While the Vanguard’s mood had previously been split between anxiety and excitement, now the anxiety was nowhere to be found.

  The Revenants pushed forward, bolstered by the sudden retreat of the Crimson Reaver cavalry. Grant assigned a third team of Revenants to push and defend each siege tower. One last volley from the trebuchets removed the final wall-mounted ballista. Then the Vanguard’s war machines ceased their assault, allowing the siege towers to approach the walls in relative safety.

  Yet still, Davon couldn’t calm his thoughts. The siege seemed too easy thus far.

  He also found the sudden retreat of the Crimson Reaver cavalry both suspicious and disappointing. On one hand, fewer powerful enemies were standing in their way now. But on the other, he worried about an ambush later in the siege.

  Davon also couldn’t shake the selfish disappointment he’d felt watching the Red Plume ride away. He had been looking forward to a rematch with her ever since they first crossed blades.

  Staring up at the walls, more troubling thoughts occurred to him. So far, aside from the cavalry rush, the Vanguard had encountered minimal enemy resistance. Only simple soldiers and sergeants, easily overcome.

  Then there were the walls themselves. Even if the Vanguard claimed the outer walls with ease, they still had to fight their way through the heavily reinforced Duke’s Road, and then conquer the inner walls as well.

  Davon knew damn well that there were more powerful Crimson Reavers within those walls. He feared the moment they would show themselves. And of course, there was always the looming threat of Tenebris and when he might choose to join the battle.

  Looking over his shoulder at the rest of the Vanguard, Davon spotted both Grant and Emma escorting a siege engine of their own. This war machine, being pushed along by six other Revenants, was a massive cylindrical metal structure, every inch of it covered in runic script.

  Davon remembered Grant mentioning the Guild had ways to deal with threats such as Tenebris. Was this machine one of those ‘tools’? Or was it simply a type of siege engine Davon wasn’t familiar with?

  The sound of arrows hitting metal snapped Davon’s attention back to the front. He realized quickly that the arrows were aimed at the siege tower he and his team were pushing. Dozens of small projectiles bounced off of the tower’s armor plating, landing pitifully in the snow.

  Spurred on by the attack, Davon refocused his efforts on pushing the siege tower along. The sound of rolling wheels and groaning wood had become so deeply embedded in his ears that the noise of arrows whizzing through the air was barely audible to him.

  When an arrow struck the ground at his feet, just barely clearing the gap between the ground and the barricade in front of Davon, he almost jumped. A string of smoke rose from the point of impact.

  Fire arrows… that’s not good.

  Davon turned his gaze to the slit in his barricade. From the extremely limited point of view, Davon could see Crimson Reaver archers standing boldly atop the ramparts, weapons raised. With the catapult bombardment ceased, the enemy had free rein of the walls again, and they were using this to its full potential.

  Davon watched each Crimson Reaver nock an arrow. As they pulled their bowstrings back, those arrows lit up with crimson flame. Most of the enemy archers took aim at the barricades, but a few fired directly at the Vanguard’s siege towers.

  That fire is useless, so long as the armor plating holds, Davon assured himself.

  He continued pushing and moved his head away from the slit. There was a slight chance that a stray arrow could make it through that slit and hit him. He wasn’t willing to take that risk, no matter how small it was.

  As the siege tower crossed the line of barricades, Grant’s voice echoed again over the battlefield.

  “Archers, retaliate!”

  Davon glanced over his shoulder, wishing he could join in the retaliation. He watched the archer Revenants split off from the battle lines and launch a volley against the Crimson Reavers. The Vanguard’s catapult attack had destroyed the merlons on large swaths of the ramparts. Davon found some satisfaction in watching the enemy soldiers who stood on these wall sections fall off the ramparts, arrows sticking out of their armor.

  As the exchange between Vanguard and Crimson Reaver archers continued, the siege towers drew ever closer to the walls. Roughly halfway between the battle line and the walls, Davon picked up on guttural shouting inside the city.

  Davon’s Reliquary piped up with a warning, sending calls for caution through their mental link. Davon no longer had any qualms about these warnings. The last few minutes alone had given him plenty of reasons to trust his Reliquary without hesitation. Heeding the weapon, Davon peeked out at the walls again, just in time to see a new contingent of Crimson Reavers step onto the ramparts.

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  These were Crimson Reavers he had never seen before, even in his three weeks of scouting behind enemy lines. They wore armor much heavier than even the captains. Each was equipped with a tower shield and longsword. Davon could only imagine how difficult it would be to get past their guard.

  Well… I’ll have to figure out how to do that very quickly, he thought with an exasperated sigh.

  Heavily armored units in a small space would already be difficult to deal with. Heavily armored units with tower shields to boot were a whole other layer of difficulty to overcome, especially for someone who specialized in ranged combat.

  Davon began to strategize about how to deal with the ‘Heavies’, as he decided to call them in that moment, then quickly realized he was out of time. The siege tower was about to be in position. He would have to form a strategy in the few minutes it took to climb up the ladder and onto the wall.

  “Towers, anchor in place!” Grant commanded.

  Davon reached towards a mechanism near the base of the tower. Flipping a hooked bit onto the segmented wheel, he locked it in place.

  “Now, make for the walls!” Grant shouted, and the Vanguard obeyed.

  Swiftly moving from the side of the tower to its back, Davon grabbed onto one of three ladders in the interior. He only had time to notice Kai and a Revenant in Heinburg colors leaping onto the other two ladders before he began his ascent.

  Reaching the tower’s top first, Davon grabbed the release lever and waited for his siblings-in-arms to catch up. Kai was only seconds behind, followed swiftly by the Heinburg Revenant. Kai gave Davon a nod.

  Exhaling quickly to calm his nerves, Davon pulled the release lever. The siege tower’s massive walkway dropped onto the ramparts with a thunderous crash. Almost as soon as the walkway dropped, Davon saw two Heavies step into position on the other end, placing their shields side by side to block the path.

  Before Davon could act, Kai rushed past him, axe held high.

  As a rune lit up on his weapon, Kai slammed the axe down onto one of the shields. Golden energy enveloped the warrior’s axe at the moment of impact. The energy quickly surged from the axe to Kai’s target. Both the shield and its bearer disintegrated into a fine ash in a matter of seconds.

  Without wasting time, Kai moved to take the place of the soldier he’d just killed. However, this left him wide open to the archers lining the wall behind him.

  Even as a few arrows landed in Kai’s back, making the young warrior stagger, Davon reached for the enchanted knives in his belt. With only a second to aim, Davon flicked his hand forward, launching the enchanted blade towards the unprotected archers.

  His perception of time slowed as the blade flew. Then Davon smiled as his shot landed in the chest of an enemy archer, erupting into a massive fireball immediately after. Several other archers were sent flying off the wall by the blast.

  More explosive than it was against the captain… his armor must have contained it, Davon observed with another smile.

  He returned his attention to Kai just in time to see the other Heavy lean bodily into their shield, slamming it into the young warrior. Kai stepped to the side deftly, toeing the edge of the rampart as he repositioned behind his adversary.

  Kai aimed a slash at the massive Crimson Reaver’s knee. Still carried by the momentum of their own recent attack, the Heavy couldn’t react in time. They could only cry out in pain as Kai’s axe bit into the back of their knee, sinking a few inches into flesh.

  With a furious roar, the Crimson Reaver dropped onto one knee, using their shield to cover their front. Then Davon spotted another group of archers, now from the other side, taking aim again at Kai’s back.

  As the arrows flew, the young warrior turned on his heel and conjured a golden barrier. The arrows bounced off of his defenses weakly, without even making a mark.

  Davon raised his bow, invoking his Scattershot rune as he prepared a shot for this second group of archers. But the moment he loosed his shot, more Heavies stepped onto the ramparts, one of them placing a shield between Davon and his target. Davon scowled with frustration as the Scattershot projectiles crashed ineffectively against the Crimson Reaver’s shield.

  More Revenants were making their way up the tower behind Davon. He studied the ramparts, considering his options carefully and rapidly.

  A moment was all it took to realize the gap made by Kai was rapidly closing. Davon decided that, for once, taking a risk was warranted.

  Quickly detaching his bow into blades, he Shadow-stepped towards the Heavy still blocking the walkway. Davon landed in a crouching position on the Crimson Reaver’s shoulders. In one smooth motion, Davon placed his blades against the Heavy’s neck and jumped backwards, using the force to decapitate the Crimson Reaver. As soon as his feet touched the ramparts, Davon spun on his heel, landing a kick to the headless soldier’s side and sending him off the ramparts.

  In the time it took Davon to straighten himself up, an explosion of pain erupted from his left shoulder. He spun around to find several Crimson Reaver Heavies arrayed behind him, with an archer taking aim between two of their shields.

  Infuriated, Davon prepared himself to fight back. But before he could act, a spear pierced the archer from the side. It only took a glance for Davon to recognize Lyla’s spear as it flew back in the direction it had come from.

  The newly arrived Heavies moved to fill the gap opened by Kai’s and Davon’s combined assault, but it was too late. More and more Vanguard Revenants flooded onto the ramparts, pushing past Davon to bring the fight to their enemy.

  As the heavily armored Crimson Reavers turned towards the invading Revenants, they left themselves exposed to the Vanguard’s archers on the ground. Though the Heavies proved capable of shrugging off a few arrows, the persistent volley proved to be too much for them.

  But even in this moment of triumph, watching the Vanguard storm the walls, Davon couldn’t relax. It all still felt far too easy. The enemy hadn’t even tried to deploy their firestorm yet… and there was still no sigh of Tenebris.

  An arrow whistled by Davon’s ear from an enemy archer, forcing his attention back to the fight.

  His suspicions would have to wait.

  Falling into the archer’s tempo as he had so many times before, Davon returned to the siege tower’s walkway and took his time eliminating enemy archers. Occasionally, he would cast a glance at the main clash to see Kai gleefully chopping away at the Crimson Reavers’ defenses.

  Within a few minutes, a shrill war horn sounded from deeper in the city, causing the Crimson Reavers on the walls to retreat. Davon gazed around, panting heavily. His troubled thoughts roared back into life as the noise of combat faded around him.

  The Vanguard had claimed the outer walls, but Davon knew the siege was far from over.