A Dream of Mortals

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Volusia watched in surprise as hundreds of thousands of Empire soldiers poured out, charging right for her, preparing to engage her in the biggest battle she had ever experienced. They came at her from all sides, streaming around the capital walls from both sides. They also poured through the golden capital doors, opening wider and wider, as the Empire men let out a great cry. It seemed as if the gates of hell themselves were opening to attack her. She had never seen so many men.

Volusia was surprised and disappointed that the Voks sorcery had been unable to take down the capital walls, surprised to find their powers useless against these fortifications, and she had no choice now but to brace herself for conventional warfare—her two hundred thousand men up against an army two or three times the size.

Volusia checked back over her shoulder and was relieved to see that her men held their formations, well disciplined, and that they all charged forward, as she had commanded, to fearlessly meet the enemy.

As the men closed in on her, now hardly a hundred yards away and gaining speed, one of her advisors came up beside her.

“Goddess, you must retreat,” he said, fear in his voice as he yanked her arm. “You will die here. You must retreat at once to the rear lines.”

Volusia shook off his arm and stood her ground, facing the Empire army defiantly. After all, she was a goddess. She felt that she was. She was invincible. And no man, nothing of this earth, could harm her.

“If they are to fight my men, they will fight me first,” she replied. “They will have to go through me.”

Volusia stood there as horns and trumpets sounded, as Empire soldiers on massive horses, flying banners, bore down on her. She looked up and saw, high above, the Empire general, looking down, clearly enjoying himself, satisfied that he was about to witness a bloody slaughter.

Volusia, though, was unafraid. In fact, she relished the confrontation. She had enjoyed violence her entire life, and this, she felt, was no different.

“Fork into three divisions!” she commanded, her voice booming over the din of the galloping horses. “One fork left, one right, and one in the middle with me!”

Her army, well-disciplined, did as she commanded, dispersing into three units, charging to meet each of the three empire battalions. A huge caravan of horses charged right for her, over the golden bridge, and before them, in the vanguard, charged thousands of soldiers on foot, with their long black-and-gold axes held high, gleaming in the sun.

Volusia knew she did not have the manpower of these soldiers. But she had unshakable belief in herself: she simply could not see herself dying. And what she could not see, she knew could not come to pass.

They came closer and closer, and Volusia stood there and braced herself as the first of the men reached her, screaming, battle-ax raised to the sky, gleaming as he brought it down for her forehead.

Volusia waited till the last moment, till the swinging blade nearly touched her face, standing perfectly still, then she reached up and drove the small concealed blade attached to her palm right up and into the soldier’s throat. She kept driving it, all the way, embedding it in the man’s throat, until he gurgled blood, dropped his ax, dropped to his knees, and collapsed to his face, dead.

The first casualty of this war was hers, and Volusia could not be more thrilled. As more men reached her, on all sides now, she turned and spun, using her small blade to slash one throat after another. She did not need strength or size when she had dexterity and cunning; the smallest weapon, she knew, from the smallest person, could sometimes be the deadliest of all.

There came a tremendous clang of armor and weaponry, of men shouting, as the armies all finally met in the middle, in one great clash of battle. The two sides met in an explosion of energy, swords meeting shields, axes and maces and halberds and spears meeting armor, limbs lost, men dying on both sides as they came together. The fighting was intense and fierce, man to man, shoulder to shoulder, neither side giving an inch. They pushed into each other’s lines, their momentum carrying them, and a back-and-forth ensued, the lines ebbing and flowing in both directions.

Volusia’s men, to their credit, did not yield to fear, held their ground like a stone wall, even in the face of the charging armies. Maltolis’s men were well-disciplined; that’s what years training beneath a madman would get you.

The Empire armies, Volusia could see, had expected their momentum to carry them, had expected to run her men over in a tidal wave, or had expected them to retreat. But none of the above had happened, and this, her men staunchly standing their ground, had created a bottleneck effect that began to work in Volusia’s favor. Soon the Empire men were backed up, all the way to the capital, only so many able to pass through the capital gates at one time with her men keeping them at a standstill. Despite their greater numbers, it kept the two sides even.

At the flanks of the battle, though, it was a different story: there, in the open field, the momentum of the Empire’s greater numbers carried them forward, and they kept pouring in, one battalion after the next, overwhelming her forces. Her men put up a gallant fight, killing scores of Empire—but the Empire had an endless supply of men, and for the Empire, men were cheap. It did not take Volusia long to realize that her men were being overpowered at the flanks. Bodies were piling up fast on the desert floor, and she knew she had to do something quickly or else risk being surrounded.

Volusia heard a sudden crash and felt the earth rock beneath her, sending her stumbling. She heard men scream out and she looked over to see a huge boulder had landed on the ground a few feet away from her, leaving a big crater in the ground and crushing several of her men. It killed some Empire men, too, but the Empire did not seem to care.

Volusia looked up and saw the Empire general standing atop the city parapets, grinning down in satisfaction. She saw dozens more boulders being tipped to the edge of the parapets, balancing precariously, about to be rolled down.

Volusia watched in horror as the boulders began to fall, one after the other, the ground shaking and rocking at the explosions all around her. Massive clouds of dust rose in the air as men cried out in agony. Her men fell left and right, and Volusia knew at once that it was not just the boulders that were deadly, but the psychological impact of these weapons being hurled at them.

She knew they would lose this battle if something were not done, and fast.

Volusia, finishing slicing another Empire soldier’s throat, looked up and braced herself as she spotted several Empire soldiers barreling down for her. They all had her in their sights and she knew she could not evade them this time. She raised her hands to her face as the axes came down, knowing there was nothing more she could do and prepared to meet her fate.

Vokian stepped forward beside her and held out a palm, and as he did a light-green bubble formed around her; their axes came down for her head and bounced off it harmlessly, one after the next after the next.

Volusia stood there, grateful to be alive as the soldiers could not touch her. They swung again and again, fruitlessly.

Volusia stepped forward and with her dagger stabbed one of them in the heart, dragging it along his chest until she cut out his heart. She reached in barehanded and pulled it out, and relished the moment as the man fell screaming to the ground, Volusia holding his still beating heart in her hand.

“I am the Goddess Volusia,” she said calmly down to the dying soldier.

Volusia turned to Vokin, knowing something must be done.

“If you cannot topple the walls,” she cried out to him over the din, “then cast me another spell. Hurt them another way.”

He looked at her knowingly, and he turned and nodded to his army of green Voks. As one, they stepped forward and raised their palms.

Green orbs of light came flying out, aimed low, at the desert floor, and as they impacted, the desert floor began to crack and split open. Crevices appeared, widening, and soon they were twenty feet wide, between Volusia’s army and the onslaught of Empire soldiers.

The Empire forces, still charging forward, went tumbling, horse and man, into the trenches. Men cried out as they went down and were smothered by more men and horses landing top of them.

The tens of thousands of Empire soldiers charging forward suddenly came to an abrupt stop as their men collapsed into the trenches. It was as if the earth were swallowing them up.

The Empire men trapped on the near side of the trenches turned and looked over their shoulders in fear, realizing they were now cut off from their main army.

“CHARGE!” Volusia commanded.

Her men, emboldened, let out a great battle cry and charged forward, doubling their efforts. They slashed and stabbed trapped soldiers, felling them by the dozens, sending them back. Volusia too her three-pointed flail and swung it high overhead and struck a half dozen soldiers on the back of the head, smiling wide as she killed them.

The Empire men, terrified, began to turn and flee.

“ARROWS AND SPEARS!” Volusia cried.

Her men took up positions and hurled spears and fired arrows into the fleeing soldiers’ backs, and hundreds more fell.

Momentum was turning in their favor, but Volusia looked out and saw that the trenches were filling up, crammed with thousands of Empire soldiers, and she knew they could only hold so long.

“THE FLAMES!” Volusia yelled out.

Vokin stepped forward with his men, and as they held out their palms, this time red orbs came flying forth, striking the soldiers inside the trenches. As they did, all the soldiers inside suddenly lit up in flames, massive fires roaring up into the sky, mixed with the awful sound of men being burned alive. A huge ring of fire surrounded the capital, as men let out horrific screams, all the trenches up in flame.

“CHARGE!” Volusia yelled.

Volusia charged forward, right down the center, right for the trenches, for all the men on fire, unafraid. She ran quickly, over their heads and shoulders and arms, using them as a human bridge, and as they screamed beneath her, she relished in their suffering. She ran across them, stepping from head to head, shoulder to shoulder, her men following her, using the Empire bodies as a footbridge.

On the other side, Volusia ran right for the capital doors. The Empire soldiers standing before it, overwhelmed, smoke and fumes in their faces, terrified at the sight of her men charging out of the flames, finally gave in. They turned and ran back for the safety of the capital doors.

The Empire commander, watching over all of it, seeing what was happening below, frowning, yelled out a command. Horns sounded, and slowly, the great golden capital doors began to seal shut. He cared not for his men who had not made it back inside yet, shutting the doors on them. He made a decision to save the city first.

Volusia led her men in fury as they let out a great cry and slaughtered the hundreds more Empire soldiers trapped between them and the now-closed doors. They had nowhere to go, and they butchered them mercilessly, their blood staining the doors.

Volusia herself slaughtered men, hacking through them like thorn bushes, all the way to the capital doors, her men close on her heels, until finally there was no one left to slaughter.

Breathing hard, seeing there was no one left to fight, studying the doors before her, she yelled out:

“BATTERING RAM!”

Her men parted ways, and there was rolled up before her a huge iron battering ram on wheels, rolled forward by two dozen men. They pulled it back and then, at full speed, they rolled it forward, slamming it into the golden doors. There came a great hollow thud.

They slammed it again, and again, and again. But the golden doors would not give.

Volusia saw something falling from the corner of her eye, and began to hear her man scream out. She looked up and saw, high above, the Empire forces leaning over the edge of the parapets and pouring cauldrons of boiling oil down on her men. They then dropped torches along with it, and her men manning the battering ram suddenly lit up in a great conflagration—and the ram along with it.

Volusia let out a scream, irate, determined to get through those doors. Empire reinforcements were pouring in on the horizon, and she knew her time was limited. She needed to get inside the capital, to strike at the heart of it, to cut off its head and take command of its armies. She knew that if she could not get through those doors, all was lost.

She knew the time had come to take desperate action.

Volusia turned and nodded to one of her commanders.

“The human catapults!” she ordered.

The commander stared back, wide-eyed, but then barked orders to his men.

From the back lines of the army there slowly rolled forward a long line of catapults, dozens of them, smaller than the others. In each of these was a bale of hay, and as Volusia watched, the elite of her soldiers mounted the hay and strapped the bales to their stomachs, holding onto the catapult.

“My lady,” said Gibvin, the commander of her armies, rushing up to her, panic in his eyes, “this is a foolhardy plan. You will kill good men. It cannot work. All of these men will die.”

She stared coldly back at him.

“Some will die,” she said, “but the valiant will live. Myself among them.”

He stared back, unbelieving.

“You?” he said. “You do not mean to join them?”

She smiled back.

“I will go first,” she replied.

“You will die,” he gasped.

She smiled wider.

“And since when have I feared death?”

Volusia ran to the catapults, strapped herself to a bale of hay with a long cord, and stood on a catapult. She looked left and right and saw dozens of other soldiers strapped to hay, each on their own catapult, each staring back at her with a terrified look, waiting. She looked high up, a hundred feet, and knew how crazy this was. Yet if she were to die, she could think of no better way.

“FIRE!” she commanded.

There came the sudden noise of a cutting rope, a creaking of wooden gears, and Volusia lost her breath as she suddenly felt herself rocketed up in the air, shooting up in an arc like a shooting star, up higher and higher into the sky, alongside dozens of her other men, all strapped to the huge bales of hay. Volusia, overwhelmed by the sensation, could hardly breathe, squinting into the wind, feeling her stomach drop. She had never felt so reckless. So alive. She felt free, for the first time in her life. Free of all fear of death.

Volusia rocketed up, over the walls, clearing them by a good twenty feet, and she looked down at the amazed look on the Empire general’s face, as he watched her soar over his head, over the wall.

She, though, was one of the lucky ones: many of her men on the catapults did not clear it, but smashed right into the wall, screaming as they plummeted straight down on the wrong side of it, to their deaths.

As Volusia cleared the wall and began to fall back down the other side, she looked down below to see the streets of the Empire capital far below her. As her speed slowed, the rising sensation stopped, but as it did, she suddenly felt a plummeting sensation, her stomach rising into her throat, as she began to fall straight down the other side.

She flailed as she did, the bale of hay still strapped to her chest, and she tried to position herself so that she landed on the hay. She prayed that the bale held, that her plan worked, that she landed on it stomach first. All around her, her soldiers screamed as they flailed on the way down, too.

As she fell, the cobblestone streets loomed, coming closer and closer…

Her men weighed more than she, and many landed before her. The ones she saw were not so lucky. Most did not land properly on the hay, spinning around awkwardly and landing on stone, breaking their backs instantly. The sickening sound of cracking bones filled the air. It would have caused terror in her, if only there was time to fear.

Moments later, Volusia braced herself, and hit the ground with the impact of an asteroid falling to earth. She turned at the last second and managed to position the hay between her and the ground. The bale of hay exploded, and she hit the ground right through it, it cushioning her fall.

Volusia lay there, her head spinning, winded, slowly crawling to her hands and knees. She shook her head and it took her several moments to realize that she was alive.

She had made it.

She looked around and saw a dozen of her men had made it, too.

Volusia, hearing the cries of Empire soldiers rallying in the streets, wasted no time. She untied her cords, scrambled to her feet, and she led the way, sprinting for the capital doors. Her men, gaining their feet one at a time, fell in behind her.

Before her, in her sights, were a half dozen Empire soldiers, their backs to her, standing guard at the golden doors. It was a light formation because, of course, the Empire never expected the doors to give. And their backs were to her because they never expected a threat from inside.

Volusia sprinted as fast as she could, narrowing the gap, and she managed to lodge a knife in one of the soldiers’ backs before any of the others reacted.

The others, though, spun, and an Empire soldier raised his sword and brought it down for Volusia’s exposed neck; she realized she could not react quickly enough, and braced herself for the blow.

A spear whizzed through the air and pierced the soldier and pinned him to the door. Then there came several more, and Volusia turned to see her men rushing up to join her. They attacked the guards in a rush, and the guards, not knowing what was happening and unprepared, were soon all killed, spears and swords and maces descending on them in a hail of death.

Volusia looked out with satisfaction to see that all the men guarding the doors were dead. She turned and spotted the ancient, huge, golden crank that controlled the opening of the doors.

“THE CRANK!” she yelled.

Volusia ran to the huge crank, reached up, and with all her might yanked on it—to no avail. It was too heavy for her.

Her men joined in, and together, they all began to pull on it—and slowly, it began to move.

There came a great creaking noise and slowly, one foot at a time, Volusia watched with delight as the doors began to open. First it was but a crack of sunlight, just a few inches wide—but then it widened. And widened.

Behind her, dozens of Empire soldiers within the city caught onto her presence and charged to kill her. They were perhaps thirty yards off and closing in.

But as the doors opened there came a great shout and Volusia watched with ecstasy as her army flooded in. The Empire soldiers stopped in their tracks, turned, and ran.

Her army poured into the capital, through doors that were increasingly widening, and she watched them run by like a stampede of elephants, right into this ancient city’s sacred streets.

The air was soon filled with the sound of Empire soldiers and citizens being slaughtered, of their blood filling the streets, and Volusia threw back her head and roared with laughter.

The capital, finally, was hers.