Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
The night hangs heavy and cold. Hot breath dies on chilled lips as the silence gnaws at the darkness. A stray breeze drags dead leaves down dirt-drenched streets, skittering across stone that was once creamy and proud, now stained with ash and grime.
The abandoned town of Semita is losing its fight with the march of the years.
Its streets are haunted with the barest memories of the long dead and buried.
The crumbling walls protrude like ancient bones from the forgotten ground; neglect claws at the once-proud structures.
Smothered in darkness, each corner smirks with cursed shadows promising to swallow the world whole.
I press my hand to the dirty wall, crouching low and out of sight of any who would dare a stray glance our way.
My pulse could rival the fury of wild rapids.
My nerves balance on a razor’s edge. I track the slightest of movements, flinching at the quietest of clatters or the whispered chatter of frozen leaves from the forest’s encroachment.
Tahira is next to me; her sword hasn’t left her skilled hand since the second we chose our hiding spot.
Kneeling just behind me by this shallow wall, she covers my back.
She seems far more comfortable in the dark, but the way her eyes flick across every opening makes me wonder if it’s an act, her courage mastering what her mind threatens to cower behind.
Either way, I don’t know if I would manage this alone.
Down the steps from this shallow wall, we found the perfect place for Michelle to do her work.
To craft her most important masterpiece to date.
A gruelling, taunting piece of artwork, designed to humiliate and enrage.
It’s huge, the paint bold and brash against the old wall, metres tall and wide.
Its subject is a mockery of Nouis himself – a collage of his different deaths, many at mine or Idris’s own hand.
Hanging, torn apart, pierced with arrows, speared through the gut, burning – in every depiction he is screaming and crying like a coward or petulant rat.
And written big and clear in red paint through the centre of Michelle’s most brilliant artwork are five important words.
Nouis Rizaro will die tonight.
We left a large fire burning in the abandoned square to properly light the piece, knowing it will be a beacon, drawing in the Holy States scouts to check what’s happening in the abandoned town.
Exactly as we hoped, they found Michelle’s work and were horrified, racing straight back to tell their narcissistic leader all about it.
So now we wait in the shadowed hallows of this ghost town, waiting to see if Nouis takes the bait, to see if my last-ditch plan will actually do anything.
Darkness draws in, dissolving our presence into night like we’re part of the old bones.
The silence commands ardent attention as we listen and wait for a sign.
Then we hear it: boots marching. Soldiers coming closer.
I let out a breath, turning to look at Tahira with a gleeful smile. Something has worked, at least. Being the entirely self-absorbed mongrel that Nouis is, of course he’d want to see Michelle’s work for himself.
From our crouched position I dare to peak around the corner, looking down to the small clearing as one hundred soldiers descend upon the space like a swarm.
Maybe a third are the traitorous Coari mercenaries while the others wear the Holy States’ signature brutish black and white cloaks.
In the centre of the infestation are a few familiar faces.
Lysa, Bash, three Holy States cardinals and of course the monster himself.
Nouis steps up to the picture, burning torch in his hand. His face contorts, mouth pulling in fury as he takes it in. Then he smirks at it, gesturing as he says something to Lysa who laughs and dances in delight by his side, dark hair gleaming in the firelight.
I take a deep breath as on the other side of the clearing, Alfieri removes the cover from his candle, making his presence – and that of two of his trusted scouts – known.
The Church Militia shout in surprise and ten or so soldiers race after him as my friend makes his daring escape.
Nouis narrows his eyes in suspicion, having not seen who interrupted his little outing.
He indicates that they should move now they’ve been discovered.
Thirty Coari soldiers and sixty Church Militia stand between me and Nouis Rizaro.
As they start to file into the main street and away from the painting, a dilapidated building gives a loud, ear-splitting crack.
The stones start tumbling as bricks larger than dinner plates fly forwards, flooding across their exit.
It swallows maybe five of the Church Militia, but most avoid it.
But it does cut off their immediate retreat.
“Trap!” shouts Nouis drawing his sword, looking around frantically. “They’re here! It’s a trap!”
Now for the part of the plan that makes me want to scream. My heart clogs my throat and tears surge into my eyes. Idris removes the cover from his candle, jumping up from his hidden position in the night on the other side of the wall, due east of here.
“Of course it’s a trap, you gullible egotist!” he shouts at the top of his lungs before sprinting away.
“KILL HIM!” screams Nouis, jabbing a vile finger in his direction. Ten Church Militia and ten Coari soldiers take after him.
“NO!” roars one of the cardinals. “Don’t leave! Don’t split up! Stay as a group!”
That leaves twenty Coari soldiers and fifty Church Militia still standing.
Suddenly the street beneath their feet fills with water, like someone deliberately broke the banks of a poorly maintained river. The water surges forwards ominously, turning the dirty road black and cold.
“Move! Move!” shouts the one cardinal with common sense.
This is the part that was a guess, the part that I was least certain of.
Which way would they move, east or west?
Both Idris and Alfieri ran to the east, suggesting we wanted them to go that way.
Our camp is also to the east. But we couldn’t be sure what they’d choose. This part still gnaws at my gut.
Idris was right. They move west.
My heart soars and sours at the sight of them hurrying towards us, instinctively closer to their camp and away from the perceived threat.
Behind them another building cracks, exactly as Emilia promised, collapsing down behind them.
Tumbling bricks throw water and splash like a thrashing beast. Even though no one was caught under it, it turns them all frantic.
“Move! Move now!” shouts the cardinal. My heart pounds in my throat, as I fight the tears of worry in my eyes. I stand up and remove the cover from my candle.
I wait, Tahira standing with me, shifting on her feet as we prepare. Lysa finds me in the dark first. She hits Nouis’s arm as I turn and flee. Tahira is with me as we race away, dropping the candle. This needs to look like we’re running for our lives.
“GOT YOU!” snarls Nouis tearing after us. “I’VE GOT YOU!”
“Faster, faster!” Tahira shouts as we sprint up ruined steps.
My breath rattles in my teeth as we sprint through the darkness, our steps slapping against aged paths.
Another crack rocks through the night, followed by two explosions in the distance as we sprint up and around the corner of a street and tear down it.
My arms pump with all the strength I have, the nerves of the last few hours lacing me with so much adrenalin I can barely feel my limbs. My pulse screams, my eyes sting, my lungs rail against my ribs.
“Renza! Renza!” screams Nouis as he hunts us through the abandoned city in the dark, his men following his trail.
Tahira leads me into a dark tunnel, the mossy sponge squelching underfoot as we flee into the darkness.
The other end has a large fallen tree cutting off the exit and the two of us throw ourselves to our bellies to roll under the small opening and out the other side.
“Come on! Come on!” Tahira shouts at me as we sprint down the next street.
Nouis is in hot pursuit, leading a pack including Bash, Lysa, one of his cardinals, and a handful of both Coari mercenaries and Church Militia.
This was the plan – draw them out, make them less of a huddle and more of a line; a chain we can break.
I hear another telltale crack and thud – Serra and Emilia’s last trap going off. Fate’s Fury, I hope it’s enough.
We round the corner again, bodies fighting for all their worth as Tahira and I run together towards the platform at the north end of the small town, a platform that looks over the ford that glistens like liquid diamonds over the cream and beige gravel.
The moon gives a crooked snarl, its teeth bared as a thousand narrowed eyes bear down on us.
To one side, the Halician forces are camped, to the other the Holy States.
We skid to a stop on the ancient viewing platform which stands two storeys above the ford. The view is solemn and spectacular, as though all the divinity of Fate were standing witness to tonight.
One way in, one way out. A way out blocked by our enemy. Tahira locks eyes with me, and we nod at each other before turning around to face the monsters that race after us.
Eleven Coari mercenaries. Fourteen Church Militia still standing.
Not to mention Lysa, Bash, and only one of the three cardinals – the one that seemed to have common sense. Then of course, the villain himself.
Nouis’s vicious grin is manic. He licks his teeth in feral victory as he laughs, arms wide.
“You really thought this would work? You really thought you could trap me?” he spits, breathing so hard he might collapse inward. “I’m not pathetic like Bellandi. I won’t fall for stupid actors or ridiculous little traps!”