Ignacy found Elzada in front of the wall. The wolf hag stood on a pile of crates, barking orders and coordinating several mainteeams. Her pack also hurried up, carrying supplies ihe bastions. The wall surrounding Houstad was a teological marvel, far from the single monolithic structure it appeared to be from the outside. Its interior was honeybed, creating a byrinth of partments taining barracks, geor rooms, defensive instaltions, medical and prison facilities. Secret passageways opened easily in the heat of battle, releasing soldiers for a clever terattack or unleashing a deadly New Breed to cim the head of an enemy ander. Whole seoved around freely, sparing the most valuable partments from destru.

  Tanks and APCs already filled the narrow tunnels, and walkers created from the samples of Teo-Queen’s maes loomed over them, making it impossible for the supply trucks t in additional ammunition, energy cells, or repair parts; so troops rushed bad forth, adding to the surplus of supplies by emptying the stes.

  The rumble of a mountain range of maery reached his ears. Gears grinded, pistons thundered, elevators carried defeo their positions, and geors activated with a hiss. On any other day, Ignacy would’ve made every effort to sneak in and at least admire this feat of engineering, or at best, try to learn a little or be of any help. Or maybe he would have spent his time admiring the loernian VTOL at the airport and talking to its crew. But not today. He had a more important goal.

  A Wolfkin nearly dropped the crate, the size of a modest cusack, on his leg, and Ignacy helped the man regain his bance, holding the grenades alongside him until a scout arrived. He spped his paw on the knee and turned, sensing Elzada’s eyes at his nape. She somersaulted off the crate, nding gracefully with her arms outstretched, then scowled at the pain iomach, her magnifit amber eyes shining with a mixture of and anger.

  “I love you,“ Ignacy said, and the bonfire of anger vahe two of them embraced, fetting for a selfish moment the world, their pain, the friends they had lost, and every worry. Nothied but them, and the Wolfkins and Normies nearby redoubled their efforts, grinning at the se. “Are you going to fight today?” Ignacy whispered.

  “No,” Elzada answered. She bit him lightly on the neck, and he responded in kind, drawing blood and teari. By tasting flesh and vitae, they sealed the soulmate pa front of everyone, and until death separated them, the two became part of a greater whole. “Half of my pack is either dead, and the rest are wounded or too young. They may hate me, but I have accepted the warlord’s order. We will escort the refugees to Stormfiend and then to the Wastes to…” A cheeky smile fshed across her lips. “… breed a new geion. Up to the task?”

  “Always wao see the pce.” He took her uhe arm, teasing Elzada. “And in good pany. I heard Stormfiend’s spires are incredible. Pity I am more ied in other things than expl them.” He returhe smile. “Are you okay?”

  “Nervous,” Elzada sighed. “But I enjoy being a mother. Time to gift siblings to our boy.”

  Horns bred warnings, and the two tensed, looking up to see the crimson light appearing oes of the radar arrays. Laser beams struck, bringing in the cacophony of a titanic blow from the outside that didn’t overload but tore through the force fields capable of withstanding nuclear strikes. The hiss of burning logs, the explosion of ammunition silos, the opening of fissures during ahquake, and the billowing of the fiercest sandstorm were in this wailing. Purple lightnings fshed in the sky above as the shield reformed itself and the batteries answered, shaking the very ground.

  “DEVOUR THE WORLD!” The words, apanied by the boastful ughter, crept in, eg off the buildings in Houstad and reverberating in the eardrums.

  Fears for Marco’s safety and worry over Elzada almost paralyzed Ignacy; he pulled his beloved after himself, and they walked away on the shaking legs. Panic spread around them; the haughty battle cry brought the promise of utter devastation and pointless death to all who opposed a literal god stalking the ground. This paper barricade won’t hold us! Thundered in the ughter. Nothing save you! Clouds of smoke coated the outer side of the shield, shrouding Houstad in darkness.

  Then his fears were washed away by a distant, faint, yet so familiar howl that shook everyone present. Its sound ripped through the Wolfkins, energizing the wounded and the healthy alike, abs their despair. Even the Normies blinked, shaking at the nightmare. The howl did not call fhter or shame for cowardior did it summon armies to battle.

  A promise that everything had not been in vain sounded in that call, bringing Ignacy memories of Dad and Mom purchasing aire cake to celebrate the New Year, and how no squabbles occurred that night, and how Mom insisted they eat the chocote off the cake before it melted away. He imagined a paw on his shoulder and even said the name.

  Along the way, they entered an Ice Fang; the knight-captain held a paw to his head, his eyes wide open and the mouth agape as he drooled unsightly. Instinctively, Ignacy reached for the man, and he felt a presence pass from him and Elzada, who held him by the shoulder, to the white-furred, and he imagined seeing two titanic bodies reflected in the crimson eyes. It couldn’t be them; the two had the fur of the purest snow, and their eyes shone brighter than psma.

  “The Holy Trinity.” The Ice Fang gasped and straightened up. “It is restored,” he said, awestruck.

  “We are not holy,” Elzada giggled, full of ued joy. “We’re, like, the opposite of anything holy.” She tapped her metal leg. “And don’t ftter yourself, ice boy; you are not diviher. Survive, traitor.”

  “Same to you, kin.”

  Bogdan’s ughter resonated in the howl, peting with Dad’s encement and Mom’s love. Death approached Houstad, and life answered it, stubbornly refusing to kowtow or disappear. And the Wolf Tribe howled, mog and teasing the hordemen, inviting them to set foot he gates, their fears fotten. Ignacy, Elzada, and the knight-captain added their voices to it and darted in different dires, as if spped by a mother irritated by their procrastination.

  The Butcher Maiden answered with her own promise. The sun will shine.

  ****

  Janine raised her snout to the smoke-filled sky and howled, answering the call. An urge kept shaking her body. She could almost taste the Spirits permeating the very foundation of Houstad and driving the Tribe into a. Janine wao kill. No, wanting wasn’t suffit. She o kill someone, and she o do it now.

  Mother and daughter charged across the streets, parting ways, and Chak’s g legs trailed after Anissa, carrying him along the buildings’ walls. The Iable activated its engines, firing the first volley above the walls, and the trucks carrying the wounded hurried to leave the battlefield. Rivers of amber-eyed figures filled the streets, heading in perfeison to their assigned positions, the deafening cacophony of their battle cries answering the booming ughter.

  Alpha overtook Janine, saying nothing, a thirty meters into the air, tinuing running on the rooftops to not step on her kin. Onyxia, wreathed in the shadoeared briefly in a window alongside Anji, and nodded once. Janine’s HUD activated, and she instructed her unit to reinforce the defensive posts. Jaie obeyed, and Reaper ehe sewers, creeping toward the ambush point.

  Even through the preparations to repel the assault, the packs found time to say their farewells. Impatient O Elzada and Igna her way and gave them both a quick blessing. Wolf hags selected to participate in the defense good-naturedly roasted several wolf hags responsible for proteg the citizens, promising to solve any grievances iure dominations. Kaisa’s own cameras showed Jahe wolf hag standing in the crawler’s shadow, addressing her pack as they prepared to leave Houstad.

  “I won’t be asking fiveness for my misdeeds. Don’t deserve one,” Kaisa said pinly. “I was a shitty leader, a terrible sister, and a worthless human being. But I fight to buy you time. To give my family a ghost of a ce at happiness, and to spend my life seg my pack’s retreat. This much I do. Lead the pack well and try tet me,” she asked her sister.

  “Should we wish you a good death?” the scout asked sarcastically.

  “Pretend like you never existed?” the brother added.

  “Is that how it should end?” Kirk’s shaking voice joiheirs as he struggled to look at his older sister. Uo bear the fear, the male trated on his legs and ched his fists. “What, you die and we’ll be sorry and five you, K… sister? Screw that! Live! You don’t get to get off the hook so easily! Never fet what you’ve done! Want to atone?! Keep on being a better person! The dead ’t make amends. A dead sister is worth nothing but grief!”

  “Grief…” Kaisa repeated, Kaisa repeated, and Janine switched the HUD’s view and saw the woman smile. “Thank you. I know I didn’t earn it, but thank you so much. The future exists.”

  “trate on today, dumbass!” her sister advised. “Let your cws breathe, shoot, explode, and kill. Hurt them!”

  “Don’t worry about that bit, sister. I itch to fill the graves,” Kaisa growled, and her brged her, her sister patted her, and Kirk stood aside, breathing heavily. Then they parted, the siblings esc the armored trucks, and their wolf hag raced to join the ambushers. Ygrite assigned Kaisa to one of the safer pces, desiring to preserve the future warlord. Short of anything impossible, she will survive.

  Safe challenges, kin. Janine wished to her.

  And throughout the city, the se repeated itself in tless variations. Old grudges were fotten, fiven, or cast to the wayside; the Wolfkins exged heartfelt apologies and hugs, wishing each other survival. Rivalries erupted over who would cim the biggest tally, and the Tribe marched merrily to war. Thoughts of death vanished from their eyes. Even Janine didn’t think about it. A colossal weight had been kicked off her heart, and the faint, barely audible call brought her hope.

  It isn’t over. Let the Horde e.

  And e they did.

  A wall of fme rose to the west, its tongue lig the very clouds. Sers and cameras bypassed the heat, and drones swooped down, showing an orderly host of infantry and vehicles advang, shaking the ground with the thunder of tens of thousands of armored boots and the wailing of numerous engines. Hoverbikes fhe host, their riders ready to charge the sed the wall was breached. Meical, arroed flying transports danced above, waiting for an opportunity. For now, they focused on taking out the drones, cutting them in half with bursts of small-caliber onry.

  Iron Lord led from the front, riding calmly between two mobile shield carriers, Svetaker and Widowmaker, at his side. es were welded to his body, metallidrils writhed at his back, and the ons on his shoulders shifted stantly, searg for targets. He repced the destroyed give with a simir one and poi at the defenders in a silent promise.

  The carriers activated their geors, bing the space around the advang forces. Lightnings fshed in the pces where the defenders’ ser beams harmlessly fizzled out, and smoke mushrooms emerged, the results of the destroyed artillery shells failing to pee these ss. Spheres of hissing energy rolled across the ground, pung holes in the minefields, and the fabled siege tanks of the khatun fired their first shots.

  Brood Lord postured atop a battle tank in the rear. Ivory-colored and gem-incrusted armor covered his body; the le cameras caught the fident grin in his visor. Prosthetic limbs, gleaming with gold and ptinum and thicker than his natural limbs, repced his missing hind legs. Casually carrying a sword on his shoulder, the khan motioned, and hulking shapes lumbered ahead of the front.

  Taller than their leader, these Malformed used knuckles to support their oversized and misshapen bodies ripped with muscles, mouths on their ed shoulders eagerly opened and closed, bubbling with violet liquid on their half-rotten fangs. The soldiers in the first line of defense opened fire, hiding the Horde from view in the horizons of eruptions, and several shells and shots even breached the shield, tearing ks of flesh from the Malformed.

  Out of their mouths, the Malformed vomited streams of filth, and the fme arted, letting the acidic torrent soak the soil aohe remaining mines.

  “Fourth brigade, to the sed line,” Janine ordered.

  “They are still capable of inflig damage,” Dragena noted calmly.

  “They will inflict far more if they fall bad stay alive,” Jaated.

  The defenders hastily abahe front line areated to the rear trenches as the hissing mass melted through the force shields and enveloped several towed artillery pieces, instantly redug them to corroded wrecks.

  Behind the Horde, it moved. The superon that spelled Opul’s doom was visible in the distance, despite the enormous distance. pared to it, even a crawler seemed small; it ure mountain of metal, baring its fangs, its turrets, and keeping the main on ready.

  Drozna. Heika. Phaser. Janine spotted her of them as she joined her unit, greeting the fused Jaie full armor and wielding a four-barreled mae gun.

  “Warlord, what is going on?” Jaie asked on the private el, handing a psma on to Janine as they ehe tunnel leading to the bridge. “We were supposed to be reinf the north!”

  “ge of pns,” Janine assured her, waiting fena’s trap to sprout.

  How to deal with a teleporter? Dragena had used the New Breeds, blessed with predictive abilities and not shying away from enlisting the criminals guilty to bankrupt os, and had id out her pns and avaible information to them, demanding approximate pertages of success for her ambushes. Not satisfied with that, she had also used the analytical officers of the Iigation Bureau, sulted Till Ingo’s experimental puter processors, and talked to the Brood. Gleaning clues from every possible source, Dragena now kly how Phaser wielded his power and deduced potential locations based on Brood Lord’s personality.

  The first invading party emerged from an open portal in the sewers, fifty men strong. Their leader’s neck was sliced in two by Reaper, who then threw a grenade in the dire of the portal, causing Phaser to close it before the explosives desigo breach the wall could be sent. Jumping backwards and disappearing into a nearby tuo hide from the hail of bullets, the assassin began his grim business. The incursion took pce at a power pnt in the south. Three assault teams appeared in its corridors.

  Here the pn ran into its first difficulty. A unit of sixty soldiers positiohemselves behind the barricades in the main hall, ready to kill the invaders as they came. To their woe, Drozna stepped out of the blue portal’s surface, utterly ign the bullets and ser beams heating his hide. A single sweep of his arm tore the defenders from the barricade, colpsing it and sending the men and women spttering against the wall. Heavy blows liquidated them and the hordeman roared ay warning about the ‘betrayal’. The Recimers’ jammers came online, preventing the enemy’s coordination, and the trap rung.

  While the first group had failed to hinder Drozna, Sughterer gleefully pushed over the soldiers of his unit, his tendrils ed around the shocked hordemen, squeezing them dead and throwing the carcasses in his mouth. Lacerated One, arms folded, stared dow raiding party in the trol ter, where a skeleton crew of teis oversaw the silenced pnt.

  “A meager ,” said the Supreme Shaman. Her cws sshed, defleg the projectiles away from the allies and screams of agony filled the room as she bit the first hordeman.

  Ihe crawler, Ygrite smiled, spreading her arms wide iing to those infiltrating the Iable’s armory. Volunteer Jaquan Kruger and his bodyguards gave her no time to gloat, and immediately opened fire on the enemy, using the crates for cover. The warlord rolled her eyes and joined in, slig off limbs.

  In the north, another portal opened he fuel silos. The raider in charge of this group tapped on the fuel tank and yelled, “The bastards had us! Into the city now, take cover in…”

  “What’s the rush, little mbs?” murmured Kaisa, climbing dowank; the electric mps caused her long shadow to stretch over the invaders.

  She bounced off it the sed the first of the saboteurs fired, and her paw closed on the leader’s head, twisting it away and using the dead body to sm the hordeman dead. The wolf hag dropped a couple of grenades and shoved a hordewoman off her path with a shoulder tackle, running to ward off the soldiers’ positions and clutg her old wound with one paw. Acid flowers bloomed in her wake, speared by the suppressive fire of her allies.

  Not every group hahe sudden invasions as pnned. Jached as several panies of meraries and even former assassiheir match, dying to the superior firepower of the invaders. Several scouts had their brains spttered on the pavement by heavy boots, their troops sshed to the st. Then the enemy spread throughout the city, carrying out their sabotage.

  Cruel as it was, the situation was still within acceptable parameters. They had no way of proteg everything, and with the citizens safe and the vital facilities secured, the freed units could hunt dowruders like ioids…

  “Ining!” Janine roared, spotting a single shell fired by a siege tank from the Horde’s position. It broke through a weakened segment of the shield and was about to fall atop the wall.

  Then it disappeared. Janine narrowed her eyes, looking at the trembling air, and the HUD of her helmet firmed a spatial distortion that obscured the projectile’s trajectory and ed it away.

  “Dragena,” Janine tacted the bridge. “Are you aware of any teleporters or spatial maniputors on our side?”

  “Yes, sister,” came the cold reply. “Everything as expected.”

  A tear on the bridge stopped Janine’s further inquiry. The blue line ran from the ceiling to the path leading ter’s throne, and Phaser rolled from it, ughing at the bullets fired far above him. His hands sshed, cutting through reality, and blobs of psma flew from the opened passages, vaporizing two soldiers all the way to their ankles.

  The hordeman immediately drew himself high and unched himself off the path down to the operators. His touch split a human-sized terminal, and in its pce opened a window into a ste bay. Servants began rolling a cart full of explosives. A single shot from an energy on startled the servants, and Phaser darted away from the window, closing it in a hurry as another shot followed into the portal. If there was an explosion, Janine’s cameras didn’t catch it.

  “I o kill you without toug your cws?” Dragena asked no one in particur, jumping down and sending tremors through the floor. She leveled her rifle, sg Phaser away from killing aor. “Simple enough.”

  “Weren’t you supposed to be…” Phaser started talking.

  His eyes widened in fear, and a swipe of his cws opened a portal that swallowed the seari aimed at his head. The warlord took a siep, sliding uhe portal before its edges could touch her armor, and neared Phaser, pausing briefly at his smile and reag for a knife on her leg.

  Space shattered above her head.

  “That’ll cost extra to Brood Lord,” ughed Phaser, dousing Dragena in the familiar violet sludge. “Didn’t see that ing, doggie?! I handle anything you throw at me myself!”

  His cws stabbed, destroying the reality around them and f a tuhat kept Phaser’s arms safe from the acid. Ten cws aimed fena’s neck, and she rammed the butt of her hissing rifle into his stomach, throwing the man straight into the wall with enough force to leave a footprint in it with his body. He screamed in pain and agony, notig two fingers missing from his hand, and Dragena broke from the downpour.

  “Open emergency ports, oxygen masks, now,” Dragena anded, dropping the useless rifle and uhing the sed knife. “Captain, take over. It’ll take a while.”

  Schalk’s unit went dark; their IDs disappeared from the HUD, marking their st location as they deserted the crawler via the emerges amid the fusion and raced toward the city, firing at every camera in their path. But this time we know what you are pnning, traitor. You’ll pay for Keon’s death. Janine ched her fist, wishing she could be there to deliver retribution to that lying piece of human garbage.

  She trusted him! Janine really thought that the man really weled her to Houstad and wao help out of duty or the goodness of his heart. She pitied and grieved for his people… Then again; they didn’t deserve what happeo them. Janine reproached herself. Schalk’s betrayal did not lessen the old tragedy.

  But he’ll die. Anissa and Yennifer will make sure of that.

  “Soldiers of the Recmation Army!” Jaie visibly shuddered, hearing Captain Cristobo’s voice. The man lowered himself from the partment above the bridge and sat ohrone. “We have identified the traitors. Schalk is hereby stripped of his rank. Every loyal soldier of the state is to shoot him and the 4336th ptoon on sight.”

  “What is going on?” Jaie demanded. “Warlord, first we btantly ighe orders and took a different post, and now…”

  “Five the deception, Captain. I myself have only retly learned of Captain Cristobo’s survival. Though I admit I was a fool. The Blessed Mave him the gift of immunity to poisons; I should have realized it sooner.” Janine pced a paw on the captain’s shoulder. “I am not privy to every detail, but Dragena and he were busy flushing out the traitors and tering their as.”

  “But Schalk… He is… That’s just not possible.” Panic fshed in the captain’s eyes. “The plex! Warlord, that traitor wanted my troops to take over the plex! If he…”

  “Nothing will happen to it. It is impossible to teleport in there, aook precautions about the rest,” Janine assured the woman. “The lies were id bare at st. The scorg fme of the Dynast’s judgment awaits the traitors, and they will be found wanting.”

  “DEVOUR THE WORLD!” The hordemen boomed their battle cry, shouting on top of their lungs.

  “Choke on your own blood!” Janine roared back, exiting the gates leading to the bridge.

  The artillerymen of the Recmation Army answered with their as. ons fired and missiles streaked from the wall, raining upon the advang army. The very ground trembled, and were it not for the shield proteg the state’s positions, Janine had little doubt that many of the defenders would be crushed by the shockwaves alone. Explosions rolled upon the ground, slipping off the Gilded Horde’s shields and reag the defenders’ field.

  Specialized missiles failed to burst the enemy’s prote. The enemy leader gathered enough shield geors to form several individual domes of prote, so when one failed, more rose to stop the ining barrage. But the Recimers kept at it, unleashing enough firepower to level hollow cities and colpse entire mountain ranges. Something had to give. The soldiers stepped nervously from leg to leg, watg as the fming wall advang on Houstad was riddled with vas created by the le ons of both sides.

  Dozens of hordemen, far too few, died when the protective shield failed to quaff and not choke the ining barrage. A simir se pyed out in the Recimer ranks, and dust fell on Jaemple from above as a ser on hit one of the ptforms on the wall, destroying the parapet and killing the soldiers there. Janine caught a falling body, briefly checked the man’s pulse to firm his demise, and respectfully handed him to be carried away.

  Where one enemy soldier fell, two more took his pce. The Horde lived up to its heir numbers seemed endless, advang in waves of gold, green, crimson, and bck toward the defenders. A young mahe warlord cried out as the artillery fttened a se of the trenches, and broken bodies were tossed callously into the air as the rest of the Third’s vanguard retreated. Janine didn’t reprimand the young man, softening her impression when she realized the boy was about twenty years old.

  Dragena pced Janine’s unit on the bridge leading into Houstad, and the structure was wedged between two bastions. Soldiers already manned bunkers and pillboxes, preparing to repel the invaders when they entered ihe shield. Officers had ordered trenches dug into the crete in preparation to fight for this pce with fang and cws. The shallowness of the river at this point prevehe and from blowing up the bridge right away.

  It served better as an obstacle and a desirable target.

  Ign the shells, Janine walked to the young merary, not even batting a the approag devastation. She checked the soldier’s on, made him adjust his helmet, and him. The panic was uandable. The meraries of the Core Lands handled gangs, corporate petition, and hunted an occasional monster from the Outer Lands. They never expected to fight in a real war.

  “This is your home!” Janine shouted, raising the axe above her head. “A pce to raise your cubs, a den that you have worked so hard to build! A rare safe haven in the world resisting the grip of insanity and violence, a testament to human dignity and honor. The world demanded of your aors to surreo their primitive instincts and be reduced to a crazed rabble, squabbling over the dregs. Instead, they spat in the face of that demand and built a pce for all of you! The question is, will you fail to live up to their example?” She raised her voice, ging it into a r tornado. “I say no! I am a product of savagery and cruelty, and I refuse to let Houstad burn! There are things worth fighting for! What about you? Will you run and hide? Will you let your cubs be raised in sve pens, devoid of a future?”

  “NO!” the volunteers screamed back, joined by the provincial and the Third’s soldiers.

  “If any of you were drafted by trickery ainst your will, now is your ce to leave.” The bzing fme behi her a vast shape against the red. “As a soldier, it is my duty to stand and fight. A civilian’s duty is to live and prosper. The state has failed; I have failed to ehat you’ll have this priceless opportunity. No one will n you if you leave. heless, I, Janine of the Wolf Tribe, ask you. Join me in the defense of Houstad.”

  “Janine.” Jae stepped forward, cheg her rifle. “o ask. Houstad has bee the home of my people. No one person carry the weight of the world, but together we shove it down the Horde’s ravenous throat hard enough to end them. We are staying.”

  “I am from the west…” said an elderly man in a fitting uniform and a body armor of an outdated design. “I had hunting dogs… I had hounds.” His finger moved closer to the trigger of his rifle.

  “You rebuild,” said a nearby volunteer gently, armed with a spiked ma addition to the standard mae gun.

  “For most of my life, I’ve been murdering people for money,” said another man, dressed in a mesh of loose-fitting power armor and body prote. His eye shoh a yellow light of the targeting matrix, and he spun a knife in his hand. “Might as well kill for something that matters for once. I’ve skinned several fatties. They die just as easily as anyone else. Don’t bury us yet.”

  “Meh.” A half-woman, half-mae ked forward, traversing on pistons that served her fs. An unblinking green ocur had repced one of her eyes, and most of her hair went gray. The merary captain smirked, rotating the on protruding from her left forearm. “My crew busted our asses to get citizenship. And now the Dynast has ha to the rest of our families aives on a silver ptter. You bet your pretty head that we will kill for it. Waste no more words, ma’am. Not a bad pany has gathered here. Sure, some may wet themselves, but they’ll shoot and, more importantly, kill.” A group of Malformed and victs ughed. “Yours to and, Warlord.”

  “Thank you.” Janine smiled bad faced the fire. “Anyone willing to die, try to get past us!”

  “Janine. Your challenge is accepted,” they heard the voice. Boastful, full and knowledge of one’s might. These simple words resonated in souls, filling even Jah icy dread.

  Mad Hatter stepped out from the wall of fme. She was wearing a pristine white dress with gold trim and brown pants adorned with bracelets and neckces. On her shoulders were the furs of great beasts, her hair touched the back of her waist, and a leather cap with a blue feather covered the woman’s face up to her nose. Her lips smiled while bloodshot eyes focused on the warlord.

  For all Janine’s bravado, she knew better than to hope to stand against this creature. The woman, dressed more for a party than a battlefield, might as well be death itself. It wasn’t a matter of possibility; she had not even a pertage of a pertage of a ce to deal a fatal blow to that.

  Cristobo directed the assault on the khatun immediately. Energy ons, artillery and turrets, missiles, and even grenade unchers loaded with every deadly gas and substance ceivable—they fired it all, and a sphere of devastation rose around the Khatun.

  She breathed in the white phosphorus and nerve agents as if it were air. The khatun’s scimitars drew arcs around her, sending the regur ammunition aside so that nothing would damage her clothing. Her legs carried her away from the energy beams. Swaths of nd around her were torn and vaporized; the sand turo gss. And still she advanced, unharmed, undamaged, her arms blurry from the creation of wind sshes that repeatedly swatted away everything fired at her.

  A single such ssh touched a line of the defense, barely grazing it, but no soldier in its path survived. They weren’t crushed by the pressure, or cut; they didn’t even turn into a crimson mist. Two hundred and sixty-seven soldiers of the Third simply vanished, as if they had never existed.

  “Abandon equipment areat to the wall,” Janine ordered, interrupting Cristobo’s coordination of the retreat. He reprimaer. They had tools in abundance.

  The Sky’s Avatar moved further ahead from her host, trating on Janine, and the soldiers retreated, abandoning the sed and third lines of defense.

  “You should have accepted my offer,” said Mad Hatter. It should’ve been impossible for her words to reach the Recimers, but Janine heard them loud and clear. “It isn’t wise to resist a demigod. Fall to your knees, worship the Sky, praise me, admit that your faith is inferior, and I’ll spare you and your spirits.”

  “Demigods don’t make mistakes. But you did,” Janine answered. “You should’ve killed me when you had the ce.”

  “What for?” Mad Hatter ughed. “You are powerless. Yods are powerless! Even that progenitor of yours is not here to save you! And without might, you ot fe a legaor you ge anything!” She poihe tip of her scimitar skyward.

  The battlefield ceased going. Sounds faded, shells froze in mid-air, tongues of fme grew still, and even ser beams burheir way to their target slower than Janine could run, and, as the warlord surveyed the situation, a terrible realization struck her. Mad Hatter wasn’t faster than light. She was dodging the shots before they were even fired.

  It was insanity. No mind, no awarehat she knew of, was capable of such a feat. The Khatun’s eyes never left Janine’s; she had no HUD to share the omnidireal vision. It could not be happening.

  “My offer stands,” a voice whispered to her left, and a familiar white shape took pear Jahe warlord tried to sniff it, to touch that weird man, but her muscles refused to obey her. “My touch is reserved for the faithful. My child, you stand at a precipice. Accept me and be plunged into greatness and face your enemy as an equal. Reject me and know that Abyss of yours.”

  Janine didn’t answer; she didn’t eve to pay any further attention to this figment of her imagination. The Spirit e often teased his victims, and she didn’t know a woman who would’ve been gd of trading her self to bee a skinwalker. The figure glowed; the infernal crimson of its eyes resembled two mouths of active voloes. At st it disappeared, saying nothing, and the time resumed.

  Mad Hatter blinked and smiled; the ers of her lips touched the ears.

  “Unfortunate. I hoped for an appetizer before the mai.”

  “There are worse things than being weak,” Janine said bluntly. “When you die, Mad Hatter, you’ll be little more than a footnote, another mania the long history of the Recmation Army broken uhe Dynast’s heel, an accessory to the Blessed Mother’s legacy. Unloved, uncared for, and even your own sves will fet you.” She sighed. “No friends, no family, no rades or allies. By your own choice. If I am weak, then you are a pathetic squanderer of gifts.”

  “Bold words. But here’s the thing, Janine. If I want a family, I’ll have one. Friends too. And I’ll be strong enough o lose them. The question is, are you?” Veins showed on Mad Hatter’s hand, and she slowed directly opposite of Janine, and a cold sweat ran down the warlord’s back. “What is the matter? What is there to be afraid of? It’s just a single ssh, and I am so far away, and you have that bubble created by those rades of yours. Surely, if they are so precious, you have naught to worry about...”

  “Permission granted!” said a new, familiar voi the unication and unknown images joihe shared vision. The perfed smooth interior of a highly advanced room. A gloved hand held a slightly crumpled terminal. The hand tossed it aside; the mae drummed against a carpet and its surface straightened.

  Nanomaes. And that blue glove that covered the hand…

  “Elite Eugenia, joining the battle!”

  A pilr of blue rose from the airport, streaking into the smoke-filled sky. The top of the beam hit the force field and bounced off, quickly ging dire, and Mad Hatter looked up. The blue lihe Elite, passed above the walls by jumping all the way from Houstad’s airport. Still spinning, the round ball nearly touched the ground and then spread herself into a feminine form.

  Blue boots touched the desoted ground, soon followed by the hem of a blue cape. A growing, sprawling oak, painted white, fshed briefly on the cape before a living cloak formed by blonde hair, so long it almost touched the ground, covered it. Simir national emblems were on her gloves, boots, and chest. She was a head shorter than Ravager; her helmet covered the face simir to Mad Hatter’s mask, and from the deep blue of her visor, two eyes fshed fiercely, meeting the khatun’s gaze.

  Her attire seemed to be paper-thi could withstand more damage than even Alpha’s suit. None of that body was made of leather or spandex; every part of that fn thing was formed by the nanomaes. Janine had seen it before, clouds f teological ‘derblocks” over soldiers’ bodies, assembling themselves into armor like pieces of a puzzle.

  These smart maes unnerved Jahey weren’t mindless; they thought and acted. Several soldiers who had nht to remain whole after swings of her own axe had survived that way, and then their own suits turned into plicated medical instruments that helped the unscious injured survive even mortal wounds. As per the accepted rules, the Recimers didn’t try to retrieve them from the wounded as the nanomaes termihemselves to avoid revealing their secrets.

  A se of the shield parted briefly, and the figure walked bravely toward the khatun.

  “Hey!” Eugenia Mylli, the pinnacle of the achievements of the Iternian bioengineering, pointed a fi Mad Hatter. “Why don’t you pi someone equal for a ge?”

  “Murderer! Butcher! Traitors’ spawn!” Janine roared, spitting saliva. Her son dying, his desperate squeals, the females and males lost during the Culling… “How dare you set foot on our nd? Has Iterna lost all shame? I will sughter you here and now!”

  “Janine,” Eugenia softened her voice. “I am sorry.”

  “His Excellency himself has authorized the involvement of Elite Redeemer, Warlord,” Cristobo warned.

  “Hey, Janine.” Jaie took her by the arm. “I don’t know what cat came between you and her, but let’s not. Nht now, anyway.”

  “That would be a first, because no one is my equal,” Mad Hatter responded, straightening up. No on was fired at her anymore, and the khatun tilted her head. “An Iternian. Hm. Hm. Why are you here? I haven’t had any beef with your try. What is there to gain in helping your prime rival? Let us fight, withe destru of the Recmation Army, or…” She smiled. “Could it be that you wish to join me? I have heard of you, manufactured sparrow. The rabble has elevated you above itself, but isn’t it tiresome to forever be ed by responsibilities and rules? Take flight; bee yourself for oand at my side a us feast upon the world together!”

  Mad Hatter’s words resonated with Janine’s soul. She recalled her anger aimed at Terrific, the disappoi after meeting her mother, Bertruda’s betrayal, and more. Alpha had always uimated her, called her a coward. The shamans were stubborn idiots. She knew better; she was borer, so why was she fighting for the side that… Her fangs bit her too the blood, and the feeling disappeared. Janine spped the gssy-eyed Jaie, snapping the woman out of her trance, and together they went to wake their soldiers.

  “Megalomaniacal speeches put me to sleep,” Eugenia ughed, her voice clear as a river. “The Intelligence was right, not just emotional manipution, but a passive invasive mind trol to boot.” She tapped the side of her helmet. “Don’t waste the efforts, punk. Been there, toughed it out, became immune. Wao know, why am I here? To stop you. Why? Because lives are at stake, and I am here. Because you have destroyed cities, engaged in svery, killed minors, and endangered our citizens.” A white mist gathered around the Elite’s hands. She ched her fist, gripping the handles of silver tonfas formed by the nanomaes. “Because I owe debts. Iterna will no loolerate your wanton terrorism. Your war ends today. And your crimes will be punished.”

  “By whom, little imitation?” the khatun asked.

  A soft, blue glow covered most of the battlefield. A portal that made Phaser’s tears look positively tiny had opened in the south, widening and expanding to reveal another portal within, ohat led into the depths of the os. The pleasant hue soon turned e and then bright red as a k of stone, rge enough to serve as a wall’s bastion, pushed through the portal. Jaie quailed, grabbing Jao stand, and the warlulped.

  Eugenia was dropping a meteor. The wind roared, blowing in every dire, dispced by the sheer mass of the meteor, superheated by the fri. The helmet closed around the Elite’s head.

  She is going to murder us all. Jahought.

  “And they call me mad,” Mad Hatter remarked.