Vanian Year 1104

 

The House of Schönau, Marianne had discovered, was nominally extinct.

 

Her grandmother had been the last true Schönau from the male line. Perhaps she should’ve expected it, after all her father was referred to as the Lord Edelhardt, and the full name of their house was that of Edelhardt-Schönau - even if they had always been only referred to as the latter half. But in truth, she had never placed much thought into their family name before - she grew up with it after all, and just accepted it to be the way it is.

 

Instead, the Edelhardt-Schönaus were a branch family of the House of Edelhardt, who were margraves in the Kingdom of Schwerin. The story goes that the Edehardts were invited to Neuchatel in order to witness the coronation of the current King of Reichenau. While there, her grandfather, the second son of the Edelhardts, met and fell in love with the Countess Schönau. 

 

Since her grandfather was only a second son, he was allowed to marry far below his station. Thus only after a brief courtship period, Marianne’s grandparents took their vows. Because the marriage wasn’t matrilineal, by law her grandmother should’ve adopted the Edelhardt name along with all of their children henceforth. However, it was said that her grandfather was so taken by his new wife that he would not force her to abandon her family name, thus willfully creating the branch House of Edelhardt-Schönau.

 

A few years before Marianne was born, her grandmother died suddenly from a sinister wind. Lord Landolf told her that her grandfather was so griefstricken by his wife’s death that he secluded himself wholly and refused to do anything other than mourn. Nary a year later, he followed her to the grave.

 

How, she did not know - her father wouldn’t speak of it. 

 

It was a most romantic love story nonetheless, albeit just as tragic. Marianne had to wonder if she would ever love someone as her grandfather did, to be so infatuated that she couldn’t bear living without them.

 

She doubted it, that kind of story came only once in a house’s lifetime.

 

“My lady!” Arwin’s voice caught her attention, “Please pay attention to the road!”

 

Marianne pursed her lips, instinctively gripping the reins of her horse tighter, “My apologies, Arwin.”

 

They were currently riding along the Norduferstraße, an ancient highway built by the old Reicher kings in cooperation with the Victorian Empire and Quraysh emirs. As befitting its name, the road straddled the northern shore of the continent - all the way from Lyonesse at the western tip of the continent, through the Kingdom of Schwerin, and to the former Quraysh emirates in the east.

 

The Norduferstraße’s stone roads have been well-maintained over the centuries, and still acts as a major trade artery between the Caroline and Reicher kingdoms. Though, Marianne supposed there was not much trade anymore, and instead the highway was Nordenstein's lifeline, considering the sheer significance of the supply line.

 

To their east were the tranquil waters of the Ruhigesee, a large inland sea surrounded on all four sides by land. The only exit was a narrow strait in the north overlooked by a fortified port currently in the hands of the Crescent Alliance. To their west were the Crown Mountains, which acted as a natural barrier against the demon armies, funnelling them through two defensible passes - Nordenstein and Grenzmark.

 

To their south was the capital of the Kingdom of Schwerin, the twin cities of Reitzenburg-Echternach, where they had lodged in four days prior. The two cities were built on opposite banks of the mouth of the River Reitzen, the largest river on the continent. It is said that the mouth of the river was over three leagues across - so wide that it was impossible to build a bridge across it. Alas, they had only stayed in a small inn at the outskirts of Echternach, so she couldn’t see it with her own eyes.

 

Marianne breathed in the splendid sea breeze, the scent of salt pleasantly tickling her senses. Perhaps she should’ve been terribly ill of the sensation after spending a full moon at sea within a cramped ship - but it was of her opinion that the Ruhigesee offered a completely different atmosphere than the nauseating Twisting Sea that laid between Vania and Gehenna.

 

“I must wonder what thoughts the Lady Marianne humours herself with,” Hirzyk said from the fore.

 

“Simply my family, good sir,” she shifted on her saddle, “Of the intricacies of blood. And what of you? I cannot help but realise that I do not know your family name.”

 

Lord Landolf had assigned to her one score of men, led by Arwin. Along with the Mızrak Pasha’s two akıncı, their small band was of two dozen in total. All of them were horsemen, allowing for swift and easy passage along the Norduferstraße’s stone roads. 

 

“The Kazimierzi put little faith in family, leydim,” Markusz said from behind her, “Instead, we know each other by our strengths. My name is Koyun Markusz, koyun means sheep in your tongue. So I am Markusz the Sheep. The reason is because I hail from a family of shepherds, and when I was younger I would spend my time with the flock - more than I would at home to that end. So my family and friends called me more sheep than boy. This is my strength.”

 

“And I am Altın-Kanat Hirzyk,” Hirzyk introduced himself, “Hirzyk the Golden-Winged. Some families, like mine, are well-known tradesmen who promote our skills with our names. My clan is one of golden eagle tamers, thus every one of us is known as Altın-Kanat.”

 

“I do not understand,” Arwin admitted, “If you have no family names, how do you decide your king?”

 

“We don’t have a king, good sir!” Hirzyk chortled, “We have the Sejm, a council of seventy-two pashas who vote on every matter that involves the realm. Each pasha has their own station, whether they are governors, generals, ministers, or anything in between.”

 

“Then how does one become a pasha?” Marianne asked.

 

“Why, the Sejm itself! The core principle of Kazimierz is that your strength matters more than your blood. Anyone can become a pasha.”

 

“Mızrak Pasha was a boy orphaned by war,” Markusz said, “Now he is a pasha. Kurt Pasha was a huntsman’s son, now he is a pasha. Kazimierz is a realm of competition, and to us, society is a ladder you ought to climb should you have ambition.”

 

The Kazimierzi were a meritocratic people, she realised. In Kazimierz, it seemed a man’s value mattered more to the realm than their blood. She knew there was a similar Weltanschauung in the successor states of the Victorian Empire, but she had not known that the Kazimierzi shared the ideology as well.

 

But perhaps that was expected of a nomadic people.

 

“A world where anyone could be king,” Arwin mused, “What do you think, boys?”

 

“I can’t imagine it would be very peaceful,” Dieter, the standard-bearer, commented.

 

Well, so he was, but the standard was currently folded away and out of sight. Instead, the bare lance used to hoist the standard was sheathed to the side of Dieter’s horse. It was common practice among the Reichers and Carolines to strike their colours when on the road, for it signalled that no matter their allegiance, they meant no trouble. 

 

However, this only worked when they travelled through neutral territory. It allowed armies to march through unaffiliated kingdoms untouched without the need for military access, provided that they held true to the promise of being colourless. Should the travelling host be reduced to banditry, even when unintended, the lord who owns the land would be allowed to drive them out without consequence.

 

To that end, however, it was considered utterly deplorable to attack a colourless host, and a most dishonourable action. 

 

There was even an old Caroline tale of two rival armies marching to battle each other - but for that to happen, they had to pass through a neutral kingdom between them. In the end, both armies struck their banners and marched side-by-side peacefully through the kingdom until they reached their battlefield beyond its borders. Even to this day, the story was considered an exemplar of Caroline honour.

 

“It already isn’t…” Hirzyk lifted his arm to the sky just a black shape landed on his leather vambraces.

 

Jadwiga screeched, restlessly flapping her wings and snapping at the akıncı’s hair.

 

“Is there something?” Arwin asked, worry tinting his voice.

 

Hirzyk turned around and showed Jadwiga to them, revealing that her talons were dyed red with blood. The beaded string tied to her ankle shimmered with wetness.

 

“Fly, Jadwiga!” Hirzyk ordered, “Bring us there!”

 

Jadwiga screamed in affirmation before leaping off and soaring upwards. Their party swiftly raced after her shadow, chasing Jadwiga over the hills until they came across a track of beaten earth - the kind that would lead to a small out of the way town. And most certainly, an hour later they were on a hill overlooking a village masked in the shadows of the Crown Mountains.

 

From afar, there seemed nothing amiss. Marianne counted no more than a few score homes, and sighted the belfry of the local shrine. 

 

A brisk wind carried the repugnant scent of death.

 

Arwin drew his kriegsmesser, a long one-edged sword with a brutal edge - the perfect weapon for hacking and slashing both from horseback and on foot. The ringing of steel soon filled the air as all her guards unsheathed their blades. Marianne’s palm conspicuously rested on the hilt of her own panzerstecher, but nothing more.

 

Hirzyk and Markusz yanked their bows out of their leather sheaths before nocking arrows and galloping down the hill. As they approached the village, they found it eerily quiet, and even when straining her ears Marianne could only make out the whispering of the downslope wind filtering through the empty houses. There was not a single soul to be seen, not even bodies - only broken doors and windows.

 

But the stench- it was so rancid, Marianne could hurl. Even breathing through her mouth, she could almost feel the stench squirming down her throat. And the moment they rode into the village centre, they found the source.

 

Men, women, children- every single resident who once lived in here, all huddled together and held in each other's arms. 

 

Dead.

 

Every single one, from the mothers holding their children, to the elders whose bones were so brittle they couldn’t move without help - all lying in a pool of their own blood. Jadwiga cawed, perched atop the head of a black-faced man whose eyes have already been eaten through by maggots.

 

“Rounded up and slaughtered,” Markusz spat, “Not even sheep deserve this.”

 

The Crown Mountains loomed over them, and as the sun began to set, its shadows only grew longer.

 

“This is the work of plague-bearers,” Hirzyk snarled, “Their blood hasn’t even thickened and they are already rotting. How in all hells did they get past Nordenstein’s patrols?”

 

“Divines help us all…” one of the guardsmen muttered, making a sign with his hands.

 

“...We will only know when we ask,” Marianne forced out, “For now, let us send them to the heavens.”

 

“My lady,” Arwin started, “We ought to reach Nordenstein today, should we tarry too long we will have to raise a camp in this accursed place.”

 

“Then best be hasty,” Marianne clenched her fists around her reins, “We must honour the dead all the same.”

 

It took no further persuasion for her guards to dismount and begin gathering firewood from the abandoned houses around the square. After all, none of them wished to be cursed by the divines for not honouring the fallen. Marianne looked up and saw the belfry of the shrine - it should be tolling at this time to signal the eve of dusk, but tonight it would remain silent. 

 

As it would for all nights to come.

 

Marianne dismounted and stumbled towards the shrine, setting her gaze upon a stone plaque with the symbol of an open eye scratched upon it with chalk. That was the seal of the Divine Agares, the Thousand-Eyed. Divine Agares watched over the sleeping man so that no knife would undo him. So did he watch over the castle battlements, and safeguard the most precious things. He was the protector, the guardian.

 

There wasn’t a single settlement in all of Vania that did not have a shrine to the divines, but in a village as small as this one, it was more common to raise a single shrine for all divines. Only when you wished for a certain patron deity did you dedicate a shrine to just one. As Marianne wandered into the shrine, she became distinctly aware of the lack of hierograms dedicated to the Divine Agares. 

 

It was more likely that the villagers here only dedicated the shrine to him long after it was built, after the war started. The Divine Agares was the guardian, and they must’ve wished for his protection. Protection which did not come.

 

Marianne knelt before the altar and prayed. 

 

She prayed to the Divine Agares to not let such wanton deaths happen again. There was no knowing why he had allowed this to happen, for the ways of the heavens were utterly unknowable to mortals such as her. There was a powerlessness that Marianne loathed within her, but when all power was lost, all that remained was faith.

 

Marianne stood up and uncapped her wineskin, before pouring out a suitable amount of wine onto the altar. She watched as the red liquid trickled down the pedestal in rivulets, but seeping into the stone before it could reach the ground. As the white marble hungrily drank her offerings, she could only hope that the divines had listened to her prayers.

 

Stepping back out into the sunlight, she was greeted by a vast plume of smoke rising into the washed out sky. A great funeral pyre burned, her men whispering their prayers and tossing wine into the blaze. Sunset-tinted clouds waned into the darkening sky, carrying the souls of the dead to their final resting place upon the recesses of Mount Vanitas - in the court of the Divine Aiperos, the Lord Under the Mountain.

 

Soon, the rich aroma of fermented grapes overpowered the stench of rot, and they wordlessly departed upon their horses.

 

Eager to reach Nordenstein before complete darkness, they raced against the eventide without rest. Jadwiga soared high above them, her wings catching the sun’s final rays. She was their guide and their eyes, ever watchful of bands of plague-bearers that may still be grieving the region.

 

The moon was already rising over the Ruhigesee by the time they caught sight of Nordenstein, its waning figure bathing the waves with silver light. With the veil of day pulled back, the heavens were clearly visible from the earth - a great swathe of hazy gold painted across the twilight sky, a shimmering path of stars for any who wish to meet the divines. 

 

Straight ahead of them, the Northern Crown constellation seemed to frame Nordenstein’s stepped silhouette, the bright stars illuminating the banners fluttering above its towers. Silver lions danced upon scarlet fields alongside lilies and roses, almost glimmering in the starlight.

 

A roaring silver lion upon red, that was the sigil of the House of Edelhardt. A three sheaves of yellow wheat upon green, that was the sigil of the House of Schönau. The House of Edelhardt-Schönau’s sigil was both, alternated on a quartered banner. The same banner that Dieter was now raising above their heads. Now that they have arrived at their destination, they were to raise their colours so they could enter the castle.

 

Unlike Grenzmark, Nordenstein hadn’t been virtually rebuilt to service the war. The reason was that Nordenstein has always been a frontline settlement, for even before the demons came there were the Quraysh emirs who since the dawn of Victoria have been raiding the borderlands of the Reicher kings. In fact, the Margraviate of Edelhardt was also known by another name - the Quraysh Marches. Thanks to this, entire armies could be housed within its walls, and all the necessary establishments to field them were already built.

 

Nordenstein boasted high curtain walls that rose sheer from the earth, and its towers commanded an imposing view of the flat plains surrounding the fortress city. Marianne spotted the shadowy figure of a guardsman lean over the gatehouse battlements to squint at their colours, and Arwin rode closer to Dieter to raise a lit torch before their standard.

 

Soon after, shouts rose from the battlements, and the two cast iron portcullises on either end of the gatehouse began to grind upwards. As they waited, Marianne glanced at the pennants hanging from the flanking towers, proudly displaying the silver lions of Edelhardt. Only, upon closer inspection it appeared the lions were not silver themselves, but instead wore silver plate.

 

Arwin followed her gaze and leaned over to her ear, “Must be the original sigil, my lady. Because of the frequency of their banners being lost, the weavers must’ve started sewing silver lions instead of armoured lions to save time and string.”

 

“A house’s sigil is their identity,” Marianne murmured back, “How often must their banners be lost in order to allow such a thing?”

 

“I do not deny your words, my lady,” Arwin rubbed his nose, “But so too I do not doubt that the people here have long forsaken dignity for practicality.”

 

The portcullises clanked to a halt, and as they started through the gateway, she could hear a holler from above.

 

“Welcome to Nordenstein!” shouted a gleeful voice, “Where there are more bodies than graves, and where crows never go hungry!”

 

They rode into the warm glow of a bustling city. If Marianne was any more ignorant, she could’ve believed there wasn’t a war at all. Under the high walls, the city was ablaze with shining lights and cheerful fervour. Clopping down the streets, the black shapes of bypassers flitted before windows of flickering lights. Children chased the shadows of rumbling carts as they ran freely down the cobbled streets, seemingly without a care in the world.

 

Voices filled the chilly night air, a muted buzz of indistinct conversations mixing together in the cityscape.

 

The tolling of ship bells could be heard from the docks all the way on the western reaches of the city, as vessels from the capital unloaded a constant tide of supplies and materiel into the city.

 

But it only took a closer look to be aware that not all is ordinary. Marianne could see as many soldiers on the streets as there were civilians; there were bands of Caroline routiers and Reicher landsknechte drinking together on outdoor kiosks, while roving troupes of streetwalkers searched for their next pouch of coin from unsuspecting men. 

 

Prostitutes and courtesans waved handkerchiefs from the verandas of brothels, to the joy of Kazimierzi akıncı saddling through the streets. From the corner of her eye, Marianne spied a tavern scuffle between a Reicher reichsritter and Kazimierzi pancerny, cheered on by onlooking patrons.

 

She even spotted the Victorian two-headed eagle emblazoned on a vexillum fluttering in the distance, and Marianne had to wonder what possessed them to travel so far from home.

 

Nordenstein was a city of soldiers.

 

And at the most northern edge of the city was the fortified citadel of Castle Edelhardt. It sat on the edge of a cliff overlooking the Ruhigesee, boasting a pair of thick, rough-hewn curtain walls facing the plains to the north. The fortress was as old as Castle Schönau, but has been built upon by successive lords over time until it was the impregnable bastion of the north that it was today. 

 

A steady stream of foot traffic came to-and-fro the castle gates, the steep hill mostly trekked by soldiers wanting for a night to forget all their worries. Upon approaching the barbican, however, a bell was rung the moment their standard was spotted. Nary a moment later, a dispatch of riders cantered out of the gates to greet them.

 

“Hail!” the leading man shouted, “I am Gaston, the Burgmann of this castle! This is Lady Marianne’s entourage?”

 

“Indeed, it is!” Marianne urged her mare forward, “I see my lord father has sent a raven to inform you of my arrival?”

 

“That is so, meine Dame!” Sir Gaston turned his horse around, “Please, follow us! Lodgings and hot water have already been prepared for all of you, and the lord is awaiting.”

 

At the centre of the castle ward was the old keep of Castle Edelhardt. The keep was reminiscent of Castle Schönau, a squat building-turned-foundation with square towers - though the walls have since been thickened and raised. Surrounding the keep was an inner wall connected to the main keep by covered walkways - which enclosed the upper bailey with inward battlements, turning it into a slaughterfield for any army that would enter it. 

 

After they dismounted and gathered their bearings, Sir Gaston led them up a stairway to the elevated gate spanned by a wooden drawbridge. 

 

The great hall was dark, and silent - turning its vast interior into a yawning abyss. Trestle tables flanked either side of the aisle, leading up to a simple oak throne on a raised pedestal at the far end. Pennants hung from the walls, emblazoned with every manner of sigil, to honour those who have come to fight and die against the enemy.

 

A lone figure stood in the darkness, their face half-shrouded by the firelight. They stood facing the limp banners, hand gripping the backrest of a chair with their head bowed, as if grieving. Marianne noticed that they bore a walking cane, though they stood tall with a firm, straight back.

 

“Lord Edelhardt,” Sir Gaston bowed, “Lady Marianne has arrived.”

 

“So you are my nephew’s daughter,” her granduncle turned to face her, though she could not make much of him, “I am the lord of this castle, Conrad von Edelhardt, Margrave of Edelhardt.”

 

Marianne knelt as the lord approached her. Lord Conrad offered the back of his hand, and she grasped it to kiss his signet ring - feeling his rough, calloused hand worn by decades of battle. 

 

“I am Marianne von Edelhardt-Schönau, firstborn of Lord Landolf von Edelhardt-Schönau, Count of Schönau.”

 

“So you are,” the old lord agreed, his voice deep and rasping, “Stand.”

 

Marianne did so, the stomp of her boots echoing throughout the hall - before being silenced by the clattering of her entourage rising as well. She finally looked upon the old lord’s face, and was immediately drawn to his deep, sunken eyes so glaringly blue. Rough white hair fell to his shoulders, and she noticed that the lord was clean shaven - an oddity among Reichers. He was old, she knew, having seen at least three score summers, though likely many more.

 

Lord Conrad smiled thinly, and his crow’s feet crinkled slightly.

 

“I expected my lord nephew to send me a hundred wagons of grain-” Marianne’s eyes widened, “Instead he sends me his disgraced daughter and twenty farmers. But as it were, let it not be said that I am not a resourceful man.”