A kick from a squawking cassowary hurled Cress back, but it failed to pierce her jacket. She responded with a bolt of lightning that took off its head in a spray of blood, and staggered back into the fight.
Flame flared from Ignatius, spiralling into the goblins as they surged forward once again, blinding them. Tosk added a jagged streak of electric blue, hurling the frontrunners into those behind in a tangle of limbs and clubs. In the brief respite, Fletcher took the opportunity to concentrate on his scrying crystal, the overlay showing him the full picture of the battlefield.
The two orcs were holding their own against the Wendigo, while Isadora’s team stayed hidden in the bushes, keeping the goblins at bay with the liberal use of spells. It depleted their mana reserves, but was a winning strategy; dozens of the convoy’s corpses littered the ground and the rest were huddled behind the bodies of the rhinos, which had already been dispatched. Of the fifty mounted goblins that had started, no more than a score remained. Even the hyenas were dead, their heavyset bodies splayed out in a macabre slumber.
That was when it all went wrong. One of the remaining orcs broke from the pack, bolting into the jungle. With Lysander out of the picture and Sariel locked in a life-and-death struggle out of sight, Fletcher had no choice but to leave his team.
‘No survivors,’ he yelled over his shoulder.
Then he was deep in the forest, following the sound of crashing branches as the orc tore its way through the undergrowth. The air was suddenly still and silent, disturbed only by a poorly aimed spell whiffling through the leaves above. He sensed Ignatius following behind but did not have time to wait for him. Instead, he instructed Athena to remain above the battle and watch for more runaways. From her vantage point, he could see that Solomon had taken his place in the line, using a small sapling as a club to batter the goblins and cassowaries aside.
In the new quiet, the adrenaline began to leave Fletcher, his cheek stinging with each pulse of his rapidly beating heart. He was bone tired and his lungs burned in his chest. Still he staggered on, ignoring the flies that buzzed around his head, hungry for the salt in the blood and sweat that coated him.
He followed the crash and snap of the retreating orc, wishing he had thought it all through. The two orcs had battled the Wendigo without difficulty. Now he would face one alone.
There was a rattle of disturbed vegetation, then a grey-skinned orc appeared just ahead, cleaving at a thick patch of thorny branches with his macana club. Up close it was enormous, towering over him. He thought it as broad and muscular as Berdon and Jakov put together.
Fletcher didn’t hesitate. He leaped with his khopesh in both hands, the point aimed squarely at the centre of the orc’s back. It missed the spine by a hand’s breadth, spitting the orc through its midriff, the resistance a fraction of what Fletcher had expected.
He yelled with triumph as the orc stiffened, a guttural bellow spraying heart-blood on the leaves ahead of it. Then Fletcher’s head exploded with pain and his mouth was filled with the taste of rotting leaves and blood. The orc had spun, backhanding him into the ground and tearing the khopesh from his hands, leaving it impaled in its chest.
A callused foot slammed into the earth beside him as he rolled away, just in time. He fired a kinetic pulse, blasting himself from the earth to stand once again. No sooner was he on his feet than he was diving aside, the macana chopping through the air in a great, swinging arc. He sprawled into the thorny bush that had blocked the orc, his jacket caught on the hooked barbs, arms spread like a crucified man.
Bloody froth bubbled from the orc’s mouth as it bellowed in triumph, lifeblood pumping from around the blade in its chest in dark gouts. It raised the macana, chuckling throatily as it lifted Fletcher’s chin with the flat of the club. The obsidian shards on the tip dug into the soft flesh of his throat as the orc leaned forward, almost gently. His would not be a slow death.
Ignatius barrelled out of the undergrowth, a sweeping tidal wave of flame heralding his arrival as he landed on the orc’s head. His tail struck like a scorpion’s, stabbing madly at the orc’s eyes, nose and mouth, while the flames flowed over its face in great pulsing waves. Fletcher tugged himself free, ripping the coat from the thorns’ embrace after a few moment’s struggle. It was just in time, for the orc chopped blindly at him, even managing to slice a button from Fletcher’s sleeve. Then it was finished, the orc falling to its knees and keeling over, the last spurts of blood from its chest turning into a trickle.
Ignatius sprung into Fletcher’s arms, mewling with sympathy and licking at the wounds in his throat. They stood like that for a while, basking in the glory of being alive. Fletcher’s neck stung as Ignatius lapped his tongue along the wounds, but soon the feeling was strangely soothing. He ran his fingers along his neck tentatively, only to find the wounds had gone.