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The Feri War
Chapter 24
My body might be in the air on Wren-eagle's back, but my astral self was walking alongside Commander Fiori and her band. I didn't want to draw attention to myself so I stayed invisible.
'The encampment is up ahead,' Rhett said, 'why...?'
'What?' Fiori asked.
'I don't detect any fires, or hear any movements. By now we should be experiencing both.'
'The warlocks are there, though. The storm of emotions pelting my mental shield is palpable,' Nick said.
'They're downwind. I can't smell them,' River said.
'Make no mistake, they know we're coming, Fiori. Engaging the Gollums must have triggered the alarm,' Malik said.
'No. I think they knew we were coming even before that,' Fiori said.
'How? Do you think Doug and his people betrayed us?' Malik said.
'I don't think they did,' Maya said, 'although, I did have the odd sensation of being watched back in Dougsfort.'
Alessa gasped. 'I felt it too. I thought it was just me!'
'Rye felt it too. I can still feel his uneasiness about the presence,' Nick said with a smirk in his voice. Yeah. He knew I was there. Alessa too knew. She tried very hard to suppress a giggle. I was about to respond but something stopped me. Something had triggered Nick's empathy. His mind throbbed with alarming colourful flashes.
'Fiori, we're being corralled,' he said.
'I know. Notice how they are keeping their distance. They are pushing us into what I suspect is a trap.'
'What should we do?' An alarmed Maya said.
'Let's push on. This is exactly what we want,' Fiori confidently replied.
The enemy warlocks flanking us didn't engage, confirming Fiori's trap assumption. They were cautious because they knew we had shifters and other sensory types of warlocks. Therefore, they kept to a good distance and used glamour stones. But they didn't account for Nickolas. With his empath abilities, he could detect anyone within his empathic radius; glamour stones or not. When the encampment came into view, Fiori halted causing everyone to do the same. 'This is as far as we would go. They've waited for us. Now we wait and let them come to us. They've doused their fire for us not to see them so let's show them where we are. Fire warlocks! Light them up!'
In pure amazement, I watched as more than a dozen fire warlocks from our company released countless fireballs toward the enemy camp. For a moment there, I thought I was experiencing one of those medieval movie night scenes, where fire arrows rained down on the battlefield. Everything from tents, turfs, carts, and people was on fire. Two warlocks have to help another who was ablaze. One rolled him to the ground and the other threw dirt. The encampment was in chaos.
However, not everyone was in a panic. The fires did a lot of damage, but they also revealed the massive barrier of armed men spread before us right outside the perimeter of the encampment. Strange, I could feel them but couldn't see them even with my feri vision until the fire touched them. Stoic like bronze status, their gaze locked on to us. Three men astride horses led the enemy forces. They looked fierce and menacing, especially the one who effortlessly deflected a fireball as if he was merely swatting a bug.
A cold shiver washed over me. This is bad!
'Maya,' Fiori said.
As soon as she heard her name Maya pulled out a slingshot. Quizzically, I watched as she released several tiny projectiles both at the enemy and the camp. She was joined by the other mystics.
'What're those?' River said at the same time his twin said, 'What're they doing?'
'We're ready?' Maya said to Fiori. But before our fierce commander could give the command, the ground beneath our feet began to rumble.
'Maya? Are you doing this?'
'No!' Both Maya and Alessa said in unison.
'The warlocks,' Alessa said, 'they are charging!'
'They've figured out our weakness,' Fiori said. 'Closing the distance between them and us would mean less long-range attack.'
'So they hope to overwhelm us with numbers,' Malik said.
The thundering noise of feet hitting dirt intensified. Yet, there were no war cries. How come?
'With our combined powers, the mystics and I could wipe out half of their forces before they can reach us. Just give us the go-ahead Fiori,' Malik said.
Fiori exhaled deeply before releasing it with a heavy sigh. 'I'm afraid I can't let you do that. Rye asked for minimal casualties and that's what we're giving him.'
'What do we do then?' Reed said.
'Trust in your Commander and stop asking questions.' She turned towards the troops. 'Shifters! Take your beast forms and charge now! The rest of you keep them at volley with whatever you've got.'
Without any hesitation, the shifters shifted and rushed to meet the oncoming warlocks. I saw a few grins before the shift, which told me they were eager to get some action. Enemy warlocks deployed their fires as our fire warlocks tried to deflect them as much as they could. A fireball fell right between Nick and Fiori. Cleverly, Nick transformed it into a wall to block the enemy coming from behind us. It had the desired effect but they had their magic which they were using to penetrate through.
'This won't last long. Alessa, the time is now. Do your thing,' he yelled.
Alessa released an energy ball into the sky right above us. Guiding it with her hands, it enlarged while descending all around us creating a dome-like structure. She created a shield. A shield powerful enough to withstand the enemy blasts.
'Good job,' Fiori said.
'Wow! That was a neat trick. But the shifters are going through without trouble. Doesn't that also mean the enemy could come right in?' Blackburn, Fiori's second in command said.
'They won't. I registered our core signatures into the shield. Only we can go through it.'
Impressive! While I've created shields a few times myself, Alessa's won't hold for long. For that, she should have used azurite or pure ferilight energy.
"We don't need it to last, Rye," Nick thought. "We only need to delay them long enough to buy you guys time to accomplish your part of the mission. Now go. I don't know how much longer we can hold here."
I couldn't argue with that because he was right. I nodded and phased out.
"Welcome back, sleepy head," Wren thought. I scolded him. This wasn't the time to be joking.
'Looks like Fiori has everything under control down there,' Eric said.
'It looks like it, but I'm not too sure,' I replied. 'I think we should make a move too if we want them to stay in one piece.'
'Understandable. Unfortunately, we have an obstacle standing in our way,' Eric said.
'Our cover is blown.'
'What happened?!'
'The sentries spotted us because of the fireworks down there.'
That was troublesome. 'What do we do now?'
Just then we heard a commotion down on the battlefield. Cries of men in distress. My heart skipped a bit when I thought it was our men. But then I saw the source of the commotion through my feri vision. Huge trees have sprung from the ground and attached the enemy warlocks. Men after men were immobilized by creeping vines as if they had been caught in spider silk.
Maya!
So that was what the projectiles were for; seeds. I watched as Maya and her sisters expertly manipulated the trees like puppets. It showed how powerful and skilled the mystics were.
"Frightening isn't it," Wren thought. I couldn't agree more.
We circled the battlefield away from the city. We have to come up with a plan fast because I don't think Fiori and the others could last long. It so happened that more men from the enemy camp were joining the fray.
What was left now is our part of the mission. How do we get past the sentries?
"Rye look! Reinforcement! Doug and the Renegades have finally made it," Wren said. "Huh! Ferard managed to destroy the mud monsters."
Sure enough, I spotted Doug forging his way through the battlefield. And it looked like he was heading straight for the generals on horseback. One of the generals saw him and dismount. He too made his way toward Doug. They clashed with blows and kicks. I realized that their fight was on a personal level. Didn't know what happened but they were dishing it out now. Wren-eagle was moving, so I lost track of them in the throng.
I was busy scanning the battlefield when Wren abruptly banged left. "Watch it!"
"Sorry, atsa. The sentries are firing arrows at us."
"Rye, connect me with the others," Seth projected. He was in eagle form so he couldn't speak normally.
"What is it, Seth?" Eric said.
"I may have a plan if you don't have one," he said. "Dale and I would attack the east sentry tower while Kaia and Robin take the west one, leaving you free to approach the city."
"They already know we're coming, so I'm pretty sure they're on high alert. Breaking up now will be to our disadvantage."
"Let's take the posts one by one then," Seth said.
"Worth a try," Kaia said.
"Ok then, let's take the western post first," Eric said.
According to Seth, another eagle shifter by the name of Evin was their strongest and fastest flier. His job was to taunt the sentry guards, while we sneak up on them. The plan was easy enough but putting it into practice was proving to be difficult. For one, the sentries were using bows and arrows. Nothing special until I realized they didn't have quivers. They were conjurors and could conjure and shoot fifty arrows per minute. Thus shooting thirty-five more arrows than a typical archer can under a minute. But I have to give it to Evin. He was fast; and agile. Although, there were a few close calls that increased my blood pressure to breaking point.
However, the guards saw through our ploy and shoot down one of the eagle shifters. She was caught mid-air by a fellow shifter but she couldn't fly with a bruised wing. I had to teleport her to safety.
We tried attacking the sentry tower a few more times using different tactics each time. Alas, they all failed. And I believed our focus was beginning to wane and our desperation was beginning to show. As a consequence, we lost three more eagles in the process.
"I think it's time to level up," Wren projected. I saw what he intended to do and kind of agree. I called one of the rider-less eagle shifters over and teleported to her back, leaving Wren free to do his thing.
'What's going on, Rye,' Robin said from her mate's back.
I didn't get to explain because they all witnessed Wren's transformation into a mighty dragon.
"Yeah!" Seth cheered in his mind.
We pulled back and watched as Wren-dragon made a beeline for the western sentry tower. They shot at him but his skin was too tough for their arrows. He landed on the tower and dug a hole in the roof before breathing fire into it. The guards hastily vacated the structure. One even jumped out the window.
We cheered!
Wren-dragon wasn't done yet. He launched himself into the air and flew towards the eastern sentry tower. On his way, he rained fire on the enemy troops getting ready to enter the fray down on the battlefield.
He set the eastern tower ablaze before returning to us. "I'll get rid of the sentry posts around the city. You guys stay back until the coast is clear." I relayed his message to the others and watched him off.
Wren destroyed all the sentry posts around the walls virtually without any resistance. Just as we entered the city limit, I felt Charlie's core. He was in the largest and tallest building in front of the city square where four dozen warriors stood waiting. Amongst them was a large object covered with drapes. Frankly, I dismissed it as something trivial. But I was wrong. As Wren-dragon approached, the drapes were pulled off to reveal some sort of contraption which bore the resemblance of a giant crossbow.
A paralyzing fear washed over me. Wren!
Before I could get the word out, they've already fired. I yelled with tears in my eyes. That was why I missed the part where the projectile opened into a huge net and engulfed the dragon. Wings restricted, Wren-dragon could no longer stay airborne. He roared and furiously spat fire as he fell to the paved courtyard. Immediately, the warlocks rushed to subdue him further with magically imbued ropes.
Seth screeched and swopped down at top speed. He grabbed the first warlock he could get hold of and released him halfway back up. During that time, Dale was already on the ground in beast form. He leaped from Seth's back. The fierce tiger took down two warlocks before I teleported all the eagle-riders to the courtyard to help.
We fought them off Wren as Robin work her magic. She was an earth elemental, she used the soil from the cracks between the pavement bricks to disenchant the warlock's rope. It took some time and we had her back.
A warlock rushed to intercept Robin and I sent him flying a few meters off. I was a bit too rough but I didn't care at this point. Two more warlocks closed in on me and I did the same to them. I heard a yelp nearby followed by snarls. Eric was in trouble!
I turned to go to his rescue when a whisper brushed against my ear. "He's here. Rye, he's here."
Instinctively, I looked up.
A miracle!
Fluttering down from heaven, a host of angels descended on us.
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End of chapter 24