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Chapter 26: Jasmine
The shimmering cold of the portal gave way to the chilly air of the Unseelie lands. The sudden drop in temperature made us shiver.
We felt cold, but soon, our blood would boil.
We are here, I told Gethin and felt his confirmation. I’m sending the portalers to you. They’ll help.
It took me a while to adjust myself to my surroundings. We had just portaled ourselves into the middle of a battle. Our arrival had put the others in a state of shock that ceased every activity at once, but it took them only a moment to realize we were here to fight them, not join them.
Fighting broke out before all of the monster folk could climb out of the portal. Bursts of fire and ice collided everywhere. The air was dry but the ground was already wet with blood.
Arrows flew all around, aided by magic and moving awkwardly in the air as fire and wind grew out of them.
They landed and hurt.
Battle cries rose from my left and right.
The monster folk were ready to fight.
“Go!” I shouted at the portalers. They would climb the battlements with the help of the air elementals, as we had planned. They would reach Gethin soon to aid him in sending the prisoners away from the battle zone.
The battle. That’s what I needed to focus on right now.
Portaling into the moat had given us a slight disadvantage. The enemy had the upper ground. But our sudden arrival shocked them enough that we had enough time to strike the first blow. The monster folk rose to the need. They climbed up the moat and clashed with the enemy at once without needing any direction.
Dearen was climbing out of the portal a few paces to my right. He used his spear to steady himself as we climbed out and raised his hand to conjure a wall to slow down the oncoming attack by the cavalry.
Brigid was right beside him, her eyes covered with a piece of black cloth. She had her sword, but she could use her fire to strike the cavalry despite their height advantage.
The two of them knew how to carry themselves in a battle. I needn’t focus on them.
I turned to the Unseelie. The elites and the cavalry were what we needed to focus on first.
The elite ones wore black, and the cavalry had green cloaks that flew behind them as the wind picked up. The elite units of the Seelie were infamous, I assumed the same was true for the Unseelie. If we could push back the elite unit, the cavalry would be left unprotected.
Flashes of light that rose from the enemy nearly blinded me. As I looked away, I heard the clashing of steel on steel. Heat engulfed me from my left, and I turned to see the fire elementals sending balls of fire toward Lugh’s army.
But as I watched, the cavalry broke free from the stone wall that Dearen had conjured before them. They went straight toward the fire elemental who was on top of the hill, sending deadly bolts of fire to push back the elite army.
“No!” I shouted. She did not hear me. As I tried to warn her, I realized she was Ellaria. The girl was younger than most. She had been turned into a monster not at the trials, but in response to an altercation between her father and his beige lord who had been doing the queen’s bidding. Her story was on the surface of her being; as she burned the enemy, she was thinking of that lord who had killed her father and stole her to deliver her to the queen. She was distracted.
Duck! I shouted into her mind as a man with arms like tree trunks rode his horse right at her from behind, his spear aimed at her heart.
A few of the monster folk fighting beside me all ducked at once.
Luckily, Ellaria did too. A few seconds before the man’s spear would have entered her heart, she ducked and threw herself to the side.
I had saved her, but my attempt to do so had caused me to look away from the others. The fighting went on. The enemy shook off the initial shock of our arrival and now, they fought against us fiercely.
I reached to pull my blade off my belt. It would not change the outcome of the war, but I did not have anything else to protect myself and those around me.
The cavalry and the elite unit had shaken off their surprise at our arrival. The first clashes were already happening, and each wound the monster folk received was like a shock inside of me. I felt it all, even as I was forced to block the pain.
We’re outnumbered, Leof said. Lead us.
I tried to ignore the surprise I’d felt at his ability to talk to me before I initiated the conversation within our minds. It shouldn’t have been possible and yet, it was.
