Laryn ran back to the horses and mounted up on his own steed. In the distance he caught a glimpse of Hober, now riding his horse. He moved as quickly as he could across the treacherous landscape away from the guard camp.

  The moon outlined Hober’s dark figure against the pale ground. The surprised guards at the campground rushed around, mounting their horses. Two riders chased directly after Hober across the ground, while another pair started out along the Townshold road, moving more quickly on the path to get ahead of Hober and cut him off.

  Laryn snapped his reins. His horse galloped onto the road, Mat and Ollen just behind him. “They’ll forget about Hober,” Laryn called back to them. “And think this was just a voidling attack.”

  Voildings trumped as the scrambled over the top of the cliff. They scuttled toward their prey. These creatures were squat and broad, with strong hooked limbs better suited for climbing than racing.

  But they were still fast enough to chase the horses. Laryn raced down the road toward the guard camp, pushing his horse to stay ahead of the angry swarm.

  Laryn galloped into the camp, sword out. The guards were still scrambling, trying to figure out what was happening.

  Charging straight toward the horses, Laryn’s sword swung with the force of his charge behind it. This land was Fort Envin claimed, and influence worked against Laryn. He called on all his extra strength.

  His first strike nearly beheaded a man trying to mount his steed. His next knocked another from his saddle. His horse kicked a third man in the chest.

  Laryn cut through hamstrings and reins, sending some horses to the ground while others ran. He cursed as the blade tangled in leather, then ripped it free. He hated fighting against influence. His sword, magically enhanced to always remain sharp, felt like it had dulled.

  Soldiers on foot scrambled to present a united front as Ollen and Mat ripped through them, stabbing with their void-spine-tipped spears. Before the soldiers realized what was happening, half of them lay dead on the ground. The remaining men clumped together, preparing to fight back.

  Someone had the sense to call for reinforcements. A horn sounded, cutting through the night.

  “Time to go,” Laryn yelled, wheeling his mount around as voidlings scuttled into the camp.

  The creatures tore through tents and feasted on bodies, charging at anything that moved. Laryn kicked one away from his horse. The monsters drew the soldier’s attention, but Laryn doubted any of them would survive for long.

  Ollen and Mat started their horses back toward the road, heading to the west. Laryn, standing high in his stirrups, saw that the men who’d chased after Hober had turned around. The sound of the horn had drawn them back to the camp.

  He spotted Hober just as the man reached the Townshold road, off in the distance, and galloped away into the night. Laryn wheeled his horse around and plunged through fighting soldiers and Voidlings.

  Laryn returned to the Townshold road and galloped to catch up with Mat and Ollen. Horns sounded to his right in response to those of the guard camp, and dozens of small torches burned like stars in the night sky. Reinforcements were coming. They needed to get out of there before the enemy could figure out what was going on.

  If Laryn was lucky, anyone who saw him would be dead, and the enemy would assume that this was simply a voidling attack.

  If not, he knew he’d just shortened the amount of time they could hide in the wilderness. It was worth it to sneak Hober through.

  They reached the top of the pass and slowed, trotting down the steep incline as quickly as they were able.

  Mat laughed gleefully as they rode. “That was incredible!” he said. “You’re amazing, Laryn! They had no idea what was going on!”

  Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.

  “It was risky,” Laryn said. “I’m just glad we got Hober through. Let’s get home before we run into any more problems.”

  But he couldn’t help smiling.

  At the first switchback the trail wrapped around a massive boulder. They rounded this and came face to face with five men on horseback, who seemed to be ready for them.

  They probably heard the horns and the galloping horses.

  “Halt!”

  Mat and Ollen slowed, but Laryn did not.

  “Five thousand men behind. Five ahead,” he called back to them.

  Laryn summoning a water dart and charged forward.

  Arrows whipped past him, one of them cutting a gash across his thigh. His water dart caught the moonlight and streaked like a bolt of lightning across the gap. It pierced the chest of one of the men, knocking him to the ground.

  Laryn urged his horse forward, picking up speed. Arrows from Mat and Ollen’s bows flew past him, injuring one of the enemy horses. It fell to the ground.

  The enemy’s confidence broke, and they began turning their horses in an attempt to run. But Laryn was too fast, already upon them. His sword struck cleanly through the light leather armor of one man.

  The blow slowed Laryn only slightly as he raced past.

  Another man leaned low over his horse, urging it into a gallop. Laryn caught up, and jumped from the saddle, grabbing the man by the collar and ripping him backwards off of his mount. He threw him to the ground. Laryn put all the force of his weight behind the point of his sword. The blade punched through the man’s skull and embedded into the ground.

  The final mounted enemy swiped at Laryn with a sword as he rode past, but the attack swung wide. A pair of arrows sprouted from the man’s back, and he slumped off the saddle to the side, letting the horse gallop onward down the trail.

  Ollen and Mat rode up as Laryn grabbed the reins of his own horse.

  “This one’s still alive,” Mat said, indicating the man whose horse had gone down. The man was pinned by one leg under the weight of the horse.

  “Should we kill him?” Ollen asked. “They’re going to know that we were here.”

  The trapped man groaned in pain. “Please no,” he begged.

  “They’ll already know,” Laryn said, mounting his own horse and pointing to the arrows, “we don’t have time to make this look like a Voidling attack.”

  They left the man groaning in pain and pushed on down the path. As they reached the third switchback, lights and figures appeared atop the cliffs. Shouts informed them that they’d been spotted, and several bright streaks flashed past them, impacting the ground and stones around them.

  “They’ve got mages up there,” Laryn said. Another elemental dart whipped past him, splashing water against a stone. They pushed their horses dangerously fast down the slope. Already out of the accurate range of the mages, they only needed to get a little further to be safe.

  More elemental darts zipped toward them from atop the cliff. Laryn summoned a water shield between them. The sheet of water stretched out as large as he could make it in the air, absorbing the attacks from several elemental darts—lightning, fire, stone. The stone, the element strongest against water, blasted through the shield. They continued riding their horses as quickly as they could down the slope.

  From here Laryn was able to see voidlings climbing along the cliff face. They were attracted by the light and sounds of the fighting, and moved toward the seemingly unsuspecting mages atop the cliff.

  Then the ground exploded just behind them, sending stone and earth spraying through the air.

  “What was that?” Mat cursed.

  “Something stronger than a dart,” Laryn said.

  Just as Laryn’s elemental [Dart] came off cooldown, he fired the missile back up the cliff toward a place where several fire darts had launched from, and was rewarded with a scream.

  Attacks slowed dramatically as mages ducked for cover. At the same time, a new wave of voidlings reached the top of the cliffs, swarming toward the mages.

  Shouts and flashes of light crackled as the mages engaged with the void.

  Laryn rounded another switchback, moving further out of accurate range. They slowed to a safer pace, and Laryn stole another glance at the top of the cliff. On a rocky outcropping, cloaked in moonlight, stood a man. His long, dark hair blew in the breeze, a small golden crown seated at the top of his head.

  He folded his arms calmly amid the chaos around him, and seemed to be staring down at Laryn. Though he was too far to make out his face, Laryn felt as though he made eye contact with the man.

  Laryn cursed and pushed on down the slope.

  Near the bottom, they spotted one of the horses of the men they’d killed lay on the slope, having broken its leg in the frantic run down the trail.

  When they finally reached even ground, Laryn sighed with relief, wiping the foam and sweat from his horse’s neck.

  “Well done,” he muttered, wiping his own brow. “Well done.”

  A short distance on from the foot of the path they found the other three horses, which had made it safely down the pass.

  They paused for a moment to capture the three mounts. Horses were valuable.

  For several hours they trotted down the Townshold road, checking for signs that they’d been followed. Someone watching them from the top of the cliffs could track them for many miles, until the road curved and dipped and they were finally hidden by trees.

  They over shot the place to turn off to Vallor by a long distance, but Laryn didn’t want to risk anyone seeing them turn down to the south.

  Only when he was confident that they were hidden from the clifftops did they turn of the road and begin the journey back to Vallor.