"I think he's been snorting some of his spell components," Camara Tal grunted. "Anyway, if you don't mind, I'd like you to stick around, Tarrin. I've seen you use magic before. I can't think of any Sorcerer I'd want backing up my lines other than you."
"For you, Camara, I will," he sighed, "but I should warn you right now that I'm very tired. If I have to use magic, I doubt I'll get off more than two or three spells before I'm totally wiped out. They'll have to carry me back inside."
"From you, Tarrin, two or three spells may be all we need," the Amazon said confidently. "How is Triana? She looked about ready to fall over when she came out here."
"She's probably resting now," he replied. "She used up most of her energy summoning that Elemental earlier, and she still hasn't recovered. I hated sending her out here, but she was the only person I could find to come out here and relay that message. The only one I could trust, anyway."
"Are you going to stay and observe, Empress?" Kang asked.
"I think I will," she replied. "I have my own magic, you know, so I may be useful if the fur starts to fly. Sorry, Tarrin," she apologized at the use of the saying.
Tarrin realized that, again, someone had managed to avoid his attention so far. "Where is Sarraya?" he asked.
"I borrowed her," Shiika replied. "Faeries are small, fast, and they can go almost anywhere without attracting attention. So I convinced her to go out onto the battlefield and kill enemy officers."
"You got her to agree to that?" Tarrin said in surprise.
Shiika nodded. "She did a damn good job of it, to boot," she said with a satisfied little smile. "That little Faerie is a strong Druid, and she was able to use her magical power to knock off quite a few of the enemy's officers. She caused absolute chaos in their chain of command." She looked at her fingernails absently. "She should be back pretty soon. She's probably out of officers to hunt down."
Tarrin was surprised, but not too surprised. That was a rather clever thing to do, and Sarraya would be very well suited for it. It also explained why it seemed to take so long for the enemy to change their tactics. For all he knew, maybe the marilith did try to change the attack plan, but without many of her officers, it would have been very hard to implement her orders on the field. Sarraya, he realized, was the almost perfect assassin. She was tiny, quick, smart, and was a very powerful magician. She could go absolutely anywhere without being seen, strike from complete surprise, then fade away before the body hit the ground. And the people who found the body would never find out what happened. With Sarraya's Druidic power, she could make it appear like the victim died of a heart attack, or just about any other natural manner of death. They'd never know it was an assassination.
There was little to do but wait and worry. Minutes, then an hour, passed without much activity. Runners came in from the city to keep Kang and Camara Tal apprised of what was happening out there, and the news was reassuring. The Sorcerers had managed to rebuild a large Circle using Allia and Jenna, and Jenna had woven a very powerful spell that had destroyed a very large chunk of the attacking undead. With what power she had left, she wove a Ward that trapped about a quarter of the undead inside a five block area, a Ward that did not allow anything not living to pass, not even clothing. The size of it came with a duration limit, and the messages said that Jenna told them they'd have about two hours to set up to destroy those undead before the Ward dissolved. That took about half of the undead out of the battle, and that made the numbers more even. Darvon and his army held the undead back, the messages reported, but they were taking some considerable losses. When one could only strike the head off a foe to kill it, it made it very hard to fight the opponent. A dismembered undead warrior would continue to fight, even its severed limbs seeking to grapple with foes, until the head was taken from the body from which the fighting limbs had come.
After Camara Tal shared the latest report with Shiika, Sevren, and Tarrin, he and the specatcled Sorcerer spent a brief moment to catch up. Tarrin found out that not long after Sevren had started looking for the spy, he had been shipped off to Tor by the Council to investigate some leads about the Firestaff. It had been a complete waste of time for him, and he wasn't surprised to find out that the spy had been on the Council. In that position, Amelyn could simply reassign anyone that was getting close to her secret, and there wasn't much the Sorcerer could do about it. Tarrin related again the reason why he was so much taller than the last time Sevren had seen him. "It took me a while to get used to it," Tarrin admitted. "But all in all, I'm not entirely displeased. It's hard to find a chair that fits me, but at least everything in my rooms are made for someone my size."
"I think he turned out rather well," Shiika smiled, reaching out and grabbing him by the wrist, holding it up and running her fingers through the shaggy fetlock on the outside of his forearm. "Want to grow a little more?" she asked with a grin.
"I don't think I'd like that, Shiika," he said, disengaging his arm from her grip. He rubbed at his wrist absently.
"Strange that you two were enemies, yet Tarrin seems to tolerate you, your Majesty," Sevren noted. "It's not like him to be so forgiving."
"We were never truly enemies, Sevren," Shiika told him. "We opposed one another for a little time, but in the end we realized we were both actually trying to do the same thing."
"What was that, Empress?"
"Keep the Firestaff out of the wrong hands," she replied easily. "That's why I'm here, you know. I don't want anyone but Tarrin finding that old pain the butt, because I'd have to kill them. And I have more important things to do than run around the world tracking people down."
"I didn't know you had such an interest in it."
"It's more of an intense desire to be able to forget about it," she grunted. "I was here the last time someone used that damned thing. I don't want to see something like that happen again."
"Strange position for a Demoness. If you'd forgive my forwardness, your Majesty."
"Oh, it's not about doing the right thing or being a crusader, Sevren," she admitted easily. "I am a Demon, after all. It's all about how inconvenienced I'm going to be if someone uses the Firestaff. I'd rather do a little work right now then have to do a whole lot of work later."
"Well, at least you're honest, your Majesty," he smiled.
"I know. Honesty out of a monarch. The world should be turning over about now, shouldn't it?"
Sevren laughed, but an Aeradalla landed just to the side of them and went straight to Camara Tal. They were close enough to hear what the Aeradalla had to report. "The smaller element of the enemy forces are forming up on that street that runs from the north gate to here," the tall, thin, graceful winged man reported without any fanfare or pleasantries. "I think they're about to start advancing. Oh, and they have that six-armed creature with them, the one we were told to keep track of."
"Thank you, sentry," Camara Tal nodded. "Go back up and watch them. If they start advancing, signal us somehow, but don't take your eyes off them."
"As you command," he said with a sharp salute, then took a few steps away and vaulted back up into the sky.
"Zinshu, go," Shiika ordered to one of the Cambisi behind her. "If they start moving, let me know."
Tarrin heard no reply, but the redheaded Alu nodded to her mother, turned, and also climbed up into the sky to join the dozen or so odd Aeradalla who were circling high over the city, keeping track of everything happening on the ground. "Zinshu will let me know the instant they start moving, Camara," the Succubus told her.
"I hate to admit this, but you and those daughters of yours have been very handy, your Majesty," the Amazon admitted with a grunt. "I thought you'd be nothing but trouble."