It was hard to imagine, how the fate of so many could rely on the actions of so few. On a plan so haphazard, in a time so short.

Yet his voice did not tremble when he yelled the order.

“Impetus!”

Attack.

They heaved forward, the rickety wheels and rusted axles of the cart complaining as they trundled over the uneven ground. They edged ahead, picking up speed, Cade’s world in shadow as shields clattered above their heads.

There were no war cries, no whistle of arrows. Only the heavy breathing of his compatriots, amplified beneath their fragile shell of wood and iron.

Still they went, feet pounding the path, the cart juddering beneath the weight of the cannons. Cade stared through the ever-shifting crack of the shields above, their thin protection shifting as they shoved the cart forward. The fortress loomed large, its rust-tinged peaks dark against the black sky.

Then it came. A whine, buzzing over his head like an angry bee before a woody thunk sounded behind him. More projectiles hissed by, rattling and banging as they ripped into their formation.

A scream tore at his ears, and moonlight washed through as a man behind him dropped away, only for darkness to return as another stepped into his place.

There was no time for mercy, no time to think of anything but getting to those doors.

“Go!” Cade yelled. “Go, go, go!”

The world turned dark as they entered the fortress’s shadow, and now the scattered projectiles turned into a torrent. His arm numbed as the shield above splintered and shuddered, a spear tip erupting through to glint before his eyes, slicing his wrist to the bone.

He felt no pain, only the frantic beating of his heart.

“Faster,” he yelled. “Come on!”

The cart’s wheels crackled as they entered the rocky foreground of the doors, and now Cade shoved with all his might, Quintus heaving beside him.

And then the thud of the doors. Men pressed into his back, momentum crushing him against the cart’s rear, his shield pushing up into the straw to leave him exposed.

He could hear the fluting calls of the enemy above and around him, and a rock thudded down behind him. Blood sprayed his hair.

His hand grasped the torch, and touched it to the trailing twine coated in gunpowder that ran into the main cannon’s touch hole.

Light flared, casting the gateway in a flickering glow, as men sobbed and yelled at the torrent of spears, rocks, and arrows that tore at them.

The light sputtered out, the flame disappearing into the cannon’s top, leaving its charred remains behind.

One second.

Two.

Boom.

CHAPTER

26

The explosion sent the cart barreling back, the world flipping as Cade fell into a mass of fallen men. Smoke billowed, filling the cave-like doorway with acrid fog.

Cade staggered upright, his arm aching as he stared through the gray mist, where the metal doors had bent back to the walls and revealed a tunnel beyond.