The Ashen Wrath (Watty's SHORTLIST recipient 2018) CHAPTERED VERSION

*71

       

"I risked life and limb for that idiot brother of yours!" continued Sheln. "I travelled to the Obsidian Tower under the pretense of upgrading their outdated maintenance system. While I was there, I nullified Kooter's—"

"Kooper," I interrupted.

"Right, Kooper...I deactivated Kooper's nanobots to see if it would be sufficient to allow him to regain his will. It worked. He was my Guinea pig."

"What?" I asked.

Sheln rolled her eyes. "Test subject. If my machine didn't work on him, I had a backup plan to free you, directly. Luckily, everything panned out in the way I had envisioned."

"You expected TWO Thrall to take out 30 stilt striders, plus a serpent?"

"Right, I forgot about the sentry. Whoops." Sheln leaned on a table. "Well, I had faith in you and your brother. The stilt striders are designed to observe and enforce, not fight."

"They did a pretty damn good job," I argued.

"Sorry Danth, but I needed your help. Once the stilstries' routines get interrupted, their automated defense systems kick in and they make a beeline for The Walled City, which would have caused me a lot of trouble while I was in the midst of my coup. I was able to shut off the airdrones from here, but because the stilt striders are semi-autonomous, there's no way to control them remotely. Imagine my delight when you took down their entire infrastructure!"

"You're welcome," I groaned.

"Sheln, you didn't tell me any of this!" complained Daun, her face turning red.

"Easy, daughter...as I just told your boyfriend, the less you two knew the better. You both tend to fly off the handle."

"She isn't wrong," I told Daun, holding her hand tighter. The gravity of the situation was slowly dawning on me. "Does this mean we're free? The Thrall are free?"

Sheln sighed. "Well, even the best laid plans can go awry."