more rest area between them and the top, Aleya has already reached it and is waiting there for them to catch up.
James is having a hard time, his legs are beginning to become leathery from the incessant climbing. When Jiron is about to the rest area he glances back down to find James still quite a ways below them. Down at the base of the stairs is a veritable swarm of black shapes waiting their turn to begin ascending the stairs in pursuit.
He rushes back down to where James is huffing and puffing. Grabbing his arm he cries out, “We don’t have all day!”
“I know,” James wheezes, thankful for the aid. With Jiron’s help he manages to make it to the rest area and collapses.
“We can’t stay here!” Aleya confronts him as he lies on his back, trying to get his wind back and calm the complaints his legs are sending him. Above them, the cloud cover is steadily increasing as more and more stream in from every direction. Within the dark, churning mass above them, they begin to see bursts of light as lightning flashes. The wind begins to pick up as it whips against their exposed position on the ridgeface.
Flash! Boom!
Suddenly, a bolt of lightning strikes the ridge not far from them. The concussion of the blast knocks Aleya and Jiron to the ground. The spike in the tingling sensation just prior to the flash tells James this was no accident. Struggling against his protesting body, he gets up off the ground as the others do the same.
“He’s calling the lightning!” James yells to Jiron. The wind whipping the side of the ridge almost taking his words away.
“Who is calling the lightning?” Aleya yells, both anger and fear present in her voice. She looks from one to the other, “Just who are you two?”
Putting his arm under James’ for support, Jiron helps him as they begin climbing the rest of the way to the top. Aleya follows behind them, arrow knocked in her bow, more for comfort than actually thinking it will be useful in this wind.
She grabs Jiron’s shirt and asks, “What is going on?”
Over his shoulder, he yells to be heard over the wind, “We got a Warrior Priest of Dmon-Li after us!”
“What’s that?” she asks, never having heard of one.
“Tell you later,” he yells.
As they’re moving further up the steps, James has been trying to determine which way the polarity for the lightning is going. He finally believes he has it figured out when the tingling spikes yet again.
Concentrating on a point twenty yards to the side, he releases the magic and creates a severe polarity discrepancy.
Flash! Boom!
Again, the lightning flares from the sky. The bolt strikes the spot where James had increased the polarity to attract it. As the concussion knocks him down, a memory comes to him of a time back in school in Miss Anderson’s Weather and Climate class when Dave had complained about having to learn about polarities. He can still hear him moaning, ‘When am I ever going to need this stuff anyway?’
Picking themselves back up, James glances back to the mass of men swarming up the stairs. He knows the warrior priest is down there with them and hopes he doesn’t figure out how James is redirecting the lightning. You’re going to have to do better than that!
Jiron again lends a shoulder as they once more press for the top. The stairs here for the last hundred feet are ascending up an almost vertical slope. The sides are almost sheer, the drop below easily over a thousand feet.
Chink!
Something strikes the steps near James’ foot. “Above us!” he hears Aleya cry out.
At the top of the stairs, a line of crossbowmen stand arrayed, their crossbows aimed at them. Another crossbow bolt strikes the cliff face right next to Jiron. Fortunately the whipping of the wind is making it all but impossible for them to maintain any sort of accuracy.
Aleya raises her bow and fires, but the wind is blowing too hard for it to maintain a true path and her arrow is blown off course. The crossbowmen above them have the wind going their way, so even if they have limited accuracy, they at least have the added speed and distance.
As one, James watches them raise their crossbows to fire. Releasing the magic, he creates a barrier to ward off the bolts just as another spike in the tingling sensation occurs. Dividing his attention, he tries to maintain the barrier as they release their bolts while at the same time creating another disparity in the polarity to draw off the lightning.
Flash! Boom!
The lightning strikes the ridgeline further away than the last time, yet the concussion still manages to knock Aleya off her feet.
As the bolts fly toward them, James maintains the barrier. Aleya looks at the barrage of bolts coming their way, and even though the wind will reduce their accuracy, that many on the way can’t be anything but bad. Seeing her death coming toward her, she watches in shock as they seem to strike something and are deflected away.
Jiron looks at the crossbowmen above them who’re raining down bolts as fast as they can load them. Then he glances below him where the soldiers there have already reached the first rest stop and are closing the distance rapidly to the second.
He turns to James and yells over the roar of the wind, “Can you distract those on top for a moment or two?”
Aleya overhears him and asks, “How can he do that?”
Ignoring her, James says, “Maybe. It’s all I can do just to keep deflecting the lightning and maintain the barrier. What do you plan to do?”
Leaning close so he can hear, Jiron lays out his plan.
James looks at him and nods, “I think I can help with that, just give me a moment.”
“Okay,” says Jiron. Then looking down at the men coming up the stairs he says, “But don’t take too long.” Turning to Aleya, he says, “Stay with him. Keep him safe, he’s our only hope.”
“What do you mean?” she cries out.
“He’s a mage!” he explains.
Her eyes widen as they look anew at James. Nodding her head, she takes out her knife and comes to stand near him.
When Jiron sees the nod from James, he begins moving to the edge of the stairs.
Flash! Boom! Flash! Boom! Flash! Boom!
Three consecutive bolts of lightning strike the ridgeline, throwing the crossbowmen to the ground. A scream of terror can be heard as one of them is knocked off the ridge and falls past them on his way to the bottom.
Jiron begins climbing out onto the sheer cliff face, moving quickly with hand and foot holds. He steadily makes his way out from the stairs, moving precariously as he tests each grip before continuing on.
Another tingling spike and James creates yet another polarity disparity and the bolt strikes further up the stairs. The concussion rocks them and he looks in fear at Jiron who’s hanging a thousand feet above the valley floor.
When the bolt hit, he lost one handhold and had hung there fearing he’d lose the other but had managed to regain his lost handhold. Taking only a moment to calm his shaking nerves, he again begins moving further out along the cliff face. A quick glance back at the stairs shows James on the ground with Aleya standing protectively over him. Bolts are cascading around them as they strike the barrier before being deflected away.
Moving quickly, he works his way further along the cliff face away from the stairs. The strong gusts of wind which seem to almost be slamming into him make his grips upon the cliff precarious at best. When he finally judges that he’s gone far enough, he stops his lateral movement and begins climbing up, hoping to gain the top of the ridge behind the crossbowmen.
Flash! Boom!
Another bolt of lightning flashes down and strikes the cliff face further away from him than the last one, this time not causing him to lose his grip. Glancing down a moment, he sees the soldiers coming up the stairs have already reached the second rest stop, halfway to where James lies exposed on the steps under the barrage of bolts.
The number of crossbowmen above them had been reduced by half when the bolts of lightning struck in their
