NOVEL NEXT Chapter 101: March to Sea
The road south eas a path of dust and broken stone.
Westerloch's fields, still blackened from the fires, faded behind them, giving way to gold-streaked plains where wheat and wild grass rolled in the wind.
The sun was high, heat shimmering over the horizon, but the column moved without pause — carts rattling, boots drumming a relentless beat into the earth.
Lan rode at the front, not because he needed to, but because the sight of him was enough to hold the entire line steady.
They moved like a tide, not fast but impossible to stop.
By the third day, the plains broke into low, uneven hills, and the grass thinned to scrub. Dust coated armor and skin, clung to the creases of eyes and mouths. Every step forward felt heavier, but the rhythm of the march did not falter.
The first royal patrol appeared at dawn — ten mounted men in bright Solaris steel, riding hard from the south. They must have thought themselves hunters.
They died before they could dismount.
Venom's Vipers hit them like a shadow passing over the road, spears glinting, knives flashing between plates. A few of the patrol tried to turn and flee, but Miller was already there, moving faster than the horses' panic could carry them.
When it was done, Garran and two others dragged the bodies to the roadside ditch. The Vipers stripped the armor and horses, leaving only naked corpses for the crows.
No one buried them. The message was in the silence that followed.
---
Villages began to dot the road by the fourth day. The first was small, a scatter of stone houses and low barns, nothing more than a breath of smoke curling above the rooftops.
The moment Lan's banner came into view, shutters slammed closed. Chickens scattered in the yards, left half-caught by the women who had been tending them.
A boy with a wooden pail froze in the street, eyes locked on the black and red sigil, before his mother grabbed his arm and yanked him inside.
Venom watched the last door slam shut and chuckled low in his throat. "They've heard the stories."
Bragg, marching beside him, spat into the dust. "Stories don't make a man bar his door in daylight. Fear does. And they're scared enough."
Venom's eyes slid forward to where Lan rode, back straight, gaze locked on the road as if the world ahead already belonged to him. "They should be."
"How dreadful would it be if they knew?" Bragg asked.
"Know what?"
"That he's not even trying."
Neither spoke for a long while after that.
The landscape changed again on the fifth day. The hills grew steeper, their slopes layered with uneven rock. Thin streams trickled between them, cold and sharp from the mountains farther east.
Salt rode the air in faint breaths, carried by the wind like a whisper of what lay ahead.
That night, the camp was pitched among the stones. Fires burned low, hidden from distant eyes, and the men ate in silence. The sea's scent was stronger here, enough that even the most dirt-buried soldier could feel it on his tongue.
Miller approached Lan while he was accessing Devil's Lie, the old rusted blade sitting casually across his knees.
"Do you think the Solaris main force will wait in ambush?" Miller said.
Lan glanced up once. "No, they are too terrified for that. They will concentrate all their strength in the capital, to try and stop us when we get there."
"If we continue this, will the imperiality intervene?"
Lan's eyes returned to the blade. "I don't expect them to," His hand paused in its slow stroke along the edge. "But if they do, it might set us back a while nothing more."
The words carried no heat, no bravado — just the cold certainty of a man stating the shape of tomorrow. Miller inclined his head and left it at that.
---
Two more patrols tried their luck before the march was done. One was a cluster of archers hiding behind a rise, their arrows cutting the air in a ragged volley.
The Vipers charged uphill into them, shields raised, talismans flaring at their belts. By the time Lan reached the crest, the slope was painted red.
The last was a cavalry unit, faster and heavier than the first. They came in screaming, swords high, only to meet Garran in the center of the road.
His fists cracked armor like brittle pottery; their mounts buckled beneath the shock. When it was over, Garran wiped his hands on a dead man's cloak and stepped back into line without a word.
None of them lived to warn Ironwater.
The final stretch was a narrow road cut between high cliffs. The wind here was sharper, dragging at cloaks and banners, filling the air with the cries of unseen gulls.
The rock underfoot was streaked white where salt had seeped into it over years.
As they rounded the last bend, the cliffs fell away.
And there it was.
Ironwater Harbor spread out before them, a vast crescent of stone and water. The city rose in tiers from the shore, houses packed tight along winding streets that climbed toward the central keep.
The harbor itself was a forest of masts and rigging, ships rocking gently in the tide. The water was busy with rowboats ferrying goods, gulls wheeling in the air over fish stalls and dockhands.
The smell of salt and tar hit them all at once, mingled with the distant tang of smoked fish and pitch.
Bragg let out a low whistle. "That's a lot of ships."
Venom's gaze moved over the harbor defenses — the stone breakwaters, the towers bristling with ballistae. "Not for long."
Lan said nothing at first. His eyes swept from the outer walls to the dockyards, from the masts to the narrow streets that threaded toward the keep. He could see the guards in their bright Solaris livery, the merchant banners snapping in the wind, the sheer wealth of it laid bare.
A faint smile curved his mouth.
"It will be quiet tomorrow," he said.