It was only a short while after the main tower and wall had fallen. Benton's small force was still secreted inside the Aody tunnel. Their losses from the battle had been light, only two dead: Ensign Maleck and the giant Borial Thudd. Sitto was outside somewhere reconnoitering, Francesca had recovered from the shock of seeing Thudd blown to bits, and Benton was seeing to the rearmament of his troops for their next assault. They would try to penetrate the city proper and locate their missing Virgo crewmates. But their numbers were few and the city was big and the Horde were still numerous.
Suddenly, from deeper inside the tunnel, Benton heard a loud commotion coming closer. It was the sound of many running feet and angry voices and clashing metal. The Security details sprang to their feet and readied their crossbows.
From out of the darkness of the tunnel emerged the source of the racket: an angry mob of Aody! When Benton saw them he shouted, "Hold your fire!" The security men relaxed. The Aody at the head of the improvised Aody army was Gori. Benton recognized him immediately and greeted him courteously, "Hello Gori. I see you brought your friends. Where are we going in such a hurry?"
The Aody came to a halt. Gori addressed Benton, "To fight we are going. Defeat the Horde we must or never again free will we be." He shook his homemade weapon for emphasis.
Suddenly a thought entered Benton's mind. On their own, neither his force nor the Aody militia stood much of a chance of surviving an assault on Stonefist, but together they just might succeed. "Gori," began Benton, drawing Gori aside from the rest of the Aody. "I have a plan...."
Fifteen minutes later, the combined force of Benton's stealth team and the rag-tag Aody uprisers was making its way towards the crumbled walls of Stonefist city. Benton's men were to the left and right of the Aody column, armed with their crossbows and concealed from sight by their camouflage armor. The diminutive but determined Aody came up behind, ready to kill any of their long-time oppressors that were unlucky enough to come within reach of their weapons.
Surprisingly, there was no resistance, the area around the destroyed tower and wall seemed deserted. Benton and his snipers penetrated deeper into the city, heading in the general direction of the Inner Keep. Logically, any prisoners would be kept there. The Aody were spreading out a little too much for Benton's preference, but there wasn't anything he could really do about it. He trusted that their own instincts would see them through this situation.
Benton ducked from building to building. It looked like a residential district, and all the houses looked deserted. Apparently, the Horde had all been called away to the battle on one of the other fronts. He could see the other members of his team dodging between buildings, in and out of doorways, using any cover they could. Still there was no resistance from the Horde. Benton was beginning to get a little nervous. This was too easy. He glanced back at Sitto, and saw the same feeling in Sitto's face.
The security force was almost at the Keep, and the Aody were nowhere to be seen. Where were they?!? This was not in the plan! From far off in the distance, in the direction the Aody had gone, he could hear explosions. What was going on? No matter. He kept his attention on what he was doing. He picked up a clod of dirt and licked it. There was no trace of "Horde" in it. He dropped it back to the ground.
Benton crouched in the doorway of what looked like a blacksmith shop. Directly in front of him, across the wide barren 'killing zone', was the Inner Keep of Stonefist. It was constructed entirely of some sort of black, smooth, glassy stone. It's walls towered above this level of the surrounding city by hundreds of feet, and its turrets and spires were tipped with barbed iron spikes. As Benton's gaze was drawn upwards by the sweep of the Keep's architecture to the barbarous rooftop spikes, the roiling clouds overhead discharged lethal bolts of electricity which danced and arced from the sky to the spikes, and between the spikes themselves until finally being drawn to the ground around the sides of the Keep. A deafening "boom" instantly accompanied each blinding neon-blue blast.
Benton couldn't see any lights inside the Keep itself, all the windows and arrows slits were dark. And there was a column of smoke coming from the roof of the central Keep. Something's happened inside, he decided. He waved Sitto forward.
Sitto skidded to a stop in the shadow of the doorway beside Benton and said, "What's up?"
"It looks like the Keep's abandoned. We're going to storm the gate and look for the entrance to the dungeon," said Benton.
"I sure hope you're right about the 'abandoned' part!" said Sitto with a worried look at the still-menacing walls looming above them and the wide killing zone they'd have to run across before they got to the gate.
Benton saw the look and agreed with Sitto's sentiments. "You wait here. Cover me. When I signal, lead the rest of the men toward my position."
Sitto just said, "Good luck, Chief."
Benton acknowledged the admonition with a nod and moved off. Sitto took his place and aimed his crossbows at random windows in the Keep's stony facade just in case.
At first, Benton moved cautiously out from his shadowy hiding place. He was tense as a spring, ready to jump at the first sign of enemy attack. But no attack came. He moved farther toward the Keep's gate: still no attack. By now he was right in the middle of the killing zone, halfway between the town and the Keep, and feeling more exposed than he had ever felt before. He looked back at Sitto and the rest of his men. They were all jittery. He hand-signaled for two men to join him. Perhaps if the Horde archers above had more targets to shoot, they would attack. He saw Sitto and Kelowitz leave their protective positions and cautiously jog toward him. Still no attack. Benton decided to run the rest of the way to the Keep's gate. Once under the protection of its overhanging ceiling, he relaxed. Sitto and Kelowitz, taking their cues from Benton, also ran the rest of the way. They arrived safely, without any attack from above.
Panting, Sitto said, "Looks like you were right. Nobody's home."
Benton nodded in agreement. He signaled for the rest of his team to follow. He saw them emerge from every shadow there was among the huts and sheds at the edge of the village and start running towards the gate. All made it. Francesca arrived and parked herself at his side.
Benton said, loud enough for everyone to hear, "Men! We're here to rescue the Captain. No matter how many of us fall, some of us have to reach the dungeons to free him!"
Benton's challenge was answered by a roaring cry from the rest of his men. They held their weapons high as they bellowed their approval, apparently the Borials were rubbing off on them.
With that roar behind him, Benton shoved open the front door of the Inner Keep of Stonefist and stepped inside. It was dark. A few Virgos came forward and lit torches, they were prepared for anything. After progressing about 60 feet around several twists and turns, Benton decided that their crossbows would be all but useless. He gave the signal to be passed back down the line that everyone should switch to swords.
As they worked their way down the stone hallways, they passed a few doors along the way. These were always checked for occupants, but always came up empty. The keep indeed seemed to be completely deserted. Benton wondered at this.
At long last, he came across stairs that lead down. He tried to pear into the blackness below, but all was dark. This is it, he thought. Sword held rigidly before him, he began the decent, his security men close behind. Sitto was at his left with sword drawn, while Kelowitz was at his right. Francesca was behind, still armed with her two wrist-crossbows.
The stairs went down and down, and then went down some more. Then they turned a corner and spiraled down about ten times as far down as they had gone so far. The hall straightened, went down, turned a corner, went down, turned, went down, and finally bottomed out in a thirty-foot-square room. Benton guessed they must be at least 200 feet below ground. The torch-bearers spread out to fully illuminate the place. It was grim.
Barred doors around the periphery of this room suggested it was the central locus of the Keep's dungeon system. Most of the doors were open, and there were Horde corpses lying all over the place. A battle had taken place here recently; for some reason, there were bloody farm tools lying around. Another set of stairs along the opposite wall led back upward.
Benton ran for the new set of stairs. "Follow me!" he yelled. He and the rest of the Virgos charged up into the unknown. This set of stairs was not as dark as the first, apparently it was more often used. They finally burst out into a huge room. There were pillars all down the middle, and arched windows high up below the ceiling. Tapestries hung on the walls, and there was a massive stone throne atop a raised dais at one end of the room. A huge, golden figure was battling countless Horde near the throne.
Benton's men didn't need any orders. They ran screaming toward the Horde, swords flailing. The Horde were taken by surprise by this new attack from an unexpected quarter and were quickly cut down. Finally, only the golden giant remained. Benton made his way toward him. If anyone knew what was going on here, he did. Francesca was right behind him.
As Benton grew closer, he thought he recognized the giant. He was about to venture a guess, when his train of thought was interrupted by Francesca. Apparently she had recognized him too.
"But...but...but...but...you're...you're dea...dea...dead...," stammered Francesca. Her eyes rolled up, then snapped shut as she fainted dead away. Stiff as a board, she started tilting backward and toppled to the ground like a chopped tree.
Francesca was led to another room to recover. Meanwhile, the still-alive demi-god Thuddius explained to Benton that Stephen was no longer here, that he had been taken by the evil gods to the Dark Mountain.
"That settles it," said Benton. "I knew we would have to assault that hideous peak before we were done, and this clinches it. The battle here is nearly done. We need to regroup all our forces and march toward Dark Mountain."