Chapter 58

Kill Everything with Pincers

To Femira’s relief, Landryn’s wind breaking ability sheltered them from the gales that blew in from the Altasjura. As they crested a rise that overlooked a scenic beach, she could simply enjoy the view without the relentless wind blasting in her face. The sparse trees and shrubs on the cliff tops grew at angles away from the shoreline.

The beach itself was stunning, nestled between two headlands was a stretch of golden sand. The cliffs surrounding it were dark in contrast and pockets black rock jutted up closer to the where the surf broke. An impressive natural arch stretched out across a portion of the beach. It was still early morning and the sun was behind them, it illuminated the dark green of the ocean like a sheet of rippling jade.

Their guides—two fishermen from the nearby harbour town of Idrisport—hung back. They shuffled their feet in apprehension, refusing to come any closer to the edge of the cliff. They were safe from the winds within Landryn’s protective bubble so it wasn’t the fear of falling that had them spooked. It was what they knew lurked in the caves at the rim of the beach. As the group had travelled further north, sightings of the kraglings had grown more common. Word had also spread that there was a team of bloodshedders hunting them. At each village they passed through, they were greeted with a jarring mixture of respect, acclaim… and fear.

They’d passed through more ruined villages. Many with survivors that were able to give details of the monsters. Most were consistent with what they’d already discovered, although one had told them it was corsairs that had raided their village. The larger towns were all left unmolested, it appeared the kraglings were clever enough to only target smaller human settlements. Survivors told horror stories of watching their loved ones being consumed by the kraglings. Landryn would make assurances that they would clear out all of the nests. Some would pledge their blades in assistance but Landryn would politely decline and tell them that the group of bloodsheeders was more effective combatants on their own.

But that didn’t mean the locals weren’t beneficial. Having the locals guide them to the nest locations had proved an effective strategy for discovering them quickly. In the first six days, they’d scouted out only two more nests along the coast. The further north they went, more folk were willing to lead them to the nests. Over the next four days they’d found and exterminated three more nests.

“This one’s the main nest,” Landryn said with a confident step, looking out over the beach. They’d passed through two ruined fishing villages that morning and a small farm further inland that looked to be completely destroyed. The kragling tracks all looked recent, at least a dozen of them, leading up from the gaps in the cliffs that led down to the beach. The last nest they’d found had fourteen kraglings holed up and it had been a chaotic fight. With that victory, the team had been left with a feeling of exhilarating inexorability in their duty.

“I can feel it,” Landryn continued, “the kragal is here.” The kragal was the name they’d given to the alpha. More and more reports claimed a much larger one, that seemed to be moving further north. This alpha was what people believed to be the true fomori. That it was spawning its lesser monsters to sow death and destruction. The little information Landryn had on the creatures was that they were invasive. An alpha matriarch would create a nest and then move on after a few days.

They weren’t sure how big the kragal would be but the men leading them claimed they’d seen a shadow the size of a house moving in the dark a few nights before. They’d wisely fled for the safety of the Idrisport where Landryn’s team had been gathering information on nearby kragling nests. Some of the locals claimed it was an ancient primordial, that it was a Titan from the forgotten ages. Even Landryn dismissed those comments, he’d read accounts on kraglings and their matriarchs. He’d never expected to find one in his own kingdom however. Those were supposed to only live in the cursed lands of the Black Sands. Many of the locals had made the correct deduction; that it was one of the Fomori—a demon from before Elyina’s forging of the Kingdom. Landryn did not correct them when they referred to the creature as such.

“We should plan an ambush,” Drad suggested. The man was a lot sharper than Femira had earlier given him credit. She’d foolishly assumed that because the man wasn’t a bloodshedder, he wouldn’t be as skilled as the rest of them. She’d been proven very wrong on that. In addition to being an invaluable healer on the team, his spear fighting skills were an integral part to many of their team tactics; placing well timed strikes at vulnerable points while Landryn occupied the kragling’s attention.

“We should draw them from the nest, lead them over there,” Landryn pointed to a narrow gulley cutting into the cliffs.

“What about the arch?” Drad suggested, “they wouldn’t be able to flank us in there either.”

“A good thought, but the gulley is better and we’d have the highground,” Landryn said, not dismissively but with an air of authority.

“Annali and Selyn should stay up on the cliffs for support”—They’d learned from previous fights with the kraglings that they were deathly fast and could easily jump short distances—“Selyn can your edir reach the water from that distance?”

“So long as we don’t do it at low tide, I should be fine.”

“Important thing is to keep them off the sand,” Landryn continued on. On the sand, was where the kraglings fought best, they could bury themselves quickly underneath and move with shocking agility underneath the sand. Femira could clear massive sections of sand to expose them quickly but it was best to keep that advantage away from them altogether.

“If we can funnel them them through the gap in the cliffs there,” Landryn continued, “Drad and I can take them one at a time—Annali,” he turned his attention to her, “could you keep the attention of those that manage to break through the surf?” She nodded, holding his gaze confidently. They’d taken a similar approach in the last fight, Femira had remained up on the cliffs, firing projectiles. The kraglings weren’t the best climbers and those that did manage to scale the rock face she sent crashing down by dissolving the rock.

“What if the kragal is here?” Selyn asked, chewing her lip, “how do we take it down?”

“Important thing is to isolate it from the rest,” Landryn once again, he turned his gaze on Femira. “If the kragal is here we’re going to be even more dependent on you, Annali. You need to keep its attention until Drad and I dispatch the smaller ones.”

“I’ll try to keep as many as I can caught in the surf,” Selyn added, “but the kragal might be too big for me to hold.”

“I can keep it occupied,” Femira grinned, “let’s just hope it’s not bigger than the cliff.”

Overall the team had an air of tenacity about them. They’d not taken any injuries in the last two encounters and there was an assured synergy emerging from their teamwork. This was what Loreli and Endrin had with the other bloodshedders. Something that Femira hadn’t put much value in before. She’d needed rescuing during the battle with the Altareans because she didn’t know how to fight as part of the team. She could claim that she’d simply not had the same time and training as the other bloodshedders to work as part of a team but she would be lying to herself. She’d chosen not to work as part of a team. She’d focused primarily on sparring and increasing her skills in a solo combat style. She’d actively avoided training drills with other teams. Now she was experiencing just how effective team strategies were.

“If the kragal gets up on the cliff, we fall back,” Landryn moved his gaze over the three of them, “we’ll leave the horses saddled and ready by the road, we break back to Idrisport and formulate a new plan of attack. If we need to wait for reinforcements from Epilas then we’ll wait.”

“If Selyn and I break, then you and Drad are left unsupported.”

“We’ll hold on our own. Drad’s our healer so he should fall back before me, I can keep them occupied while you three gain some distance.”

There was a bizarre irony in many of their strategies in that they often left Landryn as the most vulnerable on the team. As the head of the Reldoni military and a prince, Femira assumed the priority would always be his safety. But as he was the most skilled among them and—with his soulforged stormstone affinity—he could move faster than any of them. He was so fast that no one ever truly felt he was ever in any real danger. He hadn’t taken a single hit during any of the previous encounters with the kraglings.

They had a few hours before the tide would be high enough for their strategy to work. This gave the group time to prepare. The kragling’s only ever hunted at night, so the group figured that they must be nocturnal. Attacking during the day had proved to be advantageous for the group. This also meant that the kraglings had to be drawn out from their caves.

Femira began forming a host of stonespears. Her edir could form them quickly enough, but if she had one handy, her edir could propel them one after another. The kragling’s carapace could weather five or six strikes of stonespears before it began to weaken, ten would usually be enough to take one down. She’d want well over a hundred stonespears at hand if they were facing a dozen or more of them.

They’d assumed the kragal would have significantly stronger carapace than its smaller offspring so she planned to form ten more spears but of steel. The strikes with the steel spears would need to be more precise hits. Generally, the kraglings were weak at the joints and the undersides. The maw was also another weak point but the pincers made it a tricky shot. Their best tactics involved targeting the legs, maiming and then going in for the finish. Their strategy for the kragal was much the same, assuming its weak points matched that of its spawn.

“You should eat something,” Landryn approached her. She glanced over at the small cookfire where Drad was frying some dried meat strips. “I’m almost finished here,” She replied, forming a length of steel with a deathly point. Landryn had paid for the ingots of steel back at Idrisport once they’d realised the kragal might be too big for her stonespears to be effective. She kept a reserve of the steel and some rock in her earthstone heart in case she needed it. She could always pull on the materials around her but it was wiser to have a reserve, if she needed it quickly.

“There’s a thrill to this, isn’t there?” He said, his eyes scanning the beach below.

“Yes.” She couldn’t deny it, the past few days had been incredible. Her abilities were finally being pushed to their extremes. There was an insurmountable surge of satisfaction when they’d take one down. She craved it, hungered for the adrenaline and the exhilaration of the fight. She was like a skaga addict, revelling in the thrill of a hit and spending the time between seeking another. She didn't want to admit the extent of how much she enjoyed it to Landryn but knowing he was feeling the same gave her encouragement.

“Feels like I’ve taken fen-salt,” he gave her a savage grin, “I feel alive.”

“That’s exactly how I feel,” she replied in wonder that he would describe it so similarly to how she felt, “I feel like I was made for this.”

“This is what we were made for,” he caught her eyes. A fire ignited inside of her, “the soulforgings… I don’t believe in the gods, I don’t believe in any divine powers guiding our actions but I cannot help but feel that the threads of fate have brought us to this.” She felt a pang of guilt. It hadn’t been fate that brought them here. It had been her deception. He still didn’t know that his brother was dead. Her regret for withholding it from him was growing with each day they spent together.

Would this all end when he found out? The rhythm of their days were invigorating. Once they’d found a nest and dealt with it they’d move further north and start tracking the next. Days that they didn’t find one, the group would close each evening with training exercises. Landryn had proved to be an invaluable sparring partner. He moved with such lithe grace and precision that Femira could feel the tangible change in her form and style to match his.

“Is it terrible that I want there to be more of them out there?” Landryn said, his eye contact breaking as he looked to the ground.

“I want to keep hunting them too,” she agreed. She thought about placing her hand on his arm but held back.

“We can,” he looked back at her, his eyes alive with intensity, “there are more. To the north; the Simirwoord… the Black Sands. The borders of Reldon once extended as far as the Northern Towers. My father has grand ambitions to return Reldon to its glory; that could include the plains of Athlin and the Black Sands. The wild untamed lands, monsters like the kraglings have prevented any war parties mobilising there in the past but the bloodshedders could be the sword that forges a path forward. We could finally reclaim those regions.”

“Your father would support that?” she asked hungrily.

“Maybe,” Landryn scowled then, “he’s still too bitter with the skirmishes against the Reinish, the tensions with Altarea and Keiran. His attention is focused on the south when we should be setting our sights north. That is where the true danger facing us lies.” Having seen first hand the destruction that these monsters cause, she was inclined to believe him. If the creatures of the north were as invasive as the kraglings, it wouldn’t be long until they were roaming the lands of Reldon.

Femira understood that she was not considered a Reldoni—nor would she ever be fully accepted as one—but she was still part of this country. She’d trained with their soldiers, lived amongst their highborn and despite often feeling like an outsider, she could feel Reldon becoming her home. More so than the streets of Altarea had ever been… before that, she had hardly any memories of her Keiran homeland. If the purpose of the bloodshedders was to defend the borders of Reldon from creatures like the kraglings then it was a duty she was eager to be called to.

“I want to go with you. To the north, to the plains of Athlin and the Black Sands.” she said, holding his gaze with determination. He nodded and Femira didn’t miss the hint of a smile on his lips.

“When we return to Epilas, I’m going to propose the expedition to my father. The War Council is eager to expand our borders. They’re all too concerned with the Reinish but I’m going to propose we head north to the untamed lands.” He said with determination.

There something else that Femira wasn’t ready to admit out loud. Something that festered inside and whispered to her. She had no desire to fight in real battles against other people again. The thought of it turned her stomach. Knives sliding into eye sockets. She shuddered. But she had no qualms with killing these creatures. This way, she was protecting people, not killing them.

“I’m going to check on Selyn’s progress, don’t forget to eat something,” Landryn finished. Selyn was below them in the gulley that led to the beach. She was pulling out moisture from the earth, drawing it into herself and discarding it further down the beach. The kragling’s insect-like legs would churn up that ground to mud, making it far harder for Landryn and Drad to fight. The kraglings by contrast could move just effectively in the mud as they could sand. Another lesson they’d hard learned over the past few days.

Despite their initial unsympathetic relationship, Femira and Selyn had fallen into an amicable familiarity. They were both primarily range support for the battles against the kraglings, and the more the discussed tactics and put them to use, the more each had come to trust on the other’s ability. They’d even discussed the potential compounding of their abilities; Femira could control sand, but its practical application was limited mainly to cover and blinding tactics. Grains of sand on their own—even when whipped into a sandstorm—could do little real damage but combined with Selyn’s watershaping skills, the two could potentially work together to make large coordinated attacks.

She’d resumed her tasks of forming the remaining lances. Dissolving and shaping metal was still a lot slower than rock, but she could create the spear in under a few minutes now. Compared to the hours it used to take her before. The metal felt different inside of her. It had a different resonance to it. Rock mostly all felt the same, minute differences between the various types. Solid stone, glass, metal and sand all had distinct impressions she could sense.

The metal she held had been dissolved from the ingots. And the impression of those ingots was still there. She could reform an ingot much faster than changing it into something new. The same rules applied to the other materials. Once shaped however, the impression began to change. With each dissolving and reforming the metal’s previous impressions would fade. She was becoming more and more aware of these impressions as she used her abilities and as a result the speed of her shaping was improving drastically. Even the limit of material she could store inside of her was growing each day. She didn’t doubt that it was the effect being soulforged. Would it continue to increase? Surely there would eventually be a limit to how much her body could handle. She pushed the idea to the side of her mind and continued the task at hand.

Once she had ten steel lances formed and in position at the top of the cliff, she joined the others at Drad’s cookfire to eat and run over some last minute battle plans. The tide was approaching and with it the promise of their next battle.