Forty-Six || Carona
Trap Master leaned forward, careful how he placed his weight on the tree branch, one hand holding a small spyglass to his eye while the other held fast to the branch just above him, keeping his balance. He squinted through the spyglass, sweeping it briefly over the battered ramparts of the Carona wall, a frown tugging at the edge of his lips.
He'd been watching them since dawn, keeping his distance, making sure to corral the strange, lifeless army beneath him. He hadn't liked a damn thing about this job– not the army, not the watching, sure as hell not the waiting. There was a reason Mode Master had been in charge of subterfuge; in addition to her native talents, she could be passive, and she could be patient.
Trap Master was not a patient man.
He had, in fact, been quite impatient since shortly after dawn broke. He had already abandoned his post several times that day– only for a few minutes, just enough to get down from his observation point in the trees so he could storm around on the ground, work the knots out of his limbs, toy with threads of magic, get a little distance between himself and the puppets (and god did he need some time away from those things, they creeped him right the hell out). He had been practically twitching since almost noon.
Now the first cast of golden light was settling over the town, the very edge of sunset, frustratingly close to when he would finally be able to end this farce.
"Sunset's way too long," he'd said before. "If they're gonna hold on to it they're gonna hold on. Should'a said sunrise. No time to think."
"Minimal casualties," Doll Master had responded. "If any of them wish to escape they won't be able to do so at night. Boats will come in during the day. Give them a chance to offload, if necessary."
"It'll be necessary."
"You don't believe they'll give up the Prima Doll."
It had been a statement, not a question, and Trap Master knew his boss already shared his sentiments on that. "Town might," he had said. "But that bitch of an ex-princess? Bet your ass she won't give him up without a fight. And your brother–"
"–has other incentives," Doll Master had said. "Which is precisely why we must give them a chance to leave. Carona is innocent in this. It's unfortunate we need to use them as leverage, but... well. Here we are."
Man had a point – of course he had a point – but that didn't make Trap Master any happier to be out here, standing in trees, staring at walls, feeling those things shifting beneath him.
He removed the spyglass and checked the sky, scanning the horizon. The sun was just touching down on the edge of the water. He was fairly sure Doll Master had meant closer to dusk than the start of sunset, but...
Well, hell, close enough.
He retracted the spyglass, tucked it into his coat, and descended the tree. As soon as he hit the ground he moved forward, extricating himself from being anywhere near the puppets as soon as he could, and once he had a little distance he twisted and called back, "Move it!"
He took point, and felt the puppets turn, shift through the trees, move.
They dragged his pace down, of course – the fact that the damn things could even walk was some kind of gross miracle – but it was all the better to use as an excuse for why he'd moved out early. Gotta get 'em in position, he'd say. Can't go makin' threats if you don't make it clear you're gonna be good on 'em.
It wasn't long before Trap Master emerged at the start of Carona's main road, and he gestured back to force the puppets to a halt. He himself moved closer to the gate, preparing himself for the inevitable speech, the next round of threats, the anticipated elation of finally shouting for the army to descend, when a strange grinding noise interrupted his thoughts and stopped him in his tracks.
The gates were slowly swinging outward.
Trap Master cocked an eyebrow and shoved his hands in his pockets, and the gate continued to groan open. A moment later, when they had spread open far enough, Mint stepped forward.
She looked a little haggard and disheveled; she clearly hadn't taken much time to put herself together for this meeting, and an exhausted heaviness weighed down her shoulders. Her expression was drawn, wine-red eyes a little darker than usual, rimmed somewhat dark themselves. She was tired, she moved slow, and when she stood in the open gates she mirrored Trap Master's nonchalance, putting her hands in her pockets and looking at him with an expression that betrayed nothing but her own exhaustion.
She blinked, and said, "Hey."
He grinned at her, all teeth and no smile, and said, "Ain't much of a welcome."
It wasn't. Mint stood alone in the open gates. The street behind her was empty, the lanterns unlit, no sounds of life.
She shrugged. "Well."
"Give your little town here credit," Trap Master said. "They're smart enough to know when to call it done. Unlike you, yeah?" He made a little show of leaning all the way over to either side, looking broadly behind Mint. He settled back in front of her, and his grin became a little more genuine, though no less disturbing. "I notice you still don't have that doll with you."
"Nope."
"So what? It was easier to get the whole down to make a run for it than just hand him over?" He laughed, a sharp, short bark. "You got weird priorities, princess!"
"Not easier," she said. "But more acceptable, yeah. They don't get hurt. You don't get Prima. Seems like a good deal to me."
Trap Master grin sharpened again. "Hell of a lot to go through just to piss us off."
"Not just to piss you off," she said, "but I admit it's a nice bonus."
They watched each other for a moment, tension almost palpable in the air, and Trap Master could feel a spark of fury igniting in his chest. The puppets shifted behind him, the scraping of their patchwork bodies filling the air with a dull rasping noise cut sometimes with a strange moaning escaping a few of their throats; she couldn't possibly miss them. Even if the town was evacuated they could storm the buildings, wreck the whole thing, rip apart the infrastructure. Weren't there fields somewhere nearby, too? Tear those apart. Even if the people were safe their livelihood was forfeit. And how could they even be safe? They were on an island; no large ships had come through for days. There was no way for them to escape. If necessary, the puppets could swarm the town until they came back, and Trap Master could follow them back to where they had hidden, hunt them all down, make an example of them.
The ex-princess had to know this.
And she looked nothing but tired. Worse; she looked bored.
Trap Master's hand clenched in his pocket. His fingernails bit into his skin, almost enough to break it. When he spoke, his voice was thin, clenched, tangibly furious. "I feel that you and I aren't really engaging here, princess," he said slowly. "Do I gotta make this clearer for you?"
"Sorry," she said. "I'm kinda tired. Give it a go, maybe I'll follow."
"Right," he growled. "I got an army backin' me up. I scared your town shitless. You're the only one standin' here and you're still not bringing us your damned doll, so lemme give you one more message. You got out and bring him here, and we're all squared away. You keep standin' there and I'm settin' this sorry bunch a freaks on you. And when you're dead they're hittin' the town. And when the town's hit we're combin' the island, 'cuz there's nowhere your folks could've run to. The Prima Doll's somewhere. We've findin' him, one way or another."
Mint shrugged. "Search the town," she said. "He's not in there. We've got him somewhere you're never gonna touch him. It's not a problem."
"You're awful certain about that."
"Sure am."
"That a no, then?"
"I'm politely declining your kind offer, yeah. But thanks for your interest."
Sunset had more than touched down now. The golden streaks in the sky had darkened and turned sanguine. A strange, ruddy color was playing off the boiling clouds and casting down through the trees. Trap Master squinted into the town. Still the lanterns were dark. Still the streets were dark. But something was...
"Trap Master," Mint said.
He grunted and looked up to her. Something was weird here, that much was clear, but the specifics could wait. He removed his hand from his pocket and raised it overhead, preparing to motion for the attack. Mint, however, held up her hand– no offenses, no magic, just palm-out stop. And Trap Master did stop, because in spite of himself, his curiosity was piqued.
"What?" he snarled.
"I got something to say."
"Get on with it!"
"I don't really like just saying this, out loud," she said, "especially to assholes like you, but I gotta admit, I'm impressed by your magic."
He stared at her.
"I mean... it's clever, you know? I've seen plenty of magic back in the palace, and around the kingdom, even more while I've been traveling. Lots of disciplines, lots of techniques. This thing you do, taking raw magic threads and weaving them into traps, like some kind of... porcupine-headed spider-man-thing... I haven't seen it before. And it's not just a gimmick, either, which is especially interesting. Lot of magicians like you aren't really talented, but they figure out a weird trick and just ride with it 'cuz nobody else can quite figure out what they're doing. They fold as soon as somebody does. You, though... you're actually pretty good."
He lowered his hand slightly, on edge but baffled. "Ah..."
"But you're not great."
He imagined she was trying to bait him, but the flood of compliments had left him temporarily speechless. He continued staring at her, trying to discern her end game.
"You can make traps," she said, "but there's more to magic than just being good at spinning energy. Weaving enchantments. Guiding elements. Knitting veils. You know?"
His heart beat a little faster.
"And lemme tell you," she said. "For a guy who's so good at laying traps? You're goddamn awful at seeing them."
There was no time to react; the sky overhead was suddenly singing with a dozen arrows, and not long after a dozen more, launched from an unseen source; hardly a second after he'd marked them, they were falling through the ranks of the puppets, spearing limbs and bodies along a broad line, filling the air with a haze that smelled of mildew and sawdust. Puppets staggered, edges of limbs torn or even ripped free, two of them collapsing entirely.
Trap Master knit his brow. "The hell are you–"
"Belle?" Mint asked.
The town behind her shimmered. Light played differently off the buildings now, the shadows bleeding out into the grayish red light from the sky. Lanterns suddenly snapped to life, casting shifting yellowish bands against the walls, reflecting in sharp yellow highlights off the smattering of spears waving in the air.
Behind Mint, beyond the broad doors, the town square was nearly seething with people. Just a few paces behind her stood an older, weathered man; next to him, a younger man, well-built and tanned. The younger of the two had a mace slung over one shoulder; the elder, an unadorned sword, already in hand.
"That's our cue, Graham," the younger of them said.
The older one grinned darkly. "That's our cue, Davis."
They raised their weapons, and screamed, "For Carona!"
And behind them came the same, a powerful rolling chant that burst as one from the throats of the gathered throng; "For Carona!"
And Mint whipped her remaining halo and held it aloft, sparking with barely bridled power, her own voice slicing through the air. "Hell yeah!"
And they surged.
Trap Master had been taken entirely by surprise, but his shock was wearing off and his composure returning. He snapped his hand forward, shouting, "Kill them!", and the puppets moved, the army surging past him to meet the mass swarming free of the gate.
Mint had been up and moving since before dawn, and she had barely gotten any sleep the previous night.
She had been up for a while, trying to assess what she knew of the citizenry, trying to keep the built of the town in mind. She'd decided early that they had to avoid the battle coming into the walls themselves– even if Trap Master didn't have an opportunity to lay his traps in a more compressed and controllable setting, the damage from the fight might be more than the townsfolk could be reasonably expected to rebuild from. Couldn't meet Trap Master in the thick of the forest, either– these people weren't fighters, they weren't even hunters, and the constriction of the trees would not only make combat and maneuvering more difficult, it would give Trap Master too much cover and too many opportunities for his... well, traps.
So she compromised.
She assumed he would be monitoring the town throughout the day – he'd be stupid not to be watching, and however much she wanted to pretend otherwise, Trap Master was not stupid – and before dawn she headed out of the inn to find Belle and Duke.
"I'm gonna need some veiling," Mint said.
"How much veiling?" Belle asked.
"Whole town."
"That's all? Lemme get right on that."
"If you're not good enough to do it..."
Mint had been trying to goad Belle, but instead of incensing her to work, Belle simply shook her head. "I'm not," she said.
Mint gaped.
"Don't look at me like that," Belle snapped. "I'm damn good at veiling, Princess, but the town's a little bigger than the Hexagon. I can get you a sheet over the entrance, but you can get the same effect if you keep the doors closed. I just don't have that kind of reach."
Mint considered for a moment.
"If you have a catalyst," she said, "could you do it?"
"Dunno where you're gonna find that kind of catalyst."
The answer, as it turned out, was Hobbs' shop.
Hobbs kept a little curio shop tucked away in the back alley of town, across the street from the tavern. Mint had never been in there before, but from what she remembered overhearing in the tavern he had a few magical items tucked away in there. He'd already agreed to provide what magical backup he could based on the artifacts in there, but Mint hadn't bothered going in to take a good look for herself. Hobbs, fortunately, had apparently not gotten much sleep either; when she arrived at the shop the lights were on, the door was unlocked, and Hobbs was poking around his stock.
She hadn't expected much; Rue had gotten a chunk of phantomite from a local dragon, which meant that the town didn't have much of a supply on its own or else Klaus could have just had them make an inquiry. There were a few other catalyzing metals she might be able to use, but none of them were as powerful as phantomite, and she didn't have many alternatives. She might give her remaining Halo to Belle, but she didn't think it would be enough to cast a veil that large for that long, and it would severely hurt her own ability to fight back. She might retrieve the pendant from Prima, but it would take too much time, and she wanted a solution before sunrise had a chance to betray them.
She found a few items that might help.
She found one item that blew her away.
"Hobbs," she said, pointing behind the counter. "What is that?"
Hobbs had been in the middle of checking a shelf of knickknacks for anything that might have magical properties, muttering the history of half the items to himself as he went. He was a few seconds looking up when Mint first asked, and gazed around in confusion before his eyes settled on what she was pointing at.
There was a small glass bauble sitting on a velvet pillow at the back of the shop. The glass was a pale orange color, its surface shifting and scintillating into reds and yellows from the presence of a watery light shining out from its core.
Hobbs hummed to himself. "That," he began, "is a–"
"Cannon orb, right?" Mint interrupted.
Hobbs' words stumbled to a stop, and he frowned severely at Mint. "Yes," he growled. "That's a cannon orb."
"I need that."
"A good many people do," he said testily. "Very rare. Very powerful. Very expensive."
Mint leaned over the counter, squinting at the price tag hanging off the pillow. "It says a hundred," she said. "I can pay you that. Or..." She almost hauled herself over the counter, trying to look at the tag more closely. "What's that... letter? Next to the number."
"That's an 'm'." Mint didn't comprehend. "It stands for million."
Mint felt that sink in, and wheeled. "A hundred million? I'm– I'm trying to save your town, you're gonna charge me a hundred million for that!"
"I could give you a town-saving discount," he said genially. Almost immediately his voice hardened. "But you know how rare these are, don't you, girl? I'd prefer to keep the town safe, but there's far too much money wrapped in that core to just let you take it, especially when I'm not entirely clear how it would help."
"It's intensely magical. It'll help."
He continued to watch her over the bridge of his glasses.
"I need it as a catalyst," she said. "Well, Belle needs it as a catalyst. And..."
She teetered for a moment on possibility. She could appeal to his better nature. She could threaten him. She could convince him it would help them tend the inevitable wounded– she'd heard these things could, applied correctly, heal cancer (or was it cholera)? But the man had a point; it was such a painfully expensive object, and no doubt it had come to him through a great deal of pain (he certainly couldn't have simply bought one, himself). If something happened to it during the course of the fight he would be out a lot of potential money, a lot of spent time, and...
He was right. The exact use of a cannon orb, in these exact circumstances, was a little muddy. Not worth the risk.
She perked up.
"How much with the town-saving discount?"
He considered. "Call it eighty."
Eighty million, which was still a little beyond her on-hand budget. But she didn't need to worry about that. She found herself grinning.
"You take a payment plan?"
A few minutes later she walked out of the store, her own purse a little lighter in cash but heavier for the cannon orb, gently wrapped in cloth, placed in her satchel. East Heaven Kingdom was going to be receiving an interesting bill before too long.
Mint hurried back to Belle and Duke's hotel room. As soon as Belle answered the door Mint shoved the cannon orb under her nose and said, "Think you can work with this?"
Belle took several seconds to process, her jaw slightly slack, and snatched the orb and its cloth – quickly, but gently – out of Mint's hands. She ran her fingers over the surface of the cannon orb, watching the sparks from its core leap out and dance against the crystalline surface under her skin, and looked up to Mint. Her eyes were narrow but bright, her smile sharp. "Oh yes," Belle said. "Yes, I can."
Half an hour later, as the first edge of false dawn was creeping across the horizon, Belle had stationed herself on a balcony halfway up the exterior of the town's cathedral, and was weaving a spell through the cannon orb that spread from there, cloaking the whole town in the magic.
While she was doing that, Mint was inside the cathedral. The lights weren't up yet, but Doyle had left a corona of candles burning around the shrine, where he had stood in vigilant prayer most of the night.
"You get any sleep?" Mint asked.
"I could ask the same of you, my dear," he said. "I imagine we both have the same answer."
"Mm. Ask you a favor?"
"Of course."
"This building's pretty sturdy. Any native magics here? From the statue, or the worship, or anything?"
Doyle considered. "There were defenses woven into the stone when the cathedral was constructed," he said. "I don't believe they've been reinforced for some time, though. Still, if you're looking for a point to retreat to for a final stand, it is not the worst option. Your friend found a way of reaching the higher balconies. It's feasible to set up a defensive perimeter there."
Mint had been ready to say something just after Doyle spoke, but found herself temporarily rendered speechless instead. "I'm... I'm sorry," she babbled. "I didn't think–"
"I won't participate in the fighting myself," Doyle said. "I've nothing to contribute. But the cathedral will stand with the town."
"Yeah, wow, actually not... I really appreciate that," Mint said. "But if they get into town I think we're kinda screwed no matter what. Best point of retreat is the docks, try and get people onto the ships."
"A fair plan. Davis can help arrange expedited escape."
"Right. I was gonna ask if we could use this as a, um... field clinic. Bring in anybody wounded."
Doyle closed his eyes and nodded. "Yes, of course," he said. "I cannot help the battle, but I know a little of the healing arts. Mrs. Cartha and the twins both know–"
"The twins?"
"Leeson and Solin. The hoteliers."
"Ah, right, yeah. Sorry. Not a lot of sleep."
Doyle gave her a sympathetic smile. His own naked exhaustion made it even more genuine. "Of course. But all three of them are fairly well versed in first aid. Others, as well. Anybody who cannot fight would do well to come here and assist, even if all they can contribute is prayer."
"Cool. Very cool. I'm gonna get you something to help with that."
But before she did that, Mint ran down to the docks. Dawn was now breaking over the horizon, casting the water – and the whole harbor – in a soft golden glow. Activity was already starting down there, as she'd expected; sailors would be up and moving at that hour. She found Davis without much trouble and relayed to him what Doyle had said.
"Think you can do that?" Mint asked. "Get some boats ready to take off?"
"Can't accommodate the whole town," Davis said. He looked over his shoulder at that, and Mint followed his gaze. There were a few smaller ships docked in the permanent slips, largely for back-and-forth transport in the event a particularly large ship had to dock offshore and the harbor's largest slip (and water table) couldn't accommodate it. "But we can evacuate the most at need. If you want anybody offshore before everything goes to pot we can definitely get a boat out there, too."
"We've got a coupla cached boosters in storage," another sailor said. Mint didn't remember the name, but she recognized him as somebody who had been in the tavern during one of her early storyteller performances. "The spells on 'em aren't exactly new, but they don't get a lotta use, should still be good. We can outfit the boats and keep the lines slack. Give us a quick way outta here."
"Fantastic," Mint said.
But now Davis had turned and was studying the boats, rubbing his chin. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, I bet... all right. We'll get some getaway set up." He looked back to Mint. "What've we got for fighting force?"
"People're still waking up," Mint said. "I haven't gotten to look at what's actually available. But I'm thinking Graham's going to round up a bunch of 'em and start sword practice."
"We don't have that many swords," Davis said. "I'll be around up top to round up some stragglers. Town's not heavy on weapons, but we've got a few things down here that might help. We'll see who we should get off-island before anything really starts, too."
"Fantastic."
And she left them to their devices. Davis was already directing them toward the cached boosters and having them loosen the lines.
Her next stop was the Adler household, but her trip there was interrupted before she arrived when she saw Elena scooting through town square.
"Elena!" she called. "Need to talk to you!"
"Oh! Yeah, 'course! What's up?"
Elena was energetic as ever, but there was a mild desperation to her words, a shiver to her shoulders, and her wide eyes were even wider. She had already been moving at a nervous jog when Mint had intercepted her. Now Mint was studying her for a moment, and Elena's nervous tension was becoming almost palpable.
"What were you doing out here?" she asked.
"I was..." She hesitated, swallowed, tried again. "I was goin' to Mel's house."
Mint frowned. "Really."
Elena nodded nervously. "I wanted t'... check up on Prima, first, 'fore anything happened. Make sure he's okay. I– I know what Trap Master was sayin' yesterday 'bout finding him and if they found him with Mel then–"
"If they found him with Mel," Mint said, "I don't think Trap Master'd be around long enough to do anything about it. If he didn't turn tail walking into her... place... that crazy witch'd make sure he didn't get close anyway. You don't have to worry about Prima."
Elena was still clearly worried about Prima. Mint leaned down and clapped a hand on her shoulder.
"But I'm glad you were headed that way," she said. "I was going to ask you to."
Elena tilted her head.
"Mel gave you that healing draught," Mint said. "We might need a hell of a lot more of that. That kinda spells has Mel been teaching you, other than that barrier? Can you veil yourself?"
"I... yeah. I'm not real good at it, but..."
"Can you move while you've got it cast?"
"Not a whole lot."
Mint thought about that."
"Can you veil a second person?" she asked.
"I... think I can, yeah."
"All right. Stay here."
She nearly dove into Klaus' house. Klaus himself was still resting, but Mira was moving with quick, nervous energy through the house. As soon as she heard the door slam shut behind Mint, Mira was in the doorway, disheveled and still in her nightclothes, but wide awake and dangerous, a short sword in her hand. She relaxed when she recognized Mint.
Slightly.
"Mint," she said. "Have you seen Elena?"
"She was just about to head to Mel's," Mint said. Mira was shoving past her before Mint had even finished the sentence, and she had to spin around and reach out, catching Mira's wrist. Mira snapped around, glaring at her, but Mint held her ground. "Hold on, hold on. I was gonna ask you to go with her."
Mira's gaze narrowed. "Hold on," Mira snarled. "Go with her? You're sending her?"
"She wanted to check on Prima. But yeah, I was sending her." Mint released her grip on Mira's wrist. She knew Mira wouldn't hurt her, but the woman was palpably dangerous, and Mint already felt like she was pressing her luck. "We need more of Mel's elixir. Fight could go south real quick. I'm gonna get together a few folks to help with first aid and transporting wounded, but if something goes bad enough we're gonna need a stockpile of that stuff. I plan on keeping Elena with the healing crew," she added quickly, seeing Mira's shoulders tense, "but she's still the best bet to actually get this stuff. Knows where to go and what to ask for."
Slowly, Mira relaxed. "And I'll keep her safe there and back again."
Mint nodded. "Yeah. She can cast a veil to get you through the woods and back without making a lot of noise, but if you run into any trouble..." Her eyes trailed to the naked blade already in Mira's hand. "I mean, I'm gonna level with you, Mira. Trap Master's got the town freaked out, but for my money, I haven't seen anything around here scary as you."
Mira expression hardened. "By the time this is over," she said, "Trap Master's gonna think the same thing."
She slipped out the door, briefly illuminating the house in a slice of morning light before it slammed shut behind her, plunging Mint back into darkness. Mint shivered.
"Yeah, that?" she murmured. "That's why."
Mint had come to the conclusion the prior night that the town was not going to follow her into battle on her own, and left it instead to the people the town trusted – their people, and the traders they knew, the ones that had vouched for her the previous evening, the ones who had started to convince them of what had to be done – to get them sorted. Delegating, as she liked to think of it; sending the people best suited to the task when she couldn't manage it herself.
By mid-morning the town was in motion. The square had been taken up by forces practicing rough movements with weapons. Some of them took to it. Most of them were terrible. But they were fighting the puppets. Those things were freaky as hell, but they weren't smart, weren't fast, and didn't have weapons, themselves. A whole town cowering in the face of such bizarre monsters was easy to take down, but that whole town given weapons to flail in a vaguely damaging direction would be a formidable force.
Even if emphasis was on flailing.
She wound up setting up her own rounds around town, not interrupting – a few people were still giving her uncertain or outright dirty looks, she didn't dare betray the good will they had to their actual instructors – but observing, making sure things were going smoothly. She had to admit she was fairly impressed. They had rallied. They were working. The square was filled with movement; Tonio was working out how to distribute his stock to those who could use it best; Hobbs had come out with an array of curious items that possessed their own breadth of temporary enchantments. She had sent along groups of people to the church, and Doyle was helping oversee moving furniture to make room for makeshift beds, setting aside space for first-aid supplies and, when Elena and Mira arrived back some hours later, a fair stock of Mel's healing elixir.
Around noon she headed to the tavern.
Jargen and Annette weren't there – she had seen them in passing around town, she couldn't quite recall where – but when she'd done another circuit by Hobbs' shop to look into the goodies he'd uncovered (and, she noted sourly, did not seem to forcing anybody else to pay for) she noticed that there was a light in the tavern. With everything around the town running as smoothly as she could expect it to, she decided to take a moment to sate her own curiosity.
The door had been left unlocked. She opened it.
Rue was there.
Rue was also not at all where she would have expected. She didn't even see him at first, until she heard the scrape of a stood moving across the ground and a dull thud of somebody's head hitting the underside of the bar. He emerged from behind the bar, hissing quietly and massaging the top of his head, and Mint burst out laughing.
He looked up, glowering, and she only laughed harder.
"What is it?" he growled.
She held up her hands, still chuckling. "Sorry, sorry!" she said. "It's just– naw, let's be real, that was kinda funny."
He grunted and hauled himself to his feet, and she moved a little further into the bar, flopping down on one of the chairs. She hadn't realized until that moment how much charging around and pacing she had been doing all day; she was sore, she was tired. She actually rather wanted to try a drink.
"Think you can mix something while you're back there?" she asked.
He gave her a heavy, exhausted look. It wasn't all just a response to her bad joke, either. The smile on her face flickered out.
"You okay?" she asked.
"Okay enough," he said. "Didn't sleep last night."
"I hear you." He made his way out from around the bar, although his path was still unusual, running his hand along the table, over the stones of the walls, up as high as he could reach just a little shy of the ceiling. She watched him for a moment, trying to make sense of it. She couldn't. "What are you doing?"
"I was thinking," he started, "about when Trap Master attacked before. When he hurt Klaus. We were distracted in here by your sister."
"Not my sister."
"Somebody that seemed enough like your sister to fool you," he said. "And all the other... aspects of what happened. How did we get separated from Klaus long enough for Trap Master to get to him? Why? Locked doors and strange lights and something surreal about the whole–"
"A veil," Mint said suddenly.
Rue nodded.
But a moment later, Mint was frowning down to the table. "Wait, no," she said. "I mean yes, but that wasn't like any kind of veiling I've seen before. You can make things blend into the surroundings, but that would've been..."
"Same principle, I imagine," he said. "But used differently. And I suspect it was planted here. And it might've..." He exhaled heavily. "It was all just... bizarre."
"Find any evidence?"
"Echoes," he said. He stopped partway along the wall and drew his hand away, examining the tips of his fingers, as though he'd drawn away particles of magic along with the dust. "But it was a few days ago, whatever it was that happened. Most of it's dried up."
"But not all of it."
"Enough that I know I'm not imagining it," he said. "Not enough to know how."
"Planning on making use of it?"
He shook his head. "I can't. I doubt anybody here can, or what we'd do with it. I was just... thinking. Maybe we could identify it, if it happened again. If somebody working with Trap Master wanted to pull out another..."
"Trap?" Mint asked.
"Distraction," Rue clarified.
She nodded, and fell quiet as he continued to examine the empty tavern. After a few more minutes of watching, considering, giving herself a little rest in the tavern – in the quiet of the empty room, and the surprisingly soothing scents of spices and liqueurs – she said, "Are you sure you can't mix us something?"
"You're underage."
"You are, too! That's the thrill."
He wasn't facing her, but his next few steps came slowly, and something in his body language shifted, sagged slightly. A moment later he looked back over his shoulder. "Yes," he said. "I'm sure I can't mix us anything."
She took that as an invitation to leave.
A distraction, he had said, and when she went back to her rounds she added in a new one, clambering up to the top of the wall and examining the forest for any kind of disturbances, casting her own awareness beyond the wall, beyond the liquid-shimmer sense of the veil against her magical awareness, for anything unusual. She couldn't feel anything, but she wondered if she would. He said there was evidence of magic still in the tavern, but neither of them had marked it when they had been there.
Or else they'd been distracted by something else– the pumpkin golem? (And what a time to live in that 'pumpkin golem' was hardly even a blip on her radar– although it was still a blip. That had been weird.) Either way she had to be aware for anything else. It might have been a unique use of Trap Master's magics, although she couldn't entirely imagine how. Weaving a veil was rather different than rigging threads to explode.
Whatever the case, she found herself on the wall, looking for any such oddities, and seeing nothing.
While she was there, though, she had the pleasure of seeing the archers, a small band of townspeople who were wielding the few bows that the town had.
They were headed by Tonio.
"Tonio, hey," she said. "You distribute all your weapons?"
"Best as I can," he said. "Figured it was time to contribute more directly."
"Didn't know you were into archery."
"Archery?" Tonio asked. He shook his head. "I hunt."
"You hunt?" She looked up him up and down. Nothing about him said hunter. But still he smiled to her and nodded.
"Weapons aren't exactly a big industry around here," he said. "Have to supplement for something. I do a little small-game hunting– pollywogs, stingers. Sometimes bats. Tiny bats." He held up his own bow. "We've all been out into the forest to hunt before. It only seemed right we could contribute a ranged division, of a kind."
Mint perked up. "And you're used to dealing with the trees. And with small targets."
"Don't know how much precision will help, against these monsters," Tonio said. "But if nothing else, we can give you cover fire."
Mint found herself grinning. "That's a lot more than I'd expected."
And it gave her an idea. She relayed it to Hobbs, the next time they passed, to make sure it was possible. He verified that it was.
"I... don't have to pay for it, do I?" she asked warily.
"Scrolls're easy to come by," he said. "Not like cannon orbs. I can give up a few of 'em."
"Because you're already making a killing off me."
He flashed her a grin.
He also sent her to Neil to see if he had anything he might contribute, out of his own merchant's stash. He did; matter of fact, he was already doing his own rounds, verifying which each division of attackers if there was anything his wares could contribute.
"You mentioned explosives?" she said.
"I did."
"I'm gonna want some explosives. Small ones, yeah? You said ornamental."
"Yes, ma'am."
"I got an idea, and it's a good one."
"I'm loathe to imagine your bad ones."
She wasn't sure how to take that.
Finally, as afternoon grew later, she returned to the wall and looked out through the forest, searching for any other distractions, any set traps. What she saw instead was a flash of light, playing oddly off one of the distant trees.
"Spyglass?" she asked, and one of Tonio's friends provided. She peered through the glass and focused on that flashing light, and saw, to her mild surprise, the form of Blood raised in the tree, flicking a piece of shattered glass – part of a bottle? – so it reflected the sunlight. He was also gesturing down through the forest. She moved the spyglass, turning it toward the forest floor, and saw movement– distant, a little ways off, but clearly massing. The army was moving. He was warning them.
She lowered the spyglass, and turned, looking over the town.
"They're getting ready a little ahead of schedule," she said. "Probably trying to catch us off-balance." She handed the spyglass back to the man who had given it to her, and grinned. "Let's shove 'em right the hell over."
And they were.
Trap Master was completely taken aback by the force surging against the puppets. Most of the town proved to be awkward at best when they got into the fight, but it was enough; they were armed, they were pissed, and they were defending their home. It was a far more dangerous force than Trap Master could have ever anticipated.
Not just from the front, either; if it had been just the attacks then perhaps he could have directed the puppets into a ring, used his own massive number advantage to corral them, but the back of his forces were being skewered by the arrows pouring in from above, and in addition there were enchantments being woven into them as they flew. Belle had stationed herself with the archers, to give her a better vantage point for her own magic, and was using that vantage point to reach out to the arrows and charge them with flame, drawing energy from a stack of scrolls Hobbs had provided for just such a purpose.
Trap Master himself was pressed into a corner, trying to move back to give himself space to assess the situation properly, but the army of puppets had difficulty parting to give him room, and even then he was caught between the incoming rain of flaming arrows and the writhing, shouting mass of townspeople ahead of him.
"Not what I signed up," he snarled. "Not even remotely what I–"
There was an arrow headed for him. He reached out, snagged a puppet standing nearby, and yanked himself toward it, propelling himself forward while he shoved the soulless doll behind him. The puppet took the arrow to the head, but before Trap Master had put enough distance between himself and it, the small payload tied to the arrow exploded.
It wasn't much of a force, but it was enough to propel him into the ground, head playing against the back of his neck. He twisted and looked up, glaring at the force on the top of the wall.
Mint, for her part, was smiling.
She had ducked behind the forces almost as soon as they moved out. She trusted herself quite well to dive into the fight, but she wanted to stay out of their way, at least at first– rather, she wanted the town to be out of her way once the magic explosions started. As it was they were still too congested, and she would have too difficult a time fighting through them; and, once she did, she would encounter Trap Master's problem of landing right in the field where the arrows were flying.
But for Mint, the situation was a little better.
She retreated into town, worked her way around to the wall ladders, and clambered up to the top, away from the archers and where she could get a decent view of the battle. Her magic worked best from a close range, where she could more optimally channel her own energy through the Halo, but from afar she wasn't quite useless.
In fact, though it wasn't her nature, she could provide support.
She had a few of the smaller artefacts Marcum had brought, to be used as catalysts, and they gave her the reach she needed to instill force behind attacks, giving the pikers a tailwind that augmented the strength of their blows, shifting the earth a little beneath the feet of the puppets to set them off balance, disrupting an attack or putting them into perfect range of an incoming sword. She sent down small bursts of light to warn a townsfolk of an incoming attack; she pressed together threads in the air to instill an electric charge through blades.
Mint would have preferred to be down there, fighting herself, but there was something exhilarating about watching the battle from afar, manipulating bits and pieces here and there, relaying commands through subtle suggestion, watching as her magic provided the backing for somebody else to break through, or kept somebody else safe. Her touch changed the tides of dozens of skirmishes. Not as viscerally fulfilling as going down and beating something over the head, but powerful in its own right.
To rule a kingdom – to rule the world – had to feel something like this.
But for the explosions that scattered the enemy forces below, for the inferno Belle and the archers were raining down, for the subtle way her own magic altered the playing field, for the impressive display the town as a whole was putting on, she could also see something else, too. They couldn't win.
Trap Master had extricated himself and rallied. The puppets had not rallied, but they didn't need to; Trap Master was the only real intelligence on their side of the field. His confusion had left the puppets to their singular prerogative, but now that he was out, he'd scrambled for a position nearby, out of immediate range and with enough room to direct the forces properly, and to weave his own traps into a defensive net around himself. Arrows attempting to reach him would burst into shrapnel on contact with his magical field; it was a small comfort that the townsfolk couldn't reach him, or they would have run into the field themselves.
And the townsfolk...
They were being hurt. That wasn't a surprise, and another wave had been ready behind, rushing in with impressive coordination to assist anybody injured out of the field and back toward the cathedral. They retreated before they could be hurt too severely – Mint had made sure the instructors knew to tell them that – and while it kept the individuals safe it bled off the town's forces.
The puppets, on the other hand, were utterly inhuman, and singular in their assault. They were cut down, flayed, even dismembered, and the air was soon choking with wood pulp and dusted fabric. Many of them dropped, but the others continued to surge, and continued to fight even through their worst injuries. Their assaults were far inferior to the armed forces of the town, but they were relentless unto death, and puppets that had seemed to be dead were crawling back up, catching the town off-guard when they had assumed they were in the clear.
Which was dangerous. As the town pressed further into the puppet army, Trap Master was ordering them to allow it, turning the singular tide into pools of isolated skirmishes, and the town was hopelessly outnumbered.
Mint was trying to think. It wasn't an emergency yet, but she could already see the way the fight would go, if this continued. Her gaze cut across the battlefield, and she realized she was going to have to charge in before too long. She realized...
She moved over to the archers, and to Belle.
"Hey," she said. "Where's your boy toy?"
"An excellent question," Belle said. "He should've been back by now."
"Back?"
"Back," Belle repeated. "He went out to– oh, god, really?"
Mint followed her gaze. She saw him. She couldn't miss him.
Stumbling out of the forest, around the side of town, was a star.
"You've gotta be–" Mint breathed.
She took one more look at the layout of the battle, and said, "I'm headed down."
"Slap him for me," Belle muttered.
Mint scrambled down the ladder, considered charging out the front gate, and reconsidered, instead using the smaller access gate she and Rue had used so many times already, skirting the largest contingent of the town and emerging at a much thinner band of battle. She drew a deep breath, and drew the wind around her, forming a tight orb of twisted air that she used to plunge directly through the fray, flinging aside the puppets that strove to strike her.
"Finally decided to show up, ex-Princess!" Trap Master howled. He was on the others side of the melee, but his voice sliced through the air. "Didn't take you to be somebody leading from behind!"
She ignored him and spun, channeling energy through the Halo. The wind barrier funneled forward and ignited, a long tongue of flame leaping into the puppet army. Some had shifted to attack her; now they fell to the forest floor, smoldering, or else lurched back, moaning deep in their throats.
The path cut clear, Mint darted the rest of the way to Duke, and said, "What the hell are you doing?"
"Sorry we're late!" Duke said immediately. "The, uh, the zipper got stuck."
"That is not an answer also that is stupid."
"True, though!" he said. "Don't worry, Princess. The Stars are here to save the day!"
He lumbered past her. "Excuse me?" she said. "The Stars? Plural?"
"Of course!" he called. He bent himself as best he could in his ridiculous getup, and Mint felt a pulse of magic twisting beneath him. A moment later, it exploded, and Duke was propelled into the air, arms spread wide, shouting behind him: "The Shining Warrior, Starlight Duke!"
And, in spite of how ludicrous it was, he crashed into the heart of the puppet army, and impact that crushed or shattered the few directly beneath him and scattered the rest around. They turned inward instinctively and struck at them, but Duke simply stood up beneath their assault, their blows glancing harmlessly off of his thick costume, and he started to...
...the only word for it was dance.
He was spinning, twirling, whirling, cartwheeling, a combination of his powerful blows propelling the heavy costume into the army, ramming and battering through them as he went, blissfully deflecting their own attempted blows. He even hurled himself into the heart of the arrow rain; any stray shots that might have landed on him sunk uselessly into the plush costume.
It was, without question, one of the most ridiculous things Mint had ever seen, and what propelled it to new heights of ridiculous was how well it was working.
"This is," she said, "so stupid."
"Maybe so, but you can see the heart he puts into it. There is a passion behind his madness that is difficult to deny."
She whirled, and there was Rod. It took her a moment for it to click.
"Stars," she said. "Starlight Duke, and–"
"Rod, the Blade Star!" he announced, and in that announcement hefted his weapon upon his shoulder.
She stared at it. "Rod," she said. "That is not a blade."
It was, indeed, not a blade.
It was a hammer.
An enormous piece of equipment, made primarily of black metal, elaborately decorated.
"I was told we were fighting an army," Rod said. "I believed the Black Tornado to be best equipped to fight an army."
Mint almost protested, but she looked again to the battle. To the ill-trained townspeople hurling themselves against a monstrous tide. To Duke, a brilliant whirling dervish in the middle of the shambling sea. To Trap Master, on the opposite side of the tide but visible from where she stood, and looking absolutely horrified.
"You know what," Mint said, "go for it."
And go he did.
Rod split from the front of the army and plunged into its side, angling toward the back and away from the villagers, bringing the hammer down in pounding overhead blows and broad sideswipes, and a few moments later Duke had twirled and sparkled and lumbered his awkward way over to Rod and the two of them together were tearing a gout up through the back half of the enemy.
Mint saw her opportunity, and ducked around the back.
There was a vast number of puppets still trying to stream around, flowing from the sides to trap the townspeople, breaking off to pay more attention to her. Mint knew, even with the catalysts she had gotten from Marcum – an odd little statue resting her pouch, a brooch pin clipped to her collar – that she didn't have the energy to plunge through them. Especially if she wanted to reach her real target. She generated her wind shield again, a little more focused this time, empowering the gusts around her only when an enemy came too close for comfort, and with that she dove into the army again.
She focused not on offense but on evasion, trusting her spell to repel the closest assaults while she pushed onward through openings in the crowd, always seeking more breathing room. At first it wasn't difficult– Trap Master must have seen her moving, and allowed the puppets at places to part, inviting her deeper into the fray and closing off escape routes, setting up (what else but) a trap for her. At some point, however, her intentions became clearer, and Trap Master recognized it and closed off her forward movement.
Still she pressed.
Even with Rod and Duke, the fight was too lopsided, and too many townspeople were having to pull back and pull out. The numbers of their forces dwindled, and though the puppets continued to fall others surged forward and rose from their apparent demise and continued shambling forward. They could not be stopped.
Not while somebody was commanding them.
Only one unit mattered in this battle.
Now he was focusing on her as she got closer, and she could sense the shimmer of magic around him. Threads that, when strummed, would create an explosion. Not close to him – he'd created a hemispherical barrier some distance around himself, to keep from being caught in his own explosion – but–
The puppets were getting too numerous and the spell was too much of a strain. She barreled through one more crowd, cut the spell, and wove magic instead to her Halo. She flung the ring.
The Halo impacted the magic barrier, resonated with the phantomite core of the ring, and ruptured.
The explosion erupted entirely outward, a rolling expanse of force and heat that caught a broad swath of nearby puppets in the blaze and flattened some of the ranks, leaving them smoldering and useless on the ground. Mint tugged at the thread she'd woven to the ring and drew it back to herself, catching it just in time for the puppets surrounding her to descend.
The explosion had been part of the plan. Being pinned to the ground by a half-dozen faceless, stitched-together homunculi was an unwelcome deviation. But here she was.
They slammed her to the ground with enough force to send the Halo skittering out of her hand. The magic that had attached it to her was still wound around it, but she was distracted by one of the puppets all but collapsing into her chest, knocking the wind out of her and leaving her gasping for breath against the stale air surrounding them. By the time she'd recovered – and it felt an agonizing several seconds, as others collapsed as well, locking her against the forest floor – her attempts to summon the Halo were foiled by somebody plucking it from the ground and severing the energy thread.
"Move," Trap Master snarled. "Keep attacking!"
The puppets nearby shifted and left, moving forward toward the town's forces, leaving an empty space around them. Trap Master took his place near Mint's head, his hands – and her Halo – clasped behind his back, looking down at her with a mixture of frustration and disgust.
"Hand it to you," he said, "wasn't expecting this much of a fight."
Mint grunted.
"But you know what you're doin', right? Throwin' all these people in front'a me and lettin' 'em get hurt. What for? Protectin' a stupid doll? It ain't for the Relic, I know that much. While we're here you can't make a move. Would'a been a long stalemate if we just sat here waitin' for you again. All you're doin' is makin' a lotta people suffer for no good reason. Lot less of your folks fighting now than there was when the doors opened, and you can't keep goin'. Night's comin' on. Gettin' hard to see. And these things" – he nudged one of the puppets splayed across her – "don't need t'see."
"You're not getting–" Mint breathed, and suddenly there was an explosion of pain, a brief moment of blackness, and when it receded, lights dancing in her vision. The side of her head hurt; she could feel warm liquid trickling through her hair.
"All right," Trap Master said. "Lemme put it this way. Doll Master don't wanna hurt this town any more. But he didn't say nothin' about not hurtin' you."
She heard him, but she was having a little trouble focusing, her head throbbing. Sound was filtering through her ears, impact, thuds, screams from further in. Or– not screams. Battle cry, still? But they weren't rallying. Trap Master wouldn't be bothering with her if the town was rallying. Or maybe...
Hell, she didn't know. All she knew was that it was hard to breathe, she hurt, and by the shift in his stance he was getting ready to hurt her a lot worse.
"The old man's real concerned about alla you," he continued. "How long you think he'll watch you bleed before he gives up the doll?"
He pressed the tip of his boot against the raw spot where he'd kicked her. There was a new explosion of pain, lights dancing behind her eyes. He pulled back, and she tried to focus on him, but it was dark, her vision was dark around the edges, and–
They both heard it, a strangled scream coming from only a few feet away. Trap Master's head snapped around, and he pulled back only just in time to evade the blade of Mira's gladius. His grip on the Halo failed, and it thudded into the trampled earth nearby.
Mint reached out and drew it back toward her, and with the ring in her hand focused on the threads of energy around her. She kicked up the wind again, and the air around her exploded, enough to loosen the weight and allow her to shove the puppets off of her torso and wriggled out from underneath them.
She clambered to her feet, and turned to Trap Master.
And Mira.
Mira, who was giving him no quarter; Mira, who was driving and stabbing and slashing, leaning always to his exposed side as he shifted his defense and tried to mount a counterattack, except she had given him no chance to draw a weapon, and was giving him no opportunity to spin a trap, and the one time he tried to push his own advantage and punch her she sidestepped and ducked the blow and sliced upward and the blade bit a long, deep gash into his upper arm. It was a pain Trap Master hadn't anticipated, and it caused him a moment of surprise, a moment of pain, and a moment of hesitation, at which point Mira twisted and brought her boot against his ribs, bashing him off balance and hurling him to the ground.
Trap Master sprang to his feet before she could strike again, but she'd allowed it– she wasn't as fast as she had been in her youth, and attacking him when he was downed would leave her exposed for too long, too high a risk for the reward. Anyway, she had him.
Trap Master had all the makings of a street fighter, somebody who had learned their fighting and their magic in unpredictable brawls in back alleys and fight scenes. He was younger than Mira by far, and cocky, and leaned heavily on his ability to rig an arena before the fight started in earnest. Mint could almost see the history there, the way he taunted and manipulated opponents into hurting themselves, the brutality with which he actually struck. The way he'd prepared to beat her. The way he'd already beaten Klaus.
Mira was a swordswoman.
The way she moved was almost poetry. The shifts in her stance to compensate weakness and flow into her next attack; the way she read Trap Master's movements and knew her own limitations, when she could strike, when she could harry him, when she had to hold back. Age had slowed her down, but it had given her more than enough experience to be able to compensate.
Rage filled in the gaps.
"What the hell!" Trap Master shouted. "Where did you come from!"
Mira didn't engage. She drove a stab at his exposed side, and he ducked and whirled and tried to reach for one of his own knives, except she used her momentum to twist and stab downward. He threw himself into a forward roll, grabbing at her legs, but Mira was throwing herself forward. He passed under her, and a moment later she hit the ground and rolled, springing back to her feet and lunging just as Trap Master was rising. It forced him to dive to the side, the wrong side, and she was bringing her sword down and catching his calf as she went. It was a shallow blow this time, but their movements complicated the wound, leaving a long, jagged gash in its wake.
Mint shouted; "Hey, jackass! Speaking of the old man, I'd like to introduce you to his wife!"
He didn't look at her, but she heard his voice clear even under the din, "You gotta be shittin' me!"
And it wasn't simple disbelief. There was fear.
Because the wound on his arm meant he couldn't maneuver his torso in certain ways, and the wound on his leg, shallow as it was, sapped the strength of it. He tried to keep himself out of Mira's way, tried to make his own advantage, but he was faltering, and her attacks were becoming more pointed, moving closer to vital spaces. He had been free to attack Klaus before, to terrify the town, to send the puppets after Elena, because he could scare them with little fear there would be consequence; he could toy with Mint and Rue because both of them were more worried about the town, and neither of them were willing to commit to a real attack.
Mira had no such compunctions. He had hurt her husband and attacked her daughter. She wanted blood. And, in nicks and spurts, she was getting it.
Trap Master was moving backward, realizing quickly that he wouldn't be able to continue engaging. His clothes were torn, fabric darkened with blood spatter, his breathing coming in ragged. Mint could almost see the thoughts written across his expression– he was getting his ass handed to him by a middle aged housewife.
He threw himself out of range of Mira's blade, and again, concentrating on distance and plucking at the space between them. In the darkness Mint could see the magic flashing and taking shape, threads pulled taught between the ground and the trees. Mira couldn't, however; she was still pressing the advantage, forcing him to flee.
Mint sprang forward and interposed herself between Mira and Trap Master.
"Out of my way, Mint," Mira breathed.
"Trap's set," Mint said, gesturing behind her. "You go after him, it'll kill you."
Mira leaned around her. Trap Master had already disappeared into the roil of battle.
Perhaps just in time. Mira drew in a deep, shuddering breath and staggered back. She was trying to control her breathing, but it was clear she'd pushed herself; her limbs were shaking. Mint jumped forward and helped keep her steady, and quietly cursed herself for not thinking to keep some of Mel's draught for quick use on the field.
"You okay?" Mint asked.
"Fine," Mira said thinly. "Just out of shape."
Mint grinned crookedly. "I'd have loved to see you when you were in shape."
"I don't think you were born yet when I was in shape," Mira panted. "I'm fine, let me go." Mint slowly released, and Mira immediately reached up and gingerly touched the side of her head, running hands through red hair. "Did he hurt you?"
"I've had a lot worse," Mint said. "You got him."
"That was my plan. Go after him."
Mint laughed. "That was my plan. You okay back here?"
Mira gestured with her sword to the puppets. "None of them are like that. Anything comes over here I can take them. Go."
Mint spun and almost rammed right into the threaded trap. She jerked herself to the side, staggered a bit, and then shoved herself forward.
The forces were thinning. Not just on Carona's side, either; with Duke and Rod sweeping through the back half of the puppet's army they had taken down a considerable swath of the monsters, and left them taken down. The townsfolk still fighting were generally the ones best equipped for the attack, and were still holding their own over the reduced numbers. The arrow rain had slowed to a trickle, but now the archer team above was making their shots count, tying explosives to the arrows and firing them into the largest concentrations of puppets that weren't engaged with villagers, scattering the forces further.
And Trap Master had been injured.
She saw the flash of his yellow jacket, a beacon in the encroaching darkness, moving to the back of the group, to the opposite side of the army. She hard his voice cutting through the racket, furious and shrill.
"All at once! Full assault! I don't care what Doll Master wants I want you to end this and end this pathetic little town you sons of bitches! End it!"
There was motion as the puppets surged again, nearly crawling over each other in pursuit of the townsfolk. The tide had shifted, but the fighting had been going on for– Mint couldn't tell. Evening had turned to dusk and was rapidly giving way to night. Some time, certainly. Even with the best of them remaining, they were flagging, and with Trap Master's redoubled fury they were moving with a force they had not possessed before.
"Take the walls! Go around, find another entrance! Flood the town, find the ones that are hiding, get to their injured! We'll kill you all one at a time until you hand that goddamn doll over to us! You hear me! We will kill you! I will–!"
Something shuddered through the forest. Trap Master's screaming cut off immediately. Mint pegged his location, and she watched as he spun, the puppets still moving according to his command, his focus completely devoured by something now thudding violently through the trees. Mint saw a light shifting through the air, casting odd, pale illumination and rippling shadows as it moved through the forest, toward them.
"What else!" Trap Master howled, and snapped his arm out. The space in the trees before him tightened into a field of razor wire, so much concentrated energy it shimmered visibly in the night. "Come at me! Show me what else this sad little town has to–"
He stopped. The light coming toward them cast him briefly in stark relief, and she saw his expression, the fury draining fully from it to be replaced with abject confusion.
The magic trap he had set snapped, and the energy threads fell in gossamer strands before they dissipated into the air. His arm fell to his side.
"What the fuck am I even looking at."
A heavy paw fell into the space where his trap had been set a moment before, and the massive mulberry cat tilted his head, looking down his flattened muzzle at Trap Master.
"Language, sir," Gorotan said.
Trap Master opened his mouth to speak, but there were no words. Even from a distance, Mint could see his eye twitch.
"All right," he said slowly. "You know what? No. No! Fall back! This is– I don't even know what this is! Leave it be!"
"Leave it be!" a bright voice called out from astride the cat, and a moment later the ostentatious form of Mel was leaning over Gorotan's head, her hand outstretched as the lights she cast dance and flickered around them. "All this sound and fury and that's what you come down to? Leave it be?" She lifted herself up, then stood fully, and in spite of the lunacy of the situation Mel struck a surprisingly imposing figure. "After what you've put these people through you expect them to simply leave it be?"
As her voice rose, it also grew harder, carrying with it a nearly visceral anger that sent a chill down Mint's spine.
"You would not leave them be, Trap Master!" she howled. "And we will not allow you to simply leave! It! BE!"
A new wave of cries erupted from the people of Carona, joined in by shouts from Rod and Duke, and a full-throated, chilling yowl from Gorotan's throat, and they descended.
Mint didn't have a chance to hurl herself back into the fray. As the town turned upon the puppets and drove through them, and as Mel and Gorotan hurled their own considerable power into the army, and as Trap Master tried to fight and was forced, by overwhelming power and injuries already sustained, to flee, Mint managed to take three steps before somebody slammed into her and nearly sent the both of them to the ground.
Mint managed to catch herself, with Mira's assistance. "What the hell was–"
She trailed off as her eyes caught the familiar wine-red of the East Heaven royal family.
"Maya," she breathed.
Princess Maya peeled herself away from Mint, but was still holding on to her, her hands gripping Mint's shoulders. "Sister," she said desperately. "What is happening?"
"A whole lot of ass kicking," Mint said. She assessed Maya quickly, as best she could in the poor light. "You okay to be up?"
"Not entirely, but I had to come."
"Appreciate the thought, but Mel seems to have things pretty well in–" Mint flinched. "Shit. Maya, if you two are here, who's keeping an eye on Prima!"
"Prima is fine," Maya said. "Prima will remain fine."
"I appreciate your confidence but I sorely doubt Terence is going to be enough to stop the others if they–"
"Prima is not their target!"
Mint stopped. She stared at Maya, flabbergasted– and, seeing Maya's expression, scared. "Maya," she started, but her sister's grip intensified until Maya's fingernails were biting into her skin.
"Mint," Maya said, her voice tight and low. "Where is Rue?"