Frances kept part of her attention on her friends’ backs and part of it on the sentries on the gatehouse roof. They were still looking over them towards the town on the Erisdalian side. One sentry was an orc, the other was a goblin.

The goblin standing on the merlon noticed them first and squeaked out, “Intruders!”

Frances raised Ivy’s Sting at the goblin, ready to blast him with a wall of force. She was aware her target might duck behind the wall, but she needed to keep the goblin pinned. That was when she felt Ivy’s Sting give what felt like a nudge, but only in her mind. Following her wand’s suggestion, she yanked the goblin over the wall, sending him tumbling into the water below with a splash.

In seconds, the trio reached the open gates and run out under the gatehouse.

“I got the gates, find us a way inside!” With that, Frances raised her wand and pointing at the gates began to chant a melody Edana liked to call “Dancing with Fire.” Edana had composed this herself and as the lively, jaunty tune filled the air, orange licks of fire leapt onto the gates and began to eat them up. Soon they were ablaze with a lot of black smoke rising, and Frances knew no amount of water was going to put them out.

Just as Frances finished, Elizabeth yelled, “There, and there!” She pointed at two doors, each set in the gatehouse’s two separate bases. Both were made of heavy wooden planks bound in iron.

“Let’s take the south one!” Martin exclaimed. Elizabeth nodded and led the way. The knight followed, and Frances brought up the rear.

The door slammed open and an orc charged out. The moment he saw them, he pointed his spear in their direction.

Instantly, Martin and Elizabeth sprang into a drill they’d practiced. The knight stomped forward, sword parrying the spear away. Elizabeth came at the orc’s left side and broke the his kneecap with her hammer. The orc growled and crumpled to his knees, allowing Martin to take his head off with his sword.

Elizabeth shivered at the sight of the tusked head thunking onto the ground and felt her stomach heave.

“Elizabeth, focus, please,” said Frances in a comforting voice. She could feel a hand squeezing her shoulder. Elizabeth took a deep breath and reminded herself her friends were counting on her.

The trio entered the building through the door, which was a foot larger than most human ones, probably to account for the larger orcs, trolls and ogres. Once inside, Frances slammed the door shut and turned the key that was still inside the lock. She then touched Ivy’s Sting to the lock and sung a spell that would keep the door shut and reinforce it.

“Alright—” she turned to her friends “—since there are two doors, we can stick together and start setting fires.” Frances pulled out one firebomb and glanced around. They seemed to be in a sort of entry area with a closet filled with jackets and desks. A spiral staircase snaked upwards in one corner of the room. Noticing the closet Frances chucked the firebomb into it.

Flames exploded, eating at the flammable cotton and wool, before spreading to the wooden varnish of the closet.

“Crownfire is really destructive. What is it made of?” Elizabeth asked in awe.

“Magic and plant juices. The key ingredient is a weed called Crownfire that’s made more potent when you apply a spell during the brewing process,” said Frances matter-of-factly.

“That’s really interesting, but toss another one, and let’s get going!” Martin stammered.

Nodding, the three raced for the stairs, Elizabeth going first again. Martin followed her and Frances for good measure, tossed two more bottles into a pile of papers and onto the wooden floor.

Traces of smoke were already coiling up behind them as they raced up. They found the second-storey door shut.

“I’m going in,” said Elizabeth.

Martin shouted, “Wait, Elizabeth!”

It was too late, Elizabeth had twisted the handle and shoved the door open. Luckily, she’d lead with her shield, which took a stab from a goblin spear.

Screaming out of surprise, or because of the racing adrenaline in her blood, Elizabeth charged forward and smashed her shield into the diminutive goblin, sending it reeling back. However, there were five other creatures in the room. One of them tried to stab at her unprotected side, but Martin stepped in beside her and the point scraped harmlessly off his chain mail. He dispatched the goblin with a hack of his sword.

Elizabeth managed to batter down the goblin in front of her, but as she stood up, she saw that one of the enemies was pointing a crossbow at her. It twanged, the device bucking into the goblin’s shoulder, but a sharp cry from Frances drowned out the sound, and a blast of wind seemingly coming out of nowhere knocked the bolt off course. Even then, it flew inches away from Elizabeth’s shoulder and clanged off the stonework.

“Elizabeth, move!” roared Martin .

The knight expected Elizabeth to target one of the nearby goblins, but suddenly, she seemed to leap across the room to the crossbow toting goblin. Long legs, and Otherworlder speed carried her in a blink of an eye in front of the enemy. The goblin desperately raised the crossbow as a makeshift shield, but Elizabeth’s hammer fell and smashed the wooden and steel weapon into pieces, crushing the goblin’s skull.

Martin didn’t have time to stare. Instead, he had finished off another goblin and was on a third one, which he cut down with another swing of his sword. Reaching into a pouch at his belt, he looked around for a place to throw the Crownfire bottle.

“There,” said Frances, pointing at the portcullis, the side of which jutted into the room. The iron and wooden grate continued up into the ceiling, but Martin knew it was as good a target and promptly threw the phial at the grate. It caught fire quickly and the trio soon ran back up the stairs. The room was already starting to fill with smoke.

This time the stairs opened to a storage room filled with flour and dried provisions. All of these items burned nicely, and the trio barely even bothered to go inside. They just tossed a phial in and ran up. On the third level, they opened the door to the room with the winch that hoisted up the portcullis. More Crownfire was liberally tossed onto the winch and they returned to their stairwell.

However, by this time, the smoke was choking the ceiling and Elizabeth backed away, coughing.

“We are not using that,” she gasped.

“No, we are not,” Martin agreed. The three turned around and after racing by the burning winch they found the second stairwell on the other side of the gatehouse and headed back down to the third storey.

“Ready?” Elizabeth asked this time, hand on the door latch to the third storey room.

“Ready. On your three,” said Martin.

“Right. One, two, thr—”

Someone yanked the door opened and Elizabeth stumbled in. A magical word of power echoed through the air and Elizabeth screamed as she was pulled in.

“Elizabeth!” Martin yelled and charged in after her, Frances hot on his heels.

Elizabeth found herself pulled towards a stocky human-like form wielding a war axe. Unable to do anything, she ducked behind her shield.

The blow that struck her tore the wind from her lungs and sent her flying backwards. Screaming, Elizabeth felt her legs hit something hard and the world tumbled upside down. She managed to see a table before her back slammed into something and everything went black.

Charging in after his friend, Martin saw Elizabeth’s limp body slide down the stone wall. He immediately had to raise his sword as the new opponent charged at him. The knight glimpsed a lion-like tail before having to parry his opponent’s axe. Whoever or whatever it was, the Alavari was fast and savage because Martin’s hands shook as he parried blow after blow.

Martin cut at the Alavari’s head, but only scoured his opponent’s helmet. He tried again, attempting to find a gap in the monster’s armour, but found his blow knocked aside with inhuman speed. The knight tried to turn his sword and slash down, but the Alavari roared a magic word and Martin went flying backward as if being reeled back by a fishing rod.

Only, the air suddenly filled with song and, as the knight hit the wall, he felt as if he’d hit a cushion rather than stone. Glancing up he saw Frances singing, her wand pointed at the Alavari and suddenly, the table in the room, and several chairs smashed into the creature. It was followed by Frances crying out a note that sent the Alavari flying up into the ceiling, and then backwards.

But before he smashed into the wall, the Alavari managed to yell a word of power and a bolt of red and blue magic shot toward Frances. She whipped her wand across, pitching her voice up.

As she imagined, the chairs and tables that had smashed into the Alavari locked together and formed a wall. The bolt of magic hit and blasted them apart. Frances was showered with splinters, but otherwise unharmed. Even as the splinters hit the ground she had already started moving, her next spell ready in her mind.

It was just as well because the Alavari burst out from the shower of splinters, his axe cutting down where she would have stood. She still had no idea as to his species, but she suspected that given his humanoid figure, use of magic, and tail that he was either a troll or ogre.

From what Edana had taught her, both were dangerous opponents because they were strong, and had magic. Trolls tended to have more of an elemental affinity, whereas ogres tended to just have magic. Trolls tended to be slower thinkers but were stronger than ogres.

Frances knew she was too close to the enemy to use her lightning spell, but Edana had been working with her to come up with some other magic. One of these was a lower-powered version of her lightning spell, perfect for close quarters.

Switching into a major scale, Frances cried out the motif of her usual lightning spell, which she’d memorized, but instead of imagining the charge building on the Alavari, she visualized it building at the tip of her wand and bursting out from it.

Zaaaaaaaaaaaap. A stream of lightning erupted from Ivy’s Sting. The Alavari’s eyes widened and he tried to yell out a word of power, but the blue light hit him first, blasting him back, and sending sparks arcing across his armour. He smashed into the corner, next to a large barrel and slumped down, dazed.

With a final tune, the Alavari’s helmet flew off and Frances had pocketed her wand, drew her sword and strode across to finish the stunned enemy.

When Frances got closer, she stopped and stared, her mouth agape with horror as she realized the face she was about to skewer was one that she recognized.

“Timur?” she gasped.