Free The Storm's Own Son (Book 3) by Anthony Gillis Page B

intervening distance. He soared, flipped in mid air and landed in front of the catapult. Then he vaulted upward with his own momentum and landed lightly atop the crossbar.
    Once there, he did not like what he saw.
    His army was in good order, but at the shore, the enemy had completed their landing of what might be as many as six thousand men, and they marched toward Tescani. The latter looked to have pulled up a great many of the sharpened stakes nearby and set up a hasty palisade. Behind it, his pikes massed in a half-circular line facing the sea. Drevan and the Megasi troops had moved to a position behind Tescani, guarding his back against the original enemy force.
    Out at sea, things went ill. The Avrosan navy had engaged the enemy fleet with fire ballistae, and several of the latter were now aflame. However, other enemy vessels had closed on, boarded and captured at least half of the outnumbered and lightly-manned Avrosan ships.
    Something else entirely was happening at the camp of the Prophet.
    The vast, singing crowd consisted of men, women, and children, young and old. There were very few men of fighting age among them, as those had been sent into battle. Most of them stood close together in a huge circle, swaying in time with their song. That song now approached perfect unison. The entire vast crowd flickered faintly with wisps of green light.
    A ring had been dug in the ground around that circle, fully three feet deep, and in its depths was a faint green mist. Just inside the ring, thirty-six tall stakes had been driven into the ground. People stood at them with hand clasped behind their backs. They were not tied, and they sang as they stood there. As Talaos watched, blazing light like verdant fire burst around them.
    In the center of the great crowd there was another, much smaller circular trench, with mist like the other. Thirty-six priests and priestesses in robes and white caps and shawls stood around it, spaced regularly and clasping hands as they sang.
    Inside the smaller circular trench was one final circle of people. Twelve warriors in heavy armor stood there, facing outward, so close their shoulders touched. They glowed with green light that grew ever brighter and flickered upward like flame.
    Six of them were men of Hunyos with large round shields, breastplates, and open-faced helms. Four were Easterners with leaf-bladed swords, scale armor, rectangular shields, and helms with visors in the form of smiling, bearded faces. Another had gear Talaos recognized only from descriptions in history books; the long, heavy chain coat, tall, narrow shield, and lofty, tapering closed-face helm of the knights of old Dirion.
    The last warrior was lightly armored, and bore a small round shield and a curved sword. He was short and lean with raw-boned angular features. Talaos remembered Cratus's strange bodyguard from what seemed a lifetime ago. It occurred to him this might be a plainsman.
    One of the people standing at a stake was a very old woman. She seemed to wither in the flaming light, dropped to the ground and did not move again. At another stake stood gaunt young mother with a frail, young infant bound to her side. She sang amid the green flames, but her child squirmed helplessly, screamed, and then was still.
    The glow around the warriors brightened.
    Talaos burst into fresh anger. Rage filled his heart, and furious power arced out from him in all directions. Lines of blue-white lightning wrapped around the catapult and shot into the ground. Others radiated far out into the air around him.
    Talaos roared, his voice thundering far across the plains.
    Heads turned all around and from all sides, in shock.
    He raised his right arm, hand aimed toward the center of the singing circle. He unleashed a massive bolt, a line of lightning searing bright even in the midday sun. There was a flash of green at the outer trench line. His lightning stopped and struck in midair at that point. Blue-white energy crackled and sparked