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Vol.3, Ch.3, P.2

 

Lise looked all along the portcullis gate. Even with sixty passūs and more spanning between them, its scale left her no less daunted. Against the mirk of midnight, too, was it shrunk little, for torches were set about its base, revealing it as a maw muffled by a grille of metal and hemmed in by an armour-like arch of stone.

It was but one of Arbel’s many gates, and soon to be beset by the braves of Hensen.

Many of Londosius’ marches and provinces operate in a manner not unlike city-states. In one would stand a capital—the fief-burgh, seat of the lord and heart of his rule—whilst scattered about the countryside would be satellite towns and villages, each eking out their due in agriculture and other like trades. This march of Ström was no different. Thus to bring Arbel to its knees and smite the margrave would surely precipitate the fall of the fiefdom itself.

Long-burning was the battle waged upon this land. Only now could its quenching be glimpsed. And the sole standard to see the next sunrise: the Nafílim flag. So thought Lise as looming in her heart was a great anxiety.

The very gate in her gaze would be hers to attack, but not on her own, of course. Marching with her was her own contingent of braves. At another gate, too, was amassed a separate force, one led by Rolf. The rest were in the reins of Volker, himself helming the entire operation as high commander.

Of the many mouths of Arbel, four would be struck, and simultaneously, at that. Such was Rolf’s scheme, but the inspiration was owed to the Nafílim themselves, for on many a past occasion had they employed like stratagems against Balasthea. The swordsman of soot found it quite the fair manoeuvre, enough to reenact it here at so pivotal a battle. Its effectiveness was attested against Rolf himself in his time as Balasthea’s commandant. To have it surface again was his way of admitting such, and rather openly, earning wry smiles from the Nafílim privy to the irony.

Still, more was at stake here, thus were changes in order. Two, three concurrent targets was the norm for the Nafílim, but not so for this night. Four was their chosen number; worrisome, yes, that their host should be so divided, but much deliberation saw more handsomeness in the reward than hazard in the risk.

Arbel’s interior roads were many, but those connecting the four targets were not laid with efficiency in mind, as from one to another needed quite the trek. Should word and alarum be sent from the foresaid gates, the Fiefguard would find much friction: messages would travel slowly, orders received belatedly, and reinforcements mustered and moved with great difficulty.

The contrary was the crowning advantage for the Nafílim host. Outside the gates was even and mild terrain, four fine theatres for easy, offensive coordination. Hence only the defending Fiefguard would be whipped into chaos in the combat to come. Already were the Men’s numbers culled to their dire disadvantage; now they further stood to be stretched and strained like a fraying string.

No Nafílim mind on that night could have devised such a plan. The lay of the land, of the fief-burgh—critical as they were, only Rolf had knowledge enough of them.

Lise began to recall what she had heard.

‘True; ours is a superior number. Attacking straight as we are should pierce the city with pain enough. But much merit do I find in Rolf’s strategy.’

Volker’s evaluation of the scheme, given to the jarl-daughter after Rolf had headed off to his target gate. The war-chief could well-challenge the ill-wisdom in spreading one’s forces so thinly, but for Rolf’s designs, he saw little reason to.

‘Through all crannies and corners does he seek key advantages, but never does he full-trust to any one. Wolven, indeed, his wisdom. Strange, yet intriguing. His schemes here and at Balasthea prove it clear.’

Lise agreed with the war-chief’s every word. Though if given the choice, intrigue, to her, was most immediately found in Rolf’s swordsmanship. Those swings, those lunges, those thrusts of his that she had beheld at Hensen and yestermorrow’s battle—all were bladestrokes most beautiful to her eyes. And it was no fluke, either, for even at the Battle of Erbelde three winters past was she no less a bewildered witness to his sheer skill.

A hero of legend, brandishing his blade and felling his foes—such well-beseemed Rolf’s fighting form. Merely remembering it brought a fiery fluster to Lise’s cheeks.

“…hh!” she gasped.

A flapping fluttered through the air as Lise vigorously shook her head to and fro, catching herself dipped in daydreams unfit for the battlefield. The sight baffled her nearby braves.

Right. No time for daydreams. Berta was watching. The battle at hand demanded all attention.

Switching gears, Lise peered piercingly at the gate. Then, with a voice vaulting clear through the night, she cried out her command.

“To the city! Attack, attack!!”

 

♰

 

“Four?” Theodor thought aloud as he minded the map upon the table. “Daredevils, much?”

Arbel—the Zaharte Cohort had already settled into this fief-burgh, and erected in one of its squares a command centre of their own. A breeze was blowing, but it did little to lighten the air: as per the sentries, four of the fief-burgh’s gates were being attacked—all at once.

It was but the night following the Fiefguard’s defeat afore the battlements of Balasthea. A single day, then, was all the Nafílim horde had needed to reignite their momentum. Hardly strange; their number suffered few losses, after all. Arbel’s strategists therefore had concluded that in short order would their gates be gained; Central’s reinforcements were days away yet, and the Nafílim knew well enough to strike the city at its feeblest hour.

A prediction proven by this moment. Still, the devils struck sooner than the defenders would have liked. Such speed well-presented the horde’s organisational agility, and as well, that their victory at Hensen was no mere whim of the fates.

But there was a queerness to this new commotion: that very horde was now harrying Arbel with forces split in four. A strategy straining reason. Why spread so thinly against defenders this desperate? Theodor asked himself this same question, finding it likely a strategic blunder or some brazen insult. All along the map he looked as he kept pondering this fortuitous folly, till…

“Mm?” he muttered, eyes newly wide. Comfort turned to caution. “You see what I see, Sis?”

Viola followed her brother’s gaze. “North-One and Four… and to the right, East-Two and Four… Not physically are these gates so distant. But the roads betwixt seem awfully… scenic. This bodes ill for us.”

“Ill, for sure,” Theodor echoed. True enough, the arterial streets connecting the targeted gates wound widely about the fief-burgh’s blocks Thus was it no fool offence as Theodor had hoped: the gates were chosen specifically to give the defenders as tough a time coordinating as possible. “The reports rang true, then. If they’ve scried this far…”

…then amongst the Nafílim was someone with much intelligence on the city. And the most immediate candidate?

Rolf Buckmann.

Tell of his turncoating feigned no lie all along.

Viola nodded in agreement. “Tell me. What’s his worth in your eyes?”

With Theodor’s insight did the Zaharte captain hope to piece together an actionable answer to this development. Her brother’s was a boon of a brain; ever in times like this did Viola trust to his mind first and foremost.

“Worth? Well, let’s see… He’s ungraced, for starters. A proper sting in the pious arse, certainly; mine included. And a treacher besides, through and through,” he opined gravely, holding his chin in thought. “Whichever our lot, ever are we all lambs loved by Yoná. But a black sheep damned by the Deiva Herself? A rightwise retribution, I say: if it bleats to an alien tune, then it is a beast disbelonging on Her earth—and naught more.”

“Words, right from my lips,” Viola agreed. Two lambs, confirming details undoubtable by any from Her herd.

“But as for worth…” Theodor went on, “…my eyes see the wolf under the black wool. Think on it: Balasthea, delivered in mere months. This Rolf had a plan and the means to execute it. As he does against us now, I’m sure.”

Oft was the vice-captain taken for a softie of a soldier, and not without reason: meek was his image and elegant was his gait. His foes, too, were fast in mocking his mild mien. But they were all of them silenced, and Theodor had their many heads to prove it. Hence was he keen never to echo their mistake, as Death was wont to wear robes gentlest to the eye.

Such sombre thoughts served a foundation for his next words.

“Suppose a man, a prolific contributor to the annals of scholastic achievement. But meet him, and you find him infirm, his every limb long lost to leprosy. Yet must that diminish his regard?” Theodor expounded, pacing off to the side. “Suppose another man: a lifelong imbecile. But behold in a cathedral’s niches many standing statues, marvellous in all their marbled mastery. And graven upon their pedestals? His signature, chiselled and proud. How much of an imbecile is he, then?” Turning heel, the vice-captain looked to his sister. “Suppose the same with this Rolf. Look ill beyond his ungraced label, and we look only into the dark of our graves, I say.”

“Fair enough,” Viola concurred, folding her arms in thought. “Then suppose he dons the grand strategist’s garb. Where might he be amongst these four points?”

Theodor shrugged and shook his head. “My ken can’t scry that far, I’m afraid. How fares yours, Sis?”

“It fares with this finger,” the sister answered, sliding her digit across the map before stopping at the northern edge of Arbel. Circled in ink: the gates North-One and North-Four.

“Why’s that?” asked Theodor.

“I’ve heard tell he much hates hostilities meted upon Nafílim civilians. The same be true with plundering; wish it upon Nafílim or no, and you earn his swift rebuke. Balasthea’s former bulwark-men attest to this,” Viola explained. “A puzzle of a pate, he has. But humour his game and we can guess his play.”

“That being mercy upon Arbel’s meek, I take it?” guessed Theodor. “If that’s your thought, then certainly the north seems the front of focus. There is it farther away from the residential district than the east.”

“Exactly so,” said Viola. The siblings then nodded together.

“The Fiefguardsmen defend North-One most dearly,” the brother confirmed. “We ought do our part and shore up North-Four with forces of our own.”

In answer, Viola wasted no time. “New orders!” she cried. “Dispatch Ulrik and Sigmund to North-Four at once!”

Saluting, a soldier anear speedily left the scene with her message. The command centre buzzed anew with activity.

“Ulrik and Sigmund?” Theodor asked his sister amidst the bustle.

“You heard aright.”

The vice-captain’s visage broke with surprise. A natural response; after all, Ulrik’s and Sigmund’s mettle were unmatched by any other in the free company besides that of the siblings. Forget the Fiefguard—those two brutes were mountains more menacing than even the standard Londosian knight. In all the battlefields of their braving have they known naught but triumph.

And on this night was this no more apparent. Four fronts, four frays—though each theatre was small in intensity, reinforce it with either of these men, and the scales would tip most asudden. Such was their strength.

But to bring both to bear at a single point? Theodor frowned, still dim to his sister’s designs. Rolf had renown enough, sure, but what hunter looses two tigers upon a rat?

“Necessity…” Theodor guessed. “Is that what nags you?”

“It is. Though Reason remains silent,” Viola confessed.

The Zaharte captain was ever the careful leader. But this was caution verging on overkill, Theodor felt. Yet he did little but seal his lips and comply. A sellsword’s hunch was keener than most, and if one as honed as Viola’s blew alarums at the thought of Rolf Buckmann, then surely would her worries find warrant.

That same captain cast her eyes back down to the map. Seeing her mien so grave, Theodor thought anew.

Viola: his blood-sister.

Ever by his side, ever his ally, come what may.

It was she who gave him cause enough to keep the fight.

But in merely fancying her a foe for a moment, Theodor almost drowned in dread. And that alone was enough for him to feel what Brigadier Felicia herself might have felt. The vice-captain knew not what fork it was that split the paths of the Buckmann siblings so starkly. Nevertheless, such partings surely precipitate only sorrow.

Too much a sorrow for me to bear? Theodor wondered. Should the day ever dawn where we are lost from one another… I shudder to think…

“Theodor.”

A voice like velvet, reeling him back to reality. Theodor looked to his sister, finding her smiling gently back.

“It’s all right,” she said.

“…What is?”

“Us. We’ll always be together.”

“I… don’t recall saying aught—”

Straightway, Viola thrust her face close to Theodor’s. Then, with a tapping finger upon her brother’s breast, broke open a broad smile and said to him:

“I hear your heart.”

Theodor chuckled nervously. Never in their many winters together was he ever able to conceal aught from his sister’s ken.

“S-so, will the man himself show up, you think? This ‘Rolf Buckmann’?” he broached, as though to hide away what blush his sister’s simmering boldness might have teased from his cheeks. This effort, too, was full-fathomed by Viola, but she humoured him, anyway.

“Nay…” she answered, drawing back, “…not likely, at least. Not at the fray. Sure enough, we can assume the figure Felicia had espied at Balasthea was not the ungraced himself. After all, both she and the Fiefguard commanders made their doubt clear: not without odyl could so many foes be felled at once.”

“A mete point,” Theodor remarked.

“Though I rather prefer he rear his face in this fight,” admitted Viola, to which her brother nodded in agreement. Ulrik and Sigmund were set loose, and not against them both could Rolf ever hope to escape with his hide—not in direct combat, no. But should the ungraced prove himself worthy of Viola’s caution, well, all the better to behead him at the soonest. “Whichever way, defeat be his if fight he dares,” Viola continued, “no matter how sweetly the fates may smile upon him.”

Along with those words: a hand alighting upon the spear set beside the captain. Hers was no boast, but rather a blunt assessment. Whatever teeth and talons the black sheep might hide under his shroud, he would fare not in the slightest against Viola’s battle-zeal, for she was of the Östberg siblings, spear-devouts renowned throughout the realm. Of fearful note was her weapon, a spear inspiring terrible winds in its wake, a spiteful spire just as famed as its mistress for all the ruin it has wrought.

Viola’s eyes narrowed. At once, Theodor sensed a chill in the air. About his gentle and loving sister, there swirled a stinging, snapping pall. Remembering anew what violence Viola could easily invite, Theodor inly shuddered as sweat broke out along the length of his back.

 

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