The Search for Terror (ONC 2021)

Chapter 15

      Her country was flooded with soldiers dressed in Haglaiyan colours, coral and purple, pooling around the castle like a moat. Amaia didn't have a boat, but she was running on adrenaline and didn't care how deep the water was. She ran straight towards the bristling crowd.

      A life ring landed around her chest, Saqat's arms tight in their grip on each other to keep her back. "Amaia, they have weapons raised. If you storm in there, they'll call war." 

      "Do you expect me to apologise to them? This proves my point, Saqat," she shouted, voice growing with every word, "Taavetti's rule is the terror I have to stop!" 

      Saqat's grip only tightened, turning her round so that he was between her and the soldiers wrapped around her castle. "Fighting them will only cause more of it. Look at the people cowering in their houses, Amaia. Maybe you have to stop him, but not like this. I am not starting a war to prevent one."

      For the greatest warrior of her country, Saqat was driving her crazy with his refusal to fight. "Do you really think they'll listen to reason, Saqat? Look at them! Look at what that man sent after us!" 

      "Tell them you'll return the crown and leave him be," Saqat ordered, every bit the person who'd raised her through her teenage years.

      "They have forty of your friends locked up back there and you want to give them more power than they already have in this situation?" Amaia questioned, holding Taavetti's crown out beside her. "As long as I have this, I can win!" She knew she was grasping at straws, but she couldn't let the king win this. She couldn't let the terror continue. 

      For a while, they just stood there, staring at each other with both armies in the background. 

      And then an arrow took the crown from Amaia's head, ripping it from the hair she'd pinned so neatly—so tightly—around it. 

      Hand clutching her head, Amaia spun around, dropping the arm that held the king's crown. Saqat was in front of her in seconds, but she'd already caught sight of the new army marching towards them. She'd left the king with half his men back at his castle. She'd come racing after one half just to be tracked by the other. 

      She was penned between two armies with only two hundred soldiers to her name. Forty were imprisoned, sixty-two were a day away. 

      "Everyone, get inside the castle, now!" Saqat roared, throwing his arms round Amaia as a volley of arrows followed the first. Despite the accuracy of the initial shot, very few hit their target, and those that did ricocheted off his armour.

      As the archers loaded new arrows into their bows, Saqat had her men form a defence around her, marching straight for the human wall around the castle. From her position, Amaia couldn't see anything past the closest armoured bodies, but it wasn't long before the sound of clashing metal filled her ears. Shouts rose, grunts followed, normal men became fighters. 

      She'd seen battle before, had led small ones here and there to keep the waters calm. This was different. They weren't fighting to win; they were fighting to retreat. To survive. This wasn't one of her sketchbook plans—it was a fair fight. 

      And there were people dying everywhere. 

      She couldn't see them, and for that she was grateful, but she could feel it, like the air grew thinner with every body that dropped. Steel and stone clashed and clanged, scraping off one another to throw themselves back together. Howls of pain and anger burst from the chaos like geysers from hot ground. She clung to the noise that was Saqat's voice, calling out orders to those still standing. 

      Her feet still shuffled forwards, slowly edging towards the castle gates, until at last a hole had been made large enough in the enemy line for them to spring through, fleeing into safer territory. 

      While she was rushed upstairs to the throne room, half her army was left fighting to close the gates behind them. She turned away, running up the steps and throwing the doors open to reveal the mass of gold that represented her family's reign. She was stood at the wall of windows not a moment later. 

      Blood painted the streets paved with whispers of an innocent people. A people who had smiled and laughed and loved on those roads not three days previous. With the sun nearly buried beneath the Earth, everything was cast in a red-gold light, highlighting everything she wanted hidden. Soon it would be dark, and she wouldn't be able to see the bodies of the men she'd grown to know. 

      At last, the gates slammed shut, locked from the inside by an enormous bolt. It wouldn't hold the army forever, especially not with their second half mere seconds away from joining them, but it was enough for Saqat and the few remaining soldiers to run back into the castle, secure every door after them, and arrive at the throne. 

      "There're more," Amaia said, voice drained of all emotion as she tapped the glass where, for her, a third party marched forward. 

      Saqat was by her side immediately, "Third Platoon." She wanted to call him crazy, tell him those weren't their colours, but then she realised what he meant. Warrior Bashar wasn't leading the group, but he was certainly part of it. Their attempted takeover of the third country had failed, and they were being marched back as prisoners. 

      "Grab shields," Amaia ordered everyone who could hear her, it had been stupid to leave them behind in the first place, "And swap out your current weapons for bows and arrows, spears, throwing knives. Make your way to the towers and don't stop until they're all dead."

      A chorus of voices echoed, "Yes, Your Highness," and feet pattered out of the room. 

      "Amaia," Saqat said, his voice unsettlingly quiet. When she looked towards him, he was staring out the window in pity. 

      "What?"

      "They have Issar."