Brave Men Die: Part 2 by Dan Adams Page A

still didn’t feel comfortable exposing the full extent of her power in front of her old tutor. Daria wouldn’t care, she had told herself that many times, but the thought often crept into her head of what if she did.
    Looking at her companion, Ara could see that she was getting tired, sweat dribbling down her brow as she maintained the shield and cast offensively when she was able.
    All paranoias put to the side, Ara couldn’t hold off any longer and started upping the power of her spells. Her Lava Orbs burst from her hands and sailed over the tops of the infantry and landed amongst the archers. The flames tore the unit apart, some flailing around as they burnt to death, others fleeing. Fists closed, beams of purple energy pounded into the infantry ranks below the walls. Initially they started off the size of her hands, but as Ara got into the rhythm of things the energy expanded in size and the victims grew in number.
    Ara could sense Daria shift uncomfortably, her gaze focused on her back as she studied her former student. There was nothing that could be done about it, Ara kept casting and obliterating the enemy as Daria shifted her focus to defending the walls.
    The battle raged along the rampart. Ladders bounced onto the tops of the walls, soldiers of the Empire climbed over and attacked. The Kyzantines had breached the defence in multiple locations and the only archers that remained firing were on the tower top. With Kryst before him and a couple of others behind, Pollux took the stairs three at a time to get to the scene of heaviest fighting.
    Kryst barrelled into the first Kyzantine, pushing the woman over the wall and onto her waiting companions below. Pollux swung low slicing through a soldier’s legs and the body fell to the ground. The captain continued forward, treading over the fallen and smashed into the next body with the edge of his shield.
    Pollux followed, surging through the wake created by the captain and thrust into those bumped aside. His men followed, maintaining the momentum. As they gained inch by inch of the rampart, more and more Murukans climbed the stairs and repelled the attackers.
    Pollux fought his way further along the rampart to the edge of the wall, covering the captain. Kryst pushed at a ladder propped against it, straining under the weight of not only the siege ladder itself but of the five soldiers on it. Veins emerged in his straining arms and neck. Pollux turned his back to the captain, defended him from enemy soldiers charging along the wall. He blocked a thrust to his abdomen, turning the blade away before slicing through the man’s neck. A gargled scream rang out behind him as Pollux blocked a second strike on his shield. He ducked and rammed his sword up into the soldier’s jaw and turned briefly to look over his shoulder. Kryst had staggered back, clasping at the arrow shaft in his neck and gasping for air as blood gushed down his neck. Pollux stared in blank amazement as Kryst charged at the Kyzantine coming over the wall on the ladder that he hadn’t been able to dislodge. He collected the man around the waist as he launched himself into the air, his foot caught the top rung of the ladder and took them all down to the ground in a tangle of bodies and wood.
    Pollux screamed in rage and pressed on to the next ladder along the wall. He battered his way through and decapitated the next Kyzantine at the top of the ladder. With blood splattered across his face, he gritted his teeth as he kicked the ladder away from the wall. An arrow sailed into his shoulder.
    ‘Fight!’ he ordered the Murukans around him who had seen Kryst fall.
    Leaving his sword in the chest of one woman, he snapped the shaft in his shoulder and jammed the broken end into the neck of a Kyzantine with his back turned before another Murukan hacked him down. Clutching the hilt of his sword, he ripped it from his victim and ran forward to reclaim the rampart.
    Cronos wiped the blood off his sword and looked