3. N #4
Between blinks, she saw a light green sky through the tower’s windows, nothing like the soft blues and golds of her own world.
She froze. It was one thing to wonder if she had landed in a place out of history, and quite another to know.
The woman behind her, gave her a little nudge, to remind her to clear the door so she could enter.
Triana, half turned to accommodate her, and saw Andaleisia pass under the lintel without stooping.
“The sky,” she said, “wrong color.”
He stared at her, wrinkling his nose. She wasn’t sure if it was the words, or that she spoke to him directly. The Hearthmaster shook his head and pointed to the matron. Triana turned back to the woman. “The sky. Green.”
The woman looked past her, her mouth moving silently as she worked out Triana’s words. She had to repeat it twice, with a lot of pantomime for Triana to think she understood. “Oh. There is a … ummm … barrier, to keep Monsters out. Makes green sky.”
Triana had no idea what to make of that.
Her eyes cleared enough that by squinting she could see around her.
The round room looked to be about six paces across, and held enough work-tables, desks, and books that the three of them nearly filled what space remained.
She saw a narrow balcony through a small set of filigreed doors, and beyond that, more wrong-colored sky.
Ripples shimmered across the sky that she could see, like water running across glass.
Another elven lord entered, coming from the balcony, wearing some kind of uniform, and armor?
She thought it looked too bulky to be just regular dress, but the close-set helmet that covered his head down to the cheekbones, and overlapping plates made of some kind of …
ceramic? … certainly suggested a man kitted out to fight.
He stood to attention and rapped out a quick report, but broke discipline enough to point with his whole arm back towards the open door. Triana’s eyes followed where he pointed.
Just then, a bellowing blast rocked them all, and Triana saw the others wince, even as she covered her ears. Her feet moved, of their own accord, edging her closer to the door, where she could see.
Looking down from the tower, she could see the city’s wall close by, perhaps no more than fifty paces from the tower itself, and along it, soldiers running to fight something.
The wall had a battered, debris-strewn look that suggested that whatever was attacking now had tried here before.
She knew dried blood well enough to see pools of it on the wall, where it hadn’t been cleaned up yet.
Something like a herd-beast reared up into her line of sight, but a dozen times larger, with ripping tentacles where its mouth should be. It looked to be shorter than the wall, but she guessed that standing on its hind parts, it overtopped the wall by enough to see down onto it.
A green shield of some kind … mage-craft surely …
cracked and sputtered, and the creature hissed and sizzled where it came into contact.
The Monster pressed against the green shield until it deformed back onto the wall.
One, two, then three of the whipping tentacles pierced the shield, with one playing back and forth across the stone wall.
Triana, watched, appalled, as the tentacle grabbed one man, and delivered him directly into its maw, and down in one gulp.
Triana could trace the flaring shield up, see where it climbed overhead until it formed a dome over the entire city.
The size of the magic and scale of the spells involved far outstripped anything she had seen before.
Even the most powerful wizards in her world would never attempt something on this scale.
Yet, for all its power, the tentacled thing had breached it.
She watched as the other soldiers mustered quickly, fighting the creature, using some kind of spear that they raised over their shoulders, and somehow—lit it off, arcing a thumb-thick flame that scorched the creature, and made it cry out, though it did not withdraw.
They seemed to have few of these, though, with the rest defending with crossbows, spears, and other weapons she knew quite well.
Beside her Andaleisia and the Hearthmaster talked together, a hissing conversation that Triana suspected would have been a full-out argument if she, and likely the guard, had not been present.
Over the noise of the battle below, and their low voices, she understood little, but caught a word here and there.
Her: “Second day! You risk … ” followed by much Triana didn’t understand. “ … you’re taking too much.”
He responded angrily to her, and Triana quickly got lost in the back and forth.
Instead, she watched the creature below, pressing itself against the walls.
The weapons the guards used were not all familiar to her.
Swords, and shields, and polearms, along with some types of dart throwers that she didn’t recognize.
And some time later, from him. “Stronger and closer. It’s why we need to ….” He broke off, seeing Triana looking at him. He touched Andaleisia’s arm and nodded towards Triana. The … dame-sel … the wife … met Triana’s eyes, and she could see Andaleisia looked flushed and angry.
His brows knitted, and then, unexpectedly, a slow, crafty expression spread over his face. He took Triana by the elbow and all but forced her onto the balcony, where the monster raved and continued to grope for more fighters.
“Danger,” he said, forcefully, with exaggerated pronunciation. They were the first words he had spoken directly to her. “Inside, safe. Outside, danger.” Then he mimed scooping something up and popping it in his mouth, chewing exaggeratedly, and with hideous gusto.
Just as the monster managed to snatch another soldier by the ankles and do the same.
She shuddered, and he drew her away from the balcony, and let her put her back to the wall where she didn’t have to look at anything out of the windows.
She got the point, all right. Things could be dangerous enough, outside the walls of one’s estate, back home.
But if enormous monsters came right up to the walls of your city and snatched people off the top like so many tidbits off a buffet, what did the wilderness look like?
Something about that tickled the back of her mind with a thought, but she was too terrified now to think about anything but what was in front of her.
The Hearthmaster … has he no name? … called the guard to him, and grabbed him by the shoulder, pulling him close to whisper intently into his ear.
She saw the guard nodding several times, and repeating back, receiving some kind of complicated instructions.
After a final exchange, he left, leaving Triana with the two of them.
The Hearthmaster looked distressed enough for Triana to guess that she had not been brought here to see this, and the fact that it had happened as they were climbing the stairs was an unpleasant surprise to him.
Andaleisia looked as frightened as Triana felt, and she heard the woman say, “Husband, please.”
It took Triana a few moments to understand his response. “Abide,” he said, “a few moments. No more.”
He looked at Triana, again slowing his speech and raising his voice.
“I desire speech with thee, but inter-rup-ted most rudely.”
Triana saw Andaleisia’s eyeroll at his attempt to be droll, which oddly, made her feel more comfortable, or rather, a touch less frightened.