Dismas fluffed his feathers as he sat atop the mast of the longship, surveying the rolling Kalosian countryside spread out beneath him like an imperious lord. As Halvard picked his way between the rowers, he thumped the mast with his fist, making the Chatot squawk in indignation. The jarl laughed and continued on to Wulfric's bench. He knelt beside the monk and unrolled Wulfric's map. "It seems like the river splits into three tributaries up ahead. Which route should we take?"
Wulfric glanced over the map and thought for a moment. "As I've said, I don't know much about this part of the kingdom, but I think we ought to follow the northbound route. I know there are rapids and a series of waterfalls to the south , which means we would have to carry the longships overland." He had seen the northerners do that on several occasions already, allowing them to bypass stretches of the river that would prove perilous. However, the longships were rather heavy, and they lost valuable time doing it. "We might have to pass by a settlement or two, but that's preferable to braving the rapids."
Halvard nodded and signaled for Ragnhildr's ship to draw even with his own. He spoke quietly with his sister for a few moments before Ragnhildr leapt onto Sigrund's back and shot off into the sky to scout ahead. The longships continued up the river, but when they reached a long bend, Halvard instructed them to wait for Ragnhildr's return before pressing on.
The sun continued its arc across the sky, and eventually Torvald and a few of the other warriors grew tired of sitting idly. They navigated their boat to a shallow point in the riverbed and secured it before wading to the bank for a bout of sparring. The Kalosian floodplain rolled around them, and occasionally swarms of Vivillon fluttered by to see what these strangers were doing in their territory, only to be chased off by Branna and Dismas.
A dark shape finally materialized in front of the sun, and Sigrund dropped out of the sky to alight on the riverbank, her powerful hind legs flexing to absorb the impact of her landing. Then with a quick flutter of her wings, she hopped across the narrow expanse of river to settle on the wide platform in the stern of Ragnhildr's boat. Ragnhildr dismounted and walked briskly to the railing, motioning Halvard's ship to draw alongside.
The warrior woman folded her arms. "Wulfric's hunch was right. The northern passage is the easiest, but there is a fishing village a ways up the river. We won't be able to pass by undetected, and if we're seen, they'll be sure to send word of our approach."
Halvard looked up at the sky. "Not long until nightfall now. We'll come on them in the darkness."
"And then what?" Wulfric asked.
Halvard smirked, as though it was obvious. "We make sure there is no way for them to send word on ahead."
The oars of the longships were wrapped in rags to dampen the sound they made as they dipped into the water and the blades of swords and axes were darkened with ash to dull their shine. Ragnhildr and the other women prepared torches while Torvald walked the warriors through their paces. From what Wulfric could gather, the raid on the unsuspecting village would be brief and brutal. Unlike the attack on Coumarina when he had been captured, there would be no lingering to count up treasure. If the northmen found something worth seizing, they would take it, but it was doubtful a village like this had any worthwhile prizes. They would land and rampage through the village, torching whatever they could. Anyone who resisted or tried to fight would be cut down.
It would be bloody, it would be efficient, and it made Wulfric a little sick to think about it.
The moon was just beginning to wane that night, though it was obscured by clouds. The longships silently made their way up the river, stopping just outside the village. Groups of warriors disembarked and waded to shore with their pokemon partners and waited for the signal. Halvard swung up into his usual place on Steinarr's back, and the Gogoat braced his legs.
Outside the village, Branna shot into the air, her wings cloaked in fire. She plunged at the wood and straw buildings, setting several roofs ablaze in her first pass. Halvard roared out a battle cry as Steinarr's legs bunched and he sailed through the air to land on the village's dock. The longship rocked back and forth as the northmen remaining on board fought to stabilize it, though it was not likely to capsize. Ulfi had constructed Halvard's longship with a wider draft specifically to accommodate the weight change when Steinarr boarded and disembarked for this very reason.
Though Halvard had been eager to see Wulfric prove himself in battle, when the monk had volunteered to remain with the crew to stabilize the longship, the jarl had conceded that Wulfric would likely only get in the way on a raid like this. So Wulfric watched from the river as the men and women of Rovngalad rampaged through the fishing hamlet. The still night air was filled with the roar of flames and raucous laughter of the attacking warriors, and was soon joined by screams for mercy and entreaties to Arceus.
Wulfric fumbled for the four-pronged ring he wore around his neck and tried to mutter a prayer, but the words caught in his throat.
He saw Ulfi silhouetted against the flames, an axe in one hand and a shield in the other. The boat builder roared in unison with his Druddigon Hjodtr as one of the villagers attacked with a Dragalge. The poison-aligned's whip-like appendages wrapped around Hjodtr's arms and dragged the dragon towards the river. Ulfi roared again and swung his axe in a backhand motion, cracking the villager's skull with the blunt end before attempting to hack at the Dragalge's tentacles. Hjodtr opened his maw wide and blasted the poison-aligned with a pulse of indigo light, and together warrior and pokemon beat their foes into submission.
Skaldi raced through the small houses with a blazing torch, his Breloom and Ampharos bounding along before him. The pokemon dispatched any foe in his way while the northern priest set alight everything in his path. Torvald danced through the flames, Skerast glinting in his hands. Ragnhildr had freed the town's Gogoat herd and was using Geirr and Sigrund to drive them through the wreckage of the town to sow further panic. And above it all rode Halvard, sword raised high as he and Steinarr charged through the flames with no regard for their own safety.
Next to Wulfric, Aesgir shouted encouragement to his two Sharpedo as they fell upon villagers who tried to flee to the river. Somewhere in the chaos, Ivarr's Beartic bellowed. The shrieks of the villagers were growing louder and more desperate as their homes were reduced to ash, and their bodies were beginning to pile up on the riverbank. The smell of charred flesh became overpowering, and Wulfric leaned over the side of the longship to vomit up the contents of his stomach.
Finally, Halvard blew out three long blasts on a hollowed out horn, the signal to retreat. Like the tide rushing out, the northerners raced away from the burning village and splashed through the shallows to their ships. Steinarr galloped down the burning dock and launched himself into Halvard's longship while Wulfric and the rest of the crew kept the ship steady. As they rowed off into the darkness, Wulfric glanced over his shoulder and saw the stars obscured by the thick acrid smoke of the burning village.
Around him, the northmen laughed and joked at the success of the raid, several of them showing off treasures they had managed to purloin in the chaos. As the ships continued down the river, the burning village turned into little more than a distant red smear on the horizon. Wulfric felt ill as he pulled on his oar, knowing that the destruction was all his fault. The only wrong these people had done was to live in a village their ancestors had built in a bend in the river. Had Wulfric never bought the northmen here, they would still be safe in their beds, instead of watching their lives go up in smoke, or worse, dying in the streets.
"Isn't it wonderful?" Skaldi said with a laugh as he sat on the bench across from Wulfric. "The screams, the fire, the blood?"
"It's horrific."
"Having second thoughts, priest?"
Wulfric gripped his oar tighter. "I'll do what Halvard needs me to do. I swore an oath. If that means more of… this, then so be it."
Skaldi shrugged. "If you say so."
He refused to let Skaldi get to him. Though the deaths he would be responsible for on this raid would weigh heavily on his conscience, it was ultimately a necessary step to reclaim Halvard's throne and open relations between the north and south to make a better world. He was never one for moral calculus, and trying to justify killing for the greater good did little to salve his conscience, but it did settle his stomach, and Wulfric feared that was the best he was going to be able to do for the time being. He muttered a prayer to Arceus, hoping the Lord of All would understand, or at the very least be compassionate enough to let Wulfric try to argue his case when it came time to return to the Halls of Origin.
Two days later, a lookout spotted a thin finger of smoke curling up into the sky some distance from the river. A brief consultation between Wulfric, Halvard and his siblings established that it was unlikely to be a village, given its location. "I would think it's just travelers," Wulfric said. "Possibly soldiers on patrol? We ought to be near the border of Camphorae."
Torvald folded his arms across his chest and stared off into the distance. "Whoever they are, we can't risk them bringing word that we're here. We'll have to deal with them."
And so Wulfric found himself hastening to keep up with Steinarr as the Gogoat bounded across the Kalosian countryside, Torvald, Skaldi and several other northmen racing along beside him. Torvald's lips were pulled back in his odd not-quite-grin that he always donned before a fight, and Skaldi's eyes were tiny pinpricks of black on his green iris. Branna and Dismas were tiny dots in the wide vault of the sky, easily keeping pace with the warriors below.
It was all Wulfric could do not to trip over his spear and keep his slightly too large helmet from falling over his eyes, so it was a welcome relief when he saw Steinarr cantering back towards them over a rise. Halvard swung off the Gogoat's back and waited for them to catch up. "They're just over the rise. Wulfric, tell me what you think of them."
Wulfric followed Halvard up the hill and crouched in the long grass. About twenty men lounged around a fire, a few of them armored and several more sitting within easy reach of weapons. "Those two wagons there look like they belong to traders or merchants. Most of the armed men are likely mercenaries hired to protect the caravan. But see those four men in armor there?" He pointed, and Halvard nodded. "Those are knights. It's likely they met the other group on the road and decided to all travel together if they're going in the same direction."
"The knights could be troublesome," Halvard admitted. "But we can surprise them. All right." They slunk back to where the other northmen were waiting. Halvard turned to Torvald. "You'll come at them head-on with most of the men and draw their focus. I'll flank them from the west with Steinarr and a few others, and Skaldi, sweep down from the east to pick off any who try to flee." As the northmen sorted themselves into their respective attack groups, Halvard steered Wulfric into Skaldi's force. "You'll be safest here," he told the monk. "Skaldi will strike last, and at best you'll only have to terrify a few traders." Wulfric begrudgingly agreed.
He and the rest of Skaldi's force curved out away from the trader's camp before circling back to wait for their signal to attack. While they waited, Wulfric saw Skaldi inhale some kind of spores from his Breloom's mushroom cap, and the northern priest almost immediately grew more agitated. A few other northmen partook of the strange sacrament, but Wulfric made sure to hang well back. Finally, the shouts of the Kalosian mercenaries began.
Torvald ran down the hillside at the head of his force, Skerast flashing in his hands. The first of the mercenaries raced up to him and had his head lopped off his shoulders for his trouble. Ivarr and his Beartic crashed by Torvald and fell upon the enemy warriors as Branna dropped out of the sky to claw out the eyes of a man who tried to attack Torvald from behind. Torvald spun on his heel and drove one of Skerast's blades into the man's unarmored torso even as he opened a gash across another man's stomach with the other blade. Though he could not hear it from so far off, Wulfric knew that Torvald's Doublade was likely humming with pleasure at all the blood it was drinking.
As the knights began to advance on Torvald's men, Halvard and his force appeared from the west, crashing into the flank of the hastily thrown together mercenary formation. Halvard did not let Steinarr lose any momentum, trampling two of the men as the Gogoat continued further into the camp. The largest knight in the company, a man taller and broader than even Torvald, planted his feet before Steinarr's charge and waited for the Gogoat to run him down. The instant before he did, a Pyroar jumped from the grass and tackled Steinarr to the ground. Halvard jumped from his saddle and rolled to his feet as Steinarr tried to kick the fire type away. With a snarl, Halvard drew his sword and axe and charged at the knight, but he parried the jarl's sword easily and caught Halvard's axe on his shield.
Seeing this, Skaldi hissed. "Now! Go now!" His small contingent of warriors sprinted down, whooping and hollering. Dismas drifted lower in the air, letting Wulfric know he was there. Wulfric signaled that the Chatot should go to Halvard's aid, and the little bird flapped furiously to reach the jarl in time. An enemy Talonflame screamed and moved to intercept him, only to be attacked by Branna. Halvard chanced to look up just as Dismas reached him, and he clapped his hands over his ears. The Kalosian knight took the opportunity to strike, but before his blade could fall, Dismas unleashed a horrifying cry that sent the knight reeling. Halvard grinned, kicked the man in the chest and knocked him to the ground. He placed his sword in the small gap between helmet and armor and drove the point in. The knight struggled for a second, but soon succumbed.
After seeing his partner fall, the knight's Pyroar fought on with a renewed vigor, but between them, Halvard and Steinarr made quick work of it. For his part, Wulfric waited on the edge of camp, doing his best to look intimidating in his oversize armor and herd fleeing travelers back towards the other northmen. He was seized by panic when he felt someone grab the back of his collar and drag him towards the fray. The realization that it was Skaldi who had grabbed him did little to lessen Wulfric's fear. The northern priest shoved Wulfric towards three cowering unarmed men and gestured with his axe. "Kill them. Any one of them."
"Skaldi, I-I can't, I…"
"Do it!" Wulfric clutched his spear and shook his head. Skaldi growled in disgust. "Oh, so you can kill northmen, but not your own kind?"
"I've never killed a northman!"
"You drove a knife through a man's throat at Yeavenguut!" Skaldi snapped. Wulfric knew it was pointless to argue that it was Halvard who had impaled his would-be assassin, and that Wulfric had acted out of desperation. For that matter, had the man already been dead when Halvard had driven his sword through the man's guts? There had been so much blood pumping out onto Wulfric's hands. Maybe he had killed a man. Skaldi had continued ranting. "We're just savages to you, no better than mad beasts. You'd kill us the same way you'd put down a Mightyena menacing your flocks. May the gods curse you, Wulfric—"
"Wulfric?" one of the cowering men said, picking up Skaldi's last word. "Wulfric, is that you?"
"Shepherd Aelffred?" Wulfric gasped as the chaplain of the Coumarina monastery tried to stand.
"Wulfric, what are you doing here with these… these pagans? When they took you, we all thought you died, sacrificed in some barbaric ritual."
"No," Wulfric said in Kalosian. "They took me, but they let me live. They think I'm one of them now."
"One of them?" the Shepherd was incredulous. "One of these savages? Wulfric, you shame our order and your vows!"
"I did what I had to survive, Shepherd Aelffred."
"I suppose it will be on our Lord to judge you, not me."
Skaldi appeared at Wulfric's side and pointed to Aelffred. "I've changed my mind. You don't get to pick anymore. Kill him." He spat in the dirt. "And speak properly, none of the southern garbage you've fed the jarl."
"I won't, Skaldi."
"If you don't, I'll kill the other two."
Wulfric fixed his face in what he hoped was an intimidating glare. "You would just kill them anyway. I will not kill an innocent, unarmed man."
Skaldi shrugged and tossed his axe underhand to Shepherd Aelffred. "Now he's not unarmed."
Aelffred picked up the axe and looked at Wulfric. "What is he saying?"
"He wants me to kill you. He gave you the axe because I told him I wouldn't kill you because you're unarmed."
"You're better than this, Wulfric."
"That's what I keep trying to tell myself."
Skaldi stomped his foot, clearly running out of patience. "Pathetic," he snarled, wrenching Wulfric's spear from his hands and driving it through Aelffred's abdomen. He recovered his axe and smashed in the heads of the other two men. Skaldi glared at Wulfric with the same intensity Wulfric had tried to match and pointed at Aelffred with his bloody axe. "Get your spear."
Wulfric was forced to recover his spear from Aelffred's corpse, but to his credit, he managed to stagger out of Skaldi's sight before vomiting up the contents of his stomach.