Darius Chapter 47

After a mundane twelve days, Silfor and Bart caught up with the soldiers Mitrev was awaiting. When they’d first been spotted, a group of scouts had ridden up to them, drawing their weapons when they saw Bart. They thought he had taken Silfor hostage – if only they’d known the real dynamic between the two.

The twelve days had been uneventful – it was like all the drama and excitement in the Continent had been sucked up by the bloody war happening a couple hours south. Bart was convinced he’d been hearing pops like click beetles for the last half hour, which suggested the battle was already underway. He couldn’t help feeling the quarrel was useless now that Erinstone had been destroyed.

Silfor was beginning to appreciate the sentiment. If they were to destroy the underkind, they’d need as many soldiers as they could get – killing each other was only making things more difficult. She just had to hope that the situation hadn’t devolved far enough to make the relationship irredeemable.

Her largest concern was Mitrev. In her current state, she didn’t look much more than a peasant lady in a stolen dress, whereas Mitrev would be patrolling the camp in his full armor, parading his plume. He’d have the soldiers whipped up in a fury, ready to die for him. Convincing any kind of ceasefire would need his support, which was hard to come by, even for her.

When she’d calmed down the soldiers and joined the main mass of the army, they stared at her with open jaws. Their Princess was usually a picture of pristine beauty and grace, but here she stood, in a muddied dress and in bare, scratched feet. She had friction burns on her ankles where’d they’d rubbed in the stirrups.

She spoke in hushed tones to the captains, informing them of Erinstone’s fate. Some furrowed their brows in disbelief, others slinked away, grieving for their families. It was an unfortunate time to tell them, as at that moment, a scout from Mitrev’s vanguard came over the rise.

The scout found the captains all huddled together, and he rejoiced, glad his job was going to be easy. In the masses of men, finding the captains was usually a terrible quest. When he saw Lady Silfor, he almost doubled back to tell Mitrev the strange news, but decided he should probably give the captains a hurry along first.

“Mitrev has taken the troops into battle. He demands a full gallop from all platoons. The Barringvale gates have fallen, but we still need the stockpile.”

At ‘stockpile’, he nodded towards the covered crates being pulled along in the carts. Bart cringed at each bump in the Road and every unforgiving pothole that the carts dipped into. The guards riding along beside and behind the carts must not have seen what happened the last time a pack of arrows went bang.

The group came up to speed as best they could. They were held back by the carts, and the tired horses, but most of the soldiers pulled ahead once Barringvale was in sight. Towers of smoke rose from inside the walls, reaching up to the highest of the towers up on the hillside. The command tents were pitched in the middle of the Road, forcing the riders to slow down and peel off into the grassy patches on either side. A quick inspection revealed the tents to be empty – the general, his advisors, and their retinue of guards were all standing at the brink of the forest, watching the battle play out. At present, the Erinian soldiers had been repelled outside the castle walls by a relentless squad of Barringvale soldiers. It was hard to tell how – the Erinians far outnumbered the small pack.

When they approached Mitrev and his devotees, Silfor trotted to the front of the army, breaking out ahead of them. She stayed mounted when she came before Mitrev, trying to impose on him. He squinted at her.

“Mitrev, I’m glad you’re well.”

Recognition hit the general’s face and he looked like he’d been hit on the head by a builder’s hammer.

“My Lady! How did you get here? Why?”

He fell to one knee, growling at his advisors and guard to do the same. The soldiers struggled to come down in their full, heavy armor. The concerns Silfor had about her general disobeying her vanished. The man seemed excited to see her and show her his accomplishment so far.

“I have terrible news, Mitrev. Erinstone has been overrun with underkind, and I had to escape. My father is likely dead, and I don’t know how many others made it out. I have Bart with me, too.”

Mitrev was half smiling when he lifted his eyes to Silfor.

“That is a strange joke, my Lady. I did not know you were interested in old myths and legends like the underkind. But look! See what your soldiers have done for you. We’ve breached Barringvale!”

“Mitrev.”

The smile sat on his face for a moment longer but fell off when Silfor looked at him with stern eyes. Leagues from home, he couldn’t believe the news. But here she was, his future Queen, in a ruined dress, emaciated and malnourished with only an ex-prisoner as her guard.

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“Lady Silfor, I... I’ve breached Barringvale.”

“I know you have. You’re a great general Mitrev, but we need to recall the troops. Our fight needs to be against the underkind, not the people of Barringvale.”

Mitrev frowned at that. She was saying that despite his attack going well, it was wrong. Not only did it not help her cause, but it also harmed it.

“I can’t! I... the men won’t have it! And how can I stop them now?! Look!”

He was right. The battle was going full force, and the soldiers that Silfor and Bart had arrived with were already joining the fray, unpacking and handing their archers bundles of explosive arrows. Silfor called out to them.

“Wait! Do not engage. I order you to stand down and place those arrows carefully back where they came from.”

“No!” Mitrev cried. “Continue! Help your comrades. The Princess has had a long ride, and she’s sick. I order you to attack!”

Silfor glared at Mitrev. His advisors – hers too by proxy – eyed off the dispute, subtly trying to pick the winning side. She shouted at Mitrev now.

“General! Erinstone is gone. All the civilians, royalty, and slaves are dead. You’re fighting a battle that will only weaken us further. What happens if we win? We have a big new castle to house our soldiers in? What happens when the underkind make it here – and they will – and there’re gaping holes in all the walls, and half our army is dead? Or preoccupied dealing with prisoners? You must stop this!”

Mitrev looked at her with hard, calculating eyes. If Silfor was right, and the Erinstone military was all that remained, as the head of that military, he had just become a lot more powerful than the Princess. Without civilians to rule over, she was merely a figurehead. The last of her kind.

He would not be swayed that easily.

Bart watched the argument unfold before him, and he decided to take matters into his own hands. He turned his horse in with the advancing soldiers, then, pushing his way to the edge of the pack, broke off west into the wilderness. Whilst the others were curving in to attack the main gate, he took a wide arc to the right, riding to where the battlements were thinly defended. He still stayed out of range of an arrow – to the defenders, he was just another Erinian soldier.

He tried to think up a way to get inside the walls, as the attackers had been doing for the last hour. The Barringvale soldiers had set up a wall of shields at the gates, and they’d had no issues repelling the attackers with the help of their imbued weapons.

Then, the refreshed archers filtered onto the battlefield, handing out the bundles of explosive arrows Bart had forged. He knew what was coming and knew it would be his opportunity.

The Barringvale shieldsmen realized the plan too late. The arrows they’d been showered with for the last while were all stone or iron-headed – none of the imbued ones that had helped the Erinians breach the wall earlier in the day. When the burst of explosive arrows smashed into their shields, they didn’t even properly brace themselves. The arrows decimated the wall, not killing the men, but throwing them back meters into the hard rubble and earth. Bart could hear their shouts from where he stood.

The Erinians charged forward by the hundreds, and he charged with them. The singular defender that had kept an eye on him shot a few arrows at him, and his horse nearly bucked him off when an explosive arrow landed meters ahead of them and kicked up a wall of dirt. Then, the archer switched targets to the mass of soldiers forcing their way through the gate, sending an endless barrage of fire into their midst.

By the time Bart reached the entrance, the Erinians were already inside, spreading out to take different parts of the frontlines. Men scrambled up the ladders into the waiting blades of the Barringvale guards, but every now and then, they succeeded, and with each section falling, it became harder for the rampart guards to defend their ladder.

On the main path, soldiers clashed in huge groups. The Barringvale defenders had a clear advantage man-to-man, with more than a hundred of their soldiers being armed with an imbued weapon. The Erinian archers still sent explosive arrows overhead, firing willy-nilly into the densest enemy crowd, or even at the buildings around them. Wood and brick and thatch roofs exploded, spraying a hail of junk around the battlefield.

Bart slipped through the maze of soldiers and leapt from his horse. He slinked into the alleys where there were only small skirmishes, holding his fire poker in a death grip in case he had to use it. He ran as far into Barringvale as the small streets would let him, but steep, mossy walls blocked his path.

Damn this city and its vertical-ness.

He rushed back into the alleys, all of them starting to blend.

Brown door, ruined garden, smashed window, brown door again.

He spun to his right, and a pack of Barringvale soldiers blocked his way. They advanced on him, and he threw his fire poker away, raising his hands.

“Stop! Please! I surrender, I’m not Erinian. I’m just looking for Darius – please!”

A voice barked over the soldiers, and they stopped. A man stepped forward, taking off his crystal-blue helmet.

“Bart? Is that you?”

The soldier’s blank white hair was unmistakable. Bart thanked the gods for looking down on him this day.

“Marth! Holy shit, yes! How did you recognize me?”

“Saw you at the Royal Forge in Erinstone – Darius spoke highly of you. But what’s going on? Darius thought you were dead, he told me you got shot in the escape! How’d you even get here?!”

Bart jumped from side to side like an upset Trenk. So many words jumped to his mouth, but he had to be direct.

“I’ll have to explain the details later, but you need to recall your men – Erinstone has been destroyed by underkind, and we think they’re going to come here next. If Erinstone and Barringvale wipe each other out, the monsters will come in and clean up the rest.”

Marth shook his head.

“What am I supposed to do? The Erinians want us dead, my men want the same of them, and those arrows are making negotiations difficult – I can’t really throw myself out there and ask for a parlay!”

Marth turned back to his troops, and Bart followed.

“I don’t know how, but it needs to happen! The underkind swept through Erinstone in an hour, maybe less. If we only react when we see them coming, it will be too late.”

Marth pointed his soldiers back into the fray, telling them to spread his order to defend, but not push out the gate. An idea was coming to his mind, but it required a lot of luck. He searched around the battlefield for the man in the fire-imbued armor. He’d said it was a terrible idea, but its owner had grinned and declared it to be genius. From the tests they conducted, he may have been right. He climbed the remains of a destroyed house, surveying the battle.

Come on Heldrus, where are you.