The Vampire & Her Witch

In Baron Hanrahan's great hall, a semblance of normalcy had returned to the welcoming feast following Loman's explosive sermon. The young lord had made some things clear, and they were nonnegotiable mandates handed down from his father, the Marquis.

No matter how much Baron Hanrahan tried to plead that Sir Dollin had grown old enough to have earned his retirement from the field of battle, or that Sir Niall was too young to lead his village's men into battle, Loman held firm. Both knights, along with Sir Thorryn, were required to bring the men under their command with them when he left to hunt the demons.

Adding their soldiers and a few of their servants would place an additional seventy men under Loman's command, bringing the total close to one hundred and fifty men, organized around the core of the Temple Guard and the Templars from the Church who were expected to lead the heavy fighting while the remainder functioned more as scouts, sentries, and the mobile wings of the small army when the time came to envelop any demon forces they encountered.

"... but I do not see why you feel the need to base your hunt out of Raek Village," Baron Hanrahan insisted, falling back to other, softer points of contention once it was clear that he would not be able to retain his knights to protect Hanrahan Town from the threat of demon raids. There were, after all, still other ways to make sure that his vassals remained close at hand.

"Hanrahan Town is much better prepared to support your mission with both supplies and accommodations," the portly baron suggested. "You can even use the web of watch towers built during my father's reign as safe camps that extend the reach of your search. As soon as your men see a sign of a demon camp, they only need to rush back to the nearest tower to pass the word all the way back to you, here in the keep. You can keep your core forces concentrated, well fed and well rested, and let the scouts do their work in the wilderness while you await their reports."

In truth, Baron Hanrahan wasn't even certain that the demons were still out there to threaten his lands. There had been no sightings of the strangely powerful 'demon knights' after the attack on Sir Carwyn's men, nor any additional reports of ambushes by flat tailed demons or anything of the sort, but if the demons were still out there, he wanted the additional security offered by keeping Loman, Inquisitor Diarmuid, and Templar Tommin close.

After all, Marquis Bors wouldn't risk any harm befalling his golden child if he truly had chosen Loman as his heir. So long as he could keep Loman here, safely inside Hanrahan Keep or at least within the town's walls, he would also gain the protection of Loman's powerful guardians.

"It's true, we could do that. In different circumstances, it would likely be the wisest course of action," Loman acknowledged, yielding some ground to Ian Hanrahan in an effort to smooth things over between them. "But in this case, we have every reason to believe that the demons have settled in the wilderness to the north and west of your barony."

"Over the summer, Lord Loman and Lord Liam Dunn drove the demons from many of their villages in the north, near Dunn Barony, while Lord Owain and Sir Tommin's assault on the demons west of the Summer Villa cleared out lands to the south of the Vale of Mists," Inquisitor Diarmuid pointed out, nodding at both Loman and Sir Tommin in turn.

"We know from High Inquisitor Ignatious's journals during the Brother's War that many of the Undying Demons came from the lands beyond the mountains," he explained, focusing on the knights gathered at the high table. "And that there is a pass to those lands beyond the Vale of Mists. Whatever may have happened in those lands, we think that the Demon Lady of the Vale has allowed the demons from across the mountains to pass through her domain, but she isn't allowing them to settle in her territory."

It was a topic that Diarmuid, Tommin, and Loman had debated at length while they were stuck in their tents, waiting out the fierce winter storm. Loman had spent more time studying the Sealed Archives than even Inquisitor Diarmuid, and he was well aware that the most powerful demon lords, the ones the demons referred to as 'High Lords' or 'Great Lords' ruled over powerful coalitions of many different demon tribes.

From Loman's perspective, the risk that the demons attacking Dunn Barony were allied with the demons attacking Hanrahan Barony was high. Diarmuid, however, reminded the young lord that only the most powerful demons could forge such a coalition, and to date, the Demon Lady of the Vale had never demonstrated that she was strong enough to bring together anything beyond the remnants of the horned demons and claw demons who had survived Cellach Lothian's assault on the Vale.

There had been a moment, during the War of Undying Demons, when it appeared she might possess that strength. But as the Church eradicated those 'Undying' demons, they were never replaced, suggesting that the Demon Lady of the Vale was unable to recruit or make more of them.

It was the raids for supplies that finally tipped the argument in Diarmuid's favor. If the new demons from beyond the mountain were the allies of the Demon Lady of the Vale, they would have no need to raid for supplies. The forests of the Vale were lush and filled with game, and there were plenty of fish at the headwaters of the River Luath, even in winter.

Another hundred, two hundred, or even three hundred demons wouldn't stretch her supplies so thinly that she would need to raid human farms for foodstuffs. But without her support, they needed to establish a camp or village to live in and had turned to raiding for the supplies they needed to survive the winter.

"Isn't that supposed to be the greatest weakness of demons?" Bastian Hanrahan interjected as he tried to find a way to insert himself in the conversation to curry favor with Loman without infuriating his own father. "Each demon lord stands alone, but we have the might of an entire kingdom to bind us together, and the Church to give our people a common purpose."

"If the Demon Lady of the Vale was smart," Bastian said, speaking loudly and confidently enough for the whole table to hear. "She'd welcome these new demons into her ranks. Then we might really have something to worry about. But primitive tribalism will keep them at each other's throats."

"Don't mistake primitive for weak," Loman cautioned. "My family has fought the forces of the Vale of Mists, the Horse Lords, and the Cat Lords for generations, and we've learned firsthand that…"

-GOOOOOOONNNNNNGGGGG-

The pure, shining tone of one of Hanrahan Barony's warning bells cut through the hall like the blade of a falling ax. Wine goblets froze halfway to people's lips, and conversations died mid-word as a sudden hush swept over the hall. Here and there, chairs scraped against stone as every person turned toward the western windows, craning their necks and half standing from their seats as if they could see something through the thick, distorted glass of the narrow windows.

Baron Hanrahan's knuckles went white as he gripped the edge of the table, while Sir Tommin's hand dropped to his sword hilt before he'd even realized he was moving, a gesture echoed by the older knights sitting at the table.

Collectively, everyone in the great hall seemed to hold their breath, muscles tense as they strained to hear the second toll that would confirm their worst fears…

But a second gong never came. Instead, the bright, clarion call of the bell was followed by a deep, rumbling blast from what must have been dozens of unholy trumpets.

-HAAAAAARRRRUUUUUUMMMM-

"What, what was that?" Baron Hanrahan asked, looking at the men from the Church with wide, panicked eyes. But before anyone could answer, another sound began to echo across the whole of the valley, bringing with it an entirely different terror.

-BOOM BOOM- -BOOM BOOM- -BOOM- -CLACK- BOOM- -CLACK- -BOOM-

"Look!" Sir Naill Hane shouted, displaying none of the dignity of a knight as he pushed a chair up against the wall to get a better look out of the windows. "There's something glowing coming out of the forest! It looks like, like a serpent, made of fire," he said more loudly than he should have, setting off a wave of panicked shouts and cries throughout the hall.

"And, and it's coming this way…"