The Unexpected Heir: A Tale of Alus (63 page)

"Annalicia, my lady, are you alright?" one of the sailors cried out in alarm.

She waved the man off with her left hand and nodded. "I will be fine. Just give me a moment."

"But you're bleeding," he said kneeling beside her and he pointed to her sleeveless blouse. Made of light blue cotton, it was short enough to reveal part of her stomach and bellybutton. Tanned from months in the sun, including their time relaxing on Gerid's island, now it was coated in blood.

The girl lifted the blouse high enough to find another piece of wood lodged there. For a normal person without a wizard to heal them, the wound might prove fatal under such conditions. Touching it made her gasp in pain.

"Pull it free," she ordered the sailor.

"But..." he began and she said it again.

The man turned white as he pulled the four inch long splinter from the right side of her stomach. Her pain made her close her eyes as black spots flashed across her vision. The Grimnal hadn't warned her sufficiently about the pain, she thought morbidly.

"Where is the other ship?" the wizard asked as she half lay, half sat on the deck where she had fallen.

"My lady?" the sailor asked still holding the bloody piece of wood in his hand.

"The enemy ship, where is it? How long before it crosses for another pass?" she asked worrying that more time had passed than she knew. When Gerid had been killed his first time, he told her that he had woken hours later in a pile of dead bodies ready to be burned or buried.

Standing up, the sailor replied, "It is limping away, my lady. I think that it is trying to get away."

Annalicia struggled to stand up. Though she could see it in the man's eyes that he believed it both foolish and unwise, he offered a hand to help her up. Her head swam with dizziness. Looking for the bundle of food kept nearby, Annalicia pointed to the pack thrown aside by the explosion. Understanding her need in a way, the sailor picked it up handing it to the lady even as she looked for the enemy ship.

She tried to remember which direction it had come from and where the second ship would be now. Even glancing to the sun, the girl realized that she was too dazed to remember which direction they were heading now.

"Is it running for the other ship?" she asked and drank some juice from a flask.

The sailor had to glance to the sun as well and agreed, "It is heading southwest, so I believe so, my lady."

Hiding her injured right hand from the sailor, Annalicia inspected the wound. It had nearly sealed itself. She healed slower than Gerid, the girl thought; but he told her that he hadn't always healed as quickly as she had seen that day. It had been an off handed comment, and one only meant for an immortal to say. Perhaps he had simply mused on the fact, or maybe he had meant it for her; even though Anna had been too afraid to test herself.

The wizard handed him the bag after taking out a premade sandwich. Preparation for the battle had led them all to place food they preferred for recovery of their magic. Already beginning to feel better, Annalicia waved the sailor to follow her with the bag. Her stomach, already healing she guessed without looking, was hungry, but the food was solving that problem quickly.

Annalicia hurried to the main deck and looked for any other damage. Captain Delfren was in sight standing below the helmsman's cabin. The man was looking to and fro for damage to the ship and his personnel. Seeing Anna with blood on her blouse and skirt, the captain hurried over worrying, "You're injured!"

Waving him off with her left hand as she did her best to hide the right while it continued to mend, Annalicia said, "I will be alright. It is messier than it looks. How is the ship and crew?"

Reynolvan and Ivanor had heard Captain Delfren before seeing the girl. Both men hurried over, but Anna silenced them raising her left hand palm towards them.

"Are we still ready for battle?" she clarified for the others. "There is still a second ship and the first might choose to help them even if they are hurting."

Seeming to snap out of his shock, Delfren replied, "I've sent men below deck to check for damage, but the Sea Dragon appears to be in nearly one piece." His eyes looked to where Annalicia had stood on the foredeck and added, "The rail where you stood seems to be the only real damage that we've taken. If you are sure that you are fine, then it looks like you took the worst of it. They only got three passes off before they had to run and the wizards caught most of the cannonballs."

"I am fine. We should pursue the wounded vessel, if everyone else is safe. We can handle a single ship, but I'd rather not see if we can take on two."

Reynolvan glanced in the direction of the enemy ship's flight and suggested, "We could run and see if the second ship will take care of the first. They also might see the damage that they took and second guess testing us again."

"Or they might choose to attack us together. We can only protect one side at a time. Splitting our defenses will certainly get us all killed," the girl replied sternly. "No, we need to take out the one that is wounded or drive it away long enough to deal with the second ship alone."

Ivanor appeared to think about the idea and said, "If I were on land, I could draw lightning to a place of earth. An accurate lightning strike could take out a mast and likely do enough damage to keep them from trying anything more."

Turning towards the foredeck, Anna considered the idea and nodded. "Chase them, captain. I can use the water and the air to do the same thing to the enemy ship. We'll make sure that we face only one of the enemy, if we can catch them in time."

Captain Delfren looked less certain of the plan, but he had seen the power of their magic and knew that it could do great things. He hurried to the helmsman's cabin to put in the order.

"Jezra, if you have spare energy, give the ship a push. Once this is done, we will have to face the second enemy."

The air wizard moved to an advantageous position and summoned a powerful breeze to fill the sails moving the Sea Dragon much faster than the damaged vessel ahead of them.

With torn sails and lines, the red flagged enemy merely limped away. The Sea Dragon closed the distance and at less than half a mile, Annalicia began her spell. It was a power draining attack, especially from this distance; but it was well within her strength.

When the searing white light appeared to zigzag in their vision, it still managed to strike the centermost sails. Annalicia had guided the power of the sky to the wood of the mast. Like the railing when it had been struck by the cannonball, the heavy timber appeared to just disappear in a flash. Only a nub remained on the deck which was damaged from the lighting as well.

"There, that should do it," the girl declared with a sigh. She would need more food again, Anna thought to herself.

It wasn't long after Annalicia had crippled the enemy's movement that the crow's nest called down about the second ship. Readying for a second battle, the Sea Dragon charged forward.

Mirroring the flow of the first battle, the two ships crossed and crossed again firing everything that they had. Annalicia struck with her water attacks leaving them vulnerable to the freezing winds. Holding power over both elements, the wizard froze ship and men alike barely tempering her attacks. On the third pass, the enemy couldn't afford to take another round without doing damage; so they cast hooks and lines pulling the Sea Dragon to its side. If either ship had been more desperate, they might have still fired their cannon into each other at point blank range. While such an attack might cripple one or the other, it was as likely to take out both ships in the process.

Instead, the red flagged attackers sent their men on lines swinging towards the Sea Dragon. Annalicia and Jezra used their wind spells to stop the men coming from the sails. They would have cut the lines and sails to keep the Sea Dragon from attempting to move, but the magical winds stopped their attempt. The other wizards cast the attackers back while Keith led Ryan, Welden and the remainder of their marines to repulse the few pirates to land on the deck. More of the Sea Dragon's crew rallied to join them and quickly the enemy found that this maneuver had been an unfortunate choice as well.

Annalicia hurried forward through the remaining fighting and cast one of the blue mage shields making a glowing plank from the Sea Dragon to the slightly higher deck of the enemy. Three sailors rushed forward to take down the tiny girl thinking her easy prey. Lightning was guided from the sea over the railing catching all three men throwing them back where they writhed on the deck.

Her dance began as she pulled the wind to her. It whipped around cast by her hands and swirled around her body throwing anyone back who dared to test the wizard.

Three men strode forward dressed differently from the sailors. While their clothing might not easily identify them as wizards, the glow of their auras did to her eyes. Her chant changed and the winds grew colder. Frost formed on the deck and made the three men step back even as they tried to break her defenses.

Like the spinning wind shield she had used in the tournament, these winds protected her from their attempts to kill her with their magic. Two used wind trying to break her shield, while the center wizard cast fire. The heat was welcomed to those who could feel it. Annalicia deflected the fire and threw it back. Air spells lost strength in their attacks and the girl used their own power against them.

Her icy winds caught the man to the right. Her still bloody hands directed the attacks freezing the first target in place. His clothing was wet and turned to ice, while more formed from the air trapping the man's body. Unable to move, the wizard was neutralized. The wizard to the left gave ground, but Anna replicated the ice stopping him from running or fighting.

Left with the fire wizard, the man never thought to thaw out his companions. He tried to fight the girl. His control over fire was substantial. She could tell that he was well trained; but when the wind wizard charged into his defenses scattering the fire with her winds, he was too shocked to fend off the smaller woman.

A second spell cut off his oxygen suffocating him to sleep. As he slumped to the deck, Annalicia cast her eyes looking for anyone else wishing to fight. Keith and her guardsmen followed the wizard onto the deck followed by a dozen more sailors from the Sea Dragon. With her easy dismissal of their wizards, weapons dropped to the deck as the men placed their arms in the air in surrender.

Chapter 35- Shadows on the Field

The defeat of Fort Camden had been a hollow win for Caldrefan as the wizards and most of Malaiy's soldiers slipped away through tunnels. Less than a tenth of the remaining forces had bought the others time to disappear.

Wind wizards spotted hundreds of riders fleeing north towards their next defensible position. Malaiy had spent money and time building up a system of defenses hundreds of years ago to keep their enemy at bay. Some of the forts had been reduced to skeleton crews just to maintain them for the day that alliances made by words should fail.

No one was likely to have foreseen Tseult's fall and another enemy taking its place, but the ancient kings and those who followed had remained vigilant even so. The army of the brotherhood would be forced to fight for each inch of Malaiy even as Orlaan's armies moved to reinforce those who fell back saving their numbers as best they could.

His fear spells hadn't been as powerful against those with knowledge of their safe escape in mind. Few could be controlled when their minds weren't weakened. Their magic brought down the walls of Fort Camden, but too late to frighten those few who had remained.

His anger nearly made him kill these who would be fodder for the next battle. To his surprise, the soldiers of Tseult that followed because of his magic had fought well and most had survived nearly two weeks of fighting from the river to the castle. The siege had been resisted by wizards and soldiers alike. While the former stopped his wizards from simply crushing their defense of stone, enemy archers rained arrows down on any other men who dared to attack the strong walls.

The Malaiyan army would stall their push down the river to Solan for another two and half weeks as well. Ambushes and solid fortifications made them fight for every mile. Men fell on both sides. Wizards used their magic to hold the line for Malaiy, while the other side did their best to break it.

His enemies would fight him by day and disappear in the night only to reappear at another holding point to fight them once more. By the time his army arrived at the first major city of Malaiy, Caldrefan was both mentally tired and irritated to the point that he needed to let the commanders take over for fear that his anger would make him do something stupid.

Marq Itan was ready for him by then. A dozen warships patrolled his harbor while his army had set up fortifications more than half a mile from the solid stone walls of the city. Caldrefan could feel the wizards in the city and outside among the soldiers. Unable to get a true count, he could guess that every man that fell back had been joined by at least as many soldiers from Yalan.

If he could break this army, Caldrefan had a feeling that no one would be able to stand against him until they reached Yalan. The king's mega city would be too large to fortify for every square mile and only certain strongholds had any walls. It would be even more vulnerable if he could completely destroy Orlaan's army here.