Chapter 93: SABOTAGE INSIDE THE WARD

RAIGORO’S POV

Holt disappeared back into the lower works before Raigoro could ask anything else. The southern wall shook again, dropping part of the masonry into the service court hard enough that someone screamed beneath it.

Arven was already ordering the western rank closed before the dust settled, and Raigoro drew his sword as he moved with them.

The first ash hound came through the broken wall low enough to pass beneath a spear, and Raigoro caught it across the neck. A second reached the soldier beside him, but one of Arven’s sergeants struck from the opposite side and drove it away before its jaws closed.

"Left!"

The sergeant turned in time to see three more creatures coming through the breach.

There was no room for a command table anymore. Raigoro did not need one.

"Second rank forward!"

Arven carried the order farther down the line, and the shields closed.

Raigoro stepped back only far enough to see the southern approach.

"Archers, not the hounds. Stonebacks behind them."

The first volley changed targets, making one stoneback stumble while another kept coming.

"Arven."

"I see it."

Arven sent a reserve section toward the widening breach.

Raigoro turned before the creature struck the wall again.

The attack did not stop while Holt’s crews shifted from inspection to emergency stabilization.

Ash hounds tested the gaps while stonebacks struck the weakened wall in a heavy, ugly rhythm. Above them, Dragon Host wings cut through the dark as carrion drakes kept trying to reach Dragon Host officers and wing joints.

Holt came up from the lower works while two soldiers dragged a wounded man across the court.

"Your Grace."

Raigoro remained near the wall.

"Talk."

"The crossing stays closed. Two of the three load housings we opened are carrying understrength supports. The third is correct, but it is taking more load because the other two are failing to carry theirs."

"Can you stabilize the damaged sections?"

"One with the certified emergency spare."

"The other?"

"I can strip a full-load support from one of the low-load auxiliary sections and brace the remaining housing temporarily."

"Cost?"

"That auxiliary section becomes unusable until we rebuild it."

"Do it."

Holt nodded.

"I also need the central court kept light. Every company standing directly above those housings adds weight to a structure already carrying badly."

"You will have what I can give you."

Holt went below.

The junction did not possess enough correct heavy material to repair itself in the middle of a battle.

The emergency cache could save one critical housing.

Everything else would have to survive through cannibalized verified supports, temporary military bracing, and whatever load the remaining structure could still carry.

The permanent replacement material was somewhere behind the fighting, still moving through Blackharrow’s roads.

It would not arrive because Raigoro wanted it.

Later, Holt surfaced long enough to say, "This is not a repair."

Raigoro looked at the shaking wall.

"I did not ask for one."

"Good."

"Keep it alive."

Holt went below.

A Dragon Host horn sounded overhead.

Captain Veyr landed Meris inside the eastern court.

The gray dragon’s breathing was already too hard.

"The bronze pair is down."

Raigoro looked toward the ridge.

"Dead?"

"No. Injured. They landed north of the station."

"Other pair?"

"Carrion drakes have them above the eastern wall."

"North Spur?"

"Their pair is engaged."

"West Rime?"

"Still covering the damaged anchor."

Veyr understood the next question before Raigoro asked it.

"Nothing else reaches us in time without stripping another ward sector."

The answer was useful even though Raigoro hated what it meant.

The Citadel courier pair remained grounded under field care.

Raigoro left them there.

The western service wall held through the first impact and failed on the second. Stone dropped inward, opening enough space for three ash hounds to enter together. Arven’s front rank recoiled, and Raigoro reached the opening before the command guard could close around him.

The first hound came low.

He let it commit, stepped outside the jaws, and drove his sword down behind the skull.

The second came over the falling body.

Raigoro turned with it instead of backing away. Its claws struck his shoulder plate hard enough to stagger him, but the movement carried the creature past his center. He cut behind its foreleg before it could turn.

"Close behind me."

Arven heard him.

Shields moved forward.

A third hound reached the gap before the line closed. Raigoro caught its first bite on the flat of his blade, shoved the jaws away from his throat, and drove his knife beneath the lower jaw with his free hand.

The creature dropped between his boots.

He kicked it aside.

"Forward."

The infantry recovered three paces.

Then the stoneback came through.

Men began crowding instinctively toward the opening.

Raigoro saw the mistake.

"Give it room."

Arven repeated the order immediately.

The center opened.

The stoneback forced its shoulders through the broken wall and found empty ground instead of a mass of men to crush.

Raigoro waited until the creature had taken two steps and turned toward him.

Its weight shifted.

"Left side."

Arven’s spear section moved.

The stoneback swung toward them.

Raigoro went the other way.

He moved inside the reach of the forelimb and cut into the softer joint behind it. The first strike opened hide. The second reached deeper.

The stoneback twisted fast enough to catch Raigoro across the ribs with the edge of its plated shoulder.

Pain drove him sideways.

He kept his feet.

The creature turned after him and exposed the damaged joint to Arven’s spears.

"Now."

Six spearheads entered together.

The foreleg folded.

Raigoro stepped back in before the creature could recover and drove his sword beneath the opened plate behind the shoulder.

The stoneback collapsed into the breach.

Nobody around him moved until Raigoro pulled his sword free.

"Use the body."

Arven recovered first.

"You heard him. Build around it."

Soldiers dragged broken masonry against the carcass until the creature that had opened the wall became part of the barrier closing it.

Raigoro wiped blood from the corner of his mouth with the back of his glove.

Something deeper roared from the southern valley.

He looked up.

The next problem was already coming.

Even the ash hounds nearest the wall hesitated. Meris raised her head as Veyr turned south.

Trees were moving beyond the approach.

Something much larger was coming.

Arven reached Raigoro.

"Reserve?"

Raigoro checked what remained and found almost no reserve left. Kian had already taken the light detachment toward North Spur, the command guard was fighting, one Dragon Host pair was injured, and another remained occupied in the air. Meris might have one serious pass left before Veyr had to choose between landing her and breaking her.

Holt still needed time below.

The junction did not have it.

Pain struck through Raigoro’s bond, but it did not belong to him.

Vharos.

The dragon was far away, a distance Raigoro had felt through the bond for years. What reached him now was different: restlessness, anger, and then unmistakable movement.

Raigoro knew the feel of Vharos in flight.

Nineteen years made some knowledge too old to require thought.

He looked north.

"No."

Captain Veyr heard him.

"What?"

Raigoro did not answer.

The bond tightened again.

Vharos was moving toward him.

Raigoro had not summoned him.

Vharos was coming anyway.