Chapter 501: The Siege Begins (3)
"That arch!" she barked. "Clear ten paces either side—we ride through!"
Tara and Sigrid’s shieldmaidens locked together, forming a mobile wall. They advanced under arrow-fire, shields overlapping. When a bolt clanged off Tara’s helm, she laughed—high, bright, terrifying—and hammered her axe against her shield three times. The formation surged.
But new troops poured from the mid-ring guardhouse: fresh conscripts in quilted jackets, noble retainers in gilded corslets. Someone dragged a cart into the boulevard, toppling it to form a barricade. Arrows rattled off the cart’s sides; one struck a shieldmaiden through the thigh. She roared, snapped the shaft, and kept limping forward.
Lyan’s lungs burned. He pivoted, hooking a pikeman at the knee, then reversed and spiked another through the visor slot. His peripheral vision kept snagging on motion—Surena’s sword rising, Emilia’s greatsword carving a swath, Wilhelmina’s gloved hand flashing signals. He realised, with a throb of pride, that they no longer waited for his commands; they wove battle patterns around his presence the way dancers circle a fire.
A rush of heat at his flank warned him an instant before a falchion would have bitten deep. He twisted; the blade skimmed his mail instead of spine. Josephine had ridden up again—she leaned low, snagging the attacker’s collar, yanking him off his feet to be trampled beneath her horse.
"Eyes up, darling," she teased. "I already saved that pretty back once today."
"Noted," Lyan gritted, though a grin tugged.
She blew him a kiss, then spurred off, cloak snapping.
Up on the wall Lara shouted, "North tower clear!" Her arrow stabbed toward the sky, trailing a ribbon of blue silk: agreed signal that the next ladder wave could climb.
Below, Belle’s latest illusions shimmered—rows of phantom pikemen driving invisible stakes. Defenders wasted crossbow bolts on them until magazines ran dry. By the time they realised, real skirmishers were sprinting across no-man’s land under the low parapet.
Alicia, bruised and shaking, reached into a pouch and drew a shard of the shattered ley-stone. She whispered a formula; the shard glowed, then burst into dozens of motes that raced along the cobbles like fireflies. Each mote sank into a cobblestone carved with ward-sigils. The street trembled. Protective glyphs dimmed across doorframes; windows that had been opaque shimmered transparent. "Arcane grid dead!" she called, voice cracking. "You have free run!"