They screamed, they cried, they howled, they yearned for blood. A myriad of voices roared with rage outside the walls of Vanhold, the last monument of Eldian authority in Coheria. Four days had passed since the insurgent militia had begun their storm siege on the river garrison built on the frontier between the province of Atika and the rebel state. All Eldian forces that had survived the initial onslaught and the shock assaults that followed, had retreated to Vanhold, which they planned to hold until reinforcements arrived from the Capital or die trying. The latter option was appearing to be more and more likely now.
Unlike other fortresses built in the region, Vanhold was primarily constructed of wood and stone rather than brick and mortar. It was a relic from the first expeditions of expansion when the Power of Titans was not yet fully understood by Eldians. As such, it was what one might call primitive in comparison to the modern works of masonry. Instead of being able to be defended even with a scant garrison force, Vanhold needed near full capacity to mount a proper defencive. The Eldians and their auxiliaries that had taken sanctuary behind its walls were nowhere near that number.
About eight hundred warriors in service of Eldia stood at the walls. Only a few of them were subjects of Ymir, while the rest were conscripts from conquered lands and citizens from annexed states. Some had families that hid in the bowels of the fortress, while others had lost everyone and everything in the flames of war. Some had a desire for vengeance against the insolent Coherians, some wished to uphold the honor of their oaths, while some simply wished to survive.
Vessa counted herself among the third category. To live through this nightmare was all she desired, and this desire drove her to fight back the rebel horde that stormed Vanhold. She stood at the scorpio ballista mounted over a raised platform on the palisade. Arrows rained around her, a couple of them being studded into the chainmail shirt that was held firm by a leather harness. Two of her crew had died with arrows in their eye and throat since the morning assault had begun. Vessa ignored the image of their dead faces as she heaved the gigantic mechanism to take aim and then pulled the lever. The projectile bolt hurled from the scorpio and impaled an archer that stood about hundred meters away from the wall.
"Reload," she said unnecessarily, as Infrid, a young soldier like her, placed another bolt into the weapon.
Vessa spun the wheel that pulled back the elastic cords of the war machine. Her arm ached and her muscles burned as she locked the bolt into its place. Operating a scorpio was a job for three at least, and even then it was a taxing task.
"Ready?" Infrid asked, his arms prepared to move the machine into position.
Vessa nodded as her eyes locked on to a war chariot. Three archers rode it, spraying arrows at the walls. Taking in a deep breath, Vessa aimed and pulled the lever. The bolt shattered one of the spiked wheels and the chariot collapsed with the charioteer and the archers ending up trampled under the hooves of their horses. A cheer roared from the warriors surrounding the scorpio and Vessa cheered back.
Their mirth was short-lived as the walls shook due to an echoing impact. Warriors armed with recurve bows concentrated over the platform above the main gates. The soldiers arming the battering ram were protected with broad shields which the arrows of the Eldians could not penetrate.
"Ladders!" someone yelled from one of the sides.
Siege ladders banged against the walls and rebels began scaling it with little to no resistance. With most warriors focused over and behind the gates, the Eldians were spread thin on other sections of the wall. Angry Coherians armed with spears and work tools improvised into weapons poured onto the parapet. They swarmed and overwhelmed isolated squads of warriors.
"Move it to the right," Vessa commanded, pulling the wheel of the mechanism to set the bolt in place.
Ifrid grunted as he pushed the direction of the approaching mass of rebels, "Enough?"
As a reply, Vessa loosed the bolt into the ranks of Coherians. The weighted tip of the projectile punched through the torsos of three rebels who fell instantaneously, leaving a whole in their formation. Eldian warriors engaged with them took advantage of the opening and stabbed the rebels in the rear with long spears. Vessa repeated the action, not once but twice.
The horde seemed to be endless, which wasn't the case but the Coherian militia outside outnumbered the Eldian forces inside by about ten to one. Eldia's military might was dominated by the Power of Titans, though that was changing with reforms proposed by several lawmakers in the Capital. Soldiers serving in the legions of Eldia were beginning to be better equipped and trained than those of their foes. The rationale behind this was that Eldians and all those who served them were superior, and thus should be able to hold the line until the Titans arrived. This, however, was not fact as of yet.
Coheria boasted a population of two hundred thousand slaves and indentured workers, pious men and women all of them. They led simple lives of servitude and hardship, their daily activities revolving heavily around prayer. With their religious leader now executed by an envious Eldian, there was nothing left for them to hold on to. Even if only a tenth of their population took up arms, the local garrisons would be overwhelmed, and it was clear that more than a tenth of them had drawn blades against their rulers. Adding to that, the Coherians were enraged and vengeful, their fury almost fanatical.
A painful gasp escaped Ifrid's mouth as the bolt dropped from his hands. Vessa turned to check the reason for her comrade's slackness and found that a spear had impaled him through the side. A man, a Coherian, dressed in a thick linen garb lurched from the palisade, the spear's shaft gripped in his hand. Blood in Vessa's veins ran cold. Reflexively, she drew the long seax knife strapped to her chest and sprinted forward. Before the man could pull back the spear, the wicked tip of Vessa's seax was driven through the socket of his right eye. He cried in agony before Vessa kicked him off the platform's palisade. But there were more, a lot more.
The weighted ends of the siege ladder the man had used to climb now rested on the wooden rim of the palisade. There were about more than a dozen rebels that still clung on to it, climbing up. Another spear was thrust at Vessa, but the aim was off. She caught it by the shaft and pulled it from the rebel who had not held it tightly enough. Twirling the spear into the opposite direction, Vessa hurled it at the rebels with all her might. The speartip punched through the ribcage of the dazed man who fell back on his compatriots down the ladder.
Vessa flicked the blood of her seax before slipping it back into the scabbard that was strapped to the leather harness. She turned to look at Ifrid, who had passed out from blood loss. He would not live, and Vessa would probably miss him. Like her and hundreds others currently in Vanhold, Ifrid was a Nothric. Their people had sworn allegiance to Eldia after their king's stronghold was obliterated by one of the Titan lords about a century ago. As much as the titans terrified her, Vessa wished one of them was present here, at Vanhold.
Picking up the bearded axe and the oval shield that rested against the wall, Vessa poised to meet the rebels that climbed over the palisade. While spears were lethal and had the advantage of reach in open field, they could be rather unwieldy when used in tight spaces. Unlike an axe. Vessa cut down the first three with relative ease. Unlike the rebels who had minimal training with arms, she was well versed in the art of combat due to the eight years she spent in legions, having tasted her first battle at the age of sixteen. Then there was the psychological effect of seeing a warrior in full armor fight with drilled focus. Even blind fanaticism could not prevent the Coherians from hesitating before charging on. But they had the numbers on their side, and Vessa was but one woman.
"You have a death wish, soldier?" asked a familiar, coarse voice.
Vessa did not turn, but she had a pretty good idea of who it was. Centurion Theo Gerdan, clad in his coat of plates, joined Vessa in the pitched melee with a squad of twenty warriors. What ensued next could only be described as a bloodbath. For the quarter of an hour that followed, the warriors slayed fifty Coherians that climbed up the walls at the cost of only three of their own. Theo was an Eldian, and the next best thing to a titan they had. He carved through the rebels with his ornate broadsword. His helmet, which was similar to that issued to Vess and the other warriors with the exception of a horse-hair plume, was flecked with blood and tissue matter.
"We need to fall back," he ordered, turning as he began marching towards the inner hold.
"Fall back to where exactly?" asked Vessa, before adding, "Sir."
He stopped, staring at her, "Got hit in the head, Vessa?"
"No, sir," she answered, understanding the stupidity of her question.
She had not realised it before then, but the gates had been breached and the rebels rallied to charge into the fortress.
"Well, we must hurry," he said, beginning to walk with his usual quick stride, "The central courtyard is where we make our last stand."
"What of the others?" Vessa asked, matching the centurion's pace like the rest of the warriors, "Revak? Surrin? Kelga?"
"Revak and Kelga are already there," informed a warrior who walked beside the Centurion, Leron his name was, Vessa recalled.
"Surrin is dead?" Vessa asked.
"A spear through the throat," Theo replied, "She died honorably. You and I will probably see her by today's sunset."
Ahead of them stood two rebels who had climbed through a siege ladder that had probably collapsed. Theo beheaded one with a clean swipe of his broadsword while the other was thrown off the rampart before he could even react. The battle beneath was brutal and bloody, and Vessa could not help but think that Theo's pessimism was not baseless.
By the time they got there, the carnage had already arrived at the courtyard. Warriors of Eldia met rebels of Coheria that outnumbered them on a hopeless scale. There was Revak, holding a seax in one hand and a sword in the other, ripping apart anyone who dared charge at his shieldwall. There was Kelga, wielding a hewing spear in conjunction with the oval shield. There were others too, who Vessa did not know personally but recognised well, like the Otheran warrior called Arix who was proficient in the use of a war sling. And Yana of Snarketh, who dual wielded sickle shaped swords native to her province. And finally there was the Eldian Champion, Lukas Thale, a wolf pelt adorning his coat of plates. He fought outside the shieldwall, slicing apart the rebels with his great axe.
"Lock shields," ordered Theo as he stepped forward with his sword raised, "This may be the last order you receive from me. Know this before you meet your end, it was an honor to fight along your side. You all may not be Eldians by blood but you are Eldian by spirit, and in death we shall all reunite to feast in the eternal halls of Yggdrasil. So fight well and die well! Eldia Eterna!"
"Eldia Eterna!" roared the warriors as they charged into battle.
The Coherians were an endless wave, a tireless, endless wave. They cared little for the lives of their comrades and even less for their own. But their strategy of throwing bodies at the Eldian forces was working for within an hour, less than half of the original numbers remained. Vessa's shield had cracked and every fiber of her body was plagued by exhaustion. Theo wasn't doing any better, having taken a spear wound to the shoulder. He stood behind the shield wall, furious at his inability to fight without becoming a hindrance to those under his command.
"Can't you turn into a titan, sir?" Vessa asked, trying to distract herself from the impending demise, "The mindless type you know?"
"Seriously," he grimaced and then cracked a smile, "You want your last words to be a racist joke?"
Vessa laughed as she continued to fight, it was a resonant, mirthful laughter. Unknowingly, Theo joined her and so did the rest of the warriors. The Centurion pushed through the wall of warriors, laughing loudly as he charged with his sword and crashed into the ranks of the rebels. He swung his blade with decisive precision, felling Coherians with each stroke. The centurion took wounds as well, but they were inconsequential now for pain was but a distant memory. The frenzy of combat and the battlejoy were what drove him now, as they did to so many others.
In the madness of the melee and outburst of laughter, the warriors did not notice that the Coherians were stepping back. Those that did notice dismissed it as a trick of a tired mind. But all became clear as a shadow rose from behind them and a deafening roar erupted from above. Vessa looked up to see the glorious form of a Titan Lord. Theo turned and raised his sword in salute.
"Ymir is with us!"