...Outside of Crossroads…
General Enri was in a fairly good mood. The encirclement was proceeding nicely, only a few sorties had slowed her forces down, but they'd been half hearted measures conducted by people who knew they couldn't stop her. They were right.
She stretched out as she sat up from her field bed and scratched her side. "Good morning, Lupu." She said with an enthusiastic smile at her red headed bodyguard.
"G'mornin' -su." Lupu said with her customary wide smile on her face. "You slept well. -su" She said casually as she stepped back to let Enri have room to get up and out of her cot.
"Well, I've gotten used to you more or less staring at me while I sleep, but… still, when this is all over… stay away from my bedroom window." She laughed and pointed with faux harshness at the werewolf maid.
"No promises -su." Lupusregina said as General Enri stood and went to go brush her hair. She didn't need to see Enri's face to know her friend was rolling her eyes.
"Any problems last night?" Enri asked, confident there were none.
"None to speak of, a few sorties but it bought the city only a few hours, there was some movement near the south gate, but the scouts couldn't get a good look, most seem to agree it was just refugees getting out while the getting was good -su." Lupusregina shrugged it off as irrelevant, a sentiment that agreed with the Grand Matriarch.
"It's fine then, I'm not worried about noncombatants, granted it would have been better to trap them inside the city, they'd eat more food, the city would run out faster, they'd get hungry faster, they'd starve faster, and they'd surrender faster… but it's fine, I don't intend to let this drag on that long anyway." Enri said with shocking casualness.
Lupusregina Beta raised an eyebrow. "Did you just assert a preference for their quick starvation? Who are you and what did you do with Enri -su?"
Enri shook her head as she ran the brush through her golden strands, "It's not that I want them to suffer, I just want it over quickly with as few deaths as possible, and… well that would be one way to get there. I guess it did sound a little cold, but after the battle, seeing all those people, all those lives lost… I just want this to end."
"Still, kinda 'hard' for you, isn't it?" Lupusregina asked curiously.
"Maybe, but this is war, I fought my own country's prince, I ripped children away from their parents to throw the parents into captivity, I ordered people to their deaths. Maybe I'm not the same girl I was some years ago, and the Enri of that day couldn't do these things. But the Enri here and now 'can' and I'll do a whole lot more before all this is over." She set the brush down and turned around, Lupusregina was struck by the beauty of those hardened eyes, they were the eyes of a veteran, of a soldier. They didn't have the raw fury and terror that Neia inspired, but she judged them good nonetheless.
"Well ya know, I like this you. -su." Lupu tilted her head and smiled her sadistic smile.
"Well, we're not best friends for nothing." Enri said as she took off her night clothes and reached for a sponge that lay soaking in a basin.
"Oh no! Is my general going to command my services!" Lupusregina pretended to squeal as Enri tossed her clothing aside.
"Ah, no." Enri said flatly, having only a mild blush this time as she'd gotten accustomed to Lupusregina's incessant teasing. She started to scrub, wishing very much there was a creek or a lake or a damn bathtub to use, but grateful her position allowed at least this small luxury to keep the stink off.
"Anything else I should know, Lupu?" Enri asked, partially interested, partially just hoping to keep Lupusregina from critiquing her physicality.
"Nothing big, lots of movement on the walls, and it looks like they were telling the truth about those siege weapons meant to bring down dragons, it might not do much against say… the dragons of the Argland council, but against the younger ones we've got with us? Well, just be careful about using them -su." Lupusregina said as she went over what she'd learned while Enri slept, she then got up and approached her charge and snatched the sponge out of her hand.
Enri looked at her in surprise. "I'm a maid, let me do this for you -su." Lupusregina's tone was no-nonsense insistent.
For a moment Enri almost objected, but then she relaxed her body and allowed the red headed sadist to proceed. "It's funny, most humans would be at least a little hesitant about letting a werewolf this close to them -su." Lupusregina said in passing as she began to scrub the sponge over Enri's back.
"Well, most don't call one their best friend either. I'm used to your oddities by now. Gotta admit, I still think it's a little weird you'd have the best orgasm of your life if I died… but you didn't design yourself, and we've been together for awhile. I trust you." Enri said confidently.
Lupusregina let that sink in as she soaked the sponge and crouched down to scrub more of her charge. "Well, just as long as you keep me sexually frustrated -su." The maid laughed and Enri blushed furiously.
"Lupu, I know you're a degenerate perv, and god knows I love you, but could you maybe 'not' say that while you're scrubbing my ass?" Enri exclaimed as Lupusregina started to stand back up to soak the sponge again.
The werewolf queen could only laugh, "I'll never tire of your embarrassment -su."
Enri could only sigh, "I know, I know. Hey, did the supplies from my husband arrive yet?"
Lupusregina grinned as if she were going to say something salacious, "Not that kind of supply!" Enri exclaimed, preempting whatever her friend was going to say.
"Oh pooh, no fun at all. Yes, not as much as you wanted, those potions are tough to make, but what are they all for -su?" Lupusregina asked curiously.
"A new invention of mine." Enri said, "Based on the Sorcerer King's words in the Draconic Accords."
"Oh?" Lupusregina asked as she took Enri by the shoulder and turned her around and started to scrub her front. Mercifully in Enri's mind, she was spared any salacious commentary about Nfirea's good luck in a wife, by Lupusregina's own curiosity.
"Yes, the treaty referred to aid workers and healers being illegitimate targets, but there are a few problems inherent in this. First is that they can still be hurt accidentally. Second is the shortage of magic even with those they can get to, and third is the sheer size of the battlefield, they often don't know where to go and can get caught up in the fighting. So I thought, why not bring the wounded to them? We designate a small corps of our noncombatant priests and give them wagons and a few simple tools to keep the wounded alive, they grab the injured, provide immediate care, put the wounded on the carts, and rush the injured back to the rear for safe treatment." Enri explained with pride on her face as she went over the details.
"Clever, so the potions?" Lupusregina asked.
"Stamina mostly to keep the aid workers moving, but also low grade healing potions, cheap stuff mostly, like enough to seal a stump so a person doesn't bleed to death, but not enough to restore the limb, they can be provided better treatment in the rear echelon through magic, and that can be done more easily without the same urgent depletion of mana." Enri said proudly as Lupusregina put the sponge away and she reached for her clothing.
The maid of the Sorcerer King insisted on helping her with that as well, right up to and including putting on her armor and strapping her sword belt into place. Finally the battle maid stepped back and Enri reached back and pulled her hair out from under her clothing, letting it hang free behind her.
"There you go, you look like a General of the Sorcerer King should." Lupusregina said with a thumbs up and a flashy broad smile as she looked over the golden haired general, her hard eyes so at odds with her merciful innovation, her white armor with its intricate designs and inlaid runes would have been the envy of kings, yet it was upon the body of a peasant general, and it looked damn good there.
"Thanks, now let's get going, I'd like to ride through all four positions today before we start the bombardment, the rain last night probably slowed things down a lot too, and I want to be absolutely sure that everything is in place before we start to punish them for resisting His Majesty." Enri said with conviction.
"As you like, General Enri." Lupusregina said with a respectful voice as they walked out of the tent together.
...Crossroads…
Rascal's walk took him over a fair part of the city, he could never forget the way, not if he'd lived a dozen lifetimes. He went to the merchant district, and followed the familiar feel of the cobblestones beneath his feet, each one unique in its own right, each one held a memory for him. So as he walked, he remembered, and was grateful for the rain. Had it not been raining like this, he wouldn't have gone. He looked to the left and right, he could barely see six paces in front of his face.
He looked up at the sky, he'd long since abandoned the six gods of his childhood, but it was as if here, they were helping him. Windows would be shut and nobody was going to come out doors, therefore as it was, nobody would see him even though he walked down the middle of the street all by himself. Finally, deep within the merchant district, he reached his destination. For this at least, he had to be cautious. Also, he was curious. So he walked between his destination building and its neighbor, to the back. The pens were still there, just like he remembered them. Cheap iron cages tall enough to hold an adult… uncomfortably, a retractable top with a hole in it for the head of the captive, it could be raised and lowered by a handle, forcing the captive to crouch down and put their head through the hole.
The implements of the trade hung nearby, just where he remembered them, under covered awnings to protect them from the elements but clearly visible to anyone in the cages. Various posts sat embedded in the earth, and a long smooth iron pole ran secured from one side to the other. Walking the pole was the only exercise the captives got. There were no captives now, whoever ran things had been smart enough to order the slaves removed from the city, that much he'd seen himself.
He smiled, that too served his purposes, it was as if the one god he now followed had arranged all this for him personally. He went to the back of the house and touched the handle, it was unlocked, old habits die hard. He grinned and went back to where the implements were found, he looked them over to select a tool. It didn't take long, it was only a question of whether he preferred the shears or the knife. He chose the knife, it still had blood on it, that annoyed him on a professional basis.
"Hmpf, whoever they got to replace me is sloppy, always wipe your tools after every use." He repeated what he'd grown up learning, then took the blade and went to the back door. [Sound of Still Waters] He whispered, and the sound of his feet on the creaky old floor vanished. He looked around, some of the things he expected to see were gone, and there were indications of a dog now. He shrugged and went up the stairs. [Scent of Rivers] He whispered, and all trace of scent vanished from his body. He knew exactly where to go.
He saw the covers pulled over a body in the bed. He curled his lip in contempt. Thunder rolled outside, he saw the shaking of the blanket that told him the old man was as afraid of thunder as ever. He approached and stood beside it. "Should have been afraid of retribution old man, not thunder. Thunder doesn't care if you live or die, but death is all I wanted for you." He said coldly.
From beneath the blanket, two hands came out and grabbed the edge, they pushed the blanket back, exposing a face that was significantly aged. "Rascos? You're alive? They told us…" The wrinkled, careworn face started to speak, then turned to horror as he processed what he'd just heard.
"I go by 'Rascal' now. But you, you go by 'the not so dearly departed'. Now die." Rascal said and slapped a hand down over the old man's mouth and swung the knife down, it pierced the blanket and went hard and deep into the old man's guts, Rascal raised the knife and brought it down again, and again, and again. He didn't stop swinging until the old man had entirely stopped moving. After he was done, he left the knife lodged in the body, the blanket had taken care of most of the blood, leaving Rascal clean.
He looked down at his handiwork. "Rot in hell, dad." Rascal seethed, and he went to a drawer and snatched out a purse he knew would still be full of silver coins, then he walked out as thunder rolled overhead. The walk in the rain felt marvelous, and he had an enormous smile on his face that he wore all the way back to the cheap inn.
It wasn't until he was nearly to the entrance that he thought of something. "Hmm," he said aloud, "I hope somebody goes there and finds him before that dog gets too hungry, the old bastard might give the poor pup indigestion." He laughed at his sense of humor and walked in with a skip to his step.
...Fortress Alaf…
Leinas had been accused of many things, a lot of them she would openly acknowledge that she was quite guilty of. She could be cold, selfish, obsessive, disloyal, violent, and vain.
Though there were many faults she would honestly admit to having, there were a few things she knew she was not guilty of, and of which she had never been accused. Neither stupidity nor laziness were part of her character. As soon as she and her comrade understood that the prisoners were fully expecting a rescue, she went immediately to the highest point in the fortress and looked down around it.
The way they'd crept in over the aqueduct was now well and truly secured. Her own trick would not be used against her. She looked out over the walls and found nothing of note. Since the first bombardments had begun, she'd been a little off put by how half-hearted it seemed to be. So now, with the certainty that there was more afoot, she tried to identify some pattern of attack in the damage to the thick high walls.
"Damn it all, what are they doing?" She asked out loud, as if speaking to the mountain at her back.
As if at a loss, which she was, she turned and looked at it as if expecting it to answer. "If stone could talk, eh?" She said ruefully. As she watched the mountain however, a thought occurred. She looked at the mountain stone, and she looked at the stone walls, from one to the other and back again, over and over as she began to put the pieces together.
She rushed down from the tower and found Aureole Omega as fast as she could. She found the red and white clad beauty performing a ritual dance before a battalion of soldiers, even from where she stood watching, Leinas could sense the rising power in her people, orcs, humans, and elves alike were grinning like children as they experienced the rush of power she imbued into them.
When it was done, Aureole immediately went to Leinas, "What did you find?" She asked in her usual sweet voice.
"The mountain, the stones for this fortress were taken from that mountain." Leinas said confidently.
"And?" Aureole Omega prompted.
"And we didn't see any indication of mining, for this much they could have leveled a small peak down to knee height, yet we don't see any indication that this happened. So that means they didn't do it that way, they dug 'in'." Leinas explained.
"Tunnels." Aureole Omega completed the thought.
"Exactly, they created an escape or entry route, probably somewhere under here and leading to wherever the artificial cave might come out." Leinas explained confidently.
"Alright, then we need to find where it comes out inside these walls." Aureole Omega said simply.
"And we already have a pretty good idea where. It'll be 'inside' one of the buildings, probably deep into the interior." Leinas said smugly.
She went quiet as she saw that Aureole Omega was no longer looking at her, she was seeing the unfolding struggle, picturing where such an emergence would be most devastating, but also the easiest to guard against 'if' you knew it was there.
"The prison." Aureole said with absolute, ironclad certainty in her voice.
Leinas whirled on a nearby soldier who was passing by and pointed to him, "You! Come here!" She ordered, and the soldier quickly shuffled over.
"Ma'am?" He asked, standing in a ramrod straight position.
"Gather fifty men and fifty pots filled with water, and meet me at the entrance of the prison, this is top priority over literally anything else anybody is doing, if anyone takes issue with it, tell them I said they can bring it up to me, but they'd 'better' be coming with a pot of water themselves." Leinas said urgently, the soldier looked dazed and confused at the strange command, but he promptly rendered a salute and went off to carry it out.
"Aureole, are you going to come with me or mind the wall?" Leinas asked.
"I'll see to the wall, I think you've got this one." She replied proudly.
"Yeah, I do." Leinas responded, and rushed to the prison entrance, a few minutes later she had fifty very confused soldiers standing in formation in front of her holding pots of water.
"Soldiers, I'm going to file you in, and I want each of you to start slowly pouring water onto the floor in different places, space yourselves out, but I want thorough coverage. If you run out of water, go get more as often as you need to. As you pour, look for any indication of drainage, if you see the water 'stand' don't worry, but if you see it seep down between the stone, I want to know immediately. Don't skip a single square, am I understood?" Leinas asked.
The soldiers may have been confused, but they understood the directions well enough, and so despite the chill wind, they moved with purpose as she opened the door, and one by one they followed the front rank through.
When they had all filed in, the pouring began while Leinas waited outside for them to be done, a dozen soldiers came back out to refill their pots, and after a little while of this Leinas began to wonder anxiously if this were all a big mistake.
That is, until a soldier came out, saluted, and said, "Ma'am, I poured in a three by three area, and water seeped down along all four sides."
Leinas took out a platinum coin from her coin purse and handed it to him, "You may have just saved this fort, I trust that reward will do?" She asked confidently.
His eyes went wide as he held more money in his hand with that single coin, than he'd ever seen in his entire life. "Yes ma'am!" He snapped out excitedly.
"Alright, go and gather one thousand soldiers and have them brought here, this will be the highest priority. Have them bring a hundred barrels of oil with them." She ordered, and he quickly went to obey, as the soldiers one by one filed out, Leinas had them form up again.
"I'm sure you're all curious as to just what you've been doing that for, and I'll explain. There is a tunnel running underneath this fortress from somewhere in that mountain, and the Slane Theocracy has been filling it with their people while they pretend to try breaking in through the walls. However, we've found the tunnel exit thanks to your efforts, and we're going to turn the tables on them. In a short while, barrels of oil will arrive. When they do, I want you to begin 'painting, the interior with it, walls, floors, and so on. All the way up to the command area, whoever does my office… well clear out my stuff as you leave. We're going to turn their surprise attack on its head."
It wasn't long before her statement proved true, dozens and dozens of barrels were rolled into the area, and the soldiers who had just been pouring water, now refilled their empty pots with oil and walked in to begin coating floors and walls.
As they worked, Leinas took a handful of the thousand soldiers that had assembled and went down into the prison area, where the captives waited sullenly. She had them shackled and brought out and secured temporarily in another location, they eyed the activity around them with uncertainty and doubt, but they were compliant enough in that they gave no resistance. When she had them resecured in another building, Leinas chose to address them.
"You were expecting a rescue, what you'll get instead is a look at hell. We've figured out what was going to happen, and we're taking measures to prevent it. The only reason you are not being left down there is the danger that one of you might be smart enough to figure out what I was doing and alert your would-be rescuers before we can carry out our counter strategy. So just sit here, look out that window, and watch your hope die." Leinas said bluntly. Horror began to appear on the faces of captives, some of them began to curse her in futility and frustration. She didn't care, she walked out and stationed a few guards inside with them.
When she returned to her position outside the building, she gave orders to the remaining numbers. "Station yourselves at every exit, one hundred to each, spears and halberds at the ready, arrows nocked, nobody gets out, this isn't a battle, this is a massacre."
Leinas had a chair brought and took a seat at the main entry, she just sat with folded arms and watched the door with grim satisfaction, and the last soldier finished his work, 'painting' a nice path of oil just beyond the door. For good measure, Leinas had a torch brought and set beside her chair, in the distance, the sun began to set as the dusk of night stole away the day.
Her fingers twitched in anticipation of the darkness, every minute seemed a year, but if that were so, well, years passed like all other time, and the outside 'struggle' tapered off as both sides settled in to sleep.
Eventually she heard the inevitable. Shouts were filling the building as the 'surprise' attack lifted the hidden hatch and poured into the complex, the area had ten ways in and out, it was easily the most significant building in the fortress, most of those were minor, enough for one or two people to enter or exit at a time, and one major entry meant for six, and that was where Leinas sat watching with a hundred men at her back.
When she heard the first screams indicating that her counter ambush had been sprung at an exit, she stood up and took the torch in hand, she smiled, and thought to herself, 'I did say I'd make a lot of orphans.' She then tossed the torch underhand, with casual indifference.
It flew through the air in a low arc, and landed with a clatter in the puddle that ran to the outside from under the door. The flame picked up immediately, flaring to life as if it were a hungry living thing, and it raced under the door to chase down its prey.
The screams took a different note then, fire filled hallways and rooms, soldiers were cooked alive inside their armor and jam packed as they were, they could not coordinate a response. They were like rats trapped in a sinking ship, each scrambling against his fellows to escape the conflagration and none knowing what direction would mean life or death. None of them knew that there was no escape. The 'lucky ones' evaded the flame by rushing out a nearby exit, only to be impaled by arrows, spears, or halberds, the rush of oxygen through open doors increased the power of the flame and from various windows, gouts of fire erupted as if from a dragon's maw.
The screams were loud, but seldom long, the worst off endured the heat of the flame causing the fat to boil and rupture within their own still living bodies, a few had sense enough to end their own inescapable agony by ending their own lives, but most struggled in futility until they either burned to death or suffocated. The flame raced down every hall, on every wall, the bodies of the dead slain at the exit blocked further use of it from those still trapped within, turning the entire complex into an enormous tomb from which the living could not escape.
Leinas wondered idly how many had died with her little underhand toss. The clattering of metal on stone was like a thunderstorm, but it was a thunderstorm that passed soon after it began. None could live for long in such a hellish nightmare. Those deeper within, closer to the way they'd entered the complex tried to turn back, but those coming on could not know what was causing their fellows farther in, such distress, and so the push forward and the push back were in conflict, further increasing losses deep within the interior.
Brother trampled brother in desperation, and those pushing into the front who tried to turn tail and run themselves ended up either trampling others or being trampled in turn. Faces full of the flower of youth were turned to mush as foot after foot stomped down on the unfortunate fallen, any who tripped, died almost as painfully as those who burned within.
It was well past an hour before the heat inside the building diminished enough that it no longer warmed Leinas outside, and it was several minutes beyond that before she finally stood and ordered the doors of the main entryway opened, and started to lead a cadre of soldiers to go look for survivors and survey the damage within.
AN: Yeah I know it has been a few days, I was traveling and wrapping up a mobilization, just got home the other day, wrote a few chapters, enjoy the catch up on God Rising. I'll be doing several chapters of this, but then I've been given two more commissioned pieces that I'll be getting started on soon, I have a sneaking suspicion that they just want to delay the end of God Rising because I've said I'll be done with Overlord Fanfiction after this entire series is completed, but... I'm not complaining. :D