NOVEL NEXT Chapter 253: A Staring Contest
“Milord, there is a large army marching our way.” One of the lookouts entered the hall to report to Braydon. It had been two days since they had cleaned up the army of Lord Ganz and Braydon had made sure that nobody in the garrison was slacking off during that time. Whilst he was banking on the presence of Serchi’s men to scare the enemy away, that did not mean that he was going to act as if he were invincible.
“Oh? So they finally show themselves, for people who have come to deal with somebody getting their arse on fire they sure do take their time.” Braydon said as he stood up from his chair and looked towards Roan.
“They probably already have heard news of Serchi’s men being stationed here. Though, I doubt that they will be raring for battle even if we did not have help. It is not like they can easily summon enough men to take this castle by force.” Roan did have a point. When taking the castles that he had, Braydon had faced minimal garrisons as all of the lords had their armies elsewhere. Braydon however had made sure that the two southern castles had at least 300 men garrisoned for the inevitable counterattack.
“Then it will be a staring contest until we find out the winner of the battles in the east.” Braydon had half expected as much but he hoped that the enemy had underestimated him enough to try an assault on the walls at least once. Not least because that would actually bring the full might of Marquess Serchi down on the rebel lords. And he would not have to pay anything extra to have it happen.
“Then here is to hoping that the Duchess Regent does not take too long.” Roan agreed.
“So how many of them are there?” Braydon asked as they stepped out of the hall and into the courtyard.
“We are not sure if they are hiding anything, but from what we can see their numbers are about what was predicted. They at most have 2500 men, though their numbers look closer to 2000.” The lookout who had made the report replied.
“So they have enough to lay siege to at most two of our castles then.” Braydon commented as he and Roan made their way up the walls. With that many men, they would normally be able to lay a decent siege to a castle with a garrison the size of the one Braydon was standing in. But that was if they wanted to only take back one of the castles that Braydon had taken and even then there would be so many casualties that they likely would not be able to take any of the others.
“When they sent men to come and deal with us, I do not think they expected more than 100 men guarding any one castle.” Roan noted. And if that was the number of men they had garrisoned in the castle, then they would be done for.
“They had better gather more help then.” Braydon chuckled. The rebel lords that had not come were still busy dealing with their rebellion, there was not much hope of several more lords breaking away to defend castles that were not even their own from somebody who obviously did not intend to take more land.. It was good enough that there were two such lords already.
“I would advise not speaking too early, Sire. We still do not know if Alima Shuluk will win or not.” Roan did not want Braydon to be jinxing them at the most critical moment.
“Then I will keep mum and see what they decide to do.” Braydon nodded as they stood on the walls watching in the distance as the enemy army in the distance could be seen coming closer to the castle.
“They should have set up camp by mid afternoon.” Roan estimated.
“That they should unless they decide to take a detour to smell the flowers like one of their lords seems want to do.” He joked, he knew that Lord Shara had been away from the road to try and hide his army but it had turned out to be as effective as if he had smelled flowers by the roadside.
“Are you sure their flower smelling lord is the one calling the shots at this point?” Roan smiled as he continued Braydon’s gag.
“If he was before, then I am almost certain he is not now. Perhaps they might be here before dinner then.” Braydon could hardly see someone who had lost nearly two thirds of his men being able to call the shots in any combined army.
“Now taking those two battles seems to at least have worked out more in our favour.” Roan noted. Considering that Braydon had managed to kill or capture about 300 men, that definitely made a dent in the over 2000 men that were marching their way towards him now.
“The captives should reach Serchi in the next few days too.” Braydon was hoping that they would at least offset some of the costs of getting help from Marquess Serchi. It would save his chamberlain hours of anguish once he was told of the boon.
“Regretting spending so much on a handful of showpieces?” Roan chuckled.
“Not at all, we would really be spreading ourselves thin if we had not. Not to mention, they are here to make our enemies give up without a fight, not give up after one.” If Braydon had wanted Serchi to actually fight for him he would have asked for more than a couple hundred men.
“I am merely dreading the look of despair that Colin will give me when I return to Cliforge.” Even if they won, and got every last thing that they hoped for, he could still see that happening.
