Melody of Mana

I wasn't as fast as the knights who led the way, and they certainly didn't want me to come with them, but I wasn't going to be denied. My tracker was strapped down to my side and deactivated, and I strode forward. I had armor, even if I almost never used it, kept from my own time at the academy and maintained over the years. It was in need of an update at some point, but for now it would do.

The current portal was smaller than the last, and our men had to pass through while ducking. Luckily I was shorter than most of them and with the briefest nod of my head I passed. Behind me blood was flowing as the soldiers I'd brought on slaughtered all resistance, before me... I didn't get a view of things until I had passed the gateway, and when I did I was unimpressed.

They'd set up a small room for passage but the defenses were pathetic. There were few guards, few enough that they were now all downed by the passing knights. I saw no automatic shutoffs, no grilles to cover the gate in case of emergency, even the doors were just that, just doors. The other gate pair was nearby, thankfully deactivated. That accounted for all three, Selene had made for them, excellent that they'd not deployed it yet.

"Knight," I said to one of the men who came through moments after me. "Take that back to the other side and get it up our tunnel, now," I pointed to one of the other gate pair, it would make a good backup in case we lost the active one.

"Ma'am," he responded, grabbing the item and hefting it upwards. I liked it when people didn't question me.

'No, bad Alana, no letting power go to your head. Remember last time.' I mentally chastised myself, it was a good idea to remind myself that I shouldn't be a tyrant periodically.

We appeared to be underground, and as I followed along in the trail of destruction I realized that our enemy had really gone all in. There were very, very few soldiers left behind, and those that were... well they fell like sheep before those I'd brought, and I'd only brought second rate soldiers myself. The enchantments were well done, but they were being broken one by one through sheer brute force. There was no need for subtlety here for us, and it wasn't like we actually planned to hold this place when it was all said and done.

However what I found as I made my way into the deeper halls and rooms wasn't warriors, but primarily women and children, huddling, waiting. They were here until their loved ones returned from a battle few if any would survive, husbands and sons, and a few daughters along to try and topple our empire. I supposed in a sense they'd succeeded, the emperor was dead, as was his family, but still their 'victory' had cost them everything.

Idly I wondered how things would have gone if I had surrendered to Lief. Most likely dad and Mystien would have just ripped him in half, but what if they too had lost their fights. What would he have done with his sister? What about his nephew who now lay cold without life. Would my own mother have survived? Would I in the end? I supposed it didn't matter, the past was the past.

Those that didn't fight were being taken as prisoners, and there were a lot of them. Since most were civilians we weren't just going to go on a rampage. There was no need to kill these people, so we wouldn't. Most of the empire's soldiers knew what it was like to be the repressed from their former lives, and the idea of mercy where possible had been drilled into them. I passed quickly and unopposed through dining halls and offices, and even a nursery.

That room, more than others disturbed me. It seemed there were several children here now dead. They were uninjured, at least on the outside. Their caretaker was here as well, a beheaded woman, near her lay a small bottle. The children in this room were not with parents, and were all dressed the same, and poorly.

"What happened here?" I asked one of our soldiers as he looked over the few crying babies.

"Not sure, nor about all these kids. That one," he spat on the body of the woman. "was poisoning them, got most of them before we got to the room. I'll never understand these people, why kill kids? Whose kids even are these?"

Another soldier, a bard and medic was going body to body, checking each. I didn't envy him, as I knew trying to put healing spells into the dead gave awful feedback, but he seemed to be taking it in stride.

"Got a live one, someone sing for me," he said, kneeling over a little girl, perhaps eight years old. The soldier and I both joined him for a moment or two as he pulled the poison from her, the girl's eyes fluttering open and up at him.

"I don't feel good, I wanna go home," the girl said, she had a bit of an accent, sounding almost like the people from Ice's End.

"Can you get them all out? Quick as you can in case we run into any other problems. Someone is going to answer for this," I said.

At his confirmation I turned and left, it would be a task, but I hoped they managed it, not like anyone was currently actively fighting between here and the portal.

Eventually I heard some fighting at the far end of one of the halls, and headed towards it. I found a small unit, one of the forward ones locked in battle with what looked to be the last bit of resistance in the base. This hall was separated from the others by thicker walls, and they appeared to have found something important.

Five soldiers in the old kingdom's colors faced off against three of ours. I was still singing up some lightning as one of ours fell, these men were stronger than the others, odd. They turned as they heard my voice and one caught a sword in the gut for his troubles. The remaining two imperial warriors blocked the hall, keeping them from charging me for the precious seconds it took for me to bring the thunder.

The bolt arced across the hallway and through my opponents, shaking the walls and flashing brilliant white-blue. It didn't kill them, but it did throw them enough for the men to finish the fight, blades falling on the knights who'd been stunned by my spell. Fights were like that sometimes, settled in an instant when one side got some advantage.

The soldiers quickly made sure of the opposition before nodding back and me and rushing the door.

That it turned out was a mistake on their part, as a red cone of fury slammed into them the instant they kicked the thing down. It wasn't long range, but even from well back I felt the heat as they were blasted by some ferocious fire spell.

I saw her there, framed in the charred doorway. She looked a bit like me, pale, blonde, blue eyes. But she was paler, her hair platinum to my own darker blonde, and her eyes ice to my sapphire. She was also quite a bit prettier than I was, a little taller, a little more lithe. She stood in a crown and white and blue gown. In a near perfect reflection her hands were surrounded by dark red flames. This had been the source of that last spell.

I also knew her, or of her at least. There had been talk that the Lief had taken a wife, the daughter of the former lord of Ice's End. There was some discussion about how that marriage had gone down. The people of that city didn't believe for a second that she'd gone to him willingly after he'd murdered her father and taken her city.

"Surrender, please, just surrender," I begged, if the rumors were true this was just another victim. Even if they weren't, I didn't want to kill this woman, what was the point? I'd come here for vengeance, but after all I'd seen, the sad state of the place and the dead, I was just tired now.

Her eyes were terrified, scared of who knew what. Maybe she'd been told we were brutes, maybe she feared what would become of her if she gave up, I didn't know, I couldn't know. What I did know was that she began forming another spell, the fires around her hands condensing into a sphere near her belly.

She was no battle-mage, and I wasn't going to give her a chance. I didn't want to kill her, but I valued my own life too. The power was already built and it was hardly an effort to let another bolt of pale blue death strike down upon her.

Unlike the guards, the soldiers, the knights, she had no defenses. She wasn't trained to resist magic, not to throw off any of the effect. She had no armor enchanted to keep her safe, just a gown. My spell blasted into the poor woman's body, and as it did so her own detonated in her hands, sending her sprawling back.

There were no other hallways breaching off of this one, no other directions to go, behind me was already cleared, so I strode forward, past dead men and into her room.

"Why?" I asked, looking down at her, she was gone, quite dead from either my magic or her own, eyes turned off to the side.

My answer came in the form of a small scream and the beginning of wailing from nearby. I followed her eyes to the cradle there, tucked back into a corner away from any lines of sight.

"Oh," I sighed in understanding.