Dragon Aster Trilogy

41: PHOENIX RISING



Kas sent out the orders for the Packs to intercept the approaching Falls army, and they were carried by the voices of the ayame. Once the Callers were in sync with each other, the Packs moved forward. Their low voices flowed with the energies of the Animus Threads in the Triage Woods, but collided with their targets that were not of estus energy. It took only moments for it to be determined how many they were against, and exactly where they were.

It wouldn’t matter how much the Falls used their chemicals and smoke to hide in the forest, for even if the phelan had no sight, scent or hearing, they would still be able to find their enemies by psi sonar. But it made their Callers the enemy’s primary target, and the lines had to be kept tight.

Kas sent his psi to Ishtar, as the minds of the older ayame were under the most stress. They had the younger, more reckless of the Packs, as they could adjust better to their mistakes. When an overlooked griffin jumped her from a tree overhead, she stopped her Call to quickly kill it. Her Pack came back shaken, and after she scolded them fiercely, they returned to the fight. Are you hurt?

“My Bond will eat them at the end of this.”

I am sorry that I had to separate you from him.

Jasper came to a stop beside Kas, making sure that their psi’s of Ishtar’s condition matched. “There are a lot more than I originally thought.”

“I know,” Kas replied as he took from one of his Custos an injured phelan somnus. He quickly used his aeri to heal his broken arm, before urging him back to the fight. “Will we be able to handle it?”

“With the help of the True, I believe so. But it would be so much easier if we could communicate with them. The Aeger has most, if not all of them, and I can’t make out what they say any more than they can me,” Jasper explained. “If we had the Caelestis—”

“Just deal with it,” Kas interrupted.

Jasper didn’t argue, and ran back towards the fight. His given Caller was young, and depended on him the most to keep the rest of the Pack in order.

So far, everything was working to their favor, as the griffins had only a few phelan with them and no Callers of their own. Even when a massive explosion took out the Sanctus, Kas forced himself to stay calm and remember that his mother’s home was just a trap in the battle plan of it all. He had been right to not underestimate Solar’s wrath, and the Falls likely counted on her taking out the Sanctus and turning their attentions backwards, instead of forward.

But there was no one but Gei behind him.

Shots were fired not far from where he had come to a stop, as the True collided with the Falls and their Tech. They overturned the enemy’s cannons and lured the gunfire to their massive forms. Then his Custos worked to take out the resulting chaos they created by sheer terror.

Kas continued forward when the clear was Called. A bullet struck a tree beside Kas, and he dodged behind it as two more followed. Unsheathing his blade, he moved like a shadow and cut down his two griffin somnus attackers. They collapsed to the ground in a spray of blood, and he looked ahead as a stranger Call went out.

One of the Callers collapsed. It disrupted the others for a while, as they all tried to discern what was silencing the Threads of communication between their psis. Kas knew what before they could see it. The Phoenix had caught up in the Keol under them, and its radiation knew no barriers as it had already started to burn away the Animus Threads around them.

The Packs scattered space between them, as the eerie cry of the fire serpent shattered the last voices from the ayame. Then it erupted from the ground moments later. The phelan it had nearly struck recovered quickly, and lunged at the mass of fire, before the Phoenix’s sheer size threw them against the ground and trees. Then it twisted around the trees and used its fire and strength to bring the forest down. With it, more Threads burned, separating the Callers and the Packs from each other.

Kas took cover behind a fallen tree, as the Phoenix took to the air, sending a wave of fire out in all directions as it did. When it passed, he quickly sent out his psi in search of his Callers, but the psi lines had been completely burned away.

They were now fighting this war blind.

Kas closed his eyes as the shattering of bones and trees from the Fall’s cannons made it hard to focus on anything else. He thought of Sybl and how if they lost here, they would go where she was in the Efereal Mountains.

With every True that fell, another one took up its place with an even stronger fury. The massive, wolf-like creatures made short work of the griffins who didn’t expect the Eminor spirits of the Triage Woods to become physical enough to kill them. But even with the True, they were still outnumbered three to one.

They had to reach Atrum City before they ran out of time, or lives to fight with. But Time was slowly freezing to a stop and reversing, as Kas’ strength was waning. He remembered how the air, and how everything had felt when the Sylvan Tower had exploded. He remembered the magnificent Sylvan City being decimated by the rain of fire that fell on it afterwards. Now it was happening all over again, despite their refusal to surrender against the absolution of Fate coming full circle.