Nightfire | The Whispering Wall #1

Sixty Six: An Attack

She wasn't the only one awake at a time when most were sleeping; the lord's bed was empty and had clearly not even been touched that night. A thin band of candlelight flickered under the washing room door. Despite herself, she hesitated in the doorway. She had never been into the lord's bedchamber this late. She already hunched in anticipation of an unexpected blow, half-expecting the lord to be hiding somewhere just to catch her out. But that was stupid. He wouldn't be expecting her.

Somehow that didn't make it any better.

She forced herself to cross the room and knock on the door, and the sounds of gently lapping water stopped immediately. Faellian's icy voice ground out, "This had better be a dark-damned emergency."

"There's a demon swarm at the net, my lord," Nova said.

Water sloshed onto hard flooring, and the wet patters of footsteps crossed to the door. The lord swung it wide, glaring down at her from a height, dripping wet and haloed in candlelight. "A swarm?"

"Yes, my lord." She swallowed. She had seen the lord shirtless before, but she had been whipped for looking too long in past instances. He stalked past her, vigorously drying himself off. The scars on his arms and back flashed silver in the light, and she quickly averted her eyes.

"By swarm, you had better mean it," he growled, throwing on a shirt and crossing to his window. He threw back the drapes, and froze. Nova edged up behind him, as close as she dared, and under his arm caught a glimpse of the long line of demons at ground level. From so high up, they looked like a seething greyish mass, tinged orange by firelight, except for two huge Firebulls identifiable by sheer size. Marrowhawks and Forest Haunts swept through the air above them.

"Unnatural," Faellian breathed, "This is unnatural."

He turned from the window, seeming not to register that she was even there, and all but flew from the room. Nova crept closer to the window, staring down at the spectacle in mingled horror and awe. The rune net glowed bright, holding strong against the barrage, filling her head with distant music from the source below the ground. It hadn't been built for a siege like this, but the craftsmanship was still impressive, and still holding at the outer wall. It was far closer to an art than anything her people were capable of, and against greater enemies. The only things Angels had ever had cause to fear were each other.

She frowned out at the mountains, dark save for the faintest glimmer of green. It was common for demons to flood into the city from the ranges in the dark season, but altogether unheard of to gather in such numbers. This looked, for all intents and purposes, like an organised front that was far beyond the scope of normal demon behaviour or intelligence.

She craned her neck, trying to see around the wall whether the scene was similar at other points on the ramparts. She couldn't see far, but what she could see was more of the same. Voices now carried up the stairs towards her as the castle was roused, and Faellian passed somewhere below, barking orders.

She shook her head, still unable to fathom it. When it was all over, there would be panic. The demons had been appearing in greater numbers and in stranger places all season, but this was unprecedented.

Her eyes fell on a point in the animal crush almost casually. At first, she didn't register what she was looking at, and then she realised that the gap opening up was not a loss of interest. Deaths were entirely solitary, and would prey on almost anything. Other demons gave them a wide berth, and that was exactly what they were doing with the one drifting towards the gatehouse at that very moment. It was hard to see until a flicker of fire or flash of green revealed a tendril of its smoke-like form. Otherwise, the only way to track it was by the movement of the other demons.