Into the Abyss

Goddess, she couldn’t believe he was dead. It was, she almost smiled sadly, just like Rex to get himself killed in such a manner. Heroic, brave, saving others. Just like a ballad. Rex always liked ballads, she’d always thought that somewhere down deep, Rex was really a bard, not a wizard. She could understand what he’d done, and intellectually she knew it was probably be for the best. Actually, looking at the faces of the children who had been with Rex, she couldn’t exchange their lives for his; she just wished there had been another option. It just hurt so much. It seemed so unfair that the stupid fireballs had to come over the wall at them.

Why were the innocent punished? Why couldn’t the stupid fireball have bounced and hit Exador. Even hitting Lenamare would have been better, true it would have meant the end of the siege, and Exador’s essential victory, but wasn’t Lenamare more deserving...

No, she had to stop that line of reasoning. Every human had a right to life, even those she personally didn’t care for. Both Exador and Lenamare should be allowed to live out their lives. Actually the whole thing was that damn demon’s fault. If he hadn’t been so insistent on getting in, Rex would still be alive. It was probably just being spiteful and vindictive in a typical demonic manner. If anything had to die, it surely should have been that thing. Of course, it wasn’t exactly alive, so she wasn’t sure if it could die. Nonetheless, if anything had to get hurt it should be a creature of evil, not a human being.

She turned and looked up at the late afternoon sun, its shimmering light refracted by the force dome. Actually it didn’t matter if Lenamare or if anyone else had gotten it. With Rex dead and Alvea in shock, Jenn knew the dome couldn’t be sustained long. Most of the common people didn’t realize it, and in fact no one had admitted it to her either; but she wasn’t a fool.

She hadn’t participated in the setting of the wards because they had only needed thirteen people, and her specialization was the farthest from that area, but that didn’t mean she didn’t understand how it was set up. She had known the schedule for setting up the magical defenses, and knew they hadn’t been primed. She knew exactly what it meant when a major pillar of the impromptu wards was destroyed.

Jenn didn’t know how long the dome would last, but at least Exador didn’t know for sure that it wouldn’t last. What they were going to do when the wards came down, she didn’t know. It wasn’t going to be fun. Of course, thinking back on it, what real chance had they ever had. Even under the best conditions, they would eventually have been starved out. Completely cut off, physically and magically, from the outside world with no real chance of relief, they would eventually have succumbed. Oh, true, after a year or so, Exador might have gone home, but if he really wanted the school so much that he’d gotten the Archimage’s support, then what was a year’s time?

Actually, Jenn thought, as she began to walk along the top of the walls, this all assumed Exador didn’t have any more tricks up his sleeve. He might have some way to break Lenamare’s wards. Lenamare had never made a secret of them; to the contrary, he had often boasted about them to others. He’d previously built the wards for Freehold and the Council. It wasn’t inconceivable that Exador had a plan to get around them. Not that he needed one now, but it might be morbidly interesting to see what he came up with.

Depressing; what could they do? They were doomed to lose. She shook her head slightly in frustration. She really didn’t have the energy to do much more. She nodded absently to the soldiers stationed on the wall as she walked by. What would become of all of them? Exador had no love for Lenamare, and would have no mercy for his people. One of the children had asked if they wouldn’t be safe since Exador wanted the school, and the school was made up of students; wouldn’t he spare the students.

Jenn had reassured the little girl, but she didn’t feel any such assurance. Schools also had political clout. The wizard controlling the school controlled the nearby land, and no new master who’d won the school by force could trust the people in the old master’s clique. Perhaps the youngest might be spared, but the masters and senior students would be in jeopardy.

Of course, all this effort on Exador’s part for the school seemed to be a bit much. Could any school be worth this much effort? True Lenamare and Exador had been enemies for decades, but an army this size? Jenn stopped again and looked over the edge of the wall at the besieging army again.