From his vantage point atop his horse, Helias had a horrifyingly clear view of the Erisdalian cavalry slamming into their army’s vanguard and the Royal Guard. He could see the regiments around the king just buckle and flee. Sabres, swords and poleaxes struck down on his fellow Alavari. The crack of the distant pistols and carbines boomed in his ears.
“Prepare charge!”
“Sir—”
“Saika, we’re going to be crushed if they continue on! Cavalry prepare charge!” Helias bellowed. When his young orc aide-de-camp stared at him, the general groaned. Reaching over, he slapped Saika’s armoured shoulder so hard the orc jolted. “Hurry!”
“Yes milord!” The orc rode off, bellowing orders. Helias continued to shout at his officers and troops. He even drew his sword and waved it in the air to try to urge his cavalry into a diamond formation.
While he did so he could see the battle ahead continue to devolve into chaos. The group of Royal Guard around Thorgoth were being pushed back with the routing troops. General Augusta’s entire second infantry division was in flight. The harpy-ogre was hovering over the Royal Guard, trying to yell at her soldiers to fight, and also calling in harpies to harass the enemy cavalry. The harpies however had been pulled back away from the foot of the Third Terrace’s walls. It would take time for them to engage the Erisdalian cavalry.
That left Helias’s cavalry right behind the main infantry force. Their way ahead was obstructed by the defensive trenches and fleeing soldiers, but at least the soldiers were jumping into the trenches to get out of the cavalry’s way. Glancing to both sides, he found his cavalry lined up and ready. Muttering a Word of Power, he brought his Fangroar up and channelled his magic into the blade.
“To the king!”
With cheers ringing, the cavalry leapt forward, Helias at the tip. Casting a shield atop himself, he watched his mean break into a gallop toward their king’s position.
Somehow, the Erisdalian cavalry that had appeared from seemingly nowhere, were still coming. They were not fully engaged with the Royal Guard. Their charge had lost its momentum, but they’d put enough soldiers to flight. The Erisdalian cavalry had cut those soldiers and Guardsmen attacking the fortification on the main road from the Thorgoth’s Royal Guard. They were taking full advantage of it, firing pistols point blank into the enemy, before lashing out with poleaxes and sabers. Bolts of magic continued to pound the Royal Guard from the Third Terrace and the knot of protectors was growing smaller and smaller.
Thorgoth stood amidst them. Helias could just recognize him by his crowned helmet, but then suddenly, his voice boomed over the cacophony.
“So Erisdale resorts to low cunning and trickery? Well then, come and get me!” The King waved his wand. A blazing fireball coming straight at him was dissipated with a violet shield. Laughing, Thorgoth started to cast at the Erisdalians. His second spell, some kind of blasting spell, wiped out a dozen knights in an instant with an explosion that sent a column of flame into the air.
There was a brief instant that Helias could see the shining Erisdalian knights falter. Their swordstrokes slowed. The galloping horses that circled King Thorgoth’s guard seemed to shy away from the king.
But then, another crowned figure, a human woman in full plate with a brilliant blue tabard screamed. “Then let’s kill him! Kill him and end this war!”
The man close to her, raised a sword with a ruby-red pommel. “Kill him and end this war!” He roared. He also had a gold crown atop his helmet.
“Kill him!” echoed another human knight
“End the war!” screamed a female knight in the formation.
“Kill him!”
“End the war!"
“Kill him and end the war!” howled the Erisdalian knights. No, not just Erisdalian knights. Helias suddenly realised these were the Erisdalian Royal Guard, the equivalent to Thorgoth’s own, led by their lieges into battle.
No, he had known. He remembered recognizing the red pennants with the grey hawk and blue falcon. He just didn’t believe that the king and queen of Erisdale would throw their best troops to kill Thorgoth without an escape path. He couldn’t believe they were now in the thick of it, rallying their knights into a frenzy.
A wave of harpies now plunged down toward the Erisdalians. Magic from the walls and from mages who’d accompanied the knights broke their charge, and forced many to turn away. More Alavari fighting the soldiers defending the makeshift ditch and wall on the road peeled away to make for the king, only for the defenders, more Royal Guard, to leap the wall. Using the dead bodies that filled the trench, they went after their former attackers. Helias briefly spied a one-armed mage firing what looked like an acid spray all over the backs of the retreating Alavari.
The Erisdalian knights continued to fight. Many taking pistol and musket shots point blank range, their heavy armour keeping them safe. Brutal strikes to their heads and to cripple their horses was needed. Even as the knights fell from their horses, or were dragged off their mounts by halberds, they fought. They stabbed at their attackers feet with daggers. They flung themselves into the Alavari as they died, impaled by pikes. Helias saw a massive ogre Royal Guard smash his warhammer into the Erisdalian knight’s side, only for the knight to fling himself forward. Hands holding onto a blade with a broken tip, the knight stabbed it into the ogre’s unarmoured armpit.
Alavari Royal Guard were falling. They were falling as the Erisdalians ground forward, engulfed by flame from Thorgoth. Killed by point blank musket fire. Overwhelmed by furious strikes from the harried, panicking Alavari Royal Guard.
Thorgoth was unleashing magic like nothing Helias had ever seen. Furious bolts of magic lifted Erisdalian guardsmen off their mounts or punched holes right through them. Even glancing strikes would catch a limb and wrench it at awful angles.
And yet, the Erisdalians just kept fighting.
Helias, somehow on autopilot, still guiding his horse to leap over the trenches, finally entered the battle with his cavalry. Unable to fire their own guns for fear of hitting their allies, they crashed into the Erisdalians.
Helias lost sight of Thorgoth for a brief moment as he fought his way to the king. Yet even as he whirled, dancing with his first opponent, a bloody, wailing Erisdalian knight, he felt the weight of the blows against his blade almost unseat him from his horse. Were they under some kind of spell? Had they taken some kind of super-strength potion? What was driving these soldiers?
He only managed to survive through setting his Fangroar afire and setting his enemy’s saddle and uniform alight. Even then, the knight continued to try to land blow after blow on him, even managing to hit him in the side. The blow hit his cuirass and knocked the wind out of him as the knight’s horse threw his opponent, who slammed into the ground. Helias ended his enemy with a pistol shot to the head and continued on.
Somehow, the King and Queen of Erisdale were nearing King Thorgoth who was trying to cast spells and also blocking distant strikes. He heard one of them, a lightning bolt from Frances Stormcaller. That left General Augusta to fight the Erisdalians and try to stop the now dismounted pair. The harpy-ogre swooped and wheeled around the pair, firing pistols at them and lashing out with a heavy sabre. However, the tandem bladework of both kept driving her back. Pulling up and then plunging back down, August managed to land a blow on King Jerome’s helmet and cut off one of the gold florets.
Helias bellowed out a warning, but it was too late. His colleague tried to fly away, but the King had seized her claw. His queen wasted no time in throwing one of the daggers hanging from her belt into the harpy-ogre’s wing. As Augusta screamed and fell, Helias galloped toward her, but the still slightly groggy King Jerome buried his longsword into her throat, silencing the general.
Meanwhile, the queen had sighted Helias. She’d pulled out a pistol and sighted it. Helias ducked, raising a shield as she fired.
Instead of hearing the expected ping of a bullet against his shield, Helias found himself weightless in the air. Leaping off his dying horse, he hit the ground so hard he heard his leg crunch.
Still, the tauroll managed to struggle to his feet with his Fangroar. Hissing, he touched his leg and whispered a spell to numb the pain and bind his bones together at least temporarily. He couldn’t die here.
But the Erisdalian royal couple had eyes for only one individual, King Thorgoth.
He stood, helmetless. His crown and helmet had been blown off by a barely blocked lightning bolt from Frances Stormcaller. His Royal Guard occupied with the Erisdalians, who even now, outnumbered being caught and cut down, continued to fight.
“Nobody interferes. I’ll deal with these two cunts myself,” Thorgoth growled.
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King Jerome raised his sword to guard, and…Helias blinked. Was the king laughing?
“I thought you’d call me worse!” King Jerome lunged at Thorgoth. He was fast, in his prime and fit. A rather fine specimen of a human. The king’s bloodied blade scythed toward Thorgoth’s head.
A violet barrier shimmered into existence between the pair. Somehow, the king’s blade cut into the magic, forcing Thorgoth to step back. Growling, the Alavari King drew his gauntleted left hand back, and spat out a Word of Power. Flames surrounded his fist. Jerome twisted to the side, but Thorgoth’s mighty blow still clipped the human’s shoulder with such force it sent him spinning backwards.
Queen Forowena drew her last pistol and fired it point blank. The bullet slammed into Thorgoth’s breastplate and scraped off its central ridge. It made the Alavari king step back, but he raised his wand again, black eyes fixed on the queen, who wrestled to reload her gun.
From where he was crouched over, gasping with pain, King Jerome suddenly slashed again. He didn’t aim for the king’s well-armoured gauntlet, he aimed for Thorgoth’s wand. The steel smashed the wood into kindling.
It was the last thing that Jerome managed to do. Thorgoth immediately drew his dagger, ripped the Erisdalian king’s crowned helmet off and slit his throat.
As blood poured down Jerome’s armour, a deafening shriek was ripped from his wife’s mouth. Even Helias, who had managed to drag himself quite close to the confrontation, couldn’t help but wince at the sorrow evoked by that horrifying sound.
Then Forowena charged. Her bad leg slowing her run, she feinted with her blade and stabbed at Thorgoth’s face.
The much larger Demon King dodged and kicked out at the queen’s leg. His sweep knocked Forowena off balance. She fell to the ground with a thud. Before she could scramble back up, Thorgoth kicked her right in her unarmoured armpit, cutting off her scream with a gasp.
Muttering to himself, Thorgoth tore Forowena’s helmet off, seized the queen’s neck and lifted her into the air as if the armoured woman weighed nothing. Forowena squirmed, gasping, even drawing a dagger and trying to stab it into the king’s arm, only to have the tip skate off uselessly.
“Oh don’t bother struggling for your life, Queen Forowena. I won’t kill you. I’ll make sure to humiliate and torture you so much that you are going to beg to join your husband.”
Forowena’s struggles grew limp as she croaked, trying to squeeze in breath. Her arms slowly fell limp by her side.
Helias blinked. Wait, that seemed a bit soon. He remembered Sara lasting far longer than Queen Forowena. Was she that short of breath from the fighting?
He was now a few steps from the king and queen. Close enough that he could see the queen’s mouth moving ever so slightly and while he didn’t know much about lip-reading, he knew enough to recognize the words.
“You join him first.”
Helias’s eyes dropped to the queen’s waist, where the pistol that she’d been reloading still sat on her hip. “Your Majesty! Her gun!”
Thorgoth blinked, but Forowena had already seized the pistol, and yanked it up to the king’s chin. Helias yelled the first spell he could think of, his Fangroar outstretched. A lancing bolt of magic smashed right into the Queen’s side, making her twitch as she pulled the trigger.
There was a crack. Thorgoth roared, throwing the bloody, dying Forowena away from him, one hand clutching the left side of his face. Helias, limping over, cut the dead queen’s neck for good measure before turning to his king.
“Sire?”
Thorgoth, blood dribbling through his fingers, gave a horrifyingly bloody one-eyed scowl at Helias.
“Don’t just stand there, get me a healer and take over, command,” Thorgoth growled
Helias nodded and turned to the surviving Royal Guard. “You heard him! Get the king a healer. All forces pull back! Set up defensive lines. Crush the remaining Erisdalians and—” Helias saw a flash and threw up a magical shield.
His shield shattered as the Stormcaller’s lightning bolt blinded him with its flash. Spots in his eyes, he could hear someone screaming from the walls. That scream was joined by a chorus of howls and yells from all over the walls of the city.
“Shit, sire get out of here!” Helias exclaimed.
“What are you—” Thorgoth’s one healthy eye widened as Helias raised a shield around them to block the fireball that slammed into them. It was weaker than the earlier ones. Edana and Frances must have been casting at their limits.
Even so, with the Erisdalian Royal Guard defeated, the artillery and all the mages on the Third Terrace’s walls were firing again. The crack of artillery and the hissing of magefire was only slightly louder than the dirge of mad grief that had swept over the Erisdalians and their allies.
“Your Majesty, we aren’t breaking to the Third Terrace today. We’ve killed King Jerome and Queen Forowena. Let’s go!”
“Fine but I want their corpses. We’re not letting them take them home.”
Helias glanced at the king and queen’s dead bodies, his eyes ringing with the sounds of battle and the waves of grief that roiled off from the defenders.
“With all due respect, Your Majesty. If we take their bodies, we’ll just enrage them further.” Racing over to the bodies, Helias reached down and quickly took their crowned helmets. “These will be good enough.”
Thorgoth’s eye narrowed at Helias for a moment. “Fine, but take their swords as well and give them to Berengaria.”
“Their swords?” Helias stammered.
“I’ll tell you later.” He grimaced almost unconsciously. Without another wod, he stormed off, blood still trickling down his face.
Helias shook his head but retrieved the blades of the king and queen. They were very good blades but they were heavy. He made a note to examine them later.
“Pull back! Form a rearguard. Retrieve our wounded—” Helias’s voice hitched in his throat as pain shot up his leg from the effort of carrying the blades. “And get me a fucking medic and a horse.”
As he limped away from the Third Terrace, a dusty and exhausted looking Saika brought him a horse that he somehow managed to pull himself onto. That gave him a moment to look around the battlefield.
There were no pursuers. Bodies lay strewn up and down the road leading to the Third Terrace. Horse, Alavari and human were indistinguishable only by where they fell, with many of the human corpses surrounded by Alavari soldiers. The one-armed mage that Helias had seen earlier leading the troops defending the road to the gate had fallen onto his back, almost buried by the Alavari soldiers he’d taken down with him.
There were some pained moans. Wounded that Alavari were trying to retrieve, but the carnage froze the veteran general for a moment. Tearing his eyes away, he rode back for the camp, shouting out orders to the army.
***
Sara decided she didn’t like this side of her husband. Once the battle was over and he’d had his leg mended, he’d limped into their tent and asked Sara to heat up some water to clean himself with. He hadn’t said anything through the brief meal he had before asking if he could trim his beard.
He’d continued to say nothing. Probably because Sara was holding a razor to his skin, but now, even as he was towelling off, his eyes were downcast.
The harpy-orc put her hands on her hips. “Helias, this is getting ridiculous. Talk to me. What’s on your mind?”
The general shut his eyes and put the towel aside. “I…I think I was just looking for excuses not to talk. Thank you, Sara. I hope that wasn’t too annoying.”
Relaxing her arms, Sara gently guided her husband to the chair and poured themselves both cups of beer. “Of course not. It…it was that bad? I heard a little from the soldiers but it sounds very chaotic.”
Helias swirled the frothy liquid in the cup before taking a sip. “Well, we killed King Jerome and Queen Forowena.”
“I guess they fought fiercely?” Sara asked, noting how her husband’s lips perked up. He always did prefer beer over wine for some reason. She just noticed that in most outings he requested specifically for wine. It was only in moments like these that she could slip his favorite drink through his armour.
“It is how they fought that I don’t understand,” said Helias, dark eyes now glittering with life once again.
Sara took a sip of mostly froth, and coughed to clear her throat. “What do you mean? They are the king and queen, protected by their Royal Guard. I imagine they wouldn’t have gone down easily.”
Helias drank deep. Extending his cup out for another pour, Sara obliged. “Thank you. And yes you’re right, how they fought was perfectly understandable. What I don’t understand is why they put themselves in that position in the first place.”
“They probably did it to try to kill King Thorgoth,” said Sara. “They got pretty close. I heard they hurt him badly.”
“Sara, we breached the Second Terrace. We overran them with King Thorgoth’s assistance. We were going to catch a pretty good portion of the Second Terrace’s garrison outside of the walls. Except, the Erisdalian monarchs left themselves behind in the Second Terrace and charged out with their Royal Guard. That meant they convinced their most trusted followers to give up their lives on a chance to kill King Thorgoth.” Helias made a fist with one hand. “I couldn’t get my troops to wait for hours, knowing their chance of dying is near 100%.”
“But they hurt him?” Sara asked.
Helias nodded. “Oh yes. He wasn’t hurt too badly, but I think he lost an eye.”
“But at the cost of their lives and of the entire Erisdalian Royal Guard. Ah, that’s why you can’t think killing Thorgoth couldn’t be it. The risk was massive, the chance was tiny. There must be another reason they went after him,” said Sara.
The general nodded. “Well, we might find out soon.”
“What do you mean?” Sara asked.
Helias pulled out his wand and gave a wave. As the magic settled on the tent with a sparkle, he spoke. “We have been trying to send spies into the enemy camp to help us figure that out. We’ve just had no luck until fairly recently, just before the second assault.”
“Mmhm. Hopefully they’ll tell us something. Sara rose to get more beer from the corked cask resting near the entrance of their tent, and arched an eyebrow. “Helias, where do you want me to put these swords? I cleaned them for display later in our mansion, but it’ll be some time before we send them back.”
“Oh those? Ah, keep them there. They are King Jerome and Queen Forowena’s swords. Thorgoth asked me to…” Helias frowned. “Hold on.” The general walked over to his wife. Putting on his leather gloves, he gingerly picked up the queen’s sword and laid both on the table
Queen Forowena’s sword was at first glance a longsword with its cruciform hilt. As the pair’s eyes followed the fuller to the tip, they noticed that the blade resembled more of a falchion due to how its point curved up to form a knife-like cutting tip. There was an edge on the back side of the knife tip, or the false edge, but it was a weapon clearly forged more for slashing. There was a sapphire for its pommel and tines that protruded from the crossguard to provide side protection.
King Jerome’s sword was a typical longsword with a ruby instead for its pommel. However, what was drawing the pair’s attention was the fact that both blade’s steel was shimmering with an unearthly light. Jerome’s blade seemed rimmed by a sparkling red glow, whilst Forowena’s blade shone blue. It was so soft, almost blink-and-you-miss-it. Neither could really see it until they laid it on the table against the candlelight.
“Sara, you didn’t touch the blade directly did you?” Helias asked, stepping over to examine his wife’s hands.
Sara flashed him a wry smile, before pulling her hands out of his. “No. I wore gloves and used a cloth. They…now that you mention it, I wondered why they seemed a bit odd.”
Taking off his gloves, Helias drew his Fangroar and touched the tip to King Jerome’s blade and hissed.
“Fuck, their are pretty powerful enchantments put on these. Breaking and cutting, burning and severing. That explains why King Jerome’s blade cut through Thorgoth’s shield.”
“It did that? But the Erisdalian king isn’t a mage,” stammered Sara.
“No he isn’t—” Helias turned around as he heard footsteps approach their tent. “Who is it?”
“It’s Saika, sir. The King requests you, your lady and the swords.”
Helias glanced at Sara who nodded. “Thank you, Saika. We’ll be with you shortly.”
“Maybe he might shed some light on this,” said Sara, reaching for a cloak.
“Maybe. Better be careful with these,” said Helias.