Vanian Year 1105

 

The demons were a day’s march away, as-Saffah had reported, though he added that they were significantly slowed down by the storm.

 

It seemed their entire marching column had been caught off-guard by the storm, and had been thrown into complete chaos. With only a tickle of silver tonguing, they were able to convince their men that the divines were on their side - and that the sandstorm was a blessing from the heavens that bought them time.

 

Marianne stood upon the earthen ramparts overlooking the passage from which the demon host would appear. The canyon walls rose well over three-hundred feet on their flanks at a sheer angle, thirty score feet apart. Six-hundred feet of schanzen - and with it they have transformed Ailuros’ Lock into a maw of death, with jagged teeth of beaten earth and rotting corpses for tongues.

 

Ramparts, ditches, trenches. A twisting spider’s web of earthworks that scarred the valley into one unrecognisable from which they had set foot in. For every inch of lifeless sand the demons would take, they would lose hundreds making it over the banquet of wolfholes and pitfalls - and even more against the defended abatises and stockades.

 

Her men expected a victory delivered by the heavens, and Marianne would not fail them.

 

And yet, most worryingly was the prospect that the demons had local Quraysh guides accompanying them. They must, al-Menfir had reasoned, for them to be able to discover and navigate the Lock in the first place. You could only get so far with interrogation, and the desertfolk insisted that those who knew Ailuros’ Lock to be anything more than forgotten history were few and far between.

 

And none of them would reveal its location even under the pain of death.

 

Which meant that Sarawat was suffering defectors.

 

“These wadis are not named for fear of people seeking them out,” Maslama stood by her side overlooking the entrenching works, “Ailuros’ Lock was named by Nike Aessetos when she attempted to pursue al-Mansur back into the north. Neither army could go through the Marches due to the Reicher margraviates, so when al-Mansur was forced to retrace his steps, she followed.”

 

“And she was met with this,” Marianne surmised.

 

“Our chronicles say that Nike Aessetos described this wadi as an unbreakable lock, impregnable for any invading army,” he mused, “And only the Quraysh had the key. Now, we must prove that the Lock works both ways.”

 

“Then victory is the only option,” Marianne stared at her feet, “We must declare the enemy to be invaders.”

 

Considering the territorialisation efforts in Bryneich and other captured lands, it was not out-of-mind to consider that much the same was occurring in Sarawat. These local Quraysh guides may not be deserters, but simply men who had resigned themselves to accepting the new regime.

 

It was strange how matters could change so drastically in merely a day, Marianne mused, they had come to Ailuros’ Lock with the expectation of fighting a desperate stand against an overwhelming enemy. Now, they were even considering a chance of victory.

 

Suddenly, Maslama al-Menfir lifted himself off the parapets, staring out towards their front. Marianne curiously followed his gaze, and swiftly noticed a rider hurtling towards them waving his sword in the air. 

 

“How long?” she muttered, eyes sharpening.

 

“An hour,” he replied, “Maybe two?”

 

Marianne nodded curtly, turning on her heel to face their men - still busying themselves with battle preparations.

 

“FORMATIONS!” she roared, straining her lungs to the limit, “FORMATIONS! ARMS AND ARMOUR, THE ENEMY COMES!”

 

Almost comically, every person in her vicinity froze in their spot - before stirring like a beehive. It took no time for word to travel through the trenches, and the dull roar of footsteps and shouts rose through the canyon. Streams of armoured men poured through the trenches, the hastily thrown together alures creaking and bending painfully under the hammering weight. 

 

Landsknechte banners were planted in the sand atop the ramparts, stone-eyed men laying their pikes over the parapets - so long they had to be supported by the embrasures. Pots of heated sand were laid at the base of the ramparts, ready to be thrown at a mere moment's notice, and sheaves of javelins were leaned against the parapets. 

 

The screaming started. 

 

Whatever women and children were left of the prisoners were slaughtered in groups and dumped into pits and ditches to rot. 

 

The enemy would come - and be greeted by a wall of spears in their way. They would find no stricken foe, but instead the price of their aggression.

 

Marianne breathed out, stuffing her head into her helmet - darkness encapsulating her save for a thin sliver of light through the eyehole. She could hear her breathing loud and clear in her ears, and she suddenly found herself anxious. Awaiting the enemy, she strained her eyes.

 

“You should return to the rear,” Karl advised, “This is no place for a woman.”

 

“Perhaps, but this is my place,” she returned, “I must see firsthand if my stratagem succeeds.”

 

“Well, we will all know if it does not,” he said mildly.

 

“Quiet,” as-Saffah snapped gravelly, “The enemy comes.”

 

A great dust cloud approached them, barrelling down the valley - and Marianne felt as she was staring down a charging bull. Cold sweat glazed her palm, and the tight grip she had on her sword became greasy. Marianne cursed within the confines of her own mind, before scooping up and handful of sand and gripping her blade again.

 

Granules of sand pressed against her palm like shards of glass, but Marianne felt that the pain cleared her mind.

 

The demon host was a rolling tide of black flesh and dull armour that flattened the valley in its path, trampling everything beneath two-thousand score pairs of boots - less, if the divines were merciful. Their banners hung limply in the windless gorge, but she could recognise the red-and-yellow colours upon their standards.

 

“Slow,” a sun-kissed officer noted, “Sluggish. They are tired, exhausted.”

 

Marianne was exhausted - and all she had done all day was stand and shout. She inwardly cursed and praised the sun at the same time.

 

The demon host abruptly stopped in its tracks, as if it had just collided with an unseen wall. Humorously, she noticed that many in the rear of the army were almost mindlessly bumping into those in front of them - as if not noticing they had stopped. 

 

Well, it was no surprise that they had halted in their tracks.

 

Anyone would, Marianne felt, unless they were truly birthed from the hells themselves.

 

Marianne inhaled the scent of corpses rotting in the heat, the stench of it so thick she could almost see it hanging like a dew fog in the valley. For between them and the enemy was a forest of twisted bodies - the corpses of demon soldiers impaled through by stakes and planted in the ditch like vile trees. Skewered from the anus and out of the neck, their gruesome visages stared down at their allies who came too late - vengeful spirits and broken bones and mangled limbs.

 

It was a depraved sight, for the stifling heat only exemplified the process of rot and decay - and the flies swarmed around like buzzing black mist. Marianne herself couldn’t bare to look at it, but she forced herself to behold her own creation.

 

The canyon walls came to life with unusual spectators - vultures and crows, bleak-eyed goshawks who had scented blood. Proud eagles who seemed to gaze with contempt upon them, and mountain lions lounging on cliff ledges like kings atop a tourney stand. 

 

The demon at the head of the column spurred his mount forward, shouting at them in most surprisingly - the Quraysh tongue.

 

“What does he say?” Marianne leaned over to ask.

 

“He speaks in a broken tongue,” as-Saffah grinned, “Speaking of cruelty and dishonour, that we will be cursed by the divines. He says that he doubts we are even human.”

 

Then, the Blood-Shedder roared back something in return - and the demon flinched atop his saddle.

 

as-Saffah spat, “Foul demon. Speaking about humanity while they’re the ones taking our homes like plague-ridden rats.”

 

“Any archers you can see?”

 

“In that throng? They won’t even have the space to draw their bloody bows.”

 

As the demon rode back to his lines, Marianne spotted outbursts of commotion within their ranks as officers tried to push through the mob atop their mounts in order to restore order. 

 

“Soldiers recognise soldiers,” Karl commented, “We even groomed the prisoners so that they would be recognisable, how about that?”

 

“We need to give them a little push,” as-Saffah growled, “By your orders?”

 

“Do so,” al-Menfir sharply nodded.

 

“Torches!” as-Saffah roared, “Light them up, let’s see if we can burn these demons blacker than they already are!”

 

The entire line cheered in response, setting fire to torches and tossing them over into the secondary ditch behind the faussebraye. Curtains of smoke began to sail upwards like wind-coiled banners as the dried tinder in the ditch caught aflame, choking the air with acrid smog that stung at her eyes and throat. 

 

The children broke first, their small voices crying out in the sting and pain. Hidden out of sight from the demon host by the faussebraye, the prisoners in the secondary ditch began to squirm and writhe in agony as the fires intensified - as they were cooked alive atop a bonfire. The prisoners were tied down with ropes, and soon those ropes would catch the flame.

 

To the demon army, it must’ve been a truly frightening sight - as if the impaled corpses were singing in joint suffering at a phantom fire. As if they were still alive. 

 

The first demon broke ranks and rushed forwards - and as if the unseen wall had fallen, the entire army surged forwards in a tide. The efforts of their officers were for nought, for their formation broke entirely and the haphazard crush seemed less an army and more a riot. The plague-bearers swarmed over the glacis and poured into the ditch - only for their combined weight to collapse the false bottom.

 

The first wave of demons slaughtered themselves into the wolfholes - before they were completely filled to the brim with bodies - and demons continued, uncaring. They dropped their swords and spear to climb up the stakes in an attempt to rescue the executed prisoners, believing them to be still somehow alive, while others rushed for ramparts.

 

Unknowingly, the demons were funnelled straight towards prepared positions. While the forest of impaled bodies seemed solid from afar, there were two empty glens devoid of stakes which they unconsciously consolidated in - creating two channels of men which shortened the defensive front even further. They came on with a mighty roar of indignance and rage, a rush of shouting and thumping feet that set the hair crawling on Marianne’s head.

 

By the time the mob made it to the escarpment, they were treading over the corpses of their comrades who had fallen into the pitfalls in the ditch.

 

Maslama al-Menfir bellowed an order - and a steady torrent of javelins were thrown over the ramparts and into the throng. There wasn’t even a need to aim, for every shot was certain to hit a foe.

 

Pots of heated sand followed, fragile clay shattering upon the enemy and exploding into a shower of boiling sand - getting inside their armour and frying them from the inside. Reichers used molten lead or hot oil, but the desertfolk had long learned how to make the most of their barren land - and Marianne agreed that sand was a far more economical resource.

 

The sounds of popping reached her ears, and Marianne distinctly recognised it as the sound of hemp ropes snapping. Desperate to escape the blaze, the prisoners broke out of the ditch in a frenzied mass - pouring over the faussebraye and colliding with the surprised demon army. 

 

All the while, they continued emptying their stores of ammunition - and gleeful cries filled the air as human soldiers cheered at the sight, in stark contrast to the screaming throng of demons. The prisoners broke through their own fellows, spreading flames and cinder - which soon caught onto the wooden stakes and set them aflame like wax candles. As more and more prisoners escaped their binds, the demon army was inadvertently pushed further and further back - back into the ditch, back into the flames.

 

And with a furious roar, the stakes collapsed like a house of cards - burying thousands of demons under a torrent of blazing wood and corpses. Screams of agony filled the valley as the enemy were cooked alive, the blinding flames obscuring the view until all she could see were ghastly smoke-framed visages behind the golden shroud writhing and wailing themselves hoarse. 

 

The heat grew so intense that they were forced to back away from the brilliant drapes of fire and smoke, the sand beneath their feet began to melt into glass and the red walls of the canyon were scorched black. Soot covered their blackened faces atop the ramparts, sweat and tears carving clear channels down their faces and skin.

 

“This is hell,” a soldier rasped, “We’re in hell.”

 

“A hell of our own creation!” as-Saffah howled, “And these are supposed to be demons!?”

 

They will come now, Marianne told herself, they will throw themselves against your defences until all their rage and sorrow has bled dry. Then, they will retreat. 

 

All you have to do is hold the line.

 

The devouring flames quickly ate through its fuel and began to flicker and die. With it, came a renewed charge of demons - they stormed through the dying blaze, smoke curling off their bodies like wraiths. Under the tide of flesh and steel, all the debris and charred husks at their feet were trampled into the blackened earth.

 

They clambered up the escarpment and into the secondary ditch, all under a constant hail of ammunition - and the horde began clawing their way up the ramparts. With teeth painted black and bloodshot eyes, the manic horde swarmed with no rhyme or reason, trampling over each other in their push for the ramparts, pulling against one another to get to the top first.

 

They screamed and shrieked and wailed and howled, their damned voices an orchestra of unfiltered rage that clung to their skin like a heavy coat. And for the first time, Marianne could understand why they were considered demons.

 

“Brace!” Marianne screamed, “Brace! Do not let a single of them pass!”

 

The first demon pushed himself over the parapets - before being hurled back into the ditch by a timely pike thrust, frothing blood at the mouth. One by one, they overcame the ramparts, only to be thrown back by pikes and spears. The landsknechte worked with near-mechanical efficiency, cycling thrusts with the most masterful discipline, while irregular tulay'a mutaharikkah soldiers rushed in between them to slam gold-hilted war axes down on hands grasping at the parapets.

 

This was the true value of the landsknechte. Mercenaries were impressed as irregular, undisciplined rabble little better than paid bandits. But the truth was, mercenaries were some of the most professional soldiers on the continent. Unlike national armies, which were made up of conscripted levies and the household troops noble families deigned to offer, who can go years without seeing conflict, mercenaries were bred by war.

 

War was their living, they travelled all across the continent to seek employment in battle. And when your livelihood depended upon how well you fought, it was no surprise that mercenary free companies were several times more professional than any other soldiers. 

 

Hells, even the vaunted fourierschütz - the personal command of the Pontiff and the Church - were in reality mercenaries, who only served the Church due to the sheer amount of wealth that could be earned. The best soldiers in the world, they were.

 

“Have they no strategy at all!?” Sir Eitel screamed over the din of battle, “They’re like a ram butting a stone wall. Do they reckon nothing of casualties?”

 

“They don’t have to,” Karl One-Eye replied, “They can afford the casualties. They can fall by the hundreds, and we by the score - and we will still lose in the end.”

 

“They are enraged,” Marianne said quietly, and yet her voice carried far, “They are afraid. They cannot afford to think, for once they do they’ll believe the battle lost. We must enlighten them.”

 

Marianne beheld the teeming mass of the demon army assaulting their defences, like a stormy tide crashing against a rocky shore. The sun was soon high over their heads, the hottest part of the day washing a golden light over the battle. And she could see through gaps in the smoke to where fresh forces swarmed behind the frontline, a vast rolling carpet and helmets and banners with seemingly endless numbers.

 

Firm, they were, but in the end even the unmoving stones would buckle against the unyielding tide. 

 

Slowly, the enemy’s overwhelming numbers began to trickle through their defences, weaving past the pikemen and engaging the tulay'a mutaharikkah stationed in the rear. One demon grabbed an overextended pike and wrested it out of the soldier’s hands before lunging forward and burying his hatchet deep into their head, all savage and animal.

 

No sooner than a second later, they were cut down as the second line filled the gap.

 

“Sound the retreat to the second line,” al-Menfir ordered, “I want it orderly!”

 

Bugles resounded across the valley, and a slow tactical withdrawal was fought across the line. They backed into the trenches, with bristling jaws of abatises and stakes preventing anyone from climbing atop the parapets. Those who did anyway were swiftly shot down by hawk-eyed javelinmen stationed on the second rampart.

 

Marianne commanded her personal banners to retreat into the trenches at their rear, as did the other officers.

 

Soon, the long pikes grew cumbersome and unwieldy in the narrow, twisting trenches, and the landsknechte stabbed them into the ground to act as makeshift abatises meant to hamper the enemy. Axes and maces were drawn, and the battle devolved into tight, bloody combat that devolved into utter bedlam. 

 

Marianne turned the corner and climbed onto a step, tracking their progress through the hail of sand and dust.

 

“Collapse the trenches!” she roared, “Divert them!”

 

In well-practised manoeuvres, her men kicked out the supports under the timber supports under the trench walls and allowed the unstable sand to collapse in miniature landslides. By design, that was all it took for the supports to buckle one after another, burying the passageway - and the enemy - completely while allowing her men to fall back into the rear ramparts. 

 

Any demon who attempted to climb over the unstable ground found themselves exposed to the projectiles from the ramparts, not to mention to deviously unstable ground. In the end, the enemy was forced to divert their path through other networks, unwittingly herded through array after array of traps and pitfalls.

 

A soldier stretched out their hand, and Marianne gratefully clasped it to pull herself over the parapets. To her right, she could already see al-Menfir’s banner towering over his men, along with Karl von Epp’s and as-Saffah’s. Marianne’s own banner joined them, raised and planted proudly in the earth, with Sir Eitel’s own following to her left.

 

“Pikemen!” she screamed, “Hold the line!”

 

The demon army came again, smashing their heads against the ramparts in their attempt to overwhelm them. Marianne realised that her soldiers had exhausted their stockpiles of sand jars and javelins, and were now throwing the decomposing heads of executed prisoners over the parapets and into the swarming mass below. 

 

She ducked out of the way of two men lifting a headless woman’s body above their heads and hurling it down the slopes - where it crashed into a group of demons and sent them tumbling back.

 

The hours began to bleed away as the scent of carnage burned her nostrils, imprinting itself into her senses so that she would never forget. The second line lasted much longer than the first - the uneven ground helped to break up the enemy’s advancing waves into bite-sized swells which could be beaten back individually. 

 

By the early hours of twilight, they had been forced to retreat once more - to their third and penultimate defence line. Between the second and third ramparts were vast slaughter fields - pits and ditches that acted as mass graves for the hundreds of prisoners they had to butcher before the battle. 

 

Exhaustion had long begun to set in on both sides, it was obvious, for the boiling heat sapped away at their strength and vigour. However, the soldiers on the third line bore fresh faces, having been in reserve for much of the battle until now - allowing those retreating to catch a well deserved breath. In comparison, the sheer volume of the demon host meant that they were crammed together like a bowl full of mortrew - unable to cycle in fresh soldiers to the front. 

 

And considering even those in the rear had been forced to stand in the heat all day crushed by the closeness of the mass, Marianne believed they were not faring any better. 

 

Sir Eitel offered her a waterskin, which she gratefully accepted - the valley had narrowed significantly, forcing their banners to combine. The refreshing liquid slid down her throat and quenched her thirst most satisfyingly.

 

Marianne lowered the skin, and curiously spotted Lady Silke sitting on a rock nearby. The priestess seemed completely removed from the battle happening only a few mere feet away, though in all honesty she had been somewhat despondent ever since her stone scale was crushed by the mountain lion.

 

She returned the waterskin and strode over to the cultist, who seemed to notice her.

 

“How do you feel?” Lady Silke asked, “Are you proud?”

 

“Proud?” Marianne stared up towards the ramparts, where her men were still holding the demons at bay, “No. But relieved, perhaps.”

 

“Relieved?” the cultist chuckled mockingly, “We all know the divine who favoured you, Edelhardt. Do you believe that because the Lioness is your patron that you are unguilty? That because the Lioness had supported you, your actions are heaven-sent?”

 

“My actions are mine alone,” Marianne replied distantly, “And for what my word is worth, I grieve for your loss.”

 

“You are,” Silke said mildly, “A liar.”

 

“I had not known you could still discern lies from truth,” she returned, “What untruth had spilled from my mouth?”

 

“I do not need eyes to recognise a lie,” the cultist hissed, “I weigh your soul against your words, and that is all is necessary. I pray you discover your lie on your own terms.”

 

“Can you weigh the demon army against our defences?” Marianne snarked, “Who will emerge victorious?”

 

Lady Silke’s head tilted upwards, before returning to hers, “Your own judgement will suffice.”

 

And their conversation laid dead in the water.

 

Marianne climbed back up the ramparts and noticed a distinct lull in the battle - a strange edge of peacefulness far in contrast to the chaotic turmoil at dawn. There was still fighting, but it was no longer so fierce or savage, as if both sides were now only fighting for the sake of fighting. Marianne recognised that the only thing pushing the demon army forward now was their own momentum.

 

“Inform the jaish al-zahf at the rear,” she ordered a messenger, “Charge.”

 

“Should I inform the Exiled Prince?” the man asked.

 

“Do so,” she nodded, “Tell them to clear the way.”

 

In a stroke of overconfidence and exhaustion, Marianne pried her helmet off her head - and took a long, shuddering breath. Swiping her sweat-matted hair from her eyes, Marianne began spreading word to prepare for the coming cavalry.

 

The rumbling earth heralded their arrival, some two-hundred horsemen draped in vibrant silk livery bounding over the hallowed land. They were only two ranks deep, but in the claustrophobic valley, the jaish al-zahf seemed much more numerous than they were. 

 

Standard-bearers at their head, tasselled banners trailing in their wake, the last of the famed desert cavalry broke into a gallop. Marianne pressed herself to the ground just in time for a shadow to pass over her head - a horse leaping over her,  leaping over the ramparts - and crashing straight into the demons below.

 

It was the last feather that broke the horse’s back.

 

The demons recoiled - and those behind took it for a rout, and in the process of fleeing their banners were struck and fell to the blood-soaked sand. Like scrubbing a fireplace, the demon army peeled away in an exhausted riot, revealing the mountains of dead they had suffered. Veritable hills of bodies rotting in the summer heat, carpeting the ground and crushed to paste and plaster under heels. 

 

Those atop the ramparts watched in a manner of disbelief - that they had survived the day-long onslaught, that they had achieved an impossible victory. A ragged cheer erupted from their lines, men and women waving their blades in the air as they basked in their momentary triumph.

 

But Marianne did not join them. No, she was already thinking of their next actions. 

 

Many demons were going to die, from exhaustion and wounds and infection. If their supply train was abandoned, so too would they suffer thirst and hunger. Ailuros’ Lock was a single road - and the demons knew that on one end they would be waiting. 

 

A desperate foe, lost and starving in an unknown land, would fight with five times the strength for they had nothing left to lose. It was paramount then, that they give them a way out, so that they would peacefully retreat without due conflict. Except, that would mean that this host would live to fight another day, and would become a major issue in the campaign to come.

 

They could even rally, and attack the combined army that was besieging Weißentreu.

 

The best solution then, was to-

 

Kill them all!

 

Protect your pride, girl, and kill them all! Leave one rival alive, and your children are never safe.

 

Marianne frowned at her own thoughts, but discarded them soon after. She had not the authority to make such a decision, which had to be approved by the orderly of the expedition - the Exiled Prince. For now, she would relish their brilliant victory.

 

She inhaled the flavour of blood and slaughter, and savoured the taste.