There upon the wall, where darkness had bitten.

She was indeed within the city, and she was near the gate when the mighty explosion erupted.

There was a single, defying sound. It shattered what minor peace was left within the besieged city, shattering whatever hope had been held out, despite the engines of war that lay at their door. For the world now trembled, the country now shook, knowing that the enemy was truly at their door. Now, unavoidable, inevitable, resplendent.

Definitely, no longer hiding.

The gates blasted apart without mercy. Despite the wagon having never made it, the huge structures of iron and stone twisted, burnt, rent and were ruined, devastated, and blasted as the poison of nothingness, the void of destruction that appeared in a single globe (at least it would be reported later) exploded hatefully. And, just as towers and walls had been crushed by the ballistae and catapults, ancient stones that had held against Radasanth and Corone's enemies for many decades and centuries burst apart. The aged gate, strong, was suddenly gone. Stone flew, people screamed, the city cried out in a hollow, fearful voice. And the guards, so patiently and desperately guarding their home, were killed without any chance of survival.

"Oh ... my ... Drys above!"

She felt them, ripped from existence as if she had a personal connection to them. Indeed, she did, in spirit and in brotherhood, for defence of their city, but it could have been in mind and soul. Eight warriors, each under her command, were instantly killed; taken from the world and their wives and children. Taken from their city, their home and their lives. Eight - not the first to be taken, indeed, for others had been taken in the stonework that had so far been shattered by the siege engines - yet, the first so obviously, so dreadfully, so terribly.

So ...

She began to run. Directly, to the gaping wound in the walls of the city. In her wake Kerr Barren ran, the Major of the city guard who had since dedicated himself to her. In those few hours that they had been together now, he was hers. Until their possible death. As she ran she called commands as she passed warriors of the various tribes she had control of - the city guard, the Rangers of Underwood, the old imperial warriors of Corone, and those battle-trained whores of Radasanth who had volunteered. To some she told to stay and hold, to some she called to follow. Others, to the captains and generals, she gave little orders, and allowed them to use their instinct, especially the archers who would fire upon whatever army approached.

And some had approached. To destroy and rend the gates. Immediately, fiery arrows began to fill the sky, a wave as the faun of fauns ran past them. And as they came from one side of the non-existent gates, so did too they begin to rain from the other side. A volley of them, and then volley of normal arrows. Great crossbows on rotating bodies, small catapults that could not shoot as far as the siege weapons, yet fitted neatly upon the wall.

Philomel kept running. Over to the gap in the wall, where she aimed to defend what might come through with earth and sword. And as she did she called out with her mind.

My darling! she finally called out.

And deep beneath the earth, something stirred.

* * *

There upon where the earth rises, where the siege engines lie.

A wide, savage crack shockingly ripped through the ground. Ten feet long it caught the base and foot of a catapult, which jerked to the side beneath the irregularity. The stone ball it had been preparing to fire rolled out of the sling, crashing to the ground upon the toe of a siege engine worker. He let out a shriek, as painful as they came as the crack began to widen.

And from the rend there burst a horror. All mottled grey, brown, and khaki green. All scales and savagery and anger. All teeth and claw and fireless breath, who came like a doom and threw his jaws right around the first catapult. Straight into the wood and iron did he bite - a creature from another world. For the underground was his home, and tremors from the assault on the city had disturbed him. Simply, and without hesitation, he ran through the wood, splintering it and then swallowing what he had bitten whole. Then he dove, right back down into the earth. His long lithe body, purely built for burying and for war, dug once down into the soil, but only shallowly.

A line in the earth followed his movement, but he was fast, surprisingly so for his thirty foot of length. He snapped at the next catapult. And ate it. And moved to the next, chomping as he went. His skin was as tough as steel, his teeth able to eat mythril. Half a second did the people have before he dove and ate what he willed, and then he paused -

And roared. And a wave of sonic energy blasted out from him. They shattered wood fifteen feet away, and the very grass to tremble at its roots.

People fled.

For Delath had been released.

* * *

There within the Hall of Steel, where the Assembly waits.

Sebastian held onto his own. And he prayed that his dear wife, Harriet, would be well.

She at least had left the city. Like the Brotherhood had demanded of the Assembly, she had even left the country and gone to stay Akashima alongside other wives and lovers. Secretly had they gone, looking as much like refugees as anything.

But he - he could not abandon his home. He held onto a long curved knife, naked in the firelight as he and the other members hunkered in the back, windowless room that they had claimed as their place of defence. One single Assembly member, Gerard Carruthers, had been selected to wait in a secret location in the basement in a public house in the city, just in case the worst situation that they would all die in the siege. Or if the Brotherhood should win, and then he would rise as a voice for the people.

But for the rest of them, they held their own, surrounded by the greatest warriors that the city had to offer. For too long had they toiled to make their country the wavering democracy that it was, culling the empire, striving through a civil war. Ten Rangers of Underwood, ten knights, who had once been in the company of the Ixian warriors, and ten holy paladins who worshipped the local gods, stood around the corners of the three chambers. They were fully armed and eyed the single doorway. Through it was another room, this one with windows, and armed to the brim with crossbowmen.

Sebastian breathed slowly, and wished he could be part of the fight. But he and the others had to survive. They had to remain in secret, up inside this fortress with towers and the best defence. Surviving on stuffy bedspreads, salted pork and dried fruit. Water was brought up from a well below, and at every point in the way checked by a guard dedicated to the city.

It was as secure as they could be. In the circumstances.