Let's Play: Cataphrak's Dragoon Saga

[Rogue Attican]

[X] I should find a way to make my defensive position more formidable. A barricade, perhaps.

An excellent idea, though you've no engineers with you, and your men were never issued with shovels or entrenching tools. However, there are plenty of loose stones from the tumbledown castle walls around you. It would only be the work of a few minutes to fortify your positions appreciably. How would you like to go about it?

[] I'll set up my barricades in a way that will do the most damage to the Antari.
[] I want to bottle the Antari into a narrower passage to slow them down.
[] A straight barricade between the two castle towers will suffice well enough.
[] Perhaps a barricade would prove a waste of time.

 

[Rogue Attican]

[X] I'll set up my barricades in a way that will do the most damage to the Antari.

Despite your all-but-encyclopedic knowledge of fighting instructions and tactical manuals, you cannot for the life of you think of a layout or configuration of barricades that might prove exceptionally effective against a mass of charging Antari cavalry.

However, you do know that fortress walls are often built with detached fortified positions called ravelins, something which would not only allow you to protect your men but also allow them to fire into the exposed flanks of the enemy as they are diverted into two narrow passages to each side, much like the way an infantry square might be used.

To your knowledge, nobody has ever considered the idea before, but the more you think about it, the better a notion it seems to become.

Soon, your men are frantically hauling bits of masonry and loose brush into position. Within minutes, a tiny, chest-high fortress materializes, built like a wedge with the 'point' facing the enemy, as to your specifications. You hope your brilliant little idea works as it should.

You feel the oncoming Antari horse before you see or even hear them. The ground in the shadow of castle Blogia trembles with the approach of the great tide of horse and soldiery you know is bearing down on you with speed beyond that of any man. Clumps of sod rattle along the ground as the enemy cavalry ride ever closer. The masonry to each side of your flimsy defensive line begins to shake and rumble. The distant cries of your multitudinous attackers grow until they become a thunderous roar. For a moment, you feel like a stone witnessing the world's ending.

Your men stand firm against the sound and fury, clinging to their positions with a desperation which they hide well but not well enough to conceal from you.

Then, out of the powder fog, the enemy materializes like an army of ghosts, their blades and helms and scraps of chainmail glittering in the dying sun as they rush towards you, into the narrow, fifty-pace gap which you and your Dragoons must hold.

The first wave of the Antari cavalry is great in number, formidable in skill, and all but invincible in their courage.

It is their lack of organization which dooms them.

Perhaps they had not been told of the narrowness of the passage they would have to force. Perhaps the sheer mass of their vanguard simply made it impossible to do anything other than try to force four hundred men into a space that could, at best, fit half that number. Either way, the first ranks of Antari cavalry fall into confusion as their mounts and men grind into each other, smashing into each other's flanks. Their charge devolves into a packed, constricted mass, pushed forward only by the momentum of those behind them.

Cazarosta's Dragoons could not have possibly missed.

The stone walls around you bury themselves in powder smoke as the concussive crack of a single carbine volley pierces the sound of confused horses and screaming men. The Antari are in even more confusion now as men fall by the dozens, struck down by the hidden gunmen firing upon their flanks.

The Antari press onwards towards your men, thrown forward either by sheer blind courage or the confused eagerness of the men behind them, rendered ignorant of the carnage awaiting them by the powder smoke and sounds of battle.

At twenty paces, your men open fire. The first ranks of the Antari charge crumple and die, their screams buried under the sound of hooves and the warcries of those behind them. The Antari have regained their momentum.

You gird yourself for battle, pistol in one hand, sabre in the other, as the Antari horsemen charge into your beleaguered Dragoons and begin the struggle in earnest.

The first of the Antari horse come, roaring at you like a dumb beast, a throaty battle cry on his lips and a sabre held high over his head. It is almost as if he does not even expect to meet any resistance.

His arrogance proves his undoing. Your opponent may not have seen the barricade before you, but his horse does. As the big animal leaps to clear the obstruction, you duck below. Your blade lashes out like a silver whip and buries itself deep into the animal's belly. The Antari horse's legs give way as it lands, and its rider goes flying in a heap. To finish the dazed man off is mere child's play.

The next few Antari you face fare no better. Confused by the sudden resistance of your stalwart men, assailed from both flanks by a hail of carbine balls, those that make it to your line are quickly cut down. Despite their losses, the Antari keep pressing forwards, courage or raw stupidity overwhelming sense or caution. Each enemy horseman seems more dangerous than the last, and soon, you can feel your arms beginning to strain from the fatigue of combat.

More Antari surge forward, their iron-shod horses riding over the bodies of their slain predecessors. There is nothing of the stuff of confusion or pause in them. They ride right for you, sabres flashing, their horses at full gallop.

The Antari rush your men and slough off the pointed frontage of your barricade like water off a sloped roof. It seems your stroke of inspiration has paid off. The Antari slough off to either side as your men stab and slash at their unprotected flanks. The survivors of their first ill-fated rush fall back in disarray, their retreat sped by a parting volley from the towers. A thunderous volley erupts from above you. Billows of powder smoke obscure the narrow passage. The Antari horsemen before you, so leonine in their fury and invincibility not an instant before, are brought down like so many bottles of glass, shattering as they fall.

To your surprise, the Antari do not try to rush forward again. Instead, they reel, turn and retreat. Your men jeer them as they go, their pride at having weathered the storm mingling with their relief at being alive.

What follows is an interminable series of raids and probes by the Antari horse. Having failed to force your passage through brute force, the Antari begin sending parties of a dozen or so to dash in on their fleet horses and harass your troops, perhaps to draw them out into the open where they could be more easily dealt with. Other parties fire potshots at your supporting Dragoons in the castle towers. You give your men standing orders to hold their position against the obvious Antari baiting. A particularly fierce harassing attack almost reaches your line. However, when one of your men springs forward to chase the retreating raiders, staff sergeant Lanzerel hauls him back into line by the back of the collar.

The next time the Antari send in a raiding force, you take no chances; you order your men to fire a volley at the enemy. Your troop's fire brings down half the enemy party and sends the survivors into a headlong flight. The next few Antari probes are driven back with similarly vigorous fire from all three troops.

As you watch another Antari raiding party flee back into the smoke, your staff sergeant pulls you aside. It appears that as futile as the Antari attacks have been, they have done your defenders some harm: your men are out of ammunition. Runners sent to your fellow officers report that their situation is just as dire. Between the three of your troops, you've not even enough powder and shot remaining to fire off a single volley. When the men hear of this, they grumble and look nervously over their shoulders.

"We've fought ourselves dry. They can't bloody well hang us for runnin' now," you hear one of them say. While retreat without orders would still theoretically be desertion, perhaps anybody judging your actions would do so with more leniency, knowing that you had done all that you reasonably could to slow the enemy.

Lanzerel turns to you, his expression pitched as if to say, 'What now, sir?'

What now, indeed?

[] We have been ordered to defend this position and we will do so until the end of the world if need be!
[] We do not need ammunition to use our sabres. If the Antari break through here, the entire army is in danger. That cannot be allowed.
[] I cannot leave. I can allow my men to, though. I shall let everyone not willing to fight to the death escape with their lives.
[] I'm not going to die here on the order of a man who is likely already dead! I'll simply walk into a cloud of powder smoke and slip away.

 

[Rogue Attican]

[X] I cannot leave. I can allow my men to, though. I shall let everyone not willing to fight to the death escape with their lives.

Your return your staff sergeant's gaze. "I will not fight with any man who would rather live than defend the honour of his Regiment and his King. Any man who wishes to flee may do so."

Lanzerel nods and goes off to inform the men. After a few minutes of silence, you count your men again to find a handful of them gone from your line. At least those that remain have chosen to fight alongside you to the last.

Morale: 67%
Loyalty: 75%

Click to shrink...

-​

Without ammunition, your carbines become no more than glorified clubs. You order your men to take them to the rear so that they do not get in the way of the next assault. No sooner do your men settle back into position than the ground begins rumbling again.

This time, however, you hear another, higher sound layered over the now-familiar cacophony of hoofbeats and warcries: a low, deep whistling moan, louder and higher with every passing second, until it becomes a mad shriek. You swallow hard. You know exactly what's coming next.

When the enemy finally emerges from the powder fog, a tremor of fear and shock ripples through your men. The shapes before you are the outlines of massively armoured riders and gigantic warhorses, their forms blazing with the blue glow of banefire. The great spectres solidify and dark shapes become steel and flesh and lance and blade. At long last, you see the angel wings strapped to each rider's back, their feathers shrieking as the air passes over them.

Church Hussars.

Shining mountains of steel and banefire, the Antari Hussars charge ever closer, long lances blazing blue in the darkening sun. They are not many, these terrifying riders, a dozen at most; but they would be more than a match for an entire squadron of Dragoons, let alone the few dozen men standing with you. The world shatters as the Dragoons in the castle towers fire their last, carefully hoarded reserves of powder and shot in a final volley.

The enemy cavalry ride through before the smoke even clears. For an instant, you wonder if none of the Hussars had been hit at all. It is only when they are three dozen paces from your position you see the dents and splashes of shattered lead on their shining splint mail. Gunpowder will do no good against these monsters in men's bodies.

Your sabre is tight in your hand as the Hussars gallop ever closer. Time seems to slow, and the world falls away, leaving only you, your men, and your terrible, unstoppable enemies in their bane-wrought armour and their long, vicious lances.

Time stops, and the instant is frozen as the Antari hit your line. All you know is that the lead Hussar is before you, that his horse is riding at full gallop, and that the tip of his lance has just swept by your head with only a few centimetres to spare.

Here is your chance, your dance upon the razor's edge between death and glory. You take a quick breath and:

[] Face the enemy head-on: Lunge forward and get close enough to use my sabre.
[] Be clever: Find a way to unhorse the Hussar and gut him before he can recover.
[] Rally some of my men to me, and attack the enemy from all sides.

 

[The Laurent]

The Sound of A Slipping Sword, Part 1: Facing Eternity

The world always falls away in moments like this. You are no peerless warrior, to get lost in the joy of battle. But you are well trained, and your ability to keep on thinking even as the world falls apart is what has led you this far.

Of course, perhaps led is the word.

You think of Cazarosta, dearer thoughts than you should have considering how different you two are. You think of the Ravelin idea, and as the chaos continues, as you fight and kill as if you are some philosophical automaton winding down to self-destruction, and wish you had time to suggest it for wider application. Time to add it to the annals of military history.

In a moment like this, the idea that you could make some small contribution to the science of war, to this bloody, brutal, and necessary business, is an odd sort of balm.

If Cazarosta is a well-worn, perfectly balanced saber, sometimes your mind is a rapier. He is a master of the craft of warfare, as you are growing more skilled at the science of combat.

And soon you two will be dead, you know it.

Long ago, you stood in an officer's club, all this bloodshed so distant, and had a choice of games. Each choice you have made has carved away at your futures, and you cannot believe that they are not choices because as cruel as the world can be…

It is an odd, cold, bleak, beautiful thing. It is something you could spend a lifetime writing philosophy about, and still not grasp how it feels.

"We are sabres in the hands of infinity Castleton, to move and act as we are bid. The fact that we sometimes have second thoughts in obeying gives us the delusion that we have some ability to determine our fates, that we are born with the freedom to choose our actions: to be kind or cruel, good or evil. That is mankind's most glorious and beautiful dream, but it is a delusion nonetheless."

You do not believe it. You do not not believe it. You had, at the time, a thousand philosophical objections and none of them seemed adequate to truly bring to your friend. If you had won the argument, what would it have proven? That you can ape the arguments of hoary men in dusty libraries better than he?

Now, you are fighting out your final moments. You will die, he will die. Then you will see which of you is correct, perhaps. One can only hope.

Yet somehow you survive a little longer. Your men do too. You chose well, in your Seargant.

"Why? Do you think you might die in the battle?"

You don't want to die. These years of war have been cruel, have been strange. But you want to live, and you want Cazarosta to live.

A part of you is almost glad to think that when you die, it will hurt, and it will happen before Cazarosta does. That you will not have to outlive him even by a minute. You should not be such close comrades: you have a reputation among some as a kind heart indeed, even too kind. He is a man that at times considers the laws and rules of war a checklist. It is selfish to thank such a cruel war for helping you to meet such a cold person, as if tens of thousands of deaths are some payment in full for such a bond, but that is what you feel.

It is only when he walks away that you realize he is saying goodbye.

He hadn't known then, that you would not be rid of him that easily, that you would choose to stand with him as long as you could. You would not yield your own command to him, but you stood by him in the ways that truly matter.

"We shall try. I gladly give my life for crown and kingdom. My men would likely say the same."

Now we shall see.

"You handled that situation well."

"I did what I thought necessary."

The Saints had to have been with you to have lasted this long. But now you come to the end of it, at the end of a long day of hard riding. But if you do not lower your sabers and prepare now for a charge, what was the sprint for?

"We've fought ourselves dry. They can't bloody well hang us for runnin' now."

Lanzerel turns to you, his expression pitched as if to say, 'What now, sir?'

You could order them to stand with you. You cannot flee, that would be cowardice and stupidity alike. You outlined as well as any the penalty for fleeing in a moment like this.

But, a choice. A beautiful dream? In this moment it does not feel like a dream at all. No, it feels like the most real thing you've ever done. A test, a throw of the dice, against all you believe in and all your closest friend--for all that such a word has passed neither lip--believes.

He might do the same thing, in truth: let the cowards flee, let those who stand true stand. But he would not do it with the feeling you do. With the faint air of kindness cloaked by exhausted, desperate brutality.

"I will not fight--"

I will not die.

"with any man who would rather live than defend the honour of his Regiment and his King."

You look around, and a few of the men seem to notice what you're saying too quietly for them to hear.

"Any man who wishes to flee may do so."

Lanzerel nods and goes off to inform the men.

A few leave. Not many, but a few, and not even by some logical calculus, in one sense. One man you regarded as one of the heartiest, the bravest, decides to leave: perhaps he has decided that bravery is accepting the ruin of his life.

But it is only a few of them. (If it was all or none, you would have proven yourself wrong in a moment like this, and accepted it gladly and sadly both.)

They know you mean it. You can tell that: there are people who would give this choice and then shoot those who tried to flee, or make sure word got back about it, that some message got down to Cazarosta, who would no doubt happily bayonet deserters.

You wonder what Cazarosta sees.

And those that remain, their spines straighten, they draw strength and power from their choice, the choice to stand and fight knowing they will die soon. You made a choice to be here, you cannot blame Infinity, you cannot blame the Gods, you cannot even truly blame your nature, for if your nature was so easily understood then why would you--a font of mercy--so care for such a friend as Cazarosta.

They are stronger for their choice. You are stronger for yours.

"Take the carbines to the rear. We will not be needing them," you call out. Your voice is not jolly, but there is a softness to it. There is a phrase encoded in it. 'Thank you' you say, and the men do not reply but they stiffen up even further.

They will stand with you to the very end as you would with Cazarosta. It is the sound of a slipping sword, moving as perhaps even Infinity could never guess, that you think of when at last you hear the whistling moan of death.

You've made your choices; your choices have made you.

What else is there, then, but to play this out to its end?

You swallow hard. You know exactly what's coming next.​

 

[Rogue Attican]

[X] Be clever: Find a way to unhorse the Hussar and gut him before he can recover.

You think quickly, faster than you have ever thought in your life: an instant solution to the doom that looms so high in your mind. Thankfully, your mind does not fail you. Your solution is hardly honourable and far from fair, but it just might work.

You drop to your knees as the blood-red shaft of the Antari lance passes over your head. You wait for the perfect moment as the Hussar's horse, so heavy and unwieldy in such close quarters, gallops past you. Your sabre lashes out, low and quick. You are rewarded by a spray of warm blood and an ear-piercing scream as the Hussar's horse collapses under its newly hamstrung legs. Its rider, slowed by surprise and confusion, tumbles from his saddle as his mount crumples under him.

There is no time to be lost. You leap to the side of your downed but flailing opponent and begin a frantic assault on the tiny gaps in his armour. One of your thrusts, your third or fourth, strikes home. There is a sharp gurgle and a spray of blood. Then your foe moves no more.

You stagger forwards into the fight as you look around you with bleary and powder-stung eyes, only to be pushed aside by a great wave of green-grey pouring from the entrances of both castle towers, their unbloodied sabres gleaming in the dying sunlight as they fall upon the Antari from both flanks. Your men fight frantically, but they keep their heads. All around you, teams of green-grey and red strike as teams, overwhelming their powerful foes with clever tactics and practiced blows. One by one, the Antari Hussars fall. One or two are caught in a swirling storm of blades, cut down by a lucky slash across an unprotected armpit or throat. Others soon follow, hauled from their horses and all but kicked apart by your desperately struggling Dragoons. Each small victory costs your men dear, but as you remind yourself with a great deal of bitterness, there are far more of you than there are of them.

Within minutes, only a handful of Hussars remain ahorse and fighting. One of them reaches for a horn at his belt with one hand as he fends off your Dragoons with a lightning-clad battle-axe in the other. The Hussar puts the horn to his lips as his weapon is knocked out of his other hand. A low, mournful note sounds through the bloody and corpse-strewn passage which has cost you so much to hold. The melancholy sound seems to last forever, even as the horn blower tumbles from his bloodied and dying mount. You watch as one of your men seizes the hornblower's great ax and hefts it over his head, bringing it down upon its former owner's chest with both hands.

The horn's sound terminates with a sharp, distorted shriek. Those few Hussars still ahorse pull their mounts away from your exhausted and bloodied Dragoons and ride away.

You breathe deep, trying your best not to gag at the acrid stench of death and powder as the rancid air fills your lungs. You stagger to one of the tower walls and slump against it, feeling your racing heart slow as you hear the sound of retreating hooves diminish to silence.

So great is your exhaustion that it takes you what must have been an embarrassingly long time to realize that you no longer hear the distant thunder of cannon or the crackle of musketry. The only sounds that still reach your ears are the moans of the wounded and dying, the shallow breaths of those still lucky enough to be on their feet, and the low, quiet whistling of the blackening wind.

A lanky, bloodied form settles against the wall beside you: Cazarosta, a bruised hand clamped over the left side of his face, his sabre belt torn and dangling from his waist, his tunic torn in a dozen places. For a moment, you both slump against the ancient stones, then he reaches for his neck and unties the smeared and soiled silk cravat about his neck one-handed.

He pulls his hand away from his face for a second: just long enough for you to see the bloody ruin of his face: cheek seared with banefire, scraps of skin fluttering obscenely in the dirty air, runnels of steaming fluid dripping from the empty, horrible hole where his eye had once been. You take in all of these things in the moment it takes your fellow officer to tie the silk about his head to cover his wound.

"Well then, Lieutenant Castleton," he says as if half his face were not swathed in white cloth slowly staining red and sick yellow. "We should best prepare for their next attack."

Anxiety and sheer incredulity overtake your sense as you stare blankly into the charnelhouse before you, now composed of more dead than living. "Next attack?" you whisper as if the concept were as alien to you as a bull in skirts.

Cazarosta nods, wincing as he does. "Yes. It would be best if we augmented our defensive position somehow. We might pile the bodies into walls and obstacles. I dare say we have enough of them, is that not so?"

You goggle in shock at your fellow officer's cold, toneless words as a furious response bubbles up your throat. Before you have a chance to utter it, you hear the sound of hoofbeats once again.

Your men hear it too. They tense perceptibly. Immediately, you reach for your sabre, only to find it missing. You must have discarded it at some point near the end of the last engagement. After a moment's panic, you calm yourself: the sound is no more than that of a single horse, and it comes from the direction of your own army, not the Antari.

The shape of a man and rider coalesces out of the thinning powder smoke: Major Keane, his tunic bloodied, his helmet scored with cuts, a large swath of particoloured Kentauri cloak wrapped around his blood-soaked middle. With practiced but laboured grace, he dismounts. You muster as much of your strength as you can, and you bring your hand up to a salute, but the Major shakes his head. You let your hand drop.

"Lieutenant Castleton, Lieutenant Cazarosta, His Grace the Duke of Havenport sends his compliments."

Cazarosta nods. "Does he require us to hold this position for much longer?" he asks with a chilling nonchalance.

Keane looks at the charnel house about you. From a starting strength of nearly one hundred and twenty men, you doubt that half are still alive. Of your own men, you can only pick out a dozen or so survivors, though you hope that there are others merely wounded and not dead. Those that do stand seem on the verge of complete exhaustion. The Major shakes his head.

"No, thank the Saints. Our army has retreated into the forest. The line infantry has begun forming into column for the march back south. You are to effect your withdrawal immediately. The army is safe: you have done your duty."

You slump back against the wall, Keane's words echoing in your mind. A voice screams at you from someplace deep inside. You have work to do: the horses must be saddled, the men must be formed up, and your dead must be burned. The voice fades as your knees buckle under you, and you feel tears run down your face. Finally, the voice quiets entirely as you let the black edges of your unconsciousness engulf you entirely.

 

[Rogue Attican]

EPILOGUE
Wherein the CAVALRY OFFICER is awarded JUST RECOMPENSE for his actions.​

Six days after the Battle of Blogia, the battered but defiant remnants of the Royal Army marched through the gates of Noringia.

Five days after that, a party of scouts returned jubilant with the news that the Antari are retreating north, too weary to risk a second clash against an army they had left too intact to ensure victory.

One morning, three weeks after the battle, you pull open the curtains and behold in Noringia's harbour a giant ship-of-the-line. From your window facing the sea, you are close enough to see the name gilded onto the warship's heavily ornamented stern.

She is HMS Rendower, a warship of 98 guns, the flagship of the Royal Tierran Navy. Your heart catches in your throat as you see the massive banner flying from her mainmast, bearing the golden gryphons and silver towers of the royal standard.

The King has come to Antar.

-​

That afternoon, you receive a knock on your door: it is Major Keane, now the temporary commanding officer of your regiment.

"Good day, Lieutenant," he says, his sombre expression completely at odds with his friendly greeting. You sketch a salute as the Major hands you a small envelope of thick vellum.

"You are summoned before the King's Majesty," he says, without a trace of emotion. The two of you leave without delay. You have no intention of disobeying an order from your King.

The day is a beautiful one, with the heat of the early afternoon sun swept away by the cooling breezes of the sea. Keane seems to care little for it. The Dragoon Major's eyes are dull and lifeless as he walks alongside you down the street. You fully understand why. Your regiment's desperate fight on the left flank may have helped save the entire army but it also exacted a heavy toll: out of the seven hundred men that rode into battle that morning, only half that number came back alive.

Captain Elson was not among them. Nor was Lieutenant Colonel Marras or a dozen other officers whom you could name. Even those that survived did not do so without scars: the Duke of Cunaris will never be able to walk again. The healers were able to grow back Cazarosta's eye, but the skin on the left side of his face will be forever blackened and cracked where the banefire charred it. The regiment is a shadow of its former self.

Every so often, Keane will make a sidelong glance at you, hoping perhaps, that you might disrupt the monotony of your bootheels against the cobbles with some sort of conversation.

[X] Ask why the Antari withdrew.

The Major shrugs. "The prevailing opinion among the senior staff is that Prince Khorobirit had expected to annihilate us at Blogia. By being able to extract the majority of our forces intact, we have put paid to that plan. Once the Antari realized we held too strong a position to take by storm, they withdrew."

You raise an eyebrow. "Surely the Antari had enough men to simply besiege the town."

Keane shakes his head. "Enough men, but not enough time. They cannot starve us out since the town can be supplied from the sea with ease. The only way would be to sap the walls. Such a process would likely take months. By harvest time, Khorobirit's men would be deserting en masse simply to have enough grain cut to feed their families."

You nod, finding nothing in Keane's explanation to dispute.

[X] Ask about the King's visit.

The Major's face hardens when you inquire after His Majesty's presence. "We can be certain that he is here to go through the motions: honours, speeches, that lot. He knighted your friend Cazarosta this morning and gave him a captain's commission for his actions during the battle."

You try not to make your surprise too obvious. You have never met your King before, but if he is the sort of man to bestow such high honour upon a man not even born of baneblood, you cannot help but wonder what he wants with you.

Taking advantage of your pause, the Major continues. "There is also the possibility that His Majesty is here to take personal command, though I cannot see how he will be much of an improvement over his illustrious predecessor, as untested as he is."

You nod non-committally. You know for a fact that King Miguel has never seen battle before. You can only hope that if he does plan to take command, he will prove a quick study.

[X] Ask about the condition of the Army as a whole.

Major Keane shakes his head, his features laden with sadness. "This army has lost a great deal, many of its finest leaders. The greater part of the infantry and artillery have come out of the battle intact, but who will lead them now that so many of our brother officers are dead on the field?"

You nod in agreement. You have seen the list of officers slain at Blogia: a long and depressing list. It was a list of some of the army's finest soldiers:

The Duke of Wulfram, struck down by an Antari Hussar's burning longsword.

The Baron of Tourbridge, cut down as his brigade routed around him.

Lord Lieutenant Colonel Sir Enrique d'al Hunter, and the battalion of Grenadiers he rallied around him, dead almost to a man.

The Major takes a deep, shuddering breath as if he were almost on the verge of tears. "The Antari have hurt us deeper than they likely know."

[X] Say nothing.

You continue onwards, uncomfortably silent, until finally, the Major ushers you into the building which had, not so long ago, served as the Duke of Wulfram's headquarters.

A pair of Grenadiers greet you and Keane at the door. Both wear the enameled badges of House Rendower: they are members of the King's personal guards. His task complete, the Major leaves you under the watchful eye of your orange-jacketed ushers.

The two infantrymen lead you down the hallway into the great hall which had played host to the Duke of Wulfram's reception not a month ago. A single look through the open door tells you all you need to know about the importance of the situation: lined up on each side of the hall stand lieutenant colonels, colonels, and generals-of-brigade, standing as stock still as a gallery of footmen.

The entirety of their attention is focused on the two conversing men at the far end of the hall. One of them, standing officiously, is the Duke of Havenport, newly promoted to lieutenant general in place of the late Duke of Wulfram. The other sits next to Havenport in a high-backed wooden chair: a wiry, handsome man of about twenty, his auburn hair cut short in the latest fashion.

Your King.

-​

As the two Grenadiers at your sides escort you to the threshold of the hall, the conversation between your King and his newly-appointed general becomes loud enough for you to hear.

"Your Majesty," you hear Havenport say in his urbane tenor, "it is my opinion that a favourable conclusion to the war through this expeditionary force is no longer viable."

"Our army is battered, not broken, Havenport," the King replies, his voice seasoned with reproach. "We may yet see it reforged into the instrument we desire, under our personal command."

You see Havenport wince with every emphasis of the majestic plural. The nobleman's soothing tone begins to crack as he voices his reply. "Your Majesty, we have lost nearly three thousand men, and another thousand shall be in no condition to fight ever again."

The King waves away Havenport's objection as if it were a noxious cloud of smoke. "We are well aware of the losses our armies have sustained, and we will see them made good, even if we must will half the ships of the Northern Fleet stripped of their Marines and fill the rest of the gaps with the conscripted poor."

To this, Havenport attempts a different tack: "Even so, your majesty, it would take months for the army to be made whole once again. To risk the royal personage whilst the ranks remain depleted is a most dangerous course of action."

Your sovereign's response is a most un-Kingly snort of derision. "Is that what you mean to say? Surely you could not be dancing around the fact that we are untested in battle and thus unsuited for personal command."

The Kentauri general's desperate attempt to muster a reply is cut short by the sound of your two escorts pounding the butts of their muskets against the wooden floor.

"Lord Lieutenant Castleton of the Royal Dragoons requests permission to approach the King's Majesty," announces the taller of the two as if he were a court herald.

The young redheaded King nods as his face takes on the courtly mask of a stern warrior prince. "You may approach us, Lieutenant."

You feel your palms turn damp and your face turn pale as you step forward. You try your hardest to remember all of the courtly graces taught you in your childhood as you step forward into the presence of your King and sovereign. With your helmet tucked under one shoulder, you approach no closer than ten paces from where your King sits, carefully keeping your eyes averted as you do.

"Lord Lieutenant Alaric d'al Castleton of the Royal Dragoon Regiment," the King begins, his tone a cold and mechanical contrast to the animated voice you had overheard just a few moments ago. "For your heroic conduct during the military action at the field of Blogia during the summer of this, the seventh year of our reign, as an officer in our service, it is our pleasure that you be awarded the commission of captain and given command of Sixth Squadron, Royal Dragoons. In addition, we have determined your actions in the aforementioned battle to have played a critical part in the preservation of our armies. Thus, it is our pleasure to bestow upon you an annuity of 180 gold crowns, to be paid from our personal accounts, as a small token of our thanks."

As nervous as you are, you manage to speak the appropriate words of gratitude without making an ass of yourself, a great relief. However, the King does not dismiss you. "There is one more thing."

The entire world seems to take a breath as you do your best not to meet your sovereign's gaze. "Kneel."

You drop to your knees immediately. You know what is coming. The King leaps to his feet, his sceptre clutched in one hand.

"We have lost a great deal over the past few weeks. We have lost the initiative and we have lost much pride, but worst of all, we have lost some of the finest soldiers in our service. Our army shall be as a jewel without lustre with the mournful absence of those great men."

The room is enraptured now. You can feel the gazes of men infinitely your senior upon your bent back. The King continues.

"However, we are not without joy. This faithful soldier who kneels before us has proven himself a worthy successor to the illustrious names so cruelly taken from us. We bear much hope for the future of this promising officer and those like him, who have distinguished themselves as heroes in a moment of defeat."

Your King extends a hand, two fingers outstretched. He lifts your chin, and, for the first time, you see him eye to eye. "By the power vested in me by Heavenly Mandate, and as Grandmaster of the Red, I name you, Lord Alaric d'al Castleton, Knight-Companion of the Order of Saint Joshua."

You tense yourself for the blow an instant before it comes: a short, sharp strike of the royal sceptre against your chest. Enough to knock the wind out of you or perhaps leave a bruise, but little else. "Let that be the last insult you will ever allow to pass unanswered."

The King steps back, the ritual almost complete. You hold your breath, waiting for the last words that will make you a knight of the Orders-Militant.

"Arise, Sir Alaric, and find glory through battle!"

-​

You emerge into the afternoon sun with a head full of thoughts, pulling your mind in half a dozen different directions. You will need to have your uniforms altered, first of all. You have no doubt that there will be a great deal of paperwork for the provision of your new command, not to mention the reinforcement of that new command to begin with. New officers and NCOs will need to be selected. There would, of course, also be the business of ordering the bane-hardened weapon and armour of a Knight of the Orders-Militant, and the golden spurs of your new title besides.

You take a deep breath, for those tasks would only be the beginning of your labours.

After all, there is still a war to win.

Now that we've finished Book One, what are your thoughts? If you have any questions, I'd be more than happy to answer them. If you have specific feedback, I can relay that to the author too.

Click to shrink...

 

[The Laurent]

The Sound of A Slipping Sword, Part 2: Enduring Infinity

You did not expect it. You expected to face eternity, to see the Saints or… see what happens after all of this. Instead, you're faced with continued life, with some unknown infinity before you. For every second held an infinite number of moments, and so every breath was yet another endless moment, or so one philosopher had once claimed.

It had seemed absurd until you'd been in battle. Then all at once some years ago, it made sense, and you had gone back and seen: yes, he had been a soldier. He had been in a war, long ago.

Your war will continue, and you can hear people whisper now every time you enter a room. You've built up expectations. Even more stunningly, somehow you are alive.

You left everything in that battle just to hold long enough. You killed a Church Hussar in single combat, albeit by trickery. And you saw how little mercy Cazarosta had, even to himself. It should not be a surprise, but… your fury and outrage were not feigned.

"Well then, Lieutenant Castleton. We should best prepare for their next attack."

He would have tried to pile the bodies to hold out long enough to make killing you all a work of two minutes rather than one. Almost all of your anger is at the absurdity of pushing himself, of pushing you, but a little bit of it is--what?

You think you'd have rather gathered up what you could and stayed with him for whatever fleeting seconds remained.

Yet the next night you sleep and dream, and what you dream of is the furious words.

"Are you out of your mind?" you ask, vision blackening and swaying.

He would have simply looked at you.

Then, what? With what tiny fraction of strength left you would have said. "Is there anywhere to retreat within the fort?" Sway. Sway. "We can… grab the Hussar's weapons, something to hold us, and drag the wounded back. Rubble. There has to be rubble."

"A solid suggestion," Cazarosta might have said, grudgingly, or perhaps he would have scoffed and assumed that it was cowardice and then you would have, what?

You know you cannot abandon him, but you know--in reality, if not in this dream--that you would have passed out before you could do much more. But perhaps you could have passed on the orders.

You don't know. Even in your dream, even in your nightmare, it is a cold, miserable thing. And you don't have time to tell him… tell him…

About the. Oh! About the choice you gave him and…

***​

You woke, exhausted and in a sweat. You have your men to see, what remains of them. They are not enough to fill more than half of the roster. Four left. Twelve were standing at the end, and, you're told, ten more pulled through--but four of those ten will never fight again, and three of those ten will probably not be active until the fall.

They gave everything for you, you gave everything for King, Regiment, Country, and Cazarosta, and the last is quite the heresy, by the Saints.

But he was on that list: not first, but was this a properly ordered list? Was Country above Regiment? You are not thinking clearly. You have not thought clearly in two days.

You know what you need. You need rest, and planning, you need to think and you need to read something. You need poetry and conversation. You need a chance to figure out Elson, one you will never get.

But you also need Cazarosta. You need to see him, not just hear that his eye was recovered, that his face was marked but his soul no doubt the same as it has ever been. He has risen further than he thought he would.

"However, if the Saints wish me to give my life for their plan, this would seem a perfect time: No captain would sell their commission to a Deathborn so I may advance no further in rank."

This time you do not find him in prayer. He is in his room, and you remember the last time you shared a room. He was sixteen, and you were eighteen, and it is baffling to know that you are both young men and already risen so far and so fast. He does not feel younger than you or anyone else, truly he does not.

You do not flinch away from the scars. He earned them. It was--though here lies the crux of your disagreements--his choices that brought him further than he could ever hope.

"Sir Cazarosta," you say, happy to be able to say that, "Captain. I am glad to see your eye was saved."

Cazarosta nodded. "Sir Castellon. Captain." A moment's consideration. The same regard, you feel, reflected back more quietly. "Our purpose is not yet brought to its end, the Saints yet have need--"

"Need for the sabres," you say, interrupting him.

He looks. Surprised.

And surprised at his surprise. It is faint and fleeting. "You remember."

"Cazarosta, I value heavily everything you say." He went almost blank at that. Almost. "Of course, I remember. I was thinking of it when I made my stand."

He inclined his head, and a part of him seems aware that you have the floor. That he has said his piece before, and that this perhaps is a return volley. In war he would never give the enemy the honor of being able to return fire, but this is not war and you are not his enemy.

"I gave them a choice, those who stood after we had run out of almost all our ammunition. A few left, to face whatever desertion would bring them rather than certain death. The others stood, and by their choice they were strengthened in their purpose. They were forged anew. And I believe it was a choice. You can say that they cannot help how they were made, that they are…"

You open your hands. You invite his scorn.

Instead, you get a soft, intense answer.

"A cannonball in flight. They cannot choose not to impact the ground, now that they are in the air."

"Yet you called it an illusion, and what I saw was no illusion: they fought better, and survived better because they had had the ability to leave revealed to them. They would not have done as well, I might not have survived if I simply ordered them with a hard word to stay and die or I'd kill them myself."

You could never do that. Even the ones who deserted, you almost wish you could save. But you cannot. Even allowing them to escape like this was something not to be focused on when it is time for reports to be written.

"No," you say. "I think that our choices matter, else how would the Saints judge us worthy or unworthy? I chose to be where I am… and I chose to stand by you." A pause. "Just as I chose to talk to you that night when you told me what you thought."

When you enchanted me in some strange grim fashion. Your vision, you do not say, was nothing I'd ever fully agree with but the quiet intensity that you delivered it needed an answer. "I know this is not… a philosophical response. But a few left, and most stayed, and it felt as if that was an answer to what you said, Cazarosta. An answer I would not have hit upon if it were not for you."

You cannot express the strange gratitude you feel towards him.

He considers it and nods. It is not a nod of agreement on your point, nor is it even--you think--an attempt to consider what you were saying and test it out. No, it is something all the sweeter, all the better.

It is all you ever truly wanted out of this conversation.

it is a nod of understanding. He understood why you thought as you did. That you had not come to it from books or prejudice or sheer blind optimism of the most absurd sort, but through practical means, through testing it.

You are a man of letters, an intelligent warrior, as best as you can be. You want to be understood and think that of all the things you can try to grant Cazarosta, all the things you would die to try to grant him, Understanding is one of the ones you are most capable of.

And you feel this, at least, returned.

"I have heard about your actions. They were well done, and played an important role in our victory."

I would have died without them.

It is not a thank you. But do you think to expect one? Do you understand him well enough to know…

Know that he has lived his entire life under a shadow, under the kind of pall that even without context cannot be underestimated? Know that he is not used to this, that he is as clumsy as you were with a sabre before he helped you towards basic competence.

Your heart aches for all of your men that died. It has nearly broken, but even if it had those words would have brought it back.

Brought it back to something.

You talk a little bit longer, small talk on the war, a subject which should exhaust you but all at once does not. You would talk for hours with him if need be. You should, and you should not care about your reputation at all.

But instead, after a few minutes he helps you extricate yourself, more solicitous--bafflingly--for your reputation and good standing than he is for his own.

There is a faint ghost of a smile on his lips as you part, and a spring in your step.

There is still a war to be won, and you gaze out over the gorgeous spring day.

Infinity stretches before you, and you, Sir Alaric d'al Castleton, Captain in the King's Service, Knight of the Red, have work to do.

You have plans and schemes to enact, units to reassemble, and work to do--and you have a brother Knight who will face the same burdens. You know he will excel at them, as well or perhaps better than you.

When has he ever shied from enduring infinity?

You think that there are some books you have yet to read, and that you should write more thoroughly about what happened at the battle, to find the lessons for the future. To improve yourself in this deadly science. You may have a lot yet to learn, newly a Captain, but you've always been a quick study.

You'll survive.

 

[Rogue Attican]

Chapter I
Wherein the CAVALRY OFFICER, newly promoted, leads his SQUADRON into its first BATTLE.​

"Wake up, sir!"

You open your eyes as you are shaken awake by a dark blur. Blinking the last shreds of sleep from your mind, the sensations of the outside world flood in: the light of the rising sun, the hard surface of the forest floor pressing through the cloth of your bedroll, the bite of the crisp air of southern Antar.

In a short, drowsy moment, the dark blur resolves itself into the shape of a man, one wearing the same green-grey tunic as you. Staff Sergeant Lanzerel, a man who has served as your senior non-commissioned officer since your very first command all those years ago; the one who followed you as you were promoted twice, and the one who stood by your side at the butcher's yard that was the Battle of Blogia barely four months ago.

Blogia.

On that horrible day, the Royal Tierran Army had crumpled under the relentless assault of Prince Khorobirit's Antari. The King's Army lost three thousand men, including some of its best officers and its finest general.

It was also the day of your finest hour, the day you held the ruined castle on the Tierran flank against an Antari assault, outnumbered ten to one. The King promoted you to captain and made you a Knight of the Red for that brief moment of courage.

"Dammit, sir! Wake up!"

You push yourself upright, the quickest way to assure your senior NCO that you are indeed awake. "What is it, Lanzerel?"

Lanzerel responds with a thin slash of a smile, a hunter's smile. "Well, sir, we've found 'em."

-​

A few minutes later, you find yourself hidden in the underbrush of southern Antar's primordial forest, peering into your spyglass, the two hundred men of Sixth Squadron, Royal Dragoons, waiting crouched behind you.

Lieutenant-colonel Marras had led Sixth Squadron into battle at Blogia. He did not lead them out again. Only a handful of the flamboyant Lieutenant-colonel's men avoided death or capture that day, and those few along with the men you brought with you from your previous command, made the hard core of veterans around which Sixth Squadron—your squadron—rebuilt itself.

Those bold, hard-bitten men had not been pleased with their new commander. Hero or no, to them, you were still an upstart with the King's favour and damned little else. You've had little time to convince them otherwise, but as contemptuous as they might be of your authority, they are still disciplined veterans, especially compared to the rest of the squadron.

For every veteran of Blogia under your command, six or seven are raw replacements. Even worse, they are unsuitable replacements. When Antar first declared war, the boldest and brightest volunteered for the King's Army. They were led and trained by the professional NCOs of the peacetime army. After more than five years of war, most of those men are dead. Those who had replaced them were convicts, debtors, vagrants—men who would do anything for a bed and a meal, even consign themselves to the hard life of a common soldier.

Now, most of those men are dead too. Their replacements now make up most of your command: conscripts. For all its history, the Unified Kingdom of Tierra had been defended by a volunteer army and navy. Now, after the disastrous losses at Blogia, the young King Miguel has ordered the unthinkable; more than half the men in your squadron are here not of their own volition but through bare, ugly coercion.

Worst of all, there are almost no junior officers and NCOs to command them. The Royal Dragoons lost two-thirds of its lieutenants, cornets, and sergeants at Blogia, and many of the survivors (yourself included) were promoted. Now only you, Lanzerel, and two or three NCOs run a force that would normally require at least a dozen commissioned officers and NCOs.

Discipline: 30%
Morale: 35%
Loyalty: 35%
Strength: 100%

Click to shrink...

"There!" Lanzerel exclaims, pointing in the distance. "You see it?"

You point your glass in the direction of your Sergeant's finger, and you do indeed see it: a cloud of dust moving down the bright, chalky ribbon of the Imperial Highway ahead of you. At its head, a fluttering of red and white, the double-eagle banner of the League of Antar.

The enemy.

You glance behind you, taking another look at the men whom you officially command. They are half-trained, unhardened, and lack even their barest complement of junior officers. Some disdain you, while others save their hate for the government you represent, the one that dragged them out of their homes and sent them to this land across the sea to die. Only a few have the barest scrap of respect for you…

…and now you are to lead them into battle for the first time.

-​

Over the next few minutes, you watch the approaching mass until you can pick out the shapes of men and horses.

The Antari force is three hundred strong. They are led by a vanguard of wild-eyed light cavalry, their felt vests and fur shakos aglitter with gold and steel, their belts crammed with sabres and pistols. Behind them is a ragged column of Antari peasant levies, serfs with improvised weapons, minimal training, and even less fighting spirit. Only fear of the baneblooded overlords drives them onward.

The enemy outnumbers you three to two, but they've none of their vaunted Church Hussars with them; a large raiding party, no more. Though Prince Khorobirit was able to defeat the Tierran Army at the field of Blogia, his forces had bled hard enough to be unable to push you and your fellow Tierrans into the sea. For the past few months, the Lords of the League Congress have satisfied themselves with raiding the small strip of Antari land under Tierran occupation.

Nevertheless, your men are mostly untested and certainly unused to fighting under your command. Though your Dragoons are likely better drilled than much of the Antari force, there is no guarantee you could secure victory in a simple head-on engagement.

You turn to Lanzerel. "Staff Sergeant, your thoughts?"

Lanzerel doesn't hesitate to give his answer. "My advice would be to take this lot back down south for another six months of training, but we can't bloody well do that, can we? We have orders to deal with that Antari raid, and I know you're generally not one for running."

The grizzled non-com gives a long, frustrated sigh. "It's going to be a gamble no matter what we do, and I don't bloody much fancy the odds, sir."

Not the most encouraging response, but you asked for the man's opinion. With that in mind, how will you fight the Antari force before you?

[] With brute force. I'll lead the men in a head-on mounted charge.
[] With cunning. I'll lure the enemy into an ambush.
[] With bravado. Standing firm across their path will rattle the enemy's nerves.

 

[Rogue Attican]

[X] With cunning. I'll lure the enemy into an ambush.

You quickly cook up a plan to lure the Antari into an ambush and begin putting it into action.

The basic idea is a simple one. You will dismount and stand in the middle of the road with a small portion of your men, enough to lure the Antari close. Then, the majority of your unit, hidden in the woods, will open fire upon the enemy at close range with their carbines.

Despite the simplicity of your plan, getting it into motion before the Antari get close is another matter. Few Dragoons are willing to volunteer to act as the 'bait,' even though you plan to stand alongside them. With time running short, you are forced to simply order three dozen entirely unenthusiastic dragoons to follow you while the rest set up firing positions under Lanzerel.

No sooner is your trap set do the lead horsemen of the Antari column ride into view. The enemy horsemen spur their mounts to a gallop and roar their battle cries, their moustaches abristle, sabres twirling and flashing silver in the morning sun.

Beside you, the men stand trembling, their hands gripping their sabres so tightly that their knuckles turn white. You pray that they will stand firm.

The Antari horsemen are at full charge now, leaving their supporting infantry far behind. They are still a hundred metres away from you when you hear Lanzerel give the order to fire.

The air crackles with musketry, and the forest to your right floods with powder smoke as the vast majority of your squadron gives fire. Most of the men under your command are mediocre shots at best, but the short-barreled, rifled carbines of your dragoons are far more accurate than the smoothbore muskets of the line infantry. At less than fifty metres, at a target the size of a mounted man in profile, they could hardly miss.

Only a handful of Antari horsemen ride out of the smoke. Despite their horrific losses, the enemy cavalry is still dead set upon charging home.

Your men lose their nerve. Perhaps they expected the Antari horsemen to turn back or for the single volley to kill all of them. Either way, the men alongside you are breaking. Some clutch their weapons tight as they flee, while others simply drop them onto the road.

Those men will not outrun the Antari, not on foot. Standing together, you would have been able to repulse the handful of Antari still in their saddles. Fleeing individually, they are nothing more than targets.

There is also a more pressing concern. With your men fleeing, you stand alone. While the next volley from the rest of your squadron may wipe out the remaining enemy horsemen, it will take your men half a minute to prepare for it. The Antari will be upon you long before then.

What do you do?

[] I'll face those Antari horsemen alone if I have to!
[] I save my fleeing men and my own life with some quick thinking.
[] I'll rally my fleeing men and face the Antari head-on.

 

[Rogue Attican]

[X] I save my fleeing men and my own life with some quick thinking.

Once again, your knowledge of the Antari language comes in handy. You taunt the oncoming riders as they bear down upon you. You shout horrible, disgusting things about their mothers, sisters, and goats.

Some of the Antari continue chasing your men, but most swerve toward you instead.

You have their attention now, and you plan to exploit it. You run for the side of the road, and hoping that the Antari light cavalry has more temper than brains, you duck into the forest.

The Antari chasing you realise what you're doing, but it is too late. A horse at full charge cannot be stopped easily, especially when it has just been run into the thick and uneven ground of a primordial forest.

There is a mighty crash as one of the pursuing horses trips over a root or log or some other obstacle on the rough ground, sending its rider flying. Another soon follows, smashing head-first against a tree trunk. A third's horse steps into a hidden crevice, and the dry-tinder crack of breaking bone echoes through the trees. The last rider turns around, shouting in frustration, stopping only long enough to rescue the rider of the lamed horse before beating a hasty retreat from the forest. You look around as the haze of battle clears and see the last Antari horsemen retreating back up the road. The men with you have been savaged. Many are wounded, and only a few are still on their feet. Only your quick thinking and valour were able to stop the Antari from killing more.

However, now is no time to rest. The Antari infantry is still on the advance, and their sheer numbers will be more than enough to overwhelm a few wounded, reeling, exhausted dragoons. With the rest of your squadron scattered throughout the woods, you've not the men or the resources to secure a victory today.

Hesitantly, you regroup with the rest of your squadron in the woods. The mood there is clear; after seeing the slaughter which the Antari worked upon the men with you, none of them wish to face the enemy again today. No matter how much you might want to try again, retreat is the only real option, and so retreat you do.

You and your men mount up and withdraw back down the Old Imperial Highway, the cheers of the victorious Antari fading into the distance.

-​

On the long ride back south to the safety of the main army's camp in Noringia, your staff sergeant rides up to your position at the front of the column, his mood no doubt as foul as his expression.

"Damn these stupid bastards!" He scowls. "Damn their insolence, damn their cowardice, damn their ineptitude! Today was ours, dammit! Your plan was good, but these men couldn't be trusted to guard a latrine ditch, let alone win a battle."

[] "I'm sure these men will sort themselves out eventually."
[] "You're right, Staff Sergeant. Changes need to be made."
[] "Perhaps I should make some examples, then; punish a few to encourage the others."