Iron and Magic

“An elephant the size of a cruise ship with three heads and tusks that shoot lightning,” Bale volunteered.

“There is no such thing,” Savannah told him.

“There is,” Stoyan told her. “It’s called Erawan. We’ve seen it.”

Johanna knocked on the table.

They looked at her.

“Seriously?”

Stoyan held up his fist, and made a downward motion, imitating a nodding head. He was signing, “Yes.” He did it in a hesitant fashion, the way those who have just started learning ASL sometimes second-guessed themselves.

Johanna grinned at him.

“You should see the size of its shit,” Bale said. “It’s a truckload.”

“This tells us two things,” Hugh said. “One, Nez will come at us during magic. Two, Roland let him pull on his other resources, which means Nez took this to Roland and Roland approved this fight.”

“This changes things,” Lamar said.

“How so?” Savannah asked.

“Nez was content to ignore us,” Hugh said. “Something happened to bump us up to the head of his queue.”

She knew exactly what it was. “Aberdine.”

Everyone looked at her. Savannah raised her hands and took over the signing.

“You protected Aberdine against a significant magic force,” Elara said. “You’re a fighting unit again. An army and a threat. He thought he could come and kill all of you at will, but now he can’t.”

She saw the calculation in Hugh’s eyes. He shook his head. “I doubt it. Did Nez ever explain why he wanted the castle?”

“No,” Savannah said. “He just offered to buy it again and again.”

“Maybe there is something here that he needs?” Stoyan wondered.

“I can’t imagine what it would be,” Elara said honestly.

“Let’s table that for now,” Hugh said. “Before we start planning, are there any ways into the castle that I’m not aware off? Hidden passages, secret tunnels?”

Dugas glanced at her. Elara nodded. Yes, give him the thing. Hugh was an infuriating sonovabitch and a bastard, but he would protect them to the bitter end. Baile was the only home he knew now.

Dugas reached into his robe and pulled out a folded piece of paper. He unfolded it once, twice, a third time, and spread it on the table. A complex drawing in black ink marked the large piece of paper: a central ring, from which lines spread out like spokes from a wheel. The lines started straight, then curved, lopped and intersected each other, twisting together into a complex maze.

“What am I looking at?” Hugh asked.

“Tunnels,” Dugas said helpfully.

Hugh and the centurions peered at the map.

“Is all of this under us?” Hugh asked, pointing at the map.

“Yes.” Dugas nodded.

“Fuck me,” Hugh said.

Elara almost laughed.

“Why?” Lamar asked, his eyes wide.

“We didn’t dig them out,” Elara said. “They were already here when we moved in.”

Hugh fixed her with a stare. “Were you planning on telling me about the damn tunnels?”

She pretended to ponder it. “Possibly.”

“Would you like to tell me now?”

“There are tunnels under the castle, Hugh.”

“There it is. Thank you.” If sarcasm was liquid, she would be up to her ankles in it.

“You’re welcome.”

They glared at each other across the table.

Dugas cleared his throat.

“Is there anything else you would like to disclose?” Hugh asked. “Do the gates open when someone says a magic word?”

“Not that I know of,” she told him. “Why don’t you scream some magic words at the gates for a while and tell me how it turns out?”

Dugas cleared his throat again.

“I heard you the first time,” she told him.

“Do any of these actually come up to the surface?” Hugh tapped the map with his finger.

“We don’t know,” Dugas said.

“We’ve tried mapping them several times, but we end up turned around,” Elara said. “There is only one way from the tunnels into the castle though, and it’s through this ring.” She traced the outline of the circular tunnel for him.

“This is a huge security risk,” Lamar said. “Do you actually use these tunnels for anything?”

“Those who go into the tunnels don’t always come back,” Johanna told him.

Lamar turned to Elara.

“She said that those who go into the tunnels don’t always come back.”

“Why?” Hugh asked.

Elara sighed. I wish I knew.

“We don’t know,” Savannah said. “Don’t worry about it. We can handle the tunnels.”

Hugh leaned forward. “Here is how this assault will go. The attack will come in the evening.”

“How do you know that?” Elara asked.

“I’ve prepared to fight Nez for years. He is a cheapskate. Even the youngest vampire he has costs upward of fifty grand to produce. He will attempt to intimidate us into surrendering by fielding a lot of undead at once. He will follow that with a phone call and a show of force designed to convince us to surrender. When that fails, he will rush the castle with his vanguard. He will count on the psychological impact of this force and our awareness that the sun is setting, and soon it will be dark, and we will be defenseless. If the moat does its job, we can repel this assault.”

“If?” Savannah raised her eyebrows.

“If,” Hugh said. “If the moat doesn’t soften them up, it will get ugly. However, it is unlikely he will commit more than fifty vampires. He typically brings between two and three hundred vampires...”

Elara startled. Three hundred vampires. She couldn’t even wrap her head around that many undead.

“Yes?” Hugh asked.

“Nothing. Continue.”

“And since he knows he will be fighting the Iron Dogs, we can count on the top range of that number. It’s highly unlikely he would send more than a quarter of his force. Fifty is a nice round number and Nez likes round numbers.”

Hugh tapped the map of Baile. “He will send the mass of undead straight at the front gate. Even if the moat fails, we can take fifty vampires. We will bleed but we can take them. Once that assault fails, Nez will do something loud and theatrical. He might field beasts or pull some mages out of his sleeve. Whatever form this new threat will take, it will be designed to keep our attention focused front and center. Meanwhile, his crews, which will have been digging since before the fight started, will be breaking into the castle tunnels from below. The vampires are fast diggers, and he might bring specialized help to speed things up. While we are trying to hold off whatever it is battering us from the front, the undead will make their way into the castle and massacre us from the rear.”

Hugh fixed Savannah with his stare. “So, when you say don’t worry about the tunnels, I need you to be very sure.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Elara said.

“Okay,” Hugh said.

She opened her mouth to argue and realized he didn’t say anything else. “Then that’s settled.”

“Can we attack Nez directly?” Savannah asked.

“Unlikely,” Lamar told her. “For things like these, Nez travels in a convoy of Matadors. A Matador is an 8x8 armored personnel carrier, nine meters long, three meters tall, and almost three meters wide. It has a monocoque V-hull, which means its nose and hull slope to deflect projectiles.”

Lamar held his left hand in front of him, palm up, and touched the fingertips of his right hand to it, forming a sideways V.

“It sits a driver and passenger in the front and can transport up to ten personnel in the back. Level four armor, suspended seats, blast mitigation floor, all the works. It can trench at two meters, ford a stream a meter deep, climb steps and steep hills, and it turns on a dime for a vehicle of its size. It runs like a dream during tech, but it chugs along during magic as well. It also can be set up to carry either a 50 cal or a sorcerous ballista, depending on your preference. Nez has a fleet of them.”