Spells, a mage block. Sorcery too. A sword be parried, an arrow dodged, a blow be withstood. The Gods mighty onry be fled from. Alsaria beams of light are predictable, even Neneria’s tremendous powers of Death be powered through with will.

  Not Luck.

  Excerpt from a Great War letter, written by Goddess Kassandora, of War. Never delivered, intercepted by Leona, Goddess of Luck.

  Pepayel Regional, Southern Karaina. A grand monstrosity of carved steel and flowing gss serving the cities of Yaku, Eravan and Tlizi as well as their adjoining towns. The rgest airport in the province, and the surrounding ones, flinging several million people into the sky annually and receiving just as many. It carved the ground around it as if instead of being built by men, a colossus had simply dropped a toy onto the earth. That, and the fact it may as well have been a fortress: Southern Karaina had an Anarchia problem, and the airport showed it.

  The military did thanks to Pantheon Peace; Ilwin only kories of what grand camps looked like from the stories his grandfather told him, but if there ever was a military instaltion, it would be Pepayel Regional. Tall walls of steel beams surrouhe airport, there was no easy entra the reason he had taken direand of this operation. The other teams had it easy, they could simply ram through the barriers and drive straight onto the runway to hijack a pne.

  Here, even the maintee was a crete castle. There was no driving through it. “Everyone, disembark, ons at the ready.” Ilwihe passenger seat and looked back at his voy. Five bck cars, all rge enough to carry seven men and their equipment fortably. His soldiers started to leave. Some wore shirts, others suits, a few in simple vests. There were shorts and trousers, boots of leather, sneakers and trainers. Some wsses, others hats, other kept their heads bare. The only thing uniting them were bck ribbons around the arm. The marks of Anarchia.

  Ilwin himself had donned a suit, sleek and bck, with a white shirt. He was an elf, he had to dress formally, it ractically in his genes. He felt the sword hanging from his belt and the dozen throwing daggers in his suit. A few months ago, he would have sidered himself detly armed, now that he had seen Mikhail’s iions, it may as well have been travelling he rest of the men must have felt it too, they bore sword and club and axe and bow, but no one smiled.

  Ilwin lit up his cigarette and put his dark gsses on as guards from the airport came out to watch them. They had stunning clubs in their hands. From their side, no one smiled either. Why would they? They had e exg that they were Anarchia’s men. One of the guards, a tall fellow in a blue jacket, his club hanging from his belt came up to Ilwin. “Civilians are prohibited from parking here.”

  There was an obvious threat and a begging in his tone. A simple warning to turn around and not have the situatioe. Ilwin looked down on the man and sighed. This was it, the dam holding back violearted to crack. The point of urn. He lifted his hand, two fingers raised, and flicked the air twice.

  An arrow suddenly pierced the man’s chest. The guards behind him fell just as quickly.

  The dam shattered. A flood of violence desded onto the maintee as his men raced forwards.

  Leona closed her eyes as a sudden thought came into her head. ‘Terminal Two, Maintee’. She came to a stop. She let go of Alice’s hand and poiowards the croath cleared for them as people simply started to move out of their way. There was nuiding them, nor winds pushing them, they simply realised they should not stand where they were just stood.

  Leona took her first step, her face full of sorrow. It was just her luck to be dragged here.

  Ilwin lit up anarette as the final cry died down in the mainteower. He stepped over a corpse and clicked his earpiece. “Spear thrust plete. Drivers and pilots return to the cars.” He looked down at the corpse and blew some smoke out. How was a man not supposed to smoke in this line of work? A stream of blood from another corpse finally reached it. It cracked with sparks and then short-circuited. His earpiece clicked.

  “We’re locked out of the system.” It was one of the teis.

  “How long for a reset?” Ilwin asked, the response came immediately.

  “Ten, twenty minutes.” Too long. ge of pns.

  “Don’t bother. Saboteur team, crack the gate.”

  “Aye aye Captain.” One of the sabos replied. Ilwin finished half the smoke in one drag and asked himself the question again. How was a man not supposed to smoke in this line of work? He made his way back through the corridors, the white tiles now reddened with cracks and blood, his finger on his ear.

  “Casualty report.”

  “None in the pilot team.” Good, they were the most important.

  “One man stunned, Saboteur team.”

  “ you get him up?” Ilwin asked.

  “We gave him adrenaline, he’s ing to.”

  “Good. Drivers?”

  “None.”

  “Medics?”

  “One man dead, heart attack. Two more stunned.” Ilwin finished his cigarette and flicked it away. It is what it is. Deaths weren’t to be hoped for, but they were expected. Down to thirty-four. He checked up on the saboteurs as they started to pull out their equipment. The maintee was a heavy piece of steel. It was thick, but there was only o could be cracked open.

  Four men in loose shorts and summer shirts fiddling around with wires as they ected bricks of explosives to the steel. “How long?” Ilwin asked.

  “y seds.” The elf hat was more like it.

  “Get back to the car and then blow it.”

  “Yes Sir.”

  Leona stopped at the thick gss overlooking the maintee building of Terminal Two. There. She was sure of it. Logically, there was no reason for her to be sure, the crete walls around the airport were too high to see anything. But she was sure. “Alice.” She said.

  “Yes?”

  “Close your eyes.”

  Thoughts from nowhere appeared in her head.

  Three.

  Two.

  One.

  The building before Leona buckled and cracked as an explosion silehe crowd. A cloud of dark smoke burst from the entrance. Owo… five cars dashed out of that smoke. Leona took a sigh and shook her head.

  This was her responsibility. This was her duty. She fell against the gss and started to cry, then wail. She wasn’t a Maisara or an Alsaria. Why did things like this always appear before her? She didn’t want to kill people. She was Lady Luck. She was supposed t fortune and happiness, not…

  “Faster!” Ilwin shouted to the driver, a man in a pink shirt and a cap with green shorts. And sandals. Fug sandals. Who wears sandals to a p? “FASTER FASTER FASTER!” He shouted again. Pepayel Regional started to bre with sirens. They had minutes now. Already a response force was assembling. The pnes being boarded by people stopped and more security came in to corral the civilians away.

  Ilwin clicked his earpiece. “All cars to their respective hangars. Runway is first e, first serve. Don’t block it.”

  “Uood!”

  Ilwin’s own team was to take the pnes amed Vulture One and Tair of enormous transport pnes used to parachute relief materials when roads were washed away. What Arascus wahem for, Ilwin wasn’t told. The rag voy split up half way down the runway, each car heading to its own hangar. Ilwin checked his watch. Four minutes sihey arrived at Pepayel, thirty seds sihe explosion. They had maybe ten more before the airport was swarmed by security forces.

  Leona waved her hand as aear left her golden eyes.

  Ilwin’s driver suddenly started let go of the pedal and smmed his foot back down. “It’s stuck!” He shouted.

  “WHAT?” Ilwin respond as the vehicle started to accelerate.

  “IT’S STUCK!” The driver screamed again as he pressed the brake, the car screeched as it fell into aeer; the back tyres lost tra and started drawing two slick bck lines along the tarmac. “BRACE!” Was all the driver could say before the side of the vehicle smmed into one of the hangars.

  Gss shattered, airbags gave out and Ilwin smmed into the mao him. He had braced, but even with that brace it felt as if it would be a good while before his arm returo standard funing. “Everyone alive?” He shouted. A series of lethargic affirmations answered from behind. The driver was not so lucky.

  A se of the vehicle had crumbled against the hangar and the man’s head had painted wall just outside the window red. Thirty-three me. He clicked his earpiece. “Everyone made it?” Two of the teams made it, two more reported issues: ohe tyres had been torn to shreds and another had stalled. “Run then!” Ilwin shouted, more at himself for not iing the vehicles than at any of them. His fingers finally regained trol of themselves and grabbed the door handle.

  Leona took a breath as she watched one of the cars crash. She closed her eyes a around for a oint on the gss. Of all people, she should be able to find it.

  Ilwin shakily stepped out of the car and fondled his pockets for a cigarette. Two humans were watg him from ihe hangar. Simply maintenance workers, in bck pants and neon-yellow jackets. They where there, dumbstruck, as the rest of Ilwin’s team got out of the car.

  Ilwin’s lighter took six attempts to get a fme going. He took a deep drag and his earpiece clicked on. “Sed team, first jet secured, runway clear?”

  “Clear.” Ilwin responded. “Yood to do.”

  “Affirmative.”

  A crag sound made his head spin. A crack appeared in one of the great gss panels in the main building. Another one. A third, and the gss cracked into a thousand pieces. His eyes instantly picked out the culprit.

  A blonde womaiful like no other, with golden eyes. Calm golden eyes, ced with tears but looking straight at Ilwin. She was tall, maybe even taller than Ilwin himself, although not by much. She stood there in simply clothes, a dress fit for young girl. A car horn sounded and the crowd behind that woman finally awoke into all flees and screams.

  The woman took a step and fell off the edge.

  Leona closed her eyes as she fell through the air. A sudden wind spun her mid air and she nded on the roof of a moving vehicle – a blue car for the security here. She bounced, slid across the tarmad stood up. Her head was starting tain. The car came to a stop and two guards burst from the doors. “Are you alright?!”

  She waved to them, colpsed aomach emptied today’s breakfast onto the ground.

  The two maintenance workers turned and fled when Ilwin started to march towards them. “Leave them.” The elf said when he saw his men start to rush forwards. Everything had started to g today. “Board the pne and take off.” He pressed the earpiece. “Status?”

  “Two pnes in the air; team three-first jet is waking for team two to finish up.” Two pnes in three minutes, what terrible timing. The elf turned back to his own men.

  “How’s the status on the Vultures?”

  “First pne is ready to set off, pwo has a leak!” Ilwin had never believed in luck, but today, his luck was exceptionally unfortunate.

  Leona fihrowing up as another p off. That was the fourth one. She pushed the guards trying to help her away and straightened. Being the shortest Divi was always odd to see people looking up at her.

  Ilwin scrambled to the pilot’s cockpit as the two pilots on his team started to fiddle with the ucopia of fshing lights, blinking buttons and levers in the pne. For all Ilwin uood, it was a sole of bck magic. “Fuelled up.” One of the pilots said, this man had chosen a simple jacket. The other embarrassed himself entirely with some ridiculous shirt that had a picture of some cartoon girl.

  “Wing checks plete.”

  “All good to go Captain.”

  “Go.” Ilwin anded as he lit up anarette.

  Leona watched the 77-T transport aircraft slowly emerge from its hangar. The security here was useless, they swarmed the pne like ants and then darted out of the way when it wouldn’t open its doors.

  Her head started to spin as she stopped midway through the runepayel had eight tracks, but only three were accessible from these hangars. Trucks blocked the other two, this was the only route for whoever these people were. They wore bands of Anarchia, but she knew already they weren’t hers; No reason in particur, her mind simply told her they weren’t.

  The huge pne rolled out of its hangar. It may as well have been a creeping building; two huge wings, two ealler than Leona under each wing. It ainted white and blue, as if those colours were supposed to make the behemoth less imposing.

  It started to pick up speed as Leona stood there. Her mind searched for a fault. Not an engine failure, she didn’t want to cause an explosion here. Something smaller… something weaker…

  “Captain, there’s a woman oracks.” One of Ilwin’s pilots replied.

  “Will she damage the pne?”

  “She… ahhh…” The pilots shared a quick look. “She’ll dirty the wheels.”

  “Then accelerate, straight through her.” Ilwin said as he stared through the gss. It was the same woman who had watched them from the gss. Who was she? “Pig up speed. Twenty, thirty…” A creaking sound silehe captain.

  “What was-“ Ilwin’s words were cut off by the suddenly lurg downwards. He was thrown into the air and then barely mao hold himself on his feet: human reflexes would have not ma. A red light started fshing above the window. Then another, a third. The whole sole turned red. “WHAT WAS THAT?”

  “The…” Another crash as the cockpit hit ground. Steel tearing at tarmac screamed throughout the airport. “We’ve lost the front wheel.”

  “WHAT?”

  “It fell off Sir.”

  Ilwin looked through the window, they were slowing down now as the pore its underbody on the runway. The woma over, vomited and stood back up, wiping spit from her mouth and tears from her eyes. She watched them through the gss.

  Leona did not a move an inch. She khe pne would e to a stop before it hit her.

  It did.