Chapter Twelve

The carriage stopped, and Anne glanced out the windows. All she could see was a torrent of rain, with the occasional glimmer of light to their right, and the sporadic burst of lightning turning night to day with unpredictable flashes.

“We can’t get out in this,” Elain’e said.

“Likelihood of injury caused by standing in exposed weather: moderate to high. I would advise against leaving the confines of this vehicle,” Newt said.

Anne nodded. It wasn’t nice out there, and even in the carriage it was hard to hear the others speaking over the clatter of hail against the roof. It was probably a good thing that the carriage was pulled by undead horses, really.

“I think I can tone it all down,” she said. “If we want to be able to go outside.”

“We don’t have much of a choice. I doubt they’ll call off their invasion, even with things as bad as they are,” Elain’e said. “We need to get a lay of the land, see what we can, and find a way to better prepare for their first assault.”

“How long do we have?” Anne asked.

Elain’e shrugged. “A couple of hours, I’d guess.”

“That’s both too long, and not long enough,” Anne said. She pulled up her weather machine, then twisted the dial back until it stopped on ‘light rain.’ enough to annoy, but not enough to really harm. At least, she hoped.

She imagined that the army unloading from their ships must have been taken aback by two hours of non-stop winds and hail. It was too much to ask that they take the storm as a sign that they should go back home.

The hail stopped, and soon the wind that was whipping at the carriage so hard that it rocked calmed down. Anne leaned forwards and looked out onto the city of Not Evilia.

It wasn’t that big of a city. A few thousand homes, all built around a river that switched back and forth though the middle of it all. A few hills beneath the city gave some sections a better vantage over the others, and it was mostly surrounded by flat fields where farms had sprouted up to feed the thousands of mouths within.

She couldn’t tell much about the architecture in the dark, even if many of the homes still had light pouring out of them from candles and lanterns. So many people living in a quiet, peaceful corner. All of them sleeping through a rough storm, probably glad that the worst of it was done, and entirely unaware that there was a literal army marching on them.

Anne opened the door.

“It’s still raining!” Elain’e said.

“I’m not going to melt from a bit of water,” Anne said. “I’ve been wet before, you know?”

Her feet made a wet splat as she landed on the grassy hill they were parked on. They weren’t too far from the forest between Not Evilia and the landing zone the bad guys had picked out for themselves, atop a rise that afforded them a good view of their surroundings.

Anne raked her hair back and squinted through the rain. She couldn’t see any army marching towards them, only trees and bushes, with an impenetrable darkness beyond that.

“You’re going to catch a cold,” Elain’e said. She hopped down from the carriage, landed with a splash, then daintily raised a lacey-edged umbrella over her head. With just a bit of stretching, she managed to encompass Anne’s head as well.

“Thank you,” Anne said.

“Well, take it. I have a second umbrella.”

Anne giggled. “Two umbrellas? That’s a lot.”

“More than that. Though mostly I have parasols.” Elaine waited for Anne to take the umbrella, then she summoned a cart and cast it to reveal a second. She sniffed as she raised it over herself. “Well, that’ll keep us somewhat dry.”

“I could stop the rain entirely,” Anne said.

“No, best not. Muddy terrain like this will hamper them more than a bit of rain would hamper us.”

“So, what do we do now?” Anne asked.

Elain’e took in a deep breath, then let it all out in a woosh. “Given that it’s night... on my own, I could go in those woods and maybe take out a few squads. Assuming they have the temerity to send their men out in smaller groups. The woods are a friendly place to someone like myself. But that would only be a fraction of their forces.”

“I’d really rather you didn’t head out to do something so dangerous,” Anne said.

“I’ll stay here to protect you, of course,” Elain’e said.

“I could likely damage and hamper the enemy as well,” Newt said. “If I’m ordered to detonate my self-destruct systems, I might be able to take out two of their ships, assuming they’re near to each other. Otherwise, I can employ hit and run tactics using the forest as partial cover.”

“Forgive me for asking,” Elain’e started. “But do you know how to handle magical attacks?”

“By retaliating with overwhelming violence,” Newt said.

“Let’s not split up,” Anne said. The last thing she needed was to lose track of the two girls she had sorta taken under her wing.

She glanced at her chat for advice.

“Boys...” Anne started. “I mean... chat people? Please? I could use some advice. You know this... strategy stuff better than I do. You play games, right?”

The chat slowed, then burst with dozens of replies. A lot of people were arguing about... green screens? How everything was part of some really advanced program with drag-and-drop models and fast modellers. Anne didn’t understand that part. She focused on what others were saying.

“Anything good?” Elain’e asked.

“A few things. But I think they’re thinking too much of me. I’m just a single mom, I can’t take on a whole army on my own, and some of these ideas are very silly.” She glared at the chat. “I’m not going to seduce the dark lord.”

Anne blinked as a card appeared before her. The chat went even more wild for a moment, and she noticed that one of the names was highlighted. Someone had made a one-hundred dollar purchase.

She glanced at the card.

Wall of Duty: was written at the top of the card. A slate-black card that somehow looked just as impressive as the card with the weather controlling device. The image was a painting, one taken from above. An ancient but beautiful city in mid-day, with a grand wall all around it of white stone with towers every hundred metres or so.

“Thank you, Tarumath,” Anne said as she hugged the card close. “I... just thank you. You might have saved a lot of people tonight.”

“A wall?” Elain’e asked as she stood on tip-toes and looked at the card. “That could help. An entire wall in a card.”

Anne nodded. “How do I cast this?”

Elain’e looked around, then pointed to the far end of the hill, where it dipped down a little. “Over there. If the wall creates an additional barrier between the city and the army, then that’ll save us a lot of time. They’ll think twice when a wall appears out of nowhere and blocks their path. Even if they can likely fly over it. That’ll mean retreated back to their ships and risking a close-range retaliation against their vessels.”

“Right,” Anne said. Half of that flew over her head, but she tried her best to keep up.

They walked across the hill, hurried, but not so much so that they wanted to slip on the muddy grass.

“Mistress,” Newt said. “I’m detecting several heat signatures from the forest, three hundred and fifty meters to the west.”

Anne turned and stared into the woods. She couldn’t see anything, not until a single figure stepped out of the forest. A man, in black clothes with white plate over it. It was hard to make out any features through the rain and in the dark.

Another followed, then another and another. Soon she could hear shouts as the men pouring out of the woods started to form up in neat lines.

“They are entirely too close for comfort,” Elain’e said. “Quick, the wall, then we rush to the city.”

“Right,” Anne said.

She placed the card down, then, while biting her lower lips hard enough it hurt, she cast.

The wall appeared with a single bang, displaces air pushing out of the place where it now stood. It wasn’t some little wall, or a stoney barrier. It was a massive structure, thirty, maybe forty meters tall, with gleaming white towers that towered even above that. Anne gulped as she strained her neck to look up to the top.

Her gaze followed along the wall as she took a step back. It was long. Extraordinary so, turning towards Not Evilia on the ends to properly wrap around the side of the city they were on.

“That’ll do,” Elain’e said.

***

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