Hostiles (The Galactic Mage series) Page 25

  Behind him, Gromf could hear the clink and clatter of armor and weapons as the army rose to its feet again as well.

  Gromf waited for God to go and help the other demon with the humans, but God did not move. He seemed to teeter there as Gromf watched, and the young shaman wondered if perhaps God could not walk at all. He spent a moment in study of God’s misshapen limbs, the absurd angularity of so many joints. God’s legs looked as if they might crumble with little more than a kick.

  Gromf would not be opening the gate for him. Not now. Let the old warlock try.

  He turned back to see how Warlord viewed the unfolding events, and it was with pride that Gromf saw the leader of the All Clans content to let the demon do the work on the human cavalry. Warlord watched, and made only the motion for Gromf to hurry up when he saw that the young shaman had looked to him.

  Gromf nodded but could not help feeling reluctant to summon more. The one alone had just set the humans into retreat.

  Or had it?

  Suddenly thundering into view came a new army, an army of metal-clad humans like none Gromf had ever seen. They were tall and thick like mountain ogres, yet ran with the speed of mounted men. Their whole bodies were covered in steel, and yet they were angular and thick. Even upon the muddy turf, their feet pounded loudly, shook the ground, like the thunder of the migrating mammoth herds.

  “What new magic is this?” he asked God, but God seemed to be glowering into the distance at what he beheld as well.

  Gromf thought it might be best if he did summon at least another demon or two to help the first one deal with the golden queen’s new surprise.

  Once again he went into the mana stream, followed the braided cord into the valley of demons. He speared two more, not sure he could pull them both forth without the God Stone.

  He could.

  He threw them out to where the first one was chasing after the horsemen who were now in full retreat. He saw immediately that the steel-clad human giants had now also turned to run away. That was a good sign. Perhaps this new magic was not a threat after all.

  He chastised himself for his moment of fear. There was no amount of steel plating that could harden the weak human heart. Even wrapped in their brand new magic, they didn’t stand to fight against one demon, and in the time it took to bring forth two more, they ran away like younglings from a bear cub. He laughed and watched as his new-flung demons landed amongst the fleeing enemy.

  The largest one he’d summoned, a great black bubble of a thing with a flat head and several thick legs, landed near one of the steel giants, the impact of its landing rocking the ground so mightily that the armored human was thrown twirling into the air. Gromf laughed as he watched the magic armor land hard on its back. He wondered if it would get up again or if the human inside had turned to mush on impact.

  Apparently not mush yet, the steel giant rocked and twisted itself back to its feet, turning just in time for Gromf’s hulking demon to bash it with a massive forelimb. Again the human in the bulky armor spun through the air. Gromf’s contentment continued, and he could not help but question what had made the golden queen think such armor could be of any use. Her warriors were an embarrassment to her people, and it made him wonder how orcs had ever been defeated by such feeble things as men.

  Gromf’s demon crawled with amazing speed to another armored human nearby, whipping its steel-encased legs out from beneath it and then straddling it when it fell. The demon began to pound upon the armor with its mighty limbs, hammering the bulky steel suit deeper and deeper into the muddy ground with each blow. Gromf leaned forward, willing his keen eyes to see better across the distance so that he might watch the blood spill when that armor cracked open like a nut.

  That’s when the first human, the one who’d been knocked about just moments before, somehow, remarkably, got up despite how hard it had been hit and how far it had been flung. Gromf realized that perhaps that magic armor was stronger than he’d allowed. He watched as the first human ran to where the demon beat upon the downed one in the mud. Two streaks of something white burst from the ribs of the running human’s armor, the smoky lines shooting across the intervening space and then exploding in bright yellow flashes of light and a mighty sound. The explosion destroyed four of the demon’s legs, causing it to tilt sideways and sag. Meanwhile, the upright human continued to close the distance, its right arm upraised and directed at the demon, the end of it emitting a bright plume of fire and a high-pitched metallic whine. Gromf could see that the fire was not long enough by any stretch to cover the distance, but the human was too stupid to stop trying as he ran. A few moments after the too-short fire erupted, Gromf heard the demon roar in pain, though he could not explain why.

  Then the human was upon the demon and somehow managed to jam its left arm up inside the massive creature with greater ease than Warlord had with his mighty axe. The human simply thrust his arm up through the armor plate and began, what Gromf could only assume, to grip and tangle the demons guts with a steel-clad fist. Soon the demon lay dead upon the field.

  Gromf realized now that the humans had tricked him into thinking they were weak. He looked back to see if Kazuk-Hal-Mandik had opened the gate yet. He closed his eyes and forced himself to listen to where the old shaman was in the casting of the spell. From the verses he heard, it would still be some time before the gate was open to let the demons out; opening the gate was much different than cracking it some and pulling a demon or two through.

  Gromf did not want those armored human giants coming this way. There weren’t very many of them, and he did not want Warlord to have to send the army to brush off this small flanking threat. He and Kazuk-Hal-Mandik should be up to such a task. He would conjure more demons.

  He reached reluctantly into his pouch and pulled out the God Stone. He could get many demons with it. He would get enough to deal with the humans’ new armor magic. By then, Kazuk-Hal-Mandik would have opened the gate. Then, they would have to trust in God to stem the tide and control them.

  God laughed then, and Gromf wondered if he had read the thought in his mind. He looked up to see that God was looking down at him, smiling with that great creviced face.

  “Now you believe,” said God. “Now that you face the children of another God.”

  Gromf shook his head, not to disagree, but because he did not know what God’s words meant.

  That’s when Kazuk-Hal-Mandik gasped. The sound was followed by a wet thump upon the muddy grass.

  Gromf looked to the sound, which came from nearly at his feet. Kazuk-Hal-Mandik lay there, still as a windless night.

  Gromf knelt and shook the old man, but he did not move. He rolled him onto his back and listened at his chest. The drum of his heart was still. Gromf looked up to God then.

  “Take his stone,” said God. “He is weak. It has always been for you. Take his stone and yours together, one in each hand. You will need them both to open the gate. The golden queen’s armies will soon appear, and your Warlord is waiting for the hordes you promised him to tear down her enchanted walls. And now the children of a new God have come to help, so you must hurry or it will be too late.”

  The fighting demons were out of sight now, chasing the humans off, but he could hear the sounds of the new magic armor in the distance, the explosions and strange metallic-sounding fire. He knew that God was right. He was a fool to have questioned him. He bowed his head then, steeling himself for what he must do. He snatched the God Stone from around dead Kazuk-Hal-Mandik’s neck, breaking the cord with the violence of it. “I will open it,” he said. “Let them come.”

  Chapter 29

  “Dad?” Orli said for the twentieth time at least. She held the tablet close despite its sensitive microphone. “Colonel Pewter? Is that you? Come in Colonel Pewter.” She repeated it several more times, still not knowing if the message was getting through. The infernal effects of magic, especially here in Crown City, made electronics almost pointless, and her tablet hadn’t been picking anything up since Alt
in had taken the Queen away. She’d been trying for well over ten frantic minutes, and when she saw the bright flash and the mushroom cloud, she’d nearly been in a panic the whole time as she tried to raise him again.

  It took several long minutes before he answered after the flash, and when he did, he was more than distracted by the sound of it. “Orli? What are you doing on this frequency?” The signal was broken in a few places, and she still couldn’t get video feed, but enough of his message got through that she could make it out. “Are you guys operational already?” he asked. “That’s incredible, and your timing couldn’t be better. We need orbital support, and we need it now. Call up my location, and then get the Aspect’s lasers to drill these things some new assholes ASAP. Tell the rest of them if they’re back up and running too. It’s bad down here, and the shit storm is only starting to blow.”

  “No, I’m not on the Aspect. And you need to call off the fight. It wasn’t the Prosperions. I don’t know how you guys got back here, but stop. Stop attacking them. This is all a big mistake. And there is a huge army outside the capital. Are you close enough to see it? It’s really bad.”

  “No shit it’s bad. And yes, I’m right on top of these things. Some kind of aliens. One of the Prosperions called them demons. And there are at least ten divisions of regulars on the other side of this demon mob. One of the Prosperions says they’re orcs.”

  Altin reappeared beside here then, looking impatient at having been kept at the parade grounds so long by the Queen. He started to complain but gauged immediately by the look on her face that there were more serious things afoot.

  “Demons?” she asked, as she worked through what her father had said. “We knew about the orcs.”

  Altin frowned when she said it, the very word jarring to any learned magician of Prosperion. He could not understand what the colonel had said, however, for the translation spell seemed no longer to be in effect for him. Altin repeated the word back to her, echoing her question almost exactly as she had spoken it. “Demons?” But even as the word passed his lips, he felt the chill of dire epiphany hit him like an ogre’s fist. Of course demons! How could he have been so stupid as to have not anticipated it long before? He closed his eyes and started a seeing spell immediately, dreading what he might be about to verify.

  “Yeah, big ugly things. Hard black casing, legs everywhere,” the colonel replied to Orli’s repetition of the word. But he had to give orders for a time after that, and for a long string of minutes Orli could only listen to the grunts and breathing of a fight that she could not watch. The voices of other Marines filled the air as well, cries of agony, shouts of triumph all intermixed. Then her father’s breathing sounded as if he were running, which rushed his words as well. “Orli, we just tore up a bunch of them. They’re big, but they’re not too smart and they die easy enough. Problem is, there’s going to be too goddamn many of them. And what do you mean you’re not on the Aspect? Did Altin come get you out of that mess in Earth orbit? Tell him I owe him one for that.”

  “Yes. Well, sort of. He did come get me. They tried to kill me.”

  “Who, the Prosperions? Or the Hostiles? I saw what was happening before we came back here.”

  “The fleet. Captain Asad and the rest of them. I’m pretty sure the director was in on it too.”

  “What? For what?”

  “Treason and lots of other bullshit. The court martial was a sham. But I’ll tell you about it later. I’m fine now. Altin did come, and I’m safe in Crown City. Well, not really safe, because there are tens of thousands of orcs outside the city, and the numbers are growing. They’re using magic to bring more and more, just like the Prosperions do.”

  “They’re all Prosperions from where I’m standing,” said the colonel. “Although we’ve made a truce for the moment with a bunch of them, the same ones who attacked us earlier. Turns out they didn’t know these demons were coming either. At least this group here didn’t. No clue what’s going on with that queen of theirs, though.”

  “She didn’t know about them either. I was just with her. You have to call off the attack against her people. This is all a bad mistake, and it’s going to get worse if you join with the orcs against her.”

  “We’re not fighting her, at least not for now. We’ve got bigger problems with these goddamn monsters crawling out of the ground.”

  “Monsters coming out of the ground?” she gasped aloud.

  “Yes, monsters out of the ground,” said Altin then, now finished with his cast and knowing exactly what she was talking about as he came out of the spell. “The orcs have opened a portal of some kind. They got the spells for it when they stole Melane Montclaire’s spellbooks from Calico Castle. This is really bad. This is what happened to Duador.”

  “Orli, what’s he saying? I can hear Altin’s voice, but I had to give my com badge away.”

  “He said it’s a spell. He said the demons are what happened to Duador. Remember what I told you about that small continent in the northern part of Prosperion, the genocide?”

  “Yes. That’s what I heard from their officer here. He said we’re all fucked. Major Kincaid figures there will be two hundred thousand of them in less than an hour.”

  She turned to Altin, “So what do we do?”

  Altin shrugged. “I have no idea. As far as I know, there’s no way to stop it. I would have to find Melane’s books, but even if I did, I wouldn’t have time to read them and figure it out. This is really bad.”

  “What did he say?” asked the colonel.

  “He said it’s bad. He said he doesn’t think there’s a way to stop them. Definitely not soon.”

  “Hey, Colonel,” came another voice then. “I got this dude with the feather tapping on my window with his stick. Should I let him in?”

  “Yeah, Chang, let him in. See what he wants. He probably wants to talk to you. I gave him my com link.”

  “Roger that,” said Corporal Chang.

  A few moments passed, and then a new voice came on, sounding distant but clear enough. “Sir Altin, this is Lieutenant Forland, Seventh Cavalry. Tell Her Majesty that the demons are resistant to magic, or at least they are to elemental spells. Our transmuters are having some luck turning them to stone, but getting close enough to touch them is dangerous, and even those spells they seem to resist half the time. So far it’s the best we’ve been able to do. Swords and spears are the only certainty.”

  “Can they be teleported?” Altin asked.

  “They’re all rage, Sir Altin. We tried. It just won’t work. If Her Majesty can get some stone transmutations enchanted for the archers, that is the city’s best chance. It takes several men quite a while to hack even one demon apart. And the numbers are stacking against us very fast. Were it not for the Earth people’s magic—the weaponry of their machines—my men and I would all be dead.”

  “Well, Her Majesty left the wall a few minutes ago. She’s convinced the Earth people came back to make war on us.”

  “They did come back to make war on us,” said the lieutenant. “But things have changed. At least for now.”

  “What are they saying?” asked the colonel then, unable to understand what either Prosperion had said.

  Orli summed it up for him. The colonel hummed but didn’t answer right away. “Orli, can you and Altin get the Queen to call off the Hostiles now? Maybe us helping her man Forland out here will be enough to make her play nice now.” She relayed that to Altin.

  “That’s not the Queen’s doing,” Altin said even before Orli could. “Colonel Pewter, I swear to you on the love I have for your daughter, Her Majesty did not order that attack.”

  Orli translated that for him, adding for her part, “And what’s more, it’s not Blue Fire doing it either. There’s something else going on. Something about a red world. There is another planet like Blue Fire somewhere, and that’s the one responsible for the attack on Earth. It’s not Blue Fire. I’m sure of it.”

  “I think the timing of the attack suggests otherwi
se. There are no coincidences that big.”

  “Yes, there are. Blue Fire tried to explain it to me. Something about ripples in space. And how she found Altin’s world. I didn’t have time to figure it all out, though, not before those NTA assholes tried to kill me.”

  “Holy shit,” came the cry from another Marine. It was echoed by more than a few others as well.

  “Baby, I’m going to have to go for now. Things just got ugly over here. Tell the Queen to call off the Hostiles. The director has ordered Prosperion be destroyed if she does not comply. He’s serious. Earth is done for if it doesn’t stop, and they’re fine with evening the score. It’s bad at home, Orli. I don’t know when Altin got you out of there, but it’s bad. We can’t stop them. This is our parting shot. There’s more ships inbound and a whole heap of bombers and low-altitude fighter craft coming with them. If she wipes out our planet, we’ll be planting the NTA flag here in the radiated rubble of her kingdom right before we all move to Andalia. That’s a promise you know we can keep.”

  “Here they come, people, formations tight. Open up on them,” said a woman’s voice, her tone even but clearly tense as she gave the command. “Colonel, we need you up here.”

  “I have to go, baby girl. I love you. Stay close to Altin. He’s a good man. Let him keep you safe.”

  “I will,” she promised, tears forming in her eyes. He rarely spoke to her so tenderly. She didn’t like how that sounded like goodbye.

  And then her father’s attention went elsewhere, and the sound of heavy breathing came across the connection, his every word one of command. The battle was on in earnest where he was.

  Altin sent a seeing spell out across the plains, intent on seeing what was going on. Orli had to content herself to just listening to the sound of the colonel and his men fighting for a time, but the cries of the dying Marines were too awful for Orli to handle for long. She felt helpless and, after a few moments, weak and worthless too.

  “We have to do something,” she said, looking up at Altin with frightened eyes. “We have to do something now.” He did not see the fear, but he heard it in her voice, even as transfixed as he was by the battle he was witnessing. He let the seeing spell go. She repeated herself when she saw that he was with her again.