Olimpia

Derg stood in the center of the breach of the city's wall, and he really could not remember its name. The wolfkin knew that he had been told it at some point, but he never made the effort to etch it into his mind, so it never stuck. And there was no reason that he should care about it now.

Really, if their plan had gone the way he expected, he would have already passed through the razed city, and half the warband would be on the other side. That was currently far from reality. If he had to guess, hardly a sixteenth of his warriors were on the other side of the city, and most of those had gone around the damn thing. Not to mention that they were newly enlightened and barely deserved the title of warriors. All of this was understandable once you realized nearly the entirety of the warband's attention was focused on moving what amounted to a mountain.

Not the biggest mountain, but any pile of rock and dirt that deserved the name could not, by any measure, be called small. Not unless you wanted to appear as an utter fool to everyone. And the time that was going to be wasted because of this was utterly infuriating.

It was a rage that had no outlet, because if anyone was at fault, it would be him. Or the scouts, but what could you expect from the bird brains? They were on average flighty creatures, but more to the point, their foe specifically hid their efforts, and those efforts were buried in the ground. It simply wasn't practical to expect that they would have been able to discover any sign of the trap.

That just made it all the worse. Because there was nothing the Olimpians could have done that would have slowed Derg's warband down more. Killing the giant blood golem was a possibility they anticipated. However, it was expected that it would be ripped apart or some massive spell would burn or rip off huge chunks. Worst case, enough of the blood cores scattered throughout the giant would have been destroyed to cause the golem to collapse into inert chunks of flesh.

In either case, the core components of the golem could be easily gathered, and another one could be constructed once they acquired more materials. Except now, they had to spend hours, perhaps days, of effort moving blocks of stone weighing collective tons until the golem could lift itself out.

Sounds easy, but that was skipping over the small, relatively insignificant fact that every minute that passed by, the creature was being crushed. Given that no one had anticipated this situation would occur, the golem's built-in regeneration was constantly draining the blood cores. Although not having the healing would have its own issues. At this point, it was a toss-up whether the passive regeneration was beneficial or not.

Regardless, neither Valaska nor the Blood Witch was sure how long they had before the golem would be unable to move. What they were confident about was that every minute longer they took to remove the rubble would slightly increase the distance they had to dig to secure the valuable materials, as the golem was getting weaker. And he was not going to waste something that had taken tens of thousands of lives to create, even if they were Olimpians.

So the entire valley floor was filled with lines of Kin passing stones from one to another. Any open area they could reach with a few thousand people lined up was being used. Needless to say, no one would be effectively marching through the city anytime soon.

A flap of wings sounded above Derg, and he felt a rush of wind a moment later. The wolf didn't look, as he knew who it was. There was only one bird that would dare to land so close to him. "This is taking too long!" Declared the indignant bird, "The Olimpians are getting away."

"You do not need to tell me that!" Snapped back the wolf, his voice more snarl than anything. "I have been standing in place for hours; I am well aware that we are not moving."

"Then what are you going to do about it, Warleader?"

Turning, Derg saw the aggressive stance of the golden eagle, his spear even appearing in his hand as he pulled it from his storage ring. Sunsray had been becoming increasingly aggressive and vocal about his leadership, but he was not strong enough to actually challenge Derg, and they both knew it.

The eagle was large for his race, but he was constrained by the fact that he still had to lift off into the air. Derg wasn't, and while he was only a couple of inches taller than High Chiftain Sunsray, he was several times broader and with larger muscles. More importantly, the eagle's magic was focused on long-distance mass devastation, while Derg's was all physical enhancement with a couple of tricks for those who kept their distance.

Scoffing, the wolf dismissed the threat and returned to watching the endless work all around him. "What am I going to do about the fleeing Olimpians? Well, that much is obvious. I am going to leave that choice up to you, Sunsray."

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"Are you now?" The eagle grunted, but he sounded interested, and there was less of a challenge in his voice.

"Yes," Derg responded, his voice serious. "As you have voiced repeatedly at this point, you and your people can do more than scout and make surprise attacks." The bird puffed out his chest at the compliment, only for his eyes to narrow and to release a caw of annoyance the next moment as Derg continued, "However, you are not particularly good at anything else."

Slashing his hand to the side to cut off the proud eagle, Derg continued speaking, his voice trampling over the other, "You and your people's magic is not suited for close combat or a drawn-out battle, and we both know it. So, you and your chieftains will work with a couple of bands of wolves, let's say numbering around two thousand total. Take Irontooth and Silverhide under your command. How well you use them will determine how many more I put under your command. Is that acceptable, High Chieftain Sunsray?"

The eagle looked mildly annoyed that his people needed the wolves in any way, but it was losing out to his pride that he would be commanding more troops. Finally, after an internal struggle for several seconds, he dipped his head ever so slightly, saying, "It is acceptable."

"Good. Now, for those who escaped, I would suggest that you herd them to the west. It is, of course, up to your discretion, but you would be taking them on with your flock and two thousand wolves, and they have proved themselves rather formidable. Ensuring they cannot escape the plateau while slowly wearing them down as you wait for the rest of the warband to catch up would be the best action you could take, in my opinion."

"We will see." The bird replied before he flapped his wings, and a wave of air far stronger than his wings should have been capable of producing blasted the ground around them, kicking up dust.

Derg held back his snarl of annoyance, not wanting to ruin his comparatively pleasant interaction with the arrogant birdbrain. Now was the time for control and decisive decisions. A short temper and impulsive actions could be at least tolerated in situations that don't matter, but no one wants that from a leader all the time. In the tense and important moments, such behavior would be rightfully seen as weakness. One of the last mistakes any of his detractors would make in their lives, if they decided to challenge him because of it, but the result would weaken the warband, regardless of the outcome.

"Mate," said a husky but hesitant voice that sent a shiver of desire running down his spine. "I do not mean to question you…"

"But you want to know why I gave him some of my wolves and didn't accept his challenge?" Derg said, a grin of approval appearing on his face.

"Yes, exactly that. What you just did isn't normally how you handle such situations."

"Ahh, but what did I actually do?" Derg rumbled, stepping up to his mate and bumping into her, causing her to partially turn to face the increasingly distant eagle flying over to his flock.

After a couple of seconds of thought, the wolf hesitantly answered, "You gave him permission to pursue the Olimpians."

"Correct."

"And you gave him a couple of chieftains to act as screening forces."

"Also accurate, but why would I take such actions?"

"If you put any thought into it," Derg gave a cheeky grin to Val in reply to her words, earning a snort of annoyance and an uplifted nose. "Then… you allowed him to do so because you knew that regardless of what you ordered, he was going to follow and harass the Olimpians."

"Sunsray is nothing but predictable. He sees wounded prey, and he will take the opportunity to chase it down for the thrill. Take that incident that he tried to cover up when we were assaulting the Triad. There was no reason for it to escalate to such a degree that he almost created a forest fire that could have halted our advance for a day or more."

"So you gave him permission for an already guaranteed outcome. But why did you give him control over some of the lesser chieftains? I can not see how that would benefit you."

"You are the one who gave me the idea. You and the other blood mages are our greatest source of strength. Really, the only reason we are even here is that you are loyal to me."

"That still does not tell me why you took such actions, though I do appreciate the compliment."

"Not a compliment when it's true. And you do not see it because you aren't looking at the long term… But enough with the guessing, I will just tell you. The bird will see my acquiescence in allowing him to attack the Olimpians, and me giving him some wolves to command, as a boost to his authority. More importantly, he will likely decide to wait, as he will view it as a simple request and an opportunity to preserve his flock, while being the best strategy. Simple commands from me that he will get used to following. Commands that will perhaps make it so that once we reach the swamps, there will not be a need to replace him when he realizes his people are dependent on me to resist the Call and stop them from going feral."

"Ahh, you do not see the need to continue asserting your authority, so you are looking for a way to control him without him constantly bucking his leash."

"Yes," Derg said, his voice suddenly becoming hard as he looked back to the pile of rubble and the mad woman, urging everyone to hurry up and free her creation. "We are about to enter the heart of the Republic. Soon enough, we may be threatened from all sides and have a real risk of being defeated. Having someone unable to follow orders will be dangerous, and I will not allow him to put us… put you in danger for his pride and arrogance."

"So it is a test," Val said, slipping under his arm and snuggling into his chest.

"For both of us," Derg responded, looking up into the night sky. "I need to see if I can learn another method of leadership. And we'll see if he can follow."