It was early morning before Ska returned from his hunt. Not that I minded a good night's sleep. We were already underway, the invisibility field concealing us from the ground. We were floating along at a leisurely twenty miles an hour. There was no immediate rush to get there and I was curious about the area.

I rolled out the rough map we had been given. It had been a state map but someone had scribbled on most of it with a sharpie.

The line of mountains that the dwarves lived in was marked as the Spine and little triangles marking them at the edge. I noticed they ran mostly north with no real break. 'I wonder how far they go.'

The words hill country with a rough distance of two hundred miles was marked. I assumed this information came from one of the Marshall's men. A large area was marked off in the north, probably a hundred miles from the base of the mountains as 'Forest'.

It looked like the town we were headed to was ten miles from the edge of the forest. Around where Tyler Texas used to sit. It was now marked as the Hornwell Holding and it stretched from the mountain to the forest and easily a hundred miles north to the edge of where Texas used to end. The words scribbled inside the map 'Not Hostile' didn't give me a lot of faith.

***

Spencer watched the trees from his concealed vantage point on the bluff. The elves had been quiet in the last few weeks and it made him nervous. Ever since one of the holding's men cut down one of their stupid trees, they had been at war. No amount of trying to apologize or make amends had worked. The elves simply attacked and killed on sight.

Spencer tightened the grip on his bow. He had earned the weapon after killing off one of the elves when they ambushed his group as they were scavenging the abandoned houses in the area. It hadn't been the first attack nor the last. Every few weeks an armed party of elves would ambush or attack anyone caught unawares. This had been going on for months now, with no end in sight.

Carlson Hornwell had ordered the forest cut back and so it was. Two miles of forest were leveled by spells or weapons. That also marked the largest confrontation with the elves to date. Over a hundred elves engaged the defenders. Ten men fell that day to the damned elven archers. But the elves didn't get away unscathed. At least fifteen elves died. The injured were treated and the attacks stopped for two whole weeks.

That was rare. This was why Spencer was diligently looking for anything out of the ordinary. A flicker caught his attention and his raptor-like gaze zeroed in on where it had occurred. He had maxed out his perception when he hit level fifteen. It gave him a significant edge when it came to dealing with the crafty elves.

One of his companions in the bunker walked up beside him after seeing his gaze locked on something.

"You got movement?" the man asked.

"I'm not sure."

He continued to watch that area of sky as a cloud passed behind a slightly distorted area.

"It's something and it's getting closer. Get ready to alert the garrison if it's the elves," he said, readying his bow and a skill called Lock-on. The skill failed to activate though as there was nothing to lock onto.

Before he could activate another skill a bolt of an iridescent green shot from the forest, impacting the flying object. Whatever spell was concealing the object shuttered and rippled. Three more elven arrows hit the object.

"Shit, signal the garrison!" he yelped. The elves were less than a mile from the edge of the forest. Whatever this object was it had forced them to reveal themselves.

Spencer watched as the three arrows impacted the object. His mouth dropped open as the enchantment concealing it dropped away, revealing an enormous floating rock. More arrows screaked out from the trees aimed at the strange thing but a glittering field popped into existence, causing the attacks to be absorbed or deflected.

***

"What the hell was that!" I yelped as the fortress rocked, causing my seatbelt to clench tight.

"You guys ok?"

"Yeah," they replied.

I adjusted the focus on the remote viewing device and saw the trails of more attacks heading our way. Three more impacted the bottom of the fortress before I could switch off the stealth and activate the shield.

"We're under attack! Roll out the cannons."

Martin and Ska unstrapped themselves and moved over to where I had molded in two cannons. They had limited side-to-side mobility but they could pivot up or down a good forty degrees. Thankfully Ska had those pre-filled mana hearts so he could transfer mana to the weapons. There wasn't any targeting system so it was going to have to be the best guess.

"I'm rotating around to face the target. Try twenty-five degrees."

I had marked a simple degree indicator on the walls next to the cannon's opening.

"Alright, we are pointed in their general direction, Fire when ready!"

I watched Martin fire off his shot. A white beam struck past the attackers, tearing up trees and sending a plume of dirt into the air.

"Go down five degrees," I said, watching the incoming attacks triple. Our shield was being hammered as it dropped below three thousand.

Ska's attack came next, hitting just shy. It seemed to be enough to pause the attacks before Martin's follow-up strike hit dead center.

These weren't the only mana cannons I had mounted, they were just the closest to get to, being mounted to what we considered the front. We had to fire a few more times as a sporadic number of attacks came in but they stopped as we moved out of range of the attackers. Ska could only fire three times. It took two of his charged crystals to power one shot and he only had six.

By the time the fighting had ended our shield had dropped to nearly two thousand. Some of that was just the cost of sustaining the field. The rest was from damage absorbed. Whoever had attacked us was serious. I'm glad I decided to take those mana cannons from the dwarves.

***

Spencer watched the whole fight in a stupor. White beams had torn up large sections of the elven forest while the rock floated there unshakable as it returned blast after blast. The object hovered there for a minute, before it zipped overhead, making a beeline toward the town.

"Oh, shit!"

***

I wanted to be done with this forest, it hid too many nasty possibilities. I jacked the speed up to the limit and zipped over the terrain with the shield still up. It would cost some power but it was safer than trusting the apparently faulty invisibility screen.

I set the fortress down well short of the town. I could see through the viewer that some anxious-looking humans were coming our way. I had also spotted a small walled compound near the edge of the forest. I imagined that was packed with fighters as well.

The shield had to be powered off in order to land. Once on the ground, it could be brought online again but it would not cover the bottom of the fortress. This was ok, I didn't plan to stay landed for long.

"And we're down," I said, quickly cycling down the power. "I have to see what damage we sustained. You three may want to greet our guests."

"It can't ever be easy, can it," Martin sighed.

"If life was easy it would be no fun," I responded.

Ska seemed to agree with me as he growled in confirmation. The four of us cycled through the doors and I extended the ramp, not waiting for it to touch down as I leaped off the fortress. While the others would meet with the locals I quickly inspected the underside. It didn't take me long to find the first arrow, buried five inches into the hardened stone surface.

'Good lord that attack had some oomph behind it.'

The levitation field would have reduced the weapon's impact and it still went that deep into rock. There was another issue, through that hole water dripped. I realized they must have pierced the water tank. I yanked the arrow out, letting the water drain. I couldn't be certain that the arrow wasn't poisoned so better safe than sorry.

I found the three other arrows, pulling them out as well. They were only in a few inches, still an impressive feat. I sealed up the holes, noticing one of the arrows had nicked a mithril control line.

I followed the hidden line up the structure to see what it powered. While the lines were invisible to the naked eye, I could easily spot them with my tattoo active. I was more than glad I had added the rune to my body, it was turning out to be quite effective.

My diagnostic led me to a side pusher plate. 'Good, this means I don't have to do a field repair.'

I sealed over the nicked line, leaving a small protuberance to mark its location. I could already see a dozen people heading our way from the town. Against my better judgment, I decided to stay outside with Martin and the others. The fortress would be safe enough.

***

Carlson Hornwell brought up the rear of his retinue. He wasn't foolhardy enough to lead from the front. That being said, he also wasn't the type of person to let others shoulder all of the responsibility. Word of an attack had reached the town through the signal flares. Simple, yet effective U.S. Army smoke canisters. He had thousands of the damn things after emptying the local army depot.

It hadn't been his intention to carve out a chunk of Texas for himself, it just sort of happened after people came to him looking for safety. Then the survivors of any armed forces started to trickle his way.

Then the Elves came. At first, everything was fine. There was trade between the two groups. Then some dumb shit went and cut down one of their trees. If the elves hadn't killed the man Carlson would have kicked him from his land. Now there was a war that seemed to have no end in sight. If that wasn't bad enough some strange flying object had landed south of town. With no way to communicate with his people guarding the forest, he had to assume they were hostile.

So he was a bit surprised when he spotted three people just standing outside what looked like a stone bunker, waiting for them. Two were obviously human but the third looked like a bipedal cat. He had seen stranger stuff since the world ended so the sight didn’t phase him much.

The group stopped well shy of the outsiders. Carlson's second in command spoke.

"Why have you invaded Hornwell property?"

Carlson winced at the accusation. It wasn't the choice of words he would have used but he didn't want to make his presence known until he understood why these people were here.

One of the men stepped forward, he was tall with dirty blonde hair and a bit of a swagger. When he spoke there was a distinct Creole accent.

"I apologize for the misunderstanding. We were sent here from Houston to propose an alliance."

"And what the hell is that thing?

"Our transport," the man replied.

Carlson spotted a group running from the direction of the garrison. He decided to put a stop to this charade before tensions flared.

"James, let's move this conversation to someplace more comfortable. Tell the Garrison to leave four men to guard it. You will excuse us if we are a bit wary?"

"Not a problem. My name is Martin, and I assume you are Carlson Hornwell. If you don't mind, my friend Ska will be coming with," the man replied, gesturing to the cat.

"That will be fine."