“So, what’s your name?” Emilie asked once the others had left to go investigate the root cellar.

“Adeline,” the young girl replied.

“That’s a lovely name,” Emilie brushed some of the girl’s hair out of her face and straightened her collar.

Adeline was still crying but softly now as Emilie fussed over her. There were no signs of injury or mistreatment which was always a relief for Emilie when dealing with children. She was always surprised to find how common those things were for children. It seemed these farmers were a good sort who cared well for their children.

“And you said your brother’s name is Tomast?”

Adeline nodded.

“How old is he?”

“Four months.”

What else could she say? She wasn’t around children on a regular basis. She was glad Adeline and Tomast were alright, relatively speaking, and for their sake she really hoped their mother was as well. As far as their father was concerned, she could only hope his undead body was far away from here by now. There was no telling what such a sight would do to a young child. Adeline had already seen him die at the hands of the Tower of Light. She didn’t need to see Emilie and the others have to fight him as an undead.

Raised voices from the root cellar reached Emilie and Adeline, though they were too indistinct to tell what was being said. Emilie recognized the sound of magical fire exploding but didn’t explain that to Adeline. Instead, she conjured music into the air and drowned out the noise before Adeline realized what it was she was hearing.

“You must be hungry, would you like an apple?” Emilie pulled one out of her ration pack and began cutting it up with her dagger.

“Yes, please,” Adeline nodded her head eagerly and soon she was happily dancing to the music while eating apple slices.

Emilie made sure to feed Adeline slowly to make sure the apple lasted a good while since she only had the one. She smiled to herself while she watched Adeline dance and marveled at how resilient children were, sometimes. They could be living through something terrible and yet still find joy in dancing to a poor mage’s conjured music and eating apple slices.

The front door opened and Emilie raised her hand, ready to cast a spell if needed but it was Zeter, Kasyn, and Damarys, along with a weary and slightly drained looking woman Emilie assumed was the mother.

“Mommy!” Adeline cried and leapt at the woman who caught the girl and pulled her into a tight hug.

“Oh my sweet girl,” the mother stroked Adeline’s head, “I see you found an apple.”

“She gave it to me,” Adeline pointed back towards Emilie, who gave the woman a small wave and a smile.

“Thank you,” the mother said. “Now I suppose we should be on our way.”

“Emilie, this is Amber,” Zeter introduced the mother briefly. “They were just about ready to begin heading to market when the army arrived. Their wagon should be loaded with dozens of sacks of holding with enough food to keep the camp fed for a good while.”

“Excellent,” Emile grinned even more at that good news. “Where’s the wagon?”

“In the barn,” Amber replied with a significant look at Zeter and the others.

“Why don’t you get some things packed for you and your children,” Damarys suggested, “and we’ll see about getting the wagon.”

Damarys nodded towards the door and they left the family to get their things packed.

Once they were all outside and the door was shut behind them, Emilie remembered what she’d heard about the barn, how the undead dad had gone back in there after killing the Tower of Light soldiers. If they were lucky he won’t still be there, but chances were he’d still be around.

“We can’t fight him,” Zeter insisted. “I think we got lucky last time with the city’s defenses not kicking in.”

They approached the barn carefully, with Damarys in front. Emilie tried not to think too much about how quickly they could find themselves being pursued by the undead. Hands grabbing at them from beneath the ground, seeking to pull them under to slowly suffocate. It was a terrible way to die and one Emilie was in no hurry to experience.

“I see him,” Damarys muttered, pointing into the barn. “Behind the wagon, just standing there.”

“Looks like the wagon’s mostly loaded and the horses are still hooked up,” Zeter said. “They’re probably exhausted from being stuck there since yesterday but they should still be able to get us out of the city.”

Damarys signaled for them to back up and they retreated until they were back within the warded area.

“Ideas?” Damarys asked.

“I could sneak in and lead the horses out,” Zeter suggested. “As long as the farmer doesn’t get too interested in where the wagon’s going, he should move relatively slowly and I’ll get out of the barn before he can catch up. As soon as I’m out with the wagon, you all close the barn doors and bar them to keep the farmer contained.”

That put a lot of risk on Zeter, but it wasn’t a bad plan overall as far as Emilie was concerned and she nodded her head along with Kasyn.

“I can make you invisible while you’re in there,” Kasyn said.

“And I can make you silent,” Emilie added.

Damarys, who’d looked like she was about to object to the plan, now looked more favorable towards it.

“I’ll stay back here in the warded area,” she said, “and be ready with my sling in case the farmer attacks you.”

Zeter nodded and the three of them, Zeter, Kasyn, and Emilie, moved back up towards the barn. Emilie and Kasyn both touched Zeter and placed their spells on him, whereupon he vanished. Slowly, the barn doors opened wide and Emilie slid back along the front of the barn, ready to close her door once the wagon was outside. Kasyn did the same on the other side of the barn doors.

Inside, she could see the shuffling form of the farmer, currently in the back of the barn near the empty horse stalls. The wound to his chest was gruesome and she wondered why the soldiers had killed him. What threat had he posed to them? More importantly, why were they even here? This farm was nowhere near Akumu’s castle, nor was it even on the way to it, and there were no important buildings or landmarks on this side of Autay Wa.

The sound of the horses beginning to move brought Emilie out of her musings and she gripped the door in anticipation of shutting it. Nervously, the horses walked forwards as their leads were pulled by the invisible Zeter. In the back of the barn, the farmer looked up, hesitated, and then began to follow after the wagon. There wasn’t much of a difference between the speed of the horses as they resisted their leads, and the undead farmer and Emilie wondered if there would be time to shut the doors before the farmer made it out. Knowing how close it would be, she started closing the door even before the wagon was all the way out. Kasyn, noticing the same thing, did likewise, and as soon as the wagon was clear, they both rushed the doors closed. Inside, the farmer quickened its pace as it realized it was going to be locked in.

As the doors came to, the undead thudded against them and began trying to force them back open. The bar dropped into place as Zeter, still invisible, barred the door. Inside, the thudding became louder and louder until it abruptly cut off and the barn fell silent.

“I thought I was going to need to loose a stone at him,” Damarys admitted as she joined the other three at the barn doors.

Zeter reappeared a moment later and wiped sweat off his forehead. “I’m glad you didn’t,” he said, pulling a pair of feed bags from off his shoulders and fixing them onto the horses. “We’ll need to get them some water, too,” he added.

The mother and her children came out of the house a moment later and Adeline rushed over to the horses and began petting them while Kasyn and Zeter drew water from the well and filled a shallow trough for the horses to drink from.

“Poor things,” Amber said as she climbed unsteadily up onto the driving board. “They’ve had to stay standing this whole time, haven’t they.”

“They’ll make it alright,” Zeter assured her while he removed their feed bags so they could begin drinking from the trough.

The horses wasted no time and drank as fast as Zeter and Kasyn could fill the trough for them.

“We’ll give them a good rub down once we’re out of the city,” Zeter said, “then let them rest a couple days. After that we’ll need them to start plowing new fields.”

It took the horses a few long minutes to finish eating and drinking, and in the mean time Emilie and the others shared some of their rations with the family. Amber was particularly weary and weak and after a brief explanation of what had happened, she understood why.

“Is the food in the wagon going to be safe?” Damarys asked after some thought.

“It should be fine,” Emilie assured her. “Being in a sack of holding tends to protect against that sort of thing.”

Damarys and the others noticeably relaxed a bit more upon learning this.

“I think we can get moving now,” Amber told them and clicked her tongue get the horses attention.

Adeline and Damarys rode up front with Amber while Zeter, Kasyn, and Emilie rode on the back. Tomast, who’d also been fed, burped, and back to sleep, was bundled up and strapped onto Amber’s back for the journey.

“Keep your eyes open,” Damarys ordered. “This wagon’s going to make a fair amount of noise and we’re likely to draw some unwanted attention. Emilie can you silence the wagon?”

“No, it’s too big, sorry.”

“Try not to directly attack anything that comes our way,” Zeter added. “Slow them down, trip them up, anything like that.”

It was a tense group that left the farm. Everything was calm around them now, but they all knew how quickly that could change.

“If only we could ward ourselves like the farmhouse,” Kasyn said.

Zeter cocked his head and, after a moment, called out, “how was your home warded, Amber?”

“It was something the soldiers did when they first arrived,” she replied. “My husband didn’t want them making our home some kind of base so he went out and called the city’s greater undead. That was when…when they fought.”

No one else spoke after that until Kasyn pointed to the north where a group of undead were coming towards the wagon.

“There’s three of them coming from behind,” he warned. “Fast enough to catch us.”

“Let them get a bit closer and then I’ll trip them up,” Zeter said.

Emilie watched, a spell on the tip of her tongue just in case Zeter’s plan didn’t work. The undead were almost within arms reach of the wagon when Zeter threw what looked like a handful of wire at them. The wire expanded into a net and wrapped around the three undead who collided with one another and fell down in a heap. By the time they wriggled free, the wagon was far enough away that the undead had lost interest in it.

“We’ve got some more coming from the left, now,” Damarys warned. “Undead and a walking bush.”

“I don’t remember Akumu using awakened plants for his defenses,” Emilie noted. “You think it’s like what you found in the cellar?”

“If it is, we should be okay to attack it directly,” Zeter agreed. “Try setting it on fire and see if that’ll distract the undead.”

Emilie lobbed a ball of fire over to the bush and it caught quickly. As the fire consumed it, the awakened bush dashed around madly, lighting some of the undead on fire who then in turn began attacking the bush.

“How’re the horses doing?” Zeter asked as the group of undead and the awakened plant fell behind as they fought one another. “Think we could go a bit faster?”

“Perhaps,” Amber agreed and got the horses up to a trot. “We might make it to the gate in an hour at this pace.”

That was both welcome news since the journey on foot would take much longer, but also the idea of even an hour on this road was daunting. They’d been going for barely a few minutes and already had to deal with two groups coming after them.

“Conserve your magic,” Emilie warned. “Maybe try and outrun the smaller groups and save our strength for the bigger threats.

By the time the main gate was coming into view, the horses were moving at a dead run. The wagon had splintered boards along the back and sides where undead had battered it and Kasyn was unconscious, strapped down to keep him from falling off. Damarys and Zeter were both cut and bruised and Emilie was pretty certain she’d pushed herself too far with her last spell and was at risk of internal bleeding if she tried to focus any more magic through herself today.

That was the good new.

The bad news was they were being pursued by a horde of undead, elementals, and awakened plants. Occasionally the undead and elementals would notice the awakened plants and attack them, but for the most part they moved as one enormous mass in pursuit of the wagon. Adeline was hoarse from screaming but still she managed to wail in terror as she clung to her mother. For her part, Amber was silent and focused on the job of keeping the horses under control as best she could. The beasts were nearly mad themselves and sometimes would pull to one side or the other but Amber always got them back to the middle of the road where it was easiest for them to pull the wagon. Tomast was also awake and crying loudly but there was nothing anyone could do for him right now.

“I’m out of stones for my sling,” Damarys announced after pegging an undead who’d gotten too close to the wagon.

“I’m at risk of going down like Kasyn if I channel more magic,” Emilie said. “I can throw maybe one more spell but then someone’ll need to be ready to catch me and tie me down.”

“Besides throwing sacks of food at them, I’m out of ideas,” Zeter said. He was beginning to bleed around his eyes like Emilie and Kasyn from the over channeling he’d been forced to do.

“We can make it,” Amber called out. “Just need another minute and we’ll be at the gate.”

The guardians from the city shouldn’t be able to leave the city, unless those parts of the magic were damaged as well. But since no one had seen any of them leaving the city yet, the assumption was there that they were still bound to it.

“Alright,” Emilie called back, “I’ve got one last spell I can throw at them. It should buy you enough time. Zeter, get ready to catch me when I pass out.”

He tossed a loop of rope around her waist and tied it to the side of the wagon, then put an arm around her, ready to take her weight.

Emilie had only over-channeled this badly once before and it was during a class specifically to show students what over-channeling was like so they could know their limits. Her veins burned as she pulled more magic into herself and focused it into the form she needed. A cloud began to take shape over the hoard, moving with them, as Emilie’s eyes screamed with pain. She hoped she wouldn’t go blind from this. Lighting began to flash down from the cloud, striking the front line of the hoard and making them stumble, tripping up the ones behind them. The hoard was having difficulty keeping up as the storm raged around them, buffeting them with wind and rain and lightning. The distance between the wagon and the hoard increased, meter by meter. She kept the spell going for as long as she could until the pain in her head reached its peak and she cried out as everything went dark.

Emilie ended the spell before she lost complete consciousness, sparing herself any lasting damage, and let Zeter catch her as he legs gave out and her body spasmed as the last of the magic left her body. She was only somewhat aware of the motion of the wagon beneath her, voices speaking, and she tried to fight the urge to drift fully away.

The wagon stopped and Emilie tried to open her eyes to see if they were safe or not. The more towards consciousness she went, the more pain she felt and the harder it was to want to wake up. Yet she didn’t want to die like this. If she could buy even a moment more for Adeline and Amber and Tomast, she would.

“Grh,” she grunted as she forced her eyes back open.

The world was blurry and tinted pink from the blood in her eyes. Shapes were moving in and out of focus and none of it made sense.

Someone was speaking close by to her and she got the impression they were talking to her but who it was or what they said she couldn’t tell. Next thing she knew, a hand was lifting her chin and pouring a cool liquid into her mouth. There was no sensation of taste but she swallowed and felt strength reentering her mind and body. It was not a rapid change, but certainly faster than her natural ability to recover from over-channeling.

“…we…safe?” she managed to croak.

“Yes,” came the reply and she was pretty confident it was Damarys who spoke.

Emilie let herself build up her strength a moment longer before trying to see again and this time her vision wasn’t so blurry. It was still hard to look too long at any one thing but at least she recognized the gate and Kamillus flying about.

“You’re all guilty of crimes against the city,” he was saying, “and I can’t let known criminals go.”

Behind them, the hoard was held at bay by Kamillus’ authority, but he was bound by the city laws.”

“We were running for our lives!” Zeter exclaimed. “We wouldn’t have attacked the city guards if they hadn’t been insane and trying to kill us for no reason.”

“The law holds no exceptions for uncontrolled guards,” Kamillus sighed. “The law demands its justice.”

“What about this,” Damarys said in a hurry. “For our crimes we must perform community service. And for that service we must deliver this wagon of food to the camp of survivors.”

“Well normally it’s Nyla who pronounces punishments,” Kamillus’ face contorted in disgust at saying her name, “but since she’s not here, and since I like you Damarys,” he tapped the bracelet she’d given him earlier, “I think community service would suffice. I have judged!”

His voice echoed strangely and the wagon, previously halted by the magic of the gate, was allowed to roll onward once again.

“Oh good,” Emilie sighed, “we didn’t die.”

With that knowledge in mind, she allowed herself to pass out and get the rest she dearly needed.