That man fell writhing onto the floor, screaming and holding his head.  Allistor stepped in and fired point blank into the face of the man whose clothes were on fire.  His head exploded even as his weapon fired.  Allistor felt something tear at his side but ignored it.  He pumped another round into the shotgun, then slammed the stock into the other man’s nose just as he was sitting up.  The intruder fell onto his back, still screaming until Allistor jammed his shotgun barrel into the man’s mouth.  He felt several teeth break.

“Tell me who sent you here.” He growled.   Fuzzy, who had followed him into the room, put his snout inches from the man’s eye and growled as well.

The man wet himself.  He tried to speak around the shotgun, but couldn’t.  Allistor pulled the barrel back a few inches.  “Speak.”

“Justin!  It was Justin.  He’s outside with the others.  He made us pretend to be lost, so we could get in here and open the gates for him.  He wants your head.”

“Why does he want my head?” Allistor asked.  Then he immediately said, “Wait one.”

Pressing the shotgun back down against the man’s forehead, he said, “Sam!  These two inside are down.  Get our people up on the wall as quietly as possible.  I want to surprise our guests.”

Looking back to the man on the floor, he said, “Okay, why?”

“You killed his cousin, Evan.  Says you murdered him in cold blood when he wasn’t even armed.”

“That’s a lie, but it doesn’t matter now.”  Allistor looked at Fuzzy.  “Eat his face.” He cast Mind Spike again.

The man screamed as Fuzzy opened his jaws and roared.  The scream became a gurgle a second later.  Allistor had already turned toward the door and was on his way out, leaving Fuzzy to do what bears do.

Out on the wall, he found Sam, Michael, Ramon, and one of Luther’s guys climbing the stairs, with George crossing the open area a ways behind them, puffing hard.  Allistor cast Levitate on the old man then pulled him up onto the wall.   He gasped out a thank you and put his hands on his knees.

When Sam and the others reached him, Allistor mentioned for them to spread out.  He whispered, “Anybody got one of Meg’s grenades?”

Every single one of them held up one of the crystal balls.  Allistor grinned.  “Count of three, you guys soak them with that stuff.  I’ll light them up.  Shoot anything that moves down there.”   Heads nodded, and they all approached the front edge of the wall.  The red dots showed all but one of the enemy clustered near the doors below, still waiting for their friends to let them in.