Ruein: Fires of Haraden: Action/Adventure Necromancy Series (Books of Ruein Book 2), G.O. Turner [little bear else holmelund minarik txt] 📗

When its spikes finally came away, the berm running along the arch’s side undulated. It rolled out to the open road.

What was that?

This was their opening. No other choice.

A way out was not enough, not if there were pursuers. Ruein pulled her own ampule of oil. She yanked back at Liv. “Now! Break for it.”

Smashing the glass vial at her feet, Ruein looked to Twigs. The gnome, catching her notion, had readied a tindertwig. He struck it with a flip toward the oil-soaked ground. It ignited, burning off the last of the mists.

Lightbringer, half-orc, and necromancer bolted from the gateway to the open road. As they passed by the gnome, he incanted druidic. Roots sprang from the dirt where his staff waved. Spires and thorns stabbed up in a vicious mangle across the city exit.

That’d only slow—

The berm ahead exploded in a shower of mud and magma. Wet steaming clumps smacked the ground around them, as the bald-plated monk azer sprang from the molten flow.

The rain sizzled across his shoulders and haloed him in tufts of steam, instead of running off in drips. His bronzed body flared from the furnace within. The flames of his brow furrowed, as his arms groaned with a metal-flexing ache.

Already in the lead, Liv leaned into her shield charge. In the instant of her strike, the azer’s arm swatted her shield aside. His other fist coiled.

Liv’s body balled forward, her drive caught by the blow. Her armored feet came away as the azer monk propelled her backward. Liv struck the ground; her mace tumbled beside her. A fist-sized dent cratered her breastplate.

Ruein moved to spring to her defense, and an arrow pitoned her foot to the ground. She lurched back. A broad archery hatch over the gate—another phalanx of dark-orcs, these with longbows. Damn! They hadn’t spotted that hidden perch on the way in.

Riding shields over flames and thorns, a pair of Elites thrashed through Twigs’ deterrents. Their barricade was not going to hold.

Archers be damned. Liv wasn’t getting back up. Her sister fumbled about, uneasy in her motions. The azer’s monk strike had clearly disoriented her.

“Ha-ha!” Flashing past, Ceer hurtled over Liv. Curling his head under, his feet somersaulted over as he extended to his full length…

…and sandal-slammed into the monk azer.

The force of his blow rocked the azer back, distancing them from the Lightbringer.

Ceer’s hands not only caught his fall, but he used them to spring back upright. Beating a fist against his hardened chest—“Ceer of Deepwater.”

The steaming bronze figure raised his massive hand to where Ceer’s feet had landed. He eyed the half-orc. A sneering utterance of ignan ended with a beat toward himself. “Brun.”

Ceer offered a dusky grin. “Brun have lesson for Ceer?”

The azer nodded and turned his gaze back to the earthen berm. Two more bronzed azers climbed out of their hole. The dwarf-sized warriors dripped magma in their wake as they trod over to the fallen Lightbringer. One stood upon Liv’s shield; the other retrieved her mace.

Ruein grit her teeth and yanked the arrow from her boot. She twirled her glaive and rounded back for the azers over her sister.

The dirt between them instantly peppered with a row of twenty arrows. A warning volley.

Ruein halted.

The azers had her Lightbringer sister in place, and now, so too did the archers.

Already the Elite were reforming this side of their firewall. That clearly gave no comfort to the gnome. Twigs took cautious steps closer to Ruein, his open hands raised, staff crooked under an arm.

Brun, the monk azer, pulled the iron ringlet from his flaming scalp tail. His firelights flared as he beckoned metallic mitts at their half-orc.

Ceer fell into a guttural chant. He swayed on his feet as the two marshaled judgments of the other.

Their half-orc friend drew closer. His feet took on a purpose. Like pieces upon a gameboard, there was intent with each step.

The flaming azer simply shifted in his stance. His broad arms held at his sides, fingers spread instead of balling into fists.

In the remaining space between, Ceer blurred, jabbing the azer’s chin while his other wooden palm struck the chest. A sizzle shocked Ceer back. His palm smoked with embers.

He hurled himself into a cavalcade of strikes upon Brun. A flurry of sandals, bracer blows, and covered knees scorched and clanged with each strike. The azer lost ground as Ceer leaned into his onslaught. Bronzed arms move to deflect and redirect, yet his burning eyes never came away from the half-orc.

Liv strained to right herself. As she did so, the azers before her brought their own hands over. The rain sizzled and popped from their metal arms. The air over her wavered in their heat.

She looked to Ruein.

What do I have left? What can I still do? Ruein’s dead mind flashed through her necrotic tricks. Summoning undead to their aid was still within her. Yet, the spell would be as easy to foresee as to interrupt with arrows. It would take too long without some sort of cover.

Twigs tugged upon the hem of her cloak. He shrank away beneath. Like that was going to be any help.

A necrotic ray could sap strength from the azer monk. That’d level their chances, but then how would the azers hovering over Liv respond…or the army behind?

Any maneuver she made would come at a cost. For Liv to have any hope—she’d have to strike that bargain.

Through their martial dance, the large azer dodged. Dipping and weaving, he leaned upon his hip as Ceer’s bracer came for his head. His iron teeth gleamed.

Brun surged from his lean. He hooked his arm beneath Ceer’s shoulder and spun him about. Slinging him in, the azer’s other arm clamped down like a vice. He squeezed.

The half-orc’s face was a scrawl of pain as he sizzled against the azer. Ceer gaped, teeth bared as he struggled not to cry out.

Bending at the knees, Brun rolled sideways overtop of Ceer. He ground him into the dirt. Maintaining his hold, he