Chapter 32: A Last Stand

  The rain came down heavy, pelting them with shocks of cold on an otherwise warm night. It felt like constant pinpricks of fear, inescapable and adding up by the second. Vanderborn stood still and confident while his thralls did all the work. Now, with seven opponents, each casting creatures of their own, he apparently chose to watch.

  Ambrose still had ten seconds left on his Timer, and two spells he could cast to extend it by anywhere from three to eight seconds, depending on his choice. His imps and Raeva had killed one of the thralls, or at least dismissed it back to Vanderborn’s deck, and she was the closest to their cluster of enemies.

  Which meant that she was the closest to several summoning circles, as creatures began forming. One second she was there, the next Ambrose blinked and she was surrounded.

  “Raeva!” her brother shouted. He abandoned the fight with Lennar, and tore straight through a bush, fighting to get to her.

  Jessica remained frozen and made a panicked noise, but Ambrose cast [Vampiric Kiss] again to buy him time while he surveyed the battlefield and took a quick count.

  Vanderborn stood behind a line of thralls, like a king hiding behind his pawns. Ambrose couldn’t name every one of them, but they were all familiar. Some had even been famous. Out of the seven remaining, he recognized at least one of every affinity, almost all of them from the border provinces prone to discontent.

  For half a second, he thought back to the day he bound his Signature Creature. He’d said binding someone against their will didn’t matter, that the winners took all.

  It had mostly been to stir the pot, but now…Now he owed Raeva an apology later. Then he realized there wouldn’t be a later, and burst out laughing as the vampiric imp appeared at his feet.

  “Focus,” Luthor barked. “Get the Ransas. Ambrose, go after the healers and the creatures.”

  His orders kicked off the action. The thralls began summoning enough creatures to crowd the garden, and force them back, away from Vanderborn. With one second left on the timer, Ambrose put all of his available mana into [Assassin’s Strike], praying he was right about what it would do.

  Jessica finally snapped out of it and cast another spell. Then she leapt high into the air and made a pulling motion. Raeva jerked into the air, over the ring of creatures about to close in on her. The mind mage pushed and pivoted before they would collide, sending her friend down on the ground. She jumped a second later, and cast her cantrip on a rampaging direbear, bearing down on her.

  Luthor’s archer loosed arrow after arrow in a stilted, mechanical motion, randomly shooting into the line of enemies. It focused on the thralls themselves, and didn’t aim to wound so much as annoy and distract, while its master threw himself in front of the bear. It collided with his shield and detonated the exploding ward there.

  The bear’s head jerked violently to the size, and then it disappeared into nothing. It was replaced a second later by a ten foot long, one foot thick cobra, slithering his way.

  Ambrose’s latest creature came in larger than normal, and was about half the size of the bear. He mentally directed it to intercept the cobra. The beefy, bulk, heavy imp took a second to build up momentum, but it tackled the cobra and it poofed out of existence like it wasn’t there.

  It worked!

  Round 3

  The shuffle made his brain flutter, and then twinge as [Black Hound] deactivated and became unavailable. He found himself not minding, and hoping for spells instead of creatures.

  Cantrip: [Vampiric Kiss], Spell: [Assassin’s Strike], Signature Creature: [Hateful Imps], Spell: Tap Thoughts, Creature: [Night Terror]

  Luck favored him again. Three spells, for another four imps to add to the fight. It didn’t compare to the sheer number of incoming creatures from the thralls, but it would buy them some valuable time. Time was all they needed, until Vanderborn was vulnerable once more and…and then what?

  The rain resumed pouring, and Ambrose threw himself backward. Jessica and Raeva followed, while Luthor remained in the front as a field of exotic animals and dangerous monsters advanced. His Signature Creature stood beside him, in an identical pose. Raeleq had managed to break free of the living tree and joined them, club in hand. Lightning flashed, revealing glee on Raeva’s battle-hungry face, and she held her ground.

  For a second, Ambrose could almost swear that the Timer ended prematurely. Everything seemed to grind to a halt. He knew what he would do, and he knew what the others would do, and it would be fine. He trusted them to do their part, and he’d do his. All of his mana into a single spell.

  And then everything crashed together. An enormous cat with wicked fangs hit Luthor’s shield and drove him back, only to get stabbed by the [Spirit Warrior] as it passed. It disappeared, but then a lizardman took out the warrior. Raeva threw two flames skyward, only for them to explode into twin firebirds, arcing up into the sky before crashing into the thralls behind them.

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  Raeleq glowed with power, and he cracked a rock elemental with his club. It broke apart, but it left the younger Ransa open. An enemy bird divebombed him, raking sharp talons against his face. He clutched his face, yelping in pain.

  Ambrose retreated, moving further and further back. The trees and flower beds that had been so beautiful and comforting before now boxed them in. Behind them, the only things that awaited them were the Wanderer, and a steep drop. In the chaos of advancing armies, his summoning circle was lost, but not for long.

  A monster imp the size of an ogre reared up and roared in a low, guttural voice. It swung a gnarly claw into an actual dragon, and the dragon poofed out of existence. Ambrose directed the rest of his imps at the horde, and everything clashed.

  Individually, only the [Assassin Strike]s were especially strong, but he’d since learned to not underestimate the power of imps in great numbers, nor how nasty the little bastards could be individually too. He now had nearly ten of them out, and even now he cast his newly twinned Signature Creature as well and directed them to join the fray.

  They swarmed over a storm giant, a nasty scorpion, and a fae dragon, biting and clawing. In his mind, he could feel the various spell effects trigger with their attacks. The [Black Hound] card reactivated and lingered in his discard, waiting to be cast for free.

  Luthor and Raeleq worked well in tandem, moving like two dancers, perfectly in step. The light wizard was quick and deliberate in his movements, striking and retreating, occasionally raising his shield to ward off a potential deathblow in the nick of time. His battle buddy called up another [Pack Raptor] and the two of them held the line for a while.

  Jessica, however, was nowhere to be seen.

  The problem was, even with Ambrose’s increasingly large horde and a strong frontline, holding off the thrall’s creatures was a losing fight. It started small, a cut here, a stumble there, they added up, and continued to push them back.

  Worse than that, it gave the thralls time to cast other spells.

  The trees around them exploded into flames, lighting up the night, burning through the fury of the falling rain. Tendrils of shadow flickered violently from the flames, reaching out for them. Bolts of lightning shot through Ambrose’s imp army, killing some but disrupting them long enough for them to be torn apart by a flaming bull. One by one, they faded from his awareness, save for the bigger two.

  Fireballs detonated around them, showering them with rocks and dirt. A spell hit Luthor’s shield and blew past his ward, destroying his weapons and armor and sending him to the ground. Raeleq and Raeva instinctively positioned themselves above him, but with the imps gone, there was nothing to stop the surviving big cat, venomous looking monitor lizard, and a fire elemental.

  Ambrose watched in horror as they were overrun. He had distance, but the thrall’s spells found him. Necrotic energy sapped his life until the world dimmed. A stray thought passed through him: so that’s what it feels like, before a fireball hit him in the chest and laid him out.

  The pain came a few seconds later, when he looked up at the stormy night, blinking away raindrops, and realized this was it. They were either going to tear him apart, or hold him down while Vanderborn enslaved him.

  Neither happened. Vanderborn’s voice came out, amplified to be heard over the chaos, “Do you see? You could’ve had this power as well. You could’ve fought beside me, but you threw away your lives. And for what? Any last words, Ambrose? Any last smart comments?”

  He tilted his head up weakly. Vanderborn floated above his office, illuminated by a glowing ball over his shoulder. Only a couple of the skulls from his Edict remained, orbiting him slowly. The bastard had to make it theatric, rub it in to the last. Ambrose considered his response carefully. An idea struck him.

  “More of a request, really,” Ambrose yelled, not having to feign the weakness he wanted to convey. “One last request of a dying man, if you’re feeling magnanimous.”

  Silence, then a beleaguered sigh. “I’m feeling aggravated. What could your final request in life be?”

  In the critical moment, his wit failed him. Moments before death, the only thought he had was of his family, who would no doubt pay for this. “Please don’t punish my family. Cynthia’s a little shit, but she’s got the gift as well. She’ll listen if you take her in early.”

  It wasn’t much, but it made him feel oddly good. Like he’d tried for something.

  “Mmm. No, I think I’m going to put them on the streets, thanks to you. Goodbye, Ambrose.”

  He raised his staff, and the sky opened up. Searing, sanguine red light poured out from the heavens, gathered up in a swirling, chaotic mass of magic. Whatever spell this was, Ambrose expected it would hurt like a bitch, and possibly shred his soul to pieces while it was at it. It boiled over, growing in size until the rain clouds around them turned to steam. The energy rolled around, faster and faster, promising their end.

  “Thanks a lot, Ambrose,” Raeva groaned weakly as she picked herself up off the ground. He couldn’t help it. He laughed, and so did the others. It was desperate, tired, and resigned. They’d done their best, and had lasted longer than he expected.

  Two things happened then. The Edict wore off, exposing the old wizard once more. Bathed in his spell’s dark glow, the last skull vanished and the wizard came more clearly into focus. Cold, sadistic satisfaction twinkled in his eyes.

  And then a boom shattered the world.

  Ambrose flinched, but the next thing he knew, Vanderborn went flying, launched off the floating garden. His thralls and their surviving creatures disappeared along with him.

  It took Ambrose a second to realize the sound had been a cannon, and another to realize where that cannon had come from. He and the others scrambled to their feet, battered but not beaten, and saw the Wanderer hovering just off the garden, its port side aimed right at them.

  Jessica stuck her head out from a cannon hole and yelled, “Quick, get on! He won’t be gone for long.”