Martin Hengst - The Darkest Hour

Faxon returned to the hut. Tiadaria let out some of her anger by aggressively kicking dirt into the fire ring. Wynn folded up his map and tucked it in his pack, then stood and watched Tia dismantle the dying fire.

“Tia-”

“He shouldn’t have said that,” she snapped savagely, kicking a clod of dirt hard enough that it sailed over the ring and into the bushes behind. “Why didn’t you say something?”

“He didn’t mean it.” Wynn shrugged. “And it’s not my place.”

“I’ll make it my place.”

“Tia,” Wynn said softly. “Please? Just let it go. I’m fine.”

She whirled on him so quickly that he took a step back, nearly falling over his table of logs.

“You weren’t fine when he said it. I saw you.”

“I know.”

Tia stared at him for a moment, shaking her head. “Fine!” She threw her hands up and stormed into the hut. A moment later she emerged with her pack in one hand and her bedroll in the other. She was shoving the blanket and her sleep sack into the pack as she walked, muttering under her breath.

Wynn knew better than to get in her way when she stomped past him. He made sure the last of the embers were covered in the fire ring and then picked up his own pack. Following Tiadaria at what he thought was a safe distance, he followed her to the east. Faxon would catch up with him, Wynn was sure. He wasn’t so sure about Tiadaria. She was walking so fast that the distance between them was growing by the minute.

Faxon did, in fact, eventually catch up with him. When he did, he didn’t ask about Tiadaria or the fact that she was a distant smudge on the horizon. That was just as well. Wynn really didn’t want to talk about it. They walked in silence for the better part of the morning and the sun was near its zenith when they caught up to Tiadaria. She was seated under a tree on the side of the path with her knees curled up to her chest, eating an apple.

It was to Faxon’s credit, Wynn thought, that he said nothing to Tia when they found her. The quintessentialist just waited for her to get to her feet and then the three of them walked between the high walls of the eastern pass.

Tiadaria had never been particularly bothered by enclosed spaces, and certainly this path between the rock faces was far more spacious than the Narrow Pass, which had originally been their destination. Even so, as they walked deeper into the pass, she began to feel the weight of the stone on both sides and the ever growing distance to the open end of the pass and relative safety.

The path itself was about forty feet wide with steeply sloping walls that reached up twenty or so feet on either side. The perfect place to lie low and drop rocks on unsuspecting travelers, she thought. She had a sudden and vivid vision of laying on the ground with her skull cracked open and blood trickling out of her ears. Shaking her head, Tia focused on any other thought but that one.

The tension that existed between the three of them now had nothing to do with Faxon’s treatment of Wynn and any slights that might have existed, real or imaginary. Now the only conflict between them was the very palpable feeling that they all wanted to be on the other side of the pass as quickly as possible. They were about halfway through, by Faxon’s estimation, when Tiadaria felt it. It was the unmistakable weight of eyes.

“Faxon-” Tia’s hands hovered above the hilts of her swords, not sure if drawing steel or remaining casual would be the better course of action.

“I know. I feel it too.”

“This is a hell of a time to be able to say I told you so.” Tiadaria drew steel, the ring of her blades echoing off the sides of the pass.

Up ahead, the high rock walls dipped to no more than ten feet above the path. That’s where they poured into the pass when they came, the ragged band of vagabonds who rushed at them with sword and spear and crossbow.

Fleetingly, Tiadaria was glad that they had sent the horses away. Terrorized animals in this confined space would have killed them before the battle even started. They’d have been trampled to a pulp in minutes. As it was, they had time to dive to opposite walls. Tia ended up on the right, Wynn and Faxon on the left.

Her issues with the elder quintessentialist aside, Tiadaria had to admit that he lived up to his rank. He was truly a master of the arcane arts. As she was slipping into the sphere and preparing to attack, he had thrown a wave of magical energy forward, slamming into their foes and sending them sprawling like a child’s jackstraws.

Tia’s grip on the scimitars tightened and she felt the familiar burning in her palms and deep within her chest. Even as she drew her power from the sphere, it was stealing her life, little by little, drop by drop. The battlefield was no time to worry about mortality. With a warrior’s roar, she leapt high in the air, propelled forward and up by her own type of magic. She twisted in the air, flipping over the heads of the opposing force and landing behind their line. They had recovered quickly.

She heard the twang of a crossbow and only barely managed to avoid the bolt as it streaked past her, a brilliant white line etched in her augmented vision. Tia felt a presence behind her and struck out backhanded, slicing a man across the middle. He clutched his stomach, blood pouring from between his grasping fingers. A forward swing sliced deep into the shoulder muscle of a ragged woman wielding a foot-long knife. Her arm dangled limply at her side and still she ran at Tia, who kicked her feet out from under her, spinning away from the potential attack.

Faxon cried a warning and Tia spun, too late to avoid the magic missile he had sent screaming into the mass of surging bodies. The brigand in front of her took the worst of the blast, but the shock wave was strong enough to send her head over heels, sprawling in the dirt. She lost the grip on one of the swords and it skittered across the packed earth, out of her reach.

As she struggled to her feet, she felt a dull thud against her back and felt the familiar constriction of the witchmetal rings reacting to the blow. Tia spun, bringing her sword up to block a return swing aimed at the back of her neck, rather than her armor. The burning in her chest intensified as she called on the power of the sphere to grant her the speed and strength she so desperately needed in this fight.

Armed with only one blade, her strikes were a flurry of feints, strikes, and counter-strikes. Her frenetic pace and the constant drawing of energy were taking its toll. The pain in her chest was making it incredibly hard to concentrate. Tia felt slow, clumsy, and she knew she couldn’t keep this pace up much longer. There were half a dozen dead or wounded scattered around the pass, but they seemed to just keep coming.

Tia heard Faxon’s warning the second time and danced away in time to avoid the shock wave from his projectile. The man who stood in the way of the missile folded nearly in half as he absorbed its energy. The sound of his spine splintering was loud enough for her to hear a full ten feet away. For the first time, some of the attackers seemed like they might be rethinking their plan.

Faxon screamed and Tia turned toward the sound. This wasn’t a cry of warning, this was pain, pure, unfettered agony. She saw him from across the sea of bodies, a crossbow bolt sunk deep in his chest. The wound was too high and too far to his right to have hit his heart, but the blood that stained his cream-colored robes was spreading too far, too fast. Faxon collapsed on his uninjured side.

For the first time, Tia could see Wynn. He was fighting at least, but he wasn’t using his full potential. He handled the staff well, swinging it to and fro, shattering an ankle here and crushing a skull there, but he was no match for Faxon’s spells or Tia’s speed. The highwaymen were converging on him, recognizing his weakness and Faxon’s predicament.