An altar had been set up behind the command tent. A statue of a man made from petrified wood rested on top of a velvet cloth. His arms were thrown to the sky as tears ran down his face. Four nuns prostrated themselves before it.
Nel stumbled as she ceased the rapid fire glimpses. She rested one hand against the shield wall, glad that it was both solid and not disintegrating her. The last time she overtaxed her glimpses, she had passed out for three days.
She had been heavily injured then. Hopefully her passing out was due more to that than abusing her augur abilities.
“That way,” Nel said, only moving her hand a small fraction. She didn’t want to tip-off any watching augurs that she was pointing out a direction. “Beyond the prison wall, there’s a tent a half-mile out. Behind it an altar has been set up. The idol is there.”
Devon rubbed his hands together as a small grin spread across his face. “Excellent.”
“You better hurry,” Eva said with a small stumble of her own. She had her eyes shut and her face in a grimace. “I can feel my wards unraveling. It isn’t pleasant.”
“There are ward breakers, four of them. I don’t want to point. It might tip-off the augurs. They’re south of the tent near the wall.”
“We’ll worry about them after we get rid of the bigger threat. The wards going down is not the end of the world. Them deciding to hammer the building over and over again with that sky-beam could be..”
The Lord of Slaves reached out and touched another handful of specters. As they materialized in the mortal realm, the large, fractal demon started moving towards the exit. Three slaves ran out ahead of it.
They simply stood outside. Waiting.
Nothing happened.
Nel caught a quick glimpse of their command tent. All the little dots on the map had moved around. “They see you moving the big demon. Probably waiting for it to come out before they crack the sky.”
“Good.”
The map updated in real-time, though Nel kept her glimpses spaced apart. Small dots representing the three slaves moved out in all directions. Another few dots joined the first three in spreading throughout the paths in the prison. All were heading towards the wall closest to the order’s camp.
One of the leaders moved out of the tent. Nel increased the frequency of her glimpses. He spoke to the prostrated nuns before placing his hand on the idol’s head.
“They’re going to crack the sky.”
“Where at?”
Nel opened her eyes to give Devon a glare. “I don’t know that.”
“Whatever. Keep watching.”
Nel shook her head and immediately regretted the action. It made her queasy. She pushed it down and alternated glimpses between the idol and the augur with the map.
A bright light shot off from the idol’s hands, aiming straight into the sky. A high-pitched whine started once again, but far fainter this time. With a screech, four dots disappeared from the map.
“They just fired.”
“I know,” Devon said right as a large black dot sped out of their cell house.
Nel opened her eyes to find the fractal demon was, thankfully, gone. She caught it in a glimpse. Rather than the expected seizure, Nel felt the tiniest tingle of something being wrong. Despite the lack of pain, she chose to go back to the map rather than risk collapsing.
The large dot representing the fractal demon circled around once, picking up a few of the smaller, slave dots on the way.
Both the augur and the high inquisitor started moving with haste not present in their earlier actions. The inquisitor all but ran out to the idol once again. Nel noted that all four nuns had more than a little sweat building on their faces. Some had small patches showing through their habits.
Nel smiled in spite of herself, glad she’d never wear one of the stuffy outfits again. “They’re preparing to crack the sky again.”
“Damn,” Devon said through grit teeth. “I’d hoped it had a longer refractory period.”
“If you can get it close enough to their camp, they won’t risk–”
“Nope. Not going to make it.”
All four of the smaller dots dropped off the larger dot before it zoomed straight ahead. The dot vanished from the map a split-second after.
Nel staggered back against the shield wall as Devon fell on top of her. Eva’s claws gripped his shoulder as both girls helped him get steady on his feet.
“Are you alright, master?”
Devon brushed her off. “It’s still alive.”
“They removed the dot from the map.”
“There isn’t much left,” he said. He shook his head at himself as both the Lord of Slaves and the waxy demon moved up to the cell house exit. “I don’t want to experience that again. I almost lost control.”
“Please don’t,” Eva said. “I can’t dominate these demons. And the wards are slipping more and more. I’d bet they could actually enter the prison now and only experience discomfort.”
“I’m concentrating on getting rid of the idol before that happens.”
Nel cut in to their conversation. “They’re moving out to dispatch the four slaves you dropped. On foot, not cracking the sky.”
“Let them come. If they move past where the demon is rebuilding itself, all the better.”
“The muskets won’t have an effect on our shields, nor can they catch the nuns by surprise so long as they’re connected to the source.”
“Doesn’t matter.”
Nel frowned. He was sending those men to their deaths. Though they were already dead. And they might not be real men.
Leaning back against the shield, Nel took one last glimpse of the map before starting a brief rest. It would be a minute or two before the nuns reached the slaves. Two dots representing slaves were moving along the walls, looking for the ward breaker nuns, most likely.
They’d only be a momentary distraction, unless Nel was grossly underestimating their abilities.
Constant glimpsing had her feeling more dizzy than she’d felt in a long time. She decided to carry spare frankincense pellets and find some sort of portable incense burner in the future.
Neither Devon nor Eva were moving much. A quick glimpse showed the slaves moving about, so he had to be managing that somehow.
Eva, on the other hand, looked to be both sick and deep in concentration. Her wards were blood based, using a combination of Arachne’s blood and her own. Nel wasn’t certain on the specifics, but the wards must be tied to her far deeper than any standard thaumaturgical ward scheme. She had never heard of standard wards causing discomfort when taken down.
Taking a deep breath and letting it out as a slow sigh, Nel started up her rapid glimpsing once again.
First the map. It was largely unchanged from her previous glimpse. The few ghosts near the wall had vanished and the nuns were nearing the four undead outside their camp.
Nel switched her view to the soon to be ensuing battle.
Two of the undead were knight types. One wielded a mace while the other carried a massive sword in both hands. The other two carried guns. One looked fairly new, perhaps as late as the second World War.
They crested a small hill overlooking a waiting group of inquisitorial nuns. Three of them had a single gold bar over their shoulders while the fourth had triple stripes. While that did not automatically mean that nun was more powerful than the others, it did mean she had a good deal of experience.
The slaves seemed close enough to vampire slaves that her experience was probably not going to waste.
Nel shook her head and focused.
The nuns wasted no time opening up with lightning. To Nel’s surprise, and the surprise of the nuns, the lightning did nothing. The armored knights continued their forward march without any reaction. Both soldiers did stop walking, but they didn’t appear any more injured than the knights. The only real difference was the smoke coming off their bodies.
Rather than continue forwards, both soldiers dropped to a knee and took aim. Nel wasn’t flickering her glimpse fast enough to spot any bullets, but she did catch the shields flaring up around the nuns. As expected, none of them looked concerned about the guns.