Xerxes jumped to the side, just barely avoiding Simeon’s wild attack. Then he lunged diagonally backward again, in the hopes of buying an extra second or two. He was at a serious disadvantage; his opponent’s entire blade was now an expression of devastating energy, while his own weapon only had a glowing tip. The sword tip, the weakest part, wasn’t suitable for defense. What was worse, Major Augmentation lasted for twice as long as Minor Augmentation.

He couldn’t afford to not cast a spell right now. The question was which part of his sword to augment. The tip, in the hopes of landing a killing blow? Or somewhere along the strong of the sword, which would give him a shot at defending himself?

Xerxes grabbed some stibnite talc and cast Minor Augmentation. A moment later, a section close to the hilt blazed. He raised his sword just in time to meet Simeon’s attack. Shining sparks exploded onto the street when the blades met.

Simeon pressed the attack, and it was all Xerxes could do to prevent his weapon from being chopped in half. More sparks showered down as he barely managed to bat his opponent’s weapon aside.

Simeon took a passing step as he attacked relentlessly.

Xerxes struggled to prevent his opponent’s sword from touching the non-augmented portion of his blade. Or worse; bypassing the weapon and hitting his body. If that glowing blade so much as made contact with his skin, it would be painful at the minimum and deadly at most. He backed up again.

“Running away?” Simeon sneered.

Xerxes gritted his teeth. Without being able to let the strong of his sword contact with his enemy’s weapon, he was limited so badly that he wasn’t even able to formulate a plan of attack.

Simeon put too much power into his attack and ended up overextending himself. Which created an opening. Xerxes snapped his sword forward.

Simeon screamed as the sharp tip of Xerxes’ sword bit deeply into his shoulder. He staggered backward.

Xerxes followed through with another attack, but Simeon threw his weapon in the way and blocked it.

Xerxes circled and attacked again. Simeon counterattacked. They fought back and forth in the street with neither of them gaining the upper hand.

Off to the side, Kashtiliash was still fighting the other mage. This was dragging on too long. What if the Abhorrent showed up?

Eventually, the light of Xerxes’ sword faded. Simeon’s didn’t.

Simeon took advantage of the moment, rushing forward and unleashing a succession of wild stabs and slashes that bore little resemblance to the artistry of the Epitome. Perhaps because Simeon knew all he had to do was land a single blow to end Xerxes’ life.

By a combination of jerky dancing, wild lunges, and inelegant scrambling, Xerxes kept out of the way. Fifteen seconds passed which seemed like fifteen minutes. Finally, the light of Simeon’s sword faded.

“You fucker,” Simeon said. “Can’t you just fight like a man instead of running like a baby?”

Xerxes went into the Skyward guard. “Now that we're even, we finish this or we part ways. I suggest the latter.”

“No.” Simeon rested his sword on his shoulder while digging into his garment. “I swear to the Pontifarch I’m going to make you feel pain for this.” A medicinal pill appeared in his hand. “Two of my most valuable resources wasted, thanks to you.”

“What’s that?”

Simeon grinned. “It’s what will ensure I kill you. A pill I—”

A dog-sized rat bowled into Simeon from behind, knocking him flat on his face and sending the pill flying off to the side. The rat Abhorrent buried its jaws into Simeon’s shoulder and scratched at him with its claws.

Further down the street, Xerxes saw a horde of smaller rat-like Abhorrent descend on the pill and start fighting over it. A moment later, one of them grabbed it and stuffed it into its mouth. There was a massive explosion of melam, and in the blink of an eye the Abhorrent transformed, growing dramatically larger in the process.

However, before it could finish its transformation, a blur of light hit it from the side. Kashtiliash. The Abhorrent shrieked and clawed at him, but the bearded mage pummeled its head. Gandy dashed toward them.

Xerxes turned his attention back to Simeon, who had freed himself from the Abhorrent, killing it in the process. Panting, the man struggled to his feet.

“My pill…” he grunted.

Behind him, Gandash and Kashtiliash destroyed one small rat after another.

“It’s gone now,” Xerxes said. “This fight is over.”

“I agree.”

Xerxes caught a flash of motion as Simeon jumped forward. Whipping his sword around, Xerxes went into the Squinting Slash. He bypassed Simeon’s weapon, and stabbed the enemy mage in the base of the neck. Then he twisted the sword and sliced it up toward Simeon’s head. Blood splashed as the front of Simeon’s neck was ripped out. His eyes went wide and he fell backward.

Meanwhile, Kashtiliash and Gandash were fleeing in the face of an even larger swarm of Abhorrent rats.

“We need to go!” Gandash yelled.

Not giving Simeon another glance, Xerxes turned and ran. A moment later, he heard ugly screeching as the rats converged on Simeon. Regardless of whether the man was dead or not, he had melam inside of him that they would want to devour. Hopefully that would buy enough time that Xerxes, Gandash, and Kashtiliash could evade pursuit.

The three mages fled.

They were soon in a sea of chaos. The area by the prison had been mostly empty, presumably because there weren’t many residences nearby. But only two blocks away, the streets got more crowded.

There were lone Abhorrent, all of them spawn, that created further disarray. Panicked soldiers slashed at rats and slug-like creatures. Ordinary citizens screamed.

By the third block, they’d caught sight of the company as it forced its way through the streets toward the inner wall of the city.

As Gandash rushed to the front to take charge, Xerxes took a position toward the back of the line.

The ground trembled.

Xerxes looked back to see that all three of the massive juvenile Abhorrent were attacking the keep. One of them was the four-armed type he’d faced twice in the past. The other two were the pale-skinned female type. Except, as their evolution progressed, the spindly legs came to encompass them like cloaks, writhing about.

Crowds pressed against the company. Some ordinary citizens cried to them for help. In fact, before long, they were being followed by a trail of bedraggled men, women, children, and elderly.

The mages and Unsighted troops of the company, after all they had experienced fighting the Abhorrent so far, weren’t fazed by the occasional rats that jumped out of shadows, or many-armed monsters that jumped down at them from rooftops.

It took about thirty minutes before they got through one of the inner wall gates. From there, it became easier to move around, as the outer city wasn’t as cramped. Gandash led them in a roughly westerly direction.

More meteors started falling when they were about halfway through the outer city to the outer wall. On many occasions in the past, Xerxes had seen the falling stars streaking across the sky and landing in distant locations. A few times, they’d reached the earth near him. This time, it was different. The meteors fell as if they were targeting the inner city itself, and most specifically, the keep. Some fell in the outer city, and others outside the wall. And they came without end.

The company eventually entered a large public square, where Gandash had them form into tighter ranks.

“Mages,” he yelled. “To me.”

The surviving mages of Black Jackal company formed a circle. Xerxes tried not to think about how few of them there were. Himself and Gandash. Kashtiliash, Dasi, and Katayoun, the other High Seers. Ningsummunu, Kishar, and Teucer, the Seers. Eight mages, which was exactly half of the number who had paraded through the streets of Sin-Amuhhu on the way to start the mission.

“Dasi,” Gandash asked. “Can you shapeshift? It would be very helpful to have eyes in the sky.”

“Sorry, no,” she said. “I used the last of my melam to get that key.”

“Shit,” Gandash murmured. He closed his eyes briefly, then opened them. “Then we go forward blind. Same rough formation as before. I’ll lead. Kat, I want you up with me. Xerk has rear guard. Kishar, you stay back with him for healing. Everybody else, space out evenly.”

Before anything else could be said, a meteor smashed into a nearby building, releasing a shockwave along with a spray of rubble. As shouts of pain and dismay filled the air, a spawn with pale skin and a reddish face crawled into the open, accompanied by an acrid odor.

“Unit One, take it out!” shouted Sergeant Stratos.

“Go!” Gandash yelled.

After Unit One soldiers took out the Abhorrent spawn, they reformed their ranks and started marching. More meteors fell. More Abhorrent rushed them.

At first, Black Jackal was dominant. Until a horde of rats overwhelmed a group that had once been Unit Eight. Three soldiers fell, throats ripped out before the Balatu mages could save them. Black Jackal Company pressed on.

Cubit by cubit, block by block, they made their way toward the outer wall of the city.

Fires raged. Crowds screamed. Abhorrent crawled everywhere.

The biggest upside was that the juveniles still seemed focused on the keep. The inner wall mostly obscured that area, though, making it impossible to see what was playing out. Xerxes just hoped that the monsters would remain focused on the city center long enough for Black Jackal to escape.

A stage one juvenile appeared, a beautiful woman with spidery legs. Kashtiliash killed her, but not before she gutted two Unsighted troops. A block later, a meteor landed right in the middle of their procession. Five soldiers lost their lives instantly. Ningsummunu was next to them, and his left leg was crushed below the knee.

Katayoun rushed to heal him, but a moment later yelled, “It’s too far gone!”

Xerxes nearly vomited at the sight of the pulp that had once been Ningsummunu’s limb.

“What do we do?” he shouted.

Katayoun looked like she was about to cry. “Cut it off here!” she pointed at his thigh. “After that I’ll cast Minor Restoration. It’ll close up the wound. Probably.”

“Hold him!” Xerxes shouted to Kashtiliash. The bearded mage knelt and put his hands on Ningsummunu’s shoulders.

A longsword wasn’t a tool for amputation, so Xerxes used Stratos’ short sword, backed by all of his High Seer strength, to saw Ningsummunu’s leg off above the knee. Ningsummunu, a Seer, couldn’t fight against Kashtiliash, who was a High Seer. But he screamed until passing out.

After, Katayoun cast the spell. They watched the flesh, bone, and muscle working to stitch together. When the spell effects ended, Ningsummunu had a bleeding stump. It wasn’t fully closed, but it would have to do.

“Tie him to my back,” Xerxes said.

“No,” Katayoun said. “You need to be able to fight. Dasi should do it.”

“Fine.”

They tied Ningsummunu to Dasi’s back, then pressed onward.

They were now within sight of the outer wall. There was fighting atop of it. Abhorrent and local soldiers.

More meteors fell.

And then Xerxes’ heart went cold when he saw an enormous hand suddenly reach up and grab the top lip of the outer wall. A hand that was dozens of cubits from one end to another.

Another hand appeared, slamming onto the stone of the wall. Then a stage six juvenile climbed over it from the outside.