the soot had once been part of a living human being. Hysterical men, women, and children ran everywhere at once, some of them bloodied and naked. The insane screams of the tortured and the dying seemed to fly alongside her through the smoky air.
It’s like Birmingham all over again! she realized. The man-serpents must be here-but where?
Changing course, she led her witches toward the town square. Suddenly the grisly impalements came into view along with the thousands of horrific man-serpents and the human victims on whom they were doing their terrible work.
Sigrid clenched her jaw and tightened her grip on the dreggan. What was happening here easily rivaled the atrocities that the Minions had been ordered to commit against the helpless citizens of Parthalon when they served the iron will of the Coven. As in those terrible days, the brutality she saw this night was heinous, and total in its depravity. Then she saw a lone figure in a dark robe, standing in the center of the square. Swooping lower yet, she took her witches down for a better look.
The bloody square was something straight out of some madman’s nightmare. Thousands of citizens had been impaled; in many cases their organs dangled from their ravaged bodies. Most looked dead, while others still writhed in agony, waiting for the reaper to come and gather up their souls. Swooping closer, Sigrid took a good look at the figure in the dark robe.
What she saw stunned her. The being’s face wasn’t quite human, nor could it be called fully reptilian. The tattered black robe that he wore spilled down over his wrists and boot tops. In one hand he held a silver staff.
He was surrounded by thousands of obedient man-serpents. The creatures listened intently as their master shouted out orders that Sigrid couldn’t hear. It seemed that his servants were abandoning their grisly work. Coiled up on their tails and rearing into the air, ever more of them gathered around to hear their master’s words.
That was when Sigrid realized that she had flown too low and had attracted the attention of several man- serpents. Hissing loudly, they pointed to the sky. Soon thousands of them were staring up and hissing viciously at the careening Night Witches. As Sigrid swooped by, she saw their master snap his head around and glare at her with his yellow reptilian eyes. To her surprise, he smiled.
Well aware that attacking would be suicide, Sigrid did her best to dig her wings into the night air and gain some altitude. Her fourteen Night Witches followed her, but not one of them knew that the Viper Lord commanded the craft. Realizing that he was seeing theJin’Sai ’s winged servants for the first time, Khristos eagerly raised his staff.
The azure bolt that soared skyward was unlike any that Sigrid and her brave Night Witches had ever seen. It pierced the dark night as a narrow beam and hurtled straight toward the center of their group. Then the bolt suddenly flattened out and exploded with an eardrum-shattering bang.
Eight of Sigrid’s witches died immediately, their bodies, heads, and wings ripped apart by the bolt. Two more were burned beyond the ability to stay airborne, and they crashed to the bloody cobblestone square. The savage man-serpents set on them at once, tearing off their leather armor and ripping their bodies apart even before they could lift their heads. To the delight of their fellows, the creatures lifted the warriors’ body parts high and paraded them about the square. Others writhed among themselves in orgiastic triumph.
Sigrid and the three remaining witches were burned but remained airborne. She immediately screamed out an order to head south, but even as the words left her mouth she realized that it was too late. Just as they started to turn, another azure bolt from Khristos’ staff came tearing through the air.
The second bolt proved equally deadly. When it exploded, it killed Sigrid’s three remaining witches immediately. This time Sigrid became showered with blood and bits of destroyed organs and bone. She survived only because her fellow witches had been behind her and their bodies had absorbed most of the blast.
Although she lived, Sigrid was shocked to the point that she could barely fly. Dazed and weakened, she too started tumbling down. Desperately trying to think, she groggily realized that she needed to break her fall. As she tried to straighten out her wings and regain control, the best that she could do was to head toward one of the few thatch-roofed buildings that wasn’t ablaze. As she tumbled through the air she knew that the end was near.
Then from somewhere she heard Duvessa’s stern voice counsel her again. “You’re a Night Witch!” the voice said.“Never give up-never surrender! Think! Do whatever you must to stay alive!”
Summoning her strength, Sigrid snapped her wings closed to protect them. She then took her dreggan tightly into both hands and did her best to raise it over her head. Just before she crashed into the roof, she brought the razor-sharp blade down with everything she had left.
She felt the blade slice into the bundled straw and cut straight through a slender roof joist, clearing a path for her to fall through. Suddenly her dreggan struck against something hard and metallic, the blow resonating so strongly that the sword was knocked from her hand.
Amid a hail of dust and loose straw she tumbled end over end into the building. At the same time a great ringing sound suddenly tormented her ears as if she were standing in some great steeple and someone was madly ringing its bell. As she crashed into the room, two more resounding explosions came from overhead, combining with the mysterious clanging to create a deafening cacophony.
Tearing through the roof, she tumbled the rest of the way down to crash hard upon a wooden worktable. Like a dry twig being snapped in two, she heard as much as felt her left forearm break. Then the table collapsed under her weight and she smashed hard onto the stone floor. Her eyes closed and her head lolled over to one side. Some time passed; she would never know how much.
As she lay there, a dense fog seemed to surround her. Her body felt weightless, her mind without care. Is this what it means to be dead? she wondered. Her thoughts seemed forlorn and far away, like the plaintive cry of a lonely wolf. Were those noises I heard the sacred death bells that our graybeards talk about when a valiant warrior dies in battle and goes to the Afterlife?
Groaning, Sigrid opened her eyes. Lying on her back, she looked up to see the lifesaving cut she had made in the thatched roof. A dark patch of sky lay beyond, silently embracing its network of twinkling stars. Then the pain in her broken left arm reached out to bite her. She groaned again and used her good arm to cradle her bad one.
It seems I’m not dead after all, she realized. But where am I? Then her mind cleared and she remembered what had happened. Her blood ran cold as the deadly nature of her predicament set in.
Sitting up was a huge struggle; standing was an even greater one. She hobbled to lean against a wooden beam and took stock of herself. She hurt everywhere. Night Witch blood, bone, and flesh still clung to her skin and body armor. Her returning wheel remained fastened to her hip, but her dreggan was missing. Miraculously, only her left arm seemed to be broken. She could still fly, but fighting would prove difficult. Then she remembered the terrible man-serpents and their powerful master. She snapped her head around, all her senses on alert.
Why haven’t they come for me? she wondered. Perhaps the blinding light of the second explosion shielded my crash through the roof. If not, the terrible things will be on me in moments. But what caused all those awful clanging noises? Didn’t the man-serpents hear them, or did the last two explosions mask them?
Sigrid looked around to see her sword lying in the pool of moonlight filtering down through the hole in the roof. She hobbled toward it and picked it up. At least I will die with a dreggan in my hand, she thought. Then she looked around the room, and the reason for all the clanging noises became evident.
She had crashed straight through the thatched roof of a bellmaker’s shop. Cast iron bells of all descriptions hung from the ceiling and from wooden crossbraces and lay scattered across numerous work tables. A hearth full of dwindling coals lay on one side of the room. A massive bellows stood beside it as if waiting for the bell master to return and use it to set the hearth glowing brightly again. More tables held variously sized bell knockers, casts, and odd bits of hardware. An old sign that had seen better days hung crookedly on one wall, reading “House of Ryburn and Sons, Bellsmiths.”
Then Sigrid remembered her dreggan striking something hard after it sliced through the roof joist. One of the bells, she realized. A quick look at her sword showed that its blade was undamaged. Bless our Minion swordsmiths, she thought.
Suddenly she heard a sharp scream pierce the night. It seemed to come from the square. She turned in that direction to see a smashed-out window frame in the far wall, moonlight streaming through it onto the dirty floor. Cradling her left arm, she quietly crept toward the opening and peered outside. She soon discovered what was occupying the man-serpents’ attention.
Eight of the brave Night Witches from Valda’s group were being systematically impaled. Like Sigrid’s group,
