Hrost, Valentin, and Morna found the scouts a mile past the conquered village along a thin trail that led towards Etrineux. The path followed a narrow gully that cut through the forested foothills on the route to the town several more miles away. Destroyed caltrops and raised earth defenses littered the side of the path towards the scouting party.
Valentin wondered why all these unused defenses had been erected so far away from the battlefield. Those resources would have been better served fortifying the hill that they decided to clash on.
Ferron was kneeling in front of part of the path that was obscured by branches and infant leaves. He made a hand motion to one of the scouts off to the side. The warrior pulled a rope and spikes erupted from the ground to pierce any who were traveling towards Etrineux. He spoke something to the warrior next to him before he rose from his knees to face the riders that approached him.
“There you are, Valentin. Did you rest well?”
Hrost stepped in before Valentin could answer. “You shouldn’t coddle him. He was late for our departure because he was wasting time with Morna. Letting him be so blatantly favored by you sets a poor example for the rest. Even to your own son.”
Ferron quickly glanced between Valentin and Morna before dismissing the elder deggan’s concern. “Everyone’s first battle is difficult, the boy deserved some slight respite.”
Hrost grunted in dissatisfaction before changing the subject. “So, how does it look?”
“There are trenches, caltrops, and all other devices of impediment erected along this path. It appears that the initial strategy was to retreat to the gully and slow our progress down. Unfortunately for them, it seems that there was a disagreement in tactics, and the force decided to face us head on.”
“A strategy like this all but announces that you believe to be outmatched. It would be a difficult thing for the proud warriors of the Merciless Curs to accept,” Hrost commented. “A constant retreat without truly facing the enemy is something that I would be unable to readily agree to without proper reason.”
“Aye, even Tiarna Marche did not choose to follow this strategy even though it was the correct one,” Ferron remarked, tapping his foot on the spikes. “Preparation like this is not cheap or quick to throw together. Which begs the question, who exactly did this?”
Valentin listened to Ferron and Hrost discuss the intricacies of the fortifications and gazed upon the hillsides that they would traverse. An eeriness carried over the landscape at the sight of the abandoned positions spotted between the trees, those that meant to occupy them already slain and burned. However, a different uneasiness, one of being watched by a predator, pricked the back of Valentin’s neck. Perhaps beasts of the forest were also interested in reclaiming the abandoned woods.
What sort of battle would have occurred here if their adversaries followed the plan set up for them? How many faces that he only just began to learn would have melted away in the wooden teeth of these defenses? He only wondered further at why the superior strategy would be neglected in favor of a head on battle but his mind wandered only a short distance. Pride had killed those people, just as it had killed that boy. He wondered if every battlefield would be driven by the same emotions.
The group began to wander further up the path. Large leather quivers full of javelins were hung up on racks. Many were taken by the fleeing troops, but many more remained for the invading army to use to bolster their own reserves. Makeshift stables to tether reserve horses were emptied, only troughs of stagnant water and scattered hay remained.
A light drizzle fell from the sky, tickling Valentin’s face and causing Vescal to shake the annoying droplets away. Ferron motioned his arms for the group to push ahead a little further. Valentin
The farther along they went, the more impressed Ferron seemed to be. However, Valentin also noticed anger rising within the man. Valentin could not ascertain what exactly was gnawing at the warrior, but he knew that it involved the remnants of this strategy.
Up the path further, five horsemen rode from Etrineux towards the group. Valentin tensed briefly before seeing the expressionless masks of the Armée and relaxed.
“Elane, what have you discovered?” Ferron requested of the deggan leading the scouting party.
“Etrineux is close. Only two more miles up the path. If you travel five hundred paces up, you can see the palisades. We could go no further than one mile away before we spotted patrols and turned back.”
“So Celfor has not besieged the town yet,” Ferron commented. “We will move our camp to the village and await a response from Celfor. If he cannot hold a siege with whatever of his forces remain, we will take our payment and return home. Is there anything different from what we have already seen further up?”
“No, there are some trenches and some earthen-works, but we did not spot defenders. Even if it was fully manned, it would not be difficult to assail.”
“Then let us return and wait for our benefactor to contact us,” Ferron replied, turning his horse around and trotting off in the opposite direction.
Ferron sat tensely upon his saddle, his face twisted in frustration. The rest of the scouting party offered their leader a wide berth. Only his ward seemed to possess the courage of riding near the man. The pair did not speak to each other as the man simmered over his thoughts.
“This is vexing,” Ferron commented to himself.
“Was there something wrong?” Valentin asked, wondering if there was something that he missed during this tour of the abandoned hillsides.
“The longer I think about it, the more frustrated I become,” Ferron admitted. “A perfect strategy to counter our advance, completely neglected. I struggle to think how we could manage to navigate such an intricate and expansive defensive infrastructure without incurring uncomfortable losses. Whoever this strategist is, their talents are wasted on the Marche clan. I so desperately wish to know who devised this.”
“If they are even alive,” Elane commented.
“Of course they are alive,” Ferron asserted. “I can assure you that the plan would not have been disregarded if that person was at our battlefield.” Ferron looked eastward in the direction of the forces of Arven. “Something tells me this person is responsible for our difficulties elsewhere.”
“Then we have discovered the fatal flaw of the enemy,” Hrost interjected. “They only have one competent strategist who is already stretched thin. If we wish to win this swiftly, we should strike while we believe they are preoccupied with other battlefields.”
“You’d be making the prudent decision if that was the goal,” Ferron responded. “However, how does sieging Etrineux of our own initiative benefit us? It complicates negotiations for additional wealth with Celfor. Besides, I wish to take this time to get in contact with whoever is devising these plans. Elane, do you think you could find them?”
“I can’t guarantee anything,” the deggan responded. “If this person is as clever as you give them credit for, it will be difficult.”
“If all else fails, look for a place where a small group would retreat away from Etrineux and notify me. I will not let them get away from me, alive or dead.”
Elane nodded in acknowledgement. She took a pensive posture in consideration for how she would go about accomplishing the task set out for her.
The gentle gusts of the morning began to pick up as if the sky spirits were angry. Howling winds drowned out the ambient sounds of the wooded hills and kicked up dust and debris from the forest floor that made Valentin’s eyes water. Rain began to fall from the sky in sheets, rapidly soaking all beneath it. The horses swayed their heads with the direction of the wind to try to spare themselves from the tiny projectiles that peppered their skin.
Valentin swore he saw hunched over silhouettes in the tree line. However, the sudden lack of visibility made it difficult to determine whether it was real or a fabrication of the boy’s paranoia. Was it the animals from before, now rushing to find their own cover? He could not gaze long as a gust of wind forced him to use his cloak to break the wind.
The ride out of the forest was forced into slow and deliberate steps. Traps and obstacles set along the path were not properly disarmed and removed. Any unnecessary rushing could lead to a severe injury to their horses. Instead, they would have to be buffeted by the intense wind.
The threatening sky that Valentin had seen from that morning had finally begun to trickle from the sky. A light layer of water descended upon the riders. The angry winds caused the falling water to descend almost horizontally upon the world. The parched soil of the forest floor would be quickly flooded if the rain persisted.
Javelins whistled through the murky air. Their trajectories swirled every which way from the violent whipping of the wind. A few found purchase in the nearest two horses. The beasts toppled to the ground and flung their riders from their backs.
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The surviving horses were brought to a stop. Several figures stood across the path with their spear ends dug into the dirt, blocking it from the approaching riders. The rain and wind made it impossible to make out their insignias, yet all knew that they were not allies. Uneasiness swept across Valentin’s heart at the tension building in the muscles of the scouts. The howling wind deafened much of what was said among those that occupied the forest. He could only hear Ferron and Hrost due to their proximity.
Ferron grinned when he closed his faceplate and hopped down from his horse. He pulled out his hammer and hefted it in his hands. “It seems that these hills were less abandoned than we thought, Elane. They don’t want scouts to report back.”
“There is no need for you to engage them,” Hrost assured, hastily dismounting from his own horse. “We can find a path to outrun them.”
“I have no fear of warriors that cower behind peasants and sell swords to defend their lands,” Ferron announced as he charged at those that blocked the path forward.
The ambushers were bearing down on the dismounting riders, spears pointed angrily up at them. From the corner of Valentin’s eye, an armored woman jumped off their horse and stabbed one of the approaching warriors in the neck, driving them to the ground. The figure was quickly supported by other horsemen that vaulted from their steeds to form a protective line.
Valentin quickly saw that he was the only one still sitting foolishly on his horse, frozen temporarily in surprise at how quickly things had transpired. A javelin toss interrupted by the blustering wind flew past his dumbfounded head. The boy leapt from his horse in a panic and tumbled to the ground before more projectiles could fly his way.
His heart beat wildly in his chest and fear coursed through his body. He could die. His life could easily end within the chaos of this disorganized skirmish. The scouts were outnumbered and surrounded. Panic set in his mind as the fight rang above him. He rolled to dodge the panicked retreat of some of the horses and the feet of clashing warriors.
He scurried across the ground towards his spear that had fallen nearby. Mud was rapidly forming and his hands and knees sunk into the soil. Rain with crimson droplets splashed atop him. His hand thrust out towards the weapon, his fingers fully extended to desperately bring it towards him.
A boot slammed down on his wrist and pain shot up his arm. Valentin groaned in pain and looked up at his assailant in time to see a spear careening in his direction from above. The boy twisted his body the best he could, pulling at the muscles in his anchored wrist. The spear jammed into his armored shoulder. The tip did not pierce the metal but a white hot pain vibrated in his shoulder.
The assailant prepared another strike aimed at Valentin. The boy’s senses were flooded with the will to live. Time slowed down as he was able to observe all things around him. The extreme stresses, peculiarly enough, allowed Valentin’s mind to cool down.
He focused all of his favor into his pinned arm, letting the appendage buzz overtop the arching pain. In one quick motion, he drug his arm through the mud, forcing the enemy off balance and freeing his body. Pain roared through his wrist, arm, and shoulder and flashed white within his mind. He needed to create more distance.
Before either Valentin or his enemy had the opportunity to react, a flash of metal struck the attacker across the head, taking them down into the mud. The familiar figure of Morna, her spear lost somewhere in the corpse of another ambusher, rushed the warrior with the blade of her longsword clutched in her mailed fists. She stepped on one of the arms of the attacker and smashed their head with the pommel of her blade.
The other arm of the ambusher was too late to stop the devastating blow and a sickening crunch was barely audible to Valentin. The arm fell back to the ground as Morna delivered several more blows to the attacker’s face like a blacksmith to a hot iron. She bashed the warrior long after even Valentin understood the person had died.
Flesh and blood coated the pommel and did not wash away in the ever more intense rain. Morna briefly looked to help the boy up before using the blade of her sword to deflect a spear strike from another ambusher. She grabbed one of her attacker’s arms to force them off balance and kicked out their legs. The sword pommel struck down again and again and again until the attacker’s head was nothing more than pulp.
No sooner had that attacker been dispatched than another assailant moved out of the darkness of the rain. She forced this attacker away from Valentin and she disappeared out of his vision. Her fight drifted elsewhere, lost somewhere in the rain. Only the muffled shouts and the sound of metal clanging off each other was the only thing Valentin could make out.
Valentin finally retrieved his spear and he rose to his feet. Disorientation still gripped at his mind as he tried to get his footing back beneath him. His boot crushed something odd. He lifted his foot to see an eyeball smashed into the mud. An inadvertent look at the face of the warrior that faced Morna’s vicious strikes almost brought Valentin back to his knees. If he had not seen it himself, he would not have recognized it as human.
He turned away to try to observe the battle around him. To his right, he found Morna supporting Elane and a couple other scouts fending off several attackers. They employed excellent group tactics to cover the weak parts of their defense. To his left, he saw Hrost facing off against four attackers on his own. The warriors were trying to encircle him before striking him all at once to dispatch of the pesky deggan once and for all.
Valentin quickly turned in the direction of his instructor and ran towards him. There was no plan in his head, no grand ideas of how to turn the tables safely for Hrost. All Valentin thought was that, no matter how talented Hrost may be, he would have difficulties surviving such an attack.
The wind and rain dampened the senses of all, and the boy’s charge went unnoticed by the warriors who were all focused on taking down Hrost.
Valentin went up behind the back of the nearest warrior and saw the skin on the nape of the man’s neck. Instinctively, Valentin coursed energy through his body and unleashed it in an empowered strike upwards through the back of the neck. The tip of his spear disappeared in the warrior’s head and the man fell to his knees as Valentin tried to wrench the spear free.
The other three warriors paused and the death of their comrade at the hands of this child. In that short span of hesitation, Hrost lunged forwards, and dispatched another one of his attackers in a strike that Valentin struggled to follow. The other two leapt away to try to find a new approach in this sudden change in fortunes.
Hrost reached over and yanked Valentin’s spear out of the corpse of the warrior the boy had embedded it into. Viscera clung to the spear tip, dangling from the weapon like a macabre ornament.
Valentin resisted the urge to wretch at the sight and turned his head away only to see the ground littered in the corpses of the ambushers.
“What are you staring for?” Hrost admonished, trying to get Valentin’s focus back. “Either get ready or retreat.”
Valentin shook his head and readied his spear. The four of them stood in a standoff. Four of them already had difficulty cornering the deggan and now they were reduced to two. While Valentin did not look overly imposing, he had still managed to kill one of them and they could not take him lightly.
Hrost, for his part, was not interested in pressing into the two survivors. This was a defense against an ambush and, the longer it took, the more advantageous it was for the defenders. A brief, violent, coughing fit came over him, however, only Valentin could hear it and the window for the attack shut for both parties.
Further to Hrost’s left, a lumbering figure appeared through the wind and rain. A hammer rested over their shoulder and they walked with a leisurely gait. Hrost relaxed a bit and chuckled.
Dyed red by the unfortunate souls that faced him, Ferron Martelle strolled towards the two warriors that faced off against his ward and his second in command. He hefted his hammer off of his shoulder and pointed it authoritatively at the two increasingly nervous warriors. Valentin couldn’t see it, but he knew that the grin on his face from earlier had yet to leave.
“It was unlucky for you that I was here.” Ferron boasted. “Take this opportunity to run while you still can. Tell your commander that I want to meet with them.”
Ferron continued to march forward with an intimidating presence, tiny sparks flying off of his limbs and crackling behind his helm. The two warriors gave each other a brief look before fleeing into the forest.
The sound of a horn pierced through the tempest. Incoherent shouting followed from all around Valentin as the surviving ambushers disengaged and fled into the woods.
Ferron stood tensely for several more minutes, listening to the howling of wind. He faced the woods and watched for the potential reemergence of the ambushers. It wasn’t until he was certain that the ambushers had fully fled from the battlefield that he let out a deep exhalation and lowered his hammer back to his side.
Valentin exhaled sympathetically to the warband leader, unaware that he had been matching the man’s breathing patterns. The fervor of battle ebbed from his psyche, leaving only throbbing pain in his shoulder and wrist.
Ferron lifted his face plate, revealing a toothy grin on his face. The man burst into laughter that competed with the wind, carrying deep into the forests.
“Nothing like a fight during a storm,” he announced jubilantly. The jewelry braided in his beard clanged on his armor like wind chimes. “There is no greater blessing than warring beneath such darkened skies. Ah, I feel so light, Hrost, as if all my stress were washed away.”
“There are few feelings that match it,” Hrost agreed before hunching over and coughing a bit more.
Ferron met eyes with his ward whose armor was disheveled and caked in mud. A dent in his shoulder from the spear blow was clearly seen. His own spear was coated in the tissues of the warrior he had struck from behind, the larger pieces still violently fluttering in the wind like a tethered bird.
“I see that you joined the fray as well,” he casually commented, reaching his hand out and freeing the dangling flesh from Valentin’s spear. “How was your first real battle?”
Valentin touched his right hand to his injured shoulder and winced. “It was so chaotic, nothing compared to what I saw yesterday.”
Ferron laughed again. “That’s because you watched from a distance. If you had fought on the front with the rest, you’d be surprised how frenetic it can get.”
The warrior moved forward and inspected Valentin’s armor. He placed his fingers on the plate and the slight adjustment made the boy wince. “It looks like it didn’t go through but it will likely still give you a nasty bruise.”
As they were talking, the surviving members of the scouting party returned to meet with their leader. All were covered in muck and blood. Some needed the shoulders of their comrades to help them move. The jovial and unharmed appearance of their leader seemed to raise the spirits a bit.
“Who was it?” Ferron asked with great interest. He drummed his mailed fingers on the bloody spear tip. “Did you get them back?”
Valentin pointed in the direction of the two bodies that Morna had dispatched, their open skulls draining crimson into the mud. He saw his savior supporting one of the other scouts, her mask coated in blood. Her battle prowess served as a harsh reminder of why he feared her in the first place.
Her ferocity was something that Valentin found enviable. She was decisive and ruthless when it was required while he floundered in the mud and muck.
“They got me while I was disarmed but Morna killed them for me.” While this had not endeared the woman to him, he still felt it necessary to show appreciation to someone who had saved his life. “Thank you, Morna.”
It was uncertain if Valentin’s words of gratitude surprised Ferron or Morna more. Ferron whipped his head towards the woman and she nearly dropped the scout she was supporting to move towards Valentin. However, Ferron blocked her from doing so.
“It seems that you have done me a great service, Morna,” Ferron spoke with gratitude. “I will make sure that you are suitably rewarded for your efforts.”
Morna stopped her attempt to move forward and instead offered a half bow to her leader. “It was my pleasure.”
“We need to retrieve the horses and get these bodies out of here,” Ferron said, whistling loudly in hopes his horse returned. “How many of ours went down?”