Page 25 of Fly to Fury
“Three. Two. One.” Fieran counted out over the radio. “Now.”
He pressed on the rudder bar with his feet as he tugged on the control column. His aeroplane turned, tilting partially upside down, before the nose pointed downward once again.
Merrik had performed the same maneuver, his aeroplanecoming out of the turn into the dive just in front of Fieran’s flyer, putting him in the lead and Fieran in the wingman position.
As they sped downward at the enemy again, Merrik aimed for the center of the fray.
Fieran reached out with his magic and found Merrik’s aeroplane. Fieran’s magic sparked over Merrik’s magic, which he had woven through the wooden frame and plant fiber canvas of the craft. Fieran gritted his teeth as he kept his magic from eating through Merrik’s magic and igniting the flammable canvas.
Fieran drew on his magic, piling it in his chest, in his veins, until he was shaking with it, his vision growing hazy and blue.
“Half-Breed Squadron, on my mark, head upward at full power.” Fieran’s voice felt rough with all the magic filling him. “Merrik, call out the range.”
Merrik, in the lead aeroplane, began calling out the distance. Fieran tried to breathe past his magic, running the mental calculations. If he called the order too early, the Mongavarians would have time to match the maneuver. Too late, and his pilots wouldn’t have enough time to react and put distance between themselves and the destruction he was about to unleash.
Almost…just a little more…
“Now!” Fieran shouted over the radio.
Aeroplanes flashed past him, heading upward, nothing but dark shapes against the brightness clouding Fieran’s vision. How would Fieran even know once his men were safely out of range?
Lt. Rothilion’s voice was a splash of cool calm against the rage of magic filling Fieran. “The squadron will be clear in three…two…one…”
“Now, Fieran!” Merrik’s shout rang in Fieran’s ears.
Fieran unleashed the magic in his chest, and it burst out of him in an explosion of magic, sweeping across the sky in a torrent of crackling obliteration in all directions except up. He yelled at the fury of it, clinging to the control he held over the magic wrapped around his aeroplane and Merrik’s by a slim thread.
His magic tore through men and machines, eradicating anything within its explosive tide. The edge of the magic stretched so far out and even downward that Fieran tasted the scorching sizzle as his magic lashed against the far greater power of the shield Dacha held over Fort Defense below.
Fieran peeled his eyes open. The earth rushed ever closer, his dive carrying him downward as if he was determined to drive himself into his dacha’s magic. He yanked back on the control stick, the force pressing him into his seat, a weight on his chest so that he had to clench his muscles to breathe through it. The wings of his aeroplane strained as he brought the craft to its structural limits.
He leveled out several hundred feet above where his dacha’s magic surged over Fort Defense. All around Fieran, burning and blackened bits of aeroplanes dropped in a macabre rain, incinerating as they hit his dacha’s magic.
A handful of Mongavarian aeroplanes limped across the boundary of the Wall. One of them was burning so badly that it immediately headed downward once it was over the border.
“Should we pursue?” Lt. Rothilion’s tone remained so unruffled he might as well have been asking about teatime.
“No.” Fieran released a long breath, trying to steady the shaking in his hands after wielding so much power. “Letthem tell their commanders to fear the Half-Breed Squadron.”
A few cheers met his words. Some whistles.
Another voice broke into the clamor. “Capt. Laesornysh, the Fighting Second is here to assist. Though I see we missed the party.”
Capt. Fleetwood flew his aeroplane with a second flyer behind him. Down below, more of the other squadron were getting ready to take off.
“Thanks for coming, but no assistance was needed.” Fieran lifted a hand to give the other captain a lazy salute that was more an acknowledgment than a formal gesture.
“Then we’ll take over the station here and leave you to your patrol.” Capt. Fleetwood gave a similar salute in return as his aeroplane passed Fieran’s.
Right. Their patrol. As much as Fieran wanted to land and walk off the adrenaline fading through his veins, he still had a long day of patrolling the border ahead of him.
“Flight A, report. Any injuries?” Lt. Rothilion spoke in elvish at nearly the same time as Merrik called out, “Flight B, report in. Anyone injured?”
One elf had taken a bullet to the shoulder while a few other pilots in both flights reported minor injuries.
Merrik and Lt. Rothilion sent the injured back to base and reconfigured the pairs to make sure everyone still had a wingman. Or wingwoman, as the case might be, since Flight A had some female elf pilots.
Then Fieran led the way south with Flight B falling in behind him, heading out for a patrol, as Flight A headed east along that border.
