Sons of Ironstorm - Book 4: Griffon's Stand

Demons in the Delta

Mram'met's eyes slid from the human's determined face to his sheathed blade, a finger's width visible above the sheath's lip glowing bright blue. The sight of the glowing blade immediately quashed the multitudinous questions that boiled up inside his mind.

"We go," he tautly commanded, pivoting around to charge southward into the gloom, not bothering with stealth now that they were directly endangered. The rest of the company followed at a dead run, hands never straying far from weapons as they did so.

His legs and arms moving smoothly to impart their momentum and impetus to his forward motion, Lawrence concentrated on making sure his boots continued their easy path down the center of the cobblestone road, the stones slick with the ongoing downpour. But no amount of concentration on running could push aside the cold feelings that continued to gnaw into his senses, warnings of the approach of dark soldiers. They were closing in on the company from all sides, if his senses could be trusted. With the harbor a good fifty lengths down the avenue distant, there was no way they'd make it before the enemy fell on them.

Then a second chill, one as familiar and more haunting than the first, began to push its insistent way into his mind and Lawrence nearly stumbled when he recognized it. 'Kaal Eran,' he grimly labelled the sensation of acidic cold in the depths of his mind, a sick feeling immediately knotting his belly as he did. The Great Enemy had demonic agents in Isile'ahkanak. An instant later the dark soldiers in pursuit let them know just how close they were.

It began with a single, hoarse-sounding horn, almost solitary as it echoed between the dark buildings lining the broad avenue the company found itself running along. It was swiftly joined by another, sounding closer than the first, and then a third and a fourth in short order and yet more until the heavy night's air was filled with them.

"Shards," Will tightly gasped through clenched teeth, not slowing in his headlong flight in the midst of the muraan warriors. The young lord of Tal Janux heard his fill of those particular horns, which had pursued him and Lawrence through the Giant's Teeth and well into the Gyren. To hear them again sent a painful stab of anxiety lancing through him.

"Tjor'riin."

The first appeared as a shadow pacing them along a nearby rooftop, hurling itself pell-mell along in an attempt to keep them within striking distance. The second joined it a few shades later on the opposite side of the street, instantly illustrating to the fleeing company that they had dark soldiers on either side of them. For a long moment it was only the pair that paced them. Then, just as the horns had multiplied, so did they, adding more and more shadows until the rooftops were thronging with their oily numbers, surging along through the rain to stay with the company.

Duncan saw it first, a single dark soldier standing in isolation on the rooftop of a squat stone building half a length in front of them at a fork in the avenue. His eyes wide in horror, the Mamran Tobald Airna watched the wiry figure lift a horn to its lips and blow long and hard.

"Bah," he growled, skidding to a halt to pull his claighmore from its sheath. "This is it, lads. We're surrounded." He spun about to face the path they had just crossed and grimaced to see it swiftly filling with dark soldiers.

Forced to also slide to a stop on the slick cobblestones by not wanting to leave their Mamran comrade behind, the rest of the small human company drew their weapons with steely rasps. Only to be shouldered aside by Mram'met and his warriors, jagged trk and long bladed daggers held ready in their gauntleted fists.

"Not today, Lawrence," the big muraan hissed, jerking his head to a nearby alley. "Get you and your men out of here. You must continue your quest for the Weapon of Power or all is lost."