Valkyrie's Shadow

Chapter 8

The first thing that Ghroklor did after his meeting with the town leadership was send runners to call for reinforcements from the previous town. Next, he sent another set of runners to confirm the status of the adjacent territories on the frontier. After that, he busied himself organising the town’s defences, as he had little other choice but to wait for the outlying warbands to report in.

In all, it was a reasonable response for an experienced Commander, but Ghroklor clearly wasn’t satisfied with his limited options.

“Have you ever wished that you could fly?” He asked.

“I can’t say that I have,” Ilyshn’ish answered.

“Truly?” Ghroklor seemed genuinely surprised, “I think about it all the time. Imagine soaring above the land with the ridiculous senses of a Dragon. You’d be able to see everything; respond to any threat with unparalleled swiftness. If it wasn’t for their constant infighting, our world would be a very different place.”

“I just thought I’d mention this,” Ilyshn’ish said, “but you’ve been referring to Green Dragons as if they represent all of Dragonkind. They’re not all the same, you know.”

“I’ve only ever fought Green Dragons,” Ghroklor said. “Of course, I know of the Blue Dragons in the Great Lut and the Red Dragons far to the southwest, but they seem just as bad, if not worse. What sort of Dragons does your homeland have?”

“White Dragons,” Ilyshn’ish replied. “The locals usually call them Frost Dragons.”

“That sounds terrible,” a note of sympathy rose from the Nar. “Do they cause you much trouble?”

“Once in a while, though less often recently. Speaking of which, does the Worldspine not have resident populations of White Dragons? It seems like the ideal home for them.”

“If there are any, our lore says nothing of them.”

The fact that there weren’t any of her kind around was one of Ilyshn’ish’s greatest worries about the region. She was confident that she could avoid an unfavourable fight with the Green Dragons if necessary, but she had no idea what awaited her in the Worldspine. There was nothing to suggest what was keeping them from moving in; no Frost Giant Citadels, traces of other types of Dragons, or anything else. In her imagination, unimaginable terrors lurked in the massive mountain range and the fact that she literally couldn’t imagine what they might be made them all the more terrifying.

Throughout the night, the local warbands arrived to join Ghroklor’s rapidly growing defence force. To the Nar’s frustration, none had information related to the attack earlier that day.

“The mountain tribes probe the frontier for weaknesses every day,” one chief said. “It has been that way since the snows started.”

“You haven’t noticed any Dragon activity at all?” Ghroklor asked.

A chorus of soft responses filtered through the air as the assembled chiefs sounded their negatives. Ghroklor scratched the back of his neck as he considered the absence of useful information.

“An anomaly? No, the Dragons are probably only meddling in our battles if they think the mountain tribes have a good chance of breaking through. Are there any locations with major tribal movements aside from the village we just lost?”

“That’s difficult for us to keep track of in this situation,” one of the chiefs said. “Our hunters are busy watching for incoming raids.”

“Then are there any areas where raids have been more frequent?” Ghroklor asked.

“Aside from the area around the village that was just attacked, no.”

Ghroklor sent his gaze around the gathering, waiting to see if the other chiefs had anything more to add. He took a deep breath after no one did, releasing it in a long sigh.

“Then our course is clear,” he said. “We win back the village and destroy as many of the invaders as possible. Once that’s accomplished, we go on the offensive. The enemy camps in the area must be destroyed before they learn how to collaborate with those damned Dragons.”

“What if the Dragons interfere with our offensive?”

“Then they do,” Ghroklor said. “But I doubt it will happen during the opening moves of our counterattack. That village had nowhere near the number of warbands we have with us now and the Dragon that appeared wasn’t confident enough to join the fight.”

“What about ambushing the invaders when they advance again? It will be difficult to coordinate warbands of every race. We’ll be able to make most of the Nar and Urmah forces if we have them lie in wait.”

“I’m not averse to the traditional approach,” Ghroklor said, “but there’s no guarantee that they’ll move as we wish. If we form a net, each warband will be increasingly vulnerable to a Dragon attack the longer they remain in the same position.”

It took another thirty minutes for the Beastmen to settle on a battle plan. Ilyshn’ish could only shake her head over how complex it had to be. Each race had its strengths and weaknesses and it was the weaknesses that seemed to dictate what was possible rather than their strengths.

Before dawn the next morning, the warbands gathered at the northern edge of the town. Ilyshn’ish went looking for Vltava, finding him buried under a small pile of Beastman cubs. Several of them tried to bite her as she fished Vltava out and shook the cubs loose.

“We’re leaving now,” Ilyshn’ish said. “Do you even know what’s going on?”

“What is, is.”

Technically, he wasn’t wrong. Vltava could probably ignore whatever was out there just as easily as he could the pile of cubs she had just pulled him out of.

Back at the gathering of the warbands, Ghroklor was looking more eager than anxious. The Con, Lup, and Gao warbands had already departed, screening the way ahead and setting up checkpoints for the rest of the army to follow. It would take most of the day for the Nar and Urmah warbands to reach their destination, making for some very awkward manoeuvring on their forces’ part.

“Is it always like this?”

“Like what?” Ghroklor asked.

“The movements of your forces are quite disjointed,” Ilyshn’ish answered. “It makes me wonder if having combined forces is worth the trouble.”

“The answer to that question is no,” Ghroklor told her. “Not on this scale, anyway. Usually, the warrior clans field entire armies and those armies collaborate with armies of different races, playing to each other’s strengths. That is neither here nor now, however. We simply must make do with what we have available.”

“How do you usually deal with the Green Dragons?”

“Usually, we have elite warbands interspersed throughout an army’s theatre of operations. Those elite warbands are powerful enough to take down an Adult Dragon. A threat like that is usually enough to keep the Dragons at bay. Now, however…”

Orders rang out, going from warband to warband as the predetermined time of their departure arrived. Without a warband of his own, Ghroklor assumed a spot at the head of the columns winding their way up the foothills.

“However…?” Ilyshn’ish prompted.

“It’s said that people rise to face the challenges before them,” Ghroklor said. “That saying has proven to be true to an astonishing degree. The escalation of our conflict with the Jorgulans has seen with it a surge in the strength of our forces. Warriors both old and young are achieving heights of personal power rarely seen amongst those outside the main branches of the warrior clans. It’s even happening to those useless louts from the cities once they manage to get over themselves.”

“So that’s why you said what you did back in Ki’ra.”

“Indeed,” the Nar replied. “A bright future awaits even the lowliest recruit from the cities, but they must first embrace their identity as warriors. Far too often do I see them cling to the expectations of life that they’ve cultivated in their former homes.”

“I think most of those expectations revolve around survival,” Ilyshn’ish noted. “Many accomplished warriors would say that fear is a useful tool.”

“And I don’t disagree,” Ghroklor said. “The problem is that the recruits from the cities have twisted priorities. Sometimes, it feels like they do almost everything for the wrong reasons.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Hmm…how should I describe it? They are accustomed to being alone, I suppose. Living with immediate family, at best. Their behaviour is more in line with that of a lone predator or a mother raising cubs alone. Even when they’re given their meals, it’s like they expect someone to come along and steal their food from them. In general, they’ve grown accustomed to behaving in a way that isn’t very beneficial for life in a warband. I only wish there was a way to quickly break down those behaviours and rebuild them into something better.”

It seems that many mortals face this problem.

Once again, the warrior clans of Rol’en’gorek displayed certain similarities to the ‘martial’ cultures of Human society. Unlike the Beastmen, however, various Human martial institutions already had methods for dealing with the problem that Ghroklor described. The Imperial Army put all of their recruits through ‘basic training’ to strip away undesirable behaviours and values, putting desirable ones in their place. Lady Zahradnik expressed similar concerns over bringing the right migrants to Warden’s Vale.

Even smaller, more individualistic organisations like the Adventurer Guild did something similar, though the Guild’s focus was to curb what they called ‘hero syndrome’. This problem tended to manifest when mortals grew in personal strength, leading to dangerous levels of narcissism and antagonistic behaviour against perceived threats to one’s primacy. Strangely enough, it was said that this brand of ‘heroism’ was encouraged in the old Adventurer Guild. It was only after the advent of the Sorcerous Kingdom that the standards of the Adventurer Guild changed.

To Ilyshn’ish, this only served as evidence that weak races had no business being strong. Power seemed to amplify the base nature of the weak into behaviours that were unbecoming of beings that naturally stood at the apex of the world.

“You frame this rise in fighting strength as a good thing,” Ilyshn’ish said, “but if what you say holds true for everyone, shouldn’t the Jorgulans be experiencing the same growth?”

“I won’t pretend that they don’t benefit from this as well,” Ghroklor replied. “The thing is that it’s easier to preserve one’s forces while on the defensive. However, the most interesting thing about this growth that we’re experiencing is how it affects our relationship with the Dragons.”

“Your relationship, or the Jorgulans’?”

“Both ours and theirs,” Ghroklor said. “As you may know, Dragons are creatures that grow stronger as they age. The growing strength of our warriors is rapidly closing the gap between us and them. Even the average warband can take down a Juvenile Dragon nowadays, and our elite warbands can consistently defeat Adults. Some even speculate that the Jorgulans may act to overthrow their masters using their newfound power.”

A pungent odour on the wind turned Ilyshn’ish’s attention skyward. Through the growing cloud cover, she spotted an Adult Green loitering several kilometres overhead.

“I wouldn’t get too far ahead of myself there,” Ilyshn’ish said. “These Green Dragons that you’re fighting are only here because something even stronger is pushing them out of the Commonwealth. You may be able to defend yourself against these Jorgulans and the Greens that come along with them, but it’s highly unlikely that the Jorgulans will be able to overthrow the Dragon Lord ruling the Commonwealth.”

Numerous gazes fell upon Ilyshn’ish as she completed her statement.

“D-Dragon Lord?” Ghroklor’s ears went flat.

“Is it such a surprise?” Ilyshn’ish said, “Dragons have parents too, you know. It takes a hundred years for a Dragon to reach adulthood. With the number of Green Dragons coming your way, I’d say you’re dealing with the third or fourth generation. The Commonwealth is likely populated by dozens of Old and Elder Green Dragons with a Dragon Lord ruling over them all. Any uprising or even movement for change on the Jorgulans’ part is doomed from the start.”

“…doesn’t that mean we’ll be dealing with waves of Green Dragons forever? We can’t launch an offensive into a place filled with powerful Dragons.”

“Well, if you’re able to maintain the strength that you’ve gained, you may think of it as valuable crafting materials occasionally being sent your way. At least for the next century or two.”

“What happens after a century or two?”

“The Elder Green Dragons in the Commonwealth become Ancients. Since they’re the progeny of the presiding Dragon Lord, they won’t be taken as mates and their presence won’t be tolerated. They’ll be kicked out of the nest, so to speak. These new Dragon Lords will then seek jungles of their own to lord over.”

Ghroklor swallowed, his expression growing more grim by the moment.

“So unless we gain the means to slay Ancient Dragons,” he said, “our struggles will be for nothing?”

“I believe most would consider servitude preferable to slaughter,” Ilyshn’ish said. “After these new Dragon Lords sort themselves out and make the desired adjustments to their respective territories, the tribes of Rol’en’gorek will be subjected to the same fate as the tribes of the Commonwealth. You’ll be pawns in their never-ending games of intrigue.”

“How can you be so nonchalant while speaking of this?” Ghroklor grumbled.

“A lot can happen in a century,” Ilyshn’ish said. “You don’t plan on doing nothing about this, yes?”

The Nar warrior seemed to regain some of his composure.

“Of course not,” he growled. “The warrior clans will not remain complacent in the face of this threat. As this conflict grows, so too will the strength of our warbands. We’ll be sure to have an answer to these powerful Dragons by the time they appear. I suppose the new material support from ocelo Pa’chan will help accomplish this. Hm…”

Ghroklor lapsed into mutterings that attracted the nearby chiefs to his side. Ilyshn’ish was pretty sure that things wouldn’t work out as he envisioned, but that wasn’t what she had been referring to in the first place. In well under a century, Rol’en’gorek would in all likelihood be a member of the Sorcerous Kingdom’s growing hegemony. She didn’t know what form that membership would take, but they would at least be immune to the incursions of lesser Dragon Lords.

Ilyshn’ish yawned as they made their way around another foothill, cresting a snow-covered pass where a Gao warband awaited them. The column stopped to rest at the checkpoint while Ghroklor and the other chiefs conferred with the warband’s leader.

“Any word from the advance scouts yet?” Ghroklor asked.

“They’re just starting to return,” the Gao chief answered. “It looks like you made the right call. The Haugrarl are showing their lack of discipline, as usual. They’ve gorged themselves on the villagers and their stores; now half of them are asleep.”

“How large is the occupying force?”

“Initial counts put them over a thousand. The Con and Lup warbands in the vanguard are already moving to encircle the village.”

“What about the Dragons?”

The chief let out a dissatisfied whine.

“We can smell them, but we can’t see them. They’re probably using the clouds as cover.”

“Then we should make our move before they decide to do something about us,” Ghroklor said. “How far is it to the village?”

“Two kilometres. Just a bit up the valley we’re crossing into. It’s a bit rugged, so about an hour for this column.”

“Good. Send runners to the warbands ahead of us. We should be able to hit these invaders from all sides. Oh, any sign of surviving defenders in the hills?”

“Hunters from the missing warbands have trickled in to join our forces, but not many. Their reports confirm what happened during the Haugrarl attack. An Adult Green Dragon flew over the village moments just as the warbands sounded the alarm. The Dragon didn’t join the fight after that, so I think it’s safe to assume that it was opportunism on the Dragon’s part.”

“Well, we won’t give them any opportunities here,” Ghroklor said. “Let’s move: we have some vengeance to exact.”

Tangible tension thickened the air as they came down from the snowbound pass and closed with their destination. At a kilometre, the column split and split again as the warbands formed a loose front that swept over the forested landscape. Not five hundred metres from the edge of the village, a birdlike shriek filtered through the trees.

“That’s as good a surprise as we’re going to get,” Ghroklor roared. “Attack!”

Ghroklor’s battlecry was taken up by the nearest warbands, spreading throughout the valley as the forces of Rol’en’gorek closed on the occupied village. Ilyshn’ish was content to follow in their wake, more curious about who the Beastmen were fighting than the battle itself. The first Haugrarl specimen she encountered came in the form of a shredded corpse left behind by the attacking warbands.

They’re not exactly as they described, are they?

Haugrarl had been likened to Owlbears, but the resemblance was superficial at best. The Demihuman’s corpse had an owl-like head complete with its sharp beak and huge eyes, but not the bear-like body of an Owlbear. Instead, it was adorned in a thick coat of brown feathers that even covered its taloned hands and feet. Some might have been tempted to classify it as a Birdman, but it had no wings. If it did have wings, it would have looked like a small brown griffon.

“Are you familiar with this species?” Ilyshn’ish asked.

“I have not seen it myself,” Pebble answered, “but it is known to our people. I don’t believe they have formed any civilisations of note in the region.”

“So their behaviour is pretty much as the Beastmen described them?”

“It is a way to describe them,” Pebble replied. “But there is nothing especially wrong about what they are.”

“Right.”

They moved on from the mangled corpse, watching from a distance as the Beastmen overran their foes. Most of the Haugrarl looked like they were still in a food-induced stupor when they met their end. However, that didn’t stop Rol’en’gorek’s forces from exulting in the success of their offensive.

Well, it’s probably too soon for that…

Far above the Beastmen’s roars of triumph, a single Green Dragon plunged through the clouds.

“Dragon!”

“Dragon!”

“Dragon to the southeast!”

Ilyshn’ish tilted her head curiously, wondering what the new arrival had in mind. Ghroklor’s forces were too strong for a common Adult to handle. The warbands were already taking up air defence positions around the village, so unless they forgot to imbue their attacks with enough magic to bypass the Dragon’s defences, the Dragon’s demise under a storm of thousands of bullets was pretty much a guarantee.

“Steady yourselves,” Ghroklor called out, “we’ve got a special feast delivering itself to…wait, where is it going?”

Long before the Green Dragon dropped into the range of Ghroklor’s hunters, it banked into a graceful turn and glided north. The end of its dive was punctuated by an intimidating roar that echoed off of the valley’s slopes.

“Get me eyes on the north!” Ghroklor shouted as he scanned the village, “What in the world did that Dragon just dive on?”

“On us!” Came a voice from the northeast of the village, “The warbands that were supposed to seal the north side of the encirclement aren’t here!”

As if to confirm their situation, a chorus of Haugrarl screeching mingled with Beastman barks and roars sounded from the north. Ghroklor hopped down from the stony den he was using to survey the surroundings with a curse.

“Fortify our position! Toss our supplies into the houses. We hold here!”

“What about our allies?” A chief asked.

“After that flyover,” Ghroklor answered, “they’re probably on the run. Send a few hunters out to bring in who we can, but don’t stray too far.”

The Nar Commander looked around before he moved to the village’s central platform. He dug his claws into a Haugrarl corpse, dragging it off the wooden floorboards to clear a space for himself.

“You seem quite confident about what you’re facing,” Ilyshn’ish said.

“It’s obviously another mountain tribe,” Ghroklor replied as he shoved another corpse off of the platform.

“Reinforcements?”

Ghroklor stopped to look at her for a moment before resuming his work.

“We call them the ‘mountain tribes’,” he said, “but they aren’t part of a confederation like we are. They fight each other as much as they fight us…well, it’s more like they fight whoever borders their territories and that includes the ones we usually don’t encounter. This is a case of very bad timing on our part. The incoming tribe was planning to attack the ones that occupied this village; we just happened to get to beat them to it. Our warbands positioned in the north got caught by their vanguard, and then that flying green asshole came over just to add to the confusion.”

“What about the incoming tribe’s strength?”

“They have to be strong enough to defeat the tribe that we just destroyed. Otherwise, they wouldn’t attack at all. We came down on these savages here with three times the number, so…”

“What if they’re stronger than three times the number?”

The Nar Commander chuffed in amusement.

“The Worldspine isn’t so bountiful a place,” he told her. “These mountain tribes can only get so large before they outgrow their valley homes. Rationally speaking, our new enemies can’t be that strong.”

“I see.”

Ghroklor turned away to address several chiefs. Ilyshn’ish turned to regard the Krkonoše behind her.

“What do you think?” She asked.

“I think that weather will alter his outlook somewhat,” Pinecone answered. “How well can these people fight in a blizzard?”

“That’s a good question…”

Far to the north, an impressive wall of dark grey clouds was rolling over the landscape in their direction. The chances of the second attack coincidentally occurring at the same time as the incoming storm seemed rather slim. At least it looked like something interesting was about to happen.

Ilyshn’ish settled onto her haunches near the entrance of a nearby stone den, munching on a strip of Nug as she watched the Beastmen rush about making their preparations. It didn’t take long for them to notice that a storm was on its way, but they decided that it was better to hold their superior defensive position rather than get caught retreating up the pass without shelter.

The first of Ghroklor’s pickets arrived thirty minutes later with several wounded comrades in tow. Ghroklor jogged over to the edge of the village to question them.

“More Haugrarl?” He asked.

“Yes, sir,” a Con hunter answered. “They came screaming into us just after that damn Dragon came from behind. The chiefs didn’t get a chance to harden us against the dragonfear.”

“Did you get a count of the Haugrarl?”

“Not a useful one,” the hunter replied. “It was pure chaos with everyone running everywhere. I’m not even sure how many in my warband survived.”

“Alright. Good work getting back to us. Have one of the mystics fix you up. This fight’s far from over.”

The hunter limped past Ghroklor, finding a free mystic within seconds. That was one major advantage that the warrior clans of Rol’en’gorek had over any other military she had observed in the region. Druids were so common in their tribal society that dying or even being crippled was near impossible unless one died outright. During the Blister Campaign, the Imperial Army had to set up sprawling camps for conventional recovery despite having planned for the conflict months in advance.

“Incoming!”

Ghroklor’s head snapped toward the source of the warning. A lone Haugrarl charged up the slope from the river below, red eyes bloodshot and beak opened wide. Cracks snapped through the air as the nearest hunters let loose with their slings, putting the Demihuman down in a clear case of overkill. An eerie silence fell over the village in the aftermath.

“That’s it?” A chief asked.

“More are on their way,” a hunter said, “but…”

Another Haugrarl emerged from the bushes by the river, its drenched feathers making it look thoroughly miserable. This time, the nearby hunters were a bit more conservative with their ammunition.

“What’s going on here?” Ghroklor muttered.

Fat flakes of snow started to drift through the village. More and more Haugrarl appeared, though they lacked the coordination or numbers to make any headway against the Beastmen’s defensive lines. A veritable wall of corpses started to form below the village’s northern perimeter, leaving the defenders increasingly confused. Ghroklor brushed away the snowflakes sticking to his face as he leaned over one of the village’s cobblestone walls, peering at the carnage beyond.

“Are they even attacking us?” He said, then looked to his right flank, “Hold your shots for a moment.”

The crack of the defenders’ slings abruptly ceased, leaving only the exhausted wheezing of the Haugrarl and the sound of the howling wind. They watched as the invading Demihumans ran along the wall of their dead. Once they reached the end of it, they resumed their climb.

“They’re going past us,” Ghroklor breathed. “They’re not attacking – they’re running from something.”

“What would that many Haugrarl be running from?” A nearby chief asked.

The answer came with the next frigid gust of wind. Ilyshn’ish took a step back as a shard of crystal ice sliced through the air and decapitated one of the Beastmen nearby. The Gao’s body wavered for a moment before being blown over by the growing gale, its blood freezing solid before it could pool on the rocks. Startled shouts rose when the shard of ice righted itself and sliced into another Beastman.

“Well,” Ilyshn’ish said, “that is quite interesting.”