Sparrow Truman May 23rd,20XX

My broom wiggled as it suddenly took on new weight and caught me off guard. I began to buck my broom to shake the intruder off me but was stopped by the familiar, dry voice that panned into my ear.

“Don’t shake me off quite yet, remember goblins cant fly.”

The vulture nipped hard at the base of Iren's tail and created a large gash in the immature snake's body. I temporarily ignored Ion and focused on steadying my broom. I flew a lap around the battlefield and sent as much of my magic toward Iren as I responsibly could. It took a lot of magic to maintain his current size, and unlike Rubella’s vulture, Iren was still immature and wasn’t as familiar with his skills.

“Shouldn’t you be down there with your soldiers? You can leave the air to my team.”

I wanted to look back and see the look on Ion’s face as I spoke. I knew he didn't like being spoken to in a condescending tone like my voice had taken on, but he hadn’t exactly watched his tone with me last time either.

“My soldiers will be fine on the ground. I’d be more help up here.”

He grabbed a metal spike a witch had sent at me and fired it back, nailing the witch in the middle of his forehead. Because Ion was behind me I couldn’t see his expression but he spoke uninterrupted and calmly like he was going on a walk.

From when I had seen him on the ground, frustrated and desperate as he fought, I could tell that he was mostly faking it but I didn’t have the energy to pick a fight with him over it.

“Where is Cai?”

I could hear the grimace in his voice and the broom slightly wobbled as he got up from his seated position.

“Hopefully safe on the back of his flutter moth. Knowing him though he’ll be here at any moment. We need to finish this up by then.”

I wasn’t too sure as to why he wanted to deal with Rubella before Finn got here. I’d only seen him fight a few times but the overwhelming power he’d had… I still shuddered when I thought of it. He was somewhat untrained with fighting with magic and mainly battled with his body, but even so, he had taken out almost half my forces alone. And when he had deigned to use his magic while he was locked in the dungeon with a vine that was specifically designed to leech magic out of him; he had blown out almost a block of magic reinforced stone.

“Any reason for the deadline?”

He jumped off the broom instead of answering and dived down to Rubella’s bright red hair. She looked tired as well, wielding both her giant animated vulture as well as fending off the many attacks from the goblins around her. The battle was far from won, and even though I and the few witches I’d brought had helped, there was only so much we could do.

I’d told them to prioritize saving the goblins and harassing the witches around Rubella, but I didn’t want them to risk their lives. I’d sent all the younger witches out of the city but the ones that fought alongside me were barely older than I. I hadn’t wanted to be their leader, but they all seemed to listen to me well enough, so I took on the mantle. With that being said, I couldn't order them all to their deaths.

They focused on deflecting spells from allies and healing them when needed. They also flew around the field to catch the goblins out of mid-air.

Iren let out a loud hiss as he bit the giant vulture and strapped its wings to its feathery chest with his scaly body. The vulture let out a piercing screech in response and pecked at Iren's body with its sharp beak while writhing to get out of his embrace.

Multiple lacerations marred Iren’s previously resplendent scales and dark green blood leaked onto the vulture’s body, singing its feathers with the toxic blood.

“SPARROW”

Rubella howled my name with hatred as she tried to maneuver her vulture out of Iren’s embrace. Iren was a real animal that had been grown up to the vulture’s size but the vulture itself was just a spell animation. She’d had a real vulture at one point, but it had died of old age, she used the animation in its form as some sort of useless homage to her very first familiar.

She could recall it to her tattoos and bring it back out, although the magic cost would be rather high. I wasn’t sure why she didn’t but if I’d had to guess it was probably because she couldn’t afford to lose so publicly to me and lose her follower’s faith in her as the strongest witch.

As much as I hated her, I couldn’t deny that she was incredibly strong.

I found myself floating lower and lower as I used more magic to maintain Iren’s current size but didn’t dare descend too close to the ground.

It was a slow process, but we were slowly beating the other witches down. Their previously large force of forty witches had been thinned down to about fifteen. As of now, we were pretty evenly matched and the battle had devolved into a one of attrition. It was all about lasting until one of us tired out.

Ion and his goblins worked well with the witches, using their brooms as leverages to fight an airborne battle. As a witch, it was an impressive sight, but the part of me that had grown up in the human world was stunned. I didn’t have time to think about it and could only try to focus on the battle.

They mainly used their bodies as weapons, using sharp nails to scratch at the witches and their iron-like limbs to breakthrough the spells and brooms or opposing witches. I looked away as I saw a group of four of them gang up on a witch and smash a whole fist through her skull.

This was war, as gruesome as it was.

People died and all one could do was hope that it wasn’t anyone that they were close to.

If only I had a few more witches; If Ion had a few more goblins. It was selfish but I hung on to Ion’s earlier words and hoped for Cai to get here quickly and end the situation. Even if we managed to win in this case, it wouldn’t be a victory worth celebrating.

I flew around the battlefield again and reinforced Iren with another bout of magic, hoping to squeeze the vulture out of existence but Rubella was just too strong. Iren was bleeding out a lot and

I would have to recall him to my side if I didn’t want him to die, and I didn’t.

My broom shook as it readjusted to the weight of another goblin and Ion’s dry voice filtered into my ears again.

“Hate to alarm you but Rubella’s reinforcements are filing over here. We need to end this as quickly as possible.”

That was alarming, very alarming.

“I don’t suppose we have any reinforcements coming?”

“We do, but it’s a matter of when. They’re probably having too much fun in the main battle.”

“Any plan on how to end this quickly?”

“If I did I wouldn’t be on the back of your broom now, would I? Any chance that knowledge packet of yours has an idea?”

It did, but it came at the cost of too many of our comrade's lives. Although I couldn't call myself a saint, I wasn't quite at the level of using my companions as meat shields. It also wouldn't be worth it for a scenario that wasn’t even a guaranteed win.

“Is there any way you can contact your backup to get here quicker?”

“I could but I ant leave the battle, and I can't afford to send any of my soldiers off either. We need all the hands on the floor to keep the equilibrium we have now.”

He was right, but wrong at the same time. If this was just a battle of stamina then Rubella’s side would win, especially with the reinforcements on the way. Once the other witches arrived we would all be wiped out. It was better to take the risk of sending a goblin off than to wait for a guaranteed defeat.

“I’ll have the witches on our side take on a more active role to make up the difference. Send them.”

“I’ll forgive you ordering me around this once Miss Sparrow.”

Although he sounded annoyed, he still jumped down from the back of my broom and rocketed down to the floor. He landed on the back of an enemy witch’s broom and grabbed him by the back of the head, directing him into the line of fire of another witch's spell.

He flipped off the broom before the witch could recover and landed on the floor and sprinted toward a goblin soldier. He had dark brown hair and was slightly taller than ion but more slender and less handsome overall.

Ion pulled him out of the middle of a fight and spoke to him for a few seconds then took over the fight while the other goblin ran off into the forest.

We just needed to last until help arrived.