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Vol.1, Ch.3, P.9

 

“Rolf!” Emilie gasped. “Good grace, you’re hurt…!”

“My Lady. I’m well,” I tried to calm her. “You needn’t worry.”

“Not to mine eyes, you are,” came Tiselius’ arrow-shot of an observation. And its mark was true: no man so bloodied and broken of bones could rightly be well. Yet such a man must have quite the tale to tell, and for this particular moment, one most exigent.

“I’m well enough, madame. But enough of me,” I said, now with more urgency. “Mareschal Tiselius, pray draw back the left wing.”

“What’s this now?”

“Vermin! You wormed your way out of the woodwork, and now you dare pretend the tactician!?” Lindell cut in, his wrath-filled voice clapping against the air. It would seem the short-fused lieutenant of the 1st’s Owlcranes had also managed to cross the Erbelde.

But I did not back down. “The enemy’s sole line of retreat traces from our left wing up to a hill, and from there exits the encampment proper—this, I’ve seen for myself upon that same hill ere my return.”

“Then all the more reason to press the offence!” yelled Lindell. “Why draw back when we can cull the curs right then and there!?”

“Nay. Deny our foes their retreat and we only make cornered beasts of them. They would bare their fangs all the more bitterly and make prey of our own men in return. We cannot chance this; if the enemy seeks retreat, we must yield it to them.”

“Then yield it, we will,” said Tiselius. “Boris! Reign in the left wing! Have the 2nd Squad circle back to the centre; the rest reforms at the rear!”

“Right away, madame!”

The mareschal of the 1st, Estelle Tiselius of all people, not only agreed with my counsel, but acted upon it—swiftly and resolutely so. This shook and shocked me by no small degree, as I watched this “Boris”, the mareschal’s deputy adjutant, summarily pass down his madame’s orders to the ranks of the left wing.

For their part, Emilie and Lindell both were taken by the same surprise. Only, much to the latter’s chagrin.

“Mareschal! Pray lend not an ear to that vagrant’s guile! He is sodden-witted—an ungraced!”

“Lindell. Our foes are well-honed and well-positioned. I’ll not hazard their extermination if it means our losses run overhigh. We whip them till they whimper on their way, and in their retreat find our victory,” spoke Tiselius with adamant calm. “This matter is settled. I’ll not hear further of it from you.”

“…As you will, my Mareschal,” Lindell lowly folded.

With her errant Owlcrane grounded, Tiselius raised her silverblade high and proclaimed her next order.

“Centre brigades, all! From here we strike the enemy full sore! Give them no quarter; onward, now!”

“Ooouuh!” a bright chorus of battlecries bellowed in answer, and the knights were off at once. With her forces let loose, the hero-dame turned next to Emilie.

“The left wing joins with the centre; the frontlines won’t find our numbers wanting,” Tiselius explained. “As for me, I make for the entrance of this encampment. Lieutenant Mernesse, I would have you join me—and your swain in tow.”

“Aye, Mareschal,” Emilie saluted before looking to me. “Rolf, let’s fall back. We should have the surgiens see to you quickly.”

“Yes, my Lady.”

Closing wounds, stopping blood loss, restoring a measure of stamina—these and more are possible with mending magicks, but it would take a surgien of superb skill to fix broken bones and grievous injuries. As such, I saw little point in being seen to, to be frank, so dreadfully cut up as I was, but more pointless again was turning away Emilie’s consideration and concern.

“Boris, I leave the rest to you,” commanded Tiselius. “Exhaust the enemy. Herd them to their route of retreat.”

“By your will, my Mareschal!”

“As for you, Rolf Buckmann,” the hero-dame continued, now facing me, “after the day is won, I mean to hear much from you.”

“Yes, madame.”

With that, Emilie and I followed the 1st’s mareschal as she began making her way back through the Nafílim encampment, accompanied by a retinue of knights under her command.

 

♰

 

“Lady Emilie,” I called out in the midst of our withdrawal. “What brought you here to the enemy fields, if I may ask?”

“Why, you ran off with such haste, I couldn’t help but chase after you!” she smiled.

“…Chase?”

Ah yes—the moment when I first spied the Erbelde’s burgeoning waters. I broke away from the Owlcranes and made a mad dash off to the bridge; apparently, Emilie was hot on my heels when I did. And when the explosion happened, she, too, flew over to the enemy shores, along with Tiselius and myself.

“I am your superior, you know!” Emilie reiterated, beaming and brimming with pride.

“Were it not for your bravery, Lady Emilie, I fear we would not have wholly delivered the forders like we did,” Lindell slithered in. “Ah, to behold the beauty of your spellblade in the flesh! And to stand shoulder to shoulder with you upon the battlefield—truly am I unworthy of such a benison. Praises all to Yoná!”

“…I’m glad to find you so pleasant, Sir Erik.”

A rather skewed exchange between Owlcranes, this. One looking upon the other with a gaze engrossed in passion. The other—disimpassioned in return.

By his words, it would seem Lindell followed his mareschal right before the Des Ailes was undone. From there upon the opposite banks, he, Tiselius, and Emilie worked to suppress the enemy artillery, thereby protecting our forders.

Truly a feat no mere trio can rightfully call their own, but include amongst them Emilie and Tiselius, the keenest blades in the 5th and all the kingdom respectively, then such a feat would not seem so much a fantasy. With the explosion having frayed the enemy’s chain of command, no doubt the three capitalised on the chaos and confusion to safeguard our forders, all in the short time leading up to the tributary’s liberation.

By their bravery were Felicia and the river crossers able to reach the enemy banks, albeit not without casualties. And through cunning use of the resources available to them, the forders pushed into enemy lines, bringing the battle all the way up to the foe’s camp.

While discussing such details, our group arrived at the mouth of the foresaid encampment, finding and joining with the knightly forces stationed there.

“Lieutenant Mernesse, Owlcrane Brigade, 5th Order,” Emilie saluted them. “I come requesting treatment for my subordinate, Officer Buckmann.”

“My my… whose cat did you cross, lad?” remarked a surgien team member. “Right then, come along now.”

But not another step was taken before a spire of magicked flame shrieked across the evening air—a Lancea Calōris, aimed straight at Tiselius.

Impact.

A boom blasted through our ears. An eruption of feathery fires, illuminating the twilight.

But as those fires faded, there remained a light of a different hue: a paling enshrouding the mareschal, one swiftly erected by her sorcerer subordinates just in the nick of time.

“Enemies!!” roared Lindell, drawing his sword. “At the fore!!” To the dusk’s shadows he trained the tip of his blade. All eyes followed: lurking in the mirk was the Nafílim horde.

“This, I did not foresee…” Tiselius muttered, teeth clenched, “…has my mind’s blade been blunted?”

“Nay, Mareschal. Our steps fall squarely on the enemy’s haunt. ‘Tis as you’ve said: the lay of the land spans wholly in their favour!”

“An ill excuse, that!” Tiselius countered, brushing aside Lindell’s consolation.

Our present forces totalled a meagre score and a half. The enemy, double that.

What foul odds.

But it would seem things had not gone as planned for our foes as well: these ambushers themselves must have intended at first to initiate a flank attack upon the frontlines once our knightly host had pushed deeper into their territory.

‘The first contact with the enemy heralds the first casualty of battle: our plans.‘ Fewer words ever spoken more truly. I had the injuries and the day’s happenings to attest to that.

Tiselius raised her voice. “Surgiens, pull back! I’ll handle th—”

Instinctive caution shot through us all like lightning.

I sensed it: a looming presence.

Terrible. Immense.

And from the dark, it sprang, unseen and straight into our ranks.

 

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