They watched in horror and awe as the soldiers marched away from the city. From their vantage point, they could see there were no siege weapons, but that didn't make the army any less scary. It caused everyone to jump when there was a loud knock on the door of the mansion. Trace followed Eric down to the foyer from the greenhouse, but stopped before he got there. From what Eric had told him, he was a wanted man by many people. Eric went down and slowly opened the door, while Trace watched from behind a curtain. On the other side was a single young man, dressed in simple armor that bore no insignia, carrying a sword and a letter. "Sorry to drop in unannounced, but would you please give this to Trace Legacy?"

"He is not here at the time being. I will let him know you came Mr…?"

"Jaysen Hulim. I'm just here to deliver this from Edinmire. When he gets back, please have him read this as soon as possible."

"I'll take it now." Trace said, stepping out from where he was hiding. "Sorry, we've been having issues with unwanted visitors. What's going on down in Edinmire? We watched the Templars leave."

"Oh, this has nothing to do with them. Just a formal letter to you from the elders of Edinmire requesting that you turn over the title of Duke to a more suited individual. You haven't been present for almost two years, and a lot of folks are trying to pick up the slack. There's been a lot of talk about this for a while."

"I'll head down to town later today and talk to them. Who are they requesting I pass the title to?"

"There's been a few suggestions. One of the elders, a bureaucrat, and the chief prefect."

"Keiren?"

"Yeah. I should let you get back to whatever you were doing. Have a good day." With that Jaysen walked away, leaving Trace to wonder what to do. He had forgotten he was still the Duke of Edinmire.

"I should go deal with this. And figure out what happened."

"We'll have a pot of coffee brewing when you get back." Eric promised.

…

"I thought they were going to attack everyone!" Sythe said, his heart pounding in his head.

"They could have flattened Edinmire." Zen said. "Why did they turn back?"

"Oh, the Basitins showed up a few days ago." Kathrine said, leaning over the balcony railing. "I'd guess they probably don't want to try and fight two wars at once. And I've seen Basitins fight, they're small, but scary…" Maren and Karen stood in stunned silence as the column of soldiers faded from view behind the trees.

"Tough or not, I'd estimate that was almost a thousand soldiers." Richard said, leaning against the door frame. "Basitins are resistant to magic, but they would have been completely overwhelmed by the sheer numbers."

"I didn't think there were that many Templar soldiers total, and this isn't even the front lines of combat." Zen said, frowning. "How do they have so many?"

"Forced enlistments." Richard replied simply. "They find just about anyone on the road and then boom! You're part of the army. They tried to recruit me a few times in Valinos. Thankfully I avoided getting plucked away from everyone."

"So those aren't all soldiers!" Zen said, with sudden realization. "They're just dressed up as Templars to make their numbers seem larger!"

"No, they're actually soldiers. Forced recruitment just means you don't have a say in the matter. A lot of those folks are practically slaves I'd imagine. Forced to die on the front lines, or die trying to get away. No matter what, it's not good."

"Then we should do something about it!"

"What would we do against that? You are still a wolf, and I'm still a Templar dropout. And there's thousands of them down there. Even if we managed to rally an army of our own, what would that do? Kill people who were forced to fight against us? Less than half of those people down there are actually Templars, but they have to fight, because if they don't then they die."

"They tried to abolish the feline Keidran slave trade, but then turn around and do this?" Evals said, shocked.

"A hollow promise most likely. A way to manipulate the Tiger clans to not join the fighting." Richard shook his head. "Lynn was right. This war is only beginning. The Templars have momentum, and the Wolf Clans are going to struggle to put up any kind of resistance against them, but once they manage to stop the advance, it's going to be really easy to push back. They'll have left nothing their wake but destruction, and maybe a command post or two. Things will quickly turn around when that happens, and then the pendulum will swing the other way: the Templars will struggle to hold the line, while the Wolves flatten anything that's left."

"That's a grim way to look at it." Mike frowned.

"Surprise. That's war." Richard said sarcastically. "It's only going to get worse too, because this is going to be the primary choke point where everyone will be fighting. It's nearly impossible to go over the mountains, and with an army it would be suicide to even try. Going all the way to the east side of the mountains would take too long, so the only option is to turn everything from that mountain to the sea into the front line. The war has moved away for now, but it will come back, it's only a matter of time."

"I feel awful just standing here, doing nothing." Zen sighed as he leaned on the railing next to Kathrine. "But… you're right. What can we do?"

"You can start by getting off your tails and getting busy!" Trace said as he walked out to join them on the balcony. "I know it seems hopeless, but we will change things. We just have to figure out how, and until then, we aren't going to mope and pout! You and Natani always sparred whenever you had time, so why not start there? Keep yourselves sharp, ready for anything. I have some things to deal with down in Edinmire, I'll be back later tonight and fill you in on what happened." Small smiles came to the faces of everyone as Trace lit a fire in them. They weren't going to do nothing. They would change the world. Somehow, they would change everything.

…

Natani came out to greet him. Her human had gotten much better over the last few weeks, and she often spoke full sentences, but it was occasionally broken with scattered Keidran when she didn't know a word. "You should have seen their faces when the Basitins showed up! The short one was so angry, I thought he was going to explode. Urgh, sorry. Human is hard to learn."

"Don't worry about it. I could say that Keidran is hard to learn, but I'm managing. You've got this. Anyways, that's quite the story. How's Kei?"

"I don't think he has any more… uh… stomach contents . He hurled pretty hard for a while."

"Yikes. I hope he's feeling better now. I need to talk to him." Inside town, Trace saw the Basitins soldiers patrolling the walls, and felt their eyes watching him as he entered town. Things were actually just like he had left it a few days ago, save a dozen tents that rested in Shepherd's Square. Inside the Prefecture, Keiren was talking to a very short Basitin (which was saying a lot) and Keith.

"We would need to move everyone to the other side of town, and I can't see how they would like that. Sure, it would be safer, but we have too many people who live here. Relocating them all is out of the question. Oh! Trace! Come on in, we're just talking about some new city defenses. You are still the Duke after all, so you should have the final say. This is Telk, our Basitin commander."

"Nice to meet you. Now, tell me what you've got planned." Trace walked over to the desk to see a map of the city.

"As I said, the easiest way to prevent siege weapons from destroying homes and killing civilians would be to move the entire city's population away from the edges of town. By sending them closer to the center, we increase the range they would have to have to effectively assault the city. On top of that, it would free space for towers to be constructed, where we could place our own stationary siege weapons. A few ballistae around the city would create an effective area where an enemy would not be able to hide from our sight, and be targeted with impunity. But, that of course would require us to move the civilian population."

"It would be an ordeal." Kei said, shaking his head. "Moving everyone would be far too difficult. But I do agree that towers would be a good idea."

"What if we just put in the towers on top of the existing buildings?"

"No. The stone would crush whatever we built it on." Telk shook his head. "We would have to tear down the old building to put in a new foundation anyways."

"I don't see any other option." Trace shook his head. "Edinmire needs better defenses from everything. Two weeks ago the wall was blasted open and the city burned. Just earlier, an army marched up that could have flattened the city with ease. We need something more. They won't like it, but if it comes from the new Duke, then they should be fine with it."

"New Duke?" Kei seemed shocked. "You're giving up the title?"

"As long as I can keep the house." Trace chuckled.

"Sure, sure. It is your house. Who will take up the mantle?"

"Well, how would you like a promotion?" Trace smirked. Kei's face went from confused to shocked.

"Me?!"

"If you want it. I can think of no one else I'd trust to keep this city safe."

Eyes turned to him, and Keiren slouched in his chair, as his mind raced. Him. "Duke. Duke Keiren of Edinmire…" he muttered. Slowly, a smile came to him. "Yeah. Yeah. I think that it's for the best right now. Gladly, I will take up the mantle of Duke." Trace held out his hand, and Keiren shook it. "I won't let you down."

"I know. Now, tell me how we are going to defend your city."