Crouching at a new window further away from the golem, he could see only its left side, but it had not moved.
A new fog shimmered beside the impassive golem, a tall oval of still foggy greyness. The stern features of his queen pressed through it, it too looked misty and grey, like a face pushed through a dense paper of cobwebs. This face was as tall as the golem creature and Werik could see traces of the gatehouse through its almost transparent cheeks. The queen’s giant eyes opened to calmly regard the armoured titan. It did not react. Werik thought perhaps that he should hide; cover himself with furnishings from the cluttered warehouse he found himself in, surely his queen planned some great and dangerous spell to destroy this golem. But he watched in an awed trance, as his queen seemed to inhale, her mouth widening and nostril slits closing as she gathered a silent breath. Then she blew, exhaling at the golem a mighty wind. The golem teetered and the dirt and hay strewn about the cobbles was blasted from his view. The humans disappeared from the battlements with muted cries of dismay; one lost a feathered hat, halfway to the ground the great wind swept it from sight. The wind was beginning to wrap itself around the golem, to become a tube of rushing air twisting it around on the spot it stood. The golem seem unprepared for such an oblique and intangible assault, its barbed fists tried to part the wind, to claw it open like a badger escaping a sack. It tried to orient upon a solid enemy, something it could crush and stomp. The wind whipped around it with an increasing pace, the queen was still exhaling an impossibly long breath. Werik gasped, he had been holding his own breath as he watched her exhale and now the demands of his body forced him to pant a while. Finally, the queen stopped, her lips relaxed and closed, her face impassive once more. The wind had become a visible funnel of howling air, the golem spinning a little slower inside it, its flat feet scraping and bouncing from the gore soaked cobbles beneath it. Gradually it gained height and tilted to one side until its feet pointed one way and its flailing arms the other. The great vortex drifted lazily into the castle wall and the golem battered upon its stones noisily. The queen watched with calm amusement, as the little tornado swept the golem into crenellations, buttresses and towers. The battered creature still struggled with the air, even after a merlon had sliced its left leg away. Faster it spun, until at last the wind funnel seemed to lose its grip on its violently whirling captive. It flicked the golem toward the gatehouse at some speed. Werik heard the crash over the screaming wind as the golem struck an arrow slit on the west tower of the gatehouse. Werik winced instinctively and when he looked back, he found its body had become wedged partway through the wall. The wind vortex returned to its point of creation, hovering in front of the queen’s disembodied face. Werik could just make out the bottom half of the golem; the rest seemed embedded in the gatehouse wall. One leg was still intact and it groped blindly for some kind of purchase from which to move itself, but found none. Soldiers emerged from in and behind buildings cheering the queen and her devastating display of arcane power. However, her majesty was not finished. For a second time her nostrils closed and she seemed to be taking a large breath. A few hairy human faces appeared on the walls of the inner keep and several arrows passed without slowing through the queen’s translucent and incorporeal face. The queen blew her second great breath into the compact tornado she had created. This time she blew a thick purple smoke, it curled out into the vortex filling it until it was a violet funnel, dancing and twisting before her. The purple fog did not seem to leak out or fade, it remained held suspended perfectly in the magic whirlwind. The queen turned a little to face the inner keep and the vortex shot forward and through the portcullis. It disappeared into the keep and the queen’s face slowly sank back into the grey fog. The castle seemed almost silent; the oval of mystical fog gradually vanished. Werik crept to the door and found Soriv there, scanning for trouble. They both approached the gatehouse, taking cover behind the same cottage from which he had watched the golem battle his soldiers. He saw no whirlwinds or coloured smokes and there was no other sign of magic. The golem was still lodged in the wall, its foot searching for solid ground; obviously, its arms were incapable of pushing it free – if it still had arms. Werik sensed Marik getting closer; he was leading his men toward the inner keep.
Soriv turned and commented. “I see no humans.”
Werik squinted through his spider-silk veil at the keep and noticed a pale purple fog issuing from a few of the upper towers. He pointed. A shuttered window on the inner bailey crashed open and a human leaned out. She gave a single weak cough then slumped, head and arms dangling from the sill. A thin smoky haze drifted from the window above her. A similar haze seemed to surround the inner keep now, issuing from every window and arrow slit. Werik and Soriv exchanged looks of surprise. Gurneyhill Castle was theirs, the outer wall breached, the village burnt and ready for looting. The inner keep a silent tomb.
THE END
About the author:
I live in sunny Perth, Western Australia. I work in security and I.T. My interests include military history, physics, strategy gaming, martial arts, sketching, engineering, comedy, game theory and etymology. I like to read about unusual settings and bizarre worlds that are a little outside the regular comfort zone. I like to contemplate the impossible and wrap my head around alien places and unorthodox inhabitants. I primarily write sci-fi or sword and sorcery.
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