'What exactly?' asked Darrick.
'A mage can reverse the flows from any spell or construct and in doing so draw mana in from a wider area.'
'I said, put your weapons down. There's no room for debate,' said Selik.
Hirad held up a hand. 'Ren, put your bow on him. Don't shoot,' he said before turning to Selik. 'Actually, we're just debating whether to surrender or go down in a blaze of glory. You can attack now if you want but you're first to die, Selik, and we'll see fifty of your men go with us. Or you can wait and maybe we'll all stay alive.'
And he turned his back on their captor, who just shook his head at the Black Wings' questioning glances. 'Be quick about it. I am impatient for your surrender.'
Erienne looked square at Selik and put a finger to her lips, feeling the voices of ancients in her head. Something flooded from her across the space to the Black Wing captain. She wasn't sure she was in control of it but she knew it had worked.
'Wait,' she whispered. 'Wait.'
'Erienne?' asked Denser.
'Just buying us a few heartbeats. It'll wear off momentarily.'
None of the Black Wing soldiers was moving. The sounds of the world about them had faded. It was as if they were standing in a painting, looking at still life.
Hirad hadn't noticed the change. 'Are you helping us, Ilkar?'
'Look,' replied Ilkar. 'I'm dying already. But we needn't all go. I can make the difference you need.'
'You're staying with us and we're getting you out of this,' said Hirad. 'We'll get the thumb and stop the plague.'
'Hirad, you don't understand. There is no cure. I've got Elfsorrow and I will die of it. All you can do is stop more catching it. And I'd rather die trying to save my friends.'
Hirad felt stunned. He'd assumed there was hope. He'd come charging in here because he could still save Ilkar. And now he found he couldn't.
'You didn't tell me,' he said.
'Would it have made any difference?'
'Probably not.'
'So I'm going to do this.'
'What?' asked Hirad.
'Ilkar's suggesting a focussed backfire,' said Erienne. 'He can form the shape of a spell like FlameOrbs then detonate it within himself. And because the shape is within him, it will hold together for longer and draw in far more energy than it should.'
'But how . . . ?' began Hirad.
'I'll have to be high up.'
'No way,' said Hirad. 'No way. There has to be another answer.'
'Hirad, there isn't.' Ilkar clutched his arm. 'Please let me do this. It's all I've got left.'
The reality hit Hirad like a hammer. His grip on his blade weakened and he let it fall. The thump was unnaturally loud on the packed ground.
'That's better,' said Selik from behind them.
The sudden resumption of reality made Erienne jump. She wanted to repeat the casting but realised immediately she didn't actually know how. There was so much she still had to learn.
'Shut the fuck up, Black Wing,' grated Hirad, not turning. 'You can't die, Ilkar. You were there at the start. We can't do this without you.'
'You don't have any choice,' said Ilkar. 'I am dying and you can't save me.'
Hirad fought to keep himself together. They were in a desperate situation already and Ilkar had just made it worse. He couldn't afford to lose control now. He set his jaw.
'Please, Ilkar, don't.'
'I have to,' said Ilkar. 'Goodbye, Hirad.'
'No.' Hirad could feel his throat tighten.
'You have always been my closest friend,' said the elf. 'Don't forget me.'
Hirad looked around at them all, their desperate faces. At the tears flowing down Ren's cheeks as she fought to keep her aim, not daring to turn round. He felt the briefest of kisses on his cheek, saw Ilkar caress Ren's head, heard an incantation and then he was gone, shooting up straight into the sky.
'Get back down here!' shouted Hirad. 'Ilkar, no!'
Arrows followed Ilkar skywards, none of them even close to their target.
'What's this?' Selik's voice was laden with sarcasm. 'The Raven flying away, are they, Hirad? Those that can. Some bond.' He laughed.
Hirad would have pitched after him then but The Unknown had a strong hand on his shoulder.
'Wait,' he said. 'Soon.'
Hirad craned his head high. Everyone in the compound was doing the same. He watched as the elf manoeuvred himself above a parapet and ten archers, underneath which upwards of fifteen soldiers stood ready.
'Ilkar!' called Hirad. 'Fly away. Please fly away.'
But the words caught in his throat. He leaned into The Unknown, felt the big man's hand tighten and waited.
Above the compound Ilkar hovered, the pain in his stomach excruciating and threatening his concentration.
'Just one more time,' he said to himself. 'Just one more time.'
He clung on to the ShadowWings, his body poised a hundred feet from the rampart, aiming to remove the archer threat in one go. It was the shortest side of the stockade, the one closest to The Raven and the easiest flank for them to defend. Partitioning his consciousness, he pulled the shape of FlameOrbs together, saw the lattice shape closing, felt the flows moving as they should, coursing around and over the shape, the excess filtering away into nothing.
He was ready. He began to descend, picking up speed. He sealed the shape, refusing to let the excess bleed away. The spell reacted, pulsing larger and larger as it dragged in, the flows becoming stronger and stronger. Thirty feet from the parapet, with arrows flicking past him, he lost the wings and plummeted. He opened the spell out, reversing the flows in an instant, feeling the pressure build and the shape decay as he had been cautioned against ever since his training began. The sphere flattened, became an unravelling cylinder, sucking in mana energy to accelerate its demise. There was no way he could contain it, his mind was not strong enough. No one's would have been.
He heard Selik's laughter choke in his throat and Hirad shouting words to him that he hoped he could take with him to the afterlife. They made him smile.
He opened his eyes, saw the stockade rush towards him and the men on it trying scramble clear. Too late. Much too late.
He struck.
Chapter 49.
'Down!' roared The Unknown, and The Raven hit the dirt.
Hirad saw Ilkar plunge into the rampart just left of centre, the spell he'd kept within him detonating just before he connected. The explosion drove out and down with incredible force. Mana fire gouged out, destroying archers on the parapet, a great sheet of flame washing across the stockade, blasting away timbers, tearing men apart and hurling their bodies high into the air.
Below Ilkar's body, the parapet gave way, bringing timbers and planks crashing down in front of a wall of flame. The flame speared out into the compound, the swordsmen in its path vaporised. A great whoosh of hot air surged over The Raven where they lay. Timbers bounced end over end in all directions, the explosions rang in Hirad's ears and the agonised cries of the dying sounded in his head.
'Shield down,' said Denser.
Hirad heard The Raven begin to move but couldn't take his eyes from the fires. In the centre of them, Ilkar's body lay, consumed by flames of his own making. Dead. After all they had survived together.
He heard a concerted roar and the sound of running feet. The dirt by his head sang, an arrow skipping off a stone inches away. He could hear the Black Wings coming but he felt weak inside, unable to react.
But into his confusion came a voice.
'Hirad, move!'
The Unknown stooped and grabbed his collar, jerking him from the ground. His face was too close to focus on.
'Hirad, don't let this be a waste. We have to move. Get in line.'
Hirad's vision cleared. He couldn't allow Ilkar to have thrown his life away.
'I'm with you.'
He grabbed at his sword and moved. The Raven had backed up as close to the fires as they dared but there were gaps in the line where he and The Unknown should be standing.
He started to run, heard The Unknown clash swords right behind him and saw Denser spread his arms wide.
'Down!' shouted Erienne. 'Down!'
Hirad dived straight forward, feeling a thump as The Unknown dropped beside him. The freezing chill of an IceWind washed over their heads into the approaching Black Wings. The screams began but Hirad didn't stop to look, already scrabbling up and racing for the Raven line, the enemy closing fast to his left.
The Unknown was right by him again and they slithered and turned together. The Black Wing charge had been literally shattered. More than ten had been caught in the blast, their flesh solidifying, the blood freezing in their veins, hearts stopping as the ice rushed through their chests. Bodies had fallen to break into shards, and where the spell had caught a trailing arm or leg the victim writhed, shivered stumps clutched in disbelief, the sounds they made awful.
The Unknown tapped his blade on the packed earth, waiting. A surge of anger enveloped Hirad and he roared into the faces of the Black Wings.
From the right, the Black Wings ran in. Hirad snapped his blade to ready, blocked up and swept back low, the keen edge of his blade slicing through ribs and gut. He wrenched it clear and checked his next target.
'Ren, seek the archers,' said The Unknown. 'Denser, Erienne, offence. We can't afford a shield. Cast whenever you're ready.'
Behind them weakened timbers continued to fall, and now the Black Wings came in from three sides.
On The Raven's left the TaiGethen and Rebraal launched a stinging attack. All four had dual short blades drawn and used them to devastating effect, forcing the Black Wings back. Beside The Unknown warrior, Aeb, his axe and long sword whirling, practically struck the head from his first enemy and crashed his sword again and again on the weakening upper defence of the next, eventually breaking through to carve the blade through shoulder and deep into chest.
The Unknown himself fought silently and powerfully, his dagger flicking everywhere, defence that could attack at will. He slashed it across the face of one man, who reacted by bringing his blade up to block the return blow only to catch the Raven warrior's sword in his waist. The Unknown turned it, pulled it clear and kicked the body away.
Hirad had no such pretensions to silence. Looking for a way through to Selik, he bellowed into the faces of those against him, using his sword two-handed, driving his arms to work it through again and again, his muscles beginning to protest. He ignored the pain, leaning in and butting the nose of his nearest enemy before heaving his sword through close to his own body and into the man's ribs. He forced the blade clear, raising it to block the next Black Wing's strike and sweeping immediately down to hack into his leg. The man fell on his dead companion and Hirad chopped down on his neck to finish the job.
Ren's bow thrummed with metronomic regularity, her arrows taking the remaining two archers from the platforms above the gates before getting to work on the men in the middle of the compound.
But, for all their killing, The Raven were being pushed back by sheer weight of numbers. Hirad took a cut across his chest as he leapt away from a clever reverse strike, the blow slicing his armour and drawing blood. He blocked the next away, Darrick next to him taking the man out with a downward stab through the collarbone into the heart.
'We need more effort!' called Hirad. 'Where are those spells?'
'Right here,' said Denser. 'On my signal.'
Hirad changed to a one-handed grip, punched into the mouth of the man standing in front of him and kicked him clear.
'Now.'
Hirad ducked. The DeathHail surged out, dealing awful damage. Needle- and razor-sharp flecks of ice fired into the faces of the Black Wings, flaying skin from bone, goring into eyes and ripping holes in hands and clothing. In front of Hirad the attack momentarily collapsed. At the same time Erienne dumped more FlameOrbs at the back of the press, and from the far left the ClawBound pair broke free and panic engulfed the edge of the attack.
'Push Raven, now!'
Hirad stormed back into the fight, sensing The Unknown and Darrick on either side. He opened up a huge wound in the side of a man whose face was covered in blood, levered him down and raced on, hacking into the top of a skull, kicking out right and connecting sharply with a groin and ripping his sword clear to bury it in the chest of the next.
He looked left. A blade was coming at him. He raised his guard but there was no need. The Unknown turned the blow aside easily and plunged his dagger into the eye of the Black Wing, where it stuck as the man fell. Aeb thundered on, bleeding from his waist and thigh. His sword sheared that of his opponent, his axe bit through backbone.
'Come on!' shouted Hirad.
Almost too late, he saw a sword flash his way. He swayed instinctively left but it caught him in the side. He felt the edge come through his leather and cut his side, deep but not debilitating. He cried out, clearing his head of the sudden pain, and clamped his right hand on the hilt of his opponent's blade, pushing it clear as he crashed his own down, chopping deep, very deep, into the Black Wing's hip.
Next to him, Darrick slipped two amateur thrusts with embarrassing ease and shuddered his own blade into the neck of his enemy. The Black Wings were down to their last men and it showed. The battle swung conclusively The Raven's way.
Out on the left, the ClawBound pair sank fangs, claws and fingers into exposed flesh. The TaiGethen, movements blurring, rolled, kicked, stabbed and slashed out, driving men in front of them. Hirad took on a raw recruit, saw the fear in his eyes and batted the boy's axe blade aside before skewering his right lung. He coughed blood in a spray and fell back and aside. Hirad's path was clear.
'Selik!' he shouted.
The Black Wing turned and ran back towards the barracks.
'Raven leaving the line!' said Hirad.
'Covered,' said The Unknown.
It was all Hirad needed to hear. He tore off after Selik, the cuts to his arms, leg and side pulling and bleeding. He gasped at the sudden pain but didn't let up, leaping up the stairs into the barrack block and kicking the door in.
'Nowhere to run, Selik!'
A door banged up ahead, Hirad shouldered his way through it and saw Selik at the opposite side of the small room, working at a lock and stiff bolt.