"Impetuous boy, who gave you license to speak on behalf of our Goddess Pervalia?" Jasper snarled at me from across my field desk. Jasper was an average height rotund man with a bald spot in the very center of his head and sharp, intelligent blue eyes. We were currently encamped outside of Dorn, a large walled city overlooking one of the many rivers dotting Aurelia's plains. He had not even bothered taking a seat, and I looked at him levelly from across the worn rough wood. I noted that even sitting I was nearly eye level with the diminutive man, and I figured standing up would send the wrong message.

"Did you per chance take the time to view the ash field?" I asked him quietly and, for a moment, he seemed taken aback by the quiet fervor in my voice.

"I saw it."

"Then you know what has driven me to name a crusade against Aurelia's mages,"

"That is not what I asked." Jasper snarled again.

"I did not need your permission to do so," I remarked simply and the older man went red in the face at my apparent disrespect. I cut my eyes to Roderick who stood at the entryway to my tent and he just shook his head slightly. We both knew that this was not going to go well no matter how I spoke, and so I figured it was better to take a hard stance. "Pervalia is our goddess. It is not for you to tell me what I can or cannot do in her name as long as it follows her divine dictates," I continued and immediately I could tell Jasper was taken aback again. He seemed unable to reconcile my age with my tone. I am sure he was used to people showing him nothing but deference.

"It is the church and the church alone who decides what happens in the name of faith! None may violate our sacred duty to interpret Her will!"

"And yet I have done so and your anger cannot undo what I have done. An anger that is patently unwarranted. What would you have done in my stead?" I asked reasonably.

"What I would have done is immaterial, we are here about what you had the temerity to do in Our Ladies name!"

"So you would have done nothing?"

"It is not the duty of the Church of Pervalia to police another state! They have their own laws-"

"Which were violated, along with our own sacred laws," I thundered suddenly and jumped to my feet. The table I had been using to hold a map overturned as my knee smacked into it and Jasper found himself looking up at me.

"It is not for you to decide that! You overstep yourself you up jumped bastard pretending at religious fervor!"

"Call me names if you wish," I whispered quietly, "But if you question my honor or my faith again you will find that this conversation will take a drastic turn,"

"You dare threaten me boy?"

"Unequivocally. Your status grants you immunity from damn near any noble in the land but I am not a mere noble I am a Royal and you would do well to remember that, Priest. I can have your head removed at the drop of a hat for questioning my parentage, slandering my name and the names of my royal parents. While standing in the midst of a Hexenguardian army." I thundered back. Jasper went as white as a ghost as I reminded him that he was not just talking to some random nobleman. He had much status as one of the heads of the Church, but my status as a royal trumped him easily in this instance.

I could watch as his gaze flickered from fear to calculation. "You have overstepped yourself, your Royalness," he sneered. "The Church of Pervalia will not stand for this. We alone are the ones who may guide the church, and you have usurped our power and holy cause to further your own goals. We can very well tear this army you've constructed down around you and leave you naught but ash and ruin. All without touching a hair on your royal head."

"Bold words for a failing institution grown fat and greedy. Our Goddess of Victory would fall on her own sword if she was forced to tolerate the corruption and sheer stupidity that seems to lead our church," I said, effectively burning every possible bridge between myself and Jasper. He was already doing his own burning, so I felt no qualms about joining him in his pyroclastic fun.

"I came here to try and talk sense and get an idea of what caused you to even think you could do such-"

"You came here to bully me and to try and commandeer the Templars for your own use. The church of victory has no effective military arm and you saw an easy mark in me," I interrupted him. "I think you should go, Jasper. There is nothing here for you."

"You haven't heard the last of this," Jasper snarled before turning on his foot and storming out of my tent.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

Roderick and I stood there for a few minutes before I knelt down and righted my field desk, placing the map gingerly back on top of it. "That went well," I said airily to Roderick.

"Tact was never your strong suit," he remarked dryly and we looked at each other before Roderick snorted out a laugh and left the tent. I grinned at his retreating back.

Pervalian Army Camp, Dorn, Commanders Tent

"We can likely breach the walls in the next few weeks," our siege engineer informed us. I was sat around Gerald's massive campaign table with the assembled officers corps, inclusive of our mages. It was still very strange to me that more than half the officers present in the room wore Pervalia's tears and Templar colors. The siege engineer reporting to us, a tall woman with raven black hair and green eyes, wore a stiff leather haubek with a coat-of-plates running down her sword arm. I could see that her tabard had the sword emblem that denoted her membership in the Order of the Sword. In addition to that, my engineers had taken to having a catapult silhouette stitched in red and centered under our crests.

"Dorn was not designed to keep our a determined army, and their fortifications show as much," Roderick remarked and I nodded.

"It's likely just meant to deter their ever-present horse raiders. Bandits in this country are usually mounted and its hard to catch a lightly armed bandit galloping full tilt away with loot in hand. Most cities on these plains will be walled to prevent such activity," Gerald added.

"Once we have Dorn we should be capable of utilizing it as a forward base of operations against Aurelia." I stated, leaning over the map table and using a stick to tap Dorn on the map. "Its centralized location will force them to engage us and provide us an advantage against their horse. But we are running the risk of our supply lines being infiltrated unless we can bring more levies to bolster our patrols."

"Agreed," Gerald added with a quick glance at me, "They can choose to ignore us but it will be costly if they do so. From Dorn we can strike out at the Aurelian capital, or one of these three cities... Jurlor, Hapstop, and Bream. Any one of these falling would tighten our stranglehold on their roads, and the capital will stave if they lose those trade roads. Every day they allow us to exist in Dorn will be another day of reinforcements, another day of fortification, and another day that their northern army could lose to the Seaward forces. At this point it is in our best interest to wait."

"I disagree," I said immediately. "Everything you've stated is correct, but we cannot afford to wait for them," Gerald and Roderick looked at me curiously so I elaborated.

"Their mage corps," I said simply. "They've already proven willing to sacrifice everything in order to drive us from the field. If we place them in a losing position then they will likely try to do so again."

Roderick frowned but Gerald nodded thoughtfully. "That is a good point," he conceded. "But I don't think there are many ways we can stop them from doing so. Every option available to us risks giving them the time required to cast a similar spell. Even if we were to siege the Capital directly, they would have the time they need to turn the entire city into an abattoir and we don't have the manpower of the walls necessary to prevent them from slaughtering us en masse with their magical insanity berserk spell."

"I find it suspicious that we've managed to get to Dorn with no hostility or resistance. Not a single attack on our supply lines," Gaspard added from the seat to my left. "They have had ample opportunity to bleed our forces for all the territory we've crossed, and yet nothing? This is where they will have the largest advantage and so far, nothing has happened."

"This warrants a scouting expedition to all nearby cities, villages, towns - any and every population center. We need to put our feelers out and figure out what is going on, and get consistent eyes on their major population centers," Gerald said.

"Agreed," I added. Gerald looked askance at me but said nothing.

"Very well then. My men will canvas all the cities south of the River Dorn. Your men will take the north?" Gerald asked me.

"Sounds good to me," I agreed with him. I noticed that the man was being way more deferential to me than I think the situation warranted. He was still acknowledged as the primary commander and other than a few disagreements I had followed him as if nothing had changed. Evidently he had heard of my clash with Jasper. Maybe he thought I was going mad with power or something.

"Now what are we going to do if they are preparing a spell like that against us." Gerald asked.

"Pray." came the response from Tika. That was not a comforting answer, but I could hardly blame the man. How did you stop an entire nation of mages from casting a catastrophic spell from miles and miles away. The closer your proximity the more power you had over magic in the area, and we were simply too far and the country was simply too big. They could be hiding a grand conclave anywhere.

"I think it would be prudent to inform Seaward of our thoughts and intentions..." Roderick added.

"I will handle it," Tika said.

"I think we might want to consider breaking a portion of our forces off and riding to Seaward and helping them break apart Aurelia's northern armies," I offered and several people looked at me.

"With all this danger, you think making our force smaller would be a good choice?" Gerald asked me incredulously.

"I think it presents the best chance of mitigating the risk of the spell. By bringing Seaward inland towards our army and stationing them at... Probably Bream or Jurlor, we would have two archmagi and the entire countries military and magical corps within reinforcing distance of each other. It would swell our numbers enough to prevent us from being overwhelmed if that spell gets utilized, and we can proceed directly to the Capital."

"That presents a massive risk to our army though, if they should decide on a conventional route," Gaspard countered.

"Immaterial if we hold Dorn and the river. Horses have a notoriously hard time climbing walls and I am fully confident that Hexenguard's army could survive a siege until our force returns with Seaward," I said immediately.

"Lets get the scouting done first. All our plans are premature until we have a better idea of where their armies are located," Gerald interrupted Gaspard before he could open his mouth to retort.

"Fair enough."