The City of Fire and Shadows

Chapter 8

It was the morning after the surprise assault by the feral vampires of House Makrolyn. My muscles still ached from all the fighting the night before. My right thigh in particular hurt pretty bad after I got stabbed by Horton Makrolyn. But there wasn't any time for rest. The enemy was coming. I stood atop the battlements of Raven's Keep and looked through the binoculars. Corporal Maddox stood next to me and did the same. In the distance, we could see Meredith Wrenley's forces approaching the dirt road. Cordelia stood next to me and pointed to Meredith's army barrelling towards Raven's Keep. "They're finally here, and bringing their big guns. What's our next move?" she asked. I thought it over. The surprise attack was meant to merely soften us up for the main attack.

"They figure this will be a simple clean up operation, Cordelia," I said. "Let's prove them wrong."

"I agree, Audrey. Let's give them a nice welcome then!" said Maddox as he clenched his hand into a fist. "We've got machine gunners and rocketeers set up in the forests adjacent to the only road leading here. Raven's Keep won't fall this easily."

Meredith led in the front driving a Conquest Knight equipped with a frontal battering ram, and in the passenger seat next to her sat Flavia Drakon, the princess of House Drakon. Five two-door sedans with welded-on metal plate armour surrounded the Knight as a sort of protective barrier. Behind her was a semi-trailer truck driven by Lothario Wrenley, a lower ranked member of House Wrenley along with a machine gunner embedded on the top of the trailer. Two APCs, one red, and the other blue flanked the semi-trailer on each side, and in turn flanking the APCs were a convoy of roughly twelve minivans in total, undoubtedly carrying elite human collaborator soldiers. "Look at them," Maddox said pointing at the semi-trailer. "They're so confident they'll win that they're bringing a collection truck for their blood bank. We'll show them."

Maddox raised his radio and said, "Enemy forces number approximately 100-150. Begin the pincer attack!"

Through the binoculars I could see a spiked chain subtly emerge from the dirt as the five sedans ran over it, instantly puncturing their tires. The sedans swerved out of control, and screeched to a halt - also stopping the invading force in its tracks. I could see some soldiers exit the sedan and inspect the spiked chain. They turned towards Meredith's Knight and seemed to signal the incident.

"Now," Maddox said calmly in his radio.

Rockets fired from the forests flanking the dirt road and slammed into the minivans and sedans producing a ballet of explosive destruction, the cacophony of shouts, screams, and burning infernos hot in the air. Meredith's convoy immediately broke off into different directions, but all heading towards Raven's Keep. Soldiers that managed to escape the destruction were gunned down by our machine gunners. But Meredith's APCs responded in kind by raining rockets into the forests, silencing the initial ambush.

Maddox turned to me and handed me the radio. "There goes our advantage. Continue spotting, you two. I'm heading down. Going to round up some guys, and we're going to stop them before they reach the gates." And with that he ran down the battlements into the courtyard.

I peered through the binoculars again, and Meredith's convoy was barreling at top speed towards the portcullis gate. The semi-trailer was close behind. The two APCs were raining intermittent rockets towards Raven's Keep, and I almost fell as a rocket pummelled a section of the keep's solar panels. I screamed into the radio, "We have to take out those APCs!"

"Got it Audrey," came Brendan's voice from the other side. From the corner of the binoculars I could see one of our technicals driven by Cailey and the gun manned by Brendan circle and come face to face with the blue APC. Brendan fired an explosive rocket right into the open driver side window of the APC, lighting the whole thing ablaze in an explosion that ripped through the whole vehicle and rendered it immobile. Brendan fist pumped in celebration, but the victory was short lived as the red APC fired a rocket that blew up one of the keep's towers. It fired more rockets towards the portcullis gate, weakening the stone foundation. But the gate still held.