Patrick looked around for his mare, but could not see it. There were horses everywhere now, running around him on all sides. Riding them were extremely frightened looking men and women wearing roughspun and holding sticks and gardening tools as bludgeons. They finally understand. Patrick grinned ear to ear, admiring the courage these people were showing, and then spun around and began running toward the raging battle.
The Wardens, many of the survivors of the journey to Mordeina from the other side of the Corinth, and Preston’s crew had all descended the hill and were locked in a losing struggle. Karak’s soldiers still poured through the walls, shoving back the defenders. With everyone fighting in such close proximity, the spellcasters were forced to aim their magic deeper into Karak’s ranks, slowing their forward flow.
Blood and bodies were strewn everywhere, the victims from Paradise and Neldar alike. The conflict was chaotic, an undulating mass of struggling bodies that surged forward and back, forward and back. Patrick remained on the outskirts, hacking down those he could, trying to order his fellow defenders into forming a wall, but none could hear him. So he kept on attacking, shouting obscenities with each thrust, each parry, each arcing blow, even as his body began to tire and pain shot up his uneven legs. Despite all the blood he was spilling, it seemed hopeless, especially when a sword pieced his lower back, where his chainmail was thinnest, running him through. He shrieked and spun around, burying Winterbone in the shoulder of the young soldier who had injured him. He almost halved the man with the blow, and his sword became lodged in the soldier’s chest. Patrick collapsed to his knees, clutching the spot where the enemy’s blade had exited his stomach, trying to stop the blood flow. He remembered the moment he had gutted Joseph Crestwell on the battlefield in Haven. He did not feel like he was dying, but perhaps he was being paid back in kind.
“In any case, this is a good death,” he whispered with a laugh.
The soldiers rushed around him, pressing ever inward. This was it. He tore Winterbone from the soldier’s cadaver and lifted it, his body leaking from its many wounds, and battled them back. He fought with such intensity that the ground seemed to shake beneath his feet, rumbling and creaking, affecting all around him. The ground then shook so hard that he was knocked to his knees, and he remained there, panting, trying to regain his equilibrium.
What the fuck? Patrick wondered.
The roar of thunder came next, followed by what sounded like a mountain crumbling to the ground. Then came the screams, and Patrick rose once more, looking on in awe as the earth beneath the hole in the wall split open. Pointed spires emerged from within the chasm, impaling soldiers who had yet to cross through the breach as they rose upward. It was an immense tree, and it grew up and up, higher and taller, its base widening, stretching across the length of the hole. The soldiers skewered on its many branches struggled and thrashed, until the limbs grew in width and their bodies were torn asunder, raining gore onto the ground below. Leaves sprouted, a fiery burst of yellow and red bathing the city in its shaded aura.
The rumbling stopped, and so did the battle. All eyes turned to the newly formed tree, whose surface was a spiraling pattern of thick veins and tough bark. It looked to be the hugest and strongest tree in the world, and it plugged the hole that had been blown into the walls without a gap.
Patrick began to chuckle, which evolved into light laughter and finally an all-out guffaw.
“She did it, my Grace,” he managed to choke out. “Celestia…loves…you!” He could feel eyes upon him as he laughed, but didn’t care.
The only thing that stopped his bout of madness was the sound of Preston’s voice, loud and authoritative, rising above the din of whispers and the shrieks of the dying.
“It is not over!” the man said. “The enemy is within your gates! The children of Karak who have killed your brothers, your sisters, your Wardens! They are trapped here! Take them down!”
The bestial cry of a thousand voices rose up, and Patrick lent his voice to the fray. He felt lightheaded and weak, but he moved to charge anyway, hefting Winterbone in the air. Powerful hands grabbed him, halting his progress and dropping him flat on his back.
“Let me go, you son of a whore!” he screamed.
The bloodied face of Master Warden Ahaesarus loomed above him.
“Quiet,” the Warden told him. “You are badly injured.”
“But I need to help them!” he protested, thrashing wildly. “Let me help them!”
“There is no need,” said another voice, and then Azariah’s face appeared as well. “The children of Ashhur can care for themselves.”
The dark-haired Warden shifted to the side to grant him a view of the proceedings, and Patrick rose up on his elbows. He looked on as Preston and Judarius led their charges, a blend of men and women trained by Patrick, Wardens, spellcasters, and countless everyday citizens of Paradise rushing against Karak’s now fleeing soldiers. The enemy’s men ran headlong into the tree blocking their exit, trying to scale it, but their fingers could find no purchase in its bark. All of the soldiers, both those attempting to flee and those attempting to fight, were overrun by the massive swarm of angry people defending their home. Screams filled the air anew, and though it was a horrid sound, Patrick thought there was a sweet ring to it.
“We did it,” he said softly. “We lived.”
“For now,” replied Ahaesarus. “And only with the goddess’s help.”
“Thank the stars for her,” muttered Azariah.
“Does Ashhur know what happened?” asked Patrick. “Where is he?”
The two Wardens shared a look but said nothing.
“You know what? I don’t care,” said Patrick. “Just heal me already.”
He reclined on his back and felt the warmth of the Wardens’ hands as they chanted above him. He allowed that feeling, and the screams of the dying, to wash over him as he fell into an uneasy sleep.
Velixar looked on, stupefied, as a giant tree sprouted from the ground, filling the gap in the wall created by Karak’s firestorm. Those who had been standing nearby when it emerged from the earth had been knocked backward by its rapid ascension, while still others were impaled on its branches. The two stone walls groaned, rivulets of cracks spreading as the tree pushed its boundaries against their limits, sealing out even the slightest gaps. The soldiers of the third and fourth vanguards backed away from the tree, appearing uncertain. Lord Commander Gregorian rode his horse along the wall, inspecting the new obstacle, craning his neck to see the top, before turning his horse around and trotting back to join his charges.
Karak watched in silence, the glow of his eyes intensified a hundredfold.
“What happened, my Lord?” Velixar asked. The deity glanced over at him and then approached the massive new growth, veering around the liquefied bodies of the grayhorns. Karak stopped before the tree and rammed a fist into it. It was solid as stone. Not even a piece of bark crumbled beneath his blow.
Screams erupted from the other side of the wall, and Velixar knew what that meant. The soldiers who had been abandoned were being slaughtered.
“Was it Ashhur?” asked Velixar once his god returned to him.
Karak shook his head.
“That tree is thicker than steel. My brother doesn’t have enough power to create that. It seems as though Celestia has showed her hand.”
A lump formed in Velixar’s throat, but he did not say a word.
Karak’s glowing eyes lifted skyward. “You have shown your true colors,” he shouted to the heavens. “Let us see how far you wish to go.” He stepped back and lifted his hand as he had before, uttering words of magic.
“No, my Lord!” he yelled. “Not with so many so close!”