Blue Moon [Anbennar]

[Crushric]

Blue Moon

Introduction: What?
​

They betrayed us. Our home, Dameria, was torn apart. Lorent and Wex won the great game of thrones and exterminated the ancient and noble house of Silmuna.

But they were sloppy. We are the Sons of Dameria. We are those that challenge the sun and raise the moon banner of Rogier Silmuna, last of his line, who fought beside the War Goddess to lead us to a new promised land.

We will have our vengeance, even if it takes centuries, even if we must reduce a continent to ashes. We will reclaim our birthright.

Only when a Silmuna once again sits upon the Dove Throne of Anbennar will everything finally be alright.

What?​

This is an AAR, or After Action Report, of the game Europa Universalis IV (EU4). It’s an old picture style Let’s Play of sorts. Mostly, Europa Universalis IV is a game about taking a fledgling state kicking and screaming through the era of exploration, colonization, the French Revolution, and early industrialization. Think of it as a much more in-depth and somewhat more historically grounded version of Civilization.

But this is running Anbennar, which is a mod that takes EU4 from 1444’s Earth and instead puts all of these mechanics into a Dungeons & Dragons fantasy world. Witness the rise of states and empires and technology like never before! Use dark magic to turn sentient people into magical batteries, rebuild the dwarven kingdom under the mountains, shoot an orc with a magitek rifle!

If you don't know anything about this game, no worries. This AAR will try to explain things in ways that are clear enough, even if you don't really know what EU4 is. Doubly so for Anbennar’s unique races, faiths, and world. I’ll keep it simple and fairly narrative for you to understand! [Stuff in brackets is my own OOC player thoughts and opinions.] Everything else will be broadly from an in-character soap opera narrative POV.

And if YOU on the Paradox forums are wondering why I'm explaining what EU4 is on the EU4 board, that's because this is technically a mirror. This AAR is posted somewhere else, where I don't expect people to know too much about EU4 or Anbennar, and serves as a vague introduction to both EU4 and Anbennar.

What?​

Instead of playing a mighty nation destined to rule the world by virtue of its favorable starting position, I’ll be playing a plucky band of murder-hobos in Eastern Cannor (called Escann, which is sort of like fantasy Europe). This is a region of the world filled with orcs and monsters, with plucky bands of heroes and adventurers there to clean up the mess of an orcish invasion that ended local civilization.

The theme of Escann is that these parties of D&D adventurers clear out small areas of orcs, settle down, and become actual countries. Older nations don’t take them seriously until it’s too late, and Escann becomes home to radical ideas and dark abuses of magic, or pretender kingdoms, or the rise of entirely new religions like a fantasy Protestant Reformation.

Escann is the great womb of nations, and the things she births are bound to destroy the old order and remake it in their image.

If orcs or heroic infighting doesn’t strangle you in the crib, that is.

So join me and let’s build a nation up from a group of murder-hobos, yeah?

[TW: Contains French—due to artistic liberties]

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 1: Go East, Young Man​

The world ended yesterday.

Today, a new world is born from the graves and charnel pits of a continent.

I watched a god die to kill the orcish messiah. And when she died, the heroes and adventurers who survived looked at each other at a loss. There, amidst our victory over the orcish scourge, standing over ruins and fallen brothers, all everyone could do was look to each other and wonder, “What now?”

Everyone except for me.

This isn’t the first time I’ve seen the world end.

My baby sister, Eilís, is still out there somewhere.

The world ended yesterday.

Today, a new world is born from the graves and charnel pits of a continent.

And I’ll keep adding to it until I find her.

I am Rogier Silmuna, the Exile. Last of my line of dukes, emperors, and mages. Captain of the Sons of Dameria, those still loyal to my bloodline, to our destroyed homeland.

Our enemies took everything from me. They betrayed us all. They killed my family. Stole my birthright. Hunted us down like animals.

The details don’t really matter.

They wouldn’t change a goddamn thing.

The borders, faiths, and cultures of Western and Eastern Cannor (Escann), on 11 Nerament, 1444. The day after Corinsfall. And there at its heart, Anbennar herself. Somewhere in this wasteland is my sister.
[This is Cannor, the “Europe” of this world. Mostly human, it is dominated by Lorent (roughly equivalent to“France”), Gawed (“The North” from Game of Thrones), and Anbennar (the “Holy Roman Empire”). You’ll notice Eastern Cannor, or Escann, is kind of a wasteland after a recent orcish apocalypse.]​

The world is broken.

A usurper sits upon the Dove Throne of Anbennar, still fresh with my father’s blood.

Everything was gone. I alone survived. There was nowhere left to go.

Until a traveling mage on the road offered to use his divination magic to help me. I was never much for the arcane arts, even if magic ran deep in my blood. When he found me and made the offer, I was desperate. I was wounded. Exhausted. And I gave him the last of my crowns, all the money I had left in the world.

And a single drop of my blood for his ritual.

“Go East, young man,” he told me, gazing into his bloodstained crystal ball. “Escann is your future.”

I laughed, a desperate, hoarse sound. “Give my money back, you old bastard. There’s nothing in Escann but orcs and war.”

The mage regarded me gravely. “I can find your blood in two directions. One, in Wesdam.”

My face twisted into a grimace. “Don’t you call them my blood, not after what they did to my father!”

“And the other,” he continued without concern, “is in Escann. The blood of a princess.”

“Eilís?” I asked, sitting up sharply. “She died, her and everyone else in Escann when the orcs invaded.”

“Go east, Rogier,” he said at length. “There you will find your blood and destiny.”

Escann, home to the ruined city of Castonath, the seat of the ancient Empire of Castanor.​

Once, Escann was the cradle of Castanor, Humanity’s Empire. That fell apart a few hundred years ago. Chivalric Escann replaced it, a land of honor and courtly love, where wars were settled with knightly duels, women were gorgeous, and… you get the point.

They weren’t ready for the orcs. The Greentide swept over Escann. All their honor, all their knights, all their chivalry—none of it mattered.

In the end, it was heroes who answered the call. Adventurers and heroes and soldiers.

I’m no hero.

The men who gathered to my banner when I marched east were bastards, were veterans, were men denied their futures like myself. We could never defeat Lorent, Wesdam, or Wex to reclaim the birthright.

We were the Sons of Dameria. They chased us to the ends of Anbennar to kill me, but abandoned us at the borders of the orcish wasteland that was Escann.

We joined Corin, not out of idealism or heroism, but because we were soldiers.

Because we had a mission.

Corin is dead. The Dookanson is dead. The age of heroes ended in a murder-suicide.
[Escann is among the most striking regions of Anbennar. It repurposes EU4 mechanics of migration and tribal land meant for North American Natives to instead represent orcish tribes and adventurer bands.]​

Escann is a wasteland. Between the orcish and goblins hordes we have gelded, there are the men and women, the humans and dwarves and elves and halflings and gnomes, who answered the call, who fought alongside Corin to put an end to the Greentide. There’s almost too many to count, even if we all were there together at the Battle of Castonath only yesterday.

Corintar, Raven’s Banner, Brave Brothers, Sword Covenant, New Wanderers, Gallant Friends, Order of the Iron Scepter, Pioneer’s Guild, Warriors of Ancard, the Cobalt Company, Order of the Ashen Rose, Marrhold, Company of the Thorn, House of Riches, the Count’s League, Anbenncóst Expedition, Stalwart Band, Small Fellows, Iron Hammers, the Sons of Dameria—to say nothing of the endless parties of smaller heroes dotting the land.

For now, we all share the blood of battle. We all remember being friends who marched with Corin, for whatever our reasons were.

But only a fool thinks that peace between us can ever last.

Before the bonds of heroes break down, we must strike into the festering heart of the greenskins. Burn and root them out to find what happened to my sister.

As their Captain, the Sons of Dameria became very good at their jobs: killing orcs, saving towns, and solving quests.
[Here is the signature mechanic of Adventuring Companies, as well as the traits of human nations with human armies. In EU4, this scale is only used in the nation of Prussia to represent militarization of the state. In Anbennar, it instead represents how good a party of adventurers are at solving quests and fighting monsters. It allows tiny but heroic adventuring companies the ability to punch way above their weight class!]​

These are my men. Those who follow me, who call me Captain and Lord. These Sons of Dameria are my closest friends and companions. I would trust them with my life, and they trust me with theirs. We have fought and trained together, drilling and adventuring until our fingers were bones.

They are my family. They are my sons. For all that it matters.

We represent the last hopes of the fallen Grand Duchy of Dameria.

Dookanson may be dead. But there’s work left to do.

No matter what happens on the quest to find my sister, I can’t let them down.

I owe that much for the loyalty they have shown me.

It’s a quaint place for our main camp.​

Tiltwick in olden times was fertile farmlands of the Kingdom of Adenica. After the orcs came and slaughtered its human inhabitants, we reclaimed it. The old farms served as an ideal place to build camp.

And when the Sons of Dameria return bloodied from the Battle of Castonath, it is where I let them celebrate and party. Drinks are on me as their captain. We won the first half of the battle for Escann, but many lost their hero. A goddess died to secure us victory.

But the men deserve a rest. You can only push people so far before even the strongest break.

The whole time, I stay sober. I train. I practice. There is so much work to be done.

Once the hangovers are nursed away, once they are rested, we go back to the warpath.

My second in command, Madaléin.
[Adventurers use theocracy mechanics of devotion and successor selection. She is my “heir,” but that just means she was more or less elected. No relationship otherwise]​

“Bonjour, mon capitaine,” Madaléin calls out, chewing a piece of straw as she sits upon the fence of an old farmstead. “I know that look in your eyes. You’ve been sitting alone all night thinking angry thoughts again. Don’t even try to lie to me.”

I run my hand over my morning stubble. As soon as I open my mouth, her look of somehow smug disgust stops me.

“I swear to Castellos himself, if you were about to say ‘sleep is for the weak,’ I’m going to shank you.” She puts a hand on the hilt of her swords, winking for effect.

I shrug. “Actually, I was just going to lie to you.”

Madaléin sighs. “I appreciate your honesty, Rogier.”

Rogier. Even after all this time, it’s jarring to hear anyone address me so casually. Madaléin is the seventh child of an incredibly minor noble family on the Lorentish border. Rather than be married off to the Baron of Piss-Backwater or whatever, she bought a sword and left home to lead a party of adventurers, which is how she came to join my company when I took the Sons of Dameria to Escann.

She’s minor nobility at the best, barely more than a peasant with a slightly bigger farm than average. I’m a Silmuna, one of the great Silver Families of Anbennar. Not that there’s any left but me.

In any other world, Madaléin would’ve been so far beneath me I wouldn’t have spared her a second thought.

In this one, she is my right hand, and one of the finest warriors I’ve ever had the honor to know.

“Thanks, Freckles. I try,” I say.

She jumps off the fence with a scowl, sighing so hard her entire body shakes. Then she takes another breath just to sigh her lungs empty again for good measure.

“You good?” I ask.

“Hold on, I think I have one more sigh in me.”

“Take your time,” I say mildly.

“Alright, mon fearless leader,” she says sufferingly. “As the only one here who isn’t hungover sideways, what’s your plan now?”

So long as there are orcs and goblins in Escann, we’ve got plenty of work.
[EU4 has “mission trees” that give you rewards depending on your country when certain conditions are met, to broadly guide you down a historical path. Some bonuses are temporary, some are permanent. And Anbenner has massive mission trees to complete]​

I go to my Adenican courser, one of the legendary horses this land was once known for. They run wild since Adenica died, and a good portion of daily quests we put out to the men are wrangling more of the beasts to ride.

“There’s still greenskins out there,” I said, feeding the courser from my hand.

“And your sister too,” Madaléin says, hands clasped behind her back.

I don’t reply.

“One of these days you’ll have to tell me about her, Rogier. You can only brood about it for so long.”

“You underestimate my willingness to commit to a bit,” I say as I put the reins on my horse.

“I didn’t know you were a theater kid,” she coos. “Next you’ll tell me you studied in the Bard College in Seinathíl! Y’know, I almost went there myself, before I discovered how much I like swinging sharp bits of metal around.”

I give her a look of naked horror. My horse nuzzles my hand in concern.

“What, what, something on my face?” she asks.

“No, I just pictured you singing and threw up a little in my mouth.”

Madaléin scowls. “Casse-toi, petit con!”

I laugh. “Get your sword. As soon as the men are ready, we ride south. There’s a nest of goblins that’s been annoying me for too long.”

Surrounding us on all sides are other adventurers, and the remnants of the Greentide, be they orc or goblin.
[In the early game “civilized” races, like humans and elves, and “monstrous” races, like orcs or harpies, can freely declare war on each other, but other non-humans tend to have very strong early game armies to balance this. Except goblins, who are trash only good in the late game.]​

Adenica was good land. Many of Corin’s followers made their camps in the region. Most relevant are the Small Fellows, halflings who always struck me as standoffish; and the New Wanderers, a bunch of cat-worshiping nutjobs from the lands of Kheterata far to the south. They don’t bother us as we march south.

This is still the home of plenty of monsters, like Goblins, who followed the orcs here.

Goblins are disgusting little creatures with unpronounceable names. A clan of the bastards have made camp in the ruins of Taranton, once the regional capital. Someone told me the clan’s name translates into “Grasshopper Muncher,” which is so stupid that they deserve to be slaughtered for that alone.

The half-pints are easy fodder, cowards every one. This campaign will be a palate cleanser after Castonath.

[Good generals can turn an average army into a walking force of pure murder, with stats that add bonuses to their dice rolls during different phases of combat. What matters is Rogier has 4/6 Fire and 4/6 Shock, which makes him very good, and 3/6 siege, which in the early game means he eats forts for breakfasts. Hummuna hummuna!]​

I’m Damerian through and through. I know how to maneuver archers into position and use cavalry as a matter of course. And seeing enough sieges of my homeland has taught me a thing or two about how to undermine and destroy a fortress.

I lead my men from the front, with Madaléin beside me.

In some ways, it’s the only thing I’m any good at anymore. The only use anyone has for me.

“Adventuring Party” is something of a misnomer. In the classical sense, it’s a team of wandering sellswords or paladins or whatever, fighting local monsters or any of the other supernatural or criminal problems that rear their ugly heads up. That’s an old-fashioned understanding.

While those still exist and serve in our ranks—usually it’s what the company does when we’re idle, dispersing to do their own thing—a modern Escanni Adventuring Company is an organized, highly mobile force. We make our camps, we clean the place out of monsters and horrors, and we move on.

It’s more akin to a small, all-volunteer, highly professional army than a party of plucky rogues and mages. These men and women are veterans, more skilled and experienced than the peasant levies with noble knights that make up the armies of Gawed, Anbennar, or Lorent.

We march to the ruined city of Taranton without opposition, and lay siege to the rickety walls the goblins—

—aaaaand it’s over.​

I let the men sack what’s left of the city. The streets and houses are the same as Castonath. Desolated and decayed and looted, inhabited by squatting little men. Of course, by the time we got here, the goblins fled the city, leaving only a token force behind to make us think they were still here and waste time trying to break the gates.

Clever, I’ll admit, but pathetic. I expected a fight.

We free human slaves the goblins had kept as workers. A good many enlist with the Company, having nowhere else to go, or else offer to pay us “taxes” if we help them settle the nearby abandoned farmland. Never thought I’d meet a man who’d volunteer to pay taxes, but the Greentide made men go crazy, I guess.

An old man who claims he used to be an Adenner knight tells me the goblins fled southeast, towards the Clan of Rotcleaver.

Orcs, at least.

The Dookanson may have been the orcish messiah, but his powerbase were the clans and tribes who followed him. After Corin killed him, the clans didn’t just go away; they simply retreated to their nesting or spawning grounds to figure out their next move, no different than we victors of Castonath.

If anyone knows what happened to my sister, it would be the Dookansan’s warbosses. Eilís was a hard girl to miss, clad in her blue dresses, with a matching scarf. It was her expensive style.

Seems we’ll be marching southeast come morning.
[Adventuring mechanics only allows you to take “tribal land,” which is the barely-ruled areas without solid coloring. You can only destroy an orc/goblin tribe for good if they’re down to one last province. Any tribal land you take will become yours when you “settle down” and stop being a bunch of murder-hobos]​

Madaléin sits her ass down on the table and map I was studying.

I look up in surprise. I hadn’t noticed her entering. I’d taken up residence in what was once Adenica’s royal war room, now little more than debris, cobwebs, and old furniture from a bygone age.

“Freckles, move.”

She eyes me dubiously, holding two mugs. Or maybe she’s just too sloshed to focus rightly on me. She offers a cup to me. “Nah, screw that. We found old wine cellars in this here old castle the goblins couldn’t break into. Some girl picked the lock and now we’re really celebrating victory.”

I push the mug away. “Get off my map.”

She huffs. “Corin’s perky tits, mon capitaine, no need to be so bitter.”

“Excuse me?”

Madaléin taps at her lips. “Didn’t you hear? A bunch of adventure-priests decided Corin is officially a for-real god in the Heavenly afterlife now. The new Goddess of War, Bravery, and Heroism. So, obviously, I need to be the first person to properly blaspheme that little squire from Bennon.”

Corin has replaced Agrados, the God of War who was cast into the Inferno for his crimes?
[I’m sure this won’t spiral into a religious schism in a hundred year, plunging the world into brutal religious wars killing hundreds of thousands]

Sure, I’ll incorporate that uncritically into my worldview.
[Spoiler: it does]
[The Regent Court, or the “Cannorian Pantheon,” is the dominant religion in Cannor, and the ones the Sons of Dameria follow. It uses basegame Hindu personal deities. Your favorite God grants you special bonuses, doubly so if your leader traits match what the god likes. Corin is a strong god, and Escann Adventurers can freely switch to her via this event once the murderhobo priests start to simp for her really hard]​

“So,” Madaléin says happily, “take the drink, or by Corin’s red-haired crotch, I will smite you.”

I cringe a little, shaking my head. “Get out of here, Freckles. I’m working.”

“Mon capitaine, you don’t smoke, you don’t drink, you don’t dance, and I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen you with a girl either. What’s that all about, eh?

“I prefer to stay busy,” I say stiffly.

“You are going to burn out, is what you are,” she says, poking my breastplate with a finger. “Take the godsdamn wine and relax. What the hell am I supposed to do if you work yourself to death, huh? Huh?”

“What did you do before you hitched your wagon to mine?”

Madaléin shrugs, swaying a little. “Threaten to become a bard and do everything in my power to embarrass my father, like any girl worth her salt. But then I decided to see the world and live, Rogier. You could learn a thing or two from me.”

I regard her for the longest time, this slightly drunk girl who is almost half my age trying to tell me I could learn from her. This girl who is here by choice. Who, at any point, could go back home with her loot and gold. Who can still think about fun and relaxation without any guilt.

She reaches out to flick my nose. “No brooding. This is a—hey, watch it!”

Grabbing her offending hand, I scowl. “I said move, Madaléin.” And I let her go. “And don’t drink yourself stupid. Tomorrow we march down Lake Silvermere to the Rotcleaver Clan.”

Rubbing her fingers, she looks up at me. When she shifts in place, I can hear the leather scabbard of her sword creak. Somewhere in the distance, I can hear people cheering and singing the night away.

“And what if you don’t find her there?” she asks quietly.

I say nothing.

“Will you talk about her if I do leave? Not now, I guess.” She grimaces. “But—you can’t just bottle this up forever, mon capitaine.”

I nod.

She slides to her feet and gives me one last, long look before she leaves me to my lonesome.

When I’m sure she’s gone, I scream and stab the map of Escann until there’s nothing left.

Moving along Lake Silvermere, through the Merewood.​

Madaléin doesn’t say much. She helps me organize the Sons of Dameria, meet with my lieutenants and party leaders, and gets them out the gates of Tarantan by the morning. No matter her feelings, she follows orders.

She’s valuable that way, and the men trust her like they do me.

In the deepest parts of Escann’s forests, sometimes you can very rarely catch fairy-lights. The last dying influence of the Fey left in the mortal world. At least that’s what one company mage says around a campfire.

Thousands of years ago, most of Cannor was a forest dominated by the magical fey. Reality was weak. Until Castan “Beastbane,” a human, made it his mission in life to slash and burn the forests. To drive the fey and bestial races from Cannor, until only the impenetrable weald of the Deepwoods remained.

Madaléin finally speaks up, sharpening her sword. “But why would Beastbane have to do that? I thought magic was a good thing. It’s what the Magisterium back in Abennar is all about.”

The mage stares at me. My eyes remain fixed on the campfire.

“Because,” he says somberly, refusing a cup of ale, “no matter what you call them—be they the gods we worship, the devils we abhor, or kings and emperors we serve—things of power feast on fire and blood.”

By morning, we arrive in Rotcleaver territory, and the orcs rally to meet us.

This isn’t a battle. This is a slaughter.​

Madaléin commands the infantry at the front, while I lead the cavalry to take advantage of the greenskins. They’re not a race known for taking up the saddle.

The infantry pins the greenskins down. Archers rain arrows to destroy the center of the horde. And my horsemen break them from the sides and chase them down.

It’s not worth a song. Not worth a story. This is butcher’s work. There’s nothing more to say.

We run down every one of the bastards. If they run, we lance them. If they try to fight, we surround and eviscerate them. If they try to surrender, they’re smart orcs, and we kill them all the same.

Animals deserve no mercy, no pity.

Until we break through to the warcamp in Esckerpost. Like Taranton, it’s another human city the monsters have made home in. We surround it on all sides. There can’t be many warriors left after we broke their defense.

“Orders?” Madaléin asks me, armor covered in blood.

“Find the warchief,” I say. “I want him alive.”

She looks over her shoulder. “What about the rest of them?”

I shake my head. “This isn’t a war, Madaléin. This is pest control. This is an extermination.”

Slowly, she nods. We form the men up and advance.

The orcish chief is a poor commander and a deplorable specimen of his race.​

My arms are numb when it’s over. When the fire pits are dug and filled with orcish and goblin bodies. If they’re too big to drag to the fire, we leave as a feast for the crows. Giving back to nature, or something like that. However they die, the stench is almost like human flesh.

The all too familiar scent of blood and iron and shit and fire.

Whatever of the beast we can’t slaughter escape, running with women and children and whatever men were too cowardly to defend their stolen homes. Give the kids a decade or two, and they’ll be back, baying for vengeance and my blood.

Duke Lothane síl Wex and Lorent’s own Kylian Siloriel taught me that much when they killed my father and failed to finish me off, too. But, there’s limit to what a man can bring himself to do. Or worse yet, order others to do.

In the end, I let those who try to run do so. Maybe it’ll bite me in the ass. Maybe the smart thing to do is be heartless. Maybe I’ll just have to sate my need for blood on braves and warriors.

We take the treasures of the orcish warcamp. The greenskins almost certainly stole it from humans originally.

We’re only taking what’s ours.

Like the warchief himself, brought to me in irons. Beaten and bloodied, I have to speak to him. through an interpreter who learned orcish while they were a slave.

It’s hardly a conversation. Betweens growls and spitting, the orc can barely communicate in his own language. My questions go nowhere. Sometimes he just laughs. But when I insist on looking for a woman in rich blue silk from two decades ago, fair of skin and hair, he almost looks puzzled.

The interpreter looks up at me. “He says two words, milord,” the man says. “I think one is Bladebreaker. It’s one of the orcish tribes further east.”

“And the other?” I ask.

He grimaces. Hesitates. Look at the orc now grinning wildly at him. The man swallows before saying, “Whore.”

The orc sees my face and starts to laugh and laugh and laugh until I drive my sword through his heart.

[Anbennar allows you to commit prolonged and continuous heated Gamer moments against other species. You may purge or expel other races. Both will forcibly convert the culture and religion of their provinces to your culture/faith and remove minorities. Strictly speaking, the best choice is racial integration and harmony. And as a one-province band of murder-hobos, this is almost purely self-destructive. But we’re angry, and this is a tale of loss and vengeance right now!]​

I order the men to loot, burn, and kill everything. Rotcleaver wasn’t a dead end, at least. But I’ll be sure to leave it one.

I have a lead. And no more need to keep any of the orcs or goblins here alive. Many of the Sons of Dameria followed me here to defeat the orcs and make a new home for themselves. But as time goes by, almost just as many are survivors of the Greentide eager for vengeance under a competent commander.

Both are only too eager to carry out my orders.

I found Eskerpost a warcamp. I left it another mass grave. So much of Escann is no different. The monuments of our heroic forebears reduced to ashes and bones.

Adding another one at least makes me a hero.

And so my mission continues. Deeper into Escann.

Go East, Young Man.

My breath shudders in my lungs.

“Mon Capitaine?” Madaléin asks, the corner of her lip twisting as looks back over Escann’s newest charnel pit.

“East, Madaléin,” I say. “We go east when the spring thaw arrives.”

She cocks an eyebrow warily. “Eastern Escann is still very much orc country.”

I grunt. “Then we’re simply finishing what Corin started. Come, we make for the White Walls of Castanor, and east across Castellyr.”

Because somewhere out there, my baby sister Eilís the Blue is still out there. My only true family left. And the orc bastard had recognized her, even decades after we thought her lost to the Greentide.

I don’t care how many monsters I need to put to the sword to do it.

“Go east, Rogier. There you will find your blood and destiny.”​

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 2: Bad Company​

I tighten my cloak, doing whatever I can to keep the spring rain out of my clothes. It doesn’t help, and only the fact that my men are watching keeps me from shivering. Madaléin holds her arms out cruciform, spinning around.

“Escanni rain smells so different than Wesdamerian rain,” she says, smiling up at the sky. “Why is that, do you think, Rogier?”

I look behind me at the mostly miserable men and women marching down the ancient roads. The cobblestones are long overgrown and disused, but it’s better than open country. The wagon train stretches for miles, all the way back to Cantercourse where we started this morning. Before the heavens opened up. The hope was to ford the Aldainé River near Upcreek by week’s end.

“Because there’s no ocean breeze,” I say. “It’s all farmlands. Or was, at least.”

“It’s nice,” she says. “Couldn’t have picked a better day to start on the road!”

One of my lieutenants bitterly side-eyes Madaléin, but says nothing.

Madaléin hops back on her soaked mare. It snorts indignantly. “So, you promised me a story.”

“Did I?” I ask.

“Mais bien sûr!” she says happily. “I was promised an exciting and dramatic backstory for your mad quest.”

“Would rather not,” I say. “I’m not good at stories. Facts and logistics are more to my taste.”

“Didn’t ask, don’t care. I wanna hear it. And if there’s not dragons, buxom tavern wenches, and gratuitous violence in it, I’m going to start singing travel tunes.”

The lieutenant gives me a pleading look.

I sigh. “Alright, Freckles. How much do you know about the Silver Families?”

Our approximate route into Inner Castanor. Over the river and through the woods.
[Adventurer nations may “migrate” like this, moving their main source of power. A good tactic is to move towards richer provinces, which will become part of your country when you stop being murder-hobos]​

Madaléin gives me a tired look. “I’m not some hick, Rogier. Everyone knows about them. Big, powerful families that married elven heroes after they helped humanity defeat Black Castanor and the Sorcerer-King. Right after the elves first arrived in Cannor.”

And then quickly adds, “Also, penchant for magical power!”

I grunt. “The Silmuna line comes from a union of the elf Munas Moonsinger and the Queen of Dameria, Auci Damerid. Our symbol is—”

She raises a finger with a sarcastic finger, up to point at one of the company’s banners. “Too far back. Get to the interesting part.”

“Right,” I say, sighing. “I’m just not sure where to begin. You should know enough of it. You’re Wesdamerian after all.”

“I am,” she says, almost warily now. Then, defensively: “My family wasn’t part of the Lilac Wars, not like that. Dad was loyal to Lorent and the Rose Party. Some of my brothers fought for your father. It was messy. And here I am with you, Rogier. The war left a lot of fields barren. Plenty of work for a girl on the road with a party of adventurers, cleaning out bandits, deserters, and monsters.”

The war between Moon and Rose left scars across Cannor. There’s still the rare assassin who comes after me from this.
[Fantasy pan-European War of the Roses that ended just before the game starts]​

I tug the reins of my horse, urging him to move a little faster. “Then you know everything you need to know, Freckles. I’m not going to walk you through a war that only ended three years ago and butchered my entire family.”

“Except for her, right?” she asks, keeping pace with me. “Who was she?”

My hands tighten. “Eilís the Blue. My little sister.”

Madaléin gives me a moment to collect my thoughts.

“She was obsessed with blue,” I say. “She’d throw a fit if she had to wear any other color. And she loved her silken scarf. We were little more than kids the last time I saw her. I remember our father coming home, covered in blood. Grandfather was dead, dad had been betrayed, and he came home looking frantically for us to make sure we were safe. He found us out in the garden. Eilís was reading a book about butterflies. She—” I almost laugh, remembering every detail of that stupid day. “She was defacing it. Finding any drawings that said the bugs were supposed to be blue, and scribble-coloring their wings in.

“She held the book up to me, smiling proudly, saying she had ‘corrected’ the book and now everything was right with the world. And…”

I look to the side. My eyes eventually go to our banners of the Damerian moon. “Then father found us and wrapped us in his arms. I remember my sister screaming. Not because he was injured or wounded from battle. But because he got red on her blue drawings.”

“What happened then?” Madaléin asks softly.

“Dad was alive, but he brought the war home,” I say, shaking my head. “Eilís was sent to Castellyr, where we’re going, to be the queen’s lady-in-waiting, and hopefully marry the prince. Secure their help against the Rose Party.”

“And then the Dookanson happened,” she says, staring down into her lap.

I nod. “And when the blood had pooled, the fires turning to ash, I was alive, and everyone was dead. And I came here to find my baby sister. Maybe build a new home for the people of Dameria.”

Little to do when we stop to rest, but to train and drill. I learn some tricks from Freckles.​

Madaléin rubs her cheek, as if idly trying to wipe away her freckles. “And what will you do when you find her?”

I reach my hand back. Madaléin eyes me, instinctively reaching for her sword. She looks around, and with some amusement I watch that tenseness of soldiers ready for battle spreading forth.

My hand comes back from a saddlebag holding a leatherbound book. “I’m going to let my baby sister finish correcting her book on butterflies,” I say, and my smile is all teeth.

Silvervord, where Lake Silvermere flows into the Silverainé river, was once a thriving center of trade.
[The White Walls are a unique terrain feature surrounding Inner Castanor. Having my capital here basically makes me invincible due to the fort defense bonus. The Guild Hall helps speed up your ability to reform into a real country. Expensive, but always build it first.]​

Madaléin looks up at the massive walls of white stone, stretching from the lake in the south and vanishing north into the horizon. They’re not what they once were. Once, these massive walls were pristine and covered an entire region, the heartland of ancient Castanor.

“Beyond these walls lies what remains of Castellyr,” I say.

Elbowing me, Madaléin laughs. “You say it like we’ve never been beyond the walls. The Battle of Castonath wasn’t that long ago.”

I look over the assembling warcamp. Centuries of war and neglect have turned the once imposing walls into little more than stone pillars, overgrown with vines, blasted open, destroyed by rain and weather and time itself. Silvervord’s section is more intact than some, and we can build up against them to fortify our warcamp, which has been growing even as we’ve been on the move.

“I know,” I say. “You learned so many new swears since then.”

Madaléin winks. “You can bet Corin’s used bathwater on that.”

I stare.

“Alright, not my best blasphemy,” she admits sheepishly. “Give me some time. I’ll get back to you with a really nasty one!”

“Just help settle the camp,” I tell her. “I’m going to set up foraging parties.”

We’ve cleared enough that we’ve made a name for ourselves outside of those who fought beside Corin.​

Follow the Silverainé River down and you meet up with the Alen, which flows through the Kingdom of Gawed, before ending in the Dameshead Sea. Right into the heart of Anbennar.

It takes some time. But from all the riches and loot we’ve acquired fighting orcs, goblins, and other miscellaneous bugbears, we’ve acquired enough worth trading. While we won’t be here for long, sending traders downriver provides more tasks for the Company and returns us a tidy profit.

We came to Escann as liberators. We stay as homesteaders.
[One of the unique “government reform” mechanics adventure nations in Escann get as you move towards becoming a real nation]​

Across the lands we’ve purged of orcs, you can find men settling down to farm, but still waving the Damerian moon. They’re not deserters, of course. Everyone with me is a volunteer.

But more and more are turning swords to plowshares. Like the slaves we rescued from Taranton, they pledge their loyalty to the Sons of Dameria as if we’re a nation. Often enough, our adventurers are the closest the land has to any semblance of law and order.

It almost feels like we’re slowly building a new home, as we march by and purge evil.

It also gives us deeper supply networks. Damerian farmers settling in Escann may now ship out grain at fair market value.

Doesn’t mean the Company doesn’t have to forage. And when we’re back in camp, resting, I refuse to sit still. I train and drill and practice.

Who. The fuck. Was that?​

I stand up, brushing my men off. At first I look around for Madaléin, wondering if she’s put on a wig or something.

But no, she’s not here. The men I was training with look as confused as me.

I’m reminded of Corin, of all things. Who died and ascended. I rub my eyes, though. It’s not like I’m the most pious or devout man. I offer token gifts to Corin because it’s what so many in Escann expect.

“Ser?” one of the lieutenants I was training with, Trystan, asks. I’ve had trouble getting through his guard lately. “I don’t think I hit you that hard.”

I reach for my practice sword with a growl. “Back to it, soldier. Let’s finish this duel.”

And somehow, with only a few quick moves of foot and sword, I knock the man on his ass and win the duel.

Alright, red-headed ghost lady who may have actually been Corin. I’ll keep that in mind.
[Here we see the Regent’s Court Emulant system. If your leader is like your patron deity, you get bonuses! Extra military points are absolutely delicious. Thanks, Corin!]​

You’d think a meeting with an aspect of the divine would be more profound, assuming it wasn‘t just a really weird head wound. But I feel fine after a long day of training and drilling. Really, the worst thing is that I actually explained it to someone.

And now we’ve got rumors that Corin herself favors me spreading among the ranks.

It’s more embarrassing than anything. I’m not nearly arrogant enough to proclaim myself the
“Chosen of the War Goddess, y’know, the one who was right here a couple years ago”. But I suppose I’ll take the giddy morale in my men and officers for what it’s worth.

My biggest priority is leading the men out to scout the area ahead before Madaléin gets word of this and finds a way to make up another verbal crime against Corin. I manage to go a few weeks of this before anything happens.

The Sword Covenant, a company of adventurers from Aldresia.​

I lead a party downriver, up through Carlanhal. It’s a country of old mines outside the White Walls, without much in the way of orcs or other troubles. And almost bereft of supplies to forage.

Right as we think that’s it and are about to return to Silvervord, we hear orcish warhorns. Screams of distant battle. An explosion that has to be magefire.

I gather the horsemen around me and make for the noise.

We crest a ridge and find an orcish warband engaged in battle with armed and dismounted adventurers. I make the call and the horses slow into a gallop, lances out, making as if we’re actually going to charge directly into them.

The thunder of the hooves is enough to turn all attention to us. Caught between us and the soldiers, the orcs break and run, and we ride them down. They were a sizable warband, and now another horde of theirs is ground into the mud.

Pest control. Same shit, different day.​

When we round back on the soldiers we’d helped, I find them well-armored, a mix of heavy infantry, archers, and a couple of obvious mages. Most of them are wearing the black-and-white colors of the Sword Covenant.

“You’ll forgive me for reckoning you boys could use a hand,” I call out, bringing my courser to a stop. “We’re the Sons of Dameria. You look to be Sword Covenant?”

One of the men, grinning widely and wearing chainmail, steps forwards. He looks me up and down and whistles. “I thought we might find you here, Lord Silmuna.”

I side-eye the man. “Either you know me for good reason or ill.”

He laughs. “For good, I assure you. My name is Ser Laurens síl Place. We’ve met before during the Battle of Castonath.”

I blink. “The Ser Laurens?”

“The very same battlemage who was part of Corin’s original party,” he says with a bow.

“Then, Ser Laurens, it’s good to meet you again. You’ll forgive me a poor memory of Castonath. They were bloody times,” I say, but feel the hair on the back of my neck stand as he laughs it away. “You said you were looking for me?”

Laurens shrugs. “I’ve been making my rounds in these parts with the Sword Covenant until a little birdie traveling down the Silverainé said you saw Corin not long ago.”

I grimace, doing my best to keep it from becoming a full-body cringe. “It’s complicated.”

Hands on hips, he says, “Well, Lord Rogier Silmuna, that’s good enough for me. Tell me, would you like to destroy some evil?”

He’s a little weird, but everyone who volunteered to come to Escann is in some ways a complete nutjob.​

“I don’t like ’im, mon capitaine,” Madaléin says, chewing on a piece of sausage. She takes a drink of beer before offering me the mug, which I push away. She barely notices, just glaring daggers at Ser Laurens as he carouses with the troops. Some of them he’d brought, wearing the colors of his order, but most of them ours.

“Freckles, be nice,” I say.

She looks offended. “I am nice. I’m so sweet I give people sugar poisoning.” Madaléin points her sausage in Laurens’ direction before taking a sharp bite of it.

“He’sh jusht freaky,” she says, chewing and speaking at the same time. “Just some battlemage, member of Corin’s circle, shows up, is all buddy-buddy with the men, and wants to help us.”

“I’m not seeing the issue here.”

“He’s just—c’mon!” She gestured vaguely.

I give her a mild look.

“Too much magic?” she suggests.

“We have plenty of mages with us and you have no problem with them.”

She taps her cheekbone in thought. “He smells funny?”

“It’s Aldresian colognes,” I say. “Try again.”

“Would you believe me if I said it was woman’s intuition?” she asks, eyes narrow, like she’s grinding her teeth against some particularly uncomfortable fabric.

“Tell me one thing that’s womanly about you.”

“Shit. Got me there.” She finishes her dinner. When she looks up, she scrambles suddenly to her feet.

Ser Laurens approaches our campfire, all smiles. “I saw you gesturing in my direction. Which happens to be to your east. And I heard you were looking to go east.”

“How?” Madaléin asks quickly.

The man cocks an eyebrow. “I just asked, like, pretty much anyone here?”

To reach Bladebreaker, we’ll need to fight through Severed Ear and Bloodgorger.​

“Well, if you’re looking to get to the Bladebreaker Clan,” Ser Laurens says, “I know just the route. And I know exactly how many men the orcish tribes have.”

Madaléin makes a face. “Did you just ask ‘like, pretty much every orc’ to learn that?”

Ser Laurens frowns. “Is she always like this?”

“Sometimes,” I say.

“That time of the month?” he asks with a snide little look.

Madaléin spits her water out, eyes wide. “Con de Corin, t’es tellement con!”

I hiss in through my teeth. “I’m with her this time, Ser Laurens. Let’s not stoop to this level. Don’t talk about Madaléin like that.”

Ser Laurens just stares at me, like he doesn’t know what he did wrong.

“Look,” I say, “you wanted to talk about Bladebreaker.”

He watches as Madaléin seethes in place. “Right. Well. Destroying evil. I know the routes to go and their numbers. And if you’re going that way, I’d like to help. All I ask is for a few of your Damerians to join my unit. We’re low on manpower.”

The orcs outnumber almost two to one, but I like those odds.​

I allowed Laurens a token force of volunteers, and they act as our advanced scouting party mostly. Light cavalry who can dismount as needed.

Ser Laurens makes for a decidedly good vanguard.

“Seriously, Freckles,” I say as we march into Severed Ear territory, where Laurens claim they won’t be expecting anyone. “You’re acting rather…”

She frowns. “What are you, my dad?”

I shudder. “I really hope not. Raising you would drive me to drink.”

The look in her eyes is horrible. “I mean, if it’ll take the stick out of your ass and help you drink, I can call you da—”

I shoot my hand up. “See, right there. This is the level of appropriate adventure humor.” I raise my hand higher. “This is you right now. And you only get like this when you’re—”

Cutting myself off, I sigh.

“Take a step back?” she hesitantly suggests.

I nod. “Agreed. For both of us.”

She tugs at her horse’s reins, sucking in her lips. “It’s weird, us fighting. Laurens is a bit of a creep, though, oui?”

Glancing to the side, I say, “He shares a name with my Wesdamerian cousin.”

“The traitorous side of your family?”

I nod. “So that’s an automatic point against him.”

Madaléin snorts. “You have weird standards.”

Before I can continue, one of Laurens’ riders crests a hill and approaches us with news. The orcish warband is camped nearby, and they know exactly how to strike them.

I share a look with Madaléin, and we organize our soldiers into formation before marching to ambush the orcs.

The orcs fight like Agrados himself. If not for Ser Laurens’ advice and his timely arrival on scene, I’m not sure we would have won.
[Orcish racial benefits and their religious ability to summon good generals makes them a bitch to fight. I am two military techs ahead of them, my four vs their two, and I outnumbered them, and it was still an even battle!]​

Ser Laurens greets us as we mop the battlefield up. His outriders had been instrumental in breaking the orcs’ will to fight. “Not a bad show, then. Your boys have been very useful.”

Madaléin glances at me as if for approval. With hesitance I nod. “Right then,” she says, clearing her throat. “Ser Laurens, a good show out there. Now I want you to take your scouting force out and keep the orcs away. We’re going to spread out and try to stop them from regrouping.”

I say nothing.

Ser Laurens frowns, until he shrugs it away. It’s all smiles again. “That I can do. We’ll break the orcish bastards before the month’s over.”

He turns to leave, then pauses. “One last thing. The orcs are distracted because we’re not the only company in the area. You should try to work with them, milord.”

“Who?” I ask.

“Captain Lothane Bluetusk, of the Corintar. My scouts noticed his men in the hills. See? I am pretty useful.” He winks at Madaléin. “He’s a bit of a tightass, I think. Corin liked him more than I cared for. Couldn’t be arsed to stick around when he took over after Corin. Still, might be useful to meet with him.”

He gives an almost comical salute and gets back on his horse. “Be seein’ you. Kill a couple orcs just for me, why don’t you?”

Madaléin glares as he and his detachment ride off. “You see he’s a creep, right?”

I make a so-so gesture. “Let’s just meet this Lothane fellow in the flesh. Ensure there’s no problems on the campaign.”

Our forces spread out with Ser Laurens’ help. I take a detachment to ride towards where the Corintari are.​

I’d heard stories of Lothane. I even saw him once, from a distance years ago. He fought side-by-side with Corin in her final fight against the Dookanson. I thought he looked big, a little dumb and oafish, like an oversized Gawedi.

The Corintar are a knightly order, or at least that’s their appearance. Heavily armed and armored men and matching cavalry. Made up of some of Corin’s Circle, her adventuring party, they took on her name as a sort of honorific. They even use her personal symbol as their banner.

Corintari soldiers greet Madaléin and myself as friends and comrades. We fought alongside Corin with them, after all.

He isn’t human. He isn’t human.

But I can’t help but stare as we sit down in Lothane’s war tent. He’s big, alright. A tall, well-built specimen of a man, with skin a greenish hue. Those piercing, entirely too-human eyes. In a monstrous sort of way, he’s almost handsome. But I can’t stop myself from glancing again and again at his tusks, smaller than a real orc.

He’s tied a little scrap of silk around his left tusk. The Sword Covenant prefers black and white, the Corintar love their bright reds, and the Sons of Dameria proudly wear Damerian blue. The same color as that little scrap of fabric. It’s like a calm blue dot in the sea of Corintari fire.

“Something on my face, Captain Silmuna?” he asks dryly, his voice deep and smooth.

“I…” I say, and fail. Feel a deep sense of unease in Lothane’s presence.

“You’re an orc!” Madaléin blurts. “Or, half-orc? Not human!”

Lothane’s eyes widen. His hand slaps against his face, feeling the cheekbones and the occasional scars before his fingers run along his tusk. “My gods, you’re right,” he says, voice full of horror. “All this time and nobody told me…”

He stands up so suddenly his chair falls over. “We must tell the men at once that the Grandmaster of their order had a human mother and orc father!”

“W-what?” Madaléin whispers, looking at me of all people.

Lothane snorts, picking his chair back up to sit. “I’m fucking with you. You think I’ve never seen a mirror in my life?” He holds a hand up. “Don’t—don’t answer that.”

“I mean,” I say, trying to get some control over the situation, “I was just going to make an off-color joke.”

“Mhm,” he grunts. “Heard ’em all, Captain. Hurt the first few times. Then I gouged out the eye and cut a couple fingers off the orc who kept makin’ ’em, and I’ve been pretty self-confident since then.”

Lothane smiles, an expression that altogether too human on a face that’s half-orcish, tusks and all. “So how can we help the Sons of Dameria?”

“We’re marching east,” I say, putting a hand on Madaléin so she stops looking so weirded out. It’s as much for her sake as it is mine. “Heading through Severed Ear to take down the Bladebreakers.”

“Funny. We’re going northwest,” he says. “Taking out more of the Dookanson’s remnants in the Castonath area. Same tribes, it seems. We should work together.”

I blink in surprise. “My thoughts exactly. I expected negotiations or something.”

Lothane nods. “Please. I’m not about bullshit you. You fought alongside Corin. That’s good enough for me, Captain. We’re ready to move out and support you if you support us.”

As we fight alongside the Corintar, Ser Laurens continues his incredible streak of luck and precision. Suspiciously good.​

Lothane proves a fine commander. Even Madaléin seems to come around to him. Between my soldiers, his knights, and Ser Lauren’s scouting, we break through any orcish warband before they’re even ready to fight, and it’s not long until we’re back in the ruins of Castonath.

Lower Castonath, at least. The orcs have started to make inroads here, which has upset some of the locals still living here.

It doesn’t take long to utterly shatter the orcish forces in Inner Castonor. Soon, the way is clear for us to march east and head into hills where Bladebreaker makes its home.

I remember the orcs putting up a harsher fight when the Dookanson led them.​

“Tell me you drink, at least, eh?” Madaléin asks Lothane. Both Damerian and Corintari soldiers are intermingling after our mutual victory. We complement each other.

“I’ve never had a taste for it,” he says politely.

Madaléin groans hard. “Corin’s girl-dick, I’m surrounded by the lamest men in the world.”

Lothane squints. “You… by her what?”

I wave my hand. “It’s a thing she’s doing for some reason, trying to blaspheme the newest goddess and…” I go silent, remember how this half-orc was literally next to Corin as she died, and then named his entire knightly order after the woman.

If anyone believes Corin is a god god, it would be him, her most faithful servant on Halann.

Instead, Lothane snorts. “That’s fucking hilarious. I—I’ve never thought to swear by her. How many you got? I want to steal them all.”

She thinks on it for a moment. “I’m building a sort of compendium of new and innovative ways to ensure I go to hell when I die. So far, I’ve only got a handful, buuuuut more to follow.”

“Rather disgusting, don’t you all think?” Ser Laurens says, pouring himself a bowl of stew. Some of the Castonath locals provided us with the meat, and it tastes weird and a little sinewy. The man’s smile is somehow upside-down, if that makes any sense. “After everything she did, we should honor her memory, and not make jokes, Lothane.”

Lothane’s expression sours and he sits up a little straighter. “Go fuck yourself, Laurens,” he says, somehow formally. “Corin would be delighted to know we’re swearing by her these days. Silmuna, Madaléin, you should have heard the jokes she used to tell in the party’s downtime.”

The Sword Brother sneers and takes his stew off to eat with his unit.

“I like your frank vulgarity, Lothane,” Madaléin says, tucking away loose strands of her hair. “And that you also don’t like that man. Hey, Rogier, can we keep Lothane? Maybe trade him for Laurens.”

Lothane eyes the girl. “I’m not the only one Laruens gives the heebie-jeebies to?” He grunts. “He was with the Corintar briefly. Was very good. But then I started asking how he did his work, and he decided to offer his services elsewhere.”

I lean forwards. “We have some of our men working with his unit,” I say. “We can probably just ask them. They might work with him, but they’re Damerians through and through.”

“Investigation and intrigue?” he asks, smiling. “Sign me up.”

What. The Fuck. What the fuck the fuck the fuck?!​

We let the soldier go. And then it’s just Lothane, Madaléin, and myself in the tent. Our soldiers continue to celebrate their victory together.

“He breaks their minds,” Lothane says. And unlike when we first met, this time his horror seems genuine. “I’m no friend to Dookan’s followers, but… Gods above!”

“I heard him too,” Madaléin adds. She looks at me. “What the hell do we do, mon capitaine?”

Hunching forwards, one hand over my chin, I stare into nothing and think. Thinking of all the knowledge the orcs have. How hard it was to interrogate just one orc to learn of Eilís. If I let Laurens go wild with my blessing, what could we learn?

How easy would it be to devour the orc of every orc we met until we finally learned what happened to my sister? No more bullshitting. No more adventurers. Just the solid, brutal facts.

“I know that look, mon capitaine,” Madaléin says warily. “You’re thinking of your sister.”

“Sister?” Lothane asks, thrown for a loop.

“I came to Escann to find my baby sister,” I say quietly. “It doesn’t matter here. I’m just…”

Lothane stands up sharply. “You’d actually allow this if it helped you find your kith and kin?”

My hand tightens over my mouth. Words don’t come quickly, swallowed up in a sea of thought and possibility. But there’s a harsh look in Lothane’s eyes, and a nervous quirk in Freckles’ grimace. I look down at my own hand, the little scars and callouses from a lifetime of fighting.

Fighting for my family. For my little sister. For a future for my people.

I told myself I’d do anything to find her, permit any savagery. But now, as both of them look at me, I wonder how much I meant, and how much was just bluster I told myself just to stay sane and focused.

I drag my hand down my face and tighten my lips. “Bring Ser Laurens to me, Madaléin. We’ll deal with this in the flesh.”

“I’ll help,” Lothane says, voice terse. “This is a matter for all Escann.”

Once, I told myself I’d do anything to find my baby sister. No effort too much, no cost too prohibitive, no evil too great. I watched Corin die after watching my family die, and thought that I’d have to rebuild this new world from the graves and charnel pits.

I look now at Laurens, and see a man who isn’t all talk. Isn’t just bitter and angry. A man who follows through on his grim promises.

I look at Lothane surrounded by his Corintar, baring his teeth and tusks in a snarl. I look at Madaléin, resting on her sword, still glancing at me for approval. And I wonder how far I’d really go to reunite my family. To be able to pretend, if just for a moment, that everything might be okay.

“How the fuck can you speak of Corin like that?” Lothane snarls. “You walked with her. You helped train her. But you didn’t really know her. You weren’t next to her, powerless to help her as she died. Who do you think you fucking are, Laurens?”

Laurens grins. “I’m the only one who’s willing to really stop evil. By any means necessary. I know what I do is horrible, but you would rather my methods or let the orcs kill and murder and rape all they want, huh, huh?”

Again, I find myself thinking of my baby sister. And looking between Lothane and Madaléin. I close my fingers into fists as they start to scream and yell. Until I have to take control between everything explodes.

I stand, reaching for my sword. “Ser Laurens síl Place,” I say. “You are a witch. How can we build a better tomorrow if the tools to build it make us tomorrow’s monsters?” It feels like I’m just saying it, though. The correct words even though I’m not sure I really mean.

The man laughs like he can see straight through me. “Oh that’s rich, Silmuna. You—”

Armored men burst into the tent, wearing Sword Covenant colors. His loyalists whom we dragged him away from earlier. They aim weapons at us, threatening spellcraft as they grab Laurens.

“Oh look, my escape is here,” Laurens says as it turns into a standoff. “I was wrong about you, Silmuna. You don’t have any big dreams or worthwhile ambitions. You’re just another petty bastard. Fine by me. You want to be nothing, so be it. I’ll keep fighting evil in the only ways that count.”

He casts a spell, a blinding flash of light. By the time our senses are about us, Laurens and his Sword Brothers are riding out of Castonath.

Madaléin and Lothane try to give chase, but it’s too late.

Destroy. Evil.​

Corintari and Damerian leaders meet up in the aftermath.

“He’s gone back to the Sword Covenant,” one of Lauren’s former soldiers says, staring at his feet.

Madaléin shakes her head. “We’re not just letting him go, right?”

Lothane regards me, arms folded, silent.

“No,” I say, as if it pains me. “If we don’t stop him, his methods will continue. They’re spread. Until people think it’s okay.”

And finally, the half-orc nods. His eyes are narrow. “Captain Silmuna, if you’re riding after Laurens, then come what may, the Corintar will ride with you. If you’re willing to fight evil, you are my brother.”

“I’ll gather the men,” Madaléin offers, and I nod, and my mouth feels dry.

Corin hasn’t even been dead a decade, and already those her followers are coming to blows.

“We ride west for Carlanhal in the morning,” I decide.

Away from Eilís.

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 3: Witchbreaker​

Before me stand the assembled Marchers of Dameria and the Corintar. These are the party leaders and military commanders of our two companies. You can see who belongs to whom at a glance. The Sons of Dameria, no surprise, prefer to decorate themselves with some form of Damerian blue and silver moons. The Corintar are the opposite, decorated with steel swords and blinding red.

The only one who doesn’t fit is Lothane himself. I can’t stop looking at him. He runs an armored hand over his face, looking down at the maps and troop numbers. Until his fingers run to his left tusk, brushing the little stripe of blue cloth.

“No objections, oui?” Madaléin says, speaking for me to the Marchers. “No last minute questions, tender hearts, or the like?”

She’s not asking if they understand, not really. We’d explained the reason this is happening.

We’re making sure when push comes to shove, they will answer to me and Lothane. None of them would think Laurens had the right idea.

In the brief quiet, I tighten the grip on my sword.

These men and women who’ve dedicated themselves to ending the Greentide, now asked to kill their brothers.​

“I understand, ma’am,” a Damerian finally says. “Bastards are witches.”

A Corintari adds a “None here neither, nah.”

Lothane nods. “Captain Silmuna, your men know the land better. We marching together in force, or are we fanning out?”

He does this here in public, in a meeting with the Marchers. Putting the tactics on me. I can’t tell if he’s allowing me to fix my mistake of helping Laurens, or if it’s some politeness, or what.

I point at the table, at our map of Western Escann. “Defeat in detail is the only way we’re going to be able to pull this off.”

The half-orc nods, satisfied. “Good. I would’ve argued if you said anything else.”

Madaléin makes a face, but says nothing.

We are far outnumbered, but we’re concentrated. Lauren’s allies are spread far and wide.​

“We go through Silvervord and try to take Laurens out first,” Lothane says, moving a little wooden figure on the map for everyone to see. “With any luck, his allies won’t arrive. Maybe they don’t know what he’s done. And if they do honor their treaties, we can convince them to kindly fuck off.”

The Corintari make noises of agreement.

“You help pin the Sword Covenant down,” I say. “My archers and cavalry can better support our hammer and anvil. Play to our strengths. And like you said, we know the land.”

Madaléin adjusts her hair, tying it into a neat bun. “Well, let’s not sit with our dicks in hand, boys. Pack up camp. Let’s clap the bastards before they know what hit ’em.”

Acengard is empty.​

Conservative headcounts place our combined forces at some twenty-six thousand men and women. Mostly humans, with token dwarves and a couple elves for good measure depending on the party. It’s a massive army by any modern standard. A kingdom like Lorent can maybe muster twice that, and it dominates the entire Lencenor region.

As I watch our columns marching, my expertly drilled professionals, and Corintar’s gallant warriors, the shifting seas of blue and red, it occurs to me just how many people left the safety of post-war Cannor and beyond to fight the Greentide and make a new home for themselves.

The Sword Covenant came from the Orda Aldresia, who were knights sworn to defend Anbennar from monsters and the undead. The Brave Brothers came from Verne, a martial people south of Dameria. The Cobalt Company are Gawedi, who left their pure-human kingdom to fight for freedom. And the House of Riches are Crownsmen, of the powerful merchant lords who dominate Anbennarian trade.

They’re all free peoples we’re going to have to kill to defeat a very human evil in its crib.

Arriving in Acengard, we find the Sword Covenant’s camp hastily evacuated. Tracks point north, towards the Reach. They must have fled to regroup with their allies.

If there’s any doubt, our scouts encounter a force marching that way from the House of Riches, and we engage to keep them apart.

It’s utterly one-sided.
[This is called a “stackwipe,” where you utterly destroy an entire enemy army and they can’t even retreat. There goes one entire enemy army.]​

They hadn’t expected us to move this fast, to be in these numbers. What started as a battle between scouts turned into the Sons of Dameria raiding their camps. The House of Riches wasn’t ready for a battle, and their army utterly scatters to the hills in every direction.

We capture their Captain, Valen síl Crothán. In exchange for his life, he agrees to surrender his nation and back out of the war. And provides us letters that Laurens wrote him. We now know where his forces are mustering to push us back.

Captain Crothán looks bitter, humiliated. But after I tell him why we’re attacking our fellow adventurers, he just looks lost instead. We let him leave to collect his men and go home without incident.

Lothane nods approvingly when we let the man go. “There’s an old book I once read,” he says. “Said the best victories are those you get without fighting.”

“You saw the look on Crothán’s face,” I say, arms folded. My gaze is to the north, towards the Reach and distant Gerudia. “Laurens probably just said we’d gone evil and asked for help. There’s no reason to be butchers to these misguided fools if we can help it.”

Another nod. One of his fingers idly strokes his tusk in a thoughtful expression. “After stories of the warpath you carved to Castonath, I expected you to be more bloodthirsty. I’m happy I was wrong.”

I stare at him. At the blue cloth on his tusk. “Lothane, can I ask you a question?”

The half-orc grins. “The answer is yes, I do like my dinners like I like my women.”

Madaléin clasps us both on the shoulders. “Alright, enough lollygagging, you two. We’ve got a witch to burn. Let’s get a move on.”

By our scouts’ count, their entire army is mustered together, numbering nearly forty-thousand men.​

“A direct attack is suicide,” I say, unnecessarily.

Lothane snorts. “You reckon, Silmuna?”

“So our move now?” Madaléin asks.

Lothane considers. “Pull back. Pick off their foraging parties and try to starve Laurens out.”

Madaléin’s brown furrows. “What happens if Laruens gets his mind-devouring on our raiding parties? If he manages to learn exactly where we are like he does the orcs.”

My fingers flex. “Lothane, I think you have the right idea. But instead of turning this into some abstract siege, we should go for the weakest links. Back off, make to raid the Brave Brothers warcamp nearby, their base of operations. Try to bait them out and then attack.”

“Defeat in detail,” he says, grinning. “Simple. Relies on them being stupid or cocky. I like it.”

Idiots.​

We pull our forces back, following our steps until we double back around, pretending we’re going for the lands the other adventurers hold onto. Laurens’ forces spread out. While a fair number hold position, the Gawedi Cobalt Company moves out, trying to chase us down for whatever reason.

“Well,” Madaléin says with a whistle. “Corin rape me with a rock. This is actually working.”

Lothane gives her a weird look. “Would… you like to rephrase that?”

Madaléin shakes her head. “Je ne regrette rien!” she chirps.

The man looks to me as if for help.

I shrug. “You’re the one who encouraged her, Lothane.”

He grimaces.

She punches his shoulder. “He’s right, Lothane. You’re a terrible influence on me.”

“Y’know what?” he asks. “You’ve got a point. This one is on me.”

I walk past him, putting a hand on his very tall shoulder. “We can question and doubt all of our life choices after we break the Gawedi.”

We take them from behind. The Corintar’s heavy infantry pin the Cobalt Company, while my archers and cavalry break them from the sides.

It turns quickly in a slog in the mud and spring thaw.

I refuse to let up. For as long as they stand and fight, no quarters given, no moment of peace, no break in the slaughter. Archers rain death upon the Gawedi, and I order fake charge after fake charge until they finally break, and we run them down. We chase them a mile before allowing them to flee in peace.

I have my men loot their camp for supplies.

Some might call how I fight ruthless. I prefer to think of myself as an “efficient operator.”​

Madaléin is just sitting on a rock after the battle is over.

I sit down beside her. We’re like that in silence for what feels like ever.

“It feels… strange,” she eventually says. “I signed up to fight orcs and goblins. There’s something… I don’t know, off, I guess, about fighting other people.”

I lightly elbow her. “Not getting cold feet on me now, are you?”

Madaléin scowls. “Don’t be an ass, Rogier. I cut my teeth fighting bandits and outlaws as the Lilac Wars were winding down. Just—thought that was behind me. I could focus on fighting monsters.”

I look down the hill, watching Lothane gather his men up. Slowly, I put my hand on her shoulder.

“Is this the part where you say something inspiring to get the blood flowing?” she asks wryly.

I suck on my lips. “Don’t be stupid, Freckles. You know that thing you’re feeling? Those doubts. Those worries. Hold onto that.”

“Why?”

“Because only monsters don’t doubt themselves. Monsters can look in the mirror and only see something they’re proud of, no matter how much blood they’re covered in.”

“What do you see in the mirror, Rogier?”

I let out a long sigh. “Someone you trust, who’d rather burn the world than lose that.”

Madaléin laughs. “Wow, that is—that is terrible.”

I stiffen. “Well, I thought it was sentimental.”

She stands, bumping me with her hip. “You’re such a lousy sap, Rogier. How does a saint like me put up with you?”

“Because you are an incredibly poor judge of character.”

“I was right about Laurens!” she says, holding up a finger.

“And I was stupid to doubt you,” I tell her. “Now c’mon. Let’s put the nail in his coffin like you wanted.”

Madaléin grins, but there’s something hurting in that look.

With half of their armies gone and destroyed, we take the fight to Laurens himself.​

Years ago, the Dookanson was stopped in the marshes of Rottenstep. The Marcher Lords and adventurers fought the Greentide to a standstill. It was one of the largest battles in recent history. It was where Corin died the first time, only to return from the dead as the Avatar of War.

Thirty thousand against an orcish force twice their number.

By my count, as we approach Forksgrove, boots crunching the thawing spring snow, there are some fifty thousand soldiers ready for battle.

Lothane steps up to me, clad in heavy Corintari full plate. “I’ve got my center ready. You and Madaléin have your flanks and we’ll put Laurens in irons by nightfall.”

I reach out to grab his hand. “You support me, Lothane, and I’ve got you.”

He nods once, eyes hard. “Blood for blood, Silmuna, and burn the witches.”

“You ready, Freckles?” I ask, sizing up the battle lines of the Sword Covenant and Brave Brothers. They’re all that’s left of Lauren’s coalition.

She holds her sword, expression grim. “Yeah. Down there’s needful things we gotta do. I think I was born ready.”

“I knew you’d be.”

Madaléin gives me a scouring expression, reaching over to punch my shoulder. “Then why the fuck would you ask as if I wasn’t ready, asshole?”

I laugh.

And raise my sword. The horns blow, our forces march forwards, our cavalries move in to support them, and the first volley of arrows are loosed.

The heavy Corintari crash into Lauren’s lines, holding their formations as the Damerians support their flanks. Lothane is right in the center of things, between sword, spear, arrow, and magic missile.

My outriders break through the side, to meet their cavalry head on. With Madaléin riding beside me, I grit my teeth as we make contact with the Gawedi horses. Smaller than our Adenican coursers, they pull back first, and with trained precision our forces bank sharply and crash into Lauren’s men.

The lines begin to break on all sides, losing cohesion and turning more into a barely organized melee. The scent of blood and magefire. The clash of steel and screaming men.

I pull my cavalry back and make the long circle around Laurens, ignoring his forces to make for his camp. We throw torches and oil into the wall-less camp and turn it into a conflagration.

And then it’s straight back into the rear of Laurens’ forces. We take the horses down into a slow gallop, until the thundering of hooves is enough to shake the earth and turn men’s knees to mash. We make a pass at their archers, before breaking back to pick at stragglers.

It’s a bad idea to crash a horse into a man. That’s how you kill yourself and your horse.

But already the chaos we’re causing in the rear and flanks is breaking the Sword Covenant’s resolve. More and more units are breaking at the sides, even if the center holds.

The spark of steel and magefire catches my eyes. And there in the melee, I see the massive half-orc, and I see the witch-knight of the Sword Covenant locked in battle.

I whistle, gesturing for Madaléin and my bodyguard to follow me.

Got you now, you bastard!​

Looking at Laurens fight hurts the eyes. I feel my stomach lurch. His mix of illusion, transmutation, and swordplay—the more I look, the less I seem to see. And Lothane is right in his face. He fights strong and hard. Laurens is fast, with pulses of magical shields in his hands and illusory feints.

I focus hard on the little blue scrap of silk on Lothane’s tusk, and nothing else, and charge in.

The men around Laurens run to avoid us.

“Holy shit, I hate battlemages!” Madaléin shouts. “I can’t even look at—mon capitaine, I have an idea!”

“I’ll cover you, Freckles!” I say, not even needing to ask.

She winks at me as she stands up in her saddle, angling her horse to the side. I feel something in my stomach sink as she grabs her sword, howls like a banshee—

And straight jumps off her mare.

There’s no fancy footwork or illusion Laurens can do. Madaléin is a human missile with steel in her hands.

She tackles him hard enough to break teeth and bone. They tumble together, until Lothane grabs her hand and pulls her up. Laurens tries to find his hands and get up, only to find Lothane and Freckles’ swords at his throat.

Laurens is ours.

And his men break without him.

We give chase enough to make sure they’re too broken to ever return.​

“Did you fuckin’ see me!” Madaléin shouts, covered in blood, and grinning like a maniac. “I still got it!”

I bring my horse to a slow stop. The Corintari are already clasping Laurens, hissing and screaming and red-faced, into irons. Trying to keep his limbs and fingers apart to prevent his sorcery.

Everything smells of sweat and blood and far too many horses.

“Madaléin,” I say tiredly, “my knees hurt just remembering that little maneuver.”

She spins around and takes a bow, like some weird imitation of a curtsy, laughing the entire time.

Lothane eyes me. “Need help off your horse, then, old man?”

Madaléin cackles.

Everlasting victory over evil. Not greenskins or House síl Wex this time.​

I do the horrible honors myself. We tie Ser Laurens up and make him confess aloud to everyone in his own words what he’s done. He’s crazy enough to still be proud of what he’s done. He tries to convince people he did the right thing.

It’s all the confession we need. We ensure the news spreads far and wide of what he’s done. Why we did what we had to. And that Corin’s justice be done even to her own friends and followers.

I conduct the sentence myself. A man ought to carry out such things.

For the crime of being a Witch-Knight in Nichmer’s tradition, a traitor to Corin’s Legacy, and lying to Escann resulting in thousands of deaths, Ser Laurens síl Place is put to death.

With human evil stifled, and the northern adventures destroyed, it’s time to turn our attention back to ending the Greentide.​

Our armies return to Silvervord. We’ve picked the land dry and it’s time to move on.

I eat one last dinner with Lothane, before he’s back off to his part of Escann to continue the good fight. Madaléin is off carousing with the troops, but the half-orc and I find ourselves together due to a shared disinterest in getting piss-drunk.

“I feel like something’s missing,” Lothane says, leaning back in his chair, watching the men enjoy their victory. “We killed one of my friends. We did the right thing. But I still feel like there’s a piece I missed, Silmuna.”

“I’ve got a piece to speak,” I say, poking at a piece of cursed ham.

“Hm?” he grunts.

I point at my face. He squints, until he slowly mimes the gesture, and seems to understand.

“It’s why they call me ‘Bluetusk,’” he says, shrugging.

“Why do you wear it, though?”

He looks away. “Complicated. Long story.”

“I’ve got time.”

Lothane idly fingers at the blue piece of cloth, his eyes distant. His expression morphs into a kind of scowl, not something he wants to tell, but shifts towards a reluctant acceptance.“S’pose you’ve earned a story, all the blood we’ve spilled together.”

I tilt my head, feeling my pulse… do something. I’m not sure if it slows or hastens or if I’m just more aware of my own heart.

“It was my mother’s,” he says slowly, almost carefully. As if trying to pluck the right words off his own tongue. “Human.”

“Did she and your father…”

Lothane almost scowls at me. “You try to find me one half-orc in Escann whose mother gave consent, Silmuna. Just one. I’ll wait.”

I blink rapidly.

“Whoever dad was, he was some Bladebreaker fuck. I like to think Corin and I killed him, but I’ll never know,” he says, drumming at his cheek. With a certain agitation. Like he wants to answer my question, but hates every moment of it. “Mom didn’t make it, either.”

There’s a sudden pit in my stomach. A feeling like I’m lurching forwards, even as I sit in place and listen to him.

“I took a piece of her scarf. The orcs raised me as some kind of weird bastard, which I suppose I am. It got bad, for me and my halfbreed kin. I challenged the chieftain to battle.”

“And you killed him, took his place?”

Lothane snorts. “Fuck no, Silmuna. He beat the shit out of me, then killed the half-orcs who sided with me as an object lesson. I was just some broken thing with too many human features, wearing a piece of my human mother, and more hassle than I was worth.

“Once they were done with me and my fellow bastards, they were going to kill me too. Got bored, maybe.” He picks at his tusk. “Corin saved me. Was attacking the orcish camp. Found me. Laurens wanted to kill me, but Corin stayed his hand, and I swore myself to her cause. One thing leads to another. Apparently she dies and comes back from the dead, and thinks it’s hysterical to show herself to me first, so that I’m the last one to learn she died in the first place.” He grins at nothing, at the reveries. “Then she up and dies again to save my life and kill the Dookanson, and…”

The man shrugs, sighing. “Shit happens. I’ve learned there’s things in life you can control. Some you can’t. And sometimes shit’s so random and by-chance that it’s not worth thinking about. You find yourself in extraordinary circumstances, and all you can do is keep your sword handy and take that next step forward.”

“What was her name?” I ask, throat oddly dry.

“Corin?” he asks, face scrunching. Then he frowns.

“Your mother. I—did you know her?”

Lothane looks at me for a very long moment. Like he hadn’t heard me correctly. Or like there’s some suspect motive for the question. “Eilís,” he says very, very slowly, his eyes never leaving mine. “This cloth was from her scarf. All I remember is that she loved me until she died, even if I was… what I am.”

“Eilís,” I croak, stumbling to my feet. My hands shaking. My vision swimming. I nearly cough. I nearly puke. “Did she wear blue? Only blue?”

Lothane stares, and in that look I can see the words yes, and bubbling confusion how I know that.

My knees buckle. My face hits the dirt, breath coming in in ragged, shivering pulses.

Lothane inhales sharply, rushing to my side. “Captain Silmuna!”

I just lay there, picking at the scattered threads of my mind, trying to assemble some kind of reasonable garment from them.

The half-orc scoops me up, putting his ear to my chest. “Silmuna, are you alright?”

I reach up, grabbing his face. Taking the little piece of blue scarf from his tusk. Lothane doesn’t resist.

I hold it in my hand, and I know it’s silk. Old, faded, worn, and washed of blood and dirt over decades of use, but it’s a scarf. It’s silk.

It’s Damerian blue.

The wizard’s words from years ago come back in a flash. Go east, Rogier. There you will find your blood and destiny.

“Lothane,” I say, tightening my fist around the cloth. “Your mother was Eilís Silmuna. She was my sister. You’re my fucking nephew!”

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 4: New Dameria​

“You’re my fucking nephew!” I choke the words out, almost puking them. My stomach heaves. Blood goes hot then cold then hot again, until my entire chest is burning.

I sit up, holding the little piece of silk I’d taken from his tusk. And my eyes go to his face. Seeing double, almost. The almost elven ears and tusks of his father, the orc. And the smooth, almost pretty lines from his mother. I can see Eilís in his eyes. In the way he stands, frozen, eyes going wide.

“Lothane!” I rasp. “I—you—her! I’ve been looking for her all my life, ever since I—Lothane!”

He reaches down slowly, very slowly. At first I think he’s going to take my hand. Accept this truth. This fact. Realize that we are blood, kith and kin.

Until he takes the piece of silk from my hand. Slowly, he ties it back around his left tusk.

“Lothane, stop, listen to me,” I say desperately.

He stands back up and stares. He has his mother’s eyes, but in them is something that makes me nearly double over. This look that’s not quite horror, not quite disgust. Something quiet, reserved, and bitter. So very fucking bitter I have to avert my own gaze to avoid it.

“And?” he finally says.

“And!” I say, and laugh like a madman. “And Eilís was your mother. You’re a Silmuna. You’re my blood!”

I chance a look up to the man and see that same expression. Unchanging. Unmoving.

“My Corintari need me,” he says, voice low and cold.

“What?”

“I have to leave, Captain Silmuna.”

My mind boggles. It’s like I’ve been suck-punched in the gut. “Wait, Lothane, no—you can’t, I mean—just hold on! This changes everything. About you, about me, all of this!” I throw a hand out wide before reaching out to him.

He inhales deeply, eyes narrowing. He doesn’t let me touch him. “I said, Captain Silmuna,” he says deliberately, “my Corintari need me. I need to leave.”

“Wait, Lothane, what are you—no, no, you can’t just—Lothane, please!”

But it’s already too late. I sit there, knees and limbs shaky, as the man turns and leaves me alone. Outside, the sounds of our men celebrating our victory over a witch-knight. Inside, only the dark, only the quiet, only me.

And I just sit like that. I can’t stand. I can’t walk. I can’t even find the force of muscle and bone to get to my knees.

I’m just…

Alone.

Again.

Like when they killed my father, my sister thought gone. My family slaughtered. No one left in the world for me.

I had seen it. Seen her. My sister, one last time. And the man whose face carried her had turned from me and left, like I was something disgusted, some thing to revile and detest and hate.

I’m like that for hours. Until even the effort of sitting is too much, and I collapse onto the ground, staring up at nothing, without air in my lungs or liquid in my mouth.

Just alone.

For minutes, hours, days, years. I don’t even know anymore.

Then the door opens, and with it comes the first rays of sunlight and a squinting Madaléin. She pauses for a single moment before sprinting to my side.

And I tell her everything.

---

“So no fucking shit, you misunderstood a wizard, your sister’s dead, and your only living family member’s a half-orc?” Madaléin says, covering her eyes from her hangover as she nurses a glass of water.

“Got it in one, Freckles.” I stare at the wall.

She lifts her head, eyes red, and winces from the motion. I can feel her looking at me. I hadn’t come to get her. She’d drug her hungover self to find me, alone in my war tent. I wonder how much she’s hurting just to get here.

“And you let him go?”

I nod slowly, and feel so old. “He just stared at me. Looked at me, eyes widening. And he said he needed to lead his men home. Didn’t want to talk about it. Just looked at me and said he had to leave. What—I mean, what was I supposed to do? Keep him as a pet? Maybe ask him to stop, ask him to play a game of ball or something?” I laugh, a coarse, desperate noise. “I still have Eilís’ book. What am I supposed to do with it now?

She puts her hand on my shoulder, squeezing. Before her hands slip around me, bringing me into a tight hug.

“Freckles, please,” I whisper.

Madaléin presses my head to her chest, stroking my hair. I feel small. Emasculated. And unwilling to move. “Shh,” she says. “It’s okay, Rogier. I know what you’re feeling.”

“Do you?”

She squeezes me for effect. “You had this image of yourself. You dedicated everything to it. It was your life. Blood, vengeance, finding your sister. You wanted so desperately to become something other than the last Silmuna. You envisioned it every day. Pictured it in your head with every swing of the sword, every order to move and march. Every drop of blood and sweat, all to create the person you wanted to be with all your soul.

“Then you got it. And it’s nothing like you imagined. And the man in your head you were fighting to be, he’s not who you are now.”

I reach my hand out for hers. “You’ve been here too?”

“Mhm,” she hums. “No one who follows you hasn’t. Happy, content people don’t throw their lives away to fight orcs and make a new home in Escann.”

I raise my eyes to look at her. She winks at me for some reason. “My quest is ended, isn’t it? Sister’s dead. World’s over. But they all still rely on me.”

“So what are you going to do about it?”

I let my head rest in her arms. “I think…” I sigh. “You all fulfilled your oaths to me. I have no right to do anything but fulfill my end of the bargain.”

The Sons of Dameria are back on the move.​

Near Acenaire, we encounter a forward party of Corintari. I give their party leader a letter, asking him to give it to my nephew, and then we’re back on the road.

Away from Castellyr, back to Adenica. A lot has changed in the region. Adventurers settling down. The Halfling Small Fellows continue to try to farm the region. The New Wanderers, men from Kheterata, have made homes for themselves. Anbenncósters, from the former capital of Dameria, have moved in after the Sons of Dameria destroyed the local orcs and goblins.

We trade with them. Exchange stories. And continue on.

I promised a home for those who followed me.

And even if my quest has ended, if I’ve found my blood and slaughtered a witch-knight, theirs hasn’t.

Venomtooth is the last orcish clan left in the region.​

Madaléin to my left. The Sons of Dameria behind me.

No matter what I have accomplished, there’s more to do. More orcs to push back. More land to reclaim.

More homes to make for those who gave their entire lives to me.

Orcish power is not what it once was.​

We are the Sons of Dameria, who fought beside Corin, who defeated the orcs of Andenica, who shattered their power in Inner Castanor, who burned the Witch-Knight.

They are my soldiers. They are like sons to me, these men who give of themselves to me, with the dreams of a new home.

I’m allowed moments to be proud, in this bitter life I’ve led.​

Madaléin props her boots up on a table, mug of ale in her hand. She has to shuffle awkwardly to lean comfortably like that with her sword on her hip. “You look downright wicked, Rogier,” she says, pointing at me. “You look like you should be sitting on a throne of skulls, with half-naked women fawning over you.”

I dig my fingers into my lips and pull down into a frown. “Thish better?”

She snorts. “Gods, when you’re happy, you look insane.” She takes a pull of ale. “No wonder you’re pathologically addicted to being all dark and broody.”

I dip fingers into my cup of water to spritz her with the droplets.

“Hey!” she shouts.

I laugh. “Oh please, Freckles. You’ve just got as much to be happy about. The orcs are fleeing in droves. We’ve set up Damerian farmers from Craven’s Walk to Turnmarket. People have homes!”

Tales of our exploits are told as far as Lorent and Bulwar. I hope the Emperor is shaking in his boots that I’m still alive.​

“Between the riches we’ve brought in,” I continued as she sips, “our warcamp has turned from a motley crew of soldiers into a mobile city. There’s going to be a point we’ll have to settle down to actually administer the country.”

“You are so goofy when you get all animated like that,” she teases, laughing into her mug.

Quest boards to ensure we’ve hunting monsters and finding lost pets. Houses to run the Company.​

She folds her arms, giving me a dopey smile. “I like this new you, Rogier. You’re almost a person.”

“Well, I could always go back to being angry and vengeful.”

“You’re not anymore?” she asks, cocking an eyebrow.

I sigh. “Freckles, home is… I don’t know. Once I thought after I found Eilís, I’d be strong or whatever enough to go home. To march across Escann straight to Wexkeep and Anbenncóst. Take back the birthright, but…” I sigh. “The more I think about it, I think that Escann is my home. I want to rebuild the villages. I want to settle my people. I want to make something of my legacy, one that’s not another Lilac War, that’s more than just blood. All I want to do now is reach out to Lothane. I want this to be home. Don’t you think so too?”

Madaléin looks aways, mug to her mouth as if to hide her lips. “I think… wherever you find yourself will be where I’ll call home, Rogier.”

Rebuilding Escann from the ground up takes time, but it’s worth it. It’s the first thing I’ve truly been proud of, more than my victories, more than soldiering. Building a home.
[Rapidly finishing the mission tree and becoming a country!]​

I look up from my maps and reports of Escann, eyes sharply going to her. I suddenly find myself unsure of what to say.

She leans forwards to clasp me on the shoulder, and laughs again. “Gods, throwing you off your game will never get old, Rogier.”

“I…” I cough. “Yeah. Sure. Whatever, Freckles. Did, uh, did you come here for a reason, or were you just lonely.”

“Little column A, little column B,” she says, shrugging. With a frown, she tips her mug over. Empty. “Been helping all the boring stuff. ‘Administration’ stuff.”

“It’s not boring,” I protest. “I was literally raised for this. The Imperial House of Silmuna is good at running things. Weren’t you raised for something similar, noble daughter and all?”

She tosses her mug over her shoulder. It clatters against the wall. “Look, Rogier, all I know is that whenever you get the maps out, the fun shit goes down. And I can only drink so much during peacetime before people think I have a problem. They do not think it’s problematic if I only do it after victory.”

Madaléin sits up, tapping at my maps. “So. Where we going next?”

On the road again.​

The Sons move through Adenica, between the Khetists and Halflings. Towards the border of my old enemy, the Rotcleaver clan.

Escann is a shifting land. While the Sons remain mobile, many, many more people are staking claims in what they have.

But that’s not enough for me. The home I build will be the biggest and strongest.

Humans fighting humans for reasons as old as time.​

Take the Warriors of Ancard, for example. Not our biggest fans. More than likely, the Wesdamieran Ancardians are jealous of my successes.

As people settle, border frictions rise up. We learn as we march through that the Ancardians, under the leadership of a powerful mage, have attacked the New Wanderers. We all fought besides Corin, but apparently as the years go on, that means less and less to people.

It’s not our problem, not today. But I suspect it will be soon.

Right now, we have orcs to drive from the region.

The Orcish borderlands between Western and Southern Escann are still ruled by the Rotcleaver tribe.​

Madaléin punches my shoulder. “Like old times, huh?”

I scowl. “Old times? Gods, Freckles, you’re making us both sound old.”

She rolls her eyes. “I’m trying to be enthusiastic. I’m just ready to go kick some ass. My hand has been cramping really badly, all this paperwork you've been making me do. I signed up with the Sons to kick ass, kill monsters, and all that shit. Not sign documents.”

I elbow her. “Well, let’s not keep the orcs waiting.”

Madaléin and I make incredibly short work of the orcs. Their armies are slaughtered.​

In the end, we push the hordes back, take the borderlands, and make our way back. Moving towards Adenica’s old capital, Taranton. Ever since we freed the farmers there from goblin slavery, it’s been an incredibly friendly region to the Sons.

The people wave as we march by and are eager to give us news. Some of it is good. None of it is about Lothane or Corintar. And then some of it is less nice.

Someone sounds jealous.​

I sigh at the news, handing Madaléin the letter back.

“They’re Wesdamerians,” she says. “They talk a big game, but they’ll only go after you if they have overwhelming numbers and Lorentish support.”

“Know this from experience?” I ask.

She proudly pounds her breast. “Grew up with ’em! How many times have I told you this?”

I point my pen at her. “And how many times do I have to tell you to get back to work?”

“Ugh!” she groans, face lending on the table. “Tax offices. We’re building a tax network. I’ve become the very monster I swore to destroy!”

My gods, we’re doing it. We’re building a legal framework and administration based on Damerian law!
[This is it, boys. The very end of the mission tree. If you don’t complete this, you suffer terrible penalties when you form a nation, which represents poorly equipped murderhobos trying to LARP as a government. We won’t suffer this]​

I sit down beside Madaléin, putting one hand on her shoulder, the other handing her a mug of beer.

She squints at me, then at the beer with suspicion. “Who are you and what have you done with my Rogier?”

I sigh, pushing her away. “Look, Freckles, I been thinking lately.”

Saying nothing, she just arches an eyebrow at me.

“I never did thank you for, y’know. After Lothane,” I say. “Sometimes I worry I’ll lose you. That you’ll find something more interesting than me. But all these years, you’ve stuck around. You’ve been at my side, helping me turn the Sons of Dameria from a Company into something more, it feels like.

“And I never felt like I thanked you enough. Whenever I’m in a bad place, you have stupid jokes to keep me focused. You annoy the shit out of me, but I don’t know if I could function any other way.”

Slowly, she puts her pen down and sighs heavily. She gives me a look like she’s annoyed. “Took you that long to realize how awesome I am, Rogier? Ugh, boys, am I right?”

“I—I mean—”

She ambushes me with a hug while my defenses are down. “Do you remember how we met, Rogier?”

[AHAHAHA, FIRST PART OF THE CAMPAIGN DONE]​

“I remember facing down a girl in the rain,” I say, unsure where to put my arms. “Sword in her hands. Anger and desperation in her eyes. The War was ending, and I was on the move, and then you were there.”

Madaléin huffs and grabs my arms for me, so that I’m hugging her back.

“Those weren’t good days,” she says. “Everything was just—just so fucked up, y’know? When I first saw you, alone on that road in the rain, I thought… I don’t know. I thought about killing you.”

My eyes flutter.

“I’d lost my party. I was hungry. My father had lost his land and was sending people to find me to marry me off to try to keep his claim. My brothers didn’t care. My sister hated that father wanted me for it. Everything had been going wrong. I was alone. I was running. I was trying to prove I was, like, that I was me.

“Then I saw you. I remembered the posters. Lorent and Wex said you were becoming a bandit king. You were the prince of a deposed house, trying to raise an army. The reward for your head was… so many crowns.

“I held my sword. I stared you down. You hadn’t shaved that morning. You looked tired. I thought if I brought you in, everything would work out. I’d be rich. I could get my father off my back. I could make up for the failures that saw my friends die to a fucking wild wyvern. You looked at me, and I looked back.”

She sighs. “And you asked me if I was okay. You didn’t have much money left, but you offered to buy me a meal. I was so, so exhausted I thought I’d let you feed me, and use the strength to take you down.”

I just stare at her. This girl I’ve known for over twenty years, from a scrawny teenage fighter to this almost matronly warrior, and I can’t even tell where she turned from one into the other. Mostly because after all this time, I’ve grown old, and she hasn’t changed a bit. She’s the only constant in my life. “I… just remember you weren’t talkative. Remember when I asked your name?”

“I just sort of grunted,” she says. “I didn’t want to get attached.”

“Yeah, so…” I trail off. “I just decided to call you Freckles. Until it annoyed you enough you gave your actual name, but by then I thought it’d stuck.”

Madaléin laughs, punching me in the shoulder. “Next morning, you mount your horse, and say ‘Freckles, you look like you really know how to use that sword. Where do you plan to take it?’ I didn’t have an answer. You gestured for me to follow. I kept telling myself I’d kill you or something when you weren’t looking. But that moment never came. I watched you meet with deserters, with outlaws, with bastards. I watched you speak to the desperate and hopeless, and I watched you build an army. I watched you light hope in the eyes of those without it. I listened as you talked of building a new home.

“And when you gave me the choice of going on my way or following you to Escann, I decided fuck it, I want to see if this idiot can really do it. And now…” Madaléin hugs me tighter. “I didn’t have anything. You didn’t know that. You looked dark and mean, but you didn’t ask me details. You offered me the shirt off your back because when the chips are down, that’s who you are, and I decided I wanted to see your dream be built.”

“Why?” I ask, voice hoarse, little more than a whisper.

She gives me the most tired, exhausted look I’ve ever seen in my life. “Mon capitaine, are you actually stupid? I open my heart and… Ugh!”

“Freckles?”

She grabs my shoulders and shakes it. “I am not going to explain the most obvious thing in the world to you, asshole!”

“What?”

“Corin just kick me in the cunt already!” she says, and pulls me in for a kiss.

The Kingdom Freckles and I built for our people.​

She pulls back, and laughs. “Holy shit, you suck at this.”

“I…”

Madaléin throws her head back, laughing until she has tears in her eyes.

I just sit there. “You good, Freckles?”

She pauses, squints at me, and then just starts pounding the table.

“Alright, alright, mon capitaine,” she says, rubbing her wet eyes. “So you’re halfway to being a person. You’re how old and still utterly clueless?”

“I… like to keep busy?”

“Time to add another thing to your to-day list. We can figure out how to get you the rest of the way to personhood together, oui?”

“Huh?”

She sighs sufferingly. “People stuff now. Running a kingdom next. Deal?”

I mean, yeah, Escann is changing and I built a new home. But also, girl. I’m not sure which is more terrifying.​

For a new world has been born from the graves and charnel pits of Escann.

One I am proud that I helped build for my people.

And I couldn’t have done it without the help of those I love.

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 5: All Ends With Beginnings​

Warmth.

It’s not normal.

I wake up in a panic, only to find Freckles’ arm over me.

I prop myself up, trying to get control of my heart. Get used to this feeling. I still think a part of me prefers to stay busy. But I know this makes Freckles happy, and what makes her happy makes me happy. Whatever awkwardness I feel is worth it for her.

Madaléin looks up groggily at me. Before, scowling, putting her hand on my chest and forcing me back down. “No wakey. Early. Let me sleep in, Rogier. Business later.”

It’s hard, but I let myself give in and lay back down. To relax today before the big event.

It’s… nice. Freckles may make me feel twenty years younger, and I’ve kept in shape, but I’m feeling older and older every day.

And what a day it’s going to be.

Other nations see us as one of their equals and want to help us. Diplomats sympathetic to the Silmuna cause from Aranmas in Anbennar come to share news and knowledge with us, establishing official diplomatic ties.​

Taranton has been rebuilt. Not to its former glory as the capital of Chivalric Adenica, but close enough. Now one of the biggest cities in what remains of Escann, the hub of trade and, as I sit in our more ragged equivalent of a throne, foreign diplomats.

“Aranmas?” I ask.

The diplomat, a half-elf woman in decidedly practical attire, curtsies. “It pays to offer respect to our neighbors. And the goddess Ara favors the bold.” She spreads her hands. “Your grace, Rogier Silmuna, we’d like first dibs on exporting Escanni goods to Anbennaar.”

Madaléin scowls slightly at the half-elf, hand on her sword-hilt.

I cock an eyebrow at the diplomat. “Aranmas sided with the Rose Party. You don’t seem perturbed that I’m a Silmuna and I’m very much alive.”

Her smile is all teeth. “The Wexonard emperor may still have a warrant for your death, but his authority barely extends past Esmaria. You’ve turned a wasteland into a new Dameria. That tells me that if there’s a horse to bet on, it’s you.” She holds out a folded piece of parchment. “We can do business. Much about the world is changing. We have much to gain from each other.”

House Silmuna was once renowned for being sly, diplomatic owls.​

The Aranmasser diplomat is the first, but hardly the last. Merchants and nobles from northern Abennar, Gawed, and the Alenic Reach come to Taranton. Some to open up official trade routes for grain and locally-mined gold, and others just to recognize us as a burgeoning nation.

One man, an envoy from the Marquisate of Arbaran, the Empire’s March on our eastern borders, merely comes to warn us. “Don’t cross Cogaulúis River, little bandit king. Stay in Escann and we won’t have to throw you Silmunas back into the Dameshead Sea. We’re happy to stay distant.”

Curt. To the point. Reminding me how they fought against my father, and are willing to fight us if we make moves into the Empire.

Point taken.

A few come to ask to join the Sons of Dameria. The halflings of the Small Fellows wish to bind themselves to us, as do the Anbenncóst Expedition. The Anbenncóster hail from their self named city, which was once Dameria’s capital. I grew up there. So of course I accept their fealty.

Notably absent are any envoys from any major powers. Everything comes from smaller duchies or merchant families across the border.

Wex still sits on my father’s Dove Throne, but they haven’t tried to assassinate me lately. I almost think the new generation has forgotten about me.​

Until one day, Madaléin hands me a letter. With the Corintari seal on it.

“Your nephew finally wrote back,” she says, hand on her hilt. “I’ve got your horse ready already.”

My bones hurt at the thought. Old saddle-sores protest.​

Lothane hasn’t replied to my attempts to meet again since that day in Silvervord, when I realized who he was. He had made sure I was okay, and then left. We’ve been under a treaty of mutual support, but little more.

He doesn’t talk to me. He doesn’t regularly send any diplomats. And I half-expected he wanted nothing to do with me.

Yet as Corintar marches to war, Lothane knows there’s no one better in all Escann he can call on for help.

I am not the young man I once was. And spending my formative and adult years on the back of a horse hasn’t helped.

But Lothane is my nephew, my blood. And if it’s in the service of fighting orcs, Madaléin and I will be there.

Decades of war have made us masters at fighting orcish hordes.​

The first battle occurs not far from Taranton. As we slaughter the orcs with minimal losses, it occurs to me that Lothane’s call to arms may well have been a warning more than a request. The orcs near Castonath are on the warpath in all directions.

Lothane is putting them down from one angle.

The Sons of Dameria march in from the other.

Until we meet the Corintari north of Castonath.

The free peoples of Escann have swollen to such vast numbers, we almost outnumber the orcs now.​

The Sons’ and Corintari camps meet up, amidst fields of dead orcish armies, and destroyed land the orcs had salted in frustration due to their inability to farm.

“Lothane!” I greet, awkwardly spreading my arms.

Hardship has wormed its way into the lines of his handsome face. He has to be nearly forty or so now. Thinking of that, I can’t help but connect the implications. Eilís has been dead forty years. I came to Escann chasing ghosts who died when I was a young, young man.

Lothane, in full armor, doesn’t move into my arms. He doesn’t hug. He doesn’t greet me as an old friend. Nothing like I would have expected.

“Silmuna,” he says tersely.

I take a step back. “Hello?”

His eyes are cool, a bit wary. Our gaze meets for too long, and he shakes it off, folding his arms. “It’s good you came,” he says at length.

“Is something wrong, Lothane?”

“We’ve got orcs behind and around us,” he says, purposely misunderstanding my question. “These are our maps. While we were pushing into Castonath, the hordes moved around to our capital in Ionntrás.”

I stand up sharply. “I’ve got it. The Sons will move to lift the siege.”

“No, Silmuna,” he says. “I want you to plug the gaps here while I—don’t you run off on me, do you know how many of them there are, you old bastard?”

Madaléin follows after me, but not before spinning around to face Lothane one last time. “He’s… oddly eager to please when it comes to you, I think, Lothane. Talk with him later, please?”

Back of the napkin math says the Sons of a Dameria have an 8.8 kill/death ratio against the orcs. The weakest Damerian is as strong as nine of the strongest orcs.​

We engage them on the way southeast from Castonath. Some in Smallmere, which is more of an ambush. Then we relieve Ionntrás, coming in from behind the orcs as they’re trying to build siege weapons.

Decades have taught me how to fight orcs. And even after a long march leaves me tired, exhausted, and sometimes coughing, I never forget how to use pikes and archers and cavalry. The Sons of Dameria are on the cutting edge, with some regiments now wielding new arquebuses from Anbennar.

These new weapons are firearms, and their ease of use and training tells me to invest in them further and harder as the weapon of the future. But until that future, the bow and pike is our weapon of choice.

The orcish hordes haven’t changed since Corinsfall.

WHERE IS MY NEPHEW—I’LL WAIT!​

And just like that, the Sons of Dameria enter Ionntrás as heroes. The entire Orcish southern army is destroyed, slaughtered, and scattered.

Saving the Corintar’s capital has earned us great favor with the locals. We set up camp outside the city, trading with the locals for supplies, keeping ourselves open to ensure the locals we’re here as friends.

Then we wait for the inevitable news from the front.

After I got involved, the war was a cinch.​

One way or another, the Corintar owes me and the Sons for saving their heartland.

Madaléin leans against me. “So, this is your master plan?”

I take her hand in mine and squeeze. “Lothane has to come home soon enough. Besides, we’re in the neighborhood. Might as well drop by.”

She chuckles. “Should I bake cookies for him?”

“You can cook?”

“I can burn,” she corrects with a wink.

It’s only a couple of days before the Corintari arrive back home. Their army doesn’t enter the city at first, as if unsure what we’re doing. I have a messenger deliver a letter to Lothane.

We saved you. You owe us. I’d like to speak with my nephew.

It takes hours of waiting before Lothane rides out to meet with us.

Eastern Escann after the last round of orcish slaughter.​

I meet him halfway between our camps. I wince as I jump off my horse onto aging knees. The thin snow cushions my drop. Lothane, his assistant, Madaléin, and myself face off against each other.

Until Lothane pulls out a stool and sits down. “So talk, Silmuna,” he says, posture rigid, almost hostile.

I just stare at the half-orc. My nephew.

I look to Madaléin for encouragement. She gives my hand a squeeze and pushes me forwards.

A breath. A step forwards. I reach for my bag and hold out a book to Lothane.

“What’s this?”

I swallow. “It was my sister’s, your mother’s,” I say. “I… always meant to give it to her. It’s burning a hole in my soul. I want you to have it.”

He stares at me for a long moment, still clad in armor, still with a scrap of his mother’s scarf around his left tusk. The expression turns into a glare, and he takes the book quickly. He flips through it quickly, growing more and more confused with every page.

“Is this a picture book of birds and bugs?” he asks.

I nod. “Eilís used to love it as a little girl. See those scribbles? She used to do that. The book said some of those bugs and birds were blue, but the book didn’t have color. So she’d just fill it in herself with a pen.”

Lothane snaps the book shut, looking up at me. The silence hangs like the executioner’s blade. Before he finally lets out a huge sigh, enough to partially deflate him. “I don’t know what you want from me, Silmuna. Do you want me to apologize for your sister? Make awkward small talk about her or my father?”

My eyes widen. “No, Lothane. Of course not!”

“Then what?” he asks.

“I…” What do I want? The question circles the drain of my mind. I inhale and exhale the cold air, letting my breath mist between us, facing down the man my sister gave birth to.

Finally, I rally myself. “Lothane, you’re my nephew. You’re the only family I have left in the world. I don’t care what you think or where you’re from. I just—you said Eilís loved you. That’s good enough for me. You’re a soldier. You’re a hero. You’ve led your people to a better future. You are my blood, my family. And I…”

I laugh. “I want to hug you and tell you I love you, too.”

His eyes go wide. I feel my heart in my chest.

“Is this some kind of weird royal incest thing?” he asks dryly.

He’s still the same man I met, before I knew he was blood.​

Madaléin throws her head back and laughs.

I hold my hands up. “No, I—what? No! I’m saying I want to be your uncle. You didn’t have a father or a mother growing up. You’ve done everything, gotten this far, on your own. I used to think I got as far as I did alone, but that’s wrong. That’s not how anyone can do anything.”

I reach out for Madaléin’s hand for support. “I can’t do this alone. No one can. I’ve fought my whole life for my family, for my sister, for my people. I’m not as eloquent as I’d like, but, Lothane, you are my blood, my kith and kin. You are Lothane Silmuna.”

Lothane stands up, and he is tall. Almost six-and-a-half feet of muscle and armor. “I don’t want to be part of any royal games of yours. Escann is my home.”

“It’s my home too!” I snap. “Home is with those you love. With those who support you. I came here as a bitter young man, and I grew old here. Fuck Anbennar, fuck those wicked games dynasties play. I don’t care about any of them. Not if it means I—” I shake my head and laugh mirthlessly. “I don’t even know what I’m saying. Trying to say, Lothane. Except that you’re my nephew, that home and family mean something to me.

“We’re kin, Lothane. And it kills me every day to know that you’re out there, and we’re not a family. You deserved so much better than what you got, but you’ve gone so far from nothing. You don’t have a mother or father anymore. I don’t either. I have no siblings, no parents, nothing but those who love me.”

Madaléin rubs my shoulder with hers.

I hold out my hand. “So, please, Lothane—let me be your uncle. Let me be the loving family you deserve. Please.”

He’s quiet for a long moment, every motion possible crossing his face. From thoughtful, to darkly grim, to a practiced neutral. “And how would we be family, Silmuna?”

“I…”

Madaléin pipes up. “This Corinsfall, we’re holding a festival in Taranton. Trying to make it an official holiday. And we’d be honored if Corin’s companion attended as the guest of honor.”

“And we can play catch, too!” I blurt out. “…or something. I don’t know. I never really thought I’d get this far.”

Slowly, Lothane steps forward. My heart skips a bit. He tentatively holds out his hand.

“Gotcha!” I say, and ambush him with a hug.

Freckles has great ideas. This is one of them.​

It’s something of a festival celebrating the birth of our nation, our New Dameria, and a celebration over our triumph over the Dookanson. Everyone is invited, of course. Diplomats from Aranmas and the Reach join captains of other adventurer companies, be they Ancardian or mages of the Order of the Iron Scepter.

We spend big. We ensure food, drinks, and events for all of our guests.

It’s enough money that it might bankrupt a smaller nation. But under my guidance, from the gold mines of Carlanhal to our efficient tax administration, the Sons of Dameria are fantastically wealthy and productive enough to support everything without problem.

I don’t know what to do with this money, except to reinvest it back into the people.​

And then finally, comes the day. The Silmuna moon flies high as guests arrive. Food and drink are so subsidized as to be nearly free. Open invitations to all of our neighbors have clogged the road with travelers, here to share in the spoils of Dameria, to celebrate, and to be happy.

All shall see the splendor of Taranton, the rebuilt city of knights. All shall see the new home we’ve built for the bastards, exiles, and outcasts.

I see flags from all across Escann, and many from northern Anbennar.

And then finally, I see the shield of the Corintar.

I meet Lothane in the streets as he samples local renditions of classic Damerian dishes. He is wearing red, as usual, but this is the first time I’ve ever seen him without armor. There’s a very pretty human woman on his arm.

“Lothane!” I call out, jogging up to him, and damn does it tire me out.

“Madaléin, too!” Freckles says, waiving.

I hold out my arms. Lothane looks at the woman he’s with, and then at me.

“No,” he says.

“I reject your rejection!” I say, and hug him anyways.

His girl slips away, laughing. Madaléin joins her with a playful elbow.

Lothane just holds his arms up, a slight flush on his greenish cheeks. Until he sighs and hugs me with enough force to pop a couple spinal vertebrae. “You’re embarrassing me in front of my wife, Bella.”

“You settled, didn’t you?” Madaléin asks smugly.

Bella rolls her eyes. “You have no idea how long it took to get him to realize how I felt.”

Madaléin gives me a look that seems to say it really does run in your family, huh? “I know that feeling, girl. Hey, c’mere, lemme show you around Taranton. Let our idiots sort it out themselves.”

Lothane waits for the girls to go. “She’s enjoying her little vacation away from our two boys. I love them both to death, but they’re a handful sometimes.”

The news nearly knocks me off my feet.

Lothane hisses in a breath, stepping forwards to catch me. “Silmuna?!”

“No, I just… didn’t imagine. Wow.”

He grunts. “Are you planning to ambush my children too and demand to be their grand-uncle?”

“Not a bad idea,” I say woozily.

“Mhm.”

“Hey, want to go bobbing for apples or catch a ball, nephew?”

Taranton prospers, and let everyone enjoy the fruits of our labor. Especially Lothane.​

We go about the fair. We bob for apples, and Lothane hates it. But I make my nephew laugh. He enjoys himself, likes the wide range of foods we have. We play traditional Anbennarian games. I even try to teach him to play that game from the Duchy of Toarnen, chess, I think it’s called.

And when it’s over, I hold out a sealed envelope to Lothane.

“What’s this?” he asks.

“It’s a gift,” I say. “And a request. I know it probably means nothing to you, Lothane. But you are my blood. Not by choice or peaceful union, but you are family. I don’t know how many times I need to say this until it really clicks, Lothane. And no matter what happens, no one can say otherwise. I’ve seen what the Corintar have done under you. I have shed blood by your side. You’ve never let your birth hold you back. You’ve made yourself a man of great respect. And… I want you to read this, and I’d like you to accept it.”

Lothane scowls, but eventually takes the letter. As children play around the fairground, he opens it, reads it, and his brow furrows. “What the fuck is this, Rogier? Another book or something from my mother?”

I sit up a little straighter. My back hurts, but I think it’s the first time he’s ever used my first name. “It’s an official order. I am the last of my official line. I am, by right of surviving, the patriarch of the Silmuna dynasty. I loved your mother, my sister. I don’t know how much longer I have. I can feel the age in my bones. But this letter?”

My nephew looks at the paper, frowning deeply.

“It’s an order legitimizing you as a Silmuna. As my nephew.”

“Why does it matter?”

“It does to me,” I say, closing a hand into a fist. “My family dies with me. It lives with you.”

“I can’t accept this, Rogier,” he says, tossing the letter on the table. “It’s just—I don’t care about the great games of thrones the Cannorians play. I have a duty to my people in Escann. To the Corintar. To bastards, half-breeds, and other broken things.”

And what a great many bastards and broken things have settled in Escann.​

“I know,” I say quietly. “But I want my name to live on.”

“It’s just that, Rogier. They’re names. They mean nothing. I know my mother’s name now, but my father’s? Never even knew who he was. They’re things that don’t matter. It’s honor and prestige. Great lines of dynasties that don’t affect the here and now.”

“But it doesn’t mean nothing to me, Lothane,” I say. And it’s all I can think.

Lothane stares at me for a very long time. “You want me to be Lothane Silmuna. It’s not who I am. I am Lothane Bluetusk. I wear my mother’s scarf on my tusk, and that is enough for me.”

“But even that is no different. You wear my sister’s scarf. I carry my father’s name. We do it for the same reason. For a world that doesn’t exist anymore, that reminds us of something we’re not but wish we still had, Lothane. I have lost everything. Thought I did, at least. But then I found you. You are… you’re all I have. And I never want to lose even that.”

He swallows. He looks away. He watches the children play. The guests walking the festival. Laughter. People enjoying life in an island of calm in the sea of Escanni war. Away from the pain and bloodshed that have been all he and I have ever known.

“Please,” I whisper. “For me.”

He meets my eyes. Slowly, he says, “Does it really mean so much to you, Rogier?”

“It does.”

Lothane takes a long breath, eyes closed for seemingly ever. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay, Rogier Silmuna,” he says, more firmly. “I’ll accept your offer. Your request. You taught me who my mother really was. You stood by the Corintar against orcs and witches. You’re a good man, Rogier. Despite everything you’ve been through, the horrors we’ve faced, I still think you’re a good man. And if it does anything to return the favor, the good will between our people, I will take your name.”

He smiles faintly. “My mother’s name. Lothane Silmuna. It sounds silly. Feels like I just agreed to a marriage in reverse, but—whoa!”

I surge forwards across the table to wrap the massive half-orc—my nephew—in my arms. “Tomorrow, I want to teach you how to catch a ball.”

“I can already do that,” he laughs awkwardly, pushing me away. “I know how to use a bow, too. And throw axes. I just prefer swords.”

“We can train together. Discuss war plans. Organize trade. I don’t care. I just want to spend time with you, my nephew!”

Lothane stands, shaking his head. “I’m already regretting this. I’m going to find my wife. I need to, uh, I need to tell her she has a new last name. For her and our sons.”

I grin stupidly and allow him to leave. And I’m like that until Freckles finds me and punches me in the stomach to snap me out of it.

So many new ideas spread as so many new people come to Taranton. But I can barely think of them. I have a nephew. I have a family again!​

Madaléin takes me home after that. To the fortress we’re building in the heart of Taranton.

“Best day of your life, huh?” Freckles ask, helping me pull off my cloak.

I give her a stupid look. “Second best.”

“And number one was?” she asks with a little pout.

I lean down to kiss her, still more than a touch awkwardly. More because I’m sure it’s what she expects. What someone in my position is supposed to do. “When you told me you loved me.”

Freckles puts her nose up. “Lies and slander. Tell me one time I used those words.”

“I mean, isn’t that kind of implied?”

She rolls her eyes. “You’re an idiot, Rogier. But you’re my idiot.”

I just smile.

She pushes me away. “Let’s go to bed, you and me. I am tired and I need to use you as a pillow.”

Freckles starts to strip off her attire, before giving me a face. “Stop staring.”

I had actually just sort of phased out, thinking of tomorrow, of Lothane, of my family. But I try to play it cool and say, “Make me.”

She steps towards me. “Maybe I will.”

“Well, maybe is a baby who always says yes.”

Madaléin gives me this look of disgust and horror. “Corin’s left nut, that’s horrible. Who taught you that one? Did—”

I know that look in her eyes. Danger. A threat. I look around, following her eyes. The window is open. The curtain is—

There’s a shimmer. An illusion spell, barely noticeable in the darkness and candlelight. The shape of a man melding with the shadows, in dark clothing, and heavily armed.

“Get down!” Freckles shouts, right as the illusion spell ends, and a lance of fire goes straight for me.

Assassins all dress the same. I recognize what this man is at once.​

“Madaléin!” I scream as it hits her in the chest. What was meant for me. She coughs. Stumbles.

And I barely have time to think before I grab a heavy candle and rush for the man.

Almost casually, he holds up a crossbow slung under his arm and fires.

I go down instantly. A lance of white hot pain in my chest and through my lung so bad I don’t even really register it. One moment I’m on my feet, half-dressed. The next I’m on the floor, and there’s this wooden thing sticking out of my torso.

I try to breathe, and cough up blood.

Madaléin lays there on the ground, a burning hole where her breasts were. A wide look on her face, mouth open. She smells of burned human flesh. Like Ser Laurens in the very end.

I look up back at the man, before reaching for Madaléin. Reaching for her hand. Trying to find something—a pulse, to hear breath, even another bad joke about Corin—anything to prove she’s still alive.

“Freckles?” I ask, and choke on my own blood.

The assassin almost languidly steps over us. He looks down without any disgust, any derision. Just a tired, almost exasperated expression.

“Madaléin!” I try again.

“This is the part where you’re supposed to ask who sent me,” the assassin says, as if discussing the weather. “I was looking forward to it. My legs have cramped something fierce from hiding here all day. You could at least be—

I swing the iron candle at his shins. He grunts, but doesn’t fall.

“House síl Wex! Those Wesdam bastards!” I say. “It’s fucking obvious. You’ve been trying my entire life!”

He sighs. In a more exasperated voice than anything, “Yes, yes, drama. Your cousins in Wesdam send their regards with the emperor’s blessing, Rogier Silmuna. You ruined my fun. Happy now?

“Fuck yourself!” I howl, and break out coughing. Spewing blood over my face, over the floor, and onto Madaléin.

He snaps his fingers, the tips lighting up with fire. “I’m counting those as your last words. They don’t pay me enough for this shit.”

I try to grab at him, only for the firebolt to shoot forwards.

For a moment, all I can see is red in my eyes.

Then I realize that the red is my eyes.

I feel nothing.

I look around, I try to reach out for Madaléin’s hand, but only…

…I only hear the soft tune of a lyre.

I blink, and see a garden.

No, no, no—where is she? Where is Freckles?!​

I look around. I run back and forth. I feel like my younger self, when I was twenty. There’s no pain. There’s nothing but the cold drip in my heart. I don’t know where I am. I ignore the ghosts. The elf playing the lyre. The man who tries to apologize to me.

Fuck them all. I don’t care. I just—

I find her there. Freckles. Looking like she did the day I met her, hair still wet with rain, with a nonplussed look on her face.

“Freckles?” I ask.

Madaléin looks up at me, only for the girl next to her to grab her sleeve and pull her back.

“Now the birds in the book are all blue,” Eilís says proudly.

Freckles pulls away from my baby sister. “Well,” she says. “This sucks. Do you just, like, does your family just have a personal slice of Heaven? Because, wow, it is boring here. Why the hell am I here?”

I grab her in my arms and press my lips to hers. I spin her around, laughing like a madman.

“Easy, easy, Rogier!” she says, cheeks red. “Your entire family is watching.”

I take her hand, grinning like a fool. “I know, Freckles. I know. Come with me.”

“Where?” she asks.

“I wanna introduce you to my family!”

I’m back. I’m home.

And I still have Madaléin in my arms.

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 6: The Young Owl​

Ten years later…

A new kingdom is born in western Escann. They call her Rogieria. The first of its kind to emerge from the ashes of the Greentide. A true nation made from the hopes and dreams of the adventurers and exiles who followed Corin and made this land their home.

The times they are a-changin’.​

But a kingdom needs a king.

And who else to offer the crown to than the last of the true Silmunas? To Lothane “Bluetusk” Silmuna.

It had been Rogier’s dying wish, to legitimize Lothane as a true member of the ancient family. And the Sons of Dameria had named their new kingdom after him.

Huh?​

“That’s my name,” I say blankly, barely paying attention. I’d just been staring out the window, out across the Corintari capital of Ionntrás.

“Will you be our king?” an elf asks me, one of the delegates.

I just stare, and slowly point at myself. The question just strikes me as completely absurd. “Wait, you’re talking about me?”

Another delegate nods. “Rogieria needs a Silmuna. We’ve built upon the legacy of Rogier the Exile and his fiancée, Madaléin Silmuna. They left behind the tools we needed to turn the Sons of Dameria into a true kingdom. But what is a New Dameria without a Silmuna? You have to understand us, Rogier.”

I bring my hand up to my boyish stubble, mostly to keep my jaw from falling off. I’d only really come with Dad here because I was promised a vacation from the skirmishes in eastern Escann. I never expected anything to come of it. That’s why I was mostly just standing at the window, spacing out.

My father looks stern. My big brother Ellís just tilts his head. Unlike either of them, I’m convinced that if I can finally grow this beard out, I can hide my half-orc tusks and be human-passing, looking more akin to my human mother than half-orc father. I had hoped the beard would help me fit in better with the boys, the Corintar.

But now I’m being offered a fucking crown.

I look between the delegates and my father. And can feel the weight of the world on my shoulders. But more than anything, I feel my father’s eyes, that legendary warrior, hero, and grandmaster of the Corintar. Like he’d only asked me out of some sense of propriety. Like he wanted to politely save face and expects me to go along with him and Ellís.

I feel my throat drying. Everything feels hot and it’s hard to breathe. My heart beats once in my chest. Then twice. Without realizing it, my hands have balled into hard, determined fists.

Father begins to shake his head in a well there you have it, boys gesture.

I inhale sharply. “I’ll do it!”

All eyes are back on me. My vision swims. Somehow, I stay standing.

“I mean,” I say, fingers going to my chin. I have to force my hand down so I don’t look weak and pathetic, like I’m trying to hide my face and tusks. “I shall do it. I shall be your king.”

And Father just stares at me.

The official chroniclers recorded this very differently than I remember it.​

And just like that, I’ve sealed my fate. And my children’s fate.

Father doesn’t say much. He nods once, leaving me to lie in the bed I’ve made, and takes Ellís with him.

The Damerians are overjoyed, and for the life of me I can’t really understand why.

They’re calling me what now?​

And with that, I leave my home of Ionntrás. Leave the Corintari to cross Escann, to a land I’ve never been, where I’m expected to rule as some king of a legendary dynasty I barely know anything about.

Yesterday, I was just some kid. I was just Lothane’s second son. Born to be another soldier in Corintar, and little else more.

Today, however?

So no shit, there I was, King of Rogieria.​

Honestly, it doesn’t even really hit me. Not at first. What I just signed up for.

I was just a little boy when Rogier the Exile died. I only really learned about him when my father returned home from the funeral and told me I had a new last name. He had looked dark and grim that day. Worse than ever I had seen him before.

“Who were the Silmunas?” I ask the elf, Fëanor, the one who said I looked like Vincen.

He makes a face at me. “Your father never told you?”

“He only gave me the name. Named me after Rogier the Exile. Said he was a ‘good man, despite everything.’” I shift uncomfortably as we ride horses down the road. “Father is a man of few words.”

Fëanor nods. “I’m glad you’re already sitting, Rogier. This is a long story.”

That’s a lot of info. There’s not going to be a test on this, right?​

And sometimes, they answer questions I never asked. As if they realize I’m just some kid who signed up for this on a complete whim, and have no real idea what I’m doing. I’m thankful for it.

I worry I can only ask so many questions they consider common knowledge before they lose all faith in me, and decide to dump me by the roadside to cut their losses. Find someone better to lead the humans, elves, half-elves, and even halflings who call Rogieria their home.

At this point, I keep a notebook to write this all down. Just in case.​

We were betrayed. We were wronged.

At least, that’s the feeling more than anything. A tale of anger, of love, of betrayal, of exile, and new hope. Fëanor tells it like a bard, and everyone is wrapped around his finger.

I just sit there by the fire, rigid and emotionless, for fear that the wrong reaction would make me look weak. Better to have a stern no-reaction.

They talk of how Lothane síl Wex worked with the Wesdamerian Silmunas to stab my great grandfather in the back. To steal the Dove Throne of Anbennar from us. How our enemies followed Rogier to the ends of Cannor to finish the job. They pause awkwardly when they bring up Eilís the Blue, my grandmother, and how she was violated. Until the story ends ten years ago, when in his moment of personal triumph and love, síl Wex and Wesdam-Silmuna finally killed Rogier.

They have no proof they were the culprits, but Rogier was assassinated, and these men are not idiots.

Rogier’s body died, but not his dream.

The emotions are what bother me most of all. I can understand the pain of the elves. Some of them were there over a century ago, fighting beside Adénn “Skylance”. Or many of the others still smart from grand-uncle’s fate, as they served with him.

But from start to finish, these men, many of whom aren’t much older than me, express rage, despair, and a dogged determination to keep fighting. As if every drop of pain to the Silmuna family is a personal stain on their honor, one they intend to reap vengeance for.

Vengeance, I realize as the story ends, in the form of me. The story ends with me, after all. One great big “Rogier accepted the crown—to be continued.”

I just sit there, terrified of the wrong response. Of the thoughts they think as they look at me, some quarter-orc second-son from the middle of nowhere, Escann.

Like I’m their champion. The restorer of the world. A world only the old elves in Rogieria can remember. It doesn’t even feel real. Nothing but that cold dripping through my veins when they look at me and tell of my legacy.

Finally, I find my voice. Faking it till I’m making it as hard as I can, I say, “I am not the last Silmuna. I am merely the first in a new chapter.”

They cheer.

And I can’t sleep that night.

They expect the world of me. And what happens if I can’t deliver it?
[In true Anbennar fashion, the Rogieran mission tree is fucking massive.]​

The capital city of Taranton is a well-oiled machine. Even a decade after Rogier the Exile’s death, it carries on his legacy. Small, efficient, run like some idealized version of ancient Dameria. Unlike a traditional Cannorian monarchy, from what I’ve read, Rogieria operates with a parliament, who act as my advisors and make lower level policy decisions. It’s a holdover from the ancient Damerian Republic of antiquity.

Noble blood isn’t as important here as I imagined. Which is good, because despite technically being a Silmuna, I don’t really know how to deal with people who believe blood means anything. It’s not the way of the Corintar. Most of the powerful landowners here are small nobles, former adventurer types. We possess strong merchant and Cannorian clergy class. The differences between the haves and have-nots isn’t profound or deeply entrenched. It’s a young, dynamic court, filled with eager warriors and ex-hero types.

Much of the state is organized around an efficient administration over its lands and a large, professional army. At first I wonder how Rogieria can afford it, but the finance report makes my jaw drop.

That’s a lot of gold and trade.​

Between gold reserves and deposits of Damestear, the Kingdom of Rogieria likely has the best economy in all Escann, maybe even better than a good portion of Cannor. Standard policy has been to invest excess money into building workshops to support the people, or into the astounding army of the Sons of Dameria. We have some twenty-eight thousand men strong with some eighteen-thousand reserves—with infantry, cavalry, and the recently deployed cannon in service. The army is the height of modern innovation.

I’ve never even worked with cannons in Corintar. The fact Rogiera can afford a surplus of them while staying in the economic green astounds me.

So, to wit: I am king over the largest army, economy, and nation in all Escann, its most innovative, its most ambitious. And my people expect me to use it all to carry on the Silmuna legacy to greatness, conquest, and glory…

No pressure, right?

“What do you think?” Fëanor asks me. He just appeared as I was looking over ledgers, mind boggling as I tried to wrap my mind over the monumentality of the task I’d accepted just to prove something to my father.

It’s hard to reply at first. I press my thumb into the veins of my wrist until it hurts and swallow. “Take me to my men. My soldiers.”

That’s what a strong, confident king would ask, right? A true warrior worthy of leading a realm.

He nods once.

I trained for this my whole life, but I’ve only got eighteen years to work with. I’ll do my best, however.
[Rogier should be 26, but I mechanically de-aged him to 18 for story reasons]​

I inspect the soldiers stationed near Esckerpost. On the frontier between Rogiera and the Rotcleave tribe of orcs they’ve been fighting with for nearly fifty years now, on and off. They’re trained. Drilled. A new generation of soldiers flocking to the colors of a new kingdom.

There’s something intimidating about looking into the eyes of veteran sergeants and young officers, all of whom are older than me. Seeing them snap to salute me. I return the salutes and move forwards.

“What do you think, your grace?” Fëanor asks as I enter what’s apparently my war tent, the mobile command center that Rogier the Exile pioneered and is now standard practice for the kingdom.

I make a face at him. “Grace?”

He shrugs. “Your grace, majesty, most high, whatever you prefer. I’ve not spoken to a king in centuries.”

I can’t tell if he’s making fun of me or not. “Okay?”

“What do you think, then, your grace?” he asks again. “How do the Damerians compare to the Corintari?”

“I think…” I say, looking at the maps of Rogieria and the Taran plain before me on the table. When something catches my eyes. I look forwards, scowling.

“Your grace?”

I hold up a finger to silence the elf. “I think we’re exposed.”

The Taran plain is rich, but wide open.​

“From?” he asks, and a number of the staff officers and senior NCOs in the room turn from their duties to watch me, their noble Silmuna king, make his first decisions.

“Look here, I just realized it. This is a map of Andenica. Some of the best farmland in Escann, but that’s just it. As it stands, we have no real natural borders save the White Walls of Castanor in one corner. The capital, Taranton, is on the border of hostile nations. We’re surrounded on all sides. It wouldn’t be a long campaign to knock us out of a war.”

I tap the map, slowly finding my spine to speak louder, clearer as I try to explain. “See here? The Warriors of Ancard and the New Wanderers—Elikhand now, excuse me—have armies stationed within a day’s march of Taranton. Our armies are near the orcish frontier, but we don’t need such a massive police force against orcs. I’ve fought orcs before. You bloody their noses bad enough, and they’re happy to give you space to rebuild themselves. Humans, on the other hand?”

I shake my head. And think. And think.

My blood goes cold in my heart, and I can’t tell if this is something I want to do, or if I’m just acting out their expectations of what I should want to do.

“Tell the soldiers we’re marching,” I say.

“Where to?” one of the officers asks, snapping to attention.

I make a face at the obsequious display. “We’re marching to Robihon to end Elikhand. They’re heathens, a fresh kingdom like us. We need to hit first to secure our borders.”

“By your orders, your grace,” the officer says with a salute. Indoors, for some weird reason.

This is what a good king would have men do, right?​

I suit up in the finest armor my men provide me. It’s plate, covered in Damerian blue. I feel like they’re dressing me like the old portraits of Rogier the Exile I’ve seen around the castle in Taranton.

Fëanor suggests letting our general staff take the reigns. But I refuse him. My heart beats hard, but I know Rogieria needs a king who leads from the front. Rogier the Exile did. He was there in every battle, for over twenty years, until his bones were old and he was murdered.

He never stopped. He was a king from the back of a horse.

So I do the same. I don my armor, grab Rogier’s sword, and mount my Adenican courser.

And I march at the head of my new army.

Only to stop dead at the sight of the Elikhander army. Fifteen thousand men whose fathers fought alongside Corin with the Damerians. They’re people. Humans. I’ve studied old war stories my whole life, listening to tales of my father defeating orcs, fighting alongside Rogier, of breaking a Witch-Knight.

Those were all needful things. They were stories. With some good theory sprinkled in-between. I’ve skirmished with orcs with the Corintar, but this is different.

I have ordered good men to take up arms against men.

I look back to my soldiers, my generals and captains and sergeants.

I don’t know if I can do this…

But I have no choice.

So I just try not to shake too much as I raise my hand and order the Rogierans to advance. To put our drill into practice.

And pray to the Dame, Corin, and Castellos in that order to guide my hand and judgment.

It is a slaughter. Their army shatters to the winds instead of all being murdered.​

The Elikhanders came from Kheterata. They answered Corin’s call, and sought to establish a new home for themselves and their strange gods. But they fought with sickles and outdated tactics.

It’s almost comical. I’d trained my life to fight orcs. I’ve worked in skirmishes against them back in Corintar.

But with the backing of the Rogierans, mounted Adenicans, and cannon, we blow through their ranks. I lead my men in one final charge, tackling them as they retreat, and the Elikhander army shatters to the wind.

Just like that, it’s over.

We’ve won.

I have won.

And it doesn’t even feel real. I feel like I’m living from behind someone else’s eyes.​

I stand there, alone in the crowd, as the battles end. As the war is decided. With the swing of a sword, the shot of cannon.

There’s a ringing in my ears. And it takes me a moment to realize it’s shouting. The Rogierans shouting and cheering “Hail King Rogier Silmuna!”

I look down at my bloodied gauntlets. flex one finger, and then the other.

Hail King Rogier!

For a moment, when I look up, I think I can see my father. I can see Lothane standing beside Ellís. My older brother had fought with Father when I was too young. When I was busy reading, studying books, reading about ancient Castanor.

They were out fighting, the Grandmaster of the Corintar and his firstborn son.

I feel my breath hitch in my throat. If not for the heavy plate I wear, I’d be shaking and shivering.

I grab my sword as tight as I can, raise it over my head, and scream alongside the men in victory.

They cheer my name, but all I hear is ringing.​

We return to Taranton, with the spoils of war, and the defeat of Elikhand. I haven’t slept right in days, all the way from the battle near Banwick back to the streets of Taranton. My mind wanders, looking at the streets. So much of the city is built up from its ruins as the capital of old Adenica. It shows a lot in the features and older buildings.

It wouldn’t be hard to rebuild this place, I think, returning to the castle at the heart of the city. It’d even be nice to build a city for this kingdom. Peaceful. Something I can do.

“Your grace?” Fëanor asks.

I inhale sharply, snapping from my reveries. “Yeah?”

The old elf hands me a little white cup of something. I sniff at it and make a face.

“It is tea, your grace,” he says.

I pick it up by the little handle, which is how I presume you’re supposed to use a cup like this. “I think they made it wrong, Fëanor,” I say. “There’s little bits of leaf in it.”

He laughs. “It’s supposed to, your grace. Tea is made from leaves and boiled water. It is very good for one’s health and the nerves. It’s an old elven delicacy the Damerians somehow managed to improve.” He looks past me, towards the window out across Taranton’s nightscape.

Slowly, I take the cup. I sniff at it, and give it a sip. The taste is bitter and almost hurts. “It’s good, thank you,” I say.

Fëanor looks at me for a long moment, this ancient elf who’s seen centuries of war and scheming. So long that I pretend to drink more of it just to make him stop.

Trying not to grimace or cough from the heat and steam, I croak out a, “It is lovely, thank you.”

Until he laughs. “Your grace, you’re supposed to put sugar in it.”

“Oh,” I say. And blink. Stare at the reflection of my tusks in the dark leaf-water. “I see.”

Fëanor shakes his head, smiling. He leans against the wall, alternatingly looking between me and the cityscape outside. “You don't know what you're doing, do you?”

I sit up sharply. But words fail me.

The elf's smile is warm, reminiscent. “But that didn't stop you, not once. You saw the challenge in front of you, shrugged and accepted it, and now here we are. Adjusting to the new normal so quickly.”

I grip the cup of tea tighter. “I know enough.”

Fëanor looks at me with an expression that is all age. Elves aren't immortal, just longer in tooth than humans. Or half-orcs, not that anyone knows what the upper limits of our natural lifespan is yet. The oldest elves have been known to live up to four centuries. In this moment, I wonder how far back this man's memories go.

“Vincen didn't either. He was little more than a boy when it all started nearly a century and a half ago. But even before they started calling him the Old Owl, Vincen was, above all things, a good man. And when good men are put into bad situations, they make the most of it. Sometimes they triumph, and sometimes they fail. They murdered his little sister Riannón. They elected an outsider to the Dove Throne. And when he was backed into a desperate corner, when he didn't know what to do, the Old Owl hatched a plan.

“He told me.” Fëanor pauses. Smiles. “He told me ‘You don't get it, Finn. Maybe you can afford to wait; you'll outlive us all. For the rest of us, we've only got one shot in a lifetime. We've got to make it count.’”

“Why are you telling me this?” I ask softly.

He takes a long breath, and finally brings his own sugared tea to his lips. “Because I can see it in your eyes. The look of the cornered owl. Starving and hungry for something. But you're not lashing out. You see the trees and the forest both. You understand where you are. And you're trying to think of a solution through it, and are already onto the next move. You're not panicking, not freezing up. You know that sometimes no decision is worse than a bad one.

“You are just like Vincen, and I loved that stupid little human like a brother. He was wrong about one thing in the end, however.”

Fëanor stands. “Moments like these, opportunities like these, really only come once in any lifetime, even one as long as mine, your grace. I'm lucky to see it in the flesh, this intoxicating mix of hope and optimism and frayed nerves. This Silmuna who stands before me, when I once believed none more would come. The last Silmuna of the old world, and the first of the new one I want to help build.”

He turns towards the door, but not before I can grab his arm and stop him.

“Wait,” I say, feeling almost breathless. “His father. What did Vincen's father think of him? Did he believe in his son? Did he support him? Or did he just let the pieces fall where they may, and Vincen had to put it all together himself?”

Fëanor gives me a little smile, shaking his head, and pulling his arm from my grip. “Those little cubes are sugar. Damerians love their tea. Good night, your grace.”

Already on to the next move.

Fëanor's words swim in my mind. Everything the old elf told me.

The Last Silmuna of the Old World, the First of the New One.

I look at my hands. At the Damerian tea I’ve been trying to grow a taste for.

I am not the great warrior my big brother Ellís is. Nor am I am the hero my father is, the kind of man that a Goddess sacrificed her life to save. In a way, I’m only here because Corin herself gave it all for Lothane.

Father spoke of Corin often, in stories to his men, of her heroism and her dreams. But when he was alone, and when mother wasn’t around, he sang a different tune. Something more lost and empty. Of that little redhead from Bennon who saved his life, and was the first human to see Father as a person, as a man.

A Goddess gave her life for my father. An entire generation of lost men, soldiers, and heroes dedicated theirs to my grand-uncle, Rogier.

Who am I to bear their name and legacy, their hopes and dreams, and hold Rogieria in my hands?

Heroes, soldiers, and exiles look to me as king and leader. Why?​

Fëanor is right, however. Damerian tea is a great sleep aid. For the first time in months since accepting this crown, the frayed bundle of nerves loosely pretending to be a king that I am is able to sleep.

And I dream.

I see a mighty tower in a field of purple tulips. A crescent moon hangs over the sky. I approach it, and the flowers burst into flames and salt. The tower crumbles, and I climb its collapsing stairs which are covered in ash.

At its top, I look out across a sea of soldiers carrying the Rogieran banner. A gilded throne with doves is up here. A crowned skeleton sits upon it, with an old owl perched upon it. I reach out towards the throne, maybe for the crown, maybe for the owl.

Only to know someone is behind me.

I turn to see a pretty girl with freckles, arm-in-arm with a hardened warrior, face covered in stubble.

“I’ve always wanted to be in a prophetic dream!” the girl cooes with a Wesdamerian accent. She tugs on the man’s arm. “Say the line, say the line; I’ve been hyped for this for weeks!”

I reach for the man I’ve seen in portraits all across Taranton. I reach for Rogier the Exile. The old owl takes flight and lands on my arm, talons digging into my flesh.

“What do I do?” I ask suddenly, desperately.

Rogier gives the girl a tired, loving smile, before he turns a stern expression to me. “Remember, Young Owl: a new world is born from the graves and charnel pits. But more than that.” He holds out a snack for the old owl on my arm, which hoots excitedly as it gobbles the treat. “On this road of no release, the only way out is through, is forwards. I don’t expect to see you on the other side for a very long time, your grace.”

I just stare. “There was something in that tea, wasn’t there?”

The freckled girl laughs, shaking Rogier’s arm. “Corin’s tiddy, I can see the family resemblance. I’m looking forward to seeing what you do, lil’ owl boy. Rogier Silmuna.”

I wake up with a start, covered in sweat in my bed, with a raging headache.

I go to the meeting of my council that day, head swimming with the dream. Sometimes I hold the meetings from my throne room, and from a meeting room elsewhere in the castle. I drink more tea to settle my nerves, which Fëanor is happy to brew me. I listen to my advisors, generals, and prominent lords.

When the day is over, I ask Fëanor for three things: a map of Dameria, one of old Escann, and a final of today’s Eastern Cannor.

He gives me a single nod. Has them brought to me.

And leaves me alone in the candlelight.

I don’t know what I’m doing. I barely understand what’s going on.

I look in the mirror and see a king I’m not sure I even know.

All I know is the man looking back at me is named Rogier Silmuna. They call him the “Young Owl.” He has listened to his council, his generals, his everything.

And he—and I—dream of doing right by my name, by my ancestors, by my people.

I owe them that much.

I owe them everything I’ve got.

Even if what I have is… up for debate.

I take one last breath, take one last sip of tea, and make one last plan for the morning.

Rogieria.

I am Rogier Silmuna. And come what may, I have to make that mean something.

A new world is born from the graves and charnel pits.

And I shall be its maker.

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 7: Bad Moon Rising​

Fëanor opens the door to the throne room carefully, carrying his cup of morning tea before today’s work. His movements are slow, precise. As if afraid to wake the ghosts that haunt Taranton. The first rays of sunlight peak in through the windows. Today is administrative business, followed by a session of the Rogieran parliament. Delegates will be arriving in short order, representing their boroughs and special interests.

He closes the door softly, turns around, and stops to stare at me. “Your grace? What are you doing up so early?”

My hands have been steepled before my face so long that my elbows are almost locked like that. The candles have burned out over the night, and my eyes have adjusted to the dawn light as I stare at the map.

“Síl na Eán,” I say, voice creaky from a night of disuse. “Kings of Farraneán. Tell me about them.”

Fëanor takes his time sitting down at the war table that dominates the throne room. The business table, only removed when we need to impress special guests with an open throne room. The elf lifts his teacup to his lips, only to stop and offer it to me instead.

My joints pop as I move them, reaching to take the drink. “Thank you.”

He looks out at the map. “They’re an old house. Not as old as the Silmunas. Farraneán was a hard to rule nation, a mix of humans and elves in usually equal populations. On one side of the country was human Adenica. On the other, at the end of the Forlorn Vale, is the Elfrealm of Ibevar.”

“What of its people?” I ask, tapping the map, the sections labeled Ancardia and Luciande, newborn adventurer republics. I feel slow and sluggish from a lack of sleep, even though I’m still not tired.

“Still very much alive,” he says. “They lived in isolated, fortified cities. While the Greentide crashed into and destroyed it, it only crushed the authority of house síl na Eán. They survived in a castle in Valefort. The last legitimate king only has a single child, a daughter.”

I take a long sip of the tea. “Did the people love their kings?”

He looks to the side with a shrug. “They were a fair and even-handed dynasty, so yes. As much as people can love a monarch.”

I swirl the sugary tea in my mouth, tasting the way Fëanor prefers his brew. It gives me an excuse to stay silent, to stare at the map, at the endless possibilities. “Farraneán’s lands are a wide open gap in our armor. Like Elikhand, but better organized. A dagger pointed at the heart of Rogieria.”

The elf just nods. “Your orders, your grace?”

I let out a long sigh. “I need your help, Finn.”

Fëanor arches an eyebrow, leaning back. “Anything, King Rogier.”

“When parliament opens today, I want your help as my prime minister to get their blessing,” I say, making and unmaking a fist, playing with my own fingers. “I want a declaration of war on the Republic of Ancardia, to march into the Forlorn Vale and take the lands of Farraneán.”

“You need only speak the orders, your grace. Parliament is merely an advisory group. Local policy makers.”

I swallow and nod. “It is an old tradition. The Damerian Republic had its citizens vote for war. So did the later kingdom and grand duchy.” I let out a tired breath. “I am the heir to the old order. Building a new world from the graves and charnel pits. A synthesis of old and new. I want them to vote to support me, Finn. To show them I am a Silmuna. And to remind them of why they made me king.”

Fëanor stands. “Your will be done, your grace. We shall make it happen.”

He pauses. “But, please, get some sleep first. Your eye bags have bags.”

It’s a short session. Parliament votes unanimously to support the king, and my war plans.​

Right now, I wonder what my father is doing. In Corintar, we didn't vote on matters of state. The knightly order was organized like Corin's Circle, her party of adventurers. People presented her the information, she declared her plans, and then everyone was allowed to offer opinions and advice to perfect it.

More to the point, I wonder what he would say if he could see me now. He's still alive, of course. But the Corintar do not make a habit of taking arms against men. With the exception of the story of Laurens síl Place, the Corintari have only warred with orcs and goblins. Sometimes they kill them all. Sometimes they're happy with converts, defeating orcish warlords and usurping their throne. It's a common enough tactic to defang orcs.

Even Rogier the Exile spent most of his life defeating monsters.

Now here I am, leading the army of my country, in a war against settled peoples. To destroy a Republic of humans, by humans, for humans.

And I have never been more keenly aware of the tusks on my face that no amount of nearly trimmed beard can hide. That despite generations of human blood thick enough that you might not even be able to tell I wasn't one of them, that maybe it isn't enough to truly hide that bit of monster still left.

I sit upon my white-faced Adenican courser, my army beside me, and the Ancardian defense before me. All I can do is remember the ringing in my ears the last time I was in this position against Elikhand. The feeling that I had committed needful things. Actions of cold rationality.

And people had died.

But I think what I feel most of all is… nothing. And that scares me. This thought that I've internalized the logic and reasoning behind my actions enough that I don't consider the human factor.

“Your majesty?” one of the generals beside me asks.

I close my eyes and take a breath. “We have them surrounded. Order a probing move. I'll personally lead the following hammer and anvil.”

I have done it again. Put theory into practice and led my men to victory.​

The Ancardians called themselves a “Soldier’s Republic.” In true adventurer fashion, they chose their own leads from amongst themselves. But where in Rogieria the Damerians formed a kingdom with a radically equal peerage, the Ancardians built a republic like old Dameria.

It makes sense, really. They came from Ancard’s Crossing in Wesdameria. We speak the same language with similar accents.

Where things differ is that I, as king, was more efficient at organizing an army. I had men like Fëanor by my side.

And we had massed artillery.

Ancardia falls before the Silmuna boot.

One for the money. But two to get even.​

That makes two nations I have destroyed. Two human realms with dreams of a future or their people that I put under the power of the blue moon. To build my people up, I must destroy others. But hypocrisy is the lubricant which keeps the wheel of society turning.

Fëanor and I draft the treaty once their armies are destroyed. They fought with honor, which is the only leniency I may grant them. They are Wesdamerians and there’s still bad blood there.

In the end, we decide to end the republic altogether, absorbing its land directly into the sphere of Taranton.

Adenica, all of the Taran plain, is now under my purview.

I am a conqueror well and truly. The heartland of Rogieria is safe.

Fëanor hands me a set of documents.

I look up from my thoughts. “What’s this?”

“Petitions,” he says. “Now with all of Adenica controlled, there’s the matter of to whom we grant the land and settling rights.”

“To our people?” I say, confused.

The elf shakes his head. “Who are our people, your grace? The Damerians who followed Rogier the Exile; or the Adenner returning home, many of whom fought for us.”

I read the petitions, the arguments from either side. “Can we leave this to parliament?”

Fëanor shakes his head, pausing from his tea. “No, your grace. Parliament isn’t in session for a good while. Only you can make this call.”

“What do you recommend?” I ask.

He smiles thinly. “This isn’t the call of a minister. This is a king’s choice. Damerian or Adenner. It wouldn’t be my place to say one way or another.”

“Nice way to dodge the issue, Finn.”

His smile widens. “I do my best to avoid work I don’t want to do.”

I sigh, rubbing my forehead. “In victory we are faced with the possibility of losing more.” I swallow. “Draft diplomatic overtures to House síl na Eán, please. And have the court pages bring me books.”

“Which, your grace?” he says, taking notes of his tasks in a little journal.

“Any information we have about Adenica,” I say. “I… don’t want to make this choice blind.”

Hey, Dame, goddess of wisdom and maybe my ancestor, a little help here?​

Parliament is no assistance. Nor are my ministers. Those I do ask have wildly different takes. The Adenner among them, of course, state that they should be rewarded for their service to Rogieria. While the heirs to the Sons of Dameria make a good argument that it was Damerian steel and wit that reclaimed this land.

It wouldn't do to just abandon any one side. I have a duty to those who swear oaths to me, no matter whence they come. I am a Silmuna; to them, it means something. And I want it to stay meaning something. Reward loyalty and competence.

I pore over old books late into the night. Sleep is for the week anyhow. The Taran fields, the “fertile land crossed by rivers,” is valued land. But every book just talks of the old kingdom of Adenica; they talk of the land, the rivers, the exports. These books written before the Greentide say very little of the people who lived here.

“And what if they get angry?” I ask Fëanor one evening as the council is closing its daily meeting. I take a long drink of tea to calm my nerves. It’s an acquired taste in its own way.

Packing up his things for the evening, he says, “It is the way of kings.”

“What do you mean?”

He gives me a serious look. “It is, in my opinion, the advantage of kingship and monarchy. Those beholden to the wills of the people may become their slaves. They look towards re-election, keeping power most of all. A king has no such concerns. A good king understands he cannot please everyone, and in fact he should not. He must play the long game, looking to what will benefit his people and demesne in the long term, not what feels right in the moment.”

“How autocratic of you,” I say dryly.

Fëanor shakes his head. “When I was a boy, it was elections that led to the death of Anbennar. The elector-counts and -dukes elected Vincen’s little sister for her magical power. Until they decided they made a mistake. They killed his sister, and then elected a Lorentish king to be Emperor.

“Vincen was alone in the world. The owl, the grand duke. And when the elected emperor died. The thrones were empty and unknown, and the electors unable to decide what to do. The people had failed. And it was left to monarchs to make the choice for themselves. So Vincen asked me a question like yours.”

“What did you tell him?”

The old elf smiles wistfully. He leans back, lacing his fingers, lost in his reveries. “I've lost the exact words to the decay of decades, but I remember the spirit. ‘Whatever choice you make, only you can make it; I will stand by you for all time, my brother.’ We clasped elbows, rallied our men, and marched on Lorentainé for the throne that belonged to the Silmunas. It wasn’t popular. Many were terrified of what we were doing. But only a king could do it. There’s a right thing, and there’s a wrong thing, and there’s a king’s thing. They’re not mutually inclusive nor exclusive.”

“How does that help me here, with the Adenner?”

Fëanor finishes collecting his things. “I told you, I wasn’t going to make this choice. Merely that I have faith whatever choice you make, you will see it through. Goodnight, your grace. In the morning I’m hoping to hear back from House síl na Eán.”

And like that, I am alone. Just a throne room, several petitions, and a map of old Dameria. Words swirling my head like a drain.

Until the words of Rogier in the dream come to me. And I realize that no choice is worse than none at all. I could fight and work out a compromise, but that would only leave people happy.

A king’s choice.

I alone may decide who are Rogierans.

And I have to make the decision with an iron fist, and feign strength and confidence.

I have to, right?

No man rules alone, but a King must stand on the shoulders of his giants and make his own way.
[And here we see the first of several unique mechanics for Rogieria, the “Silmuna Legacy” points. Depending on your choices, you get legacy points for “Absolutist Monarch,” “Beloved of the People,” and “Restorer of the Old Order.” After certain big story missions they will provide a unique bonus. There are 9 bonuses to collect, but only 3 you can acquire in any one playthrough]​

There’s unhappy people, but a king cannot please everyone. He must make his choices.

At least, that’s what I tell myself. I’m not happy with it, not all of it. But I need to pretend that I am. I cannot show weakness. I must project strength. The kind of lies that people accept so thoroughly they become true.

Thus, what’s done is done. Rogieria is the New Dameria, founded by her exiled sons. These Damerians are skilled farmers, traders, and soldiers. With their undying loyalty to the Silmuna cause, we can turn Adenica from a land of old-timey knights into a proper state at the forefront of this brave new world we’re building in Escann.

A brave new world built from the graves and charnel pits of the world that was.

I feel a bad moon rising.​

Adenica, however, is only one half of the equation. The rest of it lies in the Forlorn Vale, the lands once belonging to the Kingdom of Farraneán.

My council and I work to settle the Damerians throughout Adenica. Until one meeting on the council, one of my cabinet presents the fruits of our overtures to the former Farrani kings.

“Is it good news?” I ask.

The man, síl Seinathíl, looks pensive. “That’s debatable. But Martin did reply.”

“Who?”

He frowns. “Martin síl na Eán, last of the royal line of Farraneán.”

I smack my forehead. “Oh, yes. Yes, of course. Sorry, I haven’t had my tea this morning; my head isn't running right.”

Fëanor gives me a wry look. “I’ll have some fetched for you. I fear you may need it for this. Please stay sitting, your grace.”

So, I’ve offered to marry a woman I don’t know. Because it’s what kings must.​

The game of thrones is a complex affair. One that makes my head hurt. In the Corintar, there was a certain might makes right approach to the region. There were orcs here, we killed them, and now this is our land. You are being liberated; do not resist. End of argument.

I’ve tried that twice as king. Elikhand and Ancardia, to mixed results. Fantastic on a map, but personally I still have my doubts.

Farraneán is an old kingdom. Its people more tied to the land than the Khetists or the Ancardians. These Farrani are still alive in significant numbers, unlike their Andenner or Blademarcher cousins. Enough of them that their support and faith in me would make securing an entire region a cinch.

That’s how it all works in my head, of course. That’s the plan on paper.

But no plan ever survives contact with the enemy, I’m learning.

I take my tea, look out on the nervous eyes of my council, and open Martin’s letter.

No pressure, right?​

Lord Martin invites me to his “Caseán,” a local Farrani term for the isolated fortress-cities that dot the landscape. He’s willing to parley and agree, on one condition.

That his daughter, only child and heiress, herself consents to the agreement. His human daughter. To me, the half-orc king.

“Do I look good, Finn?” I ask suddenly.

Fëanor squints. “You look rough around the edges, your grace.”

“I haven’t been sleeping, is all!”

“Whaaaat? Not sleeping, youuu?” he asks, putting his hand to his mouth. “How can this be, your grace?”

“Ha-ha,” I say, pushing away at my chair. My legs are sore from a mix of exercise followed by hours of sitting around doing nothing. “But for real, how do I look my best and talk to girls? I need to learn this now. You need to help me.”

Síl Seinathíl raises a hand. “Is it too late to quit my job?”

I point at him. “Yes!”

“Fuck,” he groans. “But on Ryala's honor, your grace, we can have tailors sew you up the finest suit in Escann. After that.” He shrugs. “Talking to women is just another kind of battle. You’ve waged war, led men from the front. Compared to that, what’s the worst she can say?”

One of my councilors says, “She can laugh and say you remind her of her dad?”

I cringe inside. “Okay, maybe no more advice. Just—get me something to wear. I need to see a barber, too. Then we take a carriage to Valefort to meet Margery síl na Eán.”

Nevermind—some sweat.​

The Caseán in Valefort is what I imagined. A well-protected little fort nestled against the Godshield mountains. Martin had, apparently, only begrudgingly worked with the Ancardians, who refused to recognize his claims as a noble lord.

Still, I can’t help but worry I’ll fuck it up. I still have tusks. My skin and eyes look human, but I’ve got just enough of an orcish silhouette to remind people that I’m not really human. Not like the Farrani.

To the Corintari, I’m the son of their greatest living hero. To Rogieria, I am the blood of Silmuna and Dameria itself.

To the native Escanni, to the people of Farraneán?

I look just like one of the monsters who destroyed their homes and way of life.

I feel like an other, and my skin and nerves crawl at the thought.

“Your majesty, welcome to Valefort!” Martin says I arrive, on a red carpet, as the feast’s guest of honor. There are so many eyes on me I almost don’t know what to do. Human, elves, and half-elves. All of them staring at me with mixed expressions of concern, mild worry, and false cheer. The only orc I can see is, of all things, a servant.

I open my mouth to say something, only to fall silent. He’s just a normal man. Brown of hair and blue of eyes, with a slight build. I’d call him on the taller end of things, but I have my father’s blood; I tower over nearly everyone here.

“Thank you, Lord Martin,” I finally say after a long pause.

He touches my arm. “We have looked forward to meeting His Majesty,” Martin says, leading me towards the party. He laughs heartily. “We have the best foods the Farrani have, and wish to show you traditional ballroom dances. I’ve been reading about your family, and so we have provided Damerian tea, and hope it shall be much to your pleasure.”

Compared to everyone else, I feel like a peacock. Damerian blue, with a crescent moon on my chest as if to really hammer home the point that yes, I am a Silmuna. Everyone else is wearing far more normal, human colors. They’re not as rich as Rogieria, more just surviving from one conqueror to the next.

I follow him to the start of the table, the center of the feast. I look around, at the men and women, and try to figure out which is his daughter. Feeling my heart deeper and deeper in my throat.

“To a long friendship between Farraneán and His Majesty, King Rogier Silmuna,” Martin says, toasting his glass.

I try not to grimace. “That’s my name.”

Because I’m very fucking elegant when people put me on the spot.

“And to my daughter, Margery,” he says, gesturing widely. “Oh, and she had to step out into the garden. She’ll be back presently. Please, make yourself at home.”

That’s a bad omen.

Martin smiles. “Would you like something? Tea, peasant?” He snaps his fingers. “Garçons, feed your king.”

A downcast orc in the corner snaps to action. I can make out his slave branding.

I hold my hand up. “No, no, I’ll get it myself, Martin.”

“A very can-do, do it yourself attitude!” he says. “I commend you on your gusto, your grace. Haha!”

“Riiiiight.”

I go alone to the amenities tables, looking at the food, the wines and teapots. I turn from the crowds, putting my hands over my face, and exhale long. I can feel them all staring at my back.

The orcish butler standing on the other side gives me a nonplussed look. “Milord, can this one help you?”

I slowly look over the rail-thin greenskin. He quickly averts his eyes, staring at the ground. “How long have you served here?” I ask in Orcish, something I picked up back in Corintar.

He stares at me for a very long, very startled moment. Before replying in Cannorian Common, “Not enough to make up for the sins of my blood. Justice through servitude.” It sounds like a phrase beaten into him.

“Why, because you’re an orc?”

He stares at me like he doesn’t understand the question. His eyes go to my tusks, and then just looks incredibly puzzled. “Milord?”

“Answer me.”

The servant points. “Someone wishes to speak to you.”

I scowl at him.

Until I hear a woman’s voice behind me. “My oh my, your grace. It seems we are like mind that sometimes the help is more interesting than the lords.”

I whirl around and see her.

Margery síl na Eán in the flesh.​

She doesn’t flinch. She holds her ground, looking up at me with a curious expression. She is, in a word, gorgeous. Tall and regal, in a fine dress that hugs her form. I almost feel like I should be dancing for her amusement, that look in her eyes. She’s a little older than me, too. A young woman when I was an old boy.

“Margery?” I ask.

She snaps a finger at me, winking. “First name basis already? My, don’t you move fast, Rogier!”

“What?”

Margery covers her mouth and laughs. It’s a dainty, aristocrat laugh. A laugh I could grow to like. “My oh my, boy, orc got your tongue? Or, my mistake, merely a quarter of your tongue? Whatever the case, I assure you, your grace, I am a better conversation than the help.”

I look back at the orc, who’s quietly excused himself. Something about that doesn’t sit well with me. And I worry that now isn’t the time, nor is it the place. And that makes my stomach flip.

When I turn back. Margery is watching me curiously, expectantly.

“What’s wrong, your majesty?” she asks.

Allowing myself a breath, I refocus. I assess the situation. The woman before me and that almost smug little expression she wears.

“Ah,” she breathes. “I understand. The punch bowl is hardly the place to discuss why you, a complete stranger, wants to marry me. Come.”

She makes a single gesture and leaves. I take one last glance where the orc was before following her.

“There’s a good boy,” she says, taking a seat.

I elect to stand, craning my neck to look down at her.

Margery’s eyes glint. “Oooh,” she almost squeaks. “I think I know that look in your eyes. Here comes your well-reasoned argument why I should give my father’s kingdom to you and just go along as the boring wife that history forgets, yes? Or just going to play the part of the half-orc brute and forgo subtlety?” She waves a hand nonchalantly. “Too cliché for my tastes. I’m a lady of class, after all.” She winks.

I stare at her and sigh. “No, Margery,” I say. “My mind is fairly empty at the moment. If anything, I’m wondering how many people your family owns, and how much it would cost for me to free them.”

“Huh. So he does speak.” Margery sits up slightly, with a look like she’s slowly reappraising me. “Why would you want to do that, free the help?”

“Because if you were just some kid one day, and the next you had the power to change the world, what would you do with that power?”

She reaches for a glass of wine, taking a sip to give her a reason to be confused, quiet. “I confess, this is not how I imagined this conversation would go, on several levels.”

“How did you?”

Margery rotates her wine glass. “Honestly? I expected the infamous young owl, the Last Silmuna, the man with a monster’s orcish blood in his veins, to be more…” She shrugs her free hand. “I expected you to come in like you owned the place. My father is scared of you; have you seen how he’s been acting all night? They all are.”

My father is scared of you.

I just stand there, digesting her words. So casual, so full of meaning. “I was trying to politely ignore it.”

She arches an eyebrow. “You could have fooled me, the way you were acting, all awkwardly casual with my father.”

“I have a lot of experience pretending I don’t realize people hate or fear me. It comes with the territory.”

“Because of what you are?” she asks, tilting her head.

“Used to be that,” I say. “Now, I think it’s because I am a king and I have an army, not merely all of…” I gesture at my face. “This.”

Margery squints at me, inspecting me. “Is it that hard to hide? Shave those hints of tusks, clip those almost elven ears, and you’d just look like a big Northman instead of half-orc. You’d almost be a real looker, in a rough-and-tumble frontiersman kind of way.”

“I’m glad the only standards you have are that I mutilate myself. I do that and you’ll think I’m hot and worth a ring?”

She sits back, putting her hands together. “That’s what I’m trying to figure out, Rogier. Not that—please don’t mutilate yourself for me. You don’t look thaaat bad.”

“Thanks,” I say dryly.

Margery shakes her head. “No, see, I’m trying to figure out if I want any part in your schemes for me. Your letters have been clear. You reckon you can use me. Just another piece in the puzzle you’re putting together. In the last year, you have ended two nations by force of arms, subjugated my father, and now come demanding my hand to cement yourself as king of a third.”

I look away. “Are my ambitions so obvious?”

She shrugs. “I pride myself on my deductive reasoning abilities. And now they tell me you want to continue your quest of conquest and tyranny, and my hand and womb are your weapons of choice.”

“Got it in one.”

Margery gives a shameless little smile and winks. “I know.”

Words fail me for a very long time. I feel naked, disarmed. My plans exposed and put through someone else’s eyes, and I feel… more than a little disgusted with myself and why I’m here. My mouth opens. Closes. Opens again.

“What did your world look like when you were little?” I ask.

Margery covers her hand with her mouth, wearing a thoughtful expression. “Black. At the mercy of others. A father trying to save his own ass, while telling me stories of a beautiful country that was ripped from our hands by monsters. A land of peace, culture, and bustling cities. Where the only Damerians were traders. The orcs were just a distant menace in the Serpentspine Mountain. And the people we were entrusted to rule loved us. A birthright stolen from us, a bloodline that used to mean something before stronger powers declared our home was theirs by conquest. What about yours, Rogier?”

I stare into my palm. “In shadows. What do you do when your older brother is a fearsome warrior that women want and men want to be? When your father is the kind of a man a goddess would give her life for? When you’re offered a crown, but everything they give you is built on the shoulders of giants, like Rogier the Exile, who birthed a nation by sweat and blood. What do you do when everything people expect of you, you think anyone could do with the tools you’ve been provided?

“I learned I was Rogier Silmuna when I was eight years old,” I go on, as if unable to stop myself, “in a backhanded way. My father was there, but busy. And then suddenly, everyone looks at me like I’m some return of the king fantasy, and expects the world from me. They tell me stories of men who lived centuries ago and expect it to mean something to me, about a family I only just learned I was a part of.”

“So you feel you need to lash out, act up,” she says.

I shake my head. “I feel I need to do more than any man should have to just to make ends meet. Because I live in terror of a day when I don’t, when I’m not constantly working on the next plan, the next conquest, the next renovation of an old city—because what if that’s the day they realize I’m a fraud this entire time?

“Truth is, Margery,” I say, and sigh. “Is that everyone I meet can only look backwards, fond memories of times that maybe never existed. They want to rebuild what was lost. And if I returned to that past, they’d see me as a fool, a charlatan. So I think, I think, that the only way I can build distance from that is to sprint forwards, sword in hand. To build a new world so grand, so spectacular, that they forget a past I should be making, and get lost in the future I create.”

I spread my hands. “So that’s who I am, Margery. That’s why I want to marry you. I do not know you, and you do not know me. You’re right about what I want, but for the wrong reasons. The way I see it, no matter the cost, I will move forward, I will make my dreams a reality, because the past is too terrifying to let catch me. And I want you by my side when I do it.”

Margery regards me for a long, long moment. She looks into her wine glass and finishes it. “Of all the things I expected of the Young Owl, I placed an honest man at the end of that list. I think it would’ve been easier if you were someone to hate and despise, the half-orc brute I thought you’d be. Not someone I almost pity. You need to perhaps learn when to shut your mouth, and I mean that respectfully.”

She casts her blue eyes to mine. “If I accept this, I will be playing into your schemes. But I want to be more than that.”

I nod once.

“Maybe you fear the past. But maybe you’re right about the past never really existing as we imagined it.” Margery stands up. Her head comes up to my chest; she cranes it to meet my eyes. “I want to build the Farraneán my father told me of, for myself and its people. If its glory never existed, then I want to create it. But I can’t do it alone. Just like how you can’t escape the specters of what was alone, Rogier.”

She puts a hand on my breast. “I’ll never agree to marry you to be a piece in your toolbox. But if you’ll accept me as your queen and equal, and you help me build my dream, I will build yours. Not as pawns, but as partners.

“Besides,” she adds with a wink. “You told me all your secrets. At this point I pretty much own your ass with blackmail material. You really need to learn to keep your handsome mouth shut.”

And in that moment, something inside me breaks, and it clicks into place with this little princess.​

Martin weeps openly as he walks Margery town the aisle. We exchange our vows. I place my cloak over hers, symbolizing my protection of her. And as we lean forwards to kiss, she smiles like a succubus and mouths I own you now, boy.

With that, I am King of Rogieria and implied rightful ruler of Farraneán.

But the road to get there must be paved with blood. We’re hardly in Valefort a weekend before I’m back on the road, marching with my royal guard back to Taranton.

She stops by my tent one night, just enters unannounced. I glance up at her, nod, and then go back to my paperwork.

Margery stops behind me. I still tower over her. She reaches a hand out, hesitates, and then more firmly puts it on my shoulder. “What are you doing, Rogier?”

“That’s a complicated question with an unsatisfying answer,” I say, moving a map of Taranton onto my desk. “It’s addictive, though. Maps of Escann. Details of the capital and our plans to expand the city. Official inquiries for future plans from informants as far as the imperial capital of Anbenncóst.”

The woman arches an eyebrow, and man can that thing climb. “It’s a lot of information.”

“It’s what I need,” I say proudly. “There’s so much to do, so little time. How can I just sit still and go to sleep when there’s all this work I can be doing?”

She sucks on her lips. “Let me help.”

I eye her for a moment, then slide over the paperwork on the desk towards her.

She reaches up to tie her long hair up into a ponytail before hunching over the desk. “Is this a map of Rogieria?”

“More central Escann itself, around Lake Silvermere. Mine was the first true new kingdom, but others are showing up. The Company of the Thorn now calls itself the Republic of Luciande, Pioneer’s Guild as Núrcestir, Order of the Iron Scepter rebrands as Esthíl.”

“Is this map accurate? They all look so small.”

I shake my head. “They’re big. Rogieria is just the biggest.”

The worst part of the map is I think I can make nicer borders with just a few thousand more deaths…​

Margery covers her mouth with the back of her hand. “You took down Ancardia. What’s your next move, Rogier?”

I consider. “Depends on the tools I have. What information. I’m learning, slowly, that the best weapon at my disposal is good information and being extremely predatory.”

She reaches past me to tap on the edge of the map, Luciande. “Them,” she says.

I frown. “Are you just saying that to make me reclaim the rest of your country?”

Margery shrugs. “I used to live in the area. My family would often travel to various Caseáns in the region. Ancardia was okay. But in ‘Luciande,’ people were afraid. Some Farrani still live there, but the nation is ruled by Roilsardi. Their old leader, Lucian, was…”

“Cruel?”

“A creep,” she supplies with a simple shrug.

“Hmm.”

“Their land isn’t very secure. People keep to themselves as best they can. Not much for friendship. You’re likely to vanish in the middle of the night if you leave town.”

“Bandit or monster problems?”

Margery almost hugs herself. “I don’t know. I just never had a good feeling there. No one does. I know the area, however. I know where the forts and towns are. If you march there and take me, I doubt the people will mind. Come as liberators of the Farrani from a foreign republic of the Roilsardi.”

“And very quickly restore your family’s rule over the Forlorn Vale.”

Margery frowns. “I never said I wasn’t trying to manipulate you. Just that this is a good next step.”

I look into her eyes, then back to my maps. “I’ll meet with my general staff and look into it.”

Maybe it’s just me, but I got a bad feeling about the guys with a skull surrounded by snakes on their flag. Just a feeling. I’m sure it’s nothing.
[Luciande is a creepy vampire country, all about orcish slavery and uncovering who the first vampire is.]​

In the end, I take Margery with me to the meeting of my generals and commanders. We’re still fresh from the war with Ancardia, high on victory after victory.

We go over the maps of Luciande, of the Forlorn Vale. She ties her hair up and goes over areas she knows. Forts and other isolated homesteads of tactical value. Whenever I am at a loss at one of their questions, Margery steps forwards to answer them like she’s been doing this all her life.

Fëanor elbows me as my wife and queen speaks to the generals, giving orders and commands on where to attack, when to march.

“She’s quite the lady,” he says.

I nod. “Yes, she is.”

“Leading us to war awfully quick,” he adds, producing a cup of tea from seemingly nowhere.

“I made her a promise. And she to me,” I said.

“Yes, wedding vows.”

“More than that,” I say.

Margery turns, meets my eyes, and winks. She looks darkly satisfied with herself. I feel a shiver of fear down my spine, but smile back.

Luciande doesn’t see us coming.

Margery planned this ambush.​

If there’s something I’m coming to learn, other than the fact that Margery looks both gorgeous and slightly silly trying to wear armor when she appears by my side on campaign, it’s that these adventurer republics can’t hold a candle to a true kingdom.

They built themselves on the claims of representing their people, but they seem trapped by their own governance. Incapable of making truly unpopular but needed choices. Luciande poorly funded its army during peacetime, whereas I ensure my professional soldiers are fully paid at all times.

The people themselves, if left to rule, cannot be trusted to keep themselves safe.

Only a king can keep his people safe from the wolves, from predatory lords, from the metaphorical vampires.

The campaign looks like it could be long, a slog through the old farmlands to root out the Lucianders. But Margery knows where to go. She knows old roads. And the native Farrani, who know their own rightful queen marches with the Rogierans, are eager to turn coat on the Roilsardi adventurers and side with the Rightful King.

In the end, the republic is no match for the disciplined men who follow me into battle.

Adenica and Farraneán fall under the Silmuna moon.
[I’d be under risk of a major coalition against my aggression at this point, if not for the fact that everyone is already in a coalition against other nations, like Wex and Arbaran. It pays to be an opportunist predator.]​

And when it’s over, Farraneán belongs to my kingdom. To my people. To the Damerians and Farrani who call me their king.

Margery just sits there, helping me read the reports, and just… sort of leans back and blinks.

I laugh, putting a hand on her shoulder. “How does it feel to be Queen of Farraneán, Margery?”

She leans back, head upside-down, looking over at me. It’s a funny sight and I laugh again. She reaches out to flick my cheek. “I’m angry. Very angry.”

“Why is that?”

Margery sighs. “Because I was hoping to nag you about this for at least another decade. I didn’t expect you to be able to do this within the year of our wedding. Now what am I going to nag you with?”

I grin wide. “See, this was my evil plan this entire time. Find a woman who could kick my ass into gear, defang her, and point her at my enemies when she has nothing else to do.”

She sighs, rolling her eyes. “You’re impossible. But you’re my impossible, boy.”

I lean down to kiss her. Everytime our lips touch it feels new, a fresh experience. She is my queen, but… I don’t know. I expected this to be a union of political convenience. Not whatever it’s becoming.

Margery pushes me away before reaching up to let her hair down. She sighs, long and hard. “Alright, fine, fine. Most of my dreams are done. Now I’m bored. Take me to Taranton so I can find more problems for us to tackle together.”

I nod once, making a fist. “Let’s.”

Our agents in Anbennar work hard to uncover the lost graves of my family.​

I told Margery that nothing scared me more than the past. The future is our destiny, not the mythical past.

Even then, the past is full of questions. And from the very start, unbeknown to anyone, Fëanor and I have been working to learn where my ancestors are buried.

Fëanor brings me the reports as Margery and I are taking evening tea. Which mostly consists of her taking sips, loudly gagging, looking pissed when I laugh at her, and angrily finishing her cup as if to prove something to me.

He and I read the letters, the reports from our spies in Anbennar. Make a few quick comments.

“Hey!” Margery shouts, banging her cup on the table. “Another round. And also some beer to wash this piss down!” She points her finger at me. “Get your ass back here, boy. You’re not going to saddle me with all these diagrams of Taranton and then leave me to play with your elf!”

“Women, am I right?” I ask Fëanor.

Fëanor smiles and shakes his head. “I’ll get you more tea.”

“Thank you,” I say, and look towards my wife and her pouting expression. “Have them bring extras, please.”

A new moon rises over Cannor.​

Margery lets her hair down. That’s how I know the work is done.

I hold her hand. She makes a face at me, but doesn’t stop me. She watches as the cranes and masons finish the last touches on the castle in Taranton, in Rogieria.

“I think you’re on an ego trip, Rogier,” she says. “Taranton was a fine name.”

“Rogieria is the future,” I say. “Also, I suck at naming things. Rogier the Exile, Rogier the me, the city of Rogeria, capital of the Kingdom of Rogieria.”

She reaches out to flick my nose. “E-go, Rogier.” But in the end, she leans her head on my shoulder.

I stroke her hair, and wonder what wonders she and I can accomplish next.

I’m not alone anymore in this world, in my mad quest for tomorrow.

My will shall be made manifest in blood and iron. My word shall be law. My legacy shall be stone and mortar.

And I will build it hand-in-hand with this spiteful human princess who’s got enough emotional blackmail to destroy me.

Sometimes, despite the horror, despite the fear of what my father would say if he saw me now, I can just relax. It’s a rare moment. Tea in one hand, Margery’s head on my shoulder, and the long road paved ahead us through blood and sweat.

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 8: Father’s Son​

I was left a legacy by my grand-uncle, Rogier. I may not have been raised with them, instead rather as one of the Corintari, but these are still my people, and I will learn all I can for them to achieve the dreams of the Silmunas.

There’s a dark romance in soldiers errant, fighting for a lost home.​

Margery stands beside me. “Orcs?”

“Looks like it,” I say, standing at the head of my army.

“Massive hordes?”

“The reports we received were accurate, Margery.”

“Our army?” she asks, sucking on her lips.

“You and I have prepared them well.”

Margery grins. “Bring it on, boy.”

The last of the Orcish realms left in this part of the world.​

Observe: twenty-eight thousands veterans. Margery and I have assembled the best from the campaigns against Ancardia and Luciande.

It had been Margery’s idea. I was content to manage Rogieria and Farraneán, building them up, holding up my end of the deal when Margery burst in, interrupting my meeting with my council, to throw down news from the Rotcleaver tribe, old enemies of the Sons of the Dameria.

They were crippled and without friends following wars with the duchies of Estaire and Stalbór.

She dragged me from my tea and demanded we needed to drop everything to invade, to liberate the lands, deal with the greenskins, and also conquer the gold mine the orcs held.

And how can you see no to a pretty face filled with opportunistic bloodlust?

Please, please, hold your applause. Save it for my woman.​

“My, Rogier,” Margery asks, sitting beside me and going over the paperwork, “why do I get the sudden dreadful feeling you’ve just made an awful joke in your own head?”

I’m still grinning. “You didn’t. I made a great joke.”

She clicks her tongue. “I hope you’ll stop making that face, at least. I’d rather it not become the joke.”

“And what would you rather I do with my face?”

Margery gives me a significant look, a little smile creeping across her lips. She covers her face with her hand, looking back at the desk. “While your mind runs, I’ll organize parties to root the orcs out of our country.”

“Why?” I ask.

She frowns. “Why what?”

“Why kill the orcs?”

Margery looks like she’s unsure if she heard me right.

“The Greentide is over. All that’s left are stragglers born a generation after the Greentide. Like us, it happened to their fathers. They’re no longer here by choice.”

She dips her quill in an inkwell. “A strange time to offer mercy, Rogier.”

I shake my head. “It’s not mercy. It’s practical. Why devote resources to hunting them down? In the Corintar, orcs were our enemies, yes, but not by, like, race. There were occasional orcs and people like myself amongst their ranks. Orcs value strengths. If they abandon their gods and accept Castellos and Corin into their hearts, they can stay.”

“And if they serve the crown,” she points out.

I smile toothily. “Why kill able bodied workers? Allow them to obey. Exterminate them if they object. Simple as.”

Another long look. “As for the goblins?”

I snort. “Fuck if I care what those rats do. So long as they don’t cause trouble and know who’s in charge, they can remain.”

The Kingdom of Rogiera dominates some of the richest lands in Escann. Our gold mines mint crowns with the Silmuna moon day in and day out.
[Most of these trade goods in Escann are random. Glass, cloth, and three gold mines are freakin’ hummuna. Suffice it to say I have the best economy in the known world.]​

I sit one day in the city of Rogieria, enjoying Damerian-style tea with my wife. Margery still struggles to down the stuff. She just takes it straight, grimaces, and pretends like she enjoyed my favorite drink. She sees me watching her and sticks out her tongue.

I act offended, hand to my breast. Acting like she’s shot an arrow through my heart.

Margery rolls her eyes, laughing. “Wounded so easily, are we, Rogier?”

“I’m sure it’ll heal if…”

“If…?” she asks.

I grab her arm and pull her into a kiss. “If only I have you.”

She kisses back, then pushes me away. “What’s gotten into you?”

“I’m buttering you up,” I say happily.

Margery props her head up on the table, eying me. “Alright, Rogier. What terrible thing did you do you need to soften the impact?”

I grin. “The terrible news that now you finally owe me. I’ve held up my deal. You have no more power over me.”

She frowns suddenly. “Come again?”

I shake my head. “Margery, take my hand. I want to show you something.”

The Kingdom of Farreán restored, the jewel of the Rogieran crown.​

I take Margery on a tour of the homeland she was raised in. The villages she and I have rebuilt. The roads paved in stone. The Caseáns restored to her people, be they human, elf, or something in between. There is still work to be done, but the Farrani people have come out of hiding, pledging themselves to the crown.

Our flag flies high over bustling fields, over workshops, and castle walls.

We’ve been working on this for years. And now, here it is.

“Well?” I ask. “What do you think of this little anniversary gift?”

Margery holds her hand over her face. “Rogier, I need you to look away.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want to give you any ideas by looking too happy.” She waves a hand at me. “Shoo, shoo. Let me smile alone so I can go back to scowling for the court.”

“Hmm, nah,” I say. “I need to remember this for blackmail purposes.”

Margery laughs. She sticks out her tongue and laughs.

Then she takes me in her arms and spins me around.

And we’re like that the entire time we tour the Farraneán countryside, letting people get to personally know their king and queen, the couple that turned their isolated towns into the integral heartland of Escann’s most powerful nation.

We listen to Farrani music, watch Farrani plays, and dine on Farrani dishes.

And, of course, oversee the finishing touches, turning Farraneán into the core of our war machine. Margery’s ideas. The people flock to serve their rightful king and queen.​

Everything is just… it’s nice.

It’s okay.

I spend the evenings with my wife. I hold council with my ministers and generals. We handle administrative work. Often, Margery joins me. For the first time since I became King, I almost feel like I’ve really done something.

That my works now stand on their own. The works I have accomplished on the shoulders of Rogier the Exile, Fëanor and my council, and Margery Silmuna. Without them, I’d be nothing. With them, I can accomplish anything.

And maybe, just maybe, I can think of the future as something I may stride into with confidence, instead of a mad gasp to escape the dragon of the past.

Until one day, during a meeting with Fëanor and the others, Margery arrives late. She’s staring at me intently, teeth grit, and motions for me.

“Sorry, the Missus needs me,” I excuse myself with.

Fëanor waves me off. “We’ve got the morning business on our own, your grace. Take your time.”

I go to Margery to hug her, only for her to grab my shirt and pull me into a side-room.

“Whoa, whoa, isn’t it a little early in the day for—”

The look she gives me shuts me up, and I feel cold.

“Heyyyy, baby, honybuns, snookums.”

I put my hands together. “Who are you and why do I suddenly feel mortal terror?”

“There’s a man here to see you,” she says, almost whisper-yelling.

I make a face. “So what?” I take her arm to comfort her. “Margery, what has you so shaken?”

“He’s really big and he’s in armor and he came without warning and—!”

“And?”

“And he says he’s your dad!”

My heart stops. “What?”

Only to turn as I hear the clank of platemail. He’s there, in the castle hallway, idly examining paintings and crests on the wall. Clad in heavy armor wearing the red shield of the Corintar, a scrape of blue Damerian silk wrapped around his left tusk.

He turns his head to me and gives a smile that’s all tusk. “Been a while, boy. I heard you’re drinking tea now. Show me around your little kingdom, why don’t you?”

Father.
[Legit surprised Lothane is still alive and still in charge of Corintar. Kudos to him, I guess.]​

I stand there, frozen with… something. There stands Lothane Bluetusk, Hero of the Greentide, Corin’s right hand. Grandmaster of the Corintar. And my father. He barely looks any older than the last time I saw him, years ago when I accepted the Rogieran crown.

“What are you doing here, Father?” I ask.

He steps towards me, boots echoing in the hallway. Still taller than me by an inch that feels like miles, he puts a heavy hand on my shoulder. “I was in the area.”

“And you didn’t message ahead?” I ask. “We could have done something, organized a parade or something for the Corintar. We could have—”

Father holds up a hand. “It was a spur of the moment. Someone told me the ‘city of Rogieria’ was the jewel of Escann. I had to see your works with my own eyes, boy.”

“His name is Rogier,” Margery says tersely, grabbing my arm.

He looks at her and smiles again. “You must be my daughter-in-law. I am pleased to meet you. I’m Lothane.”

“I know who you are,” she says, eyes narrow. “Who doesn’t?”

Father shrugs. “You’d be surprised. Half of the reason I’m wearing my Corintari colors is so no one thinks I’m an orc. Not that there’s many left in this part of Escann.” He gives me a meaningful look. “Care to show me around the city of Rogier, Rogier Silmuna?”

Margery shoots me a no look. Father just smiles at me.

“Let me introduce you to my council.”

Among all the powers of the world, Rogieria is second only to the ancient winelords of Lorent.​

Margery doesn’t let go of my arm. I lead them both into the throne room.

Father whistles. “Impressive. Hello to you all, councilmen and -women. I’m Lothane, the king’s father.”

Fëanor stands up sharply, nearly spilling his tea. “Grandmaster Lothane, it’s an honor!”

He holds up his hands and laughs. “Please, please, my friends, I am here to visit my son. Would you allow me to sit in on your meetings today? I’d enjoy seeing what my allies in Rogieria are up to. We in the Corintar have not made good penpals of late.”

“Of course!” one of my generals says. “We’d be honored to have your wisdom with us.”

I feel… small. They’re all looking at my father, and it’s as if I don’t exist.

I squeeze Margery’s hand, and then take up position on my throne. Father shrugs before taking the chair at the table I typically sit upon.

Today’s agenda is building up weapon and glass manufacturies in Merewood.​

Father dominates the discussion. Asking questions, making observations, and telling little anecdotes. The meeting only gets so far before everyone is paying rapt attention to him, and not to today’s work.

“And so Corin,” he says, holding up his hands, “she looks at me like I’d just sipped beer from her auntie’s ashes, and says, ‘Lothane, I just came back from the dead, and your pants are on backwards. You’re the weirdo here, not me.’”

I hate the way the men laugh. The way they hang on his every word, his every little story of Corin and the Greentide, or of Rogier and his work with his uncle. Today’s plans are ruined.

“Make him leave,” Margery whispers to me.

“I can’t just—” I gesture vaguely. “He’s done nothing wrong.”

“You don’t want him here.”

“He’s my father!”

“You don’t want him here, Rogier.”

I just stare at her, and only barely notice the conversation down below shifting to the orcs.

Rogiera and Corintar are the only lands where orcs are not slaughtered or enslaved.​

Father hears the news. While other kingdoms are doing everything to destroy the orcs within their borders, I refused to allow it. Margery hadn’t agreed, but I’d made the final call. The same way I’d bought her father’s slaves and freed them.

He grins wide, and looks at me. Our eyes meet, and his expression suddenly darkens.

I swallow, stand, and excuse myself.

Margery sits on her throne, confused.

And moments after I leave the room to catch my breath, I hear armored bootfalls behind me.

“What?!” I demand, spinning to face him.

Father stands there, and I realize I am alone with the man. Not even Margery for support.

“What?” I ask softer.

He puts hand on my shoulder, and I nearly wince from the touch. “I’m surprised, is all. How you handled the orcs. It’s a good thing to not hold them accountable for the sins of their fathers and fathers’ fathers.”

“Why would that surprise you?” I ask. “It’s the way of the Corintar. The way I was raised.”

Father sucks on his lips. “Because of every other story I’ve heard of you back in Ionntrás.”

And finally, at that look in his eyes, I do wince. “What do they say?”

He stares at me for a long moment, uncomfortably close to me. “They say you have destroyed kingdoms and nations. Within weeks of taking the crown, you destroyed the New Wanderers. You conquer two free republics. You subjugate those weaker than you on whim.”

“They willingly submitted to the Rogieran crown!” I snap, suddenly feeling hot in my chest. My skin burns against my clothing. “They accepted our protection and my rulership as the rightful king.”

Father’s eyes are cold and patient. “You wipe entire peoples off the map, replace them with loyalists, be they Damerian or Farrani. The Adenner are gone, the Kheterans erased, the halflings colonized, the Roilsardi and Wesdamerians overrun with your wife’s people.”

“I had no choice!” I say. “They were daggers pointed at the heart of Rogieria. You just had to look at the map, at the numbers, and realize it was the correct choice. Those people I brought, the Farrani belonged there and swore oaths to me and House Silmuna. Everyone else, I was merely rewarding those who loyally served Dameria.”

He folds his arms, expression dark. “That’s why I came here, Rogier. When we last met, you were a boy of eighteen. A bookish kid at best. But still my son, no matter what. I wanted to see the man you became when left to his own devices.”

“And?” I ask, breathlessly.

Just another small, needful conflict. Destroying Covenblad. Securing our borders.​

Father shakes his head at me. “How many people have you ordered slaughtered and removed, boy?”

Words fail me. I stare up at the old half-orc, clad in red armor. I reach for something, anything, and my hands find nothing. I look for Margery and remember we’re alone in this hall. I look back into his eyes, and I see nothing but a cold sense of disappointment.

Father sees me now. Everything I worked so hard for. Everything I bled and fought for. Everything I was proud of.

And he looks down on me for it.

“I—!”

I what? I am sorry? I am angry? I am indignant? I wish you’d fucking care how hard it was to get here?

“Power does things to people, Rogier,” he says, softly now, as if wishing to impart some fatherly wisdom after ten years apart. “I once knew a man named Laurens síl Place. He—”

“I know about Laurens!” I shout into his face.

Father doesn’t get angry. He doesn’t reach his hand back to strike me. His eyes just look sad, and he shakes his head.

“Don’t give me that fucking look,” I snap. “Like you could do better than me. That, in my place, you’d lead Rogieria to some glorious and peaceful future. You had your chance, you and Ellís! Do you remember? You told the Sons of Dameria no, both of you. And then you looked at me, expecting me to give the same answers, and you were—” I laugh mirthlessly. “You were fucking surprised that I went against you and took this crown.

“You had your chance to stand in my shoes, to wear this crown, to make some better choice you can only dream about, Dad. But when that moment came, you refused, and only I had the balls to actually do it, to take up my right as a Silmuna to lead these people to a better future. While you’re off fucking around with orcs and monster in Corintar, I’ve had to deal with people, with humans, with slaves and freedmen. I had to make choices for the future of an entire people, an ancient bloodline, while you didn’t have the guts! I am a Silmuna; you turned your back on your destiny, while I took the mantle and made something from it!”

And I made so, so many things with the Silmuna crown.​

By the end, I’m panting. My cheeks are red. It’s hard to breathe.

“Are you quite done, boy?” he asks, unimpressed.

I glare up at him.

“Where do you get off pretending like who’s grandfather fucked whose grandmother even means anything?” he asks. “You didn’t even know you were a Silmuna until you were eight, as a courtesy to the good man I named you after.”

“Because the Damerians believe in me, Father,” I say. “I can’t let them down. My blood is of the moon, of the Dame, of elves and kings and dukes and heroes. It’s your blood. But it is my legacy. Because I believe in where I came from. I believe the people who follow me. And I have a duty to uphold their trusts, hopes, and dreams—no matter the cost.”

The more I scream, the more of my bullshit and cope I start to believe as facts.​

Father just shakes his head. “A man’s place in life is in the life he builds, not tied by blood. You don’t see me dedicating my life to the man who raped my mother, do you?” He jabs a finger to my breast. “You don’t see me ascribing to that any meaning. When I was a boy, Corin once told me—”

I smack his hand away. “Corin this, Corin that—just because you fucked some bitch forty years ago doesn’t mean you should dedicate your life to her, Dad!”

He sucks in a breath. Almost without thinking, he pulls his arm back to punch me.

“Don’t you fucking dare!” Margery screams, tackling Lothane from the side. “Don’t you fucking touch him, you rat bastard!”

Father—Lothane—blinks harshly. He looks around, as if unfamiliar with where he is. He looks at the woman trying in vain to grab and push him over. He looks to the open door, to the councilors staring at through the door. Some have gone for their weapons; all are standing, with looks between rage and terror.

I grab Margery and pull her off Lothane, and put myself bodily between her and the half-orc.

Lothane looks at me like a lost little dog, a growing look of horrified comprehension of what’s happening. “I… I’m sorry, I didn’t—I mean, Rogier. You’re my son and I love you, but I’m—”

“I don’t care, Lothane,” I hiss. “All I see before me is another soul trapped in the past, in his glory days. That’s everyone’s problem. All anyone can do is look to the past. But there’s nothing for me back there. My blood is ancient, but the past means nothing. What matters is the future, what I’m going to do. I’ll do things my way, and I’ll succeed, while you’re stuck telling stories of a woman you’re still not over.”

“Son,” he tries.

I hold up my hand. “King Rogier. Your grace or majesty will suffice, Lothane. Say my fucking name or get out of my sight, once and for all.”

Lothane looks around, at all the eyes on him. He sucks on his lips and grimaces, an expression that is all death and tusk. “Of course, your grace.”

My vision swims with spots. and I nearly collapse if not for Margery holding me up. Lothane gives a nod to my council and leaves.

He just leaves.

I look back to my men, and bare my fangs. “Leave me and my queen alone at once. I will not be taking visitors.”

And I later learn his entourage left with him, too. Back to Corintar. And out of my life, maybe for good.

Margery holds me as I sit on my throne. Alone but for her, the only person I want with me anymore. Here on this stupid throne, that symbol of my might as the most powerful man in Escann, perhaps second strongest in the world.

And I can barely stop from crying as Margery holds me in her arms.

I get the feeling she wants to talk. But all she does is stroke my hair and whisper comforting noises.

I feel like a pathetic little child. I’m a grown man, a warrior and king, and this is the most comforted I could possibly be. In the arms of my queen, of my better half—of the woman I think I love—and unable to speak.

We’re like that the rest of the day. Until Margery falls asleep like that, and the warmth of her body is the last bit of heat left in my body as the rage works its way out through my pores.

I keep my arms around her, unwilling to let her go.

We sleep like that. Until I wake up in the middle of the night with an awful crick in my back from sitting on a throne. I carry Margery to bed and tuck her in, and leave to go to the kitchen to try to make myself Damerian tea.

I still don’t know if I love or hate the stuff anymore. But tea is Damerian, and I am a Silmuna, and to be a Silmuna is to be Damerian made flesh.

…or something like that. That all feels hollow now.

The halls are empty. The midnight staff is little more than guards. A baggy-eyed young mage girl, checking the windows for wards or spells. Things to prevent my fate from ending like my grand-uncle’s.

I boil water over the embers of the kitchen fire. I pour myself a drink.

“Can you pour me one, too, your grace?” Fëanor asks.

I eye him sharply. “I ordered you home for the day, Finn.”

He says nothing.

“Leave now, or I’ll have you lashed for refusing a royal order,” I say harshly, and instantly regret saying something so… cruel. I wince and say, “No, no, it’s—it’s been a long day. I’d rather forget it all, and your presence isn’t helping. Why are you here so late?”

Fëanor sighs long and leans against the counter. “We learned the real reason your father was here.”

I stiffen. “Why?”

“Because the Corintar have agents in Rogieria. And they know we found it. He wanted to see you put it on. Maybe he thought it’d be a moment of pride. Maybe just to spit on it and the Silmuna legacy. I don’t know anymore. But before morning, I needed you to know we found it.”

I scowl. “It? What is it?”

The old elf folds his arms. “It, your grace. The only it we’ve been searching for for years.”

My eyes widen. “The Crown of Dameria.”

The broken, splintered remnants of the old world in my hands.​

The guards bring it to me on my throne there in the middle of the night. That tired mage from earlier checks it for wards and traps, and she indicates it’s safe.

Fëanor presents it to me, and all I can say is, “This is it?”

These broken, splintered shards of an ancient crown. Shards of metal and broken, burned jewels. Specs of blood that have long turned brown mix with old dirt and char. It’s enough to wear if I put it back together with some twine.

“It is, your grace,” Fëanor says, looking at the object I hold. “It used to be so great. Vincen wore it with such pride. He looked so noble, so regal, so handsome with it. And when it passed to his son, Adénn made it look like it befit a warrior. Then Wex and Lorent killed him, hid the body, and attempted to destroy the crown. This is all that’s left of your ancestor’s crown.”

I manipulate in my hands. “I hold in my hands the symbol of old-world power. Of the Moon when she sat upon the Dove Throne.”

Fëanor nods. “Yes, your grace. What shall we do with it?” There’s a faint note of trepidation in his voice.

A new world born from the graves and charnel pits. The words from a dream years ago keep repeating in my head. They leak from my mouth. Like a mantra, some prayer to a dead god.

“The old world is dead, Fëanor,” I say, projecting my voice with confidence, and a hint of something bitter. “My great grandfather wore this. His nation was shattered and his throat slit. House Silmuna will not stick to the hopes and dreams of the old world. We will reclaim what is ours, and we shall make of it something new.”

I hold the splinters out. “Melt these piddling remnants down and make a new crown,” I order. “Destroy them, and rebirth them in the image befitting of Rogieria and the world we are building.”

“As you command, your grace,” he says, and sounds somehow injured.

No more weakness. No more doubts.

I am Rogier Silmuna, the Young Owl. I wear the new crown of the Silmuna family. I am the first king of the new school, the new order.

There is nothing for me in the past but ghosts and dead dreams.

Tomorrow is a new day, and it is my day.

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 9: Ruina Imperii​

“Do you think less of me?” I ask quietly, holding the Crown of Rogieria in my hands. Over the remade icon of the Silmunas. Function over form. Something I can wear to battle and meetings and ceremonies in equal part.

Margery sits on her own throne. She covers her mouth with her hand and laughs: the haughty, aristocrat sound I’ve come to adore. “Not possible, Rogier. It’s not like I can already think any less of you.”

I give her a serious look, and she frowns. Clears her throat.

“I’m sorry, not the place for that,” she says, reaching out to put her hand over mine. Squeezing it, she says, “No, Rogier. I don’t. When we first met, you told me something I never expected: that you were charging forwards to escape the shadow of your past, your father. You opened your heart to me; all its little vulnerabilities. And back there, your past found you. You looked it in the eyes, you felt fear, and you told it to go fuck itself.”

“Saying something and then acting on it are two different concepts,” I say, stroking her hand with my thumb. “I lost my cool. I exploded. And then I barely held myself together. I feel…” I sigh. “I feel pathetic. Ashamed you saw me like that, but grateful you were still there for me afterwards.”

She reaches up and bops me on the head. “Need I remind how when you married me, you made a deal to maybe build up my dreams. And then, more than some token effort, you went out of your way to go above and beyond? You were so giddy, so happy, so eager to show off how far you’d gone. You wanted to make my girlhood dreams into the new future.”

“And when it was done, you looked at me, Rogier,” she says. “You looked at me and said, ‘Well, what next? I’m just getting started.’ Some men would do one of the things you’ve done and call it the accomplishment of a lifetime. You see the world, you think you can do better, and then you do it with such energy I can barely keep up with you.”

“I… just thought it’d make you happy,” I say weakly. “It wasn’t all that much, really.”

Margery side-eyes me. “That’s what I’m talking about. You have a goal. You have this bare minimum to accomplish it, and you set the bar so high it looks crazy, then you leap it, and then you wonder how to get higher next time.

“So what if you had a low day?” she asks. “Court wasn’t even in session that very day, and somehow, some-friggin’-how, in the middle of the night, you went and reforged an ancient crown into that. I don’t know how you keep doing it, keep getting away with it, but…”

She smiles. “I am happy I can point you at my problems and watch you fix them. You’re like a guided meteor spell. I wouldn’t want to aim you at anyone, not even your own father, if there was even a chance you’d end up pointed at me for the wrong reasons.”

“I love you,” I say, the words just slipping from my mouth.

Margery blinks rapidly, sitting up. She takes a moment to compose herself. To adjust her queenly dress. Gnaws on her tongue as she thinks. Almost looks a little flustered. Until, finally, she cautiously says, “I’ll love you back if you make me a crown as snazzy as yours?”

“Always with the demands,” I laugh.

She winks. “Because I know I can manipulate you.” She points her nose up. “I’m withholding the fact that maybe I also somehow ended up falling in love with some idiot king until I get something I want. Reciprocity, that’s the name of our marriage. Certainly no feelings involved. Just business.”

I grab her and pull her into a kiss. She gasps, but accepts the embrace. We hold each other like that, awkwardly between the thrones.

It lasts forever, and not long enough. Until one of us pulls away. I give her a skeptical look.

“What?” she asks, almost nervously. “Is my hair wrong? I braided it for business today.”

I put my crown on her head. It slides down, resting awkwardly, and I laugh. “Well, I tried. It looks terrible on you. Guess I’ll keep it and see if I can’t fit a new one into the royal budget.”

Margery sits up straighter, clearing her throat. A rosy tint to her cheeks. “Yes, you had—you’d better. Or else!”

She takes the crown off and puts it on me, taking a moment to fuss with it until it fits me perfectly. Then gives me one last peck on the cheek before court opens for morning session this morning.

It’s a very impressive budget, at least. I can work something out.​

Lothane was right about one thing, maybe. As Margery and I lead today’s discussion, the talk turns again to war. To securing our borders against smaller unstable kingdoms, like Alenor and Stalbór.

Fëanor nods at my queen. “Alenor, as they call themselves, has access to the vast forests of Acengard. They used it to establish a paper industry.”

Margery folds her arms. “They have allies in Wyvernheart and Stalbór. Rogier the Exile did battle with their own heroes, the Cobalt Company and Brave Brothers. They didn’t stand a chance even when they outnumbered us.” She glances at me as if for approval, and I give her a quick smile. “Now we have the upper hand, we have the claims as the heirs to the region, and we need its resources.”

I lift a hand, indicating silence. “Their coalition is large, but we’ve handled worse foes. I intend to march north to Acengard, and Queen Margery can oversee the Stalbór front.”

One of my generals sits back. “We have forces in both regions, and allies in the Duchy of Estaire in the south. If we’re cautious, we can defeat them while they’re separated. Classic moves, really.”

I nod. “Then it’s settled. When Parliament opens in a few hours, I’ll ask for the declaration of war.”

By all accounts, our enemies are paper tigers. Fitting, as we’re after the paper mills of Alenor.​

I kiss my wife farewell as she goes to handle the southern front, and I move my own soldiers north into the wild forests of Acengard.

Once, these areas were orc country. Humans had been entirely pushed out. Clans like Venomtooth and Bonecarver made their homes here. Now, the only signs we have of them are ancient ruined towns and mass graves.

Orcs are extinct in this part of the world, exterminated and purged by the adventurers and their nascent kingdom. It’s a strange twist of irony that the only orcs left are those in Rogieria, who serve the crown.

I lead my men in an ambush against the Alenori.

They retreat north, and I pursue their ragtag forces.

Only to face the combined forces of Alenor and Wyvernheart near Acenort.

Like before any battle, I need a moment. To think. To confer with my generals and junior officers. To sit alone and just breathe. It’s not nerves, not anymore. I’ve grown so used to leading my professional soldiers into battle that I don’t even know what it is.

To contemplate this strange nothing I feel.

When I emerge from my war tent, we all draw up battle lines.

They fought like devils, but it wasn't enough.​

Summer turns to fall, which turns into a warm winter.

The army breaks up to capture townships, to forage, and bring an end to this war.

Fëanor pours me a cup of tea, the steam of which is mesmerizing in this chill. We take a break from drawing up the terms of Alenor’s surrender. “I know that look, your grace. What’s on your mind?”

“Who are our enemies, Finn?” I ask.

“Alenor and Wyvernheart,” he says without skipping a beat.

I take my cup, shaking my head. “No, I mean, as people.”

“It can be dangerous to humanize an enemy, your grace.”

“I am the rightful king of this land. One way or another, the Alenori will become my subjects. I wish to know the people I am to rule, to be the king everyone deserves.”

Fëanor adjusts his spectacles. “They were the Cobalt Company, once. Warriors, mercenaries, and escaped peasants from Gawed, fleeing tyrannical lords. The Kingdom of Gawed was the only major kingdom that stood with Corin at the battle of Rottenstep, and many of its soldiers defected and went rogue once they had a chance for freedom.”

Conquest from Alenor, reparations from the others.​

Without thinking, my fingers go to my crown. “There aren’t many of them.”

“Acengard is harder to settle than Adenica, yes.”

I sigh and take a sip of tea. “Then when I offer them terms, we shall give the people a fair deal. We don’t bind men to slavery and serfdom. They may remain on their lands; only their lords shall be stripped of power and replaced by our own. Ones willing to support us may be judged to keep control on a case-by-case basis.”

“As your grace wills it,” he says. “Now all we must do is write it into the treaty we are to offer their king.”

In Rogieria, lord and commoner, soldier and hero, are little different. Nothing like the rigid, stratified kingdoms of Cannor that so many people came to Escann to escape.​

Alenor falls. The treaty is fair, as far as a conqueror whose will and power is absolute may impose a “fair” treaty.

I see to it that the sparse lands are integrated into Rogieria, much of its emptier lands settled by the very same soldiers and officers who served in my campaign. In time, I expect the region to become mostly Damerian, with smaller landowners dotting Acengard between the larger settlements.

I return to the City of Rogieria at the same time as my Margery. The generals she presided over have, of course, won. More victories for my kingdom. Our kingdom.

“My oh my, boy,” she purrs, covering her hand with her mouth like she always does. “Feels like I haven’t seen my young owl in ever.”

I just smile dumbly.

She flicks my cheek. “What are you grinning at, Rogier?”

“You,” I say.

Margery rolls her eyes. “Don’t embarrass me.”

“So what if I do?” I ask, snaking my hand behind her waist.

“Best be careful, boy. I bite.” She winks.

I just smile at her for the longest time. Until I remember a gift I had forged in Carlanhal. “Oh, and this is for you.”

“Hmm?” she asks, and her eyes go wide as I reach over to my desk and pull out the crown I made for her. “Wait, you actually—Rogier, I was just joking! You didn’t have to—”

I put it on her head. It slides on perfectly. Snugly. Until it matches the one I had forged. “Yeah, but you look cute in it,” I say.

She sucks on her lips. “I am not cute, Rogier. I am gorgeous.” Margery holds up a finger. “Very important difference!”

I lean forwards to kiss her, and she wraps her arms around me and kisses back.

Being with her with all it takes anymore to melt my worries away. She’ll be there for me, and I’ll be there for her till the end.​

Margery mumbles something. Very angry, bitter mumbling.

“Hmm?” I ask.

She flusters. Sighs. Puffs out her cheek and looks me in the eyes. “Fine, you win, Rogier. I love you. Happy?”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t quite hear that over the sound of how much I love you more.”

Margery scoffs. “Hardly! My love for you is, like, right here. Yours is a little lower. I’m clearly the better spouse here.”

“Wanna bet?” I ask.

She scowls. “I play to win, Rogier.”

“Bet.”

And she just tackles me.

Nine months later…
[Interestingly, this event made my heir East Damerian human, which, uh, probably breaks something.]​

“Vincen,” Margery says quickly as soon as I enter the room. The midwives excuse themselves.

“What?”

She holds our swaddled son to her chest. “You’re not naming him. You’ll name him Rogier or something. You have, like, zero naming creativity!”

“…no,” I say blankly.

Margery groans. “Get over here and say hi to Vincen Silmuna. I was going over names. Lothane’s a dick, so that was a no. No more Rogiers. Martin would work, but my dad’s a bitch. So I thought your great-great grandfather would work. The one I talked with the elf Finn about.”

I grimace, sitting down in the bed with her. Wrapping my arm around her shoulders and holding her close, I ask, “Can we not swear around our son?”

Margery gives me a long, tired look. “I just spent the last several hours swearing until my throat was bleeding. Vincen here heard every possible curse known to man. Look at him; he’ll probably turn out fine.”

And I do look at our son. On some level, he’s still not fully human. One eighth of his blood is orcish, and some drops of Moon Elf on my grandmother's side. But generations of tough human girls have washed much of it away. He has my eyes, and no tusks. Fair skin. Something about him makes me think he’ll grow up big and strong, like me, like Lothane.

I reach out to touch him. Vincen opens his sleepy eyes, looks at me he can’t believe my audacity to wake him, and death-grips my finger like he wants to break it.

Margery laughs. I laugh.

And I hold my family tightly in my arms.

It’s time to take a little paternity leave.

Wait, what I miss? I wasn’t looking.​

“Your grace,” Fëanor says, adjusting his spectacles. “Your grace.”

“Huh?” I look up suddenly, blinking rapidly. I’d been staring at the empty throne next to mine where Margery usually sits. I’d been trying to take some time off, but a king can’t really do that, now can he?

My minister of war, a Damerian woman named Laurenne síl na Damesdemele, sighs heavily. “Olavlund took advantage of our destruction of the Wyvernheart army to push into Inner Castanor.”

I rub my eyes. “Right, uh, they’re the Gerudians, right? From the fjords of the far north.”

“The Ebonfrosts,” she says.

“Who?” I ask. Only to sit up and say, “Wait, no, I remember—Castan Ebonfrost, Era of Black Ice. Led Black Castanor, got bewitched by a sorcerer, and my ancestor Munas Moonsinger and the Cannorians came together to defeat him. I studied that period of time extensively. Those bastards are still alive after all this time?”

Fëanor looks like he was going to explain that all, but just shrugs it off. “Yes. Their dynasty survived in the fjords of Gerudia up north. King Sindri the ‘Monster of the Ice’ Ebonfront’s invasion into Castanor is why we called this emergency meeting.”

Well, that’s a name to run away from if ever I heard one.​

I rest my arm on the war table. “Thus the glut of military leaders today. Sorry, I only just woke up. What’s this about an emergency?”

Everyone looks around the room.

“Don’t tell me I’m the last one in Rogieria to learn,” I say, a bit more tensely, feeling something wrong on the back of my neck. “Do we think now is the time to attack them, so soon after we subdued Alenor?”

Laurenne grunts. “No, your grace. Parliament has already called an emergency session in tandem. Our armies are mobilizing for action. Because we received a letter from our allies in Núrcestir only this morning.”

I grimace. “The Ebonfrosts are invading, aren’t they?”

She nods. “The Northmen are launching an invasion into all of inner Castanor, citing ancient claims of birthright or some such nonsense. That means they're fighting Núrcestir, Corintar, Esthíl—everyone. They’re calling it the Great Heathen Army. And we need to respond. Your orders, Majesty?”

It’s the War of the Sorcerer-King all over again.​

“Come back to us in one piece, okay?” Margery asks, as I’m suiting up in my armor, preparing to march north to aid our allies.

“Only if you keep being adorable for me,” I say.

She gags. “Nevermind, go die.”

I frown.

And she suddenly looks serious. “I’m kidding, of course. Please, please be safe for me. If I have to raise Vincen without you…”

I kiss her. “Who am I, my father? I’ll always be there for you, just like you’ll be there for me. Just hold down Rogieria for me while I’m gone.”

She hugs me. “Promise?”

“Promise.”

Come here, little Northman!​

Olavlund is at war with most of Escann. King Sindri has to know he’s going to fail. Rogieria, Corintar, Hammerhome—everyone.

I don’t know what strange Skalds he’s been listening to that he thinks he can win.

Our initial counter-attacks work. Núrcestiran and Corintari forces take border towns, maneuvering around their armies. I take the army of Dameria past the ancient ruins of the White Walls of Castanor, resting a day to marvel at one of the wonders of the ancient world. And then it’s onwards into Olavlund’s territories.

We march. We capture small garrisons. We even find foraging and raiding parties from the Northmen, and end them all.

Until finally, I get word of King Sindri’s Great Heathen Army, near Serpentswic. The entire land is a wasteland, nothing but graves and charnel pits of the orcs that Wyvernheart and now Olavlund have been slaughtering.

To the south, the lone mountain at the heart of Castanor rises to its snowy peaks: the Trialmount. In ages past, Castanor’s emperors would climb the mountain and face the many supernatural trials there to prove themselves worthy to take the name Castan and rule over mankind.

Now, it is where the blood of the last Castans shall be shed.

I feel it again, that emptiness before every battle. A total stillness as my larger army forms lines to ford the river and attack the smaller heathen forces. But this time, my bones are cold. My breath mists in the early winter air.

I tighten my cloak over my armor.

I’ve won against worse odds before. The Great Heathen Army will be nothing compared to the Rogerian war machine I have built from the Sons of Dameria.

I take one last breath.

And order battle be given.

And the heathens fight like ice-demons.​

I lead charge after charge. Cavalry into their flanks, their sides, their reads. Probing moves.

But the Great Heathen Army, clad in strange armor and bear furs, holds its ground. They fight with spears and axes, their jarls commanding freemen warriors.

And then I see him, as the heathens’ horns call for another charge of their heavy infantry.

King Sindri, the Monster of the Ice. The Ebonfrost King, in black steel armor wrapped in furs. I can hear him alone roar as he charges into my men, ignoring my archers and spearmen like they’re nothing. The sight of him turns blood to ice, and I understand his nickname now. He is a monster, a striking thing in the center of the battle. I don’t know how or why. I only see his results.

I look upon him, and suddenly everything feels… silent. Men scream as he engages them, only to fall quiet when he strikes. A mix of axeblows and some sort of quick magecraft. I feel him looking up at me, and the only sound I hear is the ringing of blood in my ears.

I do everything I can to resist him, I call my men to move, order sergeants and junior officers to reform.

And in the end, I stand there alone on the fields of Serpentswic, as the Ebonfrost army surges forth and breaks the spine of Rogieria.

I see nothing but black.

I freeze.

I just sit there, on my horse, wondering what’s happening to my heart. Why my vision is so dark. My mouth feels like cotton.

I try it raise my sword. To rally the men. But my arm won’t lift. My voice won’t work.

I just stay there, frozen in terror as my men break.

Until a general grabs the reins of my horse. “Your grace, we need to retreat!”

And I can’t resist him.

We pull back. We retreat. We abandon camp and leave the entire region, making for safer places to gather our forces. To reinforce and move again.

It’s… it’s all I can do. We lost.

How did we lose? I don’t lose. I never lose. Rogierans do not lose battles.

We rally for the counterattack.​

“Your majesty?” Laurenne síl na Damesdemele asks me.

I just sit there, staring into the fire.

“King Rogier!” she says more forcefully.

I look up at her in a daze.

Everything has been a blur since Serpentswic.

“General?” I ask weakly.

“We’ve got the Northmen cornered in Venacvord. It was a good call to pull back here as bait.”

Was that my idea? Or did I just run here to catch my breath? A breath I have not had since I first put eyes on King Sindri Ebonfrost.

I stand, and my knees feel weak. I wonder where my father—where Lothane—is now. He has to be somewhere in this war, too. But I don’t know. We’re only really communicating with Núrcestir; I’ve refused to answer any of father’s letters since that day. And maybe this lack of coordination is my fault.

I grab my eyes and let out a fierce grunt. Grimacing with an expression that’s all tooth and tusk, I say, “This time, we ambush the bastards. We fire the guns to break them, and then we ride the heathens down with Corin’s own fury.”

Laurenne salutes. “Your will be done, your grace.”

And I feel that same ice as we put my plan to action.

I lost once. That happens. But Rogierans are a new breed. A stronger breed than some bastard attempting to rebuild history’s great evil.

So we march forth.

And we—

We—we—we—​

The Great Heathen Army does it again. Against all odds, with our allies in the region, we…

I don’t know.

I don’t know?

I don’t fucking know!

Our army is cut down by half. One in two men slaughtered or taken as thralls by the Olavlunders. And at its center, fighting there at the front, is King Sindri, the Monster of the Ice.

The Rogierans break. We shatter. And all I can do to keep them alive is to run like a coward.

And the icy feeling in my lungs and heart never leaves.

The entire war collapses without Rogieran support.​

Everywhere, every report, is like that.

The Great Heathen Army breaks and destroys every army they come across. Winning battle after battle after battle, until they march through Wyvernheart, Corintar, Núrcestir, and even over the White Calls of Castanor into Rogieria itself while I am still trying to replace my losses.

As I am tending to my wounds and cuts and all of that worthless pain, Escann breaks before the Ebonfrost dynasty.

Escann burns beneath the Ebonfrost banner.​

And I…

And I—!

—am helpless.​

I am a boy again. I can feel nothing else as the Northmen march towards Rogieria. As the kingdoms and soldiers of Escann die by the thousands.

I’m standing there, looking up at my father. He’s showing me how to use a bow. It’s harder than you’d think; the drawstring takes so much strength to use, and I don’t know if I have it yet. But when Lothane offered, I dropped the books I was studying and rushed for the chance to spend time with him.

I stop, exhausted. Sweating and stinking.

Lothane pats my shoulder and tells me everything will be okay. I’ll get it with some time.

My big brother, Ellís, steps up and asks to try. I let him. Why wouldn’t I?

And then I watch him pull back the bowstring and make it look so easy. Lothane’s eyes widen. He hands Ellís an arrow. Ellís puts it in his bow, follows the pose Father makes, pulls it back, and fires it. It hits the target.

Lothane smiles. He grins with pride and shouts in victory. He and Ellís hug, and he asks my brother to do it again.

I stay there in the shadow of a tree, hugging my knees to my chest, and watch Father spend the entire afternoon with Ellís, laughing and loving him, proud of how big and strong and talented my big brother is.

I go inside and no one notices. And when Mom makes us dinner, all Father can talk about is how proud he is of Ellís, and never once even looks at me.

Black Castanor rises from the ashes. The Throne of the Sorcerer-King is restored.​

I walk into my bedroom. And collapse to my knees.

“Rogier!” Margery screams, and Vincen wakes up in her arms.

She rushes to my side. And I have to hold my hands to my face. “Don’t look at me, Margery—for the love of Castellos, please!”

Vincen starts to cry.

Margery starts to shout at my wounds, poorly stitched and tearing, and getting my blood on her as she holds me in her arms.

Everything burns.

I have failed.

Betrayed my dreams, the Silmuna legacy. Rogier the Exile. Finn, the Damerians, Margery herself.

Whether he meant it or not, as Margery screams for me to talk to her, a single line bounces around in my head. Again and again. Like a mantra. A ringing in my ears.

Dad was right about you, Rogier.

Why am I even alive anymore?

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 10: Wine & Whip​

Strange sensation—trapped in my body.

I black out. I come to in a meeting of the privy council.

No one can look me in the eyes.

I’m not even really here.

Sometimes the seasons change in the blink of an eye.

Sometimes admin work. Sometimes pensions for fallen soldiers. Finn celebrates a birthday, and I forget his age even as he tells me.

Sometimes rain, sometimes shine.

Sometimes I’m in bed and I don’t even know how I got here.

Margery holds me with one arm, our son Vincen cradled in the other. He's getting bigger. Stronger.

Sometimes it feels like the only time I can move, the only time my body reacts to my thoughts, is when I reach out to hold our son in my own arms.

And when those are over, I am a prisoner trapped behind my own eyes.

Dad was right about you, Rogier.

I drown myself in a king’s work.

The people cry for vengeance.​

Every meeting of the privy council and parliament is, in one form or another, about taking back our lost land. Bringing the fight to Black Castanor; this time prepared, this time ready.

There are Damerians at home under foreign rule, the tyranny of heathens who have claimed Castonath and rebranded it to Ebonborg.

Even the great warrior, King Sindri, has taken a new name. He now calls himself Castan Ebonfrost, taking the name of the old emperors of Castanor. It’s a spit in the face. My family made a union with the elves when they landed in Cannor to defeat a man named Castan Ebonfrost five centuries ago. Well, technically Nichmer, but we’ve still come full circle to the War of the Sorcerer-King.

I lost to them.

There’s so much rage. So much sorrow.

I can’t join them.

I don’t have the right to feel sorry for myself.

I must still be king no matter my injuries, physical and spiritual.

I sign papers. I oversee projects.

But deep down, I don’t believe I’m really there.

Beneath the keep in Rogieria, there are crypts and catacombs. Adenica used to bury kings in these halls. Mages sometimes patrol down here, checking for dangers or spells, be they ghouls or would-be assassins.

It is here that my agents have entombed the exhumed bodies of my great grandfathers.

It’s a good place to be alone with my thoughts. I sit on the ground, back resting on the sarcophagus of my namesake. I hold the Crown of Rogieria in my hands, turning it over and over. As if I can’t figure out how to put it on. How to make it fit comfortably anymore.

The darkness dies with the sudden light of a torch. Fëanor, bathed in firelight, enters the cool, dank room.

“I feared I would find you here, your grace,” he says.

“Hey, Finn,” I say, and it’s all I can muster.

The silver-haired elf stands there for a moment, and I can see my pathetic reflection in his glasses. He heaves a sigh, sets the torch into a brazier, and sits down next to me. Folding his knees to his chest, he reaches out and, tentatively, puts a hand on my shoulder.

“I’m okay, Finn,” I say, attempting to shoulder away his grip.

“No, you’re not,” he says softly.

“I said—”

“No you’re not, Rogier!” he snaps, and I almost wince. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him raise his voice before.

“Why are you here?”

“Because you keep running away from Queen Margery when she tries to talk to you,” he says. “She said you’d probably be down here, and that woman figured right.”

“She knows me too well,” I whisper. “Which is why I can’t—I can’t, you know? You remember when my father came to visit. I lost my cool. I exploded. I accused him of some weird conspiracy I developed in my head. And then, when it was over, Margery held me, and I felt so weak, so emasculated. I had such doubts. I needed her, and I was terrified she’d hate me for it. For relying on her like that. Now, look at me? I lost a war, Finn. I got good people killed. Lands we bled for lost. And I can’t—Margery doesn’t—I…”

Fëanor’s hand remains on my shoulder. “I know, your grace.”

“And I don’t have the right to feel sorry for myself!” I yell, at him, at myself, at no one. “It’s a setback, and I know it. You’re probably here to tell me about Vincen or Rogier and how they failed and kept trying, but it’s… I put everything into this. Into being the king this country needs and deserves. Just some stupid bookish kid from Corintar.

“The Silmunas rose. And then for nearly a century of defeat and setback and failure and betrayal—and I thought I could turn that around. I don’t deserve to feel sorry for myself. To just sit here alone with my dead ancestors.” I elbow the sarcophagus. “But I don’t know what else to do, Finn. I have so many doubts about who I am and what I’ve done. And I just don’t know.”

Fëanor lets me speak. Lets me rant and ramble and rave. Allows me enough rope to hang myself on my own pathetic insecurities. “Rogier the Exile once said something. I was watching him after a battle speak to the woman who loved him,” he says softly, and I give him a curious look. “He said ‘only monsters don’t doubt themselves. Monsters can look in the mirror and only see something they’re proud of, no matter how much blood they’re covered in.’”

“So?” I breathe.

“So you have doubts. So you don’t know what to do. So you got your nose bloodied. So what?” he asks, shaking my shoulder. “Have you never faced setbacks before?”

“No, I have.”

“Have you never not known what next to do?”

“No, that’s almost commonplace.”

“Have you ever been defeated before, destroyed, ground into the dust, and at a loss?”

I stare into his eyes, swallow, and nod. “I have.”

“And then what did you do?” he asks. “Was that the end of Rogier Silmuna? Did he step away from the table and quit the game? Or did he square his shoulders, crack his knuckles, and charge straight back into the mess life made?”

I stare into my lap, ashamed. “I’ve never known what to do, Finn. Since I accepted this crown, I’ve been out of depth.”

“And did that stop you?”

I shake my head. “I’m really good at lying. At faking it until I make it. And then nobody knows better, or they’re smart enough to pretend I had it going on the whole time.”

His grip tightens. “That’s bullshit, your grace. With all possible disrespect, a crock of horseshit. I’ve been with your family for over a century, as a friend, advisor, knight, whatever. I have seen great men be laid low. I saw heroes die, dukes fail, princes collapse. You come from a long line of great men, and you come from a great line of failures.”

“Is that supposed to help me, Finn?” I ask with a scoff.

Fëanor stares hard into my eyes. “You remind me so much of Vincen it hurts, Rogier. He fought, bled, and died for his ambitions. And in the end, he failed. But in the nearly two decades I’ve served you, I can count on one hand where you faltered, truly faltered, and I lack the digits to count the others you’ve overcome. Even Rogier the Exile was a brokenhearted failure trying merely to shed some light on the scars left by the razors.

“You are our King. I’m not going to metaphorically suck you off and tell you you’re the best, Rogier. Because you aren’t. No one who thinks he’s the best is ever worth following.”

“Thanks, I’d say no to that offer anyhow,” I say blankly. “I’m a married man.”

“But I will tell you that we all stand by you. You have not failed in our eyes. We—all of us, your council, your queen—we’re worried for you. Because we don’t know what we’d do if we lost you. We love you, Rogier.”

“But why?” I ask desperately. “How did I earn or deserve anyone’s love?”

Fëanor lets out a long sigh. He stands, and suddenly I miss his hand on my shoulder. “Love isn’t something you earn or deserve, Rogier. It’s one of those confusing, immutable aspects of being mortal. It just is. We just feel some kind of way. You can’t explain it; you can only show it.”

He holds his hands out to me. “Let those who love you show it. And show them you love them in kind.”

I stare at him for what seems like ever, at my reflection in his glasses. He doesn’t move. He glares back at me with a savage determination that almost hurts. I want to look away, but can’t. My elbow creaks as I reach out to take his hand.

And he pulls me to my feet, grunting with effort. “Starting with your wife, Margery. She’s the most worried of all of us.”

“Hey,” I say, standing in the doorway to our room.

Margery looks up at me. Her hair’s a mess. She blows a puff of it out her eyes. “I’m mad at you, by the way. Just to preface anything you say.”

“Where’s Vincen?”

“He’s with a nanny; I needed a moment alone,” she says. And then, looking away: “Either he can cry or I can. There’s no room for two of us whiners at once.”

And now I finally see it. A puffy redness around her eyes. Hastily applied makeup to try to cover it up. I look at it and wince in harsh pain.

I walk into the room and bring her into my arms. A range of feelings cross her face: a sudden surprise, a flash of rage, sharp relief, something bitter—until she buries her face in my chest to hide them from me.

“I’m sorry,” I say.

She reaches up a hand to clasp it over my mouth. “You’re going to ask if I still love you, aren’t you?”

I try to speak, but her hand muffles me. With a look of I’ll reluctantly allow it, she loosens her grip.

“Do you?” I ask. “After—after my father, these past few months. Just—all of this?”

“Do you love yourself, Rogier?” she asks.

I look away.

She sighs sufferingly. “Then someone has to love you enough for us both. You’re allowed to be sad. You’re allowed to feel doubt. You can hurt and bleed and suffer.” Margery grabs a fistful of my shirt. “But fuck you if you think you have any right to do it alone, Rogier! That is what kills me. That no matter what, you wouldn’t share it with me. We’re a couple; I’m your girl and you’re my boy. Whatever happens to one of us happens to us both. And it kills me to think—to know—you were afraid you’d lose me if you shared it with me.”

I hold Margery tightly. “I won’t. Not anymore. You’re right, and I’m sorry, and I love you.”

She pounds a fist on my chest. “Don’t just say it, Rogier.”

“Margery?”

She gives me a look like I’m the stupidest man in the world. “If you love me, then love me. Don’t keep things bottled inside when you have me. And I’ll unload all my emotional baggage back on you so it’s fair.” She winks.

I chuckle. “Please do. You and I have work to do.”

Margery pulls down on my collar. “Read the room, jackass.”

“Huh?”

“Ohmygods, how the fuck did I fall in love with you?”

“Margery, what’s going on? I’m not following; I’m scared.”

She laughs, holding me tightly. “I need you here with me right now. Then we can get back to work, deal?”

I blink. “Y-yes?”

The first step is learning where it all went wrong.​

Escin is the city Margery dreamed of as a little girl. The one she and I rebuilt into a shining jewel, the center for the Rogieran Royal Army. Barracks and forts dot the landscape. And there, at the center of the city we restored, is our latest project.

The Escanni Academy of War.

Margery holds my hand as I officially open it. Before, we only had a few classes to train new officers to test out the viability of a proper military academy. Now, we open it officially.

She helps write the procedures to enter the Academy. Tuition is free, all expenses paid for by the royal treasury. Commission is offered to proven adventurers, veteran sergeants, and families with a history of service as officers. Commoner and privileged together in equal classes, for Rogieria cannot afford to turn any away who would serve.

We focus on the lessons of the previous war. Rogier the Exile’s campaigns into Taranton and Inner Castanor. Our battles with Elikhand, Ancardia, and Luciande. And most importantly, the failures that led to the loss of our war against Olavlund.

I’m even invited to teach an opening lecture. Margery sits in the class, pretending to take notes. She pretends to be just another girl, amidst the uniformed class of Damerians, Farrani, elves, and even a lone half-orc like myself. I tell the young class of cadets exactly how King Sindri defeated me, and how to ensure it’ll never happen again.

My ego hurts, but the young men and women don’t seem to judge me. They listen, they ask questions, and they learn from the mistakes of the past. Soon they’ll form the backbone of a new Reclamation Army.

We’re building an army to make the nation strong!​

Men and women flock to the colors. Soldiers are drilled. Companies and banners raised.

Margery is beside me as we inspect the new troops. We lost one war, but in their eager faces, their firm discipline, their immaculate drill, I see a hope of victory.

Of reclaiming our lands in Escann. Breaking the backs of Black Castanor and proclaiming a true Dameria of the East.

And when it’s over, we take lunch with one of our newest generals.

I’m half-convinced we choose generals on the basis of how cool their names are…​

Ardan sina Necropolis. That’s an old Wexonard family from Bisan.

“I was an adventurer, your grace,” he says, his uniform immaculate. “A captain. Hunted vampires in the Merewood. No real ties to my old family; I was born in Rogieria. My father served in Rogier the Exile’s army when he attacked the Rotcleaver tribe. When you finally finished them off, me and my men had signed up to help; you ordered my men to rescue a company from the orcs. When it was done, you commissioned me officially for my heroism, and I have served ever since.”

I fold my hands together, looking at the man. “So, you would consider yourself a Damerian, not Wexonard?”

Sina Necropolis sits up straighter. “Pardon my Lorentish, but fuck Wex. Rogieria is my home, and you are my only rightful king. End of discussion. Er, your grace.”

“Damerian, then,” I say, nodding approvingly. “Tell me, how do you prefer your tea?”

Margery groans. “Oh no…”

The man considers. “Bitter. But it’s expensive. I’ve always been a spendthrift, your grace.”

I nod thoughtfully. “My thoughts exactly. But I’ve been working on a way to grow it in Rogieria, that everyone may affordably enjoy our cultural legacy.”

“Lothane’s Blue,” Margery says with a sigh.

“Your grace?” he asks.

I gesture to a waiter. “You there. Fetch us a cup of Lothane’s Blue tea, if you would. I need to get this man a new vice.”

And now, the sparse grasslands of the Taran Plain grow tea!​

“It’s lovely,” Margery says, grimacing as she drinks it. “The color is actually very exotic and not at all reminiscent of a strange venereal disease.”

“Locally grown strain of tea,” I saw, enjoying my own cup. “Our own little homebrew. I believe we are now the biggest growers of tea out there. We’ll have to wait for the fresh harvest season to be sure, but I have faith.”

“Yaaaaay,” Margery says.

Sina Necropolis says nothing, just fiddling with cubes of sugar until the drink is to his taste.

And with that, I take my leave. And Margery moves to our next project: meeting with the mages of Rogieria.

[Magnificent Feast, one of the spells the unique Anbennar mage estate can cast, is incredibly powerful and well worth the cost!]​

We pull out all the stops to hold a grand ball in Rogieria. We feed the Royal Army with the finest in magecraft foods. We offer rich banquets to the poor. And we prepare a feast for official diplomats from as far as Anbennar itself.

All out of Rogiera’s still deep pockets.

Some of is to give back to the people. To remind them I’m the peoples’ king.

And the other is to impress the King of Estaire, a minor border prince.

The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.​

It’s a diplomatic success story for the ages. Like how Rogier took other adventurers under his wing, so too do I take Estaire.

Their king is a young man named Trystan, whose father recently died in a war with the kingdom of Rósande.

“They took everything from us,” Trystan tells me over dinner. “Estaire is little more than a sliver. Ravenmarch, Stalbr, and now Estaire. The winelords of Rósande attacked while we were all licking our wounds from the war with Black Castanor.”

“Winelords?” I ask, offering him a cup of blue tea

Trystan nods. “Yes, your grace. The Blacktower kings of Rósande are High Lorentish. They rule through wine and whip.” He shakes his head and takes the tea. “Some of the last orcs in all Escann live within their borders, on massive slave plantations growing wine.”

“Good gods,” Margery says. “That’s horrible.”

I give her a quick look, remembering the orcish slaves her family once owned I paid to free. “As for your own land?”

“We were broken. They only held back, I think,” Trystan says, “because they were afraid of too large a border with you, your grace.”

I nod slowly. “If you align yourselves with Rogiera now and forever, we will reclaim your lands, Trystan. We will restore Estaire to greatness and break the backs of the kingdom of wine and whip.”

Margery adds a, “It’s a good deal. I married him for the same reasons and he rebuilt my home in a year. And you won’t have to sleep with him to get it done, too. Really good deal, King Trystan.”

In the end, after long bargaining, it is done. Trystan swears loyalty to the Crown of Rogieria, and we set our eyes on Rósande.

It is a nation whose iron is used to enslave greenskins, then sell or work them, whichever turns the highest profit.​

Margery and I have been building the new Reclamation Army to defeat Black Castanor. Rósande is not them, not by a long shot. But their predation during our wars with King Sindri have turned them into a true rival.

We now have a reason to invade.

To cut our new adult teeth on a formidable opponent.

And break the chains of slavery that hold those Lorentish bastards together.

Vinum flagrumque.​

Some sixty-thousand veteran, professional, and drilled soldiers cross the border into Rósande, singing songs to stay in step. Knowing that I lead them on one flank, and General Sina Necropolis on the other.

And with the help of King Trystan and his own Estairy acting as scouts and agents in the region, the Damerian Reclamation Army moves to test its mettle.

I get that feeling again, as we form up battle lines. The Rósanda army, rattled from its recent wars, didn’t expect us to attack so quickly, so soon. They were dealing with threats from Marrhold and Corvuria.

They are spread thin, but they’re Lorentish. They have an economy of slaves, be they orc, half-orc, or goblin.

Lorent, the ancient enemy of House Silmuna. These are their sons.

I sit on my horse and imagine the man in black armor and bear fur, King Sindri, as he charged into my ranks with a smaller force and broke our lines within sight of the Trialmount. I had been overconfident then. I had expected an easy victory against barbarians. And I had lost the entire war.

General Sina Necropolis tilts his head at me, as our enemies seem to stretch from horizon to horizon. Our lines of guns, of pike and shot, and heavy cavalry, outnumber them. The latest in technological innovation. The most trained and veteran soldiers.

I shake the tension from my hands. I allow myself a breath. I take the reins of my courser.

Because no matter what happens today, I still have Margery in my corner. I have people like Finn, too. I have a son to get back to.

I have people who love me, whom I need to prove I love by fighting for their futures.

“Advance, General,” I command, raising my sword over my head.

And the unprepared Rósanda armies break before our elite forces.​

The first battle is a slaughter. We push into them while they’re making camp. Then we march forwards, attacking recently raised peasant conscripts who had to buy their own equipment. Our standardized and drilled infantry tear them apart.

And with Trystan’s men guiding us, we push forwards, and rip to pieces the enemy as he retreats. Chasing them deeper and deeper into Rósande.

I come across a massive plantation, where chained orcs and half-orcs work the land, picking grapes from the vines and turning them into wine.

Their Lorentish lords orders them to defend him as he runs.

We capture him in the hills, and return him to his slaves.

“His fate is now yours,” I say, first in Common, and then in the orcish I picked up during my time in Corintar. It’s rusty, but the orcs all seem to understand what I mean when I throw the lord into their midst.

They tear him limb from limb.

And then the eldest orc there asks what I will do to them.

I order them be given food from our more-than-ample supply lines, and invite them to willingly become my subjects. To live in New Dameria as freedmen.

They accept my offer, and blend in well with human communities.​

It’s like that everywhere my army marches.

Standing orders are to suffer not the lord to live. To break the chains and set the greenskins free. Some go wild. Others flee south to the fae-infested Deepwoods, where legend has it orcs live freely.

Many others follow our caravans, becoming scouts and camp followers as we fight deeper and deeper into Rósande.

For once, I don’t have doubts. The Royal Army breaks all who oppose us and shatter all chains. In part, it’s to utterly destroy Rósande. Even after we restore Estaire, the lack of a workforce will ruin the Lorentish. The other part is just moral. It’s the right thing to do. A society built of coercion like Rósande cannot, must not, last.

Any mistakes we do make in the field of battle, our fresh-eyed officers and NCOs are quick to learn from.

Our new theories work, but there is always room to innovate.​

The tales of our army spread before us. Entire cities and garrisons surrender at our approach.

Plantation owners offer us their slaves as a tribute to let them live and remain.

Even oppressed people as far as Black Castanor hear of our army of liberation, of reclamation, and flee to our borders seeking fair work and refuge.

All who serve the crown may call themselves Damerians.​

And when there is nowhere left to conquer, we go home.

We take our lessons of war, our new experiences, and go to teach them in the Escanni Academy of War.

I restore Trystan’s kingdom and then some, and he pledges continued and everlasting loyalty and friendship to the House of Silmuna and Crown of Rogieria.

I return home to Rogieria.

Margery wraps her arms around me, and tells me she is pregnant with our second child.

And that is how the century ends.

Happy New Year!​

I hold Margery in my arms, wrapped together under a blanket, as we watched the New Year’s fireworks explode from cannons and guns. She rests her head against my shoulder, and is the only warmth I need anymore. Our son, Vince, stares with wide-eyed amazement at the show, and we hold him together.

Five centuries ago, Black Castanor invaded Cannor. Castan Ebonfrost, bewitched by Nichmer the Sorcerer, aimed to end civilization and rule through fear and black magic.

Then the Remnant Fleet arrived. The elves, stranded at sea for a thousand years, landed on the shores of our world. My ancestor, Munas Moonsinger, married a Damerian queen, and forged the house of Silmuna.

And together, against all odds, bereft of all hopes for victory, they beat back Black Castanor and shattered it to the wind.

A handful of years ago, Black Castanor declared itself, under a new Castan Ebonfrost.

But just like in those days, there are Silmunas. There’s people like me. People who have those they love by their side. Who can fail and fail and fail, but will always learn from their mistakes, from their errors, and come back stronger.

I will reclaim what is ours. History will repeat, and the Silmunas shall lead the way to a new golden age.

And so long as I don’t have to do it alone, there’s nothing I can’t accomplish.

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 11: And Then There Was Silence​

“Gentlemen,” Margery says, spreading her hands wide, a malicious look on her face. Hardly three weeks after the birth of our second son and she’s back in action, full of vim and vigor. “And lady, of course. I’m sure you’re wondering why we’ve brought you here today.”

I turn my head towards the small crowd assembled in the throne room, letting Margery put her plan into action. She looks so stern and adorable in her crown.

Some stand. Some are sitting at the war table. Fëanor casually sips his tea, before offering a cup of Lothane’s Blue to Ardan sina Necropolis, who declines. My Commandant and Minister of War, Laurenne síl na Damesdemele, stands with a stern look. I know those three.

The other two?

Well, I’ve only read the reports.

The Rogerian Generalstaff in all its glory.
[Great generals are one thing, but via event I got my discipline to 120%. Which means my soldiers do 20% extra damage, and take about 20% less damage. Castellos Bless the King]​

The half-orc, Nunar “Bad-Hand,” holds one hand over his mouth and tusks in thought. His other hand, his bad hand with the missing ring and pinky fingers, he uses to idly tap the table. According to the documents, a particularly mouthy commander from Luciande during my war against them had bit them off, and Nunar had beaten the man to death while bleeding out. He’d been a junior officer back then, a first generation half-orc who’d gone out of his way to prove his valor to his human soldiers.

I catch Bad-Hand’s eye, and his look is so comically grave I need to avert my gaze not to laugh.

“Black Castanor, your grace,” Bad-Hand says to my wife, his voice surprisingly light for a man his size.

“I can scarcely imagine why so many generals have else been called into one room,” sina Necropolis says, his blue Rogieria uniform immaculate.

Margery clasps her hands behind her back. “Quiet right, Lord General. Draw your attention to the war table. The reports from the other side of the border do not paint a pretty picture, but they tell us very much.”

Many died to get us this information.​

They all look.

Margery continues. “The people the Ebonfrosts have sought to enslave are no friends to the Gerudians. We’ve established underground networks smuggling out refugees, in part to collect every scrap of information and news we can about Black Castanor. They’ve been having trouble holding onto their gains, between their own cruelty, extermination of any non-human, and a general distaste for their pagan ways.

“Near as all sources indicate,” she says, idly touching her braided hair, as if making double sure it’s tied up for business, “the Ebon Heer is spread wide. Some are putting down revolts, others are escorting settlers to Escann, and a sizable portion are in Castonath to rebuild the ancient Throne of the Sorcerer-King for symbolic purposes. They outnumber us, but in no one area. We have an opening we can exploit if we attack in concentrated force.

“We have called you here to draw up war plans. The Reclamation Army needs to finish building up, putting new training methods to practice, and then act on the plans we make today to invade the most powerful nation on Halann.”

“Understood, no questions,” Bad-Hand says. “Point me at the problem.”

“Your grace,” Sina Necropolis adds, “what do you mean build up? Is that not what you and His Majesty have been doing since the last war?”

Fëanor politely sets his tea cup down onto its plate. “The entire Rogieran army stands at some sixty thousand men,” he says. He adjusts his glasses and pushes forwards a piece of paper. Logistical information. “Their Majesties have set aside the funds and assets to double that.”

Sina Necropolis balks. “An army of one-hundred-twenty-thousand?”

Proven in battle against Rósande, the Reclamation Army shall lead Rogieria from Castonath to the Dove Throne of Anbennar.​

“Following the new model of the Reclamation Army, yes,” Laurenne síl na Damesdemele says, voice tight and serious. Her arms remain locked behind her back. “I’ve worked out the recruitment and drill plans in my role as war minister. Aided by the Duke of Araionn and King Trystan of Estaire, we plan to challenge the black dragon with the single largest standing army since old Castanor.”

Margery smiles in a way so malicious I feel myself falling for her all over again. “Any questions before we get to work on war plans, training regiments, and logistical preparations, gentlemen?”

And it soon erupts into arguments about how to equip the new model army.​

The meeting was smooth until that point. When Margery and Laurenne explained we’d be phasing out the famed Damerian longbow for muskets. Firearms.

“But longbows are a Damerian tradition, our heritage!” Sina Necropolis says.

Fëanor makes a noise in his throat. “Call me an old man and an elf beside that, but I have trouble believing men with hand-cannons will be as efficient and deadly as well-trained archers. You’ve seen our core of Farrani elven archers; they can pin a fly to a wall from a hundred yards away without killing it.”

“Ain’t that the point?” Bad-Hand says. “We’ve seen Farrani elves master the bow. A lifetime to master that deadly art.”

“So you agree?” Finn asks skeptically.

“You’d be daft to,” Elias Whiskeyjack says, finally speaking up after just standing there in utter silence all this time. He’s older, more ragged. His uniform has a brooch, a medal, indicating he fought alongside Rogier the Exile. “It takes years to master how to pull strings. We don’t have that time. You can more easily train fresh recruits to shoot and support pikes with a musket than a bow. Drills better.”

Whiskeyjack turns to him, and I see the hip flash of hard dwarven liquor strapped to his hip. “What does His Majesty say?”

I spread my hands. “The longbow is as Damerian as tea. But I agree with my queen. We’re building a new world, a new model army. We can’t afford to stick to the past just because it’s tradition.”

The haggard old general nods, and I swear I can hear his bones creaking. “So sayeth His Majesty. End of discussion. Now, can we get back to how we’re doing to destroy the Ebon Heer?”

Armed with state-supplied muskets, a grand army is raised, and drilled until fire and maneuver are second nature.​

We get to work at once. Plans are drawn out. The first classes of the Escanni Academy of War are put into service. Sergeants and companies are trained. Men are drilled how to march under fire, to work with muskets alongside pikes and artillery and battlemages.

The Reclamation Army is born.

I read the reports with Margery and Fëanor every day. Updates of field exercises, building roads and supply depots to feed the men fed and armed when we push into Black Castanor. The entire efforts of Rogieria are turned to the war machine.

Gold is minted into crowns to pay soldiers. Efficient taxation extracts fair dues from our citizens to arm men. Mills and workshops produce paper for orders and steel for weapons. Farm estates ensure our men are well-fed no matter what.

And we still have a budget surplus thanks to the work of Fëanor and my beloved.

[TFW you build such a doom economy you can bankroll the largest army in the world and still make a massive profit]​

It’s a whirlwind tour. There’s not a day I’m not doing something and excited for it. Speaking before parliament, guest lectures in the War Academy, inspecting the troops. I meet with guild leaders about production requests and negotiate fair pay.

“What’s that look for, Rogier?” Margery asks, nudging me as we watch a military parade in the capital, presiding over soldiers in Damerian blue and packed streets.

“It’s called a smile. You should try it sometime,” I say.

She pulls at her lips in an artificial frown. “No.”

I wrap my arm around her waist and pull her in for a kiss while her hands are away and she’s defenseless. Margery breaks out laughing, struggling to push me away.

“Stop, stop, people can see us,” she says. “Not in front of Vincen!”

I snort, pushing her playfully away. I look down at my son, just barely able to stand now. “Hey there, Vincen, can you see the parade?”

He looks up at me with wide eyes, too young to really comprehend much. But he does raise his hands to me.

I scoop Vincen up and hold him so he can see over the railing and watch the soldiers march. So that all of Rogieria can see their king, and the works he has completed with the help of the woman he loves.

This is my country. These are my people. This is the legacy I will leave behind, one for my family and those who put their faith in me.

A new world will be born from the graves and charnel pits.

I am Dameria.

I am Rogieria.

I am Silmuna.

And we shall be ready to right the wrongs of the past.

No matter the cost.

The final piece of the old Silmunas.​

I stand there, in the old crypts beneath Rogieria City again, running my fingers over the latest addition to this old room. Once, kings and great knights rested here.

Now, it is the Silmuna crypt. Where Vincen the Old Owl, Adénn Skylance, and now Rogier the Exile lie. Well, her and his woman, called Madaléin Silmuna, his fiancée or wife or whatever. There’s no record of any such union, and I’m half-convinced it’s historical revisionism. But by all accounts, Madaléin was his woman and right-hand, without whom he could never have rebuilt Dameria. She gets a place here, I suppose. Heroes and legends have a right to rewrite history.

I place a cup of tea on his sarcophagus, the ornate one we’d place him into after I ordered him exhumed to rest with his fathers.

Then I sit down, back against the little tomb, and gaze into my own cup of Lothane’s Blue. “I dreamt of you once,” I say, and sigh. “My name’s Rogier, Lothane’s son. He named me after you. We never got the chance to meet. I thought the least I could do after digging you up was offer you a cup of tea. It’s the finest in Rogieria. That’s the name of this kingdom. I’m its king. They named it in honor of you, a man they say was the most valiant who ever lived.

“They say the Lorentish and Wexonards took everything from you—your hopes, your dreams, your realm, even your life in the end—everything but your name. They say it didn’t stop you. You came to the Escanni wasteland and, from ashes and mud, built a kingdom for the lost and the damned.

“It’s my job, now, to see to your legacy, to our family name, Rogier,” I say before finally taking a drink. “I wish I had met you, Rogier. They say you were the greatest man who ever was. You lost everything, but kept fighting. You were valiant, never seeking glory or fame, only in what was right by your family and the people who loved you.”

I rest the back of my head on the tomb. “My wife will be pissed at me for going off alone to be scared one last time, but maybe you’ll hear me out. You cared for your kith and kin that way. Saw you in a dream once, I think I said. I could use your advice. We’ve trained for years. We’ve built the greatest army in the world.” I put my hand beneath my coat, to one of the pistols I’ve started to carry since their more widespread adoption. “And in this coming dead of winter, prepared and supplied, we’re going to launch Reclamation Day—to take back what is ours, destroy Black Castanor, and enthrone Silmuna supremacy once and for all over Escann.

“And I’m scared. For my kingdom, for my family. For my wife and sons,” I say, playing with my fingers. “I’m proud of what I’ve built. I think you’d be too, if you could see it, Rogier. So wherever you are in the afterlife or my dreams, look out for…” I shake my head. “No, don’t look out for me. Watch over my beloved Margery and sons, Vincen and Elran. Whatever happens to me, I act as the hammer and fist of Dameria. I’m scared; I don’t think I’ve ever been without this cold feeling in my heart. But my blood would be a little warmer if I knew those whose legacy I bear on my shoulders were watching out for those I love.”

I hear someone walking down the crypt hall. I finish my tear quickly, before tipping out Rogier’s cup over his tomb.

I turn, expecting Finn or Margery, only to see the old general Whiskeyjack.

“We’re ready, your grace,” he says simply, almost darkly.

I swallow. Take a breath.

And focus.

“Let’s reclaim what is ours,” I declare.

We can wait no longer.​

I make the final call.

Four armies mobilize and march into the heart of darkness, to challenge the black dragon, and bring down the sun itself.

Our forces catch them almost entirely by surprise. Years of spycraft and espionage to obfuscate what the Black Castanorians know about us pays off, and one hundred and twenty thousands Rogierans storm across the border nearly unopposed.

Within weeks, we capture Silvervord back from the bastards, and push into the Acengard region and beyond.

In three months, the brutal lightning offensive has seen only scrambled local Gerudian defenders. The northmen are mostly running, their armies only engaging us in light rear guard actions.

I meet with my general staff to wonder where their real army is.

The plan goes off without a hitch.​

But more to the point, I wonder why the entire countryside just seems so… empty. Full of abandoned farmsteads, burned town, and mass graves. It’s all we find as we agree to spread out to cover more ground and advance deeper into the heart of darkness.

Sometimes, we do find survivors trying to work the land. Most greet us with caution. They tell them that the Ebonfrosts have been taking people. Raiding the land like they’re still at war with it, which, in a way, they are.

A farmer, Vernman by blood from old Wyvernheart, says the local city tried to rebel against the Gerudians.

The northmen retaliated by burning the entire city down and clapping the survivors into irons. No one has seen them since, and most people just want to keep their heads down.

We ask after orcs in the region. The farmer just shakes his head. “Not even made slaves. Just put to the swords, your grace.”

We build supply lines and move deeper into the quiet countryside. Through the ruined White Walls of Castanor into the inner country.

Until, as we reach the border of the Serptendspine mountains, and receive reports of the Castanorian response. Mostly from the scorched earth they’ve left behind to delay our approach.

Even spread thin, we are more in force then them.​

We outmaneuver their armies and force a battle in Acenvror. I still remember this countryside from only a few years ago. It’s where we tried to make up for our first defeat. Where King Sindri broke the last lines of our defense and broke Escann.

All this time, the Ebon Heer has been unwilling to fight. They kept pulling back. But suddenly, they move towards us. General Whiskeyjack thinks they’re trying to find a hole in our advance to get around us.

My army is the finest of Damerians. But in this day and age, that’s only mostly human. Ethnic Damerians and Farrani make up the core of our armed forces, but there’s no shortage of elves and half-elves. To say nothing of the growing contingent of half-orcs that are rapidly replacing the purebred orcs in Rogieria. They are all my sons, and I have faith in them to win. They are Damerians one and all, for they serve the Silmuna crown.

Bad-Hand and I cut the Ebon Heer off, and battle is given near the site of my greatest failure as king.

The Northmen still fight like demons, but we have numbers and training.​

We attack before they’re ready for us. Their mages were working in vain to place runes and magical traps as their men attempted to get ready for us. It looked like we charged in while they were trying to do… something.

Our own mages report the enemy spells are incomplete.

So our cannons open fire. And our infantry advances with precision, with pike and shot. Fire and shoot. Muskets roar, filling the air with smoke. Pikemen pin their axemen in place, holding the line for our cavalry to tear them apart from the sides.

I lead one side of the battle, and General Bad-Hand takes the other.

Their center breaks, and we run the bastards down.

Our first true victory of the war.

Break the dragon in the name of the moon.​

Sometimes, I wonder if the unease before a battle will ever fade. Even seeing the Northmen break and flee, I don’t feel right. It’s not nerves, not exactly.

I look at my bloodied armor and don’t feel nervous. Not like all those years ago near Robihon, when we attacked Elikhand. Not even that sensation in my heart when I accepted this crown, or when I first met Margery.

I don’t know what it is. Like standing on the edge of a cliff, peering out over the edge, and getting that strange sensation of what if I jumped?

General Bad-Hand claps a hand on my shoulder. I nearly jump, spinning to him.

The man laughs. “Easy there, your grace. We beat the bastards. Some of our cavalry hounding them report they’ve retreated just north of here to Ebonham, as the locals are calling it. They already had soldiers there, and they’re trying to regroup with allies, I think. Best hit them now, I reckon.”

I nod, looking north. “We pursue them to the ends of the earth.”

Elias Whiskeyjack stands from where he’d been, poking at the dirt with a stick. His expression is mild, facial hair looked ruffled. “What were these wards they were trying to place?”

“‘Scuse me?” Bad-Hand asks.

Whiskeyjack points. “I’m no mage, but these don’t look like defensive wards to me. I’ve seen those in use. Laurens síl Place used to fight with one on his shield. I saw it in action when I was just a sergeant. Didn’t prevent him from being bodied, as I recall, but…” He stares at the dirt, at the thawing patches of spring snow stained with human blood. “I don’t trust it.”

“Our own mages said they were inert, incomplete,” I say. “It’s likely just Gerudian magic or runes, merely incomplete. It matters little.”

The old general scowls, but says nothing.

“Have the men ready to march in the morning,” I order. “We won’t let the bastards escape with their lives.”

And that feeling of looking over the edge won’t leave me.

The Black Casantorian army retreats, and then stands there. They don’t try to run. They almost allow us to catch and attack them.​

We break camp for Ebonham. The Ebon Heer is regrouping there. There’s no way they don’t know we’re coming. Our forces had already been through here weeks ago, before pulling back to consolidate when the Ebon Heer arrived in force.

The old forests here are eerie, almost untamed. Nothing but woods and scorched earth. Sometimes the trees have carved markings on them. One of our mages reports they’re inert magical symbols. More runes and traps they were trying to set up, but they hadn’t anticipated how quickly we Rogierans could march over rough terrain.

We follow their trail.

Until we find the massive Gerudian army just standing there, formed up already for battle in a large clearing. The trees here are covered in more runes.

A mage suggests they’re spying runes. Divination, in a way. The Ebon Heer trying to gauge how close we were from afar. And knowing they couldn’t outrun us, chose instead to try to fight a last stand.

Bad-Hand’s forces assemble, taking up a flank as my own Damerians hold center. Elias Whiskeyjack gives me this uncomfortable look, says nothing, and moves to his end of the front to command his section of the soldiers.

We just outnumber them, but have more cavalry and canons. So long as pike and shot can pin the Ebon Heer in place, our guns and horses can rip them to shreds and destroy the entire center of their counteroffensive.

At this distance, the entire horizon is just black and fur. It’s impossible to make anything out individually from this distance, in that mass. But somehow I can feel something staring at me from across the distance.

When suddenly I realize why this is. There is silence. The Ebon Heer makes no sound. They don’t scream or jeer or shout warcries. They are utterly silent. As if someone had went to every soldier in their army and cut out their tongue and torn out their vocal chords.

It’s just like when I first laid about King Sindri. Or “Castan Ebonfrost” as he calls himself now.

I exhale longly, watching my breath mist in the chill morning air.

And give the order to advance.

We open with a salvo of guns. The roar of cannon after cannon so loud I need to cover my ears. Finally, there is noise on the battlefield. Shot is hard to aim, but when you have as many as we have, you don’t need to be precise. The air fills with black smoke as the field of battle explodes. Their mage attempts to bring up quick defensive wards, but their magic is little use against cannonfire: the thunder of the guns Rogieria is famous for.

As men explode in fire and red mist on the other side of the field, long chains of runic magic cast into the earth light up in an off-purple glow. A dim thrum of light. The Black Castanorians hold their black dragon banners high and are silent as they die, and that’s somehow worse than screams of pain and rage and agony.

Whatever magic they were hoping to use to beat muskets and cannons doesn’t seem to be working. Instead, they shuffle into looser formations and start to march forwards to meet us rather than die at range.

As the cannons reload, my men push forwards with pike and musket. Enemy cannons fire wide shots, hitting more accurately than I’d like, and aided by a storm of archers and arrows. The booms are oddly muffled, and I wonder if there’s some sort of spell at work to keep everything so eerily quiet.

The ground continues to pulse as the lines of runes stretch from the center of the melee all the way into the forest clearing. In the direction of the Trialmount and the Ebonfrost castle in the horizon one way, and the ruined White Walls of Castanor to the other.

The distance between us closes. The first lines of my men open fire with a roar of muskets. And when the Castanorians close in, we drop pikes and the men crash into each other.

Hold the line, and counterattack!​

Our numbers are greater, our training and equipment better, but the Northmen fight like ice demons. With brutal, silent savagery. The only people shouting are the Rogierans. The cannonfire is mostly ours.

No matter how many we kill, they don’t seem to notice. They just keep fighting. Keep pressing forwards. The runes keep lighting up the battlefield as blood falls into the snow.

I almost think they’re more afraid of failure than the meatgrinder they’re walking into.

And then I see why.

There, in the center of the melee, a huge man in black plate armor. Runic wards of purple on his armor blowing as he bats away pike and sword, only to swing down on my men. He tears them apart, and his soldiers give him a wide berth as he cuts through them.

Emperor Castan Ebonfrost, the Monster of Ice. For a moment, as I’m organizing soldiers in the back, moving cavalry to outflank his men, I feel his gaze on me. I turn and, even over the great distances of the battle, I know he’s staring at me. Everything around him is paused. He raises a finger clad in ebony and points directly at me. The purple spells around him ignite, and his men surge forth, cutting a whole in my ranks. They die in droves, dying and dying, but they have a mission despite the losses.

They’re coming right for me.

I look around, feeling that sensation again: looking over the edge of a cliff with the desire to jump, just to see what would happen. The days where kings would duel are over, a relic of the past. This is a time instead of generals and elite armies. Where battles are decided by gunpowder and tactics, not raw strength and single combat.

“Your grace, don’t do it!” Whiskeyjack says, but already I feel myself riding my Adenica courser forwards, making my men part way for me and my elite guard.

Castan Ebonfrost finally stops his advance. Standing there as the men around him, Guardian and Rogieran, pause to watch. Locked in combat and struggle, but knowing what is about to happen. Ebonfrost just stares me down and waits. My heart doesn't exist, just this horrifying hum in my chest, blood pressure high enough that a single nick would shoot gore out for feet.

There is no more noise. There is only silence.

I stop at the edge of the circle in the middle of the battlefield. I take my time trying to feign calmness as I dismount. I take Rogier the Exile’s old sword from my course, which neighs in worry. I am no warrior. I’m no hero. I have led men, sometimes from the front, but not like this. Those days are over, that style of war is ended.

Ebonfrost speaks, and his voice is like a chill on the wind. It’s in Gerudian. I meet his eyes, or whatever he has beneath his ebony armor. He seems to realize I don’t understand and says, this time in Cannorian Common, “There is power in a king’s blood, even one with an orcish taint. I thank you for your help. Your death will not be in vain, little half-orc.”

I step up to the man, sword in hand. Castan glows with ethereal power. A mage of the old school, it seems more and more. The king I can’t hope to counter or defeat. I hear Whiskeyjack shouting my name, but his is the only sound left. Everything around Ebonfrost is silent.

He moves forwards, holding a greataxe in his hands.

I drop my sword and reach into my coat.

Pull out a pistol.

And shoot the fucker through the heart at point-blank range.

So close that his magic and armor can do nothing.

Ebonfrost just freezes. He makes no noises. He just looks down, reaching his hand for the bloody hole in his body.

“That’s King Rogier Silmuna to you,” I say, pulling out another pistol and firing, then another, and another, until Ebonfrost’s stomach and torso is just a bloody hole.

Everything stops. Time stands still.

Until Ebonfrost chokes out blood and falls to the ground in a crumpled heap of blood and limbs. His men react slower, and mine fire muskets and push pikes forwards. A slaughter begins again in earnest. The dragon decapitated. Black Castanor destroyed in a single evening.

The runes across the ground ignite. Rows of purple light and magic that run from the battlefield all the way to the distant fortress at the Trialmount in the background. My skin prickles and itches. Everything feels hot and freezing at the same time.

Everything explodes in a purple burst of magic and light.

And I feel myself collapse under the weight of the force.

What in Castellos’ name?​

I come to in a panic, shivering and covered in sweat. My Adenic courser is nipping at me, trying to make me get up, to get on, to move.

I sit up against him, looking around me. A purple light bathes the entire battlefield, dark clouds over the sky, and the scent of char, blood, shit, and death.

And screaming.

So much screaming and howling.

My men, who had been winning, are now scrambling over themselves to retreat. I see a Gerudian shot dead at point blank, glow purple, and then climb back to his feet with a gaping hole where his heart used to me. The corpse-soldier lunges at the Rogierian, biting and tearing at the man’s throat.

All around me, so much of this. The dead Castanorians were walking or lurching up to their feet, grabbing my soldiers by the legs and pulling them down into a writhing mass of living corpses and black magic.

I look towards Ebonfrost, and hear his wispy, airy laughter. As he gets up on all fours, laughing harder and laughing on lungs I blew out of him. Wounds now bathed in an ethereal light.

He stands up, leaking blood and black magic.

“I didn’t imagine it would be my blood that completed the ascension to lichdom, but here we are, King Rogier Silmuna,” he rasps, and cackles. “A blood sacrifice the likes of which has never been completed before. Thank you for being so stupid, little half-orc.”

And I just stare, uncomprehending. As my men die. As the slain rise back up to join the Black Castanorian host. I don’t believe my organs and legs even work anymore

Castan Ebonfrost used me. For black magic, to ascend to lichdom, and raise an army of the dead from our war.​

Suddenly, everything makes sense. Why the Ebonfrosts were slaughtering so many people. Taking so many lives. Destroying the Escanni countryside and exterminating orcs and men alike.

The dead return under the power of the Ebonfrost witch-king. How many corpses does he have now to raise, between the Greentide, the wars leading up to this moment, and the Black Castanorian extermination of Escann?

In times past, the last Ebonfrost Castan was the slave to a witch-king. Now, the Ebonfrosts are the witch-kings. Taking command of the failures of his dynasty and reforging them in ice and necromancy. He is a lich, an immortal creature of hatred and black magic.

The runes were his spell. His ritual. And I’d walked right into it.

He’s laughing at me, at the battle, at the slaughter, at his success.

And I would have just sat there in horror, if not for General Whiskeyjack grabbing me and pulling me to my feet and horse. “Your grace, we need to go!” he says. “We can’t stay here; we can’t win this!”

And all is lost.

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 12: All Along the Watchtower​

My moment of triumph was a brief flare. A star burning across the northern sky.

Before crashing down to Halann, and emerging as a new corpse god.

A mighty conquer, immortal in death, with powerful witchcraft and magic to aid him. This is my enemy.​

It’s funny, in a way. That was the first time I ever really met Castan Ebonfrost. The Reavers of the north were none of my concern or interest, until they broke into Escann and the Great Heathen Army shattered us..

In a way, I wonder if Ebonfrost thinks like I do. If he believes he is taking back his ancient right, the throne that belongs to his family by dynastic right. Fighting to restore the world as it was for his forefathers.

The alarms in the camp go off, shouting and screaming. I don’t have time to sit here and think as we’re under attack again.

The Ebon Legion of the Dead is endless, and growing every day. Everyone we lose is a gain on their side.​

They don’t come all at once. The dead don’t adhere to a timeframe.

We made a fighting retreat, because all we can do is fight them. They don’t sleep. They don’t tire. Corpse reavers rise from the graves, the dark magics of the Ebonfrost ritual makes old bodies dig from the earth. Skeletal hordes, zombie legions, and shambling horrors that are little more than living mounds of flesh stitched together by necromancers serving the Ebon Heer.

I grab a musket and join in the defense. It’s little more than a probing attack. But all it takes is one corpse to sneak into our camp, to start killing people in the night, for everything to spiral out of control.

The first few hours after we escape Ebonham are harrowing. Paranoia. Men trying to hide bites, afraid it’s an infection like the White Pestilence of ancient history. Entire units seeing movement and firing into the treeline, only to find it’s just the trees bathed in that omnipresent purple light.

We stop to make camp when it seems calm. But the dead are slow. And they are relentless. It’s only when we stop that they come in force.

The second few hours were spent learning that lesson. The longer we stayed put, even putting double or triple watches, the more of them would find us an attack.

Whiskeyjack and Bad-Hand realize what we have to do. We can’t stay here. So we break camp early, before the men have gotten the chance to rest or properly tend to their wounds, and move further east. We can’t go west, towards the White Walls of Castanor. It’s like a giant fishbowl, and we’re trapped here.

I don’t know where Sina Necropolis is. If he’s even alive on his front, far north into the Alenic Reach.

All I know is who we have here. The survivors. And we need to push and march. Skipping meals. Skipping sleep. Marching through the last of the spring snow. Just running. Trying to think on the run, as we carry cannons and rucksacks and all the supplies we could salvage.

Until the first horses and men begin to fall dead to the side of the road from exhaustion. The soldiers get back up to try to kill their brothers.

“We can’t keep doing this,” Whiskeyjack says, eyes red. He limps, shoulders sagging, back bent at an angle from carrying his equipment for nearly thirty hours of straight marching, straight fighting. His first horse had keeled over already.

I agree with him.

We link up our forces in a wide perimeter, try to build camp, and fend off the endless dead.

And no one gets an ounce of sleep, through the constant attacks, the endless fire of musket and cannon, as the undead throw themselves at us in ever increasing numbers.

It never ends it never ends it never ends it never—​

There was a time I joked about how I couldn’t sleep. But I don’t think I’ve ever been tired. I woke up nearly forty-eight hours ago. I marched to battle. I fought a witch in single combat. And saw my forces slaughtered.

I don’t think I’ve ever truly been exhausted. There’s a point where your organs stop working right. Where the only thing you can hear is the ringing of blood. Where your thoughts gain an almost supernatural power to bewitch your mind, until your head is empty and you are just staring.

Where, if you stop moving for even a second, blink a little too long, you’ll fall asleep. Only to instantly wake up in a panic, full of fear and adrenaline as you grasp for your musket.

Your head doesn’t stop hurting. You discover aches and pains in places you never knew you could. You get dizzy and start to dry heave just from standing and walking.

“Why,” a soldier whispers as I walk through the the ramshackle camp, kept awake only by the roar of cannon and oppressive scent of gunpowder.

I stop, and the inertia alone nearly doubles me over. I lean against the musket I’m carrying for support like a cane. “What’s that?” I ask.

The young private’s blue uniform is covered in blood, head and arms covered in gory bandages. He’s just sitting there against the wall of a tent, curled up in the fetal position and holding onto his musket as if to part with it would kill him. He snaps up when I reply, eyes wide and uncomprehending. He can’t know who I am.

“I had to kill my brother,” he says, and grins wide. He laughs maniacally. “He was—he signed up, asked me to join with me. We were gonna—” He laughs, rocking back and forth, until it turns into naked sobbing. He holds his musket tighter. “Collapsed. I—I had to shoot him. I had to shoot my own little brother to make stop trying to bite my throat!”

He just sobs, shaking. Ugly snot and tears staining his bandages, his uniform. “I just want to go to sleep, man. I just—but if I close my eyes, I see him asking me why I killed him. I just—I just—Dame, Rogier, Castellos, Corin, fucking anyone! Why?!”

I swallow hard and excuse myself. His wasn’t even the first story I’d heard like that today. Brother, friend, sergeant, lover—doesn’t matter. If I close my eyes, listen beyond the gunfire and mages’ spells, I can hear so much wailing. So many men, soldiers, reduce to nothing but mewling messes unable to even sleep.

All because of me.

I stumble into our command center, filled with red-eyed soldiers, scribes, and people just staring into space. Bad-Hand sits on the ground, holding his face in his hands. There’s no tables set up. Whiskeyjack scowls at me, or maybe his eyes are too foggy to see right. He sniffs, rubbing his running nose.

“We can’t keep doing this,” I say, and nearly puke from the effort it takes to speak. “We won’t survive just holding back. The longer we wait, the more of them there are. We’re going to be overwhelmed even more if we sit back. We need to attack.”

Bad-Hand looks up at me. His face is covered in scratch-marks and deep cuts. “Okay.”

“Okay?” I ask, and laugh. “Okay?”

The half-orc blinks slowly. “Okay.”

Whiskeyjack has his hand over his mouth, breathing slowly through his fingers. “We can’t attack the undead and hope to win, not in the long term, in any way that matters. More—more you kill, the more of you they kill, and the more they grow.”

“We can’t just sit here!” I shout.

A scribe suddenly wakes up from the scroll she was sleep-writing. She yelps and falls over.

“We need to find Ebonfrost and kill him,” I say. “End his power. Give him the hard goodbye.”

“You saw what happened. Liches come back from the dead. That’s their thing,” Bad-Hand says. “You saw it yourself.”

Whiskeyjack stares at me for a long time. “Not entirely true, I think. Liches are bound to Halann through rituals, through sacred objects. Holds its soul. Long as they exist, they can live, come back from the dead, and just keep on being.”

I seize on that. “So we find that artifact—”

“Phylactery,” he supplies, almost slurring the word.

“That phylactery and destroy it.”

“Where?” Bad-Hand mumbles, trying to sit up straighter.

“I…” Words fail me. Thought itself is hard. Abstract tactical planning seems a world away, to a safer time when Margery was by my side, and Finn was there to help point out problems. Now I’m alone with my own thoughts and these men on the cusp of death by exhaustion.

I swallow. Think of the soldier crying as he asked me why.

I hiss in a breath, pressing my fingers into my eyes. Until it just hits me. “Where’s the most secure place in Black Castanor?”

Bad-Hand squints. “The old capital of Urviksten, far to the north in Gerudia. Or…” He looks up.

I nod. “The Trialmount. Or, whatever they’re calling it. That’s the seat of their power, where the old throne of the sorcerer king used to be. If—if it’s anywhere, it’s there. If I had my soul in a box, I’d put it in only the safest place I had. We need to attack it and pray we’re right.”

“But what about the dead on our heels?”

Whiskeyjack sniffs. “We’ll hold them off. We’ll burn the bridges, scorch the earth, and keep the dead distracted. Buy you some time.”

“I’ll help,” Bad-Hand says. “I doubt my men have anything left to march and attack anyhow. I’d rather we die fighting for something than sit here and turn into those things.”

I nod and order the scribes and present officers to search for volunteers for a last-ditch suicide mission.

I leave men to die, so that others might live. And hate myself every moment.​

Dad was right about you, Rogier.

I haven’t had that intrusive thought in years. It’s almost funny.

The words wrack through my brain as the exhausted officers plan the last ditch campaign. We can't expect the entire army to move into the heart of Castanor.

I'm leading it, of course. I can't not do it. This is my war, and everyone who dies is on me.

I expect perhaps a crack team of veterans to be the ones to sign up. The few people crazy enough to go with me and to hell itself.

I don't expect so many tens of thousands to volunteer. So many that we have to turn a fair portion away just so we can keep our supply lines nimble.

Until one of my senior officers informs me one of the incentives they drew up. First they announced a request for soldiers to join an open suicide mission. Those who volunteered would be excused from watch for the night and guaranteed at least five hours of uninterrupted sleep.

And that's enough to get thousands of men to throw their lives away beside me. That's how far we've gone. How desperate they are.

Dad was right about you, Rogier.

I let them rest. I let Whiskeyjack burn the land around us.

And I take my volunteers into the belly of the black dragon, tracing the ley lines of purple runic magic towards the dark tower in the heart of darkness.

And the call is made. Orders given. And we march.​

These are the last of our known forces. We still don’t know what happened to General sina Necropolis, and suspect him and his thirty-thousand are dead. Whiskeyjack’s Army of Farraneán and Bad-Hand’s Royal Army take the onerous task of burning the countryside. Stirring the hornet’s nest as a distraction. Forcing the Witch-Emperor to gather his forces to attack them from the north. Meanwhile, my men?

I take what’s left and march to the base of the Trialmount, where once the North Citadel stood watch over all Castanor. Now reduced to little more than a black tower glowing an ethereal light we can see over the horizon.

We get the only sleep of the entire army and move to “Kastali Ebonfrost,” praying and hoping against hope that we can destroy the Monster of the Ice before his forces pour across Escann and devour the living.

The seat of Black Castanor, ancient heart of Humanity’s First Empire.​

We march with haste, more out of terror and a sense of duty, than anything else holding us together.

Once again, I am alone. Margery is a hundred miles away. My closest generals are fighting for their lives to buy us this time.

And I can barely breathe. I just grab a musket and march with my men through the undead-infested countryside.

Even marching without an army on our heels is hell. The winter is mild enough. If not for our great preparations and glut of supply deploys, we’d be starving to death and without ammunition.

The worst is that the ground is alive.

We take a water and food break, and a man starts to scream.

I rush out to find black, skeletal hands reaching out from the earth to grab his ankles, hauling itself up. Fingers reaching for the knife on his boot.

A sergeant shoots the ground. The dirt cushions the bullet.

“I don’t want to die, not like this!” the man shrieks.

I grab the soldier. “Pull him out!” I command. “It’s holding onto him. Pull him out and expose it to the air, then shoot the fucking thing!”

We pull the man back, and an ancient orc skeleton covered in dirt rasps at us.

This time when we shoot it, the bones explode, and whatever sorcery was holding it together dies with it.

We start to build a doctrine for this: what to do is things reach for you through the ground.

These would end a war in any other circumstance. The dead, however, don’t care for losses.​

What limited communications we have between my Damerian Army and the men we left to do are at first hopeful. Bad-Hand and Whiskeyjack’s delaying action not only worked, but they beat back the first waves.

These massive battles, and superior training and discipline held the line.

Until I read the letter again,

First waves.

Battles that decades ago that would have been huge, world-shaking occasions, are now only the first opening skirmishes of the war against the dead. And more are coming.

I drop the letter and realize what I’m doing. What I’ve done.

I have sent sixty-thousand men to their deaths. Not all at once. Not in a single epic battle that the bards and elves will sing about.

In a brutal, grinding war of attrition.

We can kill them all day and they’ll keep coming.

Before I know what I’m doing, I realize I’m shaking. I can’t hold anything straight. I collapse against a wall and just sit there, staring, thinking of all those men officers I spoke to, the soldiers I paraded before me like toys, all those eager-faced heroes—dying an inglorious death in the cold.

I stare at my hands. I look at the cuts, the scratches, the bits of dirt and gunpowder under my nails. I want Margery so badly. I want to hold her in my arms. I want her to run her fingers through my hair, letting my rest my head upon her chest. Listen to the little ba-thumps of her heart beating, counting them to calm down as we fall asleep safe in each other’s arms.

But I am alone. I am cold. And I have doomed so many to a needless death.

“Your grace,” an officer says.

“Just resting,” I lie, looking up.

“We’ve reached Castonath,” she says.

“I know. And?”

She swallows. “The dead are already here.”

I grab a table and use it to steady myself and get to my feet. My voice feels shaky in my own throat. I feel small and pathetic. But somehow I croak out a “Form up battle lines. We will reach Kastali Ebonfront.”

It feels fake and hollow. But forwards is the only direction I can think of.

And I pray I don’t get these brave men and women killed, too.

They renamed Castonath after their witch-emperor.​

We lose less than a thousand men. We break nearly twelve-thousand of the living dead. Most of our casualties were from those who died and came back to kill their brothers.

We stop only to burn the corpses and offer prayers for our fallen, remembering their names. And then we saddle up, reload our muskets, and march directly north towards the snowcapped peaks of the Trialmount.

To that dark tower overlooking this unending nightmare, glowing with a light. And I feel like a moth drawn to an open flame-trap.

Blow it up.​

Kastali Ebonfront is less of a city, more of a massive fortress. An ancient Castanorian citadel at the heart of the old empire, its old citadels and white walls are now stained black. Unceasingly patrolling corpses patrol the walls, sometimes aided by living Northmen.

It had been one of the last bastions to fall to the Greentide, even after the orcs swept away the country that surrounded it. The Dookanson shook the earth with his shamans, launching wave after wave of his own orcs to take it.

Until, finally, the orcs took it.

And found the entire human garrison had starved to death.

I don’t have time for that in this war. I don’t have orcish shamanism or an army of men to waste.

I have cannons.

I order every shot we have fired in a single, unending battery. Firing constantly hour after hour as the army stands ready.

Until something in the black walls breaks and cracks. And, like a kicked ant-hill, a screaming, howling legion of corpses pour out.

I order the men to fire vollies, and then charge into the fortress city.

And the guns never fall silent.

Meaningless victory after victory in the north.​

It’d be smart to try to wait them out. That’s how a siege is supposed to work. A dedicated corps of engineers undermining a fortress until its defenders surrender.

But I know we don’t have time for that.

Nothing but a reckless charge into the hordes of the dead.

Because even as Bad-Hand and Whiskeyjack send man after man to die to hold back the Northmen and their undead, more and more corpses rise from the earth. Overwhelming the entirety of Escann. Until even the scant reports from my generals vanish, their riders and messengers devoured alive.

We don’t have the time to be smart.

We just have to hope Damerian mettle is stronger than Ebonfrost sorcery.

But the dead are limitless. We don’t even have the time to rest and eat anymore.​

We break through the lines of the dead, shattering the monsters with hellfire: cannons and magecraft. But mostly by blood and iron.

Worse than the corpses are, in a way, the living Northmen who fight alongside the undead, be they jarl, reaver, or mage. We barrel through them and I march into the ancient Castanorian citadel, still pulsing from its dark towers with magic.

“Find the phylactery!” I order as we move the army into the fortress. “Burn the city if you must—but find it at all costs!”

I give the order, and the hardened soldiers scattered in organized mobs.

It starts organized, soldiers under their sergeants following the plans, the old maps we have of the fortress from our spy networks. Fanning out to likely districts, breaking down doors, and leaving no stone unturned.

It turns into…

I walk down one street, flanked by honor guard. I see human Gerudians lined up against the walls. They’re well-dressed, possibly jarls or their families.

“Useless,” a sergeant says, and his soldiers run them through.

The men pause to see if any get back up. When one does, they shoot the woman back down.

“Move out. We’ve got blocks to clear,” the sergeant says. He sees him and salutes. “Your grace, nothing to report.”

The city starts to burn. Hours after the siege is over, after we’re within the walls, the sounds of gunfire never end.

Another street. Bodies piled up against the wall as a young mage, her eyes baggy, ignites them with a spell. I see a Gerudian merchant begging for the life of his son, only for an officer to shoot him and order the store looted. And there, a man pinned to the wall by a pike, still alive as an elf very calmly interrogates him.

I know I should feel something, anything. But I don’t. Nothing but a cold, hostile hatred. A sense that this is why they get.

“It’s called a double-tap, milord,” an officer says as his men stand over a road turned into a mass grave. He doesn’t flinch as a few of the soldiers fire into the corpses. “You kill them with pike first. Then you wait till they get up and shoot. Although, if there’s a mage on hand, we’ve found if you burn them alive, they don’t come back.”

I nod, grimly approving. They’re only following orders. My orders. And tearing this city and its people apart is just vengeance.

It’s… cathartic.

And I feel nothing.

I arrive at the dark tower itself, the defiled Castanorian Citadel at the very heart of the city. We blow the gates with cannons. Mages throw fire to kill anyone hiding in the foyer.

Torture, burn, and kill—whatever it takes to end this war.​

“What are they saying?” I demand as we enter the inner throne room of Kastali Ebonfrost.

A Gerudian crawls on useless legs, trailing blood and his organs. One of my men steps on his back and shoots his brains out.

I stand behind the defensive ward of one of my mages, flanked by musketeers. A host of robed Gerudian men with blue lips stand in a phalanx, together, their skin tattooed with quick-access runes. They stand defensively around the old throne of the Sorcerer-King, a museum piece they’ve restored to its ancient, evil glory.

It’s a stand-off. My soldiers pour in and flank out through the castle, but this room is stuck like this.

One of my officers says, “Nothing. Look here.”

He kicks over the man he’d shot and uses his boot to open the man’s mouth. “He’s one of their mages. Probably a necro—”

The mage starts to get up. I offer my man a pistol to double-tap him.

“Fuck,” he grunts with digust. “But look there. This is one of Castan’s mages. Same as those men on the other side of the room. He has no tongue.”

I scowl. “He cut out the tongues of his mages? “What kind of monster cuts out the tongues of his own men? Ashen Skies.”

A sergeant adds, “Probably so they can’t speak, your grace. They probably know, but can’t say. Probably don’t even speak common.”

“So they’re useless to us alive,” I say.

The officer nods. “No sense wasting our time.”

I sigh. “Burn them alive to save us the bullets. Shoot them if they keep moving. We search this entire fortress for the phylactery.”

I don’t need to tell my men twice. I stand there, unflinching, as we butcher Castan’s inner core of necromancers. Until there is nothing but charred flesh and gunsmoke.

And we get back to searching. To killing. To turning Castanor into a charnel pit.

We’re surrounded by so many of them.​

Someone brings me to the tower atop the Kastali Ebonfrost. They point, and I see the sea of living dead. Over twice our numbers in total.

Whatever delaying action Whiskeyjack and Bad-Hand were doing, it failed. It bought us the time to get here and start searching, but it wasn’t enough.

I order the men to try to repair the defenses. To take up position along the ruined wall. And kill anyone who isn’t helpful along the way. Fewer mouths to feed, and more for us to take from them.

We hunker down, scrambling to put up a semblance of defense against the approaching hordes. We’re low on food, running short on munitions, and staying alive on fear and adrenaline. Whatever soldiers I can spare, I have continued to turn over every stone, to burn every building, on the hunt for the phylactery.

I go to join them, trusting in my officers and NCOs to do their job. To buy us the last time with their lives.

I sentence men to their deaths.

But there’s a point where it’s all… just too much. You understand what you’re doing. You know if you’re alive, you won’t be the same person when it’s over. But that relies on you surviving in the first place. Emotions just stop working after your heart and glands run so hot for so long.

All you have left is a grim sense of determination. A drive to keep moving forwards. Because you don’t have any other choice. Because the moment you stop, you know you’ll collapse.

I want so badly to write Margery. I want to ask her how our children are doing. I want this all to end, most of all. To go back to normal. To wake from this nightmare and just be able to be Rogier for a day.

But that’s not the world I’ve thrown myself into

I grab my face and breathe. One last attack of nerves. The last shreds of anything I can feel.

And when it’s over, I almost miss it. I just stand there, empty. Smelling burnt bodies and blood and organs and shit and rotting corpses on the wind.

Someone shouts. And it turns into a full chorus.

I know the dead are finally here, and we still haven’t found the phylactery.

Until I get to the wall and see the Silmuna banners flying high, ahead of a massive marching column of soldiers.

I recognize those personal standards. It’s sina Necropolis!​

They seem so pristine, so perfect. A massive formed army, the one Margery and Finn and I spent so long helping to build up and recruit.

The necromancers, jarls, and other scum leading the undead know they’re trapped between us. With a howl of the damned, they order their corpse hordes to attack the fortress.

We open the gates to sally forth and attack them back, and pin them between ourselves and the reinforcements.

You brave, gorgeous bastard!​

Sina Necropolis’ veteran, well-supplied legion joins us as we double-tap the last of the Gerudians.

I grab him in a hug.

“Your grace!” he says, pushing me off. “Watch the uniform!”

“We didn’t think you made it!” I say as our forces meet up, cheering and exchanging their own hugs and gifts.

Brushing at his blue Rogieran uniform, sina Necropolis says, “I was in Esald, up north along the coast, when we heard the news. The first waves of the undead came soon after that. We split the difference with the local Reachmen. Linked up with local rebels and resistance cells. A lot of people suddenly decide they want to be heroes when their ruler declares himself a lich and raises an army of the undead. So we came back to reinforce. I didn’t expect you’d gotten so far.”

“Why not?”

He grimaces. “Whiskeyjack and Bad-Hand.”

“They didn’t make it, did they?”

Sina Necropolis sucks on his lips, starts to shake his head, then pauses. “They did everything they could, but the Ebonfrosts overwhelmed them when they pushed north. Whiskeyjack was leading a broken retreat south and burning the entire countryside last I saw him. We picked up any men we could from their armies after crossing the White Walls, and came to help.”

I put my hand to my mouth, breathing. “They held out longer than I had any right to ask of my men.”

“But now it means the deluge is coming,” sina Necropolis says, leaning to the side to look up at the dark tower. “Between what remains of our forces, we are all that’s left of Rogieria. I’ve even heard reports of Black Castanor raising cemeteries as far south as Estaire to get behind us. We’re trapped, and we’re outnumbered, and these are last men we’ll be getting, your grace.”

We invaded with the largest army in the world. Now we’re outnumbered two-to-one, and that gap grows every day.​

“No time to spare, then,” sina Necropolis says. “I’ve got fresh mages and supplies. We either pray this gambit is on the money, your grace…”

“Or we all die, and Escann with us,” I finish.

He swallows and nods.

I turn to the burning fortress city and order the men back in.

The slaughter resumes. The Gerudians in the city are rooted out, one by one. Anyone who might know anything is interrogated. Everyone who knows someone who might be made to speak. And anyone who doesn’t know, ends up another corpse to add to the pile.

But now with so many fresh eyes and minds, the search is even faster. More brutal.

We build up our defenses and work to hold off the undead. They start as an army. They turn into the entire horizon. And our frantic search continues, as the ceaseless gunfire begins again to keep the bastards out,

The entire city, the entire innards of the old citadels, are gutted, burned, and stained with blood. And I almost believe I’ve lost. That I lead my men to their deaths for nothing.

Until, as sina Necropolis and I are trying to figure out where else the phylactery could be, a half-orc private walking through the room stops. He’d been doing another sweep through the fortress, but he just stops. Staring at the throne of the sorcerer-king. It’s an ancient relic, where Nichmer himself one sat as he manipulated the old empire.

Five centuries ago, Cannor’s heroic forefathers stood in this room and put the sorcerer-king to the sword and ended his reign of terror. My ancestor, the elven hero turned god, Munas Moonsinger, never made it this far. He died to defeat the Black Castanorian navy. Had he survived, maybe he would have been standing where I stand now. In a way, I have gone farther than any of my heric ancestors.

I watch the young man slowly unsling his musket, his face unreadable. Everyone stops to stare at him.

He seems to sense his king and generals are watching him and turns to us, still holding his weapon and aiming it at the throne. His sergeant tries to grab and pull him away, but I hold my hand up.

“What are you thinking there, son?” I ask.

He just points at the ancient, ornate, evil throne. “I thought the stories said they destroyed this, your majesty. So, why does it look so clean and fresh?”

I just sit there, mind awash. “That… arrogant prick.”

“Your grace, I’m sorry!” the soldier’s sergeant says in a panic. “He speaks out of turn. I’m sorry, won’t happen again!”

I scowl. “No, don’t you dare, sergeant. Someone wheel me in a cannon and promote this young soldier ahead of peers.”

We bring in the big guns, load it up, have mages on standby, and fire.

In a moment, a piece of history is obliterated. Shattering into a thousand pieces of gold and ebony.

We all feel it.

A feeling deep in our souls, cold and haunting. Our skin itches.

And the air around the throne ignites in screaming, purple flames. Runes explode, and then suddenly it’s over.

Everything but the sudden howling of the corpses outside the fortress.

Until there is silence.

So quiet.​

I grab the private by the shoulder and pull him with me. Sina Necropolis leads the way to the parpets of the dark tower. From up here, we get a view of the fields around the fortress, stretching to the endless urban sprawl of ruined Castanoth.

Around us is nothing.

Black Castanor’s army is gone.

All that’s left is a field of bones and rotting flesh stretching as far as the eye can see.

The lich’s phylactery is gone. His power over life and death is severed. Soul erased.

Castan Ebonfrost is gone.

And I fall to my knees laughing. Until it hurts. Until I’m choking. Until Sina Necropolis has to hold me up, as I cry tears of relief.

Over a third of a million people lie dead.​

I’ll get to see Margery again.

Just as soon as we finish burning what’s left of the Black Castanorians to ashes, knowing this time they’ll stay dead.

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 13: The Shield of Cannor​

“Daddy!” the little boy I hardly even know shouts, running up to me.

I stand there, trying to remember the last time I saw Vincen.

And my knees feel shaky as he grabs another boy and drags him with him.

“Adie, Adie!” he says, grabbing my legs. “This is Daddy!”

The other boy, a few years younger, looks up with a more hesitant, confused expression. And I realize I haven’t seen either of my boys since one could barely talk, and the other couldn’t even walk.

He grew up so big while I was away.​

Vincen pulls his brother Adénn in, and I just stand there unsure what to do, what to say. I missed so much of their childhood.

But finally, hesitantly, almost skeptical of me, Adénn tries to hug me too.

I don’t so much as kneel down to hug them back as I do collapse to my knees, wrapping them both up. “Heya, buddies. Been a while. I—” My voice cracks.

Someone laughs. The throaty, almost husky laugh I grew to love what feels like a lifetime ago. I look up and see Margery, as gorgeous as the day I met her, wearing that silly little crown I’d had made for her, and holding a daughter in her arms.

“Took you long enough, you big oaf,” she says.

I have… a daughter. A third child I never even knew about. Born during the war, and no one knew or told me.​

I hug my boys until they’re squirming, and then rush over to hold my wife. I bring her tightly in my arms and kiss her.

The little girl she’s holding looks up at me, almost offended. “Aaah!” she protests.

“What’s her name?” I ask softly.

Margery smiles and flicks me on the forehead. “Auci.”

“That’s a good, classic Damerian name.”

She sighs. “I know, and that’s my mistake. I thought the only good thing finding out I was with child after you’d left was I’d be able to come up with a good name all on my own.”

I laugh, until it ends with almost a sniffle. “No, it’s perfect. She’s perfect. Our boys are perfect. You are perfect.”

Margery looks away, trying not to blush. “I missed you.”

“You too, Margery.”

And as I hold her, my boys come back up to hug us both.

For a moment, there is nothing. Just me, my family, those I love—and no memories of war, death, my father, or anything.

A single island of calm content in the storm of death and despair I have brought into this world.

And holding them is all I can do to stop myself from bawling.

And Black Castanor collapses in our wake.​

I lay in bed, somewhere I haven’t been in years, it feels like. Somewhere soft and warm with the woman I love in my arms. She rests her head on my chest as I run my fingers over her, tracing the outline of her body.

“I didn’t think you’d come back,” Margery whispers.

I don’t interrupt her.

“Whiskeyjack and Bad-Hand returned, broken and bloodied. They helped hold the frontier. But they said you vanished. Took your army into the heart of darkness. No one had heard from you since you left.” She grabs my hand, nails digging into the flesh.

“I tried to stay strong. Wear this stupid crown and be the queen while you were gone,” she says. “But I thought you wouldn’t. I thought I was just faking it. Lying to our children that their Daddy was still out there.”

All I can do is wrap my arms around her.

“Promise me you won’t do that again.”

“I—” But words fail me.

She gives a sad, bitter little laugh. “Of course. Why am—why am I even surprised? I knew the risks when I married you. You don’t stop, Rogier. You can’t, can you?”

“No,” I breathe.

“Can’t you pretend, just for me?” she asks. “Just for a little while. Pretend like you’re happy. You’re satisfied. That the world is finally yours, and that you can relax and be my husband and their father?”

“I can try.” And wonder if I’m lying.

Margery buries her face into my chest.

I broke the balance of power, and now Rogieria stands as the New Colossus.​

I lie to my wife and family for only so many days. It feels like forever. Feels like I can’t sit still when I don’t know about the world outside, sticking to a happy, domestic life. I take my family out through the parks of Rogieria. On a carriage trip to Lake Silvermere. We sample the foods of Newshire and its halfling minority.

I teach Vincen how to fish, at least. I’m rusty, but I remember how to do it. Little Auci just stares wide-eyed at the world and clutches to her mother. Slightly bigger Erlas gets lost trying to climb trees.

It lasts entirely too long for me.

Entirely too short for everyone else.

Before I know it, the crown is back on my head and I’m sitting in the Rogieran throne room, with Margery beside me. The blue military uniform that’s become my outfit of choice since the war feels like the only thing I can wear anymore.

“Welcome back, your grace,” Finn says with a smile, adjusting his glasses.

Sina Necropolis sits back, hand over his mouth. He meets my eyes and we exchange a nod.

There’s others in the privy council I don’t recognize. New blood since the war, or replacements for those like Laurenne who died to the undead.

The post-war situation of the world.​

I shattered Black Castanor. Its armies evaporated as the dead collapsed and their forces retreated. The Witch-Emperor died. And the oppressed people under its rule rose up with our help.

It’s a New Escann. And in it, we are its mightiest nation.

Of the new lands we annexed, they are mostly a wasteland. Empty forests the Gerudians cleared of people, rich in sources, but depopulated. Not an orc, half-orc, or even a goblin anywhere north of our pre-war borders.

The Gerudians remaining in our borders were mostly freemen farmers and lumberjacks, with no love for the Ebonfrost kings. And while the Ebonfrost dynasty still rules the rump state of Olavlund, these people are willing to swear loyalty to the Rogieran crown.

That’s priority one. Establish control over the north, consolidate our gains, and cement Rogieria's power over Escann now and forever.

We slaughtered scores of them, but like the orcs, if they serve the crown, we have no problem with them in theory. We enable them to stay, though make no efforts to hide we’ll be settling empty lands with Damerian settlers and working to convert the “Black Castanorians” away from their heathen faith.

Then, it’s simply a matter of building up local infrastructure and fortifications. To restore the legendary Castanorian citadel of Bal Mire.

And with that, our meeting concludes. I retire with Margery.

Tomorrow we get up early to go north, to see the land now cleared of the undead, and lay the groundwork for a stronger Rogieria.

It’s just business. It’s that cold certainty of progress and expansion I feel so at home with.

Margery gives me a look before we go.

And I suggest we take our children. She smiles at the suggestion, as we take the princes and princess around the country.

As we build a new bulwark in the north, it seems the post-war borders were not enough to bring peace. We need defenses more than ever.​

In ages past, Bal Mire was one of the wonders of the most ancient Cannor. Bal Vroren, Bal Dostan, Bal Mire, the White Walls of Castanor, and the North Citadel. The dwarf, Balgar the Builder, had built them to assist the humans of Castanor, acts of such architectural brilliance that he ascended to godhood after his death.

The dwarves still revere him. Those who hold to the Cannorian pantheon, at least.

Nowadays, however?

I had been there and ordered the cannons that destroyed the North Citadel, reducing it to ruin and rubble. Bal Dostan is in the hands of Corvuria to the south, marking the borders between themselves and our Estaire. Bal Vroren was held by orcs, Black Castanor, and now by whatever rebels took it.

Bal Mire is half-sunk into the mud after millennia. Empires holding it have built and rebuilt upon its sturdy foundations.

Vincen plays on the stones as Margery chases after him to get him to stop risking his life on the old ruins.

I work with the royal engineers to study Bal Mire’s designs, and then improve it with modern technology. To turn this place into the new shield of Cannor.

We restore the fortress. And then take its lesson north, to build our own Castanorian Citadel all our own.

I name it Adennthíl, a good elven term. “The Tower of Adénn,” after my great grandfather. It is proof Rogieria can learn from the past, improve upon it, and make our own future.

Absolute control over Escann. This is Rogieria’s destiny.​

Strange sensation. The war is over, but I still feel like all I’m doing is preparing for the next one. Rebuilding broken Escann and settling it with loyalists. Restore the army to what it once was.

We lost so many men in the war. So many who came back to kill their brothers.

Sometimes, even when I’m with Margery and our children, I close my eyes and think back to that soldier screaming, crying, and laughing as he asked me why. I don’t know what to make of it. I don’t know how to feel about it.

Words feel… somehow inadequate. It’s like the only thing I can do is double-down

Throw myself harder than ever into repairing the damage of our war against evil. To prepare for some future war, defend against it, and ready the offensive.

Sina Necropolis and the others are there to help. We learned many lessons from the war. The value of gunfire and cannons.

Our most elite army of Rogieria, the pride of all Cannor.​

I take Margery and Vincen with me. Sometimes our other children, when I feel it appropriate. As if showing them off to the nation, the new Silmunas our nation serves, will help somehow.

But I think, as I attend parades, as I oversee expansion of barracks and regimental towns, the reformation of the army and its engineers, it’s just because I don’t want to leave those I love alone for too long.

I’m in my forties now. I don’t feel like a “Young Owl” anymore. Sometimes Margery talks to me, and I just phase out, lost in thought about what I’m going to do tomorrow. I smile, I nod, I take my tea, and I just think of tomorrow.

It’s like time is running out on me. A looming sense of something I should be doing, but am not.

I don’t know what it is.

I bury myself in my work to keep those thoughts at bay.

Inspire the troops by leading from the front.​

Some of that work is not just my soldiers. It is tending to my people. My Sons of Dameria. I have rebuilt this nation as best I can. We are a New Dameria, and this shall be my legacy.

It feels hollow to say. More platitudes than anything of substance and meaning.

So much of what I do either feels cold and gray, or like I’m not doing enough.

There’s hardly a middle ground. And I think I’d go insane if not for Margery by my side, and the way our children play and learn and grow up around us.

What is Rogieria?

There’s probably something philosophical in it. But I feel more like I’m just going down a checklist. Settling questions I don’t care to answer anymore.

Slotting the puzzle together to fit what Rogieria must be for the Silmuna legacy. For my children. For those ones who died along the way, like Roger the Exile or Adénn Skylance.

I had a dream once, many years ago. Maybe it was just from the stress of my new crown. But I recall thinking I was able to speak to my namesake, and he told me a phrase that kept sticking with me. It was something he was, apparently, fond of saying in his more grim moments.

A new world will be born from the graves and charnel pits.

But I’ve seen the graves. I’ve dug the charnel pits. And then I killed whatever miserable abomination of flesh, bone, and black magic had crawled out from them.

In the end, I suppose, Rogieria is whatever I make of it. Whatever I set my mind to it being. A home for Damerians, Adenner, elves, half-elves, civilized orcs, my half-orc kin, Black Castanorians who swear to serve, and even a token few halflings in Newshire.

L’Escann c’est moi.

“The army is back up to snuff,” sina Necropolis says, idly twirling a pen in his hands as today’s meeting comes to a close. “Losses recouped. Garrisons and control points established over the North. I think on that front, we’ve rebuilt and gotten even stronger.”

“And the north is firmly under our control,” Finn says. He takes a sip of his tea.

Other members of the privy council talk of our successful domestic policy. Trade routes are a big thing, since our domination of the region means all trade in and out of Escann must come through Rogieria or her subjects. Diplomatic relations with our Escanni neighbors are surprisingly high, with many still seeing us as liberators, the heroes who single-handedly defeated the New Black Castanor.

Doesn’t really feel heroic to me. Just—it was something I had to do.

“I believe with this all squared away,” Finn adds, “we can call an early close of today’s affairs. Unless anyone has anything else they wish to bring up?”

I sit there and lean forwards, trying to think. My mind runs empty. Hits a walls. My eyes go this way and that, trying to dig through the scattered garments of my head to assemble some kind of reasonable attire from them. Something more to do.

Margery reaches and puts her hand over mine. “Yes, actually,” she says, smiling at me. “We’ve seen to the North, but I’d like to bring our attention back to Farraneán.”

“Your grace?” Finn asks.

I hold her hand.

“In Anbennar, there’s an Esmari custom along one of its rivers. They take barges down the river, from duchy to duchy, celebrating trade and fashion. I’ve always admired it. With the other half of this kingdom properly restored, I believe we should establish our own version of it. Along the Cogaulúis River, to properly celebrate the rebirth of my own as an integral part of this new Dameria. What do you say, Rogier?”

I nod. “I’ll—Finn, we should get to work on that. Food, wine, barges, a river schedule.” I put my hands together. “To remind the people of why our rule is just and have fun doing it.”

Between the East Damerians of Rogieria and Núrcestir, Damerians have become the largest ethnic group in Escann, followed by our loyal Farrani.​

The largest barge of the Cogaulúis fleet finally kicks off, joining the others down the largest river running through Farraneán. It had been good, solid work to get there. But now as music plays from the boats, and fireworks light up the sky above us, I get that itching feeling in my skin and behind my eyes. Like the jitters from drinking far, far too much tea.

It stopped feeling like work to get here, and back to just… relaxing. Resting on my laurels when I could be doing something.

I close my eyes and think of nearly puking from exhaustion in Inner Castanor. Men forced to kill their undead brothers. The desperate massacre of the Gerudians to search for the phylactery.

“Grandpa!” Vincen shouts, and my eyes snap open.

Martin síl na Eán looks so much older than last I saw him, his brown hair and beard have turned mostly gray. But his face seems so young as it lights up, as he falls to one knee to grab Vincen and Adénn in his arms. “There you are!” he says, bringing them both into his arms. “I’ve missed you both. How have you been?”

“They’ve mostly been behaving,” Margery says, still holding little Auci. No longer an infant, the little princess still demands to be carried everywhere if possible.

“Well, how do you do, your grace?” Martin says with a laugh, reaching out to touch Auci’s hand.

Auci scowls at him and buries her face in her mother. Everyone laughs, and the excited conversations between doting grandfather and grandchildren start up. If you didn’t know I was their father, you’d think it was just a perfectly normal human family.

I don’t know why that thought hits me now of all times. Maybe because last time I’d really seen Martin, that old sense of being an other marrying his daughter had been on my mind.

Martin looks up to see me. His expression is curious at first, before he smiles. Too slow to be genuinely happy to see me. “Your grace, my son-in-law!” he says.

“That’s Daddy!” Vincen says proudly, as if Martin doesn’t know.

“Yes, yes,” Martin says warmly, walking up to me as my sons tug at his pants for attention and more of the little pieces of candy he has. “Please, your grace, how are you finding Farrani foods? That is good Farrani wine in your cup. I brought out the best and oldest in Valefort’s cellars for you!”

I look down at my goblet. It’s not wine. It’s sour grape juice, not that anyone knows. I just… I’m still wearing that military uniform. I can’t ignore the weight of the brace of pistols I’m hiding under my coat, as if I came here to murder my father-in-law. I could probably even do it, right here and now, says an intrusive voice as I look into his smiling face. Gun him down in front of everyone and claim I had a reason. My rule is strong enough it’d only be a minor scandal. Margery would hate me, but if I wanted to I could have everyone here killed. Probably do it myself.

Intrusive, intrusive!

What was I thinking before? Oh, right. The alcohol. My problem is, the idea of dulling my senses when someone could need me for any reason—it makes my skin itch.

“I thought there was something special in this, Martin,” I say through a fake smile.

“Ah,” he says, holding up a finger and winker, “it must be your Silmuna’s famous sense of taste.”

“Sure, let’s go with that.”

Margery takes her father by the arm. “Dad, c’mon. Let’s mingle with the rest of our esteemed guests. Let my husband enjoy our restored kingdom together.”

I watch them leave. I watch my wife mingling with the guests from Esmaria, old Dameria, the borderlands. Showing off her dress, products of her home, and most proudly our children to diplomats, distinguished nobility, merchants, generals—just everyone.

When no one is looking, I pour my grape juice overboard and just…

Feel like I’m not doing enough.

An integral part of Rogieria, our spear against the traitors of Anbennar, and our economic highway to the rest of the world!
[These big story events apply to so, so many provinces I can’t bother to share. But, they’re big, powerful, and important.]​

I’m almost grateful, in the end. The people cheer. It starts at our barge, and then spreads to the others. I can even hear people who couldn’t have heard me on the sides of the river, whooping and hollering just to be part of this whatever I’ve declared.

It’s over. I don’t have any more needed role here.

I sit down in the gauche little throne at the stern of the barge. My fingers twitch each time a firework goes over, and there’s so many of them. I think back to blowing the Throne of the Sorcerer-King. To the spell-muffled cannons of Castan Ebonfront. I think about a lot of things, until I realize I’m fingering the weapons under my coat.

Margery sits down on the arm of my chair. She gives me a long, skeptical look, until it hits me she wants me to wrap my arm around her waist and pull her in.

It doesn’t seem to make her happy. “What are you doing here, Rogier?”

“Enjoying the show,” I say mildly.

“No, I mean—here,” she says, gesturing at the little pavilion. “All alone. I can’t do all of this socializing myself before I burn out. Dad’s helping, and the kids are a riot enough to distract people. But you’re the king; introducing yourself and rubbing elbows with our guests is probably the biggest reason why anyone came here tonight. Why don’t you go make that silver tongue of yours useful and network with those who came to see you?”

“And here I thought that was your second favorite thing I could do with my tongue,” I say.

Margery question. “You’re trying to avoid the question.”

“Maybe.”

She sighs, resting her head on my shoulder. “What’s wrong, Rogier?”

“It’s nothing.”

“Rogier, you promised. You promised you wouldn’t do this kind of thing alone again. That you’d tell me whatever was wrong, so we could work through it together. Look around us.” She points at this, at that, at nothing. Until she grabs my head, head still resting on me. Almost nuzzling in her own way.“This was a wasteland when we married. Now it’s a bustling, thriving heartland. It’s all I ever wanted, and you helped me build it. Now let me be your partner and help you in return.”

“I…” …have nothing to say. I open my mouth, feel a cold sense of indignation, and realize it’s directed at the woman who loves me. The feeling washes away into a dark pit somewhere inside. I feel the weight of the weapons I’m carrying. The warmth of her body. “…okay.”

“Okay?” she asks, head perking up.

“Yeah. Okay,” I say quietly. “Just—not here. Not right now. In the open where anyone could hear us.”

Margery sucks on her lip, almost disapprovingly. “I’ll allow it—on one condition.”

“That being?”

She gets to her feet, pulling me up by the hand. “That you make an effort tonight to help me with all of these diplomats. I met some interesting people I want you to meet later. But right now, I need your help with all of them.”

“It’s a deal.”

Art and news from explorers who’ve crossed the sea to the lost elven homeland of Aelantir.​

We speak with artists and diplomats. We learn of news from across the sea, something I’d only half-paid attention to in years prior. Sailors and explorers who used the latest ships to cross the great sea to rediscover the ancient elven homeland, and to plunder and explore the ruins of the Precursor Elf civilization.

They say this old land, this Aelantir, is inhabited by entirely mortal “elves who are not quite elves.” Strange mutant creatures and horrors. Forests that bleed. Things with the faces of leeches guiding horrors in forbidden swamps. Plants that grow into people to control their bodies and minds.

So some interesting art about Castellos, King of the Regent Court, probably doesn’t mean too much.

Adopting the newest ideas from the guests along our river barges.​

It’s all very interesting stuff, I suppose. I smile. I talk. I grease elbows.

But none of it is really applicable to Rogieria in any way besides fascinating trivia and a few new methods of trade and transportation. It does help us stay on top of the technological curve over all of Cannor, at least.

And meanwhile, our own impressive court personnel assist Margery and me.

“What about those special guests you wanted me to meet?” I ask.

Margery stays on my arm. “Later, Rogier. Later. Not on this barge.”

Our administrators and leaders do their own work, impressing the guests.​

And like that, it’s over. It ends. The barges get to the end of our section of the Cogaulúis and we disembark. Martin is practically in tears as having to leave his grandchildren behind. It’s almost endearing, in a weird kind of way.

For a moment, I wonder if my own grandmother, Eilís the Blue would have loved me if she met me. I doubt the man who took her would have cared.

It’s whatever. I gather my family up, ensure the guests are sufficiently partied out, and make arrangements to return home to the city of Rogieria. We arrive late at night and put the children to bed.

And then it’s just me, and it’s just Margery. She changes into nightwear and just sits at the edge of the bed, head propped up on her elbows, looking at me. I sit beside her and sigh. She gives me space. She gives me time. And I love her all the more for it, and search for the right words.

“It’s not enough,” I say at length. “It will never be enough, I think. Everything I have done. Everything we have done. I went from some second son in Corintar to the most powerful man probably in the world. But…” I shake my head, sucking on my lips. “I still feel terrible when I’m not doing something. The idea that a man like me, after all I’ve done, can just rest.”

I swallow. “I feel the past looming closer than ever. The reaper on my heels. It is a feeling like… descending into a mouth, y’know? This hot, slavering mouth smelling of meat and the corpses of those who died for me along the way. Sometimes I close my eyes and see them. I see this soldier whose name I never learned, sobbing and asking me why he had to kill his own little brother in my war. I see the excited faces of our children, as I realize they’ve grown up practically without me. I see what you and I have done, and can only think of a monument to my failures.”

Margery takes my head and leans against me. Neither of us say anything for the longest time.

“It’s like when we met. You remember that?” she asks. “This nervous-looking half-orc king. I remember the first time I saw you, you were speaking to an orcish servant in his own language. You were angry at his bondage. You said if you could have the power to change the world, you’d do it. You’d use it to change the world. To make it a better place. And then you did it. But it’s not enough for you, is it?”

I shake my head. “No,” I whisper. “Because when I look in the mirror, I still see the kid whose father ignored him all day because his older brother was better with a bow. And I feel so selfish and greedy and pathetic, because I know the great deeds we’ve done, and I don’t feel like I have the right to feel sorry for myself.”

“Because you see a way out.”

Again, I shake my head. “I don’t see a way out, Margery. I see a way through. The same as that young king planning late in the throne room, studying books and maps, making war plans, writing letters to your father, building armies and destroying nations. I have spent so much of my life as Rogier Silmuna, the Young Owl, that I don’t know how to be anyone else. Sometimes I feel as though the Young Owl is chasing someone else’s dream, but it’s all I know anymore. All I can do. The only time I feel I have a purpose.”

“And it’s like the moment you stop, the moment you allow yourself to be human and relax, it’ll all come crashing down.”

“Yeah,” I breathe.

Margery squeezes my hand. “Just my luck, to fall in love with the greatest workaholic in all Halann.”

“Mhm.”

She sighs. “You promised to talk to me when you felt this way. Just like I promised to always be there for you, Rogier. Whatever you feel you have to do, I’ll be there with you, making sure it works, goes off without a hitch. Your dream is my dream.”

“And what if my dreams were never mine to begin with?”

Margery kisses my check. “Then once we fulfill that dream, I’m dragging your ass on a real vacation and we can figure out what your own original dreams are, Rogier.”

Whose dreams am I even following anymore?​

It’s the next night, and I am alone in the throne room. Myself, the map of Rogieria, and the candlelight.

Before me is my legacy. The one people like Finn had put upon me since I was a boy, since I tried to leave Lothane’s shadow.

I wonder what Father’s up to these days. He’s still alive, I know for a fact. He stepped down as the leader of the Corintar, and I chose not to follow that up.

I take a deep breath.

Rogieria. From the Vrorenmarch to Ibevar to Estaire. This is my legacy. This is what my choices have given birth to. The mightiest nation in the world, its most veteran army, its richest lands, its most prestigious crown. The legacy of the Silmunas.

I’ve done more in my life than some kid from Corintar had any right to.

I am the King of Rogiera, of Adenica and Farraneán, of the New Dameria, of the West. But, that’s just the West of Escann.

These are my works.

And I don’t believe it will ever be enough.

I’ve lived out someone’s fantasy. I’ve accomplished someone’s dream.

Just—sometimes I wonder whose it is.

And I go to bed with that question unanswered.

But at least I have Margery and my family to help me see whatever dream I have to the end.

[Thus ends the first part of the Rogieran mission tree, and we get our first Silmuna Legacy bonus]​

Two men stand before the Rogieran throne in the morning. Well, a man and a dwarf.

“Rogier,” Margery says with an almost wicked grin. “I wanted to introduce you to two very important people I met during our time on the Cogaulúis River: Alain síl Crowne and Thorin Forgehammer, from Damescrown and Silverforge respectively.”

Both men get down on a knee to greet me in an official capacity.

Finn finally enters the throne room for our morning business, and just pauses there. He looks like he’s not sure if he should be here or not.

I give Margery a confused look, before raising my hand. “Please, gentlemen, stand. We are all friends here. Why, however, do you come all this way to Rogieria?”

“Begging His Majesty’s pardon this morning, King Rogier Silmuna,” the Forgehammer says, his voice so overly formal I need to struggle not to wince.

I click my tongue. “Dispense with the formalities and titles. If you have business, get to it.”

“Right, your grace,” síl Crowne says, one hand behind his back. “Anbennar is a mess, and we can no longer tolerate the abuses of the Wexonard emperor.”

“Weren’t your nations members of the Rose Party?” I ask. “Friends and allies of Wex.”

“Fifty, sixty years ago maybe,” the dwarf says, running his hand through his beard. “I can remember it. Not many else can. And certainly not the emperor himself.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I ask.

Standing behind the men to present them, Margery’s expression is so downright malicious I actually feel uncomfortable.

“It’s like this, your grace,” síl Crowne says. “Síl Wex must go. They’re bad for business, and subpar at pretty much everything they touch.”

“So…?”

Forgehammer scoffs. “Balgar’s Blood—we need your help to get rid of the Wexonards bastards. Who else to replace him but the rightful Silmunas once again?”

Margery, you gorgeous bitch, you’ve done it again!​

 

[Crushric]

Chapter 14: Homecoming​

Forgehammer lights up a pipe. He takes a long drag before exhaling smoke. “Wex has used its position as emperor for nearly sixty years to abuse Anbennar, your grace. They promised a new era of freedom. I was alive back then, aye? Instead, they’ve stripped people of their rights, invading weaker neighbors across Damestear and Esmaria. They’ve held onto power by removing rivals, placing their dynasty on the thrones of Toaren and the Electorate of Pearlsedge, and attacking anyone who threatens them under drummed-up pretexts. Fact is, it’s intolerable. We’re terrified, but no one can stop them.”

The Crownsman, síl Crowne, makes a face as he swats away at the pipesmoke. “The Elector-Princes are torn. Some look to the Silistras of Istralore for help, but they’ve done nothing but posture. A few think the Silcalas family of Arbaran can help, but they’re so caught up in subduing Gawed that they don’t care about what Wex is doing to the imperial heartland. No one is strong enough to stop them.”

The dwarf blows smoke at síl Crowne. “But fuck that, because we know you are, your majesty. Wex needs to get knocked down straight onto its erect conquest-addicting pecker. You’re the Shield of Cannor, Young Owl. If anyone can smack Emperor Lothane síl Wex and restore order to the Empire, reckon on all me marbles it’ll be you.”

Wexonard aggression has made them no friends in their own empire.​

“So,” I say, leaning forwards. “You’re inviting me to your own little conspiracy to overturn the Wexonards and restore Silmuna rule.”

Síl Crowne grimaces. “We’d prefer less overt terms. More, just offering our implicit support to the rightful rulers of Anbennar, in exchange for your help, support, and protection.”

“You’re still rather open about it.”

The dwarf shrugs. “Being subtle is for pussies, beggin’ your pardon, your majesty. The time to pussyfoot things is over. Things are bad now, following me? We want to stay free. You help us out, and we’re authorized to say we’ll support the Silmuna’s ancient claim to the Dove Throne.”

“And you’re not afraid I’ll abuse it worse?” I ask. “Rogieria is far stronger than Wex is.”

He side-eyes me, puffing on his pipe. “Problem for tomorrow, we suppose. But you defeated the Witch-Emperor. If we can trust anyone with the Dove Throne, it’d be Cannor’s foremost expert in annihilating tyrants. We have a deal?”

I consider for a long moment, almost hungrily. Margery gives me a subtle nod. Meanwhile, in the background, Finn is just grabbing his glasses and practically shoving them into his eyes.

This is it. This is it. The restoration of the Silmunas in a grand conspiracy, a sympathy of scheme and steel. The return of the emperor to his rightful place.

So I let out a long breath. “I am the state, and you will have Rogieria’s full support, in exchange for yours. Finn, Margery, we have overtures to make into Anbennar itself.”

Protection and alliances secured. We’ll preserve them for their support.​

Treaties are signed. Paperwork is organized. Before finally the two men decide to take their leave, satisfied with the work.

But not before giving me one last piece of advice. A recommendation, realm.

“There’s one more elector we think you can sway to our little conspiracy,” Forgehammer says.

“That being?”

“Your cousin, the Grand Magister,” he says, and takes his leave.

“My cousin?” I ask to their backs. “Grand Magister?”

But it seems a dramatic leave is the best they give me.

Finn was standing there this whole time, just looking shell shocked. Like that soldier who asked me why, but somehow proud, scheming. “He means the head of the Magisterium, your grace. The Magocracy, whose mages helped create Anbennar during the great interregnum. They are one of the seven elector-princes. And they exist to preserve the rights of mages.”

“I’ve heard of them, but had no contact,” I say.

He shrugs, going over to a table and bringing out a map of Anbennar.

​

“They have great influence in Anbennar,” Finn says. “But next to nothing in Escann. Our mages’ guilds are on our own, this far from Old Damenath and the Isle of Adráil. If those two were right, they’re no friends to Wex, either. For more personal reasons.”

Margery says, “I’ll draft overtures to the mages. See if they’re willing to parley.”

“As for his comments about my cousin?” I ask, hand over my mouth.

Finn shrugs. “I wouldn't know. It sounded metaphorical. Mage’s blood runs deep in the Silmuna family.”

And so I have it done. I return to the day-to-day running of Rogieria. All the while, my thoughts churn like choppy waters about Anbennar. Fifty years ago they betrayed my family. They drove Rogier the Exile out. Now, they’re almost begging the Silmunas to come back.

I feel… close to something. Some destiny. Some dream. That this is the end-all, be-all of my entire mission as a Silmuna. More than turning Escann into the Dameria of the East, but in a grand imperial restoration, a Moon once again upon the Dove Throne.

I expect to wait months. To have to travel down rivers through Damescrown into the sea to meet with the mages, likely in secret. And there’s this anxiety about going back to the land of my ancestors.

So imagine my surprise when we get a letter back and a package. Expensive reagents. A tired-looking girl whom I’m wondering whether she is the court mage or just some sort of magical security helps assemble the materials alongside a ritual in the throne room.

Ever since Black Castanor, so much magic I don’t understand makes my skin crawl. But everyone assures me this is fine. Candles, symbols, a tiny blue crystal of Damestear, that rare rock from the sky made of pure crystalized magic. She finishes the ritual and stands back, at the appointed time recommended in the letter.

I sit on my throne.

There’s a whompf! of power, a flash of blue, and a wave of energy that nearly slams my back into the throne.

And then, standing there in the center of the magic circle, is an old man in well-tailored gray robes. His beard is manicured and pristine, white as snow, and his eyes are blue. He leans on a staff and wipes bits of dust off his clothes.

“Well, that worked,” he says, voice creaky but somehow throaty. He rolls his shoulders and sighs. “You’ll have to forgive me for an unnecessarily dramatic entrance. My old bones aren’t what they used to be, your grace. I’d likely die if I walked, but, well, it takes a lot of work and money to make a good teleportation. I was perhaps too eager to meet the Young Owl face-to-face.”

“Who are you?” I ask.

The old man scowls, then laughs. “Why, dearest cousin, I am Otó Silmuna, Grand Magister of Anbennar’s Magisterium. And as I understand it, you’re willing to cut us a deal. Let’s talk business, no?”

He’s downright ancient.​

“Thank you, garçon,” Otó says as a servant pours him tea in the castle gardens. One of his eyes goes wide as he inspects the cup. “It is true; Rogieran tea is blue. Fascinating. It’s like Rogierans are more Damerian than Damerians.”

I sit opposite him at the table, Margery at my side. Under the table she gives my hand a reassuring squeeze. “So, you’re a Silmuna?”

“Hmm?” Otó hums absently. He casts a quick spell, his fingers frosting until the cup he’s holding is cooled down enough to safely drink “Oh, that. Yes. Technically. I left the other side of family to study in the Magisterium early on, around the time the Wexonards murdered Adénn. I hardly have any rights to anything but a fancy name that still earns me some prestige to anyone who really cares.”

“You’re Wesdam-Silmuna?” I ask, feeling a sense of unease.

He takes a long drink of tea, cocking an eyebrow at me. “And you are half an orc, King Rogier. I hardly think either of us in a position to point fingers at whom and accuse the others of being less than true Silmunas.”

“Is that going to be a problem for you?” I ask, leaning forwards. I feel something tense in my shoulders.

Otó regards me for a very long time. Before his eyes go into his tea. He smiles at his reflection in the blue liquid. “Only insofar as how the first Silmuna Grand Magister in ages suddenly supporting a restoration of the Silmunas to the Dove Throne would look. We’re supposed to be nearly apolitical, merely supporting rulers with the right mage-blood who can preserve the peace within the Empire.”

He blows air over his tea, and takes another sip. “Anbennar was built by mages. Three centuries ago, when Jexis Jaherzuir’s empire collapsed and the Sun Elves retreated from Cannor, there was only chaos. The Burned Empress left a legacy of intrigue, anarchy, and siring a bastard with her own brother. It was mages who stepped in. Mages who ushered in peace. And mages who now watch over Anbennar.

“And as we speak, a new anarchy descends across Anbennar as Lothane síl Wex continues to abuse his role as sovereign of man and elf. You may not be properly honed into the magical potential of your blood, but the Silmunas are a Silver Family; they’re close enough for our needs.”

Margery makes a face. “Meaning you would back my husband to the Dove Throne.”

Otó gives her a look as if offended by her sudden intrusion. “What I mean, your grace, is that Wex has had its place in the sun. I’m willing to support King Rogier on certain conditional grounds. Concessions and gifts to smooth over the unpalatable flavor of looking like the Magisterium is playing thrones instead of our sovereign right to protect the empire against all threats foreign and domestic.”

“And what are your terms, Grand Magister?” I ask.

The old man smiles like a sly old fox.

​

Otó rolls a wrist, creating an image in his hand with magic, a swirling image of the Silmuna moon. Only for him to make a fist over it, turning the image into smoke. “I am not doing this because I am some old man with dreams of a better past. I do this because if there is to be a future for mages and knowledge, we must put Wex back into its place. We must remind those who would abuse Anbennar that their power is temporal at best, at the whims of those who hold the true reigns of rule.”

He looks back at me. “Right now, our interests merely happen to align in your favor. That can change. The sovereign of men, elves, gnomes, dwarves, and halflings is a fickle thing. Your family was Anbennar, King Rogier, and we got rid of you when you stopped being in our interests. No matter how great you think you are, you are not above that, either.

“So,” I say, folding my arms, “we’re an object lesson to House síl Wex.”

“You are replaceable, Rogier. The Empire endures. Always has, always will. And people like me have the sacred responsibility of ensuring no one forgets that lesson. And that is why we’ll support the Silmuna ascension.” He smiles, and looks every bit the kindly old man again. “Got it in one, your grace. Now, do we have a deal, or do we need to search elsewhere for more agreeable lords and company?”

And so three of the seven electors of Anbennar support me.​

I stand there, watching the spell take shape. The pulse of magical energy and the blue flash as Grand Magister Otó Silmuna returns home to Old Damenath. He leaves with Escanni gold and several nearly priceless books we’ve recovered from Black Castanor, and any other other gift he could think of to sway his colleagues in the Magisterium.

The tired-looking mage girl does some sort of magical scan, before giving Finn a thumbs up. “Aight, that’s my job done. I’m taking five for lunch.” I should really learn her name at some point. Feels like she’s just always been around Rogieria.

As soon as the throne room is empty, I collapse onto my throne and hold my head in my hands.

Margery is beside me in a second, hand massaging my shoulder. “Hey, Rogier. You alright?”

I peek through my fingers at her. “Replaceable,” I say.

She sighs and sits down on the chair’s arm, hand still on me. “I’m sure he was just—”

Holding up a hand to her, Margery goes quiet and waits for me. “Have you ever stood somewhere high, looked over the edge, and wondered what it’d be like to jump? It’s almost a magical feeling, in the worst way. Peering into death itself and wondering what if? What if, Margery?”

Her eyes widen fractionally. “Rogier, what are you…” Until it turns into a scowl. “You told me this before. You’re looking at the very culmination of everything you’ve spent your life fighting for. And now that it’s within your grasp, it feels wrong, doesn’t it?”

I shake my head. “No, but it feels like…” I gesture to one of the doors. “You saw Finn’s expression. You saw the excitement, almost hunger. You’ve heard the chatter among our ministers. This is the moment. This is it for them, everything they have worked for, and I’ve merely carried it all out. You found these diplomats. You organized the meetings. You’ve brought an entire kingdom in to fight for this dream.

“But I still—like, I still don’t know if it’s my dream.”

“What will you do if it’s not your dream?” she asks quietly.

Slowly, I stand. “You remember my father, Lothane, right?”

“Yeah. He was a prick.”

I laugh, a light, airy noise. “He’s alive, you know. I heard it through the grapevine. He retired from his position as head of the Corintar. My big brother, Ellís, had a family, and they’re prominent leaders still. But my old man, he looked upon his works, his progress, and decided he’d done everything he could. That ancient hero, and he has the nerve to be able to say that’s it, I’m done.”

“And you can’t, can you?”

I wrap Margery in my arms, bringing her face into my chest. “No, Margery. I can’t. Even if the Dove Throne is Finn or Rogier’s or this country’s dream, I don’t know what I’d be doing without it. And…”

Margery takes my hand. “You’re scared that once you have it, once the dream is completed, you’ll have nothing left. You won’t know what to do with it.”

I run my thumb over her cheek. She leans into my palm. “Yeah.”

She gives me a little smirk, hands on her hips. Looking up at me with eyes I can’t help but fall in love with everytime I see them. “Awfully arrogant of yourself, mister. You just presume you’ll win. You’ll accomplish everything without a snag.” She brings my head down to kiss me. “You have all the weirdest fears, Rogier. Not about failure, but at the price of a victory no one else but you could achieve and manage.”

“I couldn’t do it without you.”

“I know,” she says, and just holds me. “I know.”

And with that, it’s off to prepare. For days. Weeks, even.

Until our diplomats in Silverforge report in Wex’s next move.

They just can’t stop, can they?​

If we had just attacked Wex, we’d be the villains. Instead, as they continue their campaigns of aggression throughout the empire, we have the chance to step in and act as the heroes.

To destroy Wex one and for all, and be seen as liberators, not foreign invaders.

Margery and Finn work to draft a letter of demands to Wex: that they withdraw all forces from the Duchy of Leslinpár, relinquish control over illegally occupied Imperial territory, and end their stranglehold over central Anbennar.

Swinging our weight around as one of the great powers of Cannor.​

While we are not directly allied to the Duke of Leslinpár, he’s not about to turn back help. Wex seeks to end his independence and subsume him entirely.

Our demands are, of course, ridiculous. There’s no way Wex can accept it.

But Finn actually breaks down laughing when Wex gives us a curt response. “I’ll get the soldiers ready, your grace.”

Sina Necropolis looks pensively at our invasion plans. Our token liberation forces of some sixty-thousand strong, at least on paper. Poring over the maps of the Elfrealm of Ibevar, the Orda Aldresia, and into Esmaria where Wex is attacking.

Margery takes the letter, snerks, and holds it up to me.

Rogieria marches again to war.​

I stand there with an army behind me, some sixty-thousand strong. The Silmuna banners flying in the wind. The scent of horses and fresh rain. Where the Forlorn Vale of Farraneán and Ibevar ends, and the riverlands of Esmaria and the Empire of Anbennar begins.

I rest one hand on Vincen’s shoulder, all dressed up like some make believe soldier. He’s a young teenager now. I wasn’t much older than him when I became king. To the northeast, Rogieria and the world I’ve known all my life. Southwest eventually, Dameria.

Sina Necropolis steps up next to me. “What are you thinking, your grace?”

My hand goes to my chest, feeling the slow, rhythmic beat of my heart. Before I reach out to the horizon and grab at the setting moon in the distance.

My hand comes back empty.

“This is it, General,” I say as Vincen looks up at me. “This is the point of no return. If I take one more step, I will be the first true Silmuna in half a century to enter Anbennar. Not since Rogier the Exile left have we been here. With every step, possibilities have been dying, until now there remain two certainties.”

He puts his hand on his hip, his sword. “Say the word, your grace. Dameria awaits.”

“Heaven or the bottom of the Dameshead Sea with our heads cut off,” I say. “Homecoming.”

I take one last breath, feeling the muscle in my legs.

Until Vincen grins up at me. He just jumps forwards. He turns around with a smile straight from his mother’s face. “Beat ya, Dad!”

I blink rapidly, looking at my son standing in Anbennar apart from me. Until I snort. Until I’m laughing. Until I step across the border to hug him.

And the Rogierans follow suit to relieve the siege of Leslinpár, to face the Emperor himself.

To relieve the siege, we must face Emperor Lothane IV síl Wex himself.​

The Duchy of Leslinpár had friends up and down the River Esmar.

We link up in Ashfield with the Duke of Asheniande. He gives me a similar feeling to the countryside of the old Republic of Luciande. His smile is all teeth, but he offers his support with river barges to escort our force down the river to defeat Wex.

We resupply and rearm when we pass through Silverforge. The dwarves share with us halfling tobacco, a drug they’re fond of. It’s not alcohol, but I still avoid it. I don’t want my mind tainted.

And with that, the long journey ends.

We arrive outside Leslinpár itself, facing down the Grand Ducal Army of Wex. They’re only loosely Anbenarrian. Like the Marrodics of Escann, the people of Wex were barbarians who migrated into the region during the Dragonswake. They’re cousins to the Gerudians and Black Castanorians. While they speak their own dialects of Cannorian Common, one that’s hard to parse until they speak clear and slowly, they still view themselves as natives to the region.

Our uniforms are blue. Theirs are a garish off-purple that can’t be cheap to produce. Most of them only have little specks of purple on otherwise drab or utilitarian designs.

I’m saying all of this because it’s what I think and focus on as we face off outside the city of Leslinpár. Sina Necropolis rides up and down the line, checking muskets and cannons. From the way the Wexonards scramble, they hadn’t expected us to really show up, and in nowhere near the numbers we do.

I get those jitters again. Not nervousness. It’s never nerves. It’s that feeling of staring into the abyss.

Somewhere out there is Lothane IV síl Wex, the Emperor of Anbennar in all his glory. Part of me wants to face him in single combat. Another part of me knows that single-combat between kings and dukes is a thing of the ancient past. And moreover, the last time I tried a stunt like that, we were stuck surrounded by the dead.

I think back to the young half-orc king looking at a map of Adennica, callously deciding to attack Elikhand just to look good. Of leading soldiers into Ancardia and Luciande. Crushing Alenor and breaking the chains of Rosandé.

Sina Necropolis gives me a look. “Your grace?”

I let out one last shuddering breath, make a gesture, and wait until the thunder of guns brings down the very sky itself.

Fire!​

I don’t see Lothane síl Wex once. I don’t know if he’s actually leading his men or not.

The human forces of the Empire offer a far stronger resistance than we had expected. Our roaring batteries and well-drilled soldiers make short work of them as, unlike many of the other foes I’ve faced, they are regular people. They take enough losses and they flee.

We lift the siege, but spare only a little time to meet with the Dukes of Bennon and Leslinpár, whom we rescued. They meet me, and freeze as they see me. There’s a certain awkwardness before I ask them to rally their forces to join me in attacking Wex itself.

“You’re the Silmuna?” the Duke of Leslinpár asks, eyes wide. I can’t be bothered to remember his name.

“Is that going to be a problem?” I ask.

He stares at me, at my ears and tusks for a long moment. Before he swallows and shakes his head. “No, King Rogier Silmuna. We’re grateful for your timely rescue. We’ll follow you into Wex.”

I nod once. “See to it.”

Wexkeep, once an old Castanorian fortification, now the den of evil.​

We chase Lothane across Esmaria into the region creatively known as “the Borders.” Home to Wexonards and the Arranese.

I look over the reports, taking Vincen with me. Explaining the purposes of fortifications is more to hold up an enemy army than anything. I explain our plan to surround Wexkeep and Autumnsfield, barrage the walls, and take the Wexonard heartland by force.

We will destroy Wex once and for all, neutering them like a mangy dog, and end them.

Vincen is excited, but listens. He’s almost too smart for me, picking things up far too quickly, grasping implications, and even asking questions. The boy even points out a minor flaw in our lines, which I am quick to fix. He’ll replace me one day as king, maybe emperor. For now, however, we have our plans set to crush Wex.

Now just to put it into brutal action.

Old castles mean nothing to modern guns.​

Artillery brings down Wexkeep. Our forces shatter the Wexonard soldiers.

The entire country is open.

I feel empty and blank as we march through the streets of Wexkeep. I keep expecting to turn a corner and see bodies piled against walls. Mass graves. Firing lines. No different than Kastali Ebonfront, somehow. Just—in the back of my mind.

Instead, I see a sergeant offering his bread rations to a little Wexonard girl. I see orderly patrols marching through the streets. We took the city before they starved out; that means there’s still plenty of food between their stockpiles and what my army carried with me.

Looting and pillaging is kept to a bare minimum. I even see a Rogieran soldier getting dragged away by an officer when he tried to rob a local jewelry store.

This is Wexkeep. This is the home of our ancient enemies. The people who murdered Adénn and Rogier. Stole Anbennar from their forefathers and forced them into a life of frontier brutality in Escann.

And it is the most peaceful capture of a city I’ve ever seen.

I almost wonder if my expectations were wrong. That, in civilized society here in the West, this is how war ought to be organized. A professional thing only brutal on the battlefield.

Sina Necropolis salutes me as I stroll through Wexkeep’s markets where some of my soldiers are actually trading with the locals. “Emperor Lothane requests to speak.”

I make a face. “Has he arrived with an army to relieve his home?”

The general shakes his head. “He is in the heart of Wexkeep. The man never left. He wishes to discuss terms of surrender.”

Dressed in purple threads that must have cost a king’s ransom.​

His Imperial Guard has laid down its arms. Emperor Lothane síl Wex sits there on his throne, leaning to one side with an almost casual posture. He wears ornate purple armor and robes that strike me as unseasonably warm and garish on top of that.

He looks like an Emperor.

I look at my own blue uniform, and I feel like a barbarian king playing dress-up. So does sina Necropolis beside me.

“My father should have worked harder to kill you when he had the chance,” Lothane says, in a voice that’s almost friendly and amicable.

He just says it. Admits it. Doesn’t even try to hide it. More like he’s sorry they didn’t kill us all harder. This man is a síl Wex. He is the embodiment of everything I’ve fought against. His family is the reason the Damerians were exiled to Escann. They murdered Rogier the Exile.

He is the reason I am king. The reason for everything. From the start to this. Everything I’ve been through, because of what his family did, and he doesn’t even have the fucking sense to pretend to be sorry.

I just stand there and blink. My soldiers swarming the room don’t make a move for him.

Lothane sits up straighter and leans forwards, hands clasped together. “What, just going to stand there and take it, Rogier?” He clicks his tongue. “After all I heard that the Silmunas bred with monsters to survive, I expected more of you. A show of orcish rage and thunder. A little more rape and bloodshed, at least.”

He spreads his hands. “It is a fine army you have, Rogier Silmuna. You fly the correct flags and everything. Which is a shame. I was hoping to remind you, little half-orc, of what happened at the Damestear, but, well?” Another shrug.

I open my mouth.

Lothane holds up a finger. “Wait, hold on. I still have one more thing to say.” Only to pause, theatrically rubbing the little piece of blond fur on his chin. “Actually, nah, that’s all.You can have your turn now, little Rogier.”

I take a deep breath, forcing myself to stay calm. In an abstract way, I wonder if I hate this man. This arrogant, cocksure little Emperor given a realm and crown by his father. Expected to rule his entire life. Who took that power to abuse it until Anbennar came begging for a Silmuna to restore order.

I should be thanking him. I should be strangling him.

“I imagined this moment my entire moment, Lothane,” I finally say. “The moment I firmly plant my boot in your face and stomp a síl Wex’s skull into a gorey paste. You, your father, your son. Doesn’t matter. Run your mouth all you want to try to save face, but the fact remains Wex is in ruins. Her castles are ours. We pillage her fields to feed our armies.”

He grins. “Personally, little Silmuna, I’d—”

I fire a pistol in the air. Lothane jerks in place and goes utterly still, eyes slowly widening.

“Shut your fucking mouth, Lothane,” I say in a low, cold voice. “You have lost any right to bluster any further. Wex is over, and you are no emperor. You are my victim in this moment. And we have come to reclaim what is ours.”

Lothane finds something in his spine and croaks out a “Is that supposed to scare me?”

I sincerely wonder if I hate this man, or I am merely going through the expected motions. Living out some old fantasy of revenge like Finn would want. Maybe it doesn’t matter.

“You mistake what this is, Lothane,” I say. “This isn’t an execution. This is a coup from within. You have failed in your duties as Emperor. Squandered what your fathers murdered and betrayed so many for. I don’t have time for you to play big.

“You have lost. Wex is forfeit. And from the ashes Dameria shall be reborn, with you firmly under my foot.”

He says nothing.

“Get off my throne.”

Lothane sits.

“Get off. My. Throne.”

I step forward. His disarmed guards tense, and my Rogierans raise muskets. All is still as I grab Lothane by the collar and drag him bodily off his throne. He tumbles to the ground, rolling, his armor clanking loudly on the stone floor and carpet.

“Lothane IV síl Wex,” I say loudly for all to hear, “you have failed as Emperor of Anbennar. There will be no bargaining. There will no deals made. The terms are simple: Wex surrenders its unlawfully held land, relinquishes the throne, and shall allow for new Imperial Elections.”

“Fuck you!” he spits, and I kick him in the face.

Lothane coughs blood, holding his broken nose. “That’s not how Anbennar works, your monstrous rape-spawn! There are laws, rights, procedures! Even if the electors support you, I reign for life!”

I hunker down before him. “Is that really how you want to frame this, Lothane?”

He bleeds acros his purple garment, tears in his eyes from the pain.

I click my tongue with disappointment and stand back up. “It is the weak and powerless who mewl about laws and rights, Lothane. Who pray to gods to deliver them from the hands of men. It is the strong and powerful who enforce the laws. The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must. Do you understand, Lothane?”

Victory.​

Lothane spits, staring into the growing pool of his own blood beneath him.

“I’m glad we understand the power dynamics at play, little Wexonard,” I say.

I raise a hand. “Strip the palace of all wealth and luxuries. Seize this man’s crown. He is no Emperor, no Duke, no nothing anymore. Dameria rises again.”

And Wex is broken apart.​

Freedom is given to those from under the domination of Wex. And all know that it was a Silmuna who finally brought the tyrant down.

Never to return.​

And I stand there, atop Wexkeep, with my legions before me, my son beside me, knowing that it is done.

That I am home.

I look over the edge, and all I see is the future.

All I see is the dream realized. A Moon upon the Dove Throne.

Everything I have worked for in my life made manifest.

I look at my hands. I flex my fingers. I don’t know what to do with them.

Vincen stands next to me and reaches for the horizon.

For the rising moon.

A new world is born from the graves and charnel pits of a continent.