babbles across the mooring, looking around at the spot her brother fell. “We have to—”
“Look,” I say, pointing to a blond figure riding up to us, a limp body slumped over the front of his horse.
“He’s still breathing,” Alastor croaks when he reaches us, clutching Harman’s hand.
He’s thrown the jacket from a soldier’s uniform over the unconscious man, but it’s already soaked through with blood.
“That tree practically ripped him open. We need time to get him to a healer. Help him, Ana. Please,” my friend’s voice is hoarse.
“I never met a man who could put up with my bullshit like him.”
“My queen,” Drisha says once again, his voice edged with frustration. “We have to go.”
“Stay close to us,” Ana says to Alastor. “I’ll feed his inner flame as we ride.”
We join the stream of foot soldiers and mounted riders escaping from the clearing as Ana’s magic rises up, focusing in on Harman.
Archers gather in our wake, and I glance over my shoulder to watch the first round of arrows soar across the clearing toward the Temple forces.
They brace, blocking the projectiles with shields and swords, but Caledon simply strides past them all, unconcerned.
More than one arrow strikes him, but they simply bounce off his body, leaving him unmarked.
We gallop through the Miravow, Ana pouring her magic into Harman, Alastor’s voice a constant murmur all the while, urging him to hold on.
I keep my awareness on the trees above us, watching for a change in their movement, a shift from angry swaying to something more violent and murderous.
There’s not much to see at first, but as the Trovian forces swell around us, those fighting elsewhere in the forest getting the message to retreat, the trees start to attack.
“It’s spreading!” Will shouts. The branches contort and elongate, reaching out to snatch at riders galloping past.
“How is he doing this?” Drisha gasps.
“I think because the Miravow’s power is celestial and Caledon’s is too, he can tap into its magic and draw on it endlessly,” I say grimly as our group swerves to avoid a snaking tree branch.
“Incoming!” one of Drisha’s guards bellows. We all look up to see a branch swooping toward us. Ana’s awareness shifts behind me as her focus on Harman breaks for a moment.
“Hold on!” she shouts, and the branch’s descent slows, leaving it quivering in the air like it’s being held back by an invisible force—by Ana. In a few seconds, we’re clear of the tree, and she releases her orbital power, letting the branch snap back into place.
But others around us aren’t so lucky.
The trees are relentless, and shouts from the distance tell me Caledon’s army are in pursuit, chasing us down as we head to the border. No doubt Caledon’s new invincibility has boosted the morale of the Temple’s fighters, making its soldiers feel like they have the gods on their side.
Ana’s soldiers, meanwhile, are dying fast. Troops by the score are snatched from the air, shot from behind, or cut down as they try to flee.
And I’m not sure where it ends. Once we get to the border, what then?
I could create some kind of barrier—a chasm that would stop Caledon’s troops from following right away.
But lots of our forces would likely get left behind, and the Temple has enough geostri to undo my work eventually.
Still, if this army can’t rest, if we don’t get a chance to regroup, I can’t see us rallying in this fight. We’re losing, and Ana knows it. Even as she tries to keep Harman’s inner flame alive, I feel her hope dying out.
Eventually, the light in the forest changes, the dim green of the Miravow brightening as the border comes into view.
The sight of it offers the Trovians a boost of energy at the prospect of escaping at last from the murderous trees.
A burst of speed surges around us as the army makes one last push toward safety.
Except there’s something beyond the border. Movement—a lot of it—and a swathe of bright color against the green of the grass.
“What is that?” Will asks, squinting. “More soldiers? Temple forces?”
“No, not the Temple,” Alastor says, and he laughs, the sound a bark of relief. “Look at the banners.”
It’s an army alright, but the uniforms and flags are all the deep, burnt orange of Filusia.
“The fae! The fae are here!”
The shout goes up through the forest as we hurry toward the light—toward my brother’s forces.