Ella climbed up to the wall and launched bolt after bolt from her wand, losing track of how many enemy warriors fell from the onslaught. Nearby she saw Layla calmly launch an arrow into a revenant’s eye; the barbarian twitched and was still. Attackers now grabbed hold of the wall and pulled themselves up over the fallen bodies of their fellows. Swords hacked down, leaving wriggling hands abandoned on the stone.
Soldiers tossed orbs into the wide hole, each explosion sending blood and bits of flesh sailing through the air. Still the revenants poured into the gap; Miro’s funneling strategy was working too well.
The hole swiftly became filled with twitching, climbing figures while the enemy warriors pushed from behind to plunge into the mess. A revenant made it past, and Ella saw High Lord Tiesto rush forward with a glowing sword to take the woman’s head clean off. Another reached the tower, and Ella increased the power of her wand, even as she saw the prism dim, sending a beam of light to punch a hole in its chest.
Soon, Ella knew, the trickle would become a flood.
Looking to the left Ella cried out as she saw a score of tall barbarians climb onto the wall and clamber over to the inside of the defenses. A dozen of the elite palace guard shot forward to close the gap, but their strength simply wasn’t enough. More revenants scrambled over into the breach as Ella sent flurries of golden bolts into their midst, but they moved so quickly she was having difficulty aiming. Sweat dripped down her brow, and her breathing was ragged. The pounding of her heart sounded louder than the roaring cannon on the nearby tower.
A figure in black threw himself against the barbarians. Jehral hacked and thrust at his enemy, but Ella could see he would soon be overwhelmed. And there was nothing she could do.
The ground began to shake.
Trees moved, and a colossus strode forward, knocking aside defenders and attackers alike, reaching down with its arm to smash and squeeze revenants into ruinous red. A second brigade of the palace guard arrived, and together they fought to close the breach. The colossus then moved to the gap between the walls and knocked down revenants as they climbed the hole to rush forward.
Couriers rushed along the line to take reports to the commanders. There was a moment of respite, and then Ella heard a trumpet screech: three long blasts.
Ella’s blood ran cold when she heard the order to retreat.
Miro knew what he was doing, and he knew these defenses were lost.
Ella realized she hadn’t heard the cannon for a while, and looking at the tower, she saw the pile of balls below the cannon was gone. Squinting at the next distant gap in the wall, she saw a colossus defending there also.
Bodies of Dunfolk, Alturans, Halrana, and free cities natives littered the ground, mingled with revenants, their runes sparking and fizzing as the energy left the corpses.
Past the front of the wall, at the distant edge of the killing ground, Ella saw the attackers regrouping for their next imminent wave.
“Fall back!” Ella heard the cry, taken up by the men around her. The soldiers grabbed weapons and ran.
Ella knew the plan; she and the other enchanters had their own part to play. They couldn’t afford to let the cannon fall into enemy hands. The plan was to destroy everything. Miro didn’t want his defenders facing their compatriots, brought back as revenants.
Ella rushed to the base of the tower and found the cube-shaped device. This runebomb wasn’t designed to roll; it was made to destroy.
Already the wall was nearly devoid of men. Ella ignored the revenants now surging forward as she scanned the base of the wall and saw the fresh dirt marking where they’d buried barrels of black powder.
Ella placed her fingers on the cube and spoke the activation sequence.
She looked up at the colossus manning the gap. “Run!” she called.
Perhaps the animator didn’t hear her. Or perhaps he decided to buy the defenders the time they needed with his life. As the enemy once more poured into the gap, the animator took his colossus to meet them.
Ella turned and sprinted back along the road toward Sarostar. Men and women in green silk ran at her side; the enchanters had played their part. Risking a glance over her shoulder, she saw the scrabbling revenants break against the colossus, clawing at the gigantic construct and climbing up the legs. More enemies climbed up to find the wall uncontested, roaring their triumph.
Behind Ella, the entire wall, at every part of its great length, fragmented in an instant as the buried explosives at the eighty-six emplacements blew in a detonation of dirt and flame.
The blast threw Ella flat on her face, and if she hadn’t been wearing her enchantress’s dress, she likely would have been killed. She picked herself up and glanced back.
They’d planned this carefully: Miro wanted to delay the enemy and rob them of potential new revenants. The earth had a new fissure, filled with rubble, an obstacle it would take the enemy days to clear.
Ella ran with the last of the stragglers, looking for the blockade she knew lay somewhere ahead.
Miro wasn’t trying to hold his defenses; he was trying to buy time. Ella knew the next part of the plan: a rolling retreat, along the road to Sarostar.
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