The Fall of Light - Chapter 5 - YA Action Fantasy Novel

Down on the huge impregnable grey walls, two guards stood atop the battlements looking out over the cold barren grounds beyond the castle boundary. It had started to snow and the wind was picking up, the two soldiers were deep in discussion about the weather.

“Hey Rakk, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a storm like this one before. Look at the way those clouds seem to boil,” said the first soldier. He was dressed in his thick black plate armour, which creaked when he moved.

“…And look, Jargo, how it seems to almost shift from side to side, and I swear I can see little points of light in there too,” said the other man in a light excited voice.

“That’s not light Rakk, it’s just the snow,” Jargo replied. He removed his squat round helmet to try to get a better look at the approaching weather front. Jargo’s small beady eyes strained to see through the great swirling mass of frozen rain. As he stared into the darkness, some snow landed on Jargo’s baldhead and dripped down across his face. Jargo started to reach up to wipe his brow, but then he remembered he was still wearing his gauntlets, so he dropped his hands back to his side. He wished he could wipe the snow away from those clouds so he could get a better look at the rapidly approaching blizzard.

“Do you think we ought to sound the alarm Jargo, that storm could do a lot of damage,” Rakk said in an excited voice that was tinged with worry. Jargo reached up and put his hand on the taller man’s shoulder.

“I think you might be right Rakk, lets…” Jargo started to say.

“You’ll do no such thing,” said a third gruff voice that seemed to float in on the strong cold winds. A shadowy figure approached through the snow. Jargo recognised the silhouette as the Captain of the Watch in his black mail with flowing cape, and plumed helmet. He snapped off a smart salute, which Rakk quickly copied as he too saw the man approach.

“Yessir,” the pair said quickly in unison. As the man got nearer, he reached up and removed his plumed helmet, displaying the Captains older, haggard face. The captain’s hair was short and starting to recede above his temples, but his eyes were sharp and his stare made Jargo uncomfortable.

“At ease,” snapped the Captain in his thick deep voice and the two guards dropped their salutes. “That storm is quite imposing, isn’t it? I can appreciate your uneasiness in these difficult times, but now is not the time to cause any more panic among the populace. Besides, I’ve seen thicker blizzards up in the highlands of Anectar than this and we’re quite well protected by the cliffs. You’ll see in a few minutes, the storm will be lifted up, over the cliffs and we’ll all be quite safe.”

Jargo wanted to reply, wanted to ask the Captain if he was sure, but instead found himself nodding complacently. The storm came closer and just as the Captain had predicted, the snow seemed to subside as it passed up and over the grey cliff, which hung over the city. As the snow cleared and the wind dropped a little, a sense of calm and relief settled over Jargo, maybe he had just let his imagination get the better of him.

“Good call Captain,” Jargo said peering round at his superior. “It’s going over us just as you said.”

The Captain however, did not respond, Jargo saw that his face had turned a deathly pale colour and his eyes seemed to be staring out of his head. Slowly Jargo rotated his head to look at what was scaring the Captain so much.

The blizzard had been like a layer of camouflage. Jargo looked up with his beady eyes into a great mass of flying shadows that were flowing this way and that. At first, it looked like a cloud, but in fact, it was a horde of flying beasts. Jargo had never seen beasts like these before, some were scaled with huge gaping mouths that were filled with sharp pointy teeth. While others had furry shaggy arms, which were holding large bulbous clubs.

Probably the most terrifying thing about those creatures though was that each of the massive bodies carried a smaller human sized figure. The creatures were being ridden by humans, who were wearing thick grey armour with red pulsating streaks, which ran across the reinforced plates like veins. These humans were also brandishing weapons, bright red broadswords and sabres. Jargo’s mouth had hit the floor and he felt a massive surge of panic and repulsion towards the oncoming threat.

Then he heard the Captain next to him bellow over the noise of the shrieking airborne monsters. “Y… y… you there” he said pointing at a visibly shaken Rakk. “Get to the alarm and ring that warning bell. W… w… we’re under siege.” The captain seemed to be shaking off his earlier shock and now he was preparing for battle.

“You stay with me here at the gate,” he said to Jargo, “we have to be ready to repel the attackers, summon your creature and your courage…”

The Captain only got halfway through the word courage, as a blood soaked claw suddenly burst through the man’s abdomen. The claw was attached to a long spindly arm that raised the Captains now shuddering body up off the ground and tossed him over the wall with an almost casual flick.

As Jargo was sending a picture to his crystal companion, he saw the claw rise again, this time to strike at him. He drove to the ground and rolled towards the wall. He felt a rush of air as the claw passed by him harmlessly. Jargo was terrified, but he knew he could not stay where he was, so he hopped on to his feet and drew his sword, ready to meet his attacker.

The attacking claw never came, for high above the city wall, the shadowy maul of beasts had formed a funnel that was descending toward Jargo. Then the flue stopped suddenly, it parted in the middle and Jargo felt a build-up of intense pressure, followed by a loud painful buzzing noise, which caused him to fall to his knees.

Then the maw opened completely and a blinding shard of pure electricity shot down on top of Jargo, incinerating him on the spot and blasting down into the great wall below. Blocks of stone and lumps of rubble flew out haphazardly in all directions. The walls of Scorvain had been breached.

The deafening roar of the lightning blast was enough to shake the city’s very foundations. As the noise subsided, the city awoke to a new noise, a bright pearly ringing sound. Rakk had made it to the alarm bell and was ringing it with all his might. Tears were standing in his eyes after seeing his friends body evaporate before him.

The once sleepy city stirred into a mass of activity, as the citizens awoke and saw the oncoming onslaught. The inhabitants panicked and soon the streets were filled with people all rushing back toward the second internal wall of the palace. A deeper toned, louder bell began to sound, this was the evacuation call, to get the people back to the shelters under the castle and evacuate them out through the maze of tunnels beneath. This of course only made the public panic more and soon people were climbing over one another, trampling over their neighbours in a desperate bid to get away from the black swarm at the gate.

The throng of pedestrians were not only getting in each other’s way, but they also got in the way of the soldiers and their crystal companions. Yet the bigger metal encased defenders barged their way through the crowds in the opposite direction to get to the front, to defend their home.

A war horn sounded clearly from the palace grounds and up from behind the palace wall, rose the flying warriors of Scorvain. A second horn sounded and the Scorvain aerial forces surged toward the massive cloud of blackness. Beams of lightning and fire streaked across the sky into the pulsating black horde. The colourful lines twisted into the swirling mass and many charred forms fell to the ground. A cheer arose from the soldiers, as they watched their new enemy take casualties. Maybe this new foe was not as deadly as it had seemed previously.

The horn blew again and the second flight of the Scorvain air force flew towards the cloud. More bright rays of blue and red flew towards the enemy. Then just as the beams were about to reach their targets, the cloud shrank back and exploded into a storm of black armoured creatures that lunged forward to counter attack the defenders. The larger dark winged fiends fell on the Scorvain flyers and sharp claws tore through steel, stone, feathers and even flesh. Tentacles wrapped around their foes, squeezing and crushing the life out of them. The aerial forces were beaten back by the sheer ferocity of the black invaders and they were pushed backwards towards the palace to regroup.

The soldiers below had managed to arrange a much more organised withdrawal of the non-combatants and had formed a defensive perimeter to protect the hasty evacuation. A swarm of arrows covered the withdrawing panic-stricken civilians, while the friendly creatures also began to hurl huge rocks and other missiles up at the attackers. Then more rocks and boulders leap into the sky from the great catapults mounted atop the palace walls. These new giant threats took down more of the enemy and forced them back enough to finish the evacuation of the outer city and lock the inner door.

Rakk had made it back inside the inner walls just in time. After being one of the last few soldiers through the gate, he had, had to help push the huge stone block back into place to close the gap in the wall. Ahead of him in the streets below the palace, stood two stone catapults that were launching boulders up and over the wall. The catapult crews were working furiously to load the catapults and adjust the angles of the catapult uprights to aim at the targets in the sky above.

There were also a great many friendly beasts in the streets waiting for their chance to attack the intruding cloud of flying demons. Most of the creatures were quietly awaiting the signal to move, but some were snarling and growling with anticipation. Stone giants were flexing their bulky muscles, while steel razor cats were grinding their metal teeth together, which sent small sparks flying everywhere. Electric stallions buzzed with stored up power and flaming tigers rubbed shoulders with frosty wolves, all ready to pounce on anything or anyone that threatened their homes or their loved ones.

From far above Rakk heard gasps and shouts of surprise. Without thinking, he jumped to his feet and bounded up the closest staircase to see what was causing the commotion. Half way up the stairs, he was knocked forward into the steps by the down force of massive wings, as a pair of black dragon like creatures appeared out of thin air above him. Rakk just stopped and gaped up at the thin bodied, broad winged monstrosities.

The dragons swooped down at one of the catapults and the first beast grabbed the swinging arm and pulled the catapult over. This sent splinters of wood and chunks of rock flying everywhere. The second dragon hovered over the courtyard, then it covered the assembled warriors and beasts with a blast of black swirling flame. Most of the creatures managed to jump out of reach of the deadly flames, but some were not quick enough and they promptly disappeared into the blackness, never to return.

In a flash, the defenders of the castle counterattacked the dragon and leapt back up at the low flying dragons. A big razor cat jumped up at the dragon’s thin belly, sunk its sharp knife like teeth into the scales of the beast, and with a loud audible snap the dragon fell in two and its limbs writhed as it died. Instead of turning back into crystal as all the other creatures did when they died, the remains of the dragon started to steam and then it evaporated into a fine black mist that floated up into the air and vanished.

Staring in disbelief at the demise of the dragon, Rakk noticed that its rider had not disappeared, but instead the strange rider now just lay perfectly still on the ground, not moving. Maybe he had died when he fell, Rakk thought to himself. Then the courtyard erupted back into battle as the defending creatures moved in on the second dragon. Rakk turned away from the battle and continued up the stairs as fast as a man in full armour could run.

When he got to the top, what he saw before him was a massacre. The tops of the walls were covered with dead soldiers and masses of shards of crystal. Not all the soldiers were dead and a few still battled against the swooping, diving, un-natural disasters above. However, some soldiers had just collapsed, overwhelmed by grief as their companions had been slain and they had become separated.

Rakk ducked down and sent an image to his flaming airborne condor, Chal to check that he was ok. The image he got back was one of joyous battle, for some reason Rakk’s companion loved confrontation and fighting. Chal’s image was filled with black beasts, large and small, many of them engulfed in the fiery bird of prey’s flaming wake. Rakk breathed a sigh of relief and asked Chal to break off his attack and join him. The response he received was one of obedience, tinged with remorse at having to leave the battle.

Rakk then dared to raise himself up and look over the edge of the wall at the ruined city beyond. The sight he saw made him wish he had stayed down behind the wall. Most of the city was in flames, lighting up the still dark sky, the shadowy oppressive cloud above the city was still there, but it seemed to Rakk like it had shrunk considerably. The problem now was that down below, thousands of enemy ground troops were rushing towards the inner wall and the palace beyond.

The ground troops were even more hideous that the airborne ones. Most of them resembled insects, with masses of legs, pincers and multifaceted eyes, which twitched this way and that. Alongside the giant bugs, were great lumbering beasts, with impossibly large oversized arms and masses of tentacles, which emerged from all over their bodies.

The sight of these black terrors was enough to make Rakk sick; he fell to his knees and retched violently. Then Chal was there, a small bird of prey that was made purely out of fire with bright red glistening crystal eyes. The bird sent an inquiring picture to his friend who was still doubled over, coughing and spluttering.

“Don’t worry my friend, I’m ok,” he said aloud as he formed the corresponding image, “but we’ve got to get out of here. There’s too many of them.”

Most war doctrines say that the attacking force should always be at least three times the size of the defenders, these unknown foes definitely had the strength of numbers, but they also had the added benefit of surprise. The battle had become something they could not win and the onus had shifted to protecting the royal family and the Etherium.

Rakk was about to turn and head back towards the palace when more movement beyond the walls caught his attention. A new monstrous beast was approaching. The creature was just a mass of thin wriggling legs and nothing else. The creature had no body as far as Rakk could see, but the tangled mess of thin insect legs just went on and on, just like a giant bodiless millipede. The monster was longer than five buildings and thicker than a cart around its middle and it seemed unstoppable. The repulsive arthropod reached the inner wall and did not stop; it just seemed to roll up the grey stones towards the top of the wall. Several other insect like entities had begun to climb up the wall, while many of the other larger beasts were using the leggy millipede as a living ladder to scale the tall battlements.

A sick fear churned inside Rakk as he watched the attackers ascend the walls. The fighting seemed to slow as the humans atop the wall assessed this new threat. Then some of the soldiers regained their composure and began to direct their attacks at the now rapidly ascending creatures. Rakk drew an image in is mind of Chal attacking the closest insect like beast. The bird nodded and leapt off the nearby wall, emitting a burst of heat as the condors body ignited brightly into blazing yellow flames. Chal sped towards the giant abnormal insect and as she flew faster, her flames got brighter until she was white hot. The scorching bird punched straight through the spiked insect like it was made out of cloth. The beast caught fire and fell to the ground below. It hit the ground and like before evaporated into a swirling black mist, leaving only its dead rider behind.

“Good job Chal,” Rakk whooped as he proudly watched his friend make a kill. In the distance a series of horns blew, signalling an all-out retreat. All forces were to fall back and escape through the underground passages under the now burning city.

“Let’s go!” Rakk said to his partner, who had come to roost on his thick padded shoulder. Then the pair set off back down the stairs to the outer courtyard. The courtyard had emptied considerably from earlier, there now seemed to be far more dead bodies on the ground than there were living entities. Rakk had to tread carefully over and around the corpses to avoid tripping. He was half way across the courtyard when he felt a rush of air above him. He looked up to see a large bat like creature dropping down toward him. It passed over Rakk’s head toward the inner courtyard, but did not settle. As the dark scaled, broad winged bat got closer to the ground, it dropped infantry troops off its back. The grey soldiers were all wearing the same armour with the pulsing red veins. The armours colouring gave the impression that the combatants had all been turned completely inside out. They all wore high pointed helmets that completely covered their faces and made them look distinctly alien and very menacing.

One of the six deadly soldiers turned to face Rakk and raised its thick blood stained broadsword to commence combat. Rakk drew his short sword and picked up speed to rush his slower heavier opponent. He held his sword in his right hand and low across his body to his left, ready to deliver a punishing upward slash. The dark warrior had raised his massive two-handed blade high above its alien head and now it was falling fast to slice Rakk in two.

“Now!” Rakk shouted at the last second, and Chal leapt off his shoulder and burst into flame. The hot fire melted through their opponent’s dull grey blade and cleanly sliced off one of his hands. The force of Chal’s upward thrust also knocked the soldier’s helmet up and off his head and Rakk came face to face with his enemy.

The face staring back at him was a perfectly normal human face. However, the eyes were glazed over and stared blankly at a point some distance beyond Rakk’s head. The other disturbing thing that Rakk noticed, was the soldiers emotionless expression, this soldier had, had his hand burnt off and had not made a single sound or even flinched at the crippling injury.

Rakk was still moving and completed his upward strike across the soldier’s breastplate; the sharp blade tore into the armour and blood sprayed outwards. The enemy soldier fell to his knees still staring with un-seeing eyes and then he toppled over in total silence.

Rakk was shocked at the soldier’s demise; the dark creatures had attacked with such ferocity and vigour, while the humans that rode them were strangely impassive. The whole attack was taking a surreal, bewildering turn, which was confusing the fundamentals that Rakk had known and believed in for so long. Looking at the grey armoured warriors that were slowly lumbering forward toward the palace, Rakk could not help, but feel sorry for the soulless puppet like humans. Could it be that these black demon-like beasts controlled their counterpart’s bodies and silenced their minds?

A far away scream pulled Rakk away from his musings, looking over his shoulder he saw that more beasts were coming. The walls behind Rakk were now covered with monsters, he needed to get out of the courtyard. Rakk’s attention came back to the remaining grey and red warriors that were between him and the gates to palace. Without thinking, he rushed the closest opponent, with his sword thrust out ahead of him, to try to run the soldier through. Yet, this new opponent was quicker and much larger than the last. He managed to parry Rakk’s blow and sidestep away from his charge. Rakk knew that the counterblow was coming so he ducked, rolled passed his opponent and heard the slicing sound pass behind him, followed instantly by the dull thud of the blade hitting the floor.

Rakk heaved himself up onto his feet, his body screamed at him for rest, but he knew this was not the time to give in to tiredness. His foe had recovered from the missed blow and was flourishing his sword menacingly. The steel and crimson foot soldier swung his oversized broadsword again and Rakk blocked the blow as best he could. His sword wavered and his arms felt like they had just been battered with a sledgehammer. The great broadsword rose again, but as it reached its apex, a second blade pushed out through the enemy’s chest. Blood sprayed over Rakk, as another Scorvain soldier came to his aid and felled the giant.

Other soldiers had come to life during Rakk’s charge, spurred on by Rakk’s burst of activity. The courtyard had once again become a noisy battle zone.

“Are you ok?” Rakk’s saviour said in a muffled voice.

Rakk nodded dumbly and then stumbled toward the palace gates. Suddenly he was thrown forward violently, when another massive beam of lightning fell on the inner wall behind him. The sound of the thunder that accompanied the strike was deafening and Rakk was sure it had burst blood vessels in his ears. He managed to roll onto his back and saw his blood on floor next to him. His arms felt numb, the static discharge had put his body into a massive state of shock and the scariest part of all this was, that it had all happened in complete silence. Rakk’s senses were fried, waves of panic and remorse flooded over him and he felt fresh tears run down his sweaty face.

Soon he became aware of a sound, a dull roaring sound. The noise seemed to ebb and flow with his breathing and Rakk realised that it was the sound of his blood pumping through his body. He revelled in the thought that he had not gone deaf and began to notice other sounds too, the whimpers and screams of the men and women around him.

Then as the dust settled around the collapsed wall, a dark shrouded figure appeared; his cloak seemed to emit a throbbing cloud of darkness from out of its centre. The figure spoke with a voice like thunder that sent shivers down Rakk’s beaten spine. “Now that the walls hath fallen my minions, go unto the palace of Scorvain and bringst the Etherium and the corrupt King Trengar to us.”

Rakk could just see the man’s face through the clouds of darkness and dust. A face he had seen many times before, it was the traitor Inemi. Rakk managed to roll back onto his front and crawled hastily towards the palace. The King and the Etherium must be saved.