Chapter 6 - The Siege Begins
Above ground, the city of Aurelian was in utter turmoil.
Prince Adrian stood at the edge of the lower market square, surrounded by three massive, iron-reinforced battering rams and five heavy catapults loaded with incendiary pitch-pots. Hundreds of royal soldiers had forced the common citizens out of their homes, turning the neighborhood into a warzone.
King Robert arrived on horseback, his royal guard trailing behind him.
"Adrian! What are you doing?" King Robert demanded, pulling his horse to a sharp halt. "You have deployed war engines inside our own capital! The people are panicking!"
"The people are harborers of traitors!" Adrian shouted, his eyes bloodshot, his hair disheveled. He had completely lost his calm, refined demeanor. The humiliation at the arena had shattered his fragile pride. "That boy is a poison to my throne! As long as a child of Richard breathes, my right to rule will be questioned by every lord in the kingdom!"
"He is a ten-year-old child, Adrian!" Robert yelled. "We can capture them! We do not burn down our own city!"
"I am the future King!" Adrian screamed back, turning to the master of artillery. "LOAD THE PITCH-POTS! AIM AT THE CATCOMB ENTRANCES! BURN THEM OUT!"
The artillery officers hesitated, looking at King Robert for orders.
Adrian drew his sword and instantly ran it through the chest of the nearest artillery officer. The man gasped, falling dead into the dirt.
"ANYONE WHO DISOBEYS ME DIES WHERE THEY STAND!" Adrian roared, pointing his bloody sword at the catapult crews. "FIRE!"
Terrified, the crew pulled the release levers.
FOOSH! FOOSH! FOOSH!
Massive wooden arms swung forward, launching giant iron balls wrapped in burning oil-soaked hemp straight into the ground structures leading into the Under-City.
The explosions rocked the catacombs below. High walls collapsed, crushing wooden homes and trapping hundreds of innocent citizens who lived in the lower slums. Flames licked up the ancient stone pillars, filling the air with thick, suffocating smoke.
Down in the dark, chaos erupted.
"The roof is giving way!" an outlaw soldier screamed as a massive stone block crashed down, shattering a rope bridge.
"Clara! Evacuate the civilians through the southern aqueducts toward the river!" Brandon ordered, drawing his meteor-steel sword. "William, stay with Clara!"
"No!" William yelled, stepping up beside his grandfather. "I'm not running anymore! You taught me that a Vance never turns his back on his people!"
Brandon looked down at the boy. For a moment, he saw the face of William's father—brave, stubborn, and filled with an unshakeable sense of justice. A proud smile broke through the old general’s rugged face.
"Alright, lad," Brandon said, stringing a light hunting bow and tossing it to William. "Then we take the fight to them. We hit the artillery before they destroy the foundation of the city."
"How?" Clara asked, stringing her own bow. "There are over five hundred soldiers guarding those engines in the market square!"
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William looked up at the high, narrow ventilation shafts that ran from the underground catacombs all the way up to the roofs of the city market buildings. The shafts were narrow, filled with smoke, and treacherous.
"They expect us to come out of the ground," William said, his eyes glowing with tactical intelligence far beyond his ten years. "They don't expect us to come from the sky."
