blossomed on trolls, but they kept coming. The muskets spoke in a ragged volley, scattering some of the front ranks.
Mystrians reloaded again, and soldiers atop the palisade fired. Individual muskets shot, but nothing could stop the trolls. They would gain the berm, then claw their way up. As brave as Nathaniel hoped he and his men were, he figured that one of the trolls would be equal to a half-dozen dire wolves.
Then a hiss arose with whiplash fury, and the trolls on the southern flank melted away.
As Mugwump landed and furled his wings, Prince Vlad swung the forward swivel gun to the right and fired. Pain shot through his hand-not as much as had when he fought at Anvil Lake-but igniting the gun’s brimstone charge still stung mightily. The shot, each ball being the size of a hen’s-egg, knocked a pair of trolls flying. Behind him, in a saddle fitted over Mugwump’s hips, Count von Metternin fired another blast. More trolls fell.
Mugwump lashed out with his tail. The tip hit, slicing a troll in half. Then the dragon hissed again. His vaporous breath staggered trolls, dissolving fur and quickly melting the flesh beneath. The trolls, horns evaporating, screamed and clawed at their own skin. It came off in bloody ribbons, their compounding the damage Mugwump had done.
Prince Vlad catalogued their injuries, noting that Mugwump’s second hiss did not do as much harm as the first. The natural philosopher put this down to Mugwump’s salivary gland running dry. He also realized that the trolls needed more killing than the demons. This did not bode well for Mugwump’s entry onto the battlefield, and that prompted alacrity as the Prince reloaded his swivel gun.
Rufus shouted a command in a discordant tongue which made Vlad’s flesh crawl. The trolls responded as one, turning and driving toward the dragon. Mugwump, almost catlike, leaped to the side and the south, drawing the trolls away from the fort. His tail flicked, snapping one troll in half, and launching another pair into the oncoming mass. Vlad and von Metternin fired again, this time benefiting from the way the trolls had massed. More fell, torn and bleeding, but others leapfrogged the corpses, eager to get at the dragon.
Mugwump proved too agile for them. He sprang back, then lunged, catching one troll in his jaws. It struggled for a moment, then bones popped loudly. The dragon swallowed and withdrew, baiting the trolls, stretching their lines and parading them before the fort.
From the berm, fire poured into the trolls’ flank. Each ball and bullet might not have amounted to much individually, but the sheer weight of metal hurled at the trolls reaped a red harvest. The enfilade fire drove them down the hill, concentrating them, so Vlad’s fire could do even more damage.
The trolls hesitated as volleys from the swivel guns cut down their front ranks. For a moment, whatever resolution had driven them dissipated. Forward ranks backed away, some trolls tripping and falling over prostrate comrades. Those nearest the fort turned and started downhill, running and occasionally knocked flying by a lucky shot. Confusion reigned in the Norghaest ranks. Their formation completely disintegrated.
Hissing defiantly, Mugwump leaped into the air again, his wings unfurling proudly. He rose quickly, affording Vlad a glimpse of chaos below. The Prince’s heart leapt as the trolls fell back.
Then, from the hilltop, something flashed.
Mugwump jolted, shrieked and, wings flapping weakly, he plummeted from the sky.
Chapter Fifty-three
21 May 1768 Fort Plentiful, Plentiful Richlan, Mystria
As acrid gunsmoke blew away, Owen swiped at a tear. His thumb was beginning to throb. He glanced at it as he levered his rifle’s breech open. The thinnest of bloody lines had appeared at the cuticle. Before he’d learned to reshape magick, the three shots he’d already fired would have had blood much thicker. He’d touch his nail to the brass fang on the firestone collar, letting the hot metal melt through to relieve the pressure.
Across the way, Rufus thrust his staff toward the dragon. Fire lanced across the battlefield. What looked like a fiery red comet exploded against Mugwump’s breast. The blast knocked the dragon higher into the air and twisted him around. His wings fluttered as he fell. His tail hit first, then his right hindquarters crashed heavily into the earth. A wing bent, then snapped. The ground shook as Mugwump bounced once and lay on his side, very still.
Before Owen could even begin to comprehend what had occurred, two new things happened almost simultaneously. A gray torrent of the demons flew from the troll hole, filling the air. The creatures swirled high, then dove straight at the fort. At the last moment, they split. A third of them swooped toward the dragon, while the rest came straight on at Fort Plentiful. Men yelled orders to deploy the nets, but panic had set in. Even before the demons had reached the fort, the Volunteers had dropped their guns and were running for their lives.
Over by Mugwump, the air shimmered and the Shedashee stepped through. Guns blazed merrily, blasting demons from the sky. The Shedashee cast their guns aside happily and brought their warclubs to bear. The weapons, some long and straight, others curled and knobbed, each set with obsidian blades, swept out in vicious arcs. Bits and pieces of demons flew in every direction. Warriors crushed and stabbed, forming a living wall between the demons and the dragon.
The bulk of the winged gray horde poured over Fort Plentiful. Men fired in every direction, heedless of what they might hit when they missed. Owen buried a tomahawk in one demon’s breast, then brained another with his clubbed rifle. He couldn’t see past a curtain of wriggling gray flesh, but knew he and his men could never kill enough demons.
But kill Rufus, and this all goes away.
He leaped from the parapet to the roof of the thaumagraph cabin, and from there to the ground. The cabin’s door swung open, with Clara Brown brandishing her musket and the foot and a half of steel mated to the muzzle. Behind her Bethany looked out anxiously.
“Stay in there!” Owen batted another demon from the sky. “You’re to keep her safe, Corporal. That’s an order!”
He waited long enough to see the door close, then ran for the fort’s gate. He pulled a demon off a man’s back, twisting its head around until its neck popped, then helped the man to his feet. Owen recognized him immediately. “Justice, we have to kill Rufus.”
“I don’t need asking twice on that.”
Makepeace loomed over the two of them. “I’m with you. Let’s be quick.”
The three of them ran from the fort toward the northeast corner. One of the cannons had been positioned in a little redoubt nearest the fort’s northeast corner. As they raced toward the gun, what was left of the crew passed them going the other way, demons clinging to them, biting and tearing.
Reaching the redoubt, Owen grabbed a bag of brimstone, gashed it with a tomahawk, then shoved it into the cannon’s muzzle. Makepeace bent down at the other end, lifting the carriage and swinging the gun around to the right. Justice sighted down the barrel, then used a pry bar to shift it back an inch or three. Owen jammed the ramrod into the muzzle and packed the powder in tight, then Makepeace fed a six pound iron ball into the barrel.
Owen looked at the Bone brothers. “You ever shot a cannon before?”
Justice shook his head.
Makepeace smiled. “Cain’t be much worse than a swivel gun.”
Owen tossed him the ramrod. “It is. I’ve done it once, and never wanted to do it again.”
He ran around to the cannon’s closed end and crouched on the carriage. Owen pressed his right palm to the firestone. It seemed cooler than it should have. “Makepeace, get clear!”
“Hurry, Owen.”
“I am.”
But before Owen could invoke the spell to fire the gun, a furious avalanche of winged demons poured over him and buried him alive.
My left arm is broken. Vlad accepted that knowledge with clarity and surprise, because he didn’t yet feel any pain. Still, the odd way that his sleeve hung, and the fact that his hand would not answer commands, gave him no choice other than to realize that he was severely injured and that he would hurt incredibly, very soon.
Until then…
He came up to one knee and let his arm dangle. There, between him and the battlefield, Mugwump lay on his
