Several more bridges arced gracefully away from the balcony into the darkness. All looked intact, but Alexander ignored them, hoping the balcony would join with a corridor running along the wall of the chasm, but his hopes were in vain. The balcony ended without a way off save the bridges or whatever passages might lead out of the forest room.
Not a minute after they turned back to try one of the bridges, men started filing out of the forest several hundred feet ahead of them, fanning out across the balcony and drawing weapons, the overseers shouting orders to the soldiers, forming them into two ranks stretching across the balcony, blocking escape by any route except the forest.
“Run or fight?” Jataan asked.
Before Alexander could answer, a blue sphere the size of an apple shot forth from the wizard’s hand, crossing the distance with alarming speed. Time seemed to slow. Alexander saw the coming moments, and they were devastating. He moved quickly, pulling Anja away from the balcony, nearly throwing her toward the forest just a moment before the force sphere detonated. His friends were all blown toward the forest, scattering them across the stone floor, dazing them all. He was blown from his feet toward the chasm, over the railing and into the deep dark.
He’d known what was going to happen to him the moment the Acuna wizard cast his spell, but it was far preferable to losing Anja to the dark. He saw the balcony railing pass beneath him, then nothing but endless darkness. Gravity started to claim him.
He opened the door to his Wizard’s Den and tumbled inside, the portal suspended in space over the void a dozen feet from the railing. He hit hard, landing poorly, Luminessence clattering across the floor. Willing himself to his knees and then to his feet, he looked out the door but couldn’t see past the railing. He heard shouting and boots running on stone.
Stepping up on a chair, he could just see over the railing. Jataan was up. Anja was racing toward the railing with a look of wild panic that melted into relief the moment she saw him standing in the doorway of his Wizard’s Den. Soldiers were advancing on Jataan. He strode calmly toward them, no hint of a weapon in his hands.
“Don’t scare me like that,” Anja said.
Alexander tossed her a coil of rope, tying one end around his waist.
“Got it?” he shouted.
Anja wrapped the rope around her waist and nodded. Alexander stepped off the edge into the darkness and fell in an arc defined by the length of the rope, his feet landing hard against the wall below the balcony. Anja started pulling, drawing him up and over the railing just in time to avoid a sword stroke.
He hit and tumbled, rolling to his feet, the Thinblade coming free … and then he was lost in the moment, the battle joined, men coming from several directions at once as the enemy ranks closed in around them. Alexander didn’t think or plan or choose his moves, he simply let them happen, taking life and limb with each stroke, seeing the coming moments as if time had slowed just for him, allowing him to act with perfect knowledge. He was always right where he needed to be to avoid the next attack and deliver his next strike. Death piled up around him.
Jataan had engaged and was fighting a swarm of enemy soldiers, several already dead or dying. Jack was still down from the force sphere. Lita was hovering over him, extending her shield around him while she tended his injuries, ignoring the overseer standing over them both, beating on her shield with his weighted club.
Anja gave a battle cry that sounded more like the roar of a dragon and threw herself into the fight, cleaving the nearest man in half with a stroke of her broadsword, striking fear into the other men facing her.
The soldiers fell quickly, blood pooling around their corpses, but the wizard stood off a good distance casting another spell … and he’d been at it for far too long for the outcome to be good. An amber sphere of light leapt from his outstretched hand and shot toward the melee. Alexander saw it coming, but there was nothing he could do. It stopped not ten feet from him and expanded to a diameter of fifty feet in a blink. When the amber passed through each of them, it left them encased in magical energy, completely frozen in place-paralyzed and helpless, except for Jack and Lita. Her shield had protected them.
Fortunately, the remaining few soldiers still standing nearby were also frozen by the spell. Alexander willed the door to his Wizard’s Den closed, then he reopened it right next to Lita. She didn’t even hesitate, grabbing Jack by his arms and dragging him inside. Alexander willed the door closed, then focused on struggling to break free of the spell holding him in place.
“Well, as messy as that was,” the wizard said, looking at the carnage all around him, “we have our prize. The Babachenko will be pleased.”
“Do you think he’ll let me keep this one?” one of the overseers asked, savagely hitting Anja in the belly with his club. She fell backward like a rag doll, crumpling helplessly to the ground. The big man stood over her, leering at her with a purposeful smile.
“Do you think he’ll mind if I kill this one?” the other overseer asked, standing in front of Jataan. “I mean, look at this.” He gestured to the dead soldiers all around the battle mage.
As hard as he struggled, Alexander couldn’t break free of the spell. The wizard stopped ten feet before him and smiled, holding up a slave collar.
“Do as you will with them,” the wizard said to the overseers. “The Babachenko only wants this one.”
Alexander tried to vanish into the firmament, but nothing happened.
“Honestly, where did you plan to go down here?” the wizard asked, shaking his head.
“Ever been stabbed in the gut?” one overseer asked Jataan amiably. “It takes a long time to die.” He hooked his club to his belt and slowly drew his curved knife, holding it up so Jataan could see it.
“I see you’re fighting with a straight dagger,” he said, angling to get a better look at Jataan’s blade as if they were friends comparing weapons.
“I prefer …” he started to say, but never finished. Jataan’s dagger abruptly transformed into a spear, the point driving into the overseer’s eye and out the back of his head.
Alexander opened the door to his Wizard’s Den a few feet behind the Acuna wizard.
“This should make you more manageable,” the wizard said as he slowly approached with the slave collar.
Lita stabbed him in the back, the tip of her dagger coming out of his chest. Shock, dismay and disbelief played across his face just before he slumped to his knees and died-the effect of his spell vanishing with his life.
Free of the amber light, Jataan and Alexander swept back into battle against the remaining few soldiers, quickly dispatching those that didn’t flee.
While they fought, Anja regained her feet and dropped her sword, snarling at the overseer who’d hit her. She was clearly in pain, hunched over, protecting her midsection even as she advanced on the man. There was a moment of wariness in his colors, but it faded quickly. He seemed to decide that she was just a girl-no real threat.
“You want to play?” he asked with a menacing smile, raising his club.
Anja didn’t raise her guard or respond to his jibe, instead shuffling toward him resolutely. When he drew back to hit her, she sprang, closing the remaining distance before he could bring his club down, hitting him in the groin with the palm of her hand hard enough to lift him a foot into the air, then grabbing him by the crotch and throat, spinning half a turn and throwing him over the balcony railing out into the chasm. His scream seemed to last a long time before it faded into the dark.
She slumped to her knees and Alexander raced to her side.
“Easy,” he said, catching her and carefully picking her up, carrying her into his Wizard’s Den and laying her gently on a bed.