Troy Denning - The Obsidian Oracle

The best chance of survival appeared to lie outside the citadel. After opening the gates, Agis would use the crossbar to prop them open, then wait on the other side of the walls. Once the ambush ended, picking his way back through the ranks of wounded Joorsh might be difficult-but not nearly as difficult as surviving a torrent of Saram boulders.

Upon reaching the bottom of the pit, the noble saw that Nal had thoughtfully left a spiked club propped against one wall. The weapon was just long enough for him to reach the gate’s crossbar, which hung several feet over his head. The noble picked up the cudgel and went to one end of the beam.

That was when he saw Brita, the chameleon-headed sentry who had challenged Fylo when they sneaked into the castle. She stood a few feet to one side of the gate, her skin exactly matching the color and texture of the red granite blocks from which the walls had been built. Only her body’s shadow, the fact that her breechcloth had not changed color with her skin, and the huge bone sword in her hand alerted him to her presence.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

“Punishment, for letting a dead bear walk into Castle Feral,” she replied. The flange behind her wedge-shaped head flared in anger, then she added, “Now open the gate-and be sure to show yourself.”

Agis pushed the club up to the crossbar, groaning with effort as he lifted the heavy timber. The beam tilted toward the other side of the arch, finally sliding off its hooks and crashing to the ground. The noble tossed the war club aside and braced his hands against the gate. Slowly, he began to push.

The gate was about a quarter of the way open when a tremendous boom and a terrific shock ran through Agis’s body, knocking him away from the gate. He landed halfway across the yard, flat on his back and trembling in shock.

“Get up, coward!” hissed Brita. She had directed one of her conical eyes toward him and the other toward the gate. “You’re not hurt.”

Although he was not sure his aching bones agreed, Agis pushed himself back to his feet. The gate had been pushed shut again, and the head of a Shadow Viper harpoon was sticking through it. The weapon could only have come from the Joorsh ranks.

Agis closed his eyes, picturing Mag’r’s face and summoning the energy to use the Way. It was not an easy task, for he was still tired from his efforts in the crystal pit. In the short time since, he had recovered part of his strength, but far from all of it.

Once he had Mag’r’s puffy eyes and bloated cheeks securely in mind, Agis sent a thought message to him: What’s wrong? I thought you wanted us to open the gate for you .

My little spies? came the reply.

It’s Agis , the noble replied. Don’t let anything happen to our ship, or I’ll bar the gates again .

In the next instant, Mag’r’s voice came booming over the causeway. “Let the gates open!” he ordered. “Charge, Beast Eaters!”

A great roar rose from the Joorsh ranks, then the ground began to tremble beneath Agis’s feet as Mag’r’s warriors rushed across the isthmus. Boulder after boulder crashed into the walls of Castle Feral, filling the gateyard with a clamorous din such as the noble had never before heard. The Saram on the front wall responded with halfhearted battle howls of their own and hurled boulders down at the causeway.

Agis glanced upward, expecting to see the faces of the Poison Pack peering down from the lofty walls overhead. Instead, he saw nothing but yellow Athasian sky. Taking no chances that the ambush would fail, Nal had apparently withdrawn his troops from sight.

“What are you waiting for?” demanded Brita, using her sword to wave Agis ahead. “Open the gates!”

The noble rushed forward and placed one hand on each gate. Pumping his legs furiously, he slowly managed to get the heavy panels moving outward. When the gap between them grew too great for his arms to span, he concentrated all of his efforts on the one that had not been pierced by the harpoon. For a moment, it seemed to stick. Then it broke free and swung outward of its own volition. Giving it one last shove, the noble wrapped his arms around a bone slat and jumped on. His intention was not to hide, but merely to get out of harm’s way as soon as possible.

As Agis swung outward with the gate, he saw that the Joorsh warriors with the battering ram had cast their weapon aside. They were wading back to the shore to climb out of the silt. At the same time, Mag’r’s Beast Eaters were charging across the causeway, shaking their spiked clubs in the air and screaming threats against their Saram brethren.

Overhead, boulders flew in both directions as the Joorsh charged, and so much rubble rained down around Agis that he felt as though he had gotten caught in a landslide. As the Beast Eaters reached the end of the causeway and stepped onto the small deck before the gate, the Joorsh stone-hurlers turned their aim elsewhere. The lull lasted only a moment, for the Saram quickly began to drop boulders down on the heads of the Beast Eaters. The invaders responded by raising their kank-shell bucklers to deflect the deadly rain.

Their efforts met with little success. Aided by the incredible height of the walls over the gate, the boulders came crashing down with a force unmatched by the long-distance hurling that had taken place so far. The Saram stones smashed through the bucklers as though they were glass, spraying shards of kank shell in every direction, snapping Joorsh arms, and shattering Joorsh skulls with resounding cracks. Within moments of stepping off the causeway, a quarter of the Beast Eater company lay sprawled before the gate, either moaning and writhing in agony, or silent and still, like the rocks that had killed them.

The survivors rushed into the courtyard. A few muffled clatters sounded from inside, but it was nothing like the incredible din Agis expected to hear when the Poison Pack made their attack. The yard remained relatively quiet for a moment, until a triumphant Beast Eater cheer blasted out of the gate.

At the other end of the isthmus, Mag’r answered with a deep-throated war cry and signaled the second wave to charge. This time, he led the charge himself, waving a huge obsidian sword over his head and lumbering forward in great, swaying strides. Behind him came the giants who had been holding the battering ram, armed with a motley assortment of clubs and lances. Clearly, any of them could have outrun their king, for they were forced to trot at half speed behind his waddling form. Nevertheless, none of them attempted to pass, though Agis did not know whether their reluctance was out of respect for their leader, or merely because Mag’r’s immense bulk so completely filled the causeway that they would have had to jump into the dust harbor to get past.

Again, Saram boulders began to drop outside the castle, but the rain was not nearly as thick as before. The small contingent of beasthead warriors were splitting their attacks between the courtyard and the isthmus, with the result that they did not have much effect in either place.

Mag’r, charging through the sparse hail with a jubilant grin on his fleshy lips, hardly seemed to notice the stones that did fall near him. Knowing what would happen once the giant passed through the gateway, Agis could hardly bear to watch as the sachem waddled to his death.

As Mag’r reached the opening, he fixed his gray eyes on Agis’s form, which was still clinging to the gate. “Good!” He stretched a chubby arm down to pluck Agis off the gate. “Come, you’ll fight at my side!”

The noble’s heart jumped into his throat. He released his hold and dropped off the gate, allowing the sachem’s pudgy fingers to close on thin air. Mag’r frowned and looked as though he would stop to pluck the noble off the ground, but was carried into the courtyard by the momentum of the second wave’s charge.