Lady Neria slammed her fist down on the table at the center of her tent. “Where is Lord Three? I would have him smash the gate open for us! Yet he’s nowhere to be seen! Nowhere? Marra, have your scouts scour the eastern flank. If he’s still licking his wounds or ashamed because he hasn’t caught the heir yet, he can stuff it all down deeper than the Ichor channels! We need him to break the gate or scale the wall…”

  “Ma’am,” a soldier whispered, “If Lord Three and the elf fight outside the city, they will destroy your army.”

  “So be it!” She lifted her fist, but kept it clenched. “We’re wasting our time here, and lower wizards—valuable assets—are dying.”

  She pushed over a chair, then reached for her sword. She contemplated drawing it and striking Marshal Bodleon, who stood by, but said nothing. She restrained herself. “You’ve heard the rumours, yes? He’s reached the peak of Blaze?”

  “They are just rumours, my lady,” said the marshal.

  “Empress,” she reminded him.

  “Apologies, Empress. It’s incredibly unlikely that he’s advanced in such a short—”

  “Then send your wizards to kill him. All of them. Anything you have left! Send them all, and bust down that gate!”

  ~ ~ ~

  Lord Three sensed his master’s irritation from his hiding place across the Dominion camp, but he didn’t act on it.

  They might be suffering losses now, but if Neria had her way, the entire army would suffer the fallout of a battle between Wildflames—or near-Wildflames. He couldn’t have that. Without the Weavelings, they had less ability to keep the Mainland in check. They needed as many forces as they could get when they returned home.

  Worse, what would happen if people found out Lady Neria had sacrificed half her army in her increasingly erratic fits? The citizens of the Mainland wouldn’t be pleased, and she might find herself with yet another war to fight.

  To serve Neria was still in his interest, but he wouldn’t serve her self destructive whims.

  ~ ~ ~

  Northvel’s outer wall survived for four more days. The Dominion sporadically sent waves of soldiers to guard their convoys, and they set up outposts beneath the waterfall. It was slow and methodical, but they were making progress, and soon, they’d manage a sustained assault on the gate.

  Between assisting the wall, Pirin continued his duties in the forge. He finished scraping the blade’s fillings smooth, then sharpened it with a grindstone. It vibrated weakly and uncertainly, like any impulse would crack the Ichor-steel fillings, but it held together. His sword Charge imprinted on the block, penetrating into the steel just as easily as it had etched the leather.

  But the blade wasn’t done yet. Pirin unwound the old bindings around the hilt. The wood blocks around the tang were nearly rotten, and the pins holding them in place were loose. Not to mention, it wouldn’t conduct Essence very well. He could pour power into the blade all he wanted, and the old steel had been a gift to Kalénier from Chancellor Ivescent. It was already naturally conductive to Essence, and with the crushed Reign gem practically ground into the steel, it was even moreso.

  But Pirin had a better option. He withdrew the branch of the Throne from his inner world and slid it onto the tang with the gap he’d whittled in the center, then screwed the pommel cap back on. He’d whittled it so it was the exact same shape as the old hilt, but with grooves in it to improve his grip.

  With that, the sword was complete.

  “That’s…a high-grade artifact right there,” Nomad said. “I reckon it’ll be extra responsive to your Essence now.”

  “One can hope.” Pirin tucked it gently into the sheath. They still had yet to see whether the mending would hold. He didn’t have high hopes, but with the Charge, it might just work. “I’ve gotta get back out there.”

  “Pirin, don’t hurt yourself, or exhaust yourself,” Nomad reminded him. “Especially not before you fight Lord Three.”

  “I’m not spending any more Essence than I’m recovering,” Pirin said. “And I’m still keeping high levels of Essentia.”

  “But you’re draining your willpower, and that’s not so easily recovered.”

  If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  “I don’t have a choice,” Pirin said. “We can’t let the city fall.”

  “No, no you do not.” He hoisted up his staff. “But I also don’t have to let you fight alone. I’ll help hold the wall. Enough waiting around.”

  Pirin nodded, then stepped out of the forge. “I won’t deny an extra hand.”

  He and Gray flew back to the outer wall, zipping over the rooftops, until they landed on Marshal Teanor’s observation platform. Immediately, his senses flared up in warning. A presence was approaching from below.

  No…nearly four-hundred presences. The Flares. They were all pushing at once, winding up the walkway and approaching. Pirin ran to the front of the observation platform and leaned over the edge, looking down on the walkway.

  The wizards were marching up in a cohesive line, shielding each other with techniques when they rounded the corners of the winding walkway, and sheltering under the ice ridge of the frozen waterfall when they passed the center. Even when they were exposed, only a few concentrated volleys of Battle Meditation-assisted arrows snuck through. The wizards died, but not enough to slow them.

  At the head of the column marched six wizards with bears for Familiars. Each was a hulking man with bulging muscles, a few feet taller than Pirin. They held a battering ram between them.

  He couldn’t fight five-hundred Flares at once, and he couldn’t reveal himself openly to the Dominion yet.

  “Can we break the waterfall down, so we fire freely on the walkway?” Pirin asked. “The Dominion soldiers are hiding under the ice, and those wizards are sheltering under it.”

  “We could,” Teanor said. “But that would use the last of our alchemical bombs. Nothing for the trebuchets except plain rubble..”

  “Will that matter if they breach the gate and take the wall?”

  “I suppose not.” Teanor nodded. “We’ll blast the waterfall free.”

  Pirin helped lug alchemical bombs up to the wall, then joined the soldiers as they lowered the rune-etched barrels down onto the waterfall’s mouth—the culvert in the wall that it would’ve flowed through in the summer. It’d flow again next year, too. The barrels were heavy, even with his enhanced body, and it took four Sirdians or two weavelings to carry them.

  They gathered the barrels from all across the wall, then made a heap on the waterfall. Pirin jumped down off the embankment on the inside of the wall, then landed on the frozen river and crawled out to the culvert. He reached through and set his hand on a smaller detonation barrel, then fuelled the runes.

  As soon as the barrel ignited, he pushed the blast outward with a Winged Fist, shielding himself and the wall. His Essence, and the chain reaction of bombs, filled the runes of entire payload.

  They detonated at once, cleaving through the top of the waterfall. Shards of ice rained down on the walkway, and steam rose high up into the air. The main flow of the waterfall let out a hollow crack, then leaned. Without the frozen top to support it, the base crumbled, and the top leaned.

  The entire five-hundred-foot column of ice fell outward. It plummeted into the Dominion army, and soldiers scrambled to flee the impact zone. Shards fell on the wizards, and though they deflected most with techniques, a hunk of ice smashed away a cluster of wizards near the end of the column.

  With free reign to fire over the walkway, all the archers turned their attention to the wizards, and any of the weavelings on the wall through their spears.

  But it wasn’t enough. By the time they reached the gate, there were still nearly two-hundred wizards left. All Flares, all approaching the gate.

  “Keep them busy deflecting arrows!” Pirin shouted. “I’ll hold the gate!”

  Whether he revealed himself or not, he had to hold the gate as long as he could.

  He ran down to the cavern, where the army of weavelings stood. They took fighting positions, pointing their spears and interlocking their shields.

  A boom rattled out through the cavern. The gates shuddered and creaked, and debris tumbled off the pile.

  “Weavelings!” Pirin shouted. “They’re breaking that gate down! The Dominion will make it through, but we won’t let them through. There will be wizards, but you’ve trained to fight them, and you can win. There are more of us, and if we work together, we can destroy them. Fight for your freedom. Fight so you don’t have to be slaves ever again!”

  More likely, they’d be executed with the rest of us, Gray commented.

  “Oh, stuff the cynicism. It’s the dragon talking,” Pirin whispered.

  If it works, I suppose.

  The weavelings lifted their spears higher and widened their stances. It was working.

  Pirin and Gray ran to the front of the army, and the weavelings parted to allow him through. He pulled off his mask, then prepared a Shattered Palm.

  The gate bulged, then splintered. With one final push, the bear wizards on the outside of the door slammed their battering ram into the gate. The doors cracked and swung inward, sending shards of wood and an avalanche of debris tumbling into the room.

  The weavelings didn’t flinch. With a shout, they took a step forward, then planted their shields.

  Dominion wizards poured through the opening, flinging out techniques and brandishing weapons. A menagerie of Familiars charged alongside them. Those with larger predatory animals led the charge, using fortification techniques on top of their already enhanced bodies.

  Pirin unleashed a Shattered Palm to push them back. It knocked a swath off their feet and flung them over the edge of the walkway on the other side of the gate, then activated the Fracturenet.

  He moved between the Dominion wizards, punching and kicking and throwing them. They landed a few blows, but with his techniques active, they didn’t do as much damage as they would have otherwise.

  When his pure Essence ran out, he used the Charge in his pauldron to convert a little more, enough to use a Shattered Palm once again, but that was half his Essence gone. If he kept using it all, he’d have nothing to fight Lord Three with.

  The weavelings, at great cost, took down three quarters of the wizards, but they were nearly at the back of the hall, and mortal Dominion foot soldiers were pushing through.

  Pirin switched to his gnatsnapper Essence, then used a puff of wind to launch himself to the back of the hall, like he was swimming through the air. He landed beside Skell. “Give the order,” he said. “Retreat.”