Stephan’s study brimmed with one form of barely restrained excitement or another. Some, especially the Knights, were expectant, awaiting their chance to shine; others sat unsure or doubtful of their future success.
Stephan wasn’t excited. Nervous and nauseous—certainly—but resignation was the emotion that dominated. It really had come down to it. Not fiends. Not dragons. Not fae in an insane outburst. Man marched against man over a class and a bit of gold.
Just as Lord Marshal had said.
Stephan listened to the scouts’ report.
Three men stood in the center of the room, dirt still clinging to their cloaks, boots stained pale from hard riding.
Why are you dirty when you arrived hours ago? Their crumpled clothes gave a subtle hint as their leader spoke.
“… kicked up a lot of dust, so they were easy to find once we knew they were there. We think sixty, perhaps eighty thousand…”
The number made Stephan’s head spin. Once, mere weeks ago, he didn’t know such large numbers existed. Now, thanks to a game, he could work with them. For a moment, he could see both sides as tiles moving on painted vellum.
If we were pieces in The Art of War, we would lose for sure. Fortunately, humans weren’t mindless figures rushing to obey the mastermind heedless of the cost. If the enemy stormed them, they would suffer catastrophic losses and face revolt.
Then there were the camp followers to take into account. Cooks. Blacksmiths. Whores. Laborers. Of eighty thousand, at least a quarter weren’t soldiers, possibly a third. To storm a city as defensible as Cliffort, the attacker would need fifty thousand troops or more, and that was if the council didn’t levy militia.
“They won’t attack immediately,” Stephan said after the scouts left. “They lack the numbers to breach the walls, but have enough to form a tight encirclement. I expect they’ll try to lock us in. Starve us. How are our supplies?”
Queen Eleanor folded her hands before her and straightened, though she hadn’t been slouching. The young woman seemed more confident and regal, meaning she must have experienced some growth in the past months.
“We have enough grain to last us a year; two, if rationed.” Her tone was measured, almost serene. “The refugees have been cutting and preparing timber for weeks now. Shepherds are herding as much livestock into the city as we can manage. The rest we started slaughtering as soon as the scouts reported the incoming army. All households are called to corvee, so we have mustered enough hands and the work is going apace.”
“There have been three reports of attempted theft,” Ernest added once Her Majesty had stopped talking. “The men were put to the rod publicly, then cast into the dungeon.”
“Why did they steal?” Stephan asked, feeling sorry for the men who might have been trying to feed their families.
Anita answered before Ernest could.
“Whatever the reason, Sir, theft now is inexcusable,” her voice was like a sword, sharp and hard. “Outside today’s forced labor, all refugees and citizens have paid work to do. The city has been paying on time and full amounts owed without turning away able bodies.”
She glanced at the others on the civilian council. They nodded gravely. They had been working hard to ensure everyone’s safety and dignity. Stephan would have felt spat on had he been in their place, but all they showed were frowns and sternness.
“Had they stolen city food after the siege had started,” she continued, “we would have sent them straight to the executioner’s block. Or, if the morale was low, we would have chained them to the wall to work until they paid off twice the food they failed to steal.”
Stephan had read about men chained to the wall to repair it; back when sieges were more common, in the times before humanity had the King and Queen classes.
Valerio the Valiant sure had it tough. Recently, whenever Stephan thought how difficult his lot was, he just remembered the first two Paladins from the time before mankind’s unification. Even after freeing themselves from the tyranny of the fiends, the first thing free humans had done was wage war one against another.
Worse, after Valerio’s death, local warlords used his fortresses. What was meant as humanity’s shield became strongholds to conquer and oppress other men.
Thinking about everything he had read about human actions and human nature, Stephan was afraid to ask whether the men had a good reason to do what they had done. It was more likely than not that they were simple opportunists. Stealing because they could.
“Anything else?” he said instead, looking at Ernest.
“All twenty wells are under constant watch by squads of five soldiers and two constables of the city guard to prevent panic, brawls, and attempts at sabotage. We have had none so far.”
Bradley, the Priest of War, cleared his throat. “We have received reports of a warlock inside the walls. We can’t tell whether it’s fear or genuine sightings, but we’re on the lookout for undead and similar abominations walking the streets.”
Stephan felt more unease than when the scouts estimated the invading army. That was something he hadn’t expected—someone slipping in with the villagers, or perhaps there had always been a warlock in Cliffort?
“What kind of damage can we expect from a loose warlock?” Or warlocks? But he kept that thought to himself. Not that it wouldn’t pass through other minds.
“Depends on how powerful they are, Sir,” Ernest said. “It should be fairly difficult to kidnap or sacrifice anyone, since people are crowding together. Disappearances and screams are both easier to notice. Usually warlocks prey upon lone travelers, something Cliffort won’t be seeing for a long while.”
After a moment’s silence, the representative of Cliffort’s merchants stood and bowed politely.
“Our storehouses have enough stone to construct a dozen houses. The leather stock was already ample, and the tanners will be working day and night after today. We have tons of steel…”
He went on—iron, pitch, salt, cloth, arrows, bowstrings, and, for some reason, spare wagon wheels.
He listed all strategic resources, as well as the luxury ones. By the end of his report, Stephan was under the impression they had enough food and supplies to last them two years. The only real tragedy when provisions were concerned was the prospect of slaughtering and eating all horses save for the ones with levels.
“With that out of the way, we should discuss the defensive strategies,” Stephan said, and the civilian authorities excused themselves. The Priests, Martin Harrington, and Queen Eleanor remained, with none of the captains uttering a word of protest.
“So,” Stephan said, “ideas?”
“We should burn their food supply before they settle down,” Captain Avery said, all other Knights nodding in agreement.
And I was so proud I figured that out on my own.
“Ideally,” Avery continued, “we would have ten-twenty men on horseback hit them once it’s dark on the first day. Then we will feign a panicked retreat, to goad pursuit towards the wall where a hail of arrows can bloody them. Inflicting first losses while suffering none would raise morale and hurt theirs. Not to mention they can’t have anywhere near the amount of food they need to last more than a month, if that. We have already scoured the countryside, harvested or burned the fields before they could approach us. Once winter comes, it should defeat them all on its own, with our losses amounting to poorer harvests in the region next year.”
I didn’t think of goading them into pursuit. Stephan’s idea was to use ropes on the cliff side and pull the men on foot up, but Avery’s plan was better. Bolder. More brutal.
“Does anyone have anything to add?” he asked.
A technical discussion ignited. Slowly, the captains showed their worth and why the late Lord Marshal valued them. They leaned over the map. Fingers traced ridgelines. They spoke in distances, in angles of fire, in clouds and moon phase. They debated horse endurance and which mix of resin and oil should be used, timing and fallback routes.
Once they dove into tactics, there was no room for taunts or bickering; everyone was thinking in lives. The lives of defenders they intended to protect, and the lives of enemies they planned to reap.
Forty minutes later, they had a plan on how to inflict maximum damage both to the supplies and to the enemy’s face. That would hopefully prod them into making a thoughtless charge the next day to reclaim their honor, resulting in needless deaths and even further impacting the morale.
When they dispersed, Stephan leaned back in his chair. He thought about the upcoming battle, and confidence filled him.
Battle is too strong a word. It will be a skirmish with a few dozen dead at most. We will burn their supplies, sow discord, and bloody them just enough to force them to retreat and give up on this pointless endeavor.
At least, that’s what he hoped. What worried Stephan more than Count Highglen’s coalition were the fiends and warlocks. Even after burning, corpses could be raised as skeletons, and from what Lord Hardy had said, ashes from mass pyres could be used for various dark rituals as the resentment and malice of the violently fallen pervaded them.
Then there was the problem of the local Nightmare Hollow. Brighthollow’s spawned five to ten low-level stalkers of dreams. Under normal circumstances, Cliffort’s produced dozens with levels ranging from fifteen to twenty-five.
With refugees packed into the city; with fear growing and nightmares multiplying, they would grow stronger and more numerous.
Anita was right to express concern. They would be unable to clear them, and should the attackers let them multiply and somehow herd them towards Cliffort, things could turn ugly even before the first snows fell.
Stalkers born of siege nightmares, of broken gates and breached walls, of buildings ablaze, could prove devastating against fortifications. Even if the defenders got rid of them without losses, the defenses would surely suffer damage.
We’ll worry about that problem once we get there.
There was nothing Stephan could do about it anyway. The hollow was five miles outside the city, and the enemy would certainly make their camps at most two miles away from the Cliffort, probably one.
He looked out the window. The dark forest stood stripped and scarred from the recent harvests and excessive woodcutting, both to fill their own stores and to deny the enemy.
In two days, I will be looking upon enemy camps, not stripped forest.
“Dorian,” Stephan said into the speaking hole, “order lunch and invite Lacy to join me for a meal in our private dining room.”
Stephan had only two more days of reading and normal life before war would arrive at his doorstep.
AN: My wife and I are down with a cold, so chores are taking a bit longer than usual, thus, I'm late today. :Insert white rabbit pic here: