Alitia: Crown of Ash

XLIV: Tipping Point

Reconstructing the wall was, to put it simply, an absolute pain in the ass. 

S.M. nearly collapsed onto the roof of a small hut near the outer edge of the city after her segment of the wall had been closed. Three of the four holes had been plugged with rocks by that point, and all of the mages who were continuing to engage in combat were standing on top of the boundary and firing spells down from above. Carys had been doing that until she saw that the hole had been filled in, and that was her cue to fly over to S.M. and check on her. 

At first, S.M. had been confident that she was fine. However, the second that she was no longer running off the pure adrenaline of needing to keep the Shadows out of the former capital, she absolutely fell apart, and her wings nearly gave out as she attempted to land. Her energy had left her body all at once, and she had more than a few crass words and vulgar phrases for the wall that had caused so many issues for her. She had to actively resist the urge to glare at it with all the force that she could muster, understanding that she had other issues to take care of before she could lose her focus. 

"Are you doing alright?" Carys questioned as she helped to ease S.M. onto the building's roof. Carys seemed to have found her answer long before S.M. offered a response, and she cringed as S.M. let out a huff of air and turned her attention towards the sky. S.M. had to use far too much of her remaining energy to keep from falling backwards into a horizontal position. Even if she had been working with other mages to keep the Shadows out of the city, there was only so much that she could do on her own. The rocks were easy to manipulate, but trying to create a blockade that was likely over a hundred feet tall was seriously out of her range. If not for the power boost that came with her Sealing, S.M. likely never would have been able to pull it off. The headache that was starting to form at the base of her neck pounded its agreement. 

"If the Shadows start flying, I'm making it somebody else's problem," S.M. muttered angrily. The words sounded oddly faraway, and she recognized that she had likely pushed herself too far without meaning to. It wasn't as if she could go back and fix such a mistake, but it frustrated her regardless. 

"Not yet," Carys told her. "But if the holes in the wall all get filled in, it's probably going to happen sooner or later. Shadows don't have an explicit shape, and given how many of them have already been taken down, it's only a matter of time before they start trying to attack us from the sky. Absolutely lovely for us, wouldn't you say?" Her voice was dripping with sarcasm, and she let out a snort with a simultaneous roll of her eyes. 

S.M. decided to use this time where she was grounded and resting to try and identify where the rest of her team was. She couldn't figure out where any of them were, not that she particularly expected to in the first place. The city's walls created a giant circle, and seeing up into the air overhead was difficult enough. Trying to pick out a few specific mages among the onslaught of fighters circling the city was something else, and S.M. realized after a few seconds that it was a task she would rather not attempt. 

Carys glanced back and forth between S.M. and the overhead fight, and conflict began to brew in her icy eyes. She reached one hand out to touch S.M.'s arm, and the short-haired girl found herself hissing at how cold Carys was. She knew that ice mages had a lower body temperature than most others, but given that S.M. was starting to feel a bit feverish after using so much energy, the shift was enough to make her wince. She internally wondered how the hell Helena, a fire mage, put up with Carys on a regular basis. 

"I'm going to check out what's going on. I feel like something has changed," Carys eventually told S.M. before rising to her feet. She didn't wait for a response, instead kicking off the ground and allowing her wings to carry her away. S.M. grasped at the air in vain to try and bring Carys back, but she found that she wasn't able to do much aside from grab at the hot and still breeze around her. S.M. swore under her breath for what felt like the fiftieth time in the past hour.