049 – Act On Your Decision

Steven stood behind Abey as she crouched with the binoculars. They were positioned next to a large support pillar, in its dark shadows. Caspian was waiting, energy ready to cast whatever spell in a hurry.

Abey called out what she saw. “Four by the corner, second from left is the leader.”

Steven looked through his sight at the building and drifted over to the right, across one person, and onto a second. He adjusted his aim slightly and squeezed his trigger. The crossbow let fly and Steven then pulled it from his shoulder to pull the charging handle and put another bolt in.

Abey reported his effort. “He’s down, bolt in his right collar.”

Caspian scanned across the market square below them. The locals had the attackers pinned down well. But as the three had moved around, The Leader had disappeared. This was their third position. The attackers had advanced to a second market closer to the palace. The main road went up to the next level here, or branched out deeper into the city to where the mountain rock was visible, or out onto the open area where this was the highest level, and exposed to the sun. Two more carts were in this market, leaving four unaccounted for in this direction. Steven had used almost half of his bolts in this hit-and-run tactic he was leading them in. Caspian felt a bit frustrated at not being able to help more, but this was self-imposed as he knew brawling level spells and open field spells; if he wanted to start damaging the buildings, he could cut loose. For now he was looking for the leader of the attackers.

Then Cyrril got his attention. From wherever Cyrril was, he could see the leader and three others were moving through an alley. Caspian asked where this was from his where he stood. Cyrril’s view came into his mind.

Steven was setting up for a second shot here. Caspian checked the spells he had put on Abey and Steven, and saw they were still good for a bit longer. He recharged them, and looked around, getting his bearings, and planning a course. Steven let fly his second shot, and he and Abey pulled back around the column.

Caspian led out. “Follow me. Cyrril has shown me where the leader is.”

Caspian leapt up the building they stood next to, which was anchored to the column. Abey and Steven followed, as Caspian dashed across this roof. Caspian leapt kitty corner across the intersection where this building ended, and landed on a roof one floor down and kept going. He crossed this building, hurdled the alley on this block, then ran forward to the street of the next block and stopped. Abey and then Steven caught up. Steven had not yet cocked his cross bow.

Caspian pointed his staff down. The other two looked, and Steven pulled the charging handle on his cross bow, and put a bolt into it. Aiming down he shot the rear most bowman in the neck before he could turn the corner of the alley in the block beyond. As that bolt hit, and the man fell, Steven was already reloading. The party did not reappear, so Steven leapt after in pursuit. Steven ran across this block out into the light as the level above ended, and stopped at the edge of the roof he ran across. The next few blocks in front of Steven were a light well four levels deep, with a large building structure below it which extended north out of the well. Something about it screamed ‘Palace’ to Steven.

The leader and his two men were not visible. Steven backtracked, causing Abey and Caspian to skid and turn after him, as he found the alley branch and carefully looked down. Footsteps echoed up it, Steven took off in pursuit, leapt across the road, and paused to look up the street. Cyrril swooped past and to Steven’s right to the edge of the block. Steven followed, and saw the leader and his two men peek out of the alley further down, and take off along the avenue on the edge of the super structure. If Steven had a rifle he might have tried a shot but they were out of his comfortable range with the crossbow.

Caspian went on across the middle of the block, Abey following him, both slowing down. Steven ran along the edge of the roofs with a long drop off to his right, and saw the men turn left in the next square. Steven got to the square and looked down on it, from beside the large column here.

One side of the square fronted the light well. Here were more wagons, more so the remains of them, wisps of smoke lingering. Part of the building they had been parked against had collapsed. Caspian and Abey leapt, and Caspian tossed some magic down into the square. Another explosion boomed across the square. Steven felt the air rush past the way it did when ordinance was detonated too close. His ears started ringing, as the rest of the world went silent. Steven looked down, and saw that near a dozen men in the attackers uniforms were staggered. Abey and Caspian were on the roof on the far side of the square. Steven lined up and felled another man with his crossbow, and started reloading it as he moved back off the edge and to a new position. Then Steven tasted electricity. He always tasted a little when Caspian did magic, and figured it was from his dental work. Now he tasted a lot, and Caspian let off a lightening bolt. The thunderclap was the only thing that Steven heard.

Steven got back to the edge and saw that all the bad guys were down. Abey got his attention as she slung a stone across the square and to Steven‘s left. Steven followed her prompt and saw a man limping across the street and two more fleeing into the alley mid-block across to his right. Steven took off, whishing he had a vehicle to chase around in, instead of just his feet. He leapt the street, and felt the air passage of an arrow on his scalp. He landed and kept going, following the alley to its usual mid-block intersection. Carefully he looked down, and saw two men looking around and breathing hard. Steven felt the vibrations of two people landing on the roof he stood on, and turned to look as Caspian and Abey trotted up. Steven stepped back, and Caspian grabbed Steven’s ears. Steven tasted electricity and felt a mild jolt before he could instinctively dodge out of Caspian’s grasp. Suddenly he could hear again.

Before either could say anything, Steven pointed over the side of the alley. Both nodded. Steven walked back over, and saw that the men were walking against the wall right below him, back toward the market square. Steven was about to shoot, when Abey jumped off the side and landed on the man following. Steven’s professionalism kept him from cursing, as he followed Abey’s lead and landed on the leader, who had just turned to see Abey beginning to thug his man.

Steven felt the man’s armor take the brunt of Steven’s impact, as he hit him feet first. The spell for leaping around also dissipated the force somehow, Steven was not worried how, but it only felt to Steven like he had jumped the guy from atop a fence.

The man managed to turn over and start scrambling, but Steven was right next to him and grabbed him, losing his crossbow in the process. The two wrestled a bit with Steven taking a bit of punishment from the smaller man. Steven then got a solid hit in, and ended up wrapping the man in an arm lock, and pulled his ka-bar from his belt and held it across the man’s throat.

Steven risked looking around. Caspian was standing at the opening of the alley into the rubble strewn market square. Again Steven tasted electricity, and figured Caspian was doing some magic of some kind. Some guards in their red shirts and militia men were gathering up the attackers in dark uniforms from where they had fallen in the market. Looking back into the alley, Abey had the bugler at sword point. His bugle was smashed from it having been fallen on.

Steven felt reluctant to kill this man. “Surrender and I won’t hurt you any further.”

The Leader took a breath, and then yelled, trying to call for the men he thought were in the square. ”Fight on; for glory, for Hafax.”

Steven slashed his throat, without actually cutting anything but the skin. Then with the man’s left arm occupied at his neck wound, Steven took the man’s right arm, and twisted it around the wrong way feeling the connective tissue give way, destroying the elbow as the man cried out. The man’s throat and head wounds were bloody, but ultimately superficial. Steven dropped him to the pavement, and kicked his knee hard further disabling him.

As Steven dealt with his prisoner, Abey knocked the wind out of the bugler, and smacked his head with the crossbar of her sword, knocking him cold.

More confusion began to develop around them, as the shop keepers and several more pedestrians showed up armed, and joined the guards and militia. A few blue shirted men with polished steel breast plates also started to survey the situation. Everyone deferred to them.

Steven was about to leave the leader in Caspian’s care, when he surveyed the situation, and decided to stay put. He grabbed a nearby crate to sit on, and put his feet on the downed leader. For his part, the leader realized that his neck and head were only grazed, and that he might be able to get up and move, if he could get clear. Steven stepped on his already sore knee, and rolled the man onto his belly, and put one foot on his shoulders, and the other across the mans lower back, and sat down.

“Stay put. Your fight is done.” Steven kept his tone as coolly neutral as he could.

The man tried to go for a knife in a wrist sheath. Steven went to one knee on the man’s shoulders, and grabbed his left arm as the leader tried to pull a knife free. Steven glanced around.

“Abey.”

She came over.

“His left hand. Get the knife.”

Steven put more weight onto the man’s shoulders and back, as he tried to fight. “Let her take it.”

After a pause with more of Steven’s weight on his back, beginning to hurt his spine, the man’s grip relaxed, and he let Abey have the knife. Steven felt that the man’s back had chain mail while his front had a breast plate under the black shirt he wore. There were unit devices embroidered into the shoulders of the sleeves.

The confusion died down, as the locals asserted control over the situation. A wagon was pressed to service, as a cache for surrendered and confiscated weapons, and rope was produced to bind the surrendered, as they were rounded up and taken away by the constables. Abey got the attention of a constable as he went by and told him that the leader of the assault force was within the alley. The man started to enter and hit a wizard’s shield. Caspian suggested he go get whoever was in charge here.

Progressively higher rank city guards show up in succession over the next few moments and approached to take the leader in custody. But Caspian would not lower his shield.

“Send for a Palace Guard Officer. We will not talk with anyone less.” Caspian stood at the edge of his bubble shield, addressing the City Guardsman.