Linea was surrounded by Evira and five men of her guard. Lady Tira and Lady Lalana rode beside her as they were nearing the temple. The temple wasn’t that far away from the keep, but the citizens had seen their princess approaching, gathered and now waved at her. They didn’t mean to block her way, but the inevitably did as they clogged the streets.

“I’m flattered by the enthusiasm that your people show me, but isn’t it a bit excessive?” Linea asked Lady Lalana in a whispering voice. “I mean, the people in the other cities along the way were welcoming as well, but not that much.”

The countess put a wry smile on her face and combed with her left hand through her black hair.

“The people may not be informed of everything happening around them, but a few things make their round. Everyone knows about the threat that looms over the city. I don’t like to admit it, but they don’t trust me enough yet to resolve this problem on my own,” she explained. “And to be fair, I can’t even blame them.”

“They already see me as their savior?” Linea asked with a frown. “That would be quite presumptuous. I’ve yet to prove myself.”

“I believe it’s that you and your sister made your way here despite what lurks around the city. That’s what makes them believe in you.”

“Well, I hope I’ll be able to fulfill their hopes.”

They went silent as they reached the Temple’s Square. The temple was rather large compared to the temple of Alandis for example, but the underlying architecture was the same as for all temples in Luna’sindra.

Before another crowd could gather around them, Linea slipped inside the temple. Two of her guards were placed outside the main entrance to prevent any peasants from entering.

Linea asked a novice of the temple to bring her to Nora. They were led through some side corridors to the infirmary, which was full to the brim with injured people. Linea suspected them to be the Void Hunters that Sir Bilundir had mentioned.

Before she could pay them anymore attention however, a voice sounded from the other end of the room.

“Linea! Tira!”

Linea looked towards the source and saw Nora sitting on a bed waving at her. She hastily walked over to her best friend and gathered her in a hug.

“I was so worried, Nora!”

“Well, I nearly died but didn’t. Thanks to you as far as I am told…” Nora said.

“I shouldn’t have even taken you on this expedition in the first place. You’re no fighter! I was just… just…”

“Aw, come on,” Nora said and rolled her eyes. “I may not be a fighter, but you need me. We both know that. Besides, I didn’t die therefore your arguments are invalid.”

“That’s not how this works…” Linea replied but Nora flicked a finger against her forehead.

“Stop nagging, you… dunce?” she said. “Wasn’t that what Tarina always calls you?”

“Yeah, and it stays like that,” Linea said and broke off their hug. “No one else is allowed to call me that.”

Nora just smiled at her and then turned to Lady Tira.

“Sister dearest!” she said and opened her arms in expectation of a hug. “So good to see you. I couldn’t write you since we were already on the move and a courier would have been not much faster than us. I wanted to write mother as soon as we reached Taldira. Is she here with you?”

Tira embraced her sister, but a few tears dripping from her face signaled that something wasn’t right.

“Tira?” Nora asked rattled. “Where is mother?”

“Mother… mother is dead, Nora,” Tira said and wiped her tears away.

“What?” Nora asked unbelieving. “How? How did she… Where?”

Her hands were trembling as she stared into her sister’s eyes. Tira sat down beside Nora and explained what had transpired in the last weeks and what most likely happened to their mother. Nora cried heavily as Tira explained that their home had been evacuated and that their father had stayed back to buy them time when the Torra had attacked.

This part was news even to Linea. She came closer and laid her hand on Nora shoulder. Nora instinctively pressed her head against Linea and drenched her in tears.

“I’m so sorry, Nora…” Linea said, but deep inside she felt like she couldn’t find any words to describe her sadness. “I promise, I will make them all pay. I’ll make them pay…”

Nora just cried more. She released Linea and hugged her sister again.

On the other side of the room, Aruna entered and noticed them immediately.

“What happened?” she asked and looked from person to person. Linea explained it to her making Nora crying even more.

“Shit!” Aruna said. “What are we going to do about it?”

“We fight of course,” Linea said with resolve. With the death of Nora’s parents and Nora’s reaction to it, the whole thing had become more personal for Linea, even though she had never met them in person.

She looked around and saw some men and women from the Void Hunters’ Guild watching them with interest.

“Aruna, do you know why those Hunters aren’t healed yet?” she asked.

“I was told that only one fully trained healer was in the city, when it all started. And she died in an infiltration attack. The other priestesses are doing their best, but it’s a slow process,” Aruna explained to her.

“I heard of that attack,” Linea said and frowned. Without a healer the coming fight would get even more difficult.

“Are you going to help them?”

Linea just nodded. She went to the nearest bed where a man laid propped up by a lot of cushions.

“What’s your name, Hunter?” she asked sitting down on a stool beside his bed.

“Lilandir, Your Royal Highness.”

“All right,” Linea said with a nod. “Lilandir, I’m going to heal you now. Where are you injured?”

The man hastily rolled up his right pant leg to reveal a bandage which had already blood pouring to the outside. Linea got to work in an instant and put her hand above the wound. She cast the healing spell Aruna had taught her, but surprisingly enough nothing happened.

“You need to unwrap the wound first,” Aruna said with a small smile and removed the bandage. The man groaned slightly as Aruna worked on his leg. The bandage was drenched in blood on the inside and it smelled horridly. Apparently, the wound wasn’t healing properly.

Linea wrinkled her nose due to the stench, but she placed her hand above the wound, nonetheless. She tried to cast the spell again and this time it worked as intended. To her surprise the spell took more power than she had anticipated. But not enough to worry her.

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After she was done, she looked at his wound again and it was fully healed.

“Stay in bed until one of the priestesses could check on you,” Linea ordered the man.

“Of course, Your Grace!” The man said with a big smile on his face. He touched his leg, where the wound had been, with care. “Thank you so much, Your Grace. I feared I might lose my leg to the infection.”

“I don’t know about that, but I’m happy to help,” Linea said and patted his shoulder while getting up and moving to the next patient.

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It took Linea more time than she had planned to heal all injured Hunters and Huntresses, but she had noticed that the whole ordeal had put only a little dent into her power reserves. It showed how much Life Force the goddess had entrusted to her.

Because of that, Linea had decided to take her time to pray to her goddess, but to her disappointment the goddess hadn’t replied this time. Linea gave up on her prayer after waiting for half an hour. Worried about the meaning of Luna’s silence, she had set off together with Evira and Lady Lalana to inspect the walls.

It was at the northern gate where Lady Lalana decided would be the best place as it had the biggest garrison.

“Captain Gahina!” Lady Lalana greeted the Captain of the guard. “Princess Linea wishes to inspect the walls in preparation of the impending attack. Would you be so kind to conduct us?”

“Sure thing, M’ladies!” Captain Gihana answered with a slight accent, which Linea couldn’t place. Evira looked offended by the rather casual enunciation. Lady Lana picked that up and explained immediately.

“Don’t mind her, Your Grace,” she pleaded apologetically. “Captain Gihana was born in the Nava’sinkuna east of here. The clans living there are… rough and uncivilized.”

“Sorry, if I insulted ya,” Captain Gihana added with a smile.

“Don’t worry,” Linea said and waved her off.

The Captain led them through the gatehouse to the top of the gate where some guards were sitting in a room playing cards. Two of the guards stood at the windows and looked outside.

“Attention, boys!” the Captain yelled and startled the men. One even pushed an unopened bottle of wine from the table which shattered on the floor. The men didn’t show their sadness over the destroyed bottle and saluted instead.

“I hope ya didn’t drink on duty, ya little maggots,”

“No, Captain!” they answered in unison.

“Well, ya better didn’t,” she said. “Tandir, report! The others keep on spottin’ outside.”

“We’ve nothing to report, Captain! No sightings for the whole night,” the man named Tandir answered promptly.

“Good thing. Any messages from the other towers on the north wall?”

“All clear, no sightings from them either.”

“Good, continue with ya watch,” Captain Gihana ordered. “And let me catch ya with booze again up here and I’m gonna flog you real hard!”

“Yes, Captain.”

Gihana nodded towards Linea and her entourage and the left through one of the side-doors leading on top of the walls.

“This is our wall,” she explained with pride in her voice. “Twelve meters high on average and six meters thick. The segments between each tower is one solid block of Moon Stone. If ya want to break that, ya gotta have some serious siege with ya.”

“Or one of those orbs…” Linea murmured and remembered the devastating effects of that black orb. She looked over the wall and inspected the moat in front of the wall which appeared to be at least two meters deep.

‘Why isn’t there any water in that moat, even though there is a river flowing next to the city?’ Sarah suddenly noted and startled Linea for a second. Sarah had been rather quiet since the incident in the forest.

‘Why should there be?’ Linea asked. She knew nothing about the engineering of fortifications, but she couldn’t remember ever seeing or even hearing about a water-filled moat.

‘Well, on Earth when humans still built castles and city walls like this, they put water in a moat to hinder enemy troops even more in their attack. It’s hard to attack a wall, if you have to wade or swim through water first,’ Sarah explained.

‘That sounds… clever. Why didn’t we come up with something like that?’ Linea asked.

‘Beats me.’

Linea looked at Lady Lalana.

“I want one of the free mages to create a canal from the river to the moat. I want it filled with water. That should slow down the enemy even more,” she said.

“Of course, My Lady,” Lady Lalana said and bowed. “I will see to it as soon as we return to the keep.”

“Very well, I think apart from that the wall seems perfectly fine. How is the shield implemented, the Archmage told us about?”

“See those things on the towers roofs?” Captain Gihana asked and motioned towards the tower on top of the gatehouse next to them. Linea followed her finger and noticed a crystal glowing in blue.

“Those are the projectors, which are connected to a central hub in the city. There the mages put the magic in and it’s transferred to all projectors.”

Linea nodded. It was a good idea to pull the sorcerers away from the wall and more inside the city.

“Good, and how is the morale? How are the guards doing?”

“Some of us were there, when the old Countess head was brought by that fucker,” Captain Gihana started. A small cough from Evira interrupted her for a second, but she resumed nonetheless. “Word got around and the boys are afraid of what is about to come. No one knows, and that makes them restless.”

“So, we need to expect them to flee in panic?” Linea asked, in hope she misunderstood the captain.

“No, no,” she said and looked peeved. “Didn’t mean it like that. It’s just, I think someone should tell them what we're facing. And how dangerous it really is. The boys are fighting better, if ya gonna be honest with them, I think.”

“Mhm, thanks for your help, Captain” Linea just replied and turned to Lady Lalana. “Next should be the city’s main garrison. Or military district. I don’t know, how you call it here.”

“Well, the keep is our military district. The army has training grounds there and barracks,” Lady Lalana explained.

“Then that’s where we should go next!”

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Back at the keep Linea watched Lady Talura drilling the gathered army and even militia men, who hadn’t even their weapons yet. They simply took turns with the spears from the regular spearmen.

“All right men!” Lady Talura yelled over their heads. “Remember what you're facing! We’re up against Torra. Most of you probably had contact with those before, but not on this scale. Those little skirmishes and their tactics don’t apply here anymore! I will teach you how to fight as one to face an enemy that is numberless!”

She walked in front of the gathered crowd who were lined up in front of her. Linea noticed that the regular soldiers were disciplined and in perfectly aligned rows while the militia chattered with each other and their lines mostly resembled the walking path of a drunkard on his way home.

“You better listen, if you want to survive this!” Lady Talura yelled at the militia. “I want to make clear to you that we’re facing an enemy that is countless and relentless. They won’t stop with their attack until every last one of you is dead. So, stop babbling and listen, or I’ll punch you harder than a Torra could!”

The militia men stopped talking in an instant. Linea didn’t know if it was because of their reawakened fear of the Torra or their newly found fear of Lady Talura.

“Good,” she said after no sound was to hear from them. Linea took the moment to approach Lady Talura and whispered something into her ear. Lady Talura nodded and turned to the soldiers again.

“Princess Linea wishes to address all of you,” she announced. “Be honored and don’t try any stunts, or else I’ll have you flayed!”

She made space on her little podium for Linea, who was a bit too small even with the podium. The soldiers in the back got on their toe to catch a glimpse of her.

Linea took a deep breath.

“Daughters and sons of Taldira!” she started and appealed to their local pride instead of calling them Luna’sin. “What you are facing is an enemy that is not to be trifled with. It’s an enemy that wishes nothing more and nothing less than the utter annihilation of this city and everyone in it. An enemy that doesn’t care about diplomacy at all. He will come, he will attack, and he will succeed.”

She made a short break, in which the soldiers seemed to be unsure of what she tried to tell them. It was a technique, she had seen her mother using before. Instilling fear and then giving them hope.

“He will succeed, if no one stands against him. But this city will not just budge! Taldira will fight! We will fight on the walls, we will fight in the streets. We will fight with swords and spears and bows and magic. We will fight even with our bare fists if we have to! Surrendering is not an option against the Torra!”

The regular soldiers stomped with their feet rhythmically on the ground in agreement. The militia joined in after realizing what the other soldiers were doing.

Linea raised her hand to silence them.

“I can’t promise you that everyone will survive,” she said going in all honesty as Captain Gihana had advised earlier. “Such is not the nature of war. But I promise you I will fight with you! I will fight until I can fight no more!”

The crowd stomped again.

“I will give my everything to save your families, and I expect everyone of you to do the same.”

It took a few moments for the crowd to calm down again. Linea left the podium and talked to Talura about their battle plan.

“I’ve thought about your plan to distribute the militia inside the city. I suggest they man the keep instead and we place all civilians inside the keep. It will be cramped, but it’s easier to defend them inside the keep behind another wall instead of stretching our forces too thin,” Lady Talura explained.

“That leaves us vulnerable to surprise attacks from other sides, if we don’t place them at the other parts of the wall,”

“That’s true, but are you willing risk the lives of thousands of civilians on that, Your Grace?”

“Good point…”

‘Sarah, what do you think?’ Linea asked Sarah to get a second opinion.

‘I’m not sure, both plans have their merits,’ Sarah said. ‘I would tend to your plan. If they can break into the city, the militia probably won’t be able to fend them off either way. I would suggest using the militia as intended to stall any enemy trying to surprise us. But we could place the civilians inside the keep, nonetheless. Take only a token force from the militia to guard them. The rest should be enough to stall the enemy as planned.’

‘That’s a good compromise,’ Linea said with a smile.

She explained that plan to Lady Talura, who agreed to it.

‘Let’s just hope there will be no surprise attack…’ Linea said to Sarah.