AN: Not formatting this one the way I usually do, I an tired of fixing every damn double space on this, and I've got more chapters to upload, hopefully the default format looks OK when it is rendered. If it doesn't look right to you, let me know in a review.
...Fortress Alaf…
Leinas stood atop the battlements and looked off into the distance. She turned to Aureole Omega beside her. Aureole laughed in a tittering kind of voice while covering her mouth. "Something funny?" Leinas asked.
Aureole Omega pointed out to the marching ranks that were inching ever closer. "Them." She said.
"How so?" Leinas asked.
"They expect to win." She said.
Leinas started to laugh as well. "We're outnumbered in enemy territory and have no sight of our reinforcements. They've got us beat by ten to one odds, more or less. And yet…" Her laughter stopped and her face expressed the predatory bloodlust of the adamantite adventurer she had been before.
"I pity them." Aureole said.
"Hear that you fucks! You're coming all this way to die! Leinas Rockbruise, General of the Sorcerer King's Army of the Abelion Hills, will have your heads!" She shouted from the ramparts as loudly as she could.
"You're taking this very well." Aureole Omega said sweetly.
"Of course I am." Leinas said, "A thousand specks of dust are nothing to a mountain. How soon do you think they'll get here?" She asked.
"Them?" She pointed to the approaching army.
"Or them?" She pointed to the north behind them.
"Either or both." Leinas replied dryly.
"The Theocracy will be here first." Aureole Omega said, "But the pounding stopped earlier this week, and part of our view of the mountain is gone, so I'm sure they finished the road. By now, Re-Estize has probably been fully occupied, or nearly so, which means King Zanac and General Nimble will be coming south with the Imperial Legions and the Army of Re-Estize very soon."
"That reminds me," Leinas said thoughtfully, "All those prisoners from Philip's army, they're being returned home, right? I read they took an enormous number of people captive."
"I would imagine since they were already armed and equipped, that they're being sent to fight for King Zanac by now." Aureole Omega replied.
"No loyalty issues there?" Leinas asked dubiously.
"You never met Philip, did you?" Aureole said with a dismissive laugh.
"No, was he really that bad?" She asked.
"He was the worst, the very worst, he gave no loyalty and inspired none. Nobody is angry that he's gone." Aureole replied confidently.
"Well fine, but how long will it take them to get here?" Leinas asked.
"Don't you remember what I told you before?" Aureole asked.
"What?" Leinas turned the question back to her.
"I said 'the gloves are off'. Did you forget? His Majesty could open a gate and move them from there to here almost instantly, the only reason not to is to buy them time to prepare themselves. As far as our other more recently acquired allies, well, how much do you know about Jaldabaoth's invasion?" The guardian asked.
"Very little." She admitted.
"The invaders, according to the Sorcerer King, actually left the resistance alone for awhile despite knowing where they were, just so they could be gathered together and crushed. That is what is happening here. The Slane Theocracy is a very, very wealthy nation, it probably has… or had more total power than the Baharuth Empire. Not just in an economic respect, but in their fighting power and resources. Even if we crushed them to dust in an instant, we wouldn't be changing the spirit of their people who believe themselves destined for victory in the end. They'd then undermine the rule of His Majesty. So we are bleeding them dry. They're spending blood and treasure on futile battles, concentrating fighting power in unreliable ways, and allowing us to bring them to abject ruin. When this war is over, the conquered population will no longer believe they could ever have won, and any who doubt it will not have the resources to change anything. We are erasing their beliefs, their culture, their confidence, as well as all the means they have to fight back." Aureole Omega said, and her beautiful laughter rang out over the field before the fortress as she looked to where the enemy armies would assemble.
Leinas looked at her, stunned. "You're… serious."
"I am. He is. We are." She said. "When this is over, everything evil about the Theocracy will be laid bare. Many of their people are guilty of horrible crimes, violating the treaty they themselves signed, and they will cease to be factors. Their best soldiers will either join us by choice or they will perish. Their cities will have no proud walls, their beliefs will hold no power over the hearts and minds of their broken people." Aureole Omega looked at Leinas with shining eyes.
It was an expression Leinas knew well now, Aureole Omega was not looking at her now, she was seeing the days ahead, the way she saw a battlefield with all the sights and sounds that told her where the weakness of their enemies lay to crush them under heel.
"Are… we going to exterminate them, to commit genocide?" Leinas asked in a hushed whisper.
It was several minutes before Aureole Omega came back from her 'vision' and answered, "No, they will do it to themselves. Though depending on their stance, the Argland City Council State might do much as well."
"Argland? Are they joining the war?" Leinas asked.
"No, they're going to conduct the war crimes trials. How many soldiers do you think have visited the brothels of Kami Miyako? Of Wheaton? How many Latifundias do you think there are? How many mines have slit eared elves toiling under the lash? Do you think all the people responsible for doing those things will just walk away as if they'd done nothing wrong?" Aureole asked her doubtfully.
Leinas began to drift off into her own thoughts as she began to imagine the numbers, the staggering numbers of 'guilty' that would stand before the juries of Argland.
"Now, how many of those who are guilty do you think have children of their own? You have been to E-Rantel, did he leave the children to die in the gutter?" Aureole asked probingly.
Leinas's eyes glazed over as understanding dawned.
"He's… you're not serious? He'll take the children, won't he?" Leinas asked, in her mind she pictured countless institutions dotted around a newly forged empire, with the children of the Slane Theocracy, most of them, either occupying his state run organizations or fostered out to his firmest supporters.
"General Enri seized every child who lived on the Latifundias around Ikari, and she probably had it done inside the walls as well. She'll do the same at Crossroads after she's won there, and the same will happen at every single Theocracy city and town of significant size. All the children of the die-hards, which is to say 'the guilty', will grow up being educated under a new system, a new way, His Majesty's way. Where then will their loyalty lie, to whom will they look to as their god, their supreme king?" Aureole Omega asked with a serene expression on her face.
Leinas saw it as the guardian laid it all out for her. This was not just 'a' war, this was not just a religious conflict, this was the erasing of an entire people. In a generation after this was over, nothing of the old Slane Theocracy's culture would be the same, most of it would be gone, and all future generations would grow up instilled with absolute loyalty to the one who conquered them.
"This isn't like any war I've ever fought." Leinas said softly, disbelieving the future she clearly saw.
"No, it isn't. This is to be 'the last' war he ever intends to fight on these lands. He will erase the old barriers and destroy the old ways. Every time you swing your sword and make an orphan out of the child of a fanatic, you guarantee that the child will grow up with their loyalty better placed than that of their fathers." Aureole Omega said. "This isn't a war over borders, and it is even bigger than the question of the nature of our king. We're fighting for a new world, a better world, and all new worlds are built on the battlefields of the old. That is why he laid out the rules he did, to lay a foundation for all that he wants the new world to be." The tranquil voice of the guardian pounded into Leinas Rockbruise's brain like hammer blows striking a bar of molten metal.
A struggle warred on the general's face, "Is this really right? Does it have to be this way?" She asked in a hushed voice.
"Would you rather it be done the way the Theocracy would do it? With the wholesale extermination of every man, woman, and child? Would you prefer to do it the way of Re-Estize, in which any potential threat is ground down to poverty and despair so that they can never rise? Or in the Elf King's way, through abject terror?" Aureole asked her seriously.
"No… no, you're right. This is a terrible thing, erasing an entire people, something I've never even imagined before, but… this is kinder than anything else he could do. Their children will grow up, have children, grow old, there will be nothing of the old nightmares to haunt them, and they will prosper. I've seen his rule, it is good, but the sheer scale of this? I never imagined it until you said it just now." Her voice was breathless and low as she forced the words out.
"I…" She froze, then looked at the advancing army with a new hatred. Resting her hands on the crenelations of the ramparts, she leaned forward and shouted at the oncoming force. "You stupid, stupid fools! You're destroying yourselves! Don't you get it?! You're destroying yourselves! Stop! Stop! Stop!" She shouted again and again, her entire body shaking in rage.
"Feel better?" Aureole Omega asked indulgently.
"Yes." Leinas replied flatly.
"No way they heard you." She replied.
"I know." Leinas replied.
"How are you feeling about all this now?" Aureole asked curiously.
Leinas turned her gaze away from the marching dots and looked at her comrade. "I'm less than pleased, but… I'll make a lot of orphans when they get here, as many as I can, so that it doesn't have to happen twice."
"Good." Aureole said frankly.
"No, it isn't, but there is no other option. If there were, the Sorcerer King would have used it instead." Leinas replied, "If he's doing it this way, it must be the best way."
'Her attitude is the correct one.' Aureole Omega privately noted.
…Yaksun...
Queen Draudillon sat in the governor's office. Restoring order after their victory over the Slane Theocracy had been relatively simple, the sudden shock of the magic that poured out of her own mouth like a dragon's fire made of angelic light had utterly demolished the city's sense of pride. The death of Regan, however unfortunate, broke their spirits like her magic had broken the gate.
Most of the soldiers died in the fighting nonetheless, desperate men pushed to desperate lengths, but when it was over and her soldiers swarmed the streets, there was no further dispute about who had won that day.
She spent the first day of her rule simply writing death notifications and overseeing the funerals of the fallen. The first day of fighting had given them a butcher's bill on the wall. Almost a thousand of her people had died on that attempt by itself, her largest casualty figure so far. It took hours of moving her hand over documents to sign all the condolence letters by hand.
She envied Vermillion back at the palace, and as she looked at the rolls of the dead, she missed her alcohol. However, her first action was to distribute every ounce of the stuff in the manor to her soldiers outside.
She grabbed her wrist and rotated her hand. It was sore from all the writing, but given the significance of the content above each signature, she couldn't complain. Not in good conscience anyway. So she sat, and she signed her name again and again until the last notice was completed.
She rang the bell and General Musan entered, followed by two soldiers. "General Musan, have these dispatched today, and send a note to Vermillion reminding him to keep sufficient reserves of gold and silver on hand to make death benefit payouts to the deceased." She pushed a stack of documents to the end of the desk. She then reached over to the left and set them in front of her. "These are for the other three hundred, the ones who gave their lives for my magic. Any with criminal offenses are to have their criminal records burned, all their houses are to be given noble titles and lands, any children of theirs are to be given admission to the academy of their choosing at the crown's expense, and have them posthumously knighted for their sacrifice." She pushed that last set of documents over.
"How bad was it?" He asked.
"We lost roughly one thousand the first day, and if you include the three hundred who sacrificed themselves, then we lost some fifteen hundred all total. Given that we started the campaign with thirty thousand and we lost five hundred or so at the Forlorn Fortress, we've now lost one fifteenth of our army in total, barring any reinforcements. And speaking of reinforcements..." She looked at him expectantly.
"Roughly five thousand reinforcements left the capital and are on their way. They'll occupy the Forlorn Fortress for one day to rest, then march south to join us." General Musan said proudly.
His pride was well justified. Because most of the Draconic Kingdom's population had been consumed during their last war, those who remained were not generally wealthy or fit, and for that many to volunteer was no small thing. It spoke volumes about their new confidence since the purges, and when the rewards and death benefits started to flow back from the Queen's will, it was beyond question that many more would volunteer to swell the ranks of her little army.
Still, it 'was' only a small army. A single pitched fight could end them all.
"Your Majesty?" General Musan asked as he saw her sink into thought.
"General Musan, how many farms surround this area?" The Queen asked.
"Hmm, I don't believe we have an exact number, but there is a lot of open ground between here and Wheaton, so probably quite a few." He said thoughtfully.
"How many slaves are on those farms, and do you think they would appreciate a chance to fight back?" She asked, then added, "And what do you think it would do to their last harvest if we took all the manpower needed to harvest those crops?"
General Musan got a contented smile on his face, "Over an area that wide, there may be around ten thousand slaves. Most of the farms this far east are fairly small, so it'll take at least a week, but if there are any Latifundia in the area, well, that'll be a considerable boost. If we take their slaves and their food reserves, they'll have to pull people from the army or draw supplies from elsewhere. We also won't have to worry about an army marching east to take us down because they won't have the supplies to march that far."
"So? Let's do that then." The Queen said serenely. "Oh, and send me General Oma, I want to see how her inspection of the city here has been going."
"Your Majesty." He said with a deep bow, and taking up the documents, he departed with his aides.
An hour later General Oma was in front of her. "What have you learned?" The Queen asked formally.
"Your Majesty, there were only three thousand slaves inside these walls, only about one thousand of them are capable of fighting, and…" The general trailed off, her olive skin looked pale.
"What is it?" Queen Draudillon asked, feeling the chill that came over General Oma.
"Your Majesty, I don't…" She was clearly trying to speak. The Queen waited.
"General? Out with it." She said forcefully.
"Majesty, did you ever 'see' the beastmen invasion?" General Oma asked.
An odd question and it left her with a very bad feeling.
"No. Why?" Queen Draudillon asked.
"I did. You sent me east, remember? We managed to take back a settlement, mainly by choking the beastmen in our blood, but we took it. It was just a little nothing town out in the sticks, and when we took stock of what we won, nobody felt it was a victory. I went to the largest building, it had been turned into a kind of 'dining hall' by the beastmen. What I saw there, I will never forget. The blood on the walls and floor was bad enough, but what was done to the people... Some of them had obviously been alive while they'd been either eaten or tormented, as shown by the horror on their faces. We took a few beastmen captive, and after I saw that, I had them tortured to death." General Oma's voice was that of calm horror at the recollection, her entire body shook at the memory.
Queen Draudillon was not unaware of the horrors of the invasion, but even so, seeing the normally unflappable General Oma react this way, it had to have been awful, and she had a distinctly twisted feeling that there was a connection here.
"Why are you telling me this?" She asked.
As if she had not heard the question, the General continued, "I always believed to my core, even after torturing those captives to death, that we were 'the good guys', we were the heroes, that humans were decent. Even with my… ahem, heritage being obvious enough to have drawn some small hostility, I still proudly counted myself human, and thought we were basically, uniformly decent as a people, at least compared to the utter brutality, cruelty, violence, and vile barbarism of the other races, that is what I thought anyway."
"And?" The Queen prompted.
The General's fists balled up, she rigidly bent forward tensely, shut her eyes, and screamed, "We are the beastmen! Or worse! We're the monsters they're fighting against! Majesty I… the... I can't even say it… please, go see for yourself!" There were tears forcing their way past her tightly shut eyes.
Queen Draudillon slowly stood. "Show me." She said, "Take me there. The Queen would see what you've discovered."
General Oma nodded mutely, and with nervous steps, forgetting all etiquette about bowing or even saluting, she walked out the door.
When they were outside the manor they mounted horses and rode off in silence. The General led her to a quarter of the city near the western wall, a large but unassuming building with a small open pavilion around it, complete with trees and benches. It wasn't bad to look at, a nice place for people to rest at least. However, flanking the only door were two guards who looked very sick. They glared hatefully at every citizen of the city that passed by.
"Through there, Your Majesty, it is safe, we've swept it. The ones who 'worked' there are very much dead, but we've left the 'other occupants' in place, for you to see for yourself before we remove them." General Oma said in a quivering voice.
Queen Draudillon looked at her uncertainly, but she nodded encouragingly, and the Queen approached the door, she touched it and looked to the guards. Their eyes were red and staring blankly, and the only emotion to change their faces was an uncontainable animosity that resurfaced every time they looked at the people who lived in the city.
She had a very bad feeling about this. She gingerly pushed open the door, her heart pounding in her breast as she closed it behind her. General Oma stood outside, it was unthinkable to not accompany her Majesty, but she couldn't go back in there.
A few minutes later, why that was, the Queen now clearly knew. She could hear the Queen screaming, the guards at the door didn't move, they knew it wasn't danger, it was horror. The screaming kept going, they knew what it was, she was going from room to room in the building, and could not find any better reaction, or muster any other.
After a time, she came out the door again, her heart, which had already been pounding, was breaking. There was a simmering hatred in the eyes of the Draconic Queen.
"General Oma, order our soldiers gathered. I know some have questioned this war, some have questioned my decision, they've wondered what we're really fighting for. I don't have a perfect answer to that beyond what satisfies me, but I want the entire army to see what we're fighting against. Line them up outside, have them walk through here, that should answer any doubts about the side we're on. Then after that, gather the entire population of the city, outside the walls, we're going to file them all through here too, I want them to see what their side is like, without concealment to hide it from them all." Queen Draudillon's voice was low with terror, not fear for herself, but the embodiment of someone aching to make another one suffer.
Her instructions were not finished, however. "Keep some of our soldiers back after they've gone through and have them carefully watch the faces of those who exit this place. Any who do not appear horrified are either responsible or knew first hand. They are to be imprisoned until we can call for some special assistance." She said with a voice of royal wrath.
"Special assistance, Your Majesty?" General Oma asked.
"Yes, I know of one who is very skilled at punishing the remorseless guilty." The Queen said, her voice becoming calm and almost tranquil.
"It will be done, Your Highness." General Oma said.
Within an hour, soldiers were lined up outside. The citizens of Yaksun were baffled beyond words at this strange behavior, and while many questions were asked, none received an answer. But when the citizens saw soldiers enter the building and the screaming and wailing begin, and more than a few exited with vomit being wiped from their faces, rumors began to flow like water down hill.
Citizens of the city gathered to watch, many made jokes and laughed, and some enterprising merchants even began to set up stalls as the people gathered to enjoy the discomfort of the hated occupiers.
That was how it had begun. Then the citizens were herded outside the walls, all of them, they were made to line up, there were no exceptions, not for age, or sex, or infirmity, and those who could not walk were to be carried.
Anxiety began to build and grow, fury and anger at this potential humiliation were the most common expressions.
That was until the first walked through the doors, and they heard the screams of their own countrymen, and their own emerged, white with horror and distress under the loathing eyes of the soldiers of the Draconic Kingdom.
Little by little, person by person, citizen by citizen, their feelings changed to something else.
Shame.
It took a long time for the people to pass through those doors and see what their own had been privately up to. Some came out, not realizing that this was a test to see if they were aware of the private hell that had existed in those walls, or had even participated in it. They emerged with calm eyes and were immediately seized and shackled.
When the last citizen had gone through and came out changed forever, there were three hundred or so residents that had been arrested by the Queen's soldiers.
One of them had the temerity to shout, "They were only elves!" as he was shackled and he tried to struggle.
It was only after the citizens who had passed through and were mutely walking away turned to glare at him that he realized speaking had been a very bad idea.
One of the citizens, a boy with the scraggly half beard and face that showed he was just becoming a man, with his face already turned white as new cotton sheets looked at him as if he were a monster. The boy was shaking, and his peasant garb had a damp spot on it where he had presumably lost some control over his guts. At his side was a water skin, he took it off, and it being the only thing he had to hand, he threw it at the man who dared to speak. He shrieked in the cracked voice of youth, and as if a dam had burst, those who stood close by who had not left the area, took up his outrage as their own. They threw objects of their own, and any doubt about why 'those' people were being detained and others were not, was wiped from thought.
The guards watching over the prisoners quickly formed up, surrounding the group of people they'd detained, but outrage was growing. Someone threw a rock that hit one of the prisoners in the eye. He fell to his knees, shaking and clutching the injury. Another rock, and someone fell with his teeth shattered.
"Keep order here!" Queen Draudillon shouted, but the crowd couldn't hear her, a knife came out, and the bearer rushed the prisoners. "Gotta kill em, gotta kill em, gotta kill em" was all he said as he strained to force his way past the Draconic Kingdom's guards.
They were at a loss of what to do, calls for order couldn't be heard, the people who waited to go inside were paralyzed with fear, but those who came out, once they realized who was responsible for what was made to exist within their city, joined the rioters. "Bar the door till order is restored!" Queen Draudillon commanded, hoping to stop the angry mob, she cantered about on her horse, staying out of the way of her soldiers, but they were trained for killing, not for nonlethal control, not to guard men this way.
However, more importantly… they didn't want to. They didn't want to protect the fiends behind them, they didn't want to stop the wrath, they wanted to heap it down upon their charges, so when the first rioter to make a gap, pushed the soldier aside, they made only a half hearted resistance as they fell back, instead surrounding the Queen, who though she called out for order, could not gain it back. Feet rose and fell, bricks went up and came down, ears were cut and bones were broken, bruises and pain were given. It was over in a matter of minutes, but even when the prisoners were dead, the ones out for their blood did not stop beating their corpses. It was only after they had utterly exhausted themselves and fell to their knees in the pavillion, when they were reduced to feebly raising and dropping their fists, that it could have been called 'over'.
Queen Draudillon turned to her guards, "Arrest these, confine them, but do no harm to them, I will deal with them later. Anyone else who is to be arrested, remove them from the area immediately and confine them separately from these."
"What of the bodies?" A guard asked.
Queen Draudillon looked down from her horse at the man who spoke. "Leave them for anyone else who comes out to beat upon if they wish, they may as well have some use to us."
"General Oma," she called out, and the woman rode over, "I'm going to be busy crafting a letter to explain what happened here, I have to report my failure to the Sorcerer King. Come see me tomorrow, I may have to put you in charge if I am called away to account for myself. If I don't come back, support Vermillion as King in my place, unless the Sorcerer King appoints someone else."
General Oma went pale. "Majesty you can't… you aren't at fault for this." She said emphatically.
"I am. I didn't take the prisoners away, I left them in reach with inadequate guard, I'm sure they all deserved it, but I let a riot break out, and I'm not going to further disgrace myself by lying about it. Thank you for your confidence, but to be in this skin of mine is to be accountable for everything under my authority." She said with displeasure, General Oma bowed deeply, and held the bow as the Queen rode away. Her mouth turned down in a deep frown and her face green with disgust.
When the last of it was done under General Oma's watch, the city was as silent as Wenmark. Some of the population couldn't bear what they'd seen, and in the next few days there was a spike in suicides, some of the infirm and elderly died when their hearts simply refused to beat anymore, no longer wishing to be a party to that world.
The Black Justice priests that had joined her army, along with a few priests of the old gods, did their best to heal the victims they found, but even with their bodies restored, most only wanted to end their own lives as soon as they were able, and they were allowed the private dignity to do so. Nobody felt they had the right to tell them to keep living, not after that. Others craved revenge, or wanted to live to see those responsible suffer in return, and they immediately joined the ranks of Queen Draudillon.
There were no slaves left in Yaksun after that, but there was also no pride left in the city, to the 'relative' credit of the citizens who lived there. Being confronted with what lay within their walls, what Regan had been fighting to protect, kept their heads hanging low, and any thoughts of rebellion were stifled by weight of shame alone.
The next day, Queen Draudillon was attending to several documents pertaining to supply acquisition as cavalry rode out to farms beyond the city when General Oma returned to her.
"Something on your mind?" The Queen asked rhetorically.
"Majesty, how many do you think really knew?" She asked, she didn't have to clarify what she meant.
"I don't know. I sent off a request for…" The Queen froze for a moment, she had almost said 'a friend', but her own shame at her role in what had happened to the erinyes would not allow her such a word, "for some assistance from a helpful intelligence operative."
"The one that sees remorseless guilt the way I see you? The blonde girl, hell, I can't remember her name." General Oma said.
"Yes, if we can get her for a day, well we should get everybody responsible. The city stays on lockdown till then, any citizen who tries to get out will be summarily executed." The Queen said coldly. "None of them will escape for this, and I owe her a… meal."
"Do you think the Sorcerer King knew about this place?" General Oma asked.
Queen Draudillon shook her head, "I honestly don't know. It may be that he did, and that is why he made an army conquering this otherwise relatively small region a priority. He probably knows a lot more than he lets on, dispensing just enough so that we can work out what he wants us to do. He seems to lead us to the answers more often than he gives them to us. It seems to be part of what makes him such a genius of a ruler. If I were to guess, he knew we'd find things 'like this' but not that exact building, otherwise we'd have been given specific target buildings instead of target cities."
"That makes sense." General Oma said thoughtfully. "How long do we remain here?" She asked.
"Not long, I'll leave three thousand behind to hold the city and then we'll move out. There are seven objectives left for us to take, then we will have done our part and captured the entire eastern third of the Slane Theocracy." The Queen said as she looked at a map hung on the wall.
"Do you think we'll find more… like here?" General Oma asked in a haunted voice.
"I don't know, if someone had said a month ago I'd find anything like that at all, well I would have called them a liar. But now? Now I don't know. This one was apparently a 'minor amusement' of some sort for a few twisted individuals, and the rest of the city is now forever shamed by association. Rule here should at least be peaceful as a result. But elsewhere? Fortresses probably won't have much, but our inspections will remain very, very thorough." She said angrily.
"And if we do find more?" General Oma asked.
"The Theocracy likes fire a lot, don't they?" The Queen asked rhetorically.
The General answered anyway. "They do."
"Then we'll give them all the fire they like." The Queen said spitefully, and when she laughed and clenched her fists hard enough to snap her quill, General Oma laughed with her.