A dance has a beginning, a middle and an end. A build-up and a crescendo; flair and subtly. In these things, a dance can be much like a battle. Two partners might toe the line of a battlefield and silently learn the rhythms of the other. The master of that rhythm is the master of the dance – the master of the war. One difference remains, immutably. A dance is made of a hundred flowing and graceful steps and movements; a battle is made of a thousand crushed bones and torn throats. The delicate flow of vast combat, when seen from afar, may seem so gentle and intimate as a dance, but Ash was not stood afar.

The dirt was so sullied with fresh blood that she couldn’t keep her footing for more than a couple paces at a time. A wall of halberds and pikes stood before her, they each made dwarfs of her own spear. Steel-clad warriors surrounded her with iron shields as tall as they were. Their armour made for something of a disadvantage, though. While their enemies charged on horseback and circled the area with ease, the Forgelanders sank deep into the mud on account of their thick plate armour.

The opposition was as light as they had expected, a spare garrison force in a formation of half-lame sumpter horses. They hadn’t, however, counted on the terrain. It became obvious that the Forgelanders had never been so deep into the Bloodlands. The thick, vibrant mud had swallowed their vanguard as soon as they had stepped out of the portal. The men stumbled and slipped over constantly as they rapidly deployed to form a defensive perimeter.

“Champion!” A blood-sullied banner bearer cried over the storm of hooves. “Your orders?”

Ash thought on the plan as arrows hailed all around her. She needed to prepare the landing zone for siege artillery. That meant they needed to widen their defences further. The Forgelanders were experts in defensive combat, but in this battle, they had to act as the aggressors.

“Push out!” Ash boomed. “We need solid ground!”

“Huah! Pace east!” The bannerman shouted. An ornate flag of lilac and azure rose from the dirt and waded away from the setting sun. A drumbeat followed his struggled march. The men stomped to its slow but powerful tempo. Despite the chaos of the landing, the men marched in a remarkably ordered fashion.

They arranged in a triangle wedge with its flat base at the fore. Shield bearers stood like a layer of skin around them while the pikemen threatened away any attempts by the Bloodland cavalry.

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Her vanguard was small, a thousand men with only six bannermen. She fell to the centre of the formation and watched her men march as one of three captains came to her side.

“Champion,” he saluted as he waded his way through the mud and men. “The sortie has been repelled; the garrison seems to be returning to their keep.”

“Should we try to stop them?” Ash asked.

“That wouldn’t be wise, Champion. The Bloodlanders are strong on horseback, even these weak nags. They become less a threat atop stone walls.” He struggled to match her pace as they followed the crowd. His heavy plate – and his well-seasoned belly – seemed to sink him much deeper into the mud than her.

“Alright,” Ash said with a false confidence. “When we find firm ground, I want the walls set up quickly.”

“Of course, Champion. The support corps have the lumber at the ready. What fort type shall we establish?”

“There are different types?” Ash thought, realising anew just how unqualified she was for this command. “Whatever your men can do simply and quick,” she boldly said. “I don’t intend to be here long.”

“Of course, Champion. We shall set up an arrow shield and some cavalry traps then.” The captain saluted her before wading off towards a group of distant sergeants.

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The skies were clear, but the day was waning. By the count of her support unit, fifty of her men would not see the coming dusk. An acceptable loss by military standards, but an agonising fact to her. Fifty men had died – or were dying – in her name, by her order, by her incompetence.

She stepped on the solid oak planks that had been laid as a base for their quickly strengthening fort. It wouldn’t be too long before they could bring in Donaleaf and his relief force. She patrolled the open platforms that had been left for artillery emplacements and the bunkers meant for the men to catch some quick rest.

A captain caught her as she slipped out of the bunker. It wasn’t the same man she had spoken to earlier; this man was taller and bald. His armour held the lilac trim of whatever house these men belonged to.

“Sparrow-Knight,” he saluted in the Forgeland fashion, with his right fist held at his eye-level. “We have a report for you.”

“What is it?” Ash demanded as confidently as she could.

“A messenger arrived from the keep. The castellan, a Lord Mikor, wishes to parley with the general of this army. We don’t believe he knows that you are here,” the captain reported.

“Parley?” Ash repeated, unsure of the word.

“A meeting, Sparrow. He wishes to discuss terms. He may seek to surrender but it is doubtful.”

“Could it be a trap? A means to draw me out in the open?”

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“I doubt it, my lady. Parley is a vow of the gods. To breach the vow would be to become a heretic. This castle is but a few day's ride of the Veytor’s main fortress, they wouldn’t risk their wrath so haphazardly,” he said stoically.

“Then I will meet with him and hope for easy terms.” Her gaze fell to her marked hand as she gripped the air tightly. Something within it tingled. A static power, like thunder before a strike. It felt good, natural.

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The parley group was as small as was appropriate. Two sergeants rode at her sides, each carrying the banners of House Donaleaf and the flag of the Forgelands. Only four more guards rode behind, while she sauntered at the fore.

Slowly, they approached the greyish stone walls. Cracks seemed to climb from their foundations. Rubble piled beneath the battlements where age had stripped the walls of their capstones. The merlons along the parapet had been smoothed over untold centuries into rounded nubs with cracked and weathered arrow slits. Some lacked sides where the arrow slits had compromised the merlon’s structure.

The castle was in a poor state, but for the draw bridge hanging over the deep trench. The wood seemed well travelled, but much newer and stronger than the rest of the castle. The whole village beside the castle walls seemed inexplicably better made to boot.

It became obvious to Ash that despite the wealth and power of this castle, and the village surrounding it, they had never felt the need to invest in its defences. They must have believed their secure position deep within the Bloodlands would allow them all the security they would require.

“Hark!” A woman’s voice called from atop the battlements. “Who approaches?”

Ash drew on her most commanding voice, dropping her voice to her belly and bellowing out, “Ashtik, Sparrow-Knight and ally to the good King Asmond of House Donaleaf!”

“Approach then, Sparrow-Knight! Step to the draw bridge and bring no more than one guard!” The woman ordered.

“My lady,” a sergeant whispered. “That is a highly unusual request. The lord castellan ought to approach us through the gate.”

“Why is it you wish me to enter your city?” Ash called back. “Am I not to parley with your leader?”

“These are the terms of our lord’s parley. Abide or leave,” the woman coldly said.

“Sparrow, we should leave. This is too strange. It might be that they have ill intent,” the same sergeant insisted.

“I am protected by the vow of parley, right?” Ash insisted.

“You should be, but... you are the Heretic of Black. It is possible they do not believe attacking you would be a breach of this holy vow,” he whispered urgently. “It is not worth the risk, they will surrender when our artillery breaches their walls, we ought to leave.”

“But how many civilians will die in the bombardment? We must give them a chance to escape the bloodshed, surely?” Ash said.

“They may have no intent on surrender, Sparrow. The decision is, of course, yours but I highly advise caution.”

“And your advice is noted. If the risk of death is so high, I shall attend this alone. Await me here, if I don’t return... well, this whole prophecy shit’s been a big waste of time, right?”

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She dismounted her borrowed mare, a beautiful chestnut creature of all too few years to face this battle. She slid Ser Stabby from her saddle and mounted him on her back before taking a deep breath and heading onwards.

“Will you honour the parley?” she demanded as she approached the closed iron gate.

“I shall,” a raspy, boyish little voice replied. Behind the gate, a precession carried forth their lord... though lordling might have been a more apt term. The boy couldn’t have been older than eleven, even despite his near regal raiments. “So, you are the Black Heretic I’ve heard so much about.” A tuft of long blonde hair fell before his freckled little face.

“I don’t care for the Conclave’s names, nor should you. My legitimacy has no bearing here, only my army,” Ash coldly said, trying her best to speak to the boy as though he were a man. He approached the thick iron gate, it being the only thing parting the two, with slow and methodical steps.

“You misunderstand me, Heretic,” the boy rasped in his strange accent. It seemed the common tongue was not his native. Each word poured as honey from his lips, like each word was a silken poem told just for her. “I admit I am curious of your nature. A legend is quickly growing in your name. A commoner, raised in a day to a general. A huntress with the skill to hunt a demon. Some of my own men have come to... admire you, in some perverse way. I am not like them. I am a man of the gods, and I will not abide a heretic.”

“You are not a man at all,” Ash scoffed. “If you wish to see the day where otherwise can be said; surrender.”

A pious scoff found the little lord. He had a strange steel in his hazel gaze. A determination and righteousness. “My gods will strike you down, Heretic, and I shall be their fist. Break yourself against my walls. Shed your blood upon my blades. In the end, the gods reign, and the apostates always fall,” he spat.

“This is your one chance, little lord. Let your common folk leave. I give you my word – and the word of my Goden – that no harm shall befall any who leave now.”

“I have taken shits with more worth than the word of a heretic. I will protect my people, and they shall remain stalwart in the face of your evil. You cannot have them.”

“I beg you,” Ash said, her tone dropping to one of a pleading lady. “Let your people leave. We don’t intend to keep this city. It will be burnt to the ground. Everyone within will die. It doesn’t need to be this way.”

The boy looked at her, poison in his glance, and spat. “I shall hope to see you on the field of battle, Heretic. Know that – despite your crimes – the gods can forgive you. I will pray that you earn their mercy in these short hours before your death.”

A wooden barrier dropped behind the iron gate and left her alone in the entryway, mournful thoughts her only company.

The static in her hand sparked as she turned away. A single, tiny, shot of power burst out from within and melted a hole through a single rung in the iron gate. Ash barely noticed, beyond the strange tension she could feel building within herself.