Broken Fastness
Thirtieth Day of the Fourth Month 294 AC
"Lord who has broken the Gates of the Nameless City and who has given strength of arm to the People of Chiox in the day of their trial, we ask in this dread hour before the spilling of blood that you grant unto us that same might and the wisdom to use it well, not only in the reaping of foes, but in the raising up of those who, like the Third Overseer, see You in Your Glory and have the scales fall from their eyes..." The prayer was familiar upon Benerro's lips, more familiar then he would have preferred it, if truth be told. He had gone to war against the puppets of demons, against those fallen to the promises of the Dark Queen, and against the Enemy of All. Never before had he gone into a battle quite like this one.
The man Tywin Lannister was a slaver, it was true, and one fouler than many you might find in the darker corners of Essos for the fact he had enslaved the very minds of not just his servants, but his family also. That was not why Benerro was here speaking a prayer of benediction over men and women, spirits of flame and water, moles and cats. Had Tywin done none of these things and was to have been guilty of nothing but treason which could not be forgiven, Benerro would have still been here just as they were. He was here as an instrument of rising empire just as they were. It was harder to reconcile with the prospect of spilling blood before him rather than the building of schools and and healer's halls, but it was not too hard to bear, never that while the fire of his Lord burned in the world.
Walls of living water burst through the walls of the Rock as though the ocean had caught its vengeance upon the sons of Lann the Clever, they swept through the halls, carrying the debris of traps and barricades, crossbowmen's perches and pre-set charges. In their wake came the phoenixes on bright wings bearing healing and flame both and behind them the warstriders, scores of articulated joints flicking and clacking, water bound not to reason and purpose as the elemental were, but by the will of the artificer, a weapon without peer. Behind them came the praetori, the tip of the Imperator's spear, yes, but any who would fight with a spear knows that you keep it behind the shield's guard before striking.
The dead died again most often, for the alien minds within did not value the husks they were riding as much a living man might value his own flesh and blood. In truth, they did not even value their own corporeal existence as much as that, for they would return to the embrace of the green dream and so those traps not wrecked by the elementals' work reaped a harvest of flesh that had never lived and of souls that embraced oblivion like a familiar friend. Still, not all could be so fortunate when war was fought to the knife....
***
The looming figure of the praetori approached the maid who seemed to have just gotten lost in the halls amid the chaos and confusion. She tried to recall how you said 'don't panic' in the tongue of the Sunset Lands, but the answer eluded her. The servant did not seem afraid at least, she had stopped... she was coming this way. It was only in the last moment that she saw the look of helpless horror in the woman's face as she uttered the command word and the alchemical bomb that had been hidden beneath her shawl exploded in a burst or poisonous blue light.
***
Loren had not meant to get too close, but the wounds of the leshy had been too deep, he was dying and unlike many of his kin Silver Root did not wish to pass back into the embrace of the Gods so soon. He was not sure if he would be able to find his way back. The last thing the phoenix saw was the frozen carved smile of the obsidian guardian as a spray of jagged stones filled the air.
***
The Mark One Heavy Warstrider was not designed with sentiment in mind, only the intelligence required to make independent tactical decisions and at the outer scope of its abilities to take part in strategic discussion. It could not appreciate the artistry of the vaulted hall or the beauty of the light that fractured into a thousand, thousand colors upon gems drawn from the deepest chasms of the earth. It moved with grim purpose and it killed with as little fanfare as the crash of a drop hammer. Claws of dragonglass proved ill-suited to piercing its shell and magics that could have crippled a creature of flesh and blood served not at all against its implacable tread.
***
Benerro looked upon the field of broken artifice and shattered bodies still wet not only with the blood of the fallen but with the water that flowed and bubbled where the servants of the sea god walked. For all that he had bent his arts towards the breaking of enchantment where he could, he knew that far more would yet die this day, bound by chains they could not deny even for a moment, screaming inside their own heads. He gently close the eyes of a young man in robes of gold, practically cut in half by a praetorian's blade. "Lord who is Light of the World, take thee the soul of one who did not know you until the last, for he does not deserve the cold darkness beyond the fire's light."
War had a way of making you hate the enemy even when they did not serve the Enemy of All, the priest found. Perhaps all the more for that.
He had barely finished his prayer when the man who had dealt the killing blow to the dead mage suddenly shouted, "Warstrider rogue, they've got some kind of..." A bolt from the steam canon vaporized his head, just as the rest of his squad began to lay down suppressing fire.
The priest felt the energies of translocation shimmering through the air by the power of his pendant and he understood the tactic.
Stay out of sight and take over the constructs to wear down the attack against itself.
"Enough!" he called, and the Lord of Light Spoke with him in that hour. The spell failed and amid the chaos and the smoke he spotted a woman in the robes of a wizard, old scars running across a face that had not yet seen the marks of age and but a single eye looking out at him with feverish light.
The sorceress raised a hand on sheer instinct and a shimmering sphere blocked the attacks, though it was clear it would not hold off many more explosions. She looked to the two other striders and for a moment Benerro thought she was preparing to subvert them too, before he noticed their tread was not quite so smooth as it had been. They already had been...
"Ware...!" Both constructs struck the priest, any one of the blows enough to crush him utterly, but fortune was with him as much as his god was, for he stepped aside just in time to feel the searing steam burn across his side, the pain white hot. He struggled to keep his footing as a warrior in golden armor charged him, a sword that seemed forged of liquid flame in his hand.
Benerro was about to say a prayer for his own soul, hoping that R'hllor in his infinite mercy would not judge the manner of his passing too harshly, when a wall of water smashed the knight aside, giving him the chance to catch his breath and utter instead words of healing. He met the sorceress' single eye with his own as he threw one of Zherys' spell-breaker beads at her feet.
There was a flash and the shield fell, just as the shadows twisted behind her and Garin Drekelis manifested.
One would not think the dealing of death could be artistry, but only if one was not in this room and in this hour. Daggers flashed and blood gushed, and all the arcane arts gathered by skill or by good fortune would serve her naught at all against blades of crystal and envenomed steel moving faster than the eye could see.
As she swayed on her feet, healing light filled her though not the sun-bright flare of the God's light, but something that left her swaying on her feet.
"Lanna!" the knight shouted through a mouthful of roiling sea water as he struggled with his foe, the constructs crashed through the room to defend their new mistress even as they took aim and slew more of the Imperator's soldiers.
Somewhere behind Benerro a praetorian took aim... and a bolt flew true, striking her in the chest and finally casting her down. Left alone, surrounded by foes with only a handful of Lannister constructs to aid him, her husband soon followed.
It was much to the priest's surprise that he found both of them still breathing when he went over to check. With a nod to the High Inquisitor, he sealed them both away in the light of a hidden lantern until they might be judged.
OOC: For anyone wondering how Lanna was able to control your constructs, well not easily. Chained Control Construct. She was only able to chain it because she had Easy Metamagic and Arcane Thesis reducing the slot required to 'only' ninth level. Not yet edited 
