Chapter 28 #4
Someone who’d disappeared into the lift shaft tumbled back into view, knocking another climber off the chain as he fell. With a heavy thump, the man landed on top of the lift cage, not moving. An arrow protruded from his neck. It was one of Vorik’s people.
He closed his eyes. The Kingdom troops weren’t going to let any stormers out. Even a strong and capable fighter couldn’t spring out of a hole fast enough to defend against arrows from archers who stood all around it.
Another body fell into view, an arrow driven into the top of the man’s skull.
Syla wiped her face again, a shake to her hand. She couldn’t approve of such grisly means, but she probably couldn’t stop them. Except through Wreylith, she couldn’t communicate with anyone up there.
“Syla!” Tibby had spotted them, and she maneuvered her floating wagon toward them. A few stormers tried to intercept her, but she hurled another of her explosives. It struck one of the men in the head and blew up.
Vorik had never felt so helpless in his life.
He was on the verge of leaving Abrya with Fel and Syla and swimming over to try to gather his people, to bring order to the chaos, but he didn’t know how.
Two more bodies fell out of the shaft. The cage lift started clanking upward, a surprising mix of stormers and Kingdom troops inside, their backs to the bars, their weapons pointing at each other, though they must have made a truce, whether spoken or not, because they didn’t attack each other.
Those left behind shouted and splashed in dismay.
“Climb aboard,” Tibby said when she’d maneuvered the wagon close.
Syla and Fel didn’t hesitate to do so, and they reached over for Abrya. She’d woken at some point but hadn’t fought to get away from Vorik, and she groped now for the wagon.
“What are you doing here?” Tibby asked Vorik in exasperation.
“Regretting that I disobeyed orders,” Vorik said.
“We’ll all have a lot of regrets after tonight,” Syla said.
“That’s the truth.” Tibby grunted, then in a softer voice, the words meant for Syla, added, “That was the last of my explosives. Do you have any more?”
“I’m afraid not.” Syla reached for Vorik, waving for him to climb aboard with them.
He did and looked back to his two men, but they were swimming toward those around the bottom of the lift shaft instead.
A distant boom came from above. Cries of alarm and pain came from the shaft, and the lift cage tumbled back into view. Warped and no longer attached to the chains, it plunged into the water, landing on people who’d been swimming underneath.
“Wreylith said the archers up there have orders not to let any stormers out,” Syla said.
“Some of our own people were in that cage.” Tibby gawked at it.
“I think… they have orders not to let anyone out. Whoever is in command is willing to sacrifice his own people to ensure as many stormers as possible die.” Syla shook her head and met Vorik’s eyes, as if to apologize, to say she never would have given that order.
“The queen will not be sacrificed,” Fel said.
“I’d prefer not to be either,” Tibby said tartly, then eyed the orb that controlled and powered the wagon. In a softer tone, she murmured, “Maybe I can rig this to explode.”
She’d turned the wagon toward the crowd of swimmers. A single chain still dangled down from above. Vorik could climb it, but if he would be shot at the top…
The moon-mark on Tibby’s hand glowed silver as she rested it upon the orb, manipulating it with magic. How would making the wagon explode help them? Maybe Lesva hadn’t been crazy to swim away from this group.
“How are we going to get out, Syla?” Fel asked, as if she had a plan.
Syla held up a finger.
Puny humans, Wreylith boomed, her voice directed to everyone. Back away and allow the queen to arise from the water tomb, or I shall slay you.
“That’s how.” Syla pointed at her aunt. “Get us over there. The lift is destroyed, so we’re going to have to climb.”
“Oh, of course,” Tibby said. “We’re so agile and lithe that it’ll be easy.”
“To get out of here with my life, I will carry you.” Fel told her, waving at the ever-rising water.
“A minute ago, you were leaning on Syla,” Vorik said.
“For this, I can summon reserves.”
“Can you carry Lady Abrya, Vorik?” Syla asked. “I think I can climb out on my own.”
The statement surprised him until he remembered that she ought to be gaining strength from her dragon link by now. She nodded, as if she knew his thoughts.
“I can, yes,” Vorik said. “Especially if it means I’m allowed to depart without an arrow in my skull.”
“I should be able to arrange that,” Syla said. “Or Wreylith will.”
“I’d rather depend on you. Wreylith doesn’t adore my charm as much as I’d like. And she definitely doesn’t adore my dragon.”
“I think she’s warmed up to him slightly since he bit her.”
“Dragons are odd.”
“Yes. Uhm, Aunt Tibby.” Syla pointed toward the swimmers they were approaching, many still with weapons in their hands.
Faces contorted with anger, they looked like they wanted to take their frustrations out on the wagon and its occupants. If the stormers recognized Vorik, it wasn’t apparent.
Tibby sent more of her power into the orb. It started throbbing, and a clunk sounded as she removed it from its mount.
Realizing what she would do, Vorik shouted to the stormers, “Swim away from there. Get out of the way!”
Tibby didn’t object to his warning, and Syla didn’t either.
She yelled, “Let us depart, and I’ll arrange for everyone to get out without being shot.”
The Kingdom people in the water obeyed, the ominously pulsing and glowing orb perhaps swaying them as much as her words, but Vorik’s people… They raised their weapons in defiance and kept swimming toward the wagon.
“Get out of there!” he yelled again.
A few obeyed, but more glared at him, and someone shouted, “Traitor!”
Since he was riding with Kingdom people on their wagon, Vorik couldn’t deny that the word applied, but he tried one more time. “She’s about to throw an explosive!”
“A big one,” Tibby murmured, holding the orb aloft with both hands. With its power source removed, the wagon was slowing, the current started to affect it, but it continued toward the shaft.
Someone pumped an arm to throw a knife. Not certain of the target, Vorik pulled Tibby and Syla down. The blade glanced off the top of the orb and didn’t damage it. If anything, it pulsed faster, waves of magic that Vorik could sense rolling off it.
Tibby snarled like a tiger and hurled the orb.
It landed in the water in the middle of the aggressors and blew up with such light and power that it dwarfed all the explosives that had been thrown before.
The wagon rocked, throwing Vorik to his back and knocking Fel into the water.
Nearby, one of the salt pillars crumbled.
Chunks of the ceiling followed, tumbling into the water and floating like icebergs.
Snaps and cracks sounded, promising more of the ceiling would come down.
One chunk struck the wagon, diverting it from its course.
“We have to swim!” Tibby shouted.
Vorik grabbed Abrya and Tibby and leaped in, swimming on his back to more easily kick and pull them along with him.
At his side, Fel and Syla also swam through water that churned in the aftermath of the explosion.
Chunks of salt plummeting down didn’t help the situation, and Fel cursed as a head-sized piece struck his shoulder.
Fortunately, the group made it to the shaft without anyone attacking them.
Vorik didn’t know if there was anyone left to attack.
Body parts floated everywhere, and he couldn’t help but feel he’d failed his people.
He should have dueled Shi for the tribe and tried to turn the tides, tried to lead the stormers toward a truce and a peaceful way to obtain food.
Instead, he’d let Jhiton and the others force them down this path.
“There’s the chain,” Fel said.
“I’ll go up first,” Syla said.
“Don’t you dare.” Fel reached for her.
“Nobody is going to shoot me.” Surprisingly swift, she dodged his grasp and gripped the chain. Her spectacles had fallen around her neck, but she shimmied up the chain with the same determination as she did everything.
Vorik managed a smile as Fel cursed.
“Wreylith has cleared the way,” Syla added. “Hurry up after me.”
“Oh, we will,” Tibby said.
Vorik waited, treading water and waving for Tibby and Fel to go ahead of him.
He wanted to ensure that nobody else threw a knife.
But nobody moved nearby. The explosion had been…
far too effective. Mentally, he added “Aunt Tibby” to his list of women not to underestimate.
That whole family was far more than they seemed.
“Who are you?” Abrya asked blearily as Vorik arranged her so that he could climb out with her in his grasp.
“Vorik, my lady.” He left off captain. After this blatant defying of orders, he expected to lose his rank. “Just Vorik.”