Homecoming Queen 17th and 24th Oct Pt 1 & Pt 2

Delilah was the first to move. She shimmered into view next to the captain of the gold legion, who was standing in the middle of the muster ground, hand on the pommel of her sword. Delilah’s blade was in her back and she was muttering in the captain’s ear. Sorrel noted the captain nodding and her soldiers stirring uneasily.

Then Lucky, Carnan and Jaezred slipped nimbly forward, Jaezred’s silky tones and eloquent tongue mesmerising those soldiers whose sword hands twitched the most. Lucky soothed, Carnan menaced, and Oziah steamed into Leomar with two mighty blows, sending the commander reeling.

Sorrel felt the blows crash home, and knew the whole camp was now alert to the combat. She noted the flag on the tent beside her – the blue legion’s captain… and heard stirring within.

Sorrel barely touched the canvas flap as she glided through with a silence so profound eternity was jealous.

The young captain was fresh from slumber, rubbing the sleep from her eyes as she shrugged on a leather jerkin and fumbled for her boots.

Then Sorrel’s blade was at her throat.

“Good evening,” Sorrel was formal, polite. She was the visitor after all. “My name is Sorrel Darkfire. I am your strategic consultant for the evening. The blade you can feel against your carotid artery is a Drow dagger which releases a deadly toxin at the touch of a button. As you know, this is a minor concern if your artery is severed as death will follow in less than a minute. There is a choice ahead of you – rush out to rally your troops in support of Leomar or remain exactly where you are. As your strategic consultant I strongly advise you to choose the latter option. But the choice is yours.”

The captain sank back onto her camp bed, her skin pale in the flickering candlelight. At which point, Gabrielle burst in crying “do not call the blue legion to arms, you must not act now.”

The captain gave a wry grin. “Lady Oziah. I assume this is your friend holding a knife to my throat.”

Sorrel cast off her enchantment and nodded politely at both women.

“Take a seat, Gabrielle,” she indicated an old campaigner’s stool beside the bed. “This is where the evening gets very interesting.”

Outside they heard shouting, grunts, screams and the grinding of steel on steel.

There was a sudden deathly pause, then light exploded out from somewhere, glowing through the tent walls.

Another crash, a squelching sound and the pounding of feet followed by a long drawn-out scream that faded away in a choking gurgle.

What sounded like chanting rose up and down and was bitten off sharply by a dull thud and a cawing noise.

“It’s probably more interesting if you’re out there,” Sorrel admitted.

Finally a quiet murmur of voices and Sorrel knew the battle was won. She flung open the tent and saw Oziah standing over Leomar, his hands raised in surrender.

Then Oziah spoke.

“Captains, summon your men,” and Sorrel almost laughed for all the camp was assembled, staring amazed at Oziah reborn, or so it seemed to the old campaigners who saw Oziah and Gabrielle side by side and wondered how they had been fooled and for how long.

Sorrel touched her brow and called to the eagles high in the mountains on worlds long forgotten to beg their splendour as service to her leader. She felt their power flow through her and placed her hand on Oziah’s shoulder, letting it pour into her as the captains bought their regiments to order.

Then there came the great trial of Oziah’s life, where no weapon could aid her and no fury hold her up. She had no god, no faith, no wealth to bribe, no magic strong enough to weave her need.

All she had was her voice. And it called across the camp with all her heart.

“There is no strength left in Lesos,” she began, her eyes searching the assembled warriors. “There is no nobility left in House Hadir. There is no faith in the church of Torm.”

The soldiers stirred a little and muttered to each other at this. Oziah’s voice boomed louder and with greater urgency. “They are filled with weak men, desperately grasping for power, selling themselves and others, selling you, for it.”

She had their attention again.

“Lord Archon Hadir had to replace me with an imposter to retain his standing, and this man,” she spat the words out like sawdust in a summer pie. “This man was going to marry her, knowingly - after he used me for my body and my father's money. The blood on my hands of the Blue Legion are there because he gave the order to kill me if I resisted.”

Sorrel noted the blue legion captain frown and turn to regard her men.

“High Hand Amaury Jehanel has hollowed the church of Torm and filled it with knights of Bane. I killed him with my bare hands a year ago and yet he walks this earth still - spewing lies and building an army.”

Murmuring again, but angry this time.

“Tonight, I go to end it.”

Silence. The silence of the forest before the storm.

“I go to kill my father! I go to kill the High Hand! I go to end my House!”

The legions seemed stunned.

“When I die I will take the name Hadir to the grave with me and I will keep it. His name will not live on, but my legacy will.”

And she walked forward to the front rank, looking each in their eyes as she clapped each on the shoulder. The soldiers’ backs straightened, their chests filled out and they grasped their weapons more keenly.

Then Oziah stepped back and addressed them in a voice that spoke of power and glory.

“Follow me!” the words rang out like trumpets at dawn. “I will never bind you in oaths of fealty, in law or chains. I will feed you and keep you and you will forever be free to seek your fortune however you see fit. We would be no order of knights, no holy warriors called by impotent gods, no whipped dogs scared to bite the hand that feeds us.”

She gave a wry smile.

“I would work you harder than you’ve ever worked in your lives, and I would make you proud of your names. Follow me, and be free. Follow me, and be part of a legacy that will live on until the mountains crumble. Follow me, and become a legion that others tremble to behold.”

Another pause, a heartbeat and a breath.

“What say you?”

A great shout rose up from the host. Sword clashed against shield. Spears shook the ground as they crashed down.

She had won the legions and the cries of her army echoed through the night deep into the heart of the city below where the people wondered, and the sentries quailed. A wind sprang from the east, causing the fires to dance and torches to flame into fresh life.

Suddenly the camp was filled with noise and purpose. The sergeants called for order in vain, for the spirit that leaped from brow to brow was beyond any command.

And Oziah’s voice rang out again.

“Captains, to my tent,” she cried, and her pavilion blazed with light as the stewards flung back the canvas flaps so that all who had business with their new commander could enter.

Oziah slumped in the commander’s chair behind a simple field table that served as a desk. Sorrel saw Lord Jaezred reclining on Leomar’s bed, Lucky guarding the entrance, Carnan apologising to some plants and a slight blur in the corner that she assumed was Delilah. It seemed to her that of the three people Oziah had set out to slaughter this evening at least two of them were still alive – the only two she’d actually encountered. Sorrel suspected things weren’t quite going as originally planned and supposed Oziah had been correct in that sense. Although jamming up an improvised alternative when fully armed legionaries surrounded your tent took living dangerously to an edge that impressed even Sorrel.

Captain Miathrin Borrala of the blue legion and captain Travis Queen of the red legion stepped forward and saluted.

“I have a few questions, if I may…?” Miathrin ventured as she looked around Oziah’s requestioned quarters. Sorrel met her eyes with a smile and a nod. “Bane knights?” Miathrin added.

“High Hand Amaury a follower of Bane not Torm,” Oziah sighed.

Miathrin nodded. “And do you have experience of command?”

Oziah gave a wolfish grin. “Have you ever tried to corral ten adventurers into choosing between two doors? And I have served with you…”

Miathrin laughed. “I hope I taught you well.”

“I have a castle in the Dawnlands now, Miathrin,” Oziah watched her face carefully. “There’s enough work, loot and plunder there to make every soldier rich but it is a fair distance. Do you have any married quarters in this camp?”

The captains nodded.

“Perhaps we could establish who can afford to follow me and who must stay,” Oziah inclined her head.

The captains saluted, turned smartly and marched past Lucky, already calling for the sergeants to muster.

Oziah turned to her friends. “They are doughty but… conventional,” she hesitated. “For what lies ahead, you have more experience than the oldest veteran here. We need to secure the temple fast, a pincer movement, but I want you to work with different regiments to protect them from… any fuckery.”

The five companions nodded.

“We’re not saluting though,” Lord Jaezred drawled.

--

Lesos lay before them, dark as if the buildings themselves dreamed in the moonlight. But Sorrel could see the glint of steel in the torches glare and heard the tramp of booted feet. Units of brigadiers were arriving at the city wall and their numbers were hard to estimate. The night held its breath as Oziah drew up her legions in formation and prepared the assault.

Silence fell. The legions stood as still and silent as an army of the dead. Sorrel looked along the ranks and saw grim faces, soldiers that had seen battle before and knew what lay ahead.

Oziah raised her left hand.

Forth went the skirmishers, and Sorrel with them, small parties of shield warriors and archers to cover the mages as they wrought their magic. They made no sound, so skilful were these hunters, picked specifically for their silence and their caution.

Soon they were at the wall, the weaving hands of the mages crackling with arcane power, and if an alert archer caught sight of a hide shield in some traitorous gleam of moonlight, swift were the arrows that tore out their throat before they could call the alarm.

Sorrel marked one, two, three moving together, broke away from her shield wall and into a fey mist of her own summoning. She let three shafts fly, each one with a deadly eye and each one striking home.

As she turned, she saw Oziah at the wall, felt the ground gasp and cry, saw gouts of power clamber the high walls and breathed the dust of collapsing stone, crumbling at the will of the mages.

Oziah raised her right hand. Now silently the first ranks of the legions moved forward into the broken city wall, pouring in slowly but steadily, like the rising tide through breaches in a dike that men have thought secure. A smell of burning was in the air and a very shadow of death.

The vanguard passed through, reckless of their lives as they approached, still bunched and herded, within the range of bowmen on the wall. But there were too few to do them great damage. Then perceiving that the valour of the city was already beaten down, Oziah put forth her strength. Slowly the columns of men rolled forward through the dark.

Suddenly Oziah cried aloud and began the charge. Behind her, the legions banners blew in the wind. After her thundered the armoured vanguard, but she was ever before them. Fey she seemed, or the battle-fury of her dying bloodline ran like new fire in her veins, and she was borne forth like a warrior god of old, in the battles when the world was young. And then all the legions burst into song, and they sang as they slew, for the joy of battle was on them, and the sound of their singing that was fair and terrible came even to the heart of the city.

As the legions assault fell on the defenders, the streets were littered with weapons, wounded fighters and the slumped bloody corpses of butchered horses. The air, once rich in the scents and sounds of hard work, was thick with the scent of death and decay. From side streets and alleys come the screams of dying fighters. Some succumbed to panic, hiding or running away from the fight, while others revelled in the terrors around them.

The legions pressed forward, hewing, slaying, driving the brigadiers back street by street. Well nigh all the southern half of the city was overrun, and there were buildings blazing, soldiers flying towards the temple square like herds before the hunters; and the legions went hither and thither at their will. But they had not yet broken through, nor won the temple. Many stood before them, and in the north of the city were hosts still unfought.

Sorrel scampered up sheer stone walls and took to the rooftops, leaping from beam to gable, her bow in her hand. She marked the brigadier captains by their arrogant plumes – the vanity of the officer class had always served the sniper, she reflected as she pulled back the bow string and sent three arrows into the throat of a bellowing popinjay who thought himself safely behind his own lines.

She took aim again, shot, moved, never in one place long enough for those around her victims to spot the source of the bolts that flew from the sky.

The lines of the blue legion she was covering moved like a surging river, and with each dead commander the defence became ever more uncertain.

Finally, after the streets were soaked in blood, they reached the temple square. It was crowded with brigadiers, and it was knife work – her bow might take a friend as likely as a foe – so she drew and leaped into the fray.

As she ripped her blade out of a falling soldiers belly, she saw a press of foes surrounding Oziah who held the temple steps. In her hand still her dark blade shone, and the terror of the sword for a while held back the enemy, as one by one all who could gain the stair fell beneath her sword strokes. Sorrel leaped to a pillar, then stepped down behind her on the upper steps, her bow bent, arrows flying into the body of her enemies. And then she saw that the legions and the companions had prevailed. Those at the stairs fell back into a defensive ring, but they quailed under the fury of the conquerors and the final fight was brief and bloody.

The soldiers rested briefly on their swords, but Oziah strode amongst them, her power giving the weariest warrior new vigour.

“My captains, to me!” Oziah cried, and when they had gathered she set out her perimeter. “Hold the line, whatever may happen within or without,” she commanded. They raised their swords in salute and took to their positions, hearing the uncertain rumour of a half-defeated army assembling in the streets around them.

Oziah gave her companions a cheerful grin. “Kick the door down, Lucky, I’m going in through the window.”

And the temple assault began.