The Keys to Ascension Read online

  A high pitch squeak sounded behind Finio. He jerked his head and saw a blur run around him followed by another squeak. The tiny huge-eared fox ran and jumped around him making the noise again and again.

  “Ha ha, good fox, gooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood!”

  Finio sat cross legged, then the fox leapt into his lap before he pet it on the head and neck. The fox released a high-pitched purr-like noise.

  A Citian trireme pulled up to the dock in front of them.

  Kericles looked down at Finio. “C’mon, animal man. Let’s go.”

  Lizeto crossed his now food-free arms. “Don’t worry, you can wait for my ship. It’s next in line and is much larger.”

  Finio looked up at Lizeto, “Uuuuuuuuh.”

  Lizeto spoke quickly. “We got tacos on my ship!”

  Exhilaration swept up Finio’s mind. “They got tacos in Hyzantria now!? I love tacos!”

  Lizeto leaned back and crossed his arms while staring smugly at Kericles.

  Kericles nodded his head to the side. “Tshhh. You win this round, fat boy.”

  “Buff!”

  #

  The sedeux player twirled around an opponent who charged like a bull, then nimbly bounced the ball between his clubs away from opposing clubs striking in. While running forward, he slammed his club into the ball, sending it rocketing toward a corner of the net. The final guard leapt for it with a wide stick and just barely blocked it with the end of the stick before leaping upon the ball, successfully protecting his net.

  All around Kericles people stood and shouted, “Ooouuuuuuu.”

  Finio to Kericles’s right, turned to his right and excitedly said something to Lizeto, who was all smiles and wide eyes.

  Just a minute before, Kericles was scoffing at these two and all of Hyzantria for watching a silly sport when a horde of enemies ready to rape and slaughter them all besieged their city. He turned again to face outside the stadium. In these high seats, Kericles could see the mass of tents behind the sea of patrolling brown horsemen interrupted only by a growing number of loaded catapults facing the city. They prepared just outside of Hyzantria’s trebuchets’ range.

  He found his eyes drawn back to the pointless field down below, where all the Hyzantrians in the stadium focused, and many outside listened to the crowd and announcer, some of them running messages of every play throughout the city.

  “What a waste,” he muttered.

  A pusher slammed through an opponent.

  Many, including Lizeto, yelled, “Yeaaaaaah!”

  Then a following teammate controlled the loose ball by bouncing it between his two clubs and that team went on the offensive.

  “Such skill…for a pointless sport. These men could be training for battle. All this organization,” he scanned the stadium, “could be used to create another division…and of all times, now you need one.”

  Kericles was kinda talking to Finio and kinda just talking out loud.

  “Hey man,” Finio said, “this is a playoff. The Holy Ones are up one game in this best of three series. If the Divine Worshipers maintain this game’s lead, the series will be tied and we’ll be down to a final showdown!”

  Shaking his head, Kericles said, “That means nothing to me.”

  “Well a series is when they play three games and—”

  “I know what it means. I mean who cares who wins a game when war is upon your country.”

  Finio shrugged. “Everyone. It’s freaking sedeux, man.”

  Kericles mostly watched the rest of the game fascinated at such a waste of talent and training. The Divine Worshipers won, meaning there would be another game the next day…if the city existed.

  #

  In his black robes, Parto leapt off the boat onto land. He stood just out of sight range of the enemy camp surrounding the land borders of the capital. With the easterners always on the move, and their camps guarded so well, the Inquisition had failed miserably to assassinate many sorcerers. Parto hoped to get some tonight.

  As he walked forward, the blazing torches on sticks that surrounded the camp became brighter. Parto paused and crouched. On the perimeter, two men stood every ten yards and pairs of horsemen patrolled the camp. How do the others get any sleep with so much movement and light?

  He couldn’t really see into the camp through the flame. It must be dark and quiet near the center. If I can just get past the guards without raising alarm.

  He imagined himself leaping over the entire line of torches and men, landing in the darkness of the camp’s center. He then saw himself in a dark tunnel, digging, before popping out covered in dirt and ready to kill. Next, he imagained slithering like a snake as the guards stepped out of his way, not wanting to get bitten…

  He had no idea how to get in.

  Foreign voices spoke behind him. He slowly turned around, not wanting to attract attention. In the dark, he just barely made out two walking horses. The riders’ ribbons, loose clothing, and curved weapons made clear that the two seemingly casually strolling in the night, were easterners.

  Are they on patrol, or did they come back from some scouting or raiding?

  Parto glanced back at the camp. No one came from it. He crawled toward the horsemen.

  They moved perpendicular from him. He had to crawl fast to catch up, carefully watching the placement of his feet and hands to not crumple dry grass or snap twigs.

  He angled ahead of them, so they would pass by him on their current trajectory. Then, he slipped out two throwing blades. He could throw one, then the other, but if the second man had good reaction time, he could have been ready to dodge and flee. Parto couldn’t let one escape to raise alarm at the camps.

  He cocked both arms behind his head, ready to throw the two daggers at the same time; he’d done so accurately a hundred times in practice, but that was without the thrill and danger of real life. The two continued a conversation in their heathen tongue as they came toward him. Parto watched silently until he could wait no longer at risk of being seen.

  He threw. The daggers spun forward end-over-end until one sliced into a chest and likely pierced a heart, the man stunned in his coming death. The other dagger missed wide left.

  Parto muttered, “In the Divinity’s divine grace,” as he dashed toward the horse, hoping the man would do anything but turn and run.

  The foe focused on Parto and threw a spear. It whistled through the wind aimed for Parto’s chest. He leaned rightward then flashed back to an upright position after the weapon went by.

  The horseman already drew his curved blade as Parto leapt over the horse’s head. The infidel swung the blade. Parto flashed a dagger upward, deflecting the sword, then he stabbed with another dagger, piercing leather, skin, and heart.

  Parto covered the foe’s mouth and leapt off the horse, holding onto the man and dragging him off before laying him quietly to the ground.

  Parto disrobed. Standing naked in the night, he took the clothes and boots off the corpse and put them on himself. He concealed as many of his daggers as he could in the outfit, then got on the horse and headed toward the camp wearing a blood-stained shirt and leather covering.

  He spoke no heathen tongues and his lighter skin couldn’t pass for an easterner. His apparent wound and lack of partner would be sure to raise alarm. Parto decided to use this to his advantage.

  “Heaa.” He galloped toward the camp, holding his chest and moaning in his best eastern accent.

  Guards yelled, followed by other shouts and screams with flipping tongues. People made way as Parto rode past the fires and into camp. After passing a few tents, he slid off the horse and rolled behind a tent.

  The camp came alive with men running out of tents, throwing on gear, mounting horses, and preparing for a potential assault.

  Steps from an initial guard came toward Parto, probably to help him. He couldn’t let anyone examine him. He stumbled away, stumbling so that if anyone saw him, they’d think him out of place only because he was injured.
After zigzagging between a few tents, passing infidels mounted and ready for battle, Parto listened for noises coming from each tent.

  One tent was silent, so he entered, letting the tarp close behind him. Fresh easterner clothes lay in the corner of the room. Parto threw off his clothes and put on the fresh clothing. No longer looking wounded, he exited and confidently strode outside.

  His primary mission was to assassinate sorcerers or generals. He doubted any lay sleeping since he sounded the alarm.

  As he had observed from afar, the tents, while having different colors, were all the same size and the colors didn’t seem to signify anything useful.

  While trying to walk like those around him and looking like he knew where he was going, he concentrated on his own magic sensitivities. He reached out, searching for open connections. He sensed many, but all in the direction of gathered horsemen. He had to find one or two alone.

  Then, he sensed three strong connections just maybe twenty yards away. He headed toward a series of small tents, if he was lucky, one tent would contain three sleeping sorcerers. As he got closer, he heard that luck didn’t favor him today. The sorcerers talked amongst themselves, apparently not on duty to respond to camp alarms.

  He approached the tent that the energy signals came from. No one else was in the immediate vicinity. This was his chance, but three eastern fire maleefas wouldn’t be easy. Especially when he only had limited blades—just a long stabber, a short stabber, and three throwing blades.

  He couldn’t take a chance with the throwers. If he couldn’t kill all three of them quickly, they’d burn him before he got close. He had to start and finish this encounter in close contact.

  Parto entered the tent. The sorcerers cut their conversation. One spoke to Parto in a stern voice, seemingly telling him to get out.

  Crouching in the small tent, Parto moved in-between them. Whether they noticed his fair complexion or his suspicious behavior, the tent heated up as all three maleefa summoned fire. Simultaneously, Parto grabbed his two stabbers and flicked them out of their leather covers, slicing through a maleefa’s throat on his left and his right. They gurgled and dropped their building flame.

  The third mage, standing right in front of Parto, threw what fire he had. Parto ducked down and to the side, placing his right forearm and his face to the ground before launching upward with his long dagger, stabbing it straight into the maleefa’s heart.

  Their blood stained his clothing. Other sorcerers may have noticed the drop of three high being connections at once. Parto had to leave this camp.

  Some men still jogged to horses and mounted up. He jogged toward some of them and got on a horse, then joined a group of easterners apparently about to head out toward the direction Parto came; likely to patrol the area.

  He went with them into the night. After they put some distance between the fire of the camps, Parto fell a little behind before slipping away into the darkness.

  #

  Surrounded by Hyzantrians, Kericles and his men stood on the city walls watching more eastern catapults being brought up just out of range. Finio, Lizeto, and Lizeto’s knights stood guard too. If attacked, they were to repel climbers or defend breaches in the walls. Archers in their clean mail stood interspersed among them.

  Behind them, in the stadium, the crowd chanted the chant that announced the beginning of the game: “The Sovereign, The Authority, The Divinity. One source, rules all.”

  Kericles sighed. “We shouldn’t even be on this wall.”

  “Yeah.” Lizeto turned toward Finio. “Why did you integrate us into the city’s defense? We’re too elite for that. We’re better as free roamers.”

  Finio stood silent for a moment, staring out at the enemy. “We aren’t free roamers anymore. We’re a part of the city’s defense. We don’t know where we’re most needed.”

  “But,” Lizeto whined, “now we’re missing the deciding game of this playoff.”

  Speaking in a sigh, Finio said, “I know.”

  Kericles didn’t care about that. Most of the army that he would fight alongside when these easterners attacked was the very same army that destroyed so much of his homeland. Some of these archers he stood next to may have killed his friends; they may have tried to kill him.

  Maybe Zephyra was right. What am I doing here?

  Then, the horde of horses fell back. Easterners dismounted and tall ladders were brought to the front. They marched till they were in line with the catapults before all moved forward.

  Kericles knew why he defended those that just destroyed his life…glory.

  Hyzantrians yelled commands. Men in barracks throughout the city marched into the streets and toward the walls.

  Kericles fell back with the other melee soldiers, letting the archers have the front of the wall to themselves. He shook his head. These Hyzantrians face an enemy that vastly outnumbers them and controls their countryside. An enemy with skilled fire mages and apparently the smarts to build catapults. An enemy that would destroy every last inch of Hyzantria if it could. Yet, they refuse to use magic in return. And despite the coast they control, they don’t yet show any consideration of abandoning their capital.

  All the Hyzantrians in the city, somehow on cue, chanted: “The Sovereign, The Authority, The Divinity. One source, rules all.” It sounded like a mini earthquake went off around them.

  Just behind the walls stood wide towers mounted by trebuchets. These flung massive boulders that crashed through enemy ranks, smashing bodies and crushing limbs. The eastern catapults then rolled into range and shot. These rocks went all over the place. Some landed short, some went over the walls, and a few hit them, either bouncing off or just barely crumbling a little stone.

  The archers loosed while fireballs flew from the army marching on the city. Most of the fire soared over the walls and hit buildings and streets. Fire crews rushed to the structures that caught fire. Some of the balls hit the top of the walls, burning and blasting away Hyzantrian soldiers.

  The arrows rained death upon the enemy, but they had the numbers to take it, and they kept running forward.

  A cheer went up from the stadium. Despite the charging enemies, Kericles could not help but glance back at the arena. “The silly game continues?”

  “Yeah,” Finio said, “the stadium will have to collapse or catch fire before the game stops.”

  As he spoke a fireball flew just over their heads, soaking them in its heat, before buzzing the stadium then landing in the street, setting fire to a woman and her child in the midst of crossing it.

  Groups of Hyzantrians with longer bows gathered on the walls lined up with each enemy catapult. They threw something into a barrel behind them and a fire lit. Then they lit their arrows, took aim, and loosed. The arrows arced in the air, then fell on and around the catapults. Some catapult controllers fell. A few of the machines caught fire. But most continued launching boulders.

  Screaming, dark easterners with ladders approached the walls.

  A Hyzantrian officer to Kericles’s right shouted, “The Divinity guides us!”

  To the left one yelled, “Faith overcomes fear!”

  Farther to the left Kericles heard: “For the Divinity!”

  Ladders thudded against the walls; one right in front of Kericles. His body suddenly rushed with Finio’s power. He ran toward the ladder, grabbed it with his gauntleted hand, then pushed. The ladder swung away before stopping and coming back down against the wall.

  “Damn those are heavy!”

  Easterners climbed. Archers kept their focus on the mass of enemies in the field, where the arrows could kill the most, but that didn’t give Kericles much comfort as the ladder filled with foes. He shook his head. More for me to kill.

  The stadium let loose a gasp followed by a cheer. Kericles felt like he was in a Citian arena about to fight, except he knew those fans rooted for a sport while enemies stormed their walls.

  Kericles took one last scan of the battle. Piles of easterner dead lay on the field.
Many of their catapults now burned; but they had so many more men and all the trees of Hyzantria to build more catapults.

  He readied his hammers, then a dark-haired head poked over the top of the ladder. Kericles smashed its skull and the man dropped. Another ladder thudded just to the right. Lizeto tried to throw it off, but failed just like Kericles did.

  Another enemy head, another bashed skull. “Come oooooon!” Kericles shouted.

  Yet another head. Kericles swung a hammer, then a head-sized ball of fire blasted into it, knocking his green gauntleted hand away. Kericles just barely held onto his hammer. The sorcerer flung himself over the wall, but this foe wasn’t prepared for enhanced speed. With Kericles’s other hand he slammed his hammer into the mage’s chest, crushing it in and sending the mage stumbling backward into the wall, then tumbling over.

  Another heathen stepped onto the wall. A Citian exploded the foe’s brain with a polehammer.

  #

  Kericles kicked an easterner off the wall, then spun and smashed the head of another coming off a ladder. Lizeto pushed an easterner distracted by another knight.

  After almost an hour of fighting, all of the catapults had been burned by arrow fire and walls had been cracked but not breached. Kericles couldn’t believe how many men the easterners were throwing forward, all slaughtered, mostly by arrow fire.

  Behind him, Finio yelled, “We’ll run out of arrows before long.”

  Kericles glanced at the arrow runners bringing baskets of ammo to the archers.

  “Where do all these easterners come from?”

  Finio yelled, “These aren’t the elite horse warriors, but the slave levies. That’s why you’re kicking their butts so easily.”

  “Hey, I’ve killed a few sorcerers.”

  On a few parts of the walls, the easterners managed to gain a foothold, but Hyzantrians rallied with chants about their faith and their god, then pushed the enemy off.