Chapter 156 - Kill Zone

I took to the air, magic pushing me upward as I climbed for a better view. The sky above Camp Johnson was streaked with smoke, the rising sun casting long shadows across a battlefield that had tipped from dire to catastrophic.

The breach in the wall was enormous, a ragged hole blown wide open by those Alchemy packs. Through it, the orc horde surged. They were hundreds strong, pouring in like floodwater. They howled and bellowed as they came, crude weapons raised, their eyes full of bloodlust and fury.

There was good news too, though. I saw Turner and Jefferson pushing forward with their forces, following the inside of the wall northward. I got the idea. Moving along the wall allowed them to make great time. Then they’d strike from the orcs’ flanks as they clambered over the rubble. But the center was still wide open. There was only one thing standing in the way of the main orc force, right now, one person blocking the hole right in the middle of our defenses. That was all on me.

I sensed Sue and Plum outside the wall, where my undead forces had regrouped. Even the Abominations were back with us, smashing into the western side of the invading army like wrecking balls with claws. Clay was down there leading the charge, his living troops fighting alongside my undead as they drove the orcs along the western wall into a slow retreat north. It was working, but they were tied up. I wasn’t getting backup from them anytime soon.

I had to hold the breach, but I didn’t have to do it for long, thank goodness. Turner and Jefferson would have their troops in position in minutes. I dropped fast, aiming for the space between the advancing orcs and a cluster of defenders trying to reform near the rubble. I hit the ground hard and surged forward.

The first orc came at me with a hammer the size of a mailbox. I slid under the swing, drove my sword up under its arms and into its ribs, then yanked it out again in one clean motion. The second orc coming my way caught a Drain Life, its energy torn away, feeding life force back to me. I spun, caught a third coming in from the side, and kicked its legs out from under it before plunging my blade through its throat.

I raised my hand, casting Animate Dead on the orcs I’d just slain. Black tendrils of energy slithered through the air, wrapping the fallen bodies and pulling them back up. In moments, I had my new shock troops. They were crude, but effective. My trio of zombie orcs lurched into place at my side, snarling and swinging as the enemy charged toward us.

“Form up!” I shouted, turning to the defenders behind me. “On me! Rally on me!”

Dozens of soldiers, still stunned from the blast, snapped into action at the sound of my voice. Some scrambled for weapons. Others moved to support my risen orcs. The soldiers who’d survived the blast were a mess, bloodied, bruised, and wide-eyed with shock. But they were soldiers, and they’d been trained to fight, thank god. They followed orders.

The flood of orcs hit us like a tidal wave.

My undead orcs were struck first, slowing the charge just enough for the defenders behind me to find their feet. The orcs smashed into our line a second later. The sound of it was raw and awful: steel clanging, bones crunching, and horrific screams lost beneath guttural bellows. I pushed the noise away, focusing on nothing more than my sword and the enemies in front of me.

I stabbed one orc through the throat, then barely yanked my blade free before the next lunged for me. A spear held by one of the soldiers skewered it from the side. Another soldier went down beside me, screaming, blood pouring from a wound in his belly. I didn’t have time to help him. It was all I could do to keep myself in one piece as our line began fragmenting under the enormous wave of enemies.

The fighting was close and brutal. It didn’t take long for the orcs to start slipping around us. Even with me bolstering the front, they were just too many of them. They fanned out into the camp, breaking off into smaller squads to hunt easier prey.

I had a moment to spare a glance behind us, where I saw civilians running. There were mothers dragging children, medics shouting for people to fall back, and a handful of soldiers yelling for anyone without a weapon to get inside. One building after another was catching fire, the flames spreading quickly.

“Hold the line!” I roared, swinging my sword in a wide arc that hacked down another orc. “Don’t let them through! Every second counts!”

And then I heard the horns. There were two sharp blasts, one from each side. I looked left and saw Turner’s troops slam into the horde from the west. A surge of armored infantry crashed into the orc flank, blades rising and falling in as the well-trained soldiers found their rhythm. Turner led from the front, his sword dancing as he cleaved through one enemy after another.

To the east, Jefferson’s squad hit just as hard, moving fast to intercept the enemy force. His soldiers drove hard into the enemy flank, slashing at the distracted orcs and throwing them further into disarray.

The timing was perfect. We’d turned the breach into a kill zone.

“Drive them back!” I shouted to the handful of soldiers still fighting alongside me. I felt a surge of hope, but I knew better than to trust it just yet. The orcs were in a bad spot, but that one warchief could still turn things around.

The ground shook, and I turned in time to see the orc warchief crest the rubble at the heart of the breach, his monstrous mount clawing its way over broken stone and scattered corpses. The beast’s breath steamed in the cool morning air. Its rider raised his axe overhead and bellowed a challenge that echoed across the battlefield.

He wasn’t heading toward Turner. Or Jefferson. Or any group of soldiers clustered in defense. He was coming for me. Of course he was. It made sense. I was the only tier ten on the battlefield, and he was the only orc I’d seen high enough rank to actually know what rank I was. He knew I was the biggest threat among the defenders, the same way I knew he was the biggest problem we had among his invasion force.

“Fall back!” I shouted to the troops near me. “I’ll handle this!”

I surged forward, activating my Flight just long enough to get closer. I dropped myself square into the path of the charging beast. The warchief saw me coming and bared his tusks in what might have been a grin. His mount lunged, closing the last few yards in a heartbeat.

I ducked beneath the first wild swing of the axe, a blow that would’ve taken my head clean off, then rolled to the side as the beast snapped at me with jaws wide enough to bite a person in half. I slashed upward as I passed, scoring a deep cut across the wolf-creature’s shoulder, but it hardly seemed to notice. The warchief leapt from the saddle with a snarl and came down like a falling boulder, swinging that massive axe in a two-handed arc.

I caught the blow with a two-handed block of my sword. The impact numbed both of my arms and drove me to one knee. He was strong, way too strong for me to take lightly. I pushed off the ground and launched a Drain Life at him. The spell staggered him, but only for a moment. Then he roared and came back swinging.

The warchief lunged again, and I barely got out of the way in time, magic answering my call as I launched myself skyward. His axe cleaved the air where I’d been an instant before, slamming into rocks instead of me and sending a shockwave of raw force through the debris. I hovered just above his reach, panting, blood trickling from a shallow gash on my thigh.

This wasn’t going well, but at least he couldn’t hit me while I was in the air, right?

No, wrong again. The warchief grabbed a javelin from a holster on his back and flung the thing at me. I tried to dodge, and almost got out of the way, but the point ripped past my right arm, leaving a deep gouge.

I cursed and responded by firing off another Drain Life. The spell tore at his life force, wrenching vitality from him and drawing it into me. It hurt him, but it didn’t stop him. It healed my wounds, though, restoring me back to nearly full strength. My mana was tipping dangerously low, though. Between all the flying around I’d done and the Drain spells, I was heading toward empty quickly.

I landed to conserve my mana, and we circled each other amid the wreckage. We were both bloodied, breathing hard, and neither of us seemed able to land a final blow. He wasn’t just strong, this orc; he was experienced, too. He fought like someone who had survived a lot of battles and expected to survive a hundred more.

Then I heard another horn. This one wasn’t orcs, but it wasn’t coming from inside the walls, either. I shot skyward to see whether this was another threat, or a much-needed ally showing up in the nick of time.

It was, thankfully, the second. From the west, a new wave of troops burst into view, columns of armored undead bearing down on the battlefield at a fast clip. At their front was Carver, riding his undead horse as he led his legion straight into the rear ranks of the orc horde.

The orcs saw it coming, but there wasn’t much they could do about it. They tried to pivot, to shift their ranks so they could defend against this new foe, but it just wasn’t enough. Carver’s troops slammed into their flank like a hammer, blades flashing as they trampled through orc ranks with brutal efficiency. The rear of the horde buckled.

Then Sue and Plum showed up, adding their claws to the mix, and whole chunks of the orc horde just broke. First one, then more took off running northward as fast as their legs could carry them.

For the first time, the warchief looked worried. He let out a roar, hollering his anger at me. I couldn’t speak orc, but I got the impression he was using every four-letter word he knew on me. Then he raised a black iron horn and blew a single, powerful note.

The orcs within the walls began to fall back. Not in a panic—these ones weren’t routing—but in disciplined groups, retreating in good order. They dragged their wounded and shielded their leaders as they fled, and we bled them every step of the way. Turner and Jefferson’s forces pressed hard, killing more foes as the enemy pulled out.

Carver’s force continued their advance, and after the orcs had pulled back from the walls entirely, he chased them for a time, harrying their rear lines. I watched the movement, hoping he knew better than to overextend. Once again, Carver proved his cool head. After a few minutes of hard pursuit, he pulled his undead back.

It was over at last. The orcs were gone.

The breach still gaped open behind me, the ground littered with the dead and dying. Fires still burned in some of the buildings. But the camp still stood, and we’d won. In spite of the pain and suffering that had happened there, I couldn’t help but feel like we’d just validated the whole point of the alliance. One of our members had come under attack, and all of us rose together to defend them. It was everything I’d hoped to build, and it was working.

I touched down, knees nearly buckling, exhaustion roaring through my limbs now that the adrenaline was fading. I wiped blood from my face with the back of one hand and looked around as soldiers rushed to secure the breach and tend to the wounded.

Jefferson found me a few minutes later. His armor was scorched, his face streaked with ash and sweat, but he was grinning like he was fit to burst.

“You saved this camp,” he said bluntly.

I blinked at him. “Well, thanks. But I had help.”

“You had guts. And you stood when it mattered.” He extended a hand. “Camp Johnson is proud to stand with the alliance, Selena. From now on, you’ve got our full support.”

I shook his hand, the weight of his words sinking in. Jefferson’s words echoed what I’d been feeling before. This was more than just one more battle we’d survived. Today’s battle was proof that what we were doing mattered, that we were on the right track here.