Sovereign of the Seven Isles 7: Reishi Adept (38 page)

“I’d like to meet with the commanders and witches as well,” Alexander said. “My plan is going to require some careful timing and coordinated execution.”

***

Alexander had been thinking about the map table in the Reishi
library. With it he could show his friends a scene from the world in real time.

It got him wondering about his own illusion magic. While the witches and commanders were assembling, Alexander
opened his Wizard’s Den and sat down inside his magic circle. In two breaths’ time, he was floating on the firmament. A moment later, he was hovering over Zuhl’s fortress island. He focused on the shape of it, the features, the details, memorizing every aspect of it.

When he was certain that he had a firm grasp of the island in its current form, he projected into his Wizard’s Den and created an
illusion of the fortress island on his table … and it was terrible. Ill-formed, lacking detail, missing important features.

He released the illusion.

“What are you trying to do?” Abigail asked, sitting back a bit from the table as if she might get something on her.

“Project an image of the place we’re going to attack.”

“Well, are you looking at it now?”

“No,” Alexander said, frowning deeply at his sister.

“What? I don’t know how it works.”

“I’m not sure I know how it works either, but
you just gave me an idea,” he said, sending his sight to Zuhl’s fortress island. Then, while still holding his clairvoyance on the target, he split his focus, seeing there, projecting here, creating a perfect replica of the fortress island: a pair of drakini floating by on patrol, twenty-five hundred men encamped on the surface, three ships holding station half a league away … the whole perfect illusion filling the surface of the table in the middle of his Wizard’s Den.

“Impressive,” Magda said. “Is this depiction in real time?”

“Yes, it’s exactly as I see it,” Alexander said.

While creating
the initial illusion took some effort, maintaining it was nearly effortless, requiring only that he kept the location being viewed present in his mind.

“That’s quite a trick,” Jack said.

“Used well, this capability is an insurmountable strategic advantage,” Jataan said.

The implications cascaded through Alexander
’s mind. He lost focus and the illusion vanished, though the illusion he’d cast of himself remained.

“The commanders are assembled,” Bianca said from just outside the door. Everyone except Jataan and Alexander left the Wizard’s Den. Alexander remained in his magic circle and Jataan remained in the doorway.

Alexander’s illusion, every bit as real-looking as his own flesh and blood, appeared at the head of the council table. His friends and many ranking witches sat around the table. The walls were lined with chairs filled with lesser witches and Sky Knight commanders and squad leaders.

It seemed so natural the second time, like it
should have been obvious all along. He looked with his clairvoyance at the fortress island and projected a perfect replica on the table, so real that it looked like you could reach out and touch it.

“We have limited resources but many objectives
…” Alexander began, laying out his plan in careful detail, ensuring that everyone participating in the attack understood the objectives, their priorities, and the order of attack. He spent time focusing on specific locations around and within the fortress island, providing each unit with a clear picture of their field of battle.

He also offered insight into the probable response of Zuhl’s forces, examining their equipment and weapons up close, searching out the drakini and showing the Sky Knights what they would face in the air. Finally, Alexander projected an image of Ixabrax, collared and cowed, curled up in a ball in the
wyvern birthing chamber.

The capability to project real images of places at a distance was unlike his other magical talents in its development
, in that it came so effortlessly, almost as if the capability had been there for some time and he’d just never used it before. Or perhaps, it was a new combination of abilities that he was already using. Either way, Alexander came to believe that Jataan’s pronouncement was true.

By midway through his presentation, his audience
had fallen silent, seeming spellbound by the clear, real, substantive, and absolutely accurate illusions of places that awaited. He defined objectives, assigned roles to each unit, made allowances for enemy reactions, and prepared for withdrawal from the battlefield.

Once the Sky Knights and the witches knew the plan,
Alexander projected onto the bridge of the Angellica, startling a tired-looking Captain Targa.

“Lord Reishi. Your orders?” he said, recovering quickly.

“How many men can you deliver to the seawall of the fortress island an hour before dawn?”

“Fifteen hundred,” Targa said.

“Good. I want you to divide your fleet,” Alexander said. “I need a transport group to deliver the soldiers to the island and an assault force to attack one of Zuhl’s ships. Who would you have command the assault fleet?”

“As much as I hate to adm
it it, that blasted pirate, Finley Raisa, is the best man for the job.”

Alexander smiled, laughing. “I haven’t seen Captain Raisa for a long time. Here’s what we’re going to do, Captain …”

Chapter 30

Alexander held on to Ratagan’s wyvern, leaning into the saddle and struggling to breathe, the wind roaring past his ears, the creature diving toward the sea below with a kind of speed that seemed entirely reckless. Then the wind slowed, stillness and crushing weight filling the void left by the absence of roaring. The world evened out, the ocean a few dozen feet below sliding by in the darkness.

The fortress island loomed
above them as they floated through the night just above the waves, ocean spray kissing Alexander’s sweat-slick skin with increasing frequency. He sent his sight forward, searching for enemy sentries in the lowest level of the fortress, guards protecting the seawalls and docks. He found them acting according to their patterns … predictable.

He
had scouted them, watched them, timed them. He knew where they would be, how they would react to an alarm, who would come by what route to provide support. He knew their plan because he’d spent time watching them execute their plan.

Horst came in first, coasting out of the light sea fog, causing the vapor to swirl as he passed into the lantern light. The guar
d was standing on a small watchtower, scarcely ten feet tall, located in the center of a sea wall that was currently unoccupied by any vessels. Horst’s wyvern flared its wings, thrusting its tail underneath itself and into the chest of the guard on the tower, yanking the man away from the seawall and flicking him into the surf, before landing silently.

Ratagan
’s wyvern flared hard, landing softly a moment later on the seawall. Alexander patted Ratagan on the shoulder, then pulled his locking bolts loose and slipped off to the ground. Both Sky Knights quickly launched and turned in unison, silently coasting into the fog just yards over the wave caps.

Silence descended on Alexander. He reached out with his sight and found the enemy right where he expected them to be, two dozen men guarding the dock level, and only a two
-man patrol close enough to matter. Zuhl was overconfident in his security.

He
surveyed the seawall platform, twenty feet of level stone between the side of the fortress island and a twenty-foot drop to the water. It ran for a hundred feet in either direction before opening on each side into enormous enclosed docking facilities capable of housing dozens of ships. Three men guarded each enclosed dock.

Alexander
opened the door to his Wizard’s Den. His formidable assault team filed out in turn: Chloe, Jataan, Anja, Jack, Lita, Amelia, Dalia, Bree, Kat, and twenty soldiers led by Lieutenant Carson. Alexander worried about the young officer’s enthusiasm, but he’d been the first to step forward when Alexander had asked for volunteers.

He motioned for silence
, then he went to his magic circle, slipping into the firmament and projecting himself into the midst of his people, creating an image before them of the entire battlefield, the fortress island, all three enemy ships, and two friendly fleets—a troop transport fleet hugging the coastline, slipping by one of Zuhl’s three enormous warships, and an assault fleet comprised of faster, better-armed ships traveling in a broad arc that would bring them into weapons’ range of Zuhl’s outermost ship at dawn.

He pulled back, showing the two flights of Sky Knights and witches
flying to join the battle. Then he showed Zora, ridden by Abigail and Magda, floating high above the entire scene, waiting for their moment.

Finall
y, he narrowed in and showed the two guards strolling up the corridor just ten feet inside the fortress wall. Jataan remained in the threshold of the Wizard’s Den, nodding to Anja. She frowned briefly before drawing her broadsword and slipping off into the darkness.

Alexander watched her take up a position at the edge of an access corridor between the seawall and the interior corridor. The two men
were oblivious to her presence. She waited until they reached her range, then swept out, taking the nearest man’s head in a stroke before bringing her blade back, one-handed, and cleaving the second man from the side of his neck to his lower ribs.

Alexander reached out with his sight
, looking for any hint of a threat. Finding none nearby, he sent his presence to Captain Targa.

“Execute!” he said, fading out of sight and appearing before Captain Raisa.

“Execute!” he commanded, vanishing again, bringing his sight back to his physical location and searching for pathways leading upward. It took only seconds for the magic of his clairvoyance and the magic of his connection with the Reishi Keep to meld and give him a perfect mental map of the entire fortress island.

“Lieutenant Carson,
you and your men will coordinate the landing,” Alexander said. “Everyone else, with me.”

He returned to his body, closing the door to the Wizard’s Den a moment after stepping out of it, stopping only to get his bearings
before heading upward into the fortress.

Down a
corridor, up a staircase, across another corridor and up another staircase brought them to yet another corridor. Alexander stopped at the top of the staircase, his friends crowding in just below him. He sent his sight forward. Three men sat at the end of a long hallway, fifty feet away.

“Are there others near those soldiers
?” Jataan asked, after Alexander had described the situation.

“Two levels up and several hundre
d feet east, there’s a guard post with six men.”

“With your permission, Lord Reishi,” Jataan said.

Alexander nodded.

Jataan slipped around the corner and sprinted down the hallway toward the three men.
He’d covered thirty feet by the time they noticed him coming. A javelin appeared in his hand, then leapt into the chest of the man in the middle. Jataan reached him a moment later, taking hold of the javelin and transforming it into a short sword. He flicked his blade at the man on the right, cleanly slicing his throat, then whipped it back and stabbed the man on the left through the heart. His blade vanished before he even pulled it out of the man’s chest. None of them even managed to clear a blade, much less raise an alarm.

Several staircases
and another series of hallways led to another staircase. Again, Alexander stopped at the top, looking around the corner at the enemy.

The hallway was twenty feet wide and just as high. Across from Alexander was anoth
er staircase leading down. To the left, a hundred feet down the hallway, stood a gate, seven feet tall and four feet wide, made of steel bars spaced at six-inch intervals. It glowed slightly of magic.

Two b
unkers were built into the bedrock stone on either side of the gate, providing the fortress’s defenders with excellent protection. Each bunker housed a ballista and crew.

Beyond the gate was a short corridor leading to a forty
-foot-diameter circular room with one other exit, directly across from the entrance. The walls were lined with arrow slits manned by dozens of archers.

This
kill chamber was one of a handful of choke points limiting access from the lower levels to the middle levels of the fortress island.

Alexander described the enemy, weapons, and defenses.

“We have to break this gate and defeat the defenders so our soldiers can get through here unhindered,” he said.

“What
do you have in mind?” Jack asked.

“The direct approach,” Alexander said. “Once I open the way, assault through.”

He stepped out into the hall and ran toward the gate. It didn’t take long before the soldiers saw him and shouted the alarm. He raised his light, bright enough to blind his enemies and thwart their ballistae.

As he closed the distance, he drew the Thinblade, stabbing into the bunker’s firing port and slicing into the thick stone, drawing a U
-shape through the granite. He put his foot against the block and pushed it forward until gravity took hold and toppled it into the ballista room. He moved quickly to the other side, slashing the gate into several large pieces on his way before cutting a hole in the other bunker’s stone defenses.

Alexander stepped through, finding a three
-man fire team, all struggling to shield their eyes from his light. He killed them quickly and moved into the hallway surrounding one side of the kill chamber. Over a dozen archers seemed surprised as he swept into them, killing with each stroke, taking them so quickly and violently that none even loosed an arrow. The witches cleared the other side of the choke point. Down a short hall and through another door brought them all to a small room with a door in each wall. One led to an empty barracks room, another to a bath chamber, the third to a staircase going up.

Alexander opened his Wizard’s Den, sat down in his magic circle and sent his mind into the firmament before looking at the entire battlefield from high above.

The sky was just beginning to show color on the horizon. He found his forces, Sky Knights, and fleets. The assault was under way.

Captain Targa and his
troop transports were already docking at the seawall and offloading their cargo of soldiers, who were moving to secure the lower levels of the fortress island.

Bianca led her wing of witches toward the outermost ship
. Cassandra and her Sky Knights stayed high, circling and waiting.

Raisa was driving his fleet hard, pushing to get into position to s
trike at just the right moment.

Dawn broke, sunlight washing over the ocean.

Bianca tipped her flight into a dive, coming down toward the giant ship at a steep angle. She loosed a ball of blue magical force that hit the ship’s shield, draining it just a bit. Each witch in her flight followed suit, draining the shield one spell at a time until it flickered and failed. Each wyvern pulled up a moment after their rider’s spell was cast.

The crew on
Zuhl’s ship was in turmoil, scrambling to respond to the sudden attack.

Captain Raisa came next, a dozen of his ships
launching firepots with heavy ballistae. The missiles trailed streamers of smoke in a long arc across the water. Ten hit, splattering fire across the decks and sails. Another volley of nearly two dozen firepots went up as more of Raisa’s fleet came into range. Zuhl’s ship took hits all across its flank and deck, sails and rigging. Within moments of the second barrage, the ship became engulfed, an enormous torrent of flame rising off the water, spewing black smoke into the sky like a beacon.

Alexander appeared
on Captain Raisa’s deck.

“Well done, Captain,”
he said. “Proceed to your secondary objective with haste.”

“Aye
sir,” Raisa said with a curt nod.

Alexander backed off, taking in the whole battlefield once again.

As predictable as the sunrise, the drakini launched from the nearest bay high on the side of the fortress island. Fifty of the unnatural dragon-men took to wing, moving in a cluster toward Raisa’s fleet.

Alexander watched his plan unfold flawlessly. He
was starting to become a bit nervous because nothing had gone wrong yet. Cassandra led her flight out of the clear blue sky from above the drakini. The first javelin volley was devastating, killing or wounding over half of the drakini before they even knew they were under attack.

The cluster broke and scattered, d
rakini going in every direction with squads of wyverns giving chase. The drakini were quick and agile, strong and vicious. One came around, charging a Sky Knight from below, a decided position of weakness. It breathed frost on the wyvern’s wing, then tore into it with hands and feet, before breaking the engagement and letting the wyvern spiral into the water.

The battle became a swarm with Sky Knights struggling to maintain formation and order in the midst of two dozen drakini attacking at random. The drakini moved erratically, abruptly changing direction, mak
ing it difficult for the wyverns to track and engage, but there were many more Sky Knights than drakini.

The battle turned decisively when Bianca and her witches rejoined the
fray. Alexander scanned the battlefield, seeing Zuhl’s remaining two ships break and run in opposite directions along the Reishi coastline.

He
shifted his focus to Abigail and Magda riding on Zora’s back. The dragon was diving fast, having waited just a few minutes past dawn to make her move. She aimed with unerring precision for the large entrance on the side of the fortress island that opened into an interior road running straight to the birthing chamber. Her arc carried her with fluid grace and terrifying speed into the road, where she swept her wings back and coasted on inertia and magic with Abigail and Magda clinging to her back for dear life.

***

Abigail hung on to one of Zora’s back spikes with all of her strength, leaning into the dragon to present the lowest possible profile. She could feel the ceiling moving above her only a few feet from her head. Zora was stretched out, her wings swept back but still spread wide enough that they nearly touched the walls, her head and tail elongated and held straight, the world passing by all too quickly and so dangerously close.