“Above you!” the Speakman shrieked.
Down from the cliff face behind them dropped several dozen fresh attackers, springing off the rocks like cats. Railing had only seconds to realize what had happened—they had used the screen of the previous attack to come up from behind—before they were all over him. He caught a glimpse of Farshaun going down, felled by a blow to the head. Beside him, Skint whirled away, quicker than he was, knives flashing. Then Railing’s crutch was knocked out from under him, and he was swarmed over by coarse, hairy bodies and borne to the ground.
But the wishsong saved him once more, reacting to the danger faster than he could think to command it, surfacing on its own to explode out of him and throw his attackers away. It happened so swiftly that it took him a moment to realize he was free again. Ignoring the pain in his broken leg, he scrambled up, using the crutch for leverage, and lashed out at the crouched forms. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Seersha’s magic ignite her attackers in bright blue flashes, setting them afire and sending them screaming into the night. A crush of the gnarled creatures had overwhelmed one of the Trolls. It fought to get free, veering dangerously close to the edge of the drop, then lost its balance and tumbled over the side, carrying its attackers with it.
The creatures were climbing up onto the ledge again, attacking from the front as well as dropping from the cliff face behind. The defenders were surrounded. Railing saw Seersha sweeping Druid Fire all along the edges of the cliff, trying to turn back these new attackers, to purge the entire front ranks. Skint and the last of the Trolls were standing shoulder-to-hip on his right, blocking the few who slipped past the Druid.
He swung back toward the overhang and found Farshaun on his feet again, struggling to break free from a pair of the attackers that had come down off the cliff face. They had his arms and were trying to wrench the staff from his hands. The boy dispatched both with quick bursts of the wishsong, his voice a hoarse shriek by now, his throat parched and raw. Quickly, he limped through the tangled bodies to stand next to the old Rover, reaching him just as a fresh wave of attackers scrambled over the cliff edge to his right and came at them.
“Stand fast,” he heard Farshaun say.
Tightening his resolve, he did so, summoning the magic of the wishsong one more time. But he was weakened from the struggle and the effort drained him of the last of his strength. There were too many of them. Then he saw Seersha mount a counterattack, flinging herself into the heart of this fresh assault, and he responded with a wild cry and a counterattack of his own. Magic flaring, he tossed aside the crutch and began advancing toward the spidery attackers in a steady shuffle. The pain in his leg was intense, but it caused him to focus on what he was doing, generating a raw strength of will that would not let him quit. Fire burned across the ledge from both directions as the Druid and the boy struggled against this fresh surge, hammering into it, slowing it, stopping it, and finally throwing it back.
The attackers broke and scattered the way they had come, leaving the ledge smoking and ash-clouded and littered with the dead.
Railing staggered awkwardly, barely able to stand. He scanned the precipice for signs of movement, then for signs of life, and found neither.
Seersha reached him a moment later and braced him, waiting for Farshaun to place his crutch back in his hands. “Better hold on to this,” she whispered. “We need you strong enough to stand and fight, Railing Ohmsford.” She exhaled sharply. “Without you, I think we’re lost.”
Farshaun helped steer him to where he could sit down, one arm around his shoulders. The old man was bleeding heavily from a head wound, and his clothing was ripped and bloodied. “Wicked little monsters, aren’t they?” he muttered.