Magic thrummed through me, hot and heavy as a drunkard’s kiss. Though I had to be subtle for as long as possible instead of charging in like a drunken bull.
I did what I could for Layla, Eva and myself, keeping our minds shielded from his probing as we hid out of sight behind Dissever’s huge serpentine coils. He knew I was here, somewhere. If he found me too soon then all that power would fall on me like a hammer and pound me into mush.
Dissever shifted and fidgeted like an impatient child as it waited for the enemy. The ravak as a race were, I think, not built for defence and waiting. Its hatred of its two enslaved offspring was stifling. The daemon intended to ignore everything until it obliterated them.
The human forces advanced towards the city gate with packs of howling daemons running before them, the two mighty ravak in the lead and shambling fleshcrafted monstrosities of claw and fang on either wing.
At a thousand paces, I opened my wooden box and removed the warded stones, sliding them into my coat pockets for easy access.
At nine hundred paces, Eva’s magic-enhanced sight picked out a blue-robed figure in the rear.
At eight hundred paces, a single ballista bolt launched from the city walls, the very extent of its range. The swift ravak it was aiming at was gone by the time the heavy bolt arrived, and instead it punched a small hole in the Skallgrim shield wall, two or three skewered on a length of wood as long as my leg. They didn’t slow and the hole was filled immediately.
As the elder tyrant and his monstrous horde advanced to only five hundred paces from the wall, only a handful of ballistae loosed, the operators of the others standing motionless and dazed. Bolts punched through clusters of scaled daemons, lines of Skallgrim warriors, and thudded into the misshapen chests of Scarrabus-crafted monsters, felling some but serving only to slow others. Dozens died but the ballistae shots did not come close to hurting the elder tyrant at their rear – any that almost reached him burned to ash in mid-air. The shots slowed, then ceased as a moan of despair rippled through the city. Abrax-Masud’s power seized the defenders on the wall.
Fuck him and the bug he rode in on! This was my home. I struck back, freeing as many as I could on the walls and filling them with defiance. Anger was easy, and it built on the same emotion in others around it. Single-minded anger could help them fortify their wills. Bows lifted again and more ballistae bolts plunged into enemy monstrosities.
I could feel him focusing on finding me, the pressure building as we cut and raged at each other in invisible combat. If his attention was fixed on me then I wasn’t sure how long I could survive, but if I didn’t distract him the city gates would swing open at the hands of unwitting dupes – I was playing with fire.
The horde broke into a run heading straight for the city. Bolts, arrows and incandescent stabs of lightning lashed down from the walls, followed by billowing balls of flame erupting among the charging daemons.
Dissever ran out of patience. “Fight me, Scarrabus! I will be your end.” It surged forward to meet the two infested ravak in a flurry of crackling purple energy and clashing blades, claws and fangs ripping into each other. Their thrashings reduced a dozen nearby daemons to gobbets of steaming flesh, while others more magical in nature dissipated into mist blown away on the breeze.
I grimly fought to keep Abrax-Masud from the magi and ballistae operators, and from ourselves. Fighting and slaughter erupted at several points atop the walls as he turned friends to enemies. Sooner or later he would manage to break a magus and then it would be carnage up there.
I patted Eva on the shoulder plate and stepped forward to go on the attack. I lashed out and speared into the enemy tyrant’s mind, rocking both man and Scarrabus queen with the ferocity of my blow. Their defences held but they did feel it, and now they knew exactly where I was.
“We are Setharis,” I shouted loud enough for the defenders on the wall to hear. “And we are humanity. This world is ours, Scarrabus scum, and you are ancient garbage fit only to be scraped off our boots. I piss on your queen, just as I have with your so-called god. Seriously, I actually have pissed on your god, and it seemed to enjoy it.” I had details from the visions of the ogarim, and sent Abrax-Masud that image mixed with a steaming flow of yellow.
The answer was exactly as I had hoped. In a rage, the Scarrabus queen took control of its host body and the full force of Abrax-Masud’s mental power fell on me like a landslide, doubled in power but lacking the magus’ more dangerous finesse. I gritted my teeth and endured it, feeling like a sandstorm was scouring the flesh from my bones; I had to so the city remained free to act. I could not stand against it for long, but to scream and show weakness to the city’s defenders was to destroy the world.
The first wave of daemons reached us, a pack of eight lithe and swift crimson-scaled canines with razor fangs. Eva leapt amongst them, her war hammer a blur of remorseless skill, crushing heads. Layla watched her back, throwing knives at any that survived Eva’s initial attack and finishing off the fallen.
Up on the walls, the populace felt the elder tyrant’s grip on their minds dissipate, and with renewed fury they bent their bows and loosed a rain of death upon the enemy. The Skallgrim shield wall took the shots, a few at the front falling. A few long shots took down the lighter-armoured Free Towns spearmen behind.
A huge fleshy abomination reached for Eva with four twisted arms ending in steel pincers. She spun her hammer and knocked its deformed head clean off its body. As the monster fell she vaulted it to butcher the next in line, the steel haft of her hammer bending badly from the force of her blows. She tossed it aside, raging among the enemy with her hands, a whirlwind of death crushing anything that came close. Layla wisely left her to it, and focused on slaying anything that managed to get past merely wounded rather than pulped. She lacked Eva’s extreme magical might but was quick and precise, each strike a kill. Even so, they kept coming.
Dissever shrieked in victory as it reared above the battlefield with another ravak’s head in its jaws. It swallowed, then began cutting limbs and body parts from the next. Its savage victorious glee bolstered my own mental fortitude.
For a moment it looked like we were winning, and the will and hope of the people of Setharis focused upon me. I had learned an unpalatable lesson about my own weaknesses from trying to enslave an army, and instead of commanding I opened myself up wide and held out an open hand saying I am here. Their minds willingly took that offered hand and flowed towards me, and with it the magic offered by hundreds of thousands of stunted Gifts. It was a lesser version of the Gift-bond I had once shared with my friend Lynas, an imperfect linking of our Gifts. From an entire city of people intent on destroying the enemy, those individually insignificant raindrops of power fell on me and joined to become a raging river.
Sweet gods, it was glorious! THE POWER!
I was a fucking god, a weapon of war worshiped by an entire city. It was ecstasy. And it was agony – I was no elder magus and this body did not boast a crystal god-seed to help channel so much raw power. It was burning me up from the inside out, but it felt divine.
My skin shimmered with golden energy as I stood tall. I was on fire with the flames of their righteous fury. It was as endless as the sun. Wings of air lifted me from the ground to hang over the city, glorying in my people’s adoration and worship.