26: Set In Motion

It was days before the miasma blew away, but there was no time to wait idly. Each day, they sortied into the city, looking for survivors, trying to beat back the hostiles who had set up camps mostly away from the miasma themselves – though the krait didn't seem to care. Each day, they lost so many fighters, to the enemy, to the gas. The city was in a horrific state. It was still partly burning, four days later when the air finally cleared enough for the united Lion's Arch forces to begin their main assault. The destruction was near-absolute. But they were still going to take it back.

"Remember," Annhilda said to those who followed her. "Scarlet doesn't have that many forces. We won against her before, time and time again, destroying her resources and scattering her followers. She only drove us out because she took us by surprise – and because of that damned miasma. Without it, we far outnumber them, and we can outfight them, too!"

"Yeah!" a cheer went up from the crowd, determined, angry.

"So let's get in there and remind her who she's dealing with!" Annhilda yelled, stabbing her sword into the air, and they all roared.

Annhilda turned to Hope's Legacy, with the addition of Ellen and some of her Lionguard, Phiadi's Pale Reaver friend Mabbran, and a small golem for some reason. "And we're going to fight our way to the Breachmaker, and put this troublemaker down once and for all."

"You got it," Braham said.

The plan had been thoroughly hammered together. The pirates, Lionguard, and Order forces would charge in from the north, and some from the south from Bloodtide, spreading through the streets like water through empty streambeds, relieving the 14th Lionguard from their desperate foothold in Trader's Forum and sweeping all hostiles before them into the cliffs to the east and west, where they would have no room to run. The dredge might have been an issue with their burrowing abilities, but several Priory Asura assured leadership that they would not be a problem, Wegaff among them. He'd recovered enough to join a research team, though not enough to fight.

Caoilfhionn kept his eyes from wandering as they ran into the ruined city, as they crashed into enemy lines, as they broke through and fought one of Scarlet's giant clockwork dolls. All that mattered was breaking the enemy. Anything else was a distraction. For once, he wished he could feel less, afraid that his will to fight would be overwhelmed. Even after four days, he was still not numb to it.

They made it onto the Breachmaker, somehow, and there the fight truly began. In pairs and small groups, their team fragmented; Ellen was wounded, and half the others stayed back to defend against the Aetherblade pirates trying to stop them. In the end, it was only Annhilda, Braham, Rox, Marjory, Kasmeer, and Caoilfhionn who made it down to the lowest levels of the machine, looking for their now-injured opponent. "Keep it together, pup," Annhilda muttered to him. "We're not done yet."

"I'm fine," he said. He was lying, but he'd be able to see this through.

They found her in some kind of control room, hot and dark and full of sinister blinking lights. It was all alien to Caoilfhionn, far stranger than any Asuran contraption he'd ever seen. And she'd designed this? How was it possible for any one person to think this up? But there she was, lying on the floor behind a wavering force field, holding her side in pain. Her crimson longcoat was stained brown with yellow sap, and her impish face twisted in pain.

"Just look at you," Scarlet said, panting, raising herself to one elbow to glare at them. "All you… heroes. And here, at the centre, little ol' me. Aren't you even curious about why I did it? All this chaos and destruction?"

"Not particularly," Annhilda said.

"It doesn't matter now," Braham said, taking a step forward. "You're done."

"Wrong," Scarlet's voice rang out. "Tyria will bow before a new master."

"No," Rox said. "We'll stand together against any enemy."

Braham thumped his fist into his palm. "Yeah! We're Tyrians. We don't like getting pushed around."

Scarlet laughed, one of her insane giggles that turned into pained coughs. "So… what now? You big, strong heroes going to take me to jail?"

"Something like that," Marjory said, and started forward, drawing her weapons.

"Jory, be careful!" Kasmeer cried.

"I'll do something, all right," Marjory said in a low voice. "I'll end this for good."

Scarlet managed a grimacing smirk. "That's it. Come and get me… if you dare!" She pushed a button on her belt, and her shield exploded outwards, flinging back both Marjory and Braham. Caoilfhionn covered his face against the flash of light and let himself flow along with the energy, knocked back but without slamming into anything.

He was one of the lucky ones, he saw as he recovered his footing and his bearings. Braham had been flung back much farther. "Braham, your leg!" Rox cried, kneeling beside him.

But then Caoilfhionn saw a still figure in black, and gasped. Kasmeer wailed. "Jory? Jory!" She hiccoughed, her hands shaking as she shook Marjory's shoulder.

"Don't move her," Annhilda rasped, staggering up, bleeding from her head.

"Oh, sweet Dwayna, help her. She's not…" Kasmeer trailed off into hiccoughing tears, then suddenly launched herself at Scarlet, seizing her staff and raising it high as she ran. "You monster!"

Caoilfhionn ran after her, drawing his daggers, feeling her bereft rage wash over him, joined by his own wrath. Annhilda was behind him, but they were stopped by Scarlet hurling several small objects at them – grenades! He ducked, and Kasmeer threw up a shield just in time to not get scorched. But there were more, and more, and yet more – how many did she have, hidden around her person? He couldn't get close like this.

"You're ruining everything!" Scarlet shrieked, hurling even more grenades at them. "Why can't you just leave me alone!?" How he hated her strident voice!

"You're the one who chose to mess with us!" Annhilda yelled back. "Lunatic!"

"Get back!" Another wave of grenades. "This is my drill! Mine! I'll take you all down with me if I have to."

"You shan't take another life!" Caoilfhionn cried, skidding forward, but he just slammed into her shield and rebounded.

"I hate you," Scarlet growled. "Hate you. Hate you! You can't get through my shield. I will finish what I started here. I will!"

"I'll keep her occupied," Kasmeer said from beside him; tears were still running down her cheeks, and her voice quavered as she gritted her teeth, but she was there, brandishing her staff. "You get in there and… do what needs to be done." She twirled her staff, and instantly conjured multiple duplicates of herself, all surrounding Scarlet. "I'm over here!"

Scarlet coughed a snicker. "Oh, princess…es. I'll kill every last one of you."

"Ceara!" a different Kasmeer called, tauntingly as the first one vanished in a grenade blast with a burst of purple sparkles. "Ceara… Ceara, Ceara!"

"That's not my name!" Scarlet hissed.

"What's the matter, Ceara?" Another Kasmeer spun, summoning mesmeric missiles that bounced off Scarlet's shield.

"Stop calling me that! It's not my name!" Scarlet screamed in frustration, and flung something that detonated with an especially large blast – Caoilfhionn couldn't see what it was before he was flung head over heels into the railing, dropping one of his daggers with the impact.

Kasmeer was sobbing with rage as she climbed back to her feet. "Make it count! End this! Now!"

"Do it, Caoilfhionn!" Annhilda cried, knocked even further back.

"If you can!" Scarlet hissed. "You're just Trahearne's boy-toy – you can't do anything on your own!"

He sprinted for her. "For the honour of my people!"

She reached back to throw another grenade; her shield dropped for the barest instant as she hurled it; he lunged forward, past the grenade, tackling her. They rolled over together, but he ended up on top, raised his dagger with both hands, and plunged it into her chest, through leather, flesh, and wooden bone.

Scarlet coughed, tears coming into her eyes, but her face split in a maniacal grin. "This isn't how it was supposed to go… You fools! You think my death… saves you? Too… late…"

On the other side of the room, to his right, a screen lit up with a blue glow – in an instant, he saw what it was depicting. The drill had struck… something. A thunderous rumble shook the entire structure and he was almost knocked sideways. There seemed to be almost a howl in it, a distant roar that made his head twinge strangely for a moment. Scarlet lay still beneath him, still grinning dementedly in death. He yanked his dagger free, gave Kasmeer a hand up, then ran to grab his other dagger before it was knocked into the bowels of the machine.

"Kas!" Rox called. "Get over here, quick!"

"Jory!" Kasmeer rushed off, with another hiccough. "Oh Gods, are you okay?" She flung herself to her knees beside her lover and pulled her carefully into her arms. Marjory blinked, just a little. Her face was swollen, scraped, and bruised, but as she turned her head to look up at Kasmeer, Kasmeer pulled her in and kissed her warmly. "Jory! Oh, Jory, I thought you were… I thought…"

Marjory smiled painfully at her. "Hush, love. I'm okay. Rox worked some battlefield magic on me. It's okay, honey. I'm going to be okay."

Caoilfhionn melted into a smile, the first real smile he'd had in some time. Love was so beautiful!

"Guess it's a good thing you stayed behind, huh?" Braham said, grunting as he tried to stand, futilely – his leg was still broken, and unsplinted. But there wasn't anything handy to splint it with, and Marjory's life surely took precedence.

"Definitely a good thing, my friend," Rox said, patting him on the head. "Definitely a good thing. All right, hero," she said, turning to Kasmeer. "That's enough cuddling for now. We'd better report this to Magnus. I bet everyone on the ground could use some good news-"

The drill had been making strange noises since it had struck its target, and alarms had been going off in the distance, but now the entire machine began to thrash, violently, like it was going to shake itself apart.

"Ah, yak spit!" Braham complained. Annhilda grabbed his arm, hauling him to his feet; Rox took his other side. He groaned in pain. "We better get out of here before the whole place comes down!"

Magic was going haywire around them, swirling around the central engine of the huge machine – when it lost control, it was going to spread itself across half the city. "I'll clear the way!" They had to make it back to that portal that they'd come in by before it blew!

Phiadi and Damara met them next. "Did you get her?" Phiadi demanded, sitting on the back of an especially large flesh golem.

"Of course we did!" Annhilda grunted. "Any hostiles left?"

"You better believe there aren't," Phiadi said. "Come on – I sent Mabs and Rhyoll to the exit as soon as the Aetherblades stopped being in our way."

They could barely keep their footing as they ran, and all about them, pieces of the machine were collapsing, tearing free from their supports and tumbling down, down, down to the bay far below. Caoilfhionn could see the water, distantly, crashing white around the drill, a blue-green glow throbbing from deep below the sea.

They made it to the portal and activated it, just as fire engulfed the entire platform.

Disoriented, they appeared on the beach – with fire and steel hurtling towards them. They ducked as a metal plate the size of Fort Marriner's main gates came whizzing over their heads, but after a moment or two, it became apparent that no more debris was going to fall on them. They were safe.

Mabbran and Rhyoll approached them. "You took your time!" Rhyoll boomed. "Looking around much?"

"Glad you made it out, Pie," Mabbran said to Phiadi, stressing the nickname with as much disgruntlement as he ever did. It had taken Caoilfhionn much observation, in the very small number of times he saw Mabbran, to realize that he did not like being called 'Mab' or 'Mabs', but Phiadi apparently didn't notice that 'Pie' was a retaliation and not an endearment.

"We didn't look at anything," Kasmeer said, supporting Marjory as her lover sank to the sand in wounded exhaustion. "But we did it! We defeated Scarlet! …And I think she accomplished her goal anyway."

"I'll take 'defeated Scarlet' any day," Rhyoll said. "We can worry about what she was up to later, after we get a chance to look at the remains of her machine, hahaha!"

"I think we all need some food, some ale, and some medics," Annhilda said. "Let's see what I can swing for us heroes."

The city was still in ruins, terribly depressing ruins, even though the smoke had cleared and the sun shone full again. Everyone was working together to help start picking the place up, though it was such an immense task, Caoilfhionn had no idea where to begin. Thousands had died, and needed burial. Not one structure was left untouched, though a few on the edges of town had escaped complete destruction. And tourists were already coming to stare, and even looters – despicable people. And Evon Gnashblade was still around, strutting like a peacock and acting like he was owed something.

Only a day after it was all over, while they were in the remains of Fort Marriner – leveled by the destruction of the Breachmaker, if not the attacking forces – a small airship landed nearby, and from it emerged Laranthir of the Wild. He saluted them as he approached Annhilda. "Commander! I wasn't surprised to hear that you had dispatched that horrid Scarlet. It seems only yesterday you led us to victory over Zhaitan."

"Thanks, but Caoilfhionn's the one who really ended her," Annhilda said.

Laranthir turned to him and shook his hand firmly. "Well done, Caoilfhionn. Trahearne will be very proud. And I'll be proud to bring the news to him."

"Why is this Pact ship here?" Annhilda said. "Trahearne's got few enough people at Fort Trinity as it is."

"When I heard there was some connection between Scarlet and dragons, I went down and petitioned to bring one ship to survey the issue."

"But there are no dragons here," Rhyoll said.

"Exactly why it took everything I had to convince Trahearne to spare one ship. Protecting cities from deviants isn't our mission. But there are rumours that a dragon is involved."

"What do you mean?" Caoilfhionn asked anxiously.

"Priory scholars are saying Scarlet's drill breached a ley line in order to rouse an Elder Dragon. If this is true…" Laranthir took a grim breath. "…then we face a possible larger threat from her meddling."

Phiadi swore. "That's going to accelerate our plans, isn't it?"

"We'll have to see," Laranthir said. "We still hardly know which dragon was her target-"

A sobbing woman stumbled up to them. "Warmaster! Why weren't you here? Why didn't the Pact help save Lion's Arch?"

"I was here, representing the Vigil," Laranthir said gently, taking the woman's hands. "Look around you – the Pact may not have been here in name, but the Vigil was here, the Priory, the Order of Whispers. We were with you-"

"But the Pact! The Pact is supposed to save people!"

"The Pact is supposed to fight Elder Dragons," Annhilda said, less gently. "The Pact is there when all of Tyria must come together as one. But it's only people. The people were here."

Damara put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm sorry we couldn't save everyone. We really tried. Who is it you lost?"

"M-my son… He died to those dreadful krait. Oh…" She burst out weeping again and stumbled away, consumed by her grief.

"There are too many like her," Damara said. "Thank Dwayna none of us died."

"Were any in your guild injured?" Laranthir asked, looking around. "They are not all here, are they?"

"Braham and Marjory had pretty severe injuries from fighting Scarlet," Annhilda said. "Wegaff got caught in the initial attack. Everyone has at least a few bruises."

"Yes, Annhilda probably should be resting, herself," Damara said, "but she's too stubborn."

"She won't have a choice in a minute," said a new voice, and they turned to see Ellen Kiel approaching them, her arm in a sling. "Hello, Warmaster Laranthir. Annhilda, I told you to get some rest!"

"I don't need rest!" Annhilda whined. "It's a scratch!"

"An impact head wound isn't a scratch!" Ellen told her. "The rest of your guild is already on the road to Divinity's Reach. I want you all to join them."

"But-!"

"No buts! You need to rest, but you can't do that here, we don't have the facilities. Divinity's Reach does. You already killed Scarlet and stopped the attack. What more do you want?"

"Why aren't you resting?" Phiadi retorted.

"I'm on the Captain's Council, and I didn't get hit in the head. I can still strategize with the others. Go on. You're all heroes. You don't have to do anything else."

"You really should," Laranthir urged them. "Go spend time with your friends. They'll be waiting for you. Leave this to us."

Annhilda sighed. "But why all the way to Divinity's Reach?"

"Because," Damara said with a hand on her shoulder and her voice in a whisper, "There's this monastery on the way, you see. With a brewery."

Annhilda perked up. "Right! That place! That's my kind of medicine!"

The Dead End bar was dim and cozy as always; it was open for business but there were only two or three people besides Hope's Legacy inside. They laughed, and they drank, and celebrated survival.

Though Taimi had somehow pieced together as much as the Whispers agent in their group. "I suppose we should celebrate while we still can…"

"What's that supposed to mean?" Rox said.

"Nothing!" Taimi said with a very fake innocence.

"C'mon, kid," Braham said. "What are you talking about?"

"You know, don't you?" Taimi pointed at Phiadi. "Scarlet wasn't just fooling around."

"Well of course not," Phiadi said. "Even crazy people have purposes. Their purposes just don't make logical sense."

"You know something? Tell us!" Kasmeer cried.

"We're all ears," Rhyoll said. "Some of us more than others."

"You do have an unfair advantage for ears, honey," Marjory said to him.

"I think all of Tyria heard that dragon's cry," Phiadi said. "That was her plan all along. She was trying to wake one up, and it seems like she succeeded."

"Which one do you think it was?" Kasmeer asked. "Primordus? Kralkatorrik? Jormag? Do you think one is sleeping beneath Lion's Arch?"

"No, we discussed that," Phiadi said impatiently, ignoring the fact that Kasmeer hadn't been there when they discussed it. "She wanted to poke the ley lines where they were strongest, because they feed the dragons, no matter where they are in the world."

"I don't get it," Braham said.

"The dragons consume magic," Caoilfhionn said. "The ley lines are currents in an ocean of magic."

"And Scarlet threw a giant rock in that pool, sending ripples out to the dragon. Spirits help us," Annhilda said. "I expect Trahearne will start getting the band back together in short order. And I was enjoying not being Commander…"

"Speak for yourself," Phiadi said. "I can't wait to boss around some peons."

"Your krewe not doing it for you?" Rox asked. "I thought you were fond of that Human who begged to join you… The 'tall dark handsome' one?"

"Sure, he's smarter than he looks, and a competent krewe is fabulous, but I was born to rule more than that."

"I'm fine either way," Damara said easily. "Besides, we have to figure out which dragon's waking up first."

"Oh, by the way, I personally reported your victory over Scarlet to Logan Thackeray," Marjory said to Damara. "He sends his regards."

"That was kind of you," Damara said happily. "Thank you."

Marjory shrugged. "It was purely selfish. For the first time in my life, I actually feel sincere when I brag about the people I fight beside. But then he went on for some time about how impressed he is with your progress and how he 'knew you when'. I thought, for a second, I'd have to hand him my handkerchief."

Damara laughed delightedly. "For all his tough talk, he's a big softy inside."

Marjory snickered. "Don't let him hear you say that. He'll be scarred for life."

"Dwayna preserve us," Damara agreed.

"I bet you're wondering why Frostbite and I are hiding out in a human bar in a human city," Rox said to Caoilfhionn, who was blithely sipping wine next to her.

"Not really," he said. "I'm here too?"

Rox's gaze strayed to her pet, quietly nibbling scraps of chicken beside her. "Well, since you asked, Frostbite is afraid to report to Rytlock. Since we didn't actually help kill Scarlet, exactly. I've been ignoring his summons."

"Why are you afraid?" Caoilfhionn was confused. He vaguely remembered something about Rox being ordered to kill Scarlet, but- "Surely he'll understand." Rox had saved Marjory's life. She might not have struck the killing blow, but without her, it would have been much more difficult.

Rox shifted uncomfortably. "It's a Charr thing. Technically, he could gut me for disobeying an order."

Caoilfhionn gasped. "What? You mean… er… court-martial, right?"

"No," Rox said, dejected. "I mean it's within his rights to kill me on the spot for disobeying his direct order."

"You fought your way to Scarlet's doorstep, to save our injured friends."

"Yeah, I wish that counted for something. But… the truth is… when I chose to stay with Braham, I knew then that I didn't want to be in the Stone warband."

Caoilfhionn gasped again, with joy this time. "You don't?"

Rox managed a little smile. "I'd much rather hang out with you guys. Braham was right. I'm giving up a big dream of mine. But I'd be giving up even more if I left you people."

"Aww!" Caoilfhionn threw his arms around Rox and gave her a hug. "I'm so happy you're going to stay. And if Rytlock wants to harm you, he'll have to go through me, first."

Rox chuckled and patted him on the back. "Even a few months ago, I might have said that would be easy for him. But you're tougher than you look."

Caoilfhionn grinned. "'Tis a knight's duty to be strong as an oak, even if they look like… well, an orchid."

"An Orchid Prince," Damara put in. "He's no ordinary knight – not that princes are any stronger than knights except in fairytales."

"A toast to him anyway," Annhilda said. "To the fancy plant-wolf-pup who slew a raving lunatic!"

"To Caoilfhionn!" the others cried, and Caoilfhionn blushed and laughed at their attentions.