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  “He’s already assembling the men at the north gate,” he said, between breaths. “There are people still flowing into the city. I’m afraid—”

  “We’ll take care of it,” I said, standing up. I looked at Pallos and Isa. “You two, get back to the ship. Fly it to the north gate.”

  “Shanti . . .” Isa started.

  “I won’t have you there, Isa. It’s crawlers and you are not trained. Now go!”

  Isa’s lips tightened, but she nodded and headed for the door. Pallos, on the other hand, made no argument.

  I looked back at the mayor, who was standing up. “We’ll help your men hold them off.”

  “Thank you, Shanti. Or should I say . . . Anna.” He looked at me seriously. “Be very careful.”

  We headed for the door and into the street.

  “Hurry,” I said to Pallos and Isa. “Run as fast as you can.”

  As they ran in the direction of the south gate, the rest of us ran north, drawing our weapons.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  WE RAN NORTH ALONG THE street while panicked people ran against us in the opposite direction. Despite the frightened masses, the crowd still parted for us, probably because all five of us were armed to the teeth.

  We ran around the Preserve covering the hilltop, half pink from xen and the rest covered with thick, green grass and trees. Several people were making cover there. We ran across a small, wooden bridge spanning a stream flowing out from the park, likely the source of the Springstream Inn’s name.

  By the time we were on the north side of town, the streets were all but empty. I could see the top of the northern palisade down the hill. Men manned the outposts, ready to defend the town. I couldn’t get a look at anything beyond the wall.

  We ran down the main road, at the end of which stood the north gate, still open. People breathed heavily as they staggered inside. I sprinted downhill until I reached the gates. I stopped, made sure the others were behind me before I pushed through.

  Outside was a familiar sight. This is the road Isaru and I had followed into Northold, and as it snaked down the hill, I could see a good fifty people or so at various length along the road, all running for the safety of the city. There was no sign of the crawlers yet.

  But that wasn’t to last long. At the bottom of the road, insect-like monsters shot out of the cover of the trees, tackling the stragglers. Even from my distance, I could hear the screams.

  I ran down the road, past yet more people streaming upward in the opposite direction. Some were bloodied.

  The crawlers’ next target was a group of three, which looked to be a family. Knowing they were next in line, the family ran even faster. The father stopped, spreading his arms, yelling over his shoulder for the others to keep running.

  I was practically flying down the hill, with Fiona and Shara right at my heels. Tellor and Isandru were coming as fast as they could, but neither could match our speed.

  The father was tackled, just as we passed the mother and daughter, who ran with dirty, tear-stained faces.

  “Run!” I yelled. “Run!”

  My words got them moving faster. I flew around the last bend, finding that I was too late to save the father. The crawler mauled him, tearing into his neck and pulling out bloody viscera. As I slid to a stop, blade in my hand, he looked up from his grisly meal. Its three glowing eyes stared right at me.

  Fiona and Shara stopped on either side me, a cloud of dust spreading forward from their sliding. In the distance, I could see yet more crawlers scuttling in our direction.

  Despite the terror that threatened to paralyze me, facing this monster felt strangely familiar, as if I had fought them before.

  I knew, in another life, I had.

  “Don’t focus on their eyes,” I said.

  It let out a high screech, my bones vibrating from the force of it.

  It shot forward and I ran to meet it. As its mandibles opened, revealing sharp, bloody teeth, its scorpion tail arched back to strike.

  Focus, I thought. Silence.

  Instantly, I entered a void where it was only me and the crawler. Dimly, I was aware that Fiona and Shara were at my sides. My mind reached across that void, connecting with the crawler’s consciousness. There was a moment’s hesitation, as if it could sense I was there.

  I knew it was going to strike with its tail.

  “Back up!” I called out.

  Thankfully, both Shara and Fiona were listening. They backed away just the tail shot forward.

  But I was ready, dodging at just the right moment. I stepped forward with my blade outstretched, stabbing right into his gaping maw. The blade buried itself deeply, and I twisted for good measure. The creature gave an unholy scream, a sound that, in the void, seemed outside reality itself. I pulled the blade back, and it was covered with purple gunk.

  I jumped back as the monster quivered on its spindly legs—legs which shortly splayed out as it bled to death.

  I released my hold on Silence, in time to see two more creatures running forward to engage. Even more were scrambling out of the woods at the bottom of the hill.

  There was no way we could defeat them all.

  “Back up!” I called. “To the gate!”

  Trying to outrun a crawler was impossible. All we could do was hold them back while giving ground all the way to the wall, where the ballistae and arrows could provide cover.

  It all depended on how quickly Isa and Pallos could get back to the Odin.

  Isandru and Tellor lined up beside me. The five of us together effectively blocked the road.

  “Sightform,” I said. “You can read their actions if you synchronize with them. But avoid looking at them directly.”

  I didn’t know how my voice was so calm. The two crawlers in the front fanned out, one on either side of the road. We backed up toward the next bend in the road, stopping there to push the monsters back.

  Both crawlers moved forward in tandem, one heading straight for me. I joined my mind with the monster’s and it screamed at the invasion. It pushed against me with all its mental force, but I held strong, not letting it gain an inch.

  Stop.

  The creature slid to a stop, kicking up a cloud of dust. It was so sudden that the other crawler crashed into it, keeling over and exposing its soft underbelly. Its thin, scythe-like legs quivered frantically.

  Isandru and Tellor charged before it could find its feet, stabbing deeply into its abdomen. It let out a high shriek, even as Fiona circled around the side of the one I had pinned with my mind.

  It was pushing back, hard. I knew that if I didn’t let go, then it wouldn’t attack us.

  Hurry, Fiona . . . Shara . . .

  I felt my strength waning, just in time for Fiona to hack and slash into the monster with Shara backing up. The connection was severed as the monster went still. I fought to keep my feet; I’d never felt so lightheaded before.

  I became aware of myself being pulled.

  “Shanti!” Shara said. “We’ve got to pull back.”

  I forced myself to run up the road; the crawlers we had killed formed a natural roadblock against the ones still coming, but it wouldn’t last for long. There was at least a dozen pushing against the monster corpses and even more of the creatures pouring from the dark woods.

  “Whatever you did,” Elder Tellor said, “don’t try it again.”

  I had little chance to argue. A look back revealed the crawlers to be running around their dead brethren. I ran faster, looked at the town gate where the last of the refugees were slipping behind the safety of the walls.

  “We did what we came for,” I said. “Let’s get out!”

  “They’re going to catch us!” Fiona said.

  “I’ll stop them,” I said.

  “Shanti . . .” Tellor said.

  But I was already finding Silence. It came easily enough, but channeling the power of the Xenofold was much harder. I felt so weak. Whatever powers Anna possessed, I did not have them with equal strength.
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br />   But if I didn’t try, none of us were going to survive long enough for Odin to reach us.

  I purposefully slowed my breath, despite my madly beating heart. I had to be in full control of myself and my feelings—nothing could get in the way of my mind and these monsters. The crawlers had been brought to heel after the Ragnarok War. With the weakening of the Xenofold, they, like the Mindless, had broken free of its control.

  Perhaps something of the original connection remained. Perhaps, like my father, the connection could be repaired, even if it had lain dormant for generations.

  Everything went quiet as I focused harder, drawing as much power as I dared. I reached out to the first crawler and felt its bloodlust as if it were my own. I could see us through its eyes as it charged up the hill. I could smell our scent—the scent of fear—the promise of warm flesh and crunchy bone, the promise of hot blood slurped through fanged mandibles.

  This consciousness became aware of my intrusion and panicked. I had to strike before its defenses went up.

  Without knowing in the slightest what I was doing, I concentrated all my will toward hurling the creature off the cliff beside the road. The energy left my mind and I gained control of the crawler, able to move its limbs as if they were my own.

  Run off the cliff.

  Obediently, the crawler ran off the cliff, falling to the teeming mass of monsters below.

  That was only one monster though, of the many I had to kill. I shifted my focus to the next in line, which was now closer. This one was more prepared, and I felt myself get knocked back when I connected with its mind. The others stood behind me, facing the crawlers, each of them trying to do the same thing but failing.

  And then, another of the crawlers jerked, throwing itself against the others, slamming into them like pins. The impact blocked half the road, slowing the rest of them down. That hadn’t been me, but I found out who it was when Isandru fell to his knees, utterly fatigued. The crawlers pinned under writhed madly as they tried to break free, even as others trampled over them.

  I forced myself to stand. “Everyone . . . stop. You’ll hurt yourselves.”

  I knelt by Isandru, who was panting for breath. He had managed to control one of the monsters, just barely, and he was the most powerful of everyone here, myself excluded.

  If anyone succeeded in what he did, it would be a lot worse.

  Down the hill, the rest of the crawlers managed to break free of the obstruction Isandru had created.

  All of us ran.

  Tellor, Fiona, and I grabbed Isandru and ran as fast as we could up the hill.

  At the next bend came a welcome sight—a squadron of Northold’s guards, in formation and bearing high shields and long pikes, designed specifically to face crawlers. For the first time, I noticed the clank of crossbows and the twang of longbows, and missiles shooting from the palisades. Some connected with the crawlers, finding them as they ran.

  We needed to make it behind the men, who would form a strong defense against the crawlers, but one of the crawlers was going to reach us before we could reach safety. I turned to disable it, drawing my sword. As it reared up and snapped its fangs, a ballista bolt pierced its thick, chitin shell, and it was knocked back to the cliff. I didn’t stay to watch; I ran the rest of the way, the pikes parting as I entered the formation.

  I was the last one in, and soon as I was, the company came to a halt, lifting their shields as one and pointing the line of pikes outward. The crawlers were stopped cold as the sharp, glinting pikes stabbed outward. Crawlers screamed if they got too close—the steel could pierce their armor if driven with enough force.

  By the time we were behind the formation, they were already backing up slowly. They’d probably come out just to rescue us. I was impressed with how well-disciplined they were. Even if the individual men were afraid, they worked together, and not a single man died because their pikes covered each other.

  One crawler tried to dance around the row of pikes with its multiple legs . . . but it couldn’t keep that dance up for long. It let out a hiss, then a sharp scream as the sharp points found their mark, bringing the monster crashing to the dirt. The pikemen stabbed furiously as it twitched and screamed.

  “Enough!” the captain ordered. “Back up, slow and easy.”

  The next crawlers came forward hard, not wasting time trying to dodge. Through sheer force, they pushed against the formation, causing it to loosen.

  “Hold rank!” the captain shouted. “Do you want to be in a crawler’s belly? Hold rank!”

  The men formed up again, keeping the crawlers at bay. As more crawlers piled behind the frontrunners, it forced the monsters forward into the meatgrinder.

  But I noticed some of them were scrambling up the cliff to the road above the men, and behind us.

  “They’re trying to surround us!” I said. “Let’s move!”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  WE RAN TOWARD THE CRAWLERS climbing toward the road above the formation. One reached the top just in time for the five of us to arrive. Fiona and I engaged it, scoring hits in the gaps within its chitin shell. Purple blood oozed from the fresh-cut wounds, giving the others a chance to knock it back over the cliff. We stood at the cliff, watched it fall where four more were trying to ascend. It hit all of them on the way down. The crawlers fell through the air, crashing into the mass below.

  “There have to be hundreds of them,” Shara said.

  I could see that she was right. The crawlers were pushing relentlessly against the pike formation. I noticed there were fewer men standing among them . . . they had lost a few in the couple of minutes we’d spent away from them.

  Even if the pikemen were holding the line for now, they would soon be overwhelmed by sheer numbers. The pikes were barely keeping the crawlers at bay, and their snapping mandibles edged ever closer as the seconds ticked by.

  Come on, Pallos.

  How long had it been? He needed to arrive with Odin sometime in the next minute, or people were going to start dying by the score.

  Now, there were at least ten crawlers climbing the cliff face . . . seeing the others die had done nothing to dampen their spirits. Some slipped and fell to the road below, but even more were crawling over wide enough a tract that we couldn’t cover it all. From the side of the cliff, the tower-mounted ballistae couldn’t reach them.

  “We each have to guard our own zone,” I said. “Stab them before they can make it to the top.”

  We spread out at intervals of fifteen feet or so. I remained in place, just in time to meet the next crawler. Before it could pull itself up, I sliced at its front legs. The crawler hissed every time I hacked at it, but it kept pulling itself up.

  With a sudden lurch, the crawler pushed forward, slamming its head into my gut. I was knocked back a few paces, but I recovered, assuming Windform. The crawler pulled itself fully onto the road, and then, it charged.

  I dashed to the side, running toward the only open space I had, which led me right to another crawler just surfacing over the cliff. A premonition told me to turn, and I did so just in time to parry a thrust from the first crawler’s leg. Without even looking, I sidestepped to avoid the strike of the second crawler’s tail.

  I dashed for the edge of the cliff, the only available space I had . . .

  . . . only to find myself cornered.

  I stepped back as far as I could, right at the edge. The crawlers blocked any escape. All my friends were busy with their own fights—I had no way out except to save myself.

  But I wasn’t going down without a fight. I closed my eyes, drawing as much power from the Xenofold as I could.

  I had to take control of both at once.

  The resistance from their combined consciousness was far stronger than I could have ever imagined, yet I held on as hard as I could, sheathing my blade somewhere in the madness and holding out both of my hands. The world faded to black as I strengthened the connections, forging the bond even stronger.

  If they overpowered me . . .
then I was dead.

  I commanded you once, I thought. I will do it again.

  Though no words came back, I could feel their malevolence. They struggled, hard. I felt as if I was going to pass out.

  They struggled forward, as if moving into a hurricane. I reached forward until each of my hands came to rest on their small, angular heads.

  I felt each connection click into place. There was screaming—whether mine, or theirs, I couldn’t tell.

  Obey!

  The creatures screeched in tandem, turning to fight the crawlers pushing against them. They fought madly, and I knew I could let go.

  As soon as I did, however, another crawler climbed up the cliff from behind me, reaching out with a thin leg to bring me down.

  I fell, screaming.

  * * *

  When I opened my eyes, I was on the side of the cliff, looking upward, dazed. My heart was racing, I couldn’t breathe, and everything hurt.

  The crawlers raced down the side of the cliff, scuttling down to my position, even as more were making the climb up.

  Obey, I thought. Obey.

  It was futile. They were coming to kill me. I couldn’t see my friends fighting above anymore, but there were almost as many crawlers on the road above as there were on the road below. I couldn’t see the town pikemen anymore.

  Somehow, I made myself stand. If I was to die, it would be on my feet.

  Somebody . . . Quietus . . . Alex . . . help me.

  I couldn’t finish the thought. I felt myself falling again. My eyes closed on their own accord.

  When I felt the contact against my chest, I hurtled backward, only to be stopped by another force—what had to be another crawler reaching my position from below.

  If they weren’t going to obey me, I would have to go down fighting.

  And then came the sound of Odin’s roaring engines. It came out of nowhere, and the sound was as deafening as it was beautiful.

  But it was too late. I was pinned.