Chapter 55: 55. We Led Ourselves to This
Glacielle moved to his left and drew both frost fans. He could feel the bond between them hum, and there was no need for words; they just sent and received intent.
The ice magic came out in two arcs that caught both forward heads in the middle of their shift and locked them in place. The Harvester’s roar of pain was so loud that Lucian could feel it in his chest.
Marshal was already on the move. Solar Step put her at the creature’s chest in less than a second, both Dawn Reapers at full power, solar magic blazing, and Solar Execution hit the core with a sound like a struck bell.
The core broke. The fracture let purple light leak out in threads that disappeared into the air.
The Harvester staggered back, and their heads hit the ice prisons, which was enough to break two of the freezes. It screamed again, but this time it was different.
It was less angry and more like it was hurt. Its arms went up and the mouths in its palms opened wide.
The purple beam attacks spread out over a wide area of the battlefield, not aiming at anything specific but covering enough ground that accuracy wasn’t needed. Octavia’s barrier went into full engagement mode, and the water lit up when it hit her.
The synchronization link displayed her dropping HP, revealing the immense pressure she was under.
Lucian didn’t give it any thought. He synced with her, fully opening the link and sending his own health and defense into the shared space.
The barrier remained strong, absorbing the beams without faltering. Octavia emitted a sound that conveyed both surprise and gratitude.
"I’ve got you," he said.
"Aw~! My hero..."
...
After fifteen seconds, the combined barrier shattered the Harvester’s beam attack. The creature appeared both injured and disoriented, with energy leaking from its damaged core in a relentless trickle that clearly couldn’t sustain itself.
It opened a purple portal under itself and pulled back into the breach, following its instincts.
"Marshal! Glacielle! Combined ultimate!" was all he shouted, and the situation became immediately clear.
When the Harvester went through the portal, Glacielle’s Frozen Prison went up around it, trapping it between the wall and the retreat. Marshal’s solar nova was huge and happened all at once. It was a blast of heat and light that made everyone on the wall cover their eyes.
In the same moment that the nova hit, Lucian drove the ice-enhanced blade into the cracked core. All three impacts happened within half a second of each other.
BAM!
The core broke into pieces.
The Harvester melted away, the forty feet of nightmare collapsing into itself and then into nothing. The purple portal winked out when the anchor that had opened it disappeared.
For a moment, the only sounds were the wind and the sounds of battle far away on the eastern and western fronts. There was also the special kind of silence that happens when a lot of people stop making noise at the same time.
Then the defenders started to cheer, and it was the kind of cheering that people do when they don’t think something is possible but then see it happen anyway.
Lucian got down on one knee. His legs had just finished the argument they had been having since the chimera fight, and they had won.
He put his sword hand on the ground and took a deep breath. The tiredness that had been following him for two days caught up with him and sat on his shoulders.
Before he could finish his first breath, Marshal knelt down next to him. She put her hand on his back, just like she had when he was training and had overdone it, but the touch was different this time.
"We won," she said.
"Did we?" he asked.
Then he heard the cheering still going on around him and felt Glacielle’s relief through the bond. He knew that, for now, they had.
"Oh yeah...! Phew! We did!"
"It was all thanks to your plan," Marshal said. "Especially your command that brought us here to this victory."
He looked at her, and she looked back at him, and the professional mask was present but thinner than it had been that morning, worn down by the day until the person underneath it was clearly visible.
"We led ourselves to this," he said.
She didn’t argue.
...
The capital gave them guard barracks quarters for the night. This was a military space that was functional and plain, but it had real walls and roofs and the comfort of a place that wasn’t moving.
The war council was planned for the morning. The southern front was made more stable.
Helena said she was cautiously optimistic that they would be able to hold out until sunrise because the news of the Harvester’s defeat had spread through the other fronts.
In the small common room of the barracks, four people sat around a table and ate real, hot food that wasn’t rationed or cooked over a fire in the middle of nowhere. Lucian ate more of it than he thought he could.
It was the first real meal he’d had in two days.
"You were amazing today," Glacielle said to him, with the directness she used for things she really meant. "Not just the fighting, but the way you led us all."
"I’m so proud that my master keeps improving, being the real master!"
"Well, to be honest, I was scared most of the time," he said honestly.
"Good commanders usually are," Marshal said from across the table. "Fear can be a source of valuable information. What truly puts you at risk is overconfidence."
"Ara ara, and here I thought you were giving him a compliment without the footnote," Octavia said, but she was smiling when she said it.
"I was indeed giving him a compliment; the footnote provided additional information."
"Master protected ME today," Octavia said, turning to Lucian with a warmth that she usually hid behind teasing but was letting show this time. "Through the barrier..."
"I felt it through the synchronization." She tilted her head in a way that was neither the ara ara angle nor anything else; it was just real. "Thanks, sweetheart."
"You held that barrier the whole time," Lucian said. "I only helped carry it for a minute."
"You held it when it mattered." She looked at him with her half-lidded ocean-blue eyes, which usually held layers of mischief but were now holding something much simpler. "That’s what family does."
Marshal was quiet for most of the meal. He ate quickly and listened to the others, but he didn’t talk as much as usual.
Lucian saw her without really seeing her, thanks to his peripheral awareness and the constant partial synchronization that was always there at the edges of his perception.
She was thinking about something. He could tell by how still she was sitting, like someone who has made a decision and is waiting for the right time.
Lucian recognized planned choreography when he saw it. After the meal, Octavia said she was going to sit by the water barrel outside for a while to think, and Glacielle stood up and stretched and said she was going to check on her weapons maintenance. He didn’t say anything about it.
A moment later, Marshal stood up.
"I’ll take first watch," she said, sounding like she wanted to be alone with her thoughts and was using duty as a way to do it.
Lucian watched her walk away.
He looked at Glacielle, and she looked back at him and said softly, "Go to her."
"Tonight, after she’s had some time to think about it," Glacielle said, pausing for a moment. "You already know she needs you."
"Are you sure?"
Glacielle lightly touched his face once. "I’m sure."
"She’s been alone for centuries, Lucian, and she’s been carrying it the same way I carried mine."
"And you know what it felt like when you finally saw me." She looked at the door Marshal had gone through.
"Give that to her."
