Peti picked them out in the rocks and pointed her clawed finger at them. “Kill them!” she shouted.
The men on foot gave a battle cry that was far more enthusiastic than one might expect from a bunch of workmen and started charging toward Abigail and Magda. The horsemen surrounded Peti and Torin while they rode around the switchback and down toward the main road below.
Abigail tried to find an open shot, but the charmed men surrounding Peti rode too closely together, shielding the witch completely.
“I’m really getting tired of her,” she said, relaxing the tension on her bowstring.
As the men on foot negotiated the steep scree-covered hillside, a few fell, sliding down to the plain below. Magda started casting a spell, releasing a pea-sized blue orb several moments later. It struck the hillside just above the approaching men and rapidly expanded to a diameter of twenty feet, shoving them all off balance and loosening the already unstable scree beneath their feet, sending all twenty sliding to the base of the hill.
“Nice,” Abigail said. “Let’s go see if there are any horses left in the castle.”
Chapter 17
They climbed higher to avoid the area of hillside that Magda’s spell had disturbed and reached the road without difficulty.
The man who had warned them earlier not to enter the keep was still with the woman impaled on the pike, but now he was kneeling before her, sobbing uncontrollably.
“What have I done?” he asked when Abigail and Magda reached him. “Why would I kill my own wife?” He leaned forward, mewling in abject misery, putting his forehead on the ground before her, shaking as he cried.
Abigail and Magda shared a look of sympathy and anger but left the man to mourn his loss. The drawbridge was still down, spanning the gap between the road abutment and the rocky outcropping that the castle was built upon. Several frightened women were in the courtyard.
“Who are you?”
“What do you want with us?”
“Leave us be.”
Abigail raised her hand to forestall any further questions. “Who is the lady of this keep?” she asked.
An older woman with grey hair pulled back into a braid, wearing a simple grey dress, stepped forward.
“I am,” she said. “What is your business here?”
“We’re hunting the witch that took your men.”
She met Abigail’s eyes, taking her measure before nodding curtly. “My own husband couldn’t see that thing for what it was, none of the men could. How is that possible?”
“Magic,” Magda said, “dark and evil magic.”
The woman swallowed, looking at the ground for a moment as if afraid to put words to her fears. “Will our men return?” she asked very quietly.
“The ones who left on foot will return within the hour,” Abigail said, “though some may be injured. As for those on horse, I don’t know.”
She nodded tightly, a tear slipping down her cheek. “My husband was among those on horse. Why did that monster come here?”
“She’s fleeing us, and we need to catch her as soon as possible,” Abigail said. “Do you have horses?”
“No, she took them all … made a point of it.”
“Show us to the ramparts overlooking the road,” Magda said.
The woman frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“You don’t need to understand, you just need to show us to the ramparts overlooking the road.”
“Quickly,” Abigail said.
After a brief moment of indecision, the woman motioned for them to follow her, leading them up a flight of stairs to the top of the wall and then up another to the western wall of the keep. The cliff was several hundred feet high with the natural stone flowing seamlessly into the wall.
“There,” Magda said, pointing. “They’ve just reached the main road. Give me your hand and don’t let go.”
“Really? Are you sure that spell will work at this height?”
“Quite sure,” Magda said with a reassuring smile and an outstretched hand.
A few moments later, they leapt off the battlement and fell into the sky, wind roaring past them, the ground rushing toward them with terrifying speed, but their descent slowed rapidly when they approached the base of the cliff and they landed as if jumping off of a table.
“Huh, I guess that would come in handy, especially if I fell off Kallistos,” Abigail said. “Maybe I’ll give the mana fast more thought.”
“I encourage you to do so, but not right now.”
The sound of Peti and her charmed horsemen approaching carried on the damp air. With the cliff on one side and the river on the other, Abigail and Magda stood in the middle of the road preparing to meet the attack.
“I’d rather not kill those men,” Abigail said, nocking an arrow.
“Nor would I, but it may become necessary,” Magda said. “I’ll spook their horses … be ready to take your shot.”
Abigail nodded, putting tension on her bowstring and setting herself to draw and fire quickly. When the horsemen saw them, they spurred their horses into a charge while Peti and Torin fell back, separating from their unwitting protectors.
Magda began her spell.
The air filled with the thunder of horses’ hooves as the men drew closer. Magda released her spell with a clap of her hands, producing a thunderclap that struck fear into the horses charging toward them. Several turned aside, bolting toward the river; a few went toward the cliff, then turned again and ran back the way they had come; a few more started bucking wildly, filled with panic, desperate to dislodge their riders.
Through the chaos unfolding before her, Abigail loosed her arrow. It flew true, but Peti saw it coming and turned aside just enough to avoid a killing blow, instead taking the shaft through the outside of her shoulder. She snarled, then began barking the words of a spell in some ancient and unclean language. Abigail’s next arrow was deflected by the witch’s many-paned shield.
Magda sent five shards of blue force at her, one after the next, but none could defeat her shield, each striking with a loud crack.
“I’m sorry,” Abigail whispered before releasing her next arrow, driving the shaft into the throat of Torin’s horse. The animal squealed in shock and pain, bucking and throwing Torin before toppling over and thrashing around on the ground, desperately trying to flee death’s inevitable grasp.
One of the men from the castle had regained his feet and was charging toward them with his sword drawn. Abigail had just nocked an arrow meant for Peti’s horse, but she knew the charging man would be on them before she could nock another, so she sent it into his leg. He crashed into the dirt, screaming and writhing in pain.
Torin gained his feet and Peti began casting another spell. Her words were laced with anger and filled with malice as she spat them into the world. She reached out with her clawed hands and swirling blackness gushed forth, splattering onto the ground before her and taking shape as rats with coarse black fur, red beady eyes, and long sharp fangs. Dozens, then scores, swarmed toward them, racing across the ground.
“Run!” Magda shouted, pointing toward the river.
Abigail hesitated just long enough to send another arrow into the fray, the shaft plunging into Peti’s horse, driving into its right eye and killing the beast instantly.
When the rats reached the man that Abigail had felled in the middle of the road, they swarmed over him, devouring his flesh. He screamed in terror and agony … and then fell silent.
Abigail ran for the water, not daring to look back. The sounds behind her filled her with a kind of fear she didn’t know she could feel, yet she retained mastery over her will, focusing on putting one foot before the other. She heard a roar behind her, like fire consuming a great pile of dry tinder, followed by snapping and squealing, but she didn’t look back until she reached the river bank.
Magda was standing her ground, a gout of flames jetting from her hands, scorching the plague of rats swarming toward her, the dangerous little vermin vaporizing in sooty black smoke when the fire washed over them, but it wasn’t enough. A dozen got past her fire, swarming around her feet, climbing up her legs, biting and clawing, bringing her to the ground with a defiant battle cry. In the distance, Peti laughed with maleficent glee.