A Perverted Path to Victory

Chona

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“And what’s your reading?” She asked, pressing her cheek to her shoulder to help keep the speaking mask in place. They’d seriously underestimated the wind they’d be dealing with at these speeds.

“Holding steady on ten!” Tinvel called back, not quite resisting the instinct to yell over the wind. He was as hunched over the controls as he could get, trying to shelter behind what was proving to be a woefully inadequate windshield.

“Ten’s what I got too.”

“Still? Maybe something’s stuck?”

Chona flicked the glass of her gauge a few times. The needle jumped, then settled back into place. “I don’t think so. Guess we can’t be sure until we take it apart.”

The first true flight of the Foresight had so far been a mess. While nothing had gone catastrophically wrong in the airframe or engines, its multitude of prototype systems were plagued by an ever-expanding list of technical problems. Right now they were trying to troubleshoot their new speedometers which, due to the lack of measurement standardization, didn’t have any actual speeds marked on them. It was just a dial that went from zero to fifteen in even increments, five smaller lines dividing each number to improve granularity. The upper limits of the gauge, fifteen, was their best guess at when the wind would rip the plane’s wings straight off the frame. There wasn’t much point in making the dial go higher than that.

Chona and Tinvel had already understood better than anyone else just how difficult it was to build a plane, yet it was becoming obvious that even they hadn’t understood the intricate web of problems and their interactions that would be encountered as development continued. You couldn’t just solve one issue; it was always connected to a half-dozen others, and most solutions seemed to make some or all of the other problems worse. While that kind of interconnectivity tended to crop up more in Tinvel’s side of the design process, where moving an elevator or elongating the wings by a few centimeters could turn a stable aeroplane into a backflipping suicide craft, Chona’s work in weapons development and instrumentation had uncovered more than a few tangled knots for herself.

Determining air speed was what she’d learned to hate the most. The ‘pitot gauges’ were erratic at the best of times. Professor Brown had remembered their basic design, which was little more than a tube facing the wind that allowed inrushing air to push against a fluid, thus raising a dial, but there was so much more to it. How dense the air was, how wide the opening for the pitot tube was, how the exterior pressure level affected the fluid in the tube’s container, what the temperature was, if they were flying into or against the wind, all affected the behavior of the gauge’s output. The gauge could be reading a speed of three out of fifteen when they flew at altitude, which shouldn’t have been enough for them to even stay airborne, only for ground observations of their shadow’s speed to reveal they were actually traveling very near the plane’s maximum speed. If they wanted to get a consistent answer out of the dials, it would involve a complex bevy of mathematical calculus that even Professor Brown couldn’t wrap his head around.

The other instruments were similar. An inclinometer told her and Tinvel what angle the wings were sitting at relevant to the ground, and it was finally accurate enough to not be thrown off by the g-forces of a turn creating a false reading, yet the alchemist-derived lubricant it utilized had a tendency to harden below certain temperatures, leaving the readings unreliable during night flying or above twenty five hundred meters. They also now had a way to gauge engine and propeller RPM, an innovation that they’d prioritized mostly because it would be helpful with recognizing if there were any problems with the propellers, but even that was a pain in the ass because it still depended on other variables.

Namely that the Foresight had a fancy new capability: variable pitch propellers. The angle of the wooden blades could, even while they were whirling around at hundreds of rotations per minute, be adjusted at a whim. It was an increase in efficiency that was hard to describe, really. Air density was so important to the performance of a plane that, just by adjusting the propeller pitch, they could halve the distance required for the plane to take off. Not only that, if they carefully managed the prop in mid-flight, they were seeing as much as a twenty-five percent increase in top speed, all without so much as tapping the throttle controls. It was a game changer.

It was also driving her insane. The more features and details they’d added to the Foresight, the more Chona was becoming an essential part of flying the aircraft. She was jotting down notes about ideal prop angles as they flew, noting which settings got them the best speed at each altitude, but she knew that even those notes were going to end up unreliable. Everything from wind speed to humidity to temperature could affect the ideal prop angle, and without a useful speedometer, she was heavily reliant on intuition to guess at the settings she needed. Add on the fact that she was in charge of launching the rockets, casting defensive spells, and keeping her head on a swivel for any approaching attackers? Even the test flight was pushing her focus to the limits.

“How’s the handling?” Chona asked.

“Compared to the biplanes, it’s a brick,” Tinvel replied. “But it’s the fastest brick I’ve ever seen. We’ll have to wait until we get the numbers back from the ground observers, but I’m betting we hit at least two hundred and thirty kilometers an hour at combat speed settings. If acceleration and engine power trends match the Fulleyes, we might be hitting a hundred over that at emergency power.”

“Let’s not try it. I like keeping our engines in one piece.”

“I’m not planning on it. We named it emergency power for a reason.”

Tinvel leaned the Foresight into a gentle starboard roll, turning them in a circle to head back toward the city. The days of secrecy in aeroplane development were over; there were doubtlessly hundreds of spectators shading their eyes to watch the Foresight zip overhead.

It was a sight worth gawking at, in Chona’s opinion. The first plane Tinvel designed had been little more than a proof of concept, a frame-by-frame copy of an earthly design. The second, the Halfeye, had been an attempt to create something a bit more more reliable, able to be mass-produced for all the mundane duties that a plane was useful for. Scouting, transport, testing, that sort of thing. When griffons had suddenly become a threat, they’d hastily turned the Halfeye into a stopgap measure, creating the twin-engined Fulleye. It had been a major step up, but the airframe was still primitive, based on a design philosophy that had nothing to do with aerial combat.

The Foresight was different. It had been built from the ground up as a weapon of war.

With Tinvel’s growing confidence in the Carpenter Union’s ability to make suitably reliable wing struts, the biplane design philosophy had been abandoned in favor of a trim, sleek monoplane. Thick wing roots tapered to narrow slivers as they spread to their full thirty-foot extent, tapering off into a harsh curve at their apex. Two seats lay in a fuselage so narrow that they could barely squeeze into their chairs, a glowing Tinvel Engine sitting just behind Chona, another a few inches ahead of where Tinvel’s feet rested on the rudder pedals. Wide ailerons were connected to the control column by steel linkages that were twice as thick as they technically needed to be, as an extra safety margin to compensate for poor foundry quality control, and their joints were connected by heavy bolts that were dripping with enough lubrication to leave stains visible on the underside of the wings from a constant drip. The rudder was tall, providing a great deal of passive lateral stability, but they’d learned their lesson from the dangerously twitchy Fulleyes, affording the yaw axis a much smaller control surface. The elevator, conversely, was as thick and broad as it could be without being too heavy to control, giving Tinvel as much pitch authority as he could ever want. At lower speeds it was entirely possible for Tinvel to pull so hard on the controls that the plane fell out of stable flight, going belly-up into the wind as it plummeted into a stall. Conversely, higher speeds now included the risk of applying so much force to the controls that the G’s overwhelmed the structure, snapping the frame in half.

It wasn’t a novice’s plane, that was for damn sure. It was powerful, fast, elegant, and an absolute bitch to fly. Unforgiving in a dozen different ways, from the unreliable instrumentation to the errant maneuvers that could turn a routine flight suicidal, it was something they couldn’t trust in the hands of anyone but the most experienced pilots.

But gods what a plane it was in those hands. Chona leaned over the side of the cockpit, watching the ground shoot past below. They were at cruise speed, yet they would have been easily outpacing an Imperial griffon’s top speed in level flight. She could see the Foresight’s shadow whipping past small homes and fields of crops, providing a sense of scale to their blistering speed that was impossible to get in any other manner. All of its problems be damned, the Foresight was one hell of a plane.

“TCA to Uni Runway,” Tinvel said into his speaking crystal. “Coming in for a landing to receive data observations, but intend to resume flight shortly. Keep runway clear.”

“Uni Runway to TCA, message received. You’re clear for landing.”

Tinvel angled the Foresight towards Tulian proper, aligning with the concrete-covered road before the University that had steadily become a dedicated airstrip. They had enough planes by now that the street had been permanently shut off to pedestrians of all kinds, which meant visiting the University required an awkward detour around what used to be the easiest way into the long building.

The number of planes available to Tulian was the double-edged luxury of their latest engine adaptation: a way for those without any kind of spellcraft or artificery talent to control the engine’s speed. Instead of reaching down to send Intent into the crystals directly, they were now mounted on sliding racks that could be pushed forward in pairs, activating when they got close enough to the driveshaft to begin pulsing pillars of energy into it. With ten crystals in five pairs, they also now had five speed settings, which, alongside the feathered props, gave them an additional level of precision in controlling their speed.

Just like every other innovation so far, it didn’t come without caveats. Getting the desired speeds required propellers of a certain length, and taking off in the Foresight required a slight upward tilt to the entire frame, with the forward landing gear being a touch longer than the rear. With both the push and pull props being mirror images of a three-bladed arrangement, the resting angle of the Foresight meant the rear propeller was wide enough to fatally strike the ground if the engine was engaged before takeoff. The same was true for landing.

“Ready for me to cut the rear engine?” Chona asked.

“Still lining up. Give me a… okay, go for it.”

Chona pulled back on the bundle of five throttle levers on the left side of her control panel, sliding the rear engine’s crystals out of place. She felt the deceleration immediately as the prop stopped providing thrust, instead acting as an air brake that tugged at the entire frame.

“Losing speed too fast,” Tinvel tersely announced. “Feather ‘em.”

Chona pulled down on a lever that was opposite the throttles, twisting the rear engine’s blades until they were knife-edge to the wind, their drag minimized.

The Foresight was descending smoothly as they passed over the city walls. Chona saw a gun crew pull away from their maintenance work to hop up and wave, wide grins on their face as the Foresight slid past. She wanted to return the gesture, but couldn’t. This was going to be their first-ever landing of the Foresight.

“Engine one throttle to taxi speed,” Tinvel announced.

“Want me to adjust prop pitch?” Chona asked. They’d already done the tests on the ground to find the ideal angle for the blades to provide power at sea level altitude.

“No, we don’t need the speed.”

“Copy.”

The wooden frame creaked lightly as Tinvel tapped the rudder, aligning their heading with the white strip of runway. The city’s homes grew closer with every passing second, the metallic clank of their lone engine doubtlessly echoing down the streets.

“Cancel that,” Tinvel said tersely. “Give me some pitch. Want to be ready for a go-around.”

“Copy.”

The whir of wooden blades shifted to a different tune as she tugged at the forward engine’s pitch lever, noticeably reducing their deceleration. It was shaping up to be a high-speed landing, but the Foresight’s higher power made that more acceptable than it used to be. If they needed to abort, they had plenty of spare thrust to zoom up and away.

“Rear prop position good?” Tinvel asked.

“Uh… shit, no,” Chona said as she glanced over her shoulder. “One second.”

“Go around?”

“No, I got it.”

The three-bladed rear prop wasn’t quite at the correct angle for a landing: one of the blades was twisted to face downward, where it would inevitably strike the ground as they touched down. Straining her neck to look behind her, Chona adjusted the pitch lever, giving it just the barest degree of a shift. The prop caught the wind, spun a quarter turn, and then Chona flattened the pitch to pin it in place.

“We’re good,” she announced.

“Fifteen seconds to touchdown.”

The last of the homes zipped past, then they were over the runway. Tinvel kept the shallowest landing approach angle possible on their way down, aiming to give the oversized props the best chance of avoiding a ground strike. With the Foresight’s broad monoplane wings and powerful engine, they hovered like an insect above the concrete, floating in midair for a prolonged moment.

There was a light squeak from the front left landing gear, then another from the right. The tail kept hovering in the air for a few seconds, rubber mere centimeters above the concrete, and then Chona felt the rattle that came with all three wheels meeting the earth.

Tinvel cut the forward engine, then began applying yet another one of their innovations: actual, genuine brakes. The airplane shook more as metal plates pressed against the steel tire wheel wells, creating an audible scraping noise. That was fine for a moment, then Chona was suddenly pushed forward in her seat, dangling by her seatbelt.

“Woah!”

“Shit!”

Without warning, the Foresight had tipped forward. Chona fell even further as the ground was briefly visible ahead of them.

“Stop braking! Stop braking!” She called.

“I am!”

For a hair-raising time, maybe fifty meters or so, the entire plane was balanced on its front landing gear, threatening to tip forward into a disastrous crash. Chona pushed herself as far back in her seat as she could reach, trying to help balance the plane back into place. Tinvel was pulling back on the controls as hard as he could, but they weren’t going fast enough for the elevator to get a bite out of the airstream.

Finally, after five or six hair-raising seconds, the plane thunked back down on the rear landing gear, none the worse for wear. Tinvel and Chona both swore with relief as the Foresight rolled onward— without the brakes engaged.

“Shit,” Tinvel gasped, laughing nervously. “Landing gear’s too close to the center of mass, I bet. Maybe we should only have brakes on the rear wheel.”

“Or just not use them at all,” Chona suggested as they rolled to a slow stop. With the engine totally disengaged, they ended up sitting in the middle of the runway, unable to wheel around toward the aerodrome. “Maybe we should use prop feathering as an airbrake instead.”

“Not a bad idea. But it’ll be more workload for you.”

“Only on landings. I can handle that.”

“We’ll see.” Tinvel pushed one of his five throttle levers forward, then frowned, remembering that he’d entirely cut the engine. As a safety mechanism, the crystals wouldn’t provide power unless the prop was given a jump-start first. He raised a hand to the various workers milling about the aerodrome. “Hey! Can someone come help push us out of the way? Or at least give us a jump start!”

While the workers who’d been singled out began to argue over whose job it was to bother with the arduous task, Chona was working her way down her notes, reading all the problems her shaky hands had recorded through the flight. At the end of the long list, she quickly jotted better brakes.

“What do you want to do next?” She asked. “Looks like it might be a good idea to try a few touch-and-go landings.”

“We landed fine. All I need to do in the future is not hit the brakes so hard.” Tinvel unbuckled his seatbelt and stood, hopping out onto the flame-red right wing that had become their calling sign, then the ground, getting ready to push the plane. Chona followed him, taking up a spot behind the opposite wing. “No, I want to do a weapons check now,” he called across the airframe. “This is going to be the most rockets we’ve ever put on a plane, and I want to make sure we can actually take off with such a heavy load.”

“We took off with a dummy weight load already,” Chona reminded him.

“Yeah, but a bunch of lead bricks in the stowage space doesn’t affect aerodynamics. And there’s not much point in a fighter plane that can’t fight, is there?”

“Guess not.”

Several of the aerodrome workers, including a few of the trainee pilots, finished jogging up to the Foresight. Everyone grabbed a section of the plane, wherever they could reach that was sturdy enough to shove against, and began heaving it towards the open aerodrome doors.

Chona’s back itched terribly as she worked, sweat foaming up through her fur. The first shipment of Carrion-woven parachutes had arrived the day before, and that meant she’d been forced to wear proper flight gear for the first time. Not pleasant in the Tulian heat, that was for sure. Unfortunately for her, Tinvel wore a similar pack, and he was wearing it over his flight jacket. She couldn’t complain without looking pathetic in comparison. Besides, the parachutes would probably save their lives some day.

How many times did Professor Brown say some pilots got shot down in Earth’s wars? Four, five times in one career?

The thought had her scanning the sky, searching for any sign of danger. A black dot was darting between a pair of clouds a few kilometers away, but she recognized by its movement that it was another Tulian aeroplane out on a training flight. Nothing dangerous.

Not yet.

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Sirian “Seareye” Tailya, Captain

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The Royal Army of the Kingdom of Sporatos was at once a magnificently grand thing and a shockingly tawdry sight. Seareye had seen forces its size before, nearly a hundred thousand soldiers strong, but he had never seen one so… disparate.

The common peasants could be described as “armored” only by a technicality. They had ugly steel caps that hugged their head so closely that a bit of flesh-tone paint could have convinced Seareye he stood before an Army of the Balding Men, though the riveted band that ran along the bottom rim might have ruined the effect somewhat. Their chests were protected by nothing more than slovenly clothing, a thick cloth garment called a gambeson. All of the garments were specked with mud from the march, and very few of them had even been made with the same color of cloth. None were dyed, of course. Many of the peasants weren’t even afforded shields, instead wielding spears of such length that they could only be manipulated with both hands— something that would have been a logistical impossibility in the tight jungle confines of the Empire. The only ones among them that wore something resembling true armor were clusters of mercenaries scattered here or there, and even then their equipment was as variable in its design as it was its quality.

Still, Seareye could not deny that the assembled host was grand in its own way. He had seen armies this large before, yes, but only in sieges, when they were camped in rings around a city’s wall. To see them aligned like this, geometric grids laid out across the open grass fields of the barbarian kingdom, it became possible to truly grasp the enormous size of the assembled force. Officers on horseback rode up and down the rows created by the vast tide of spearmen, as if the entire force had become the buildings and streets of a gridded city. Occasionally one of the riders would point a blade at someone and shout harshly, prompting one peasant or another to hurriedly get themselves back in line. The gargantuan formation, already smartly squared, was nearing an uncanny perfection.

What caught Seareye’s lone eye the most, however, was not the peasants. They were “only” some eighty-thousand of the assembled host, with another ten thousand being mercenaries. No, what left him utterly captivated was the cavalry.

Ten thousand Knights flanked the force on either side. They, unlike nearly anything he had seen so far in this barbaric land, were truly awe-inspiring. So complete was their armored protection that the men and women were like iron golems, not a single inch of skin or hair visible, not unless one looked you dead in the eye, allowing you a brief glimpse of their face through the thin slit of their visors. Every single one, all ten thousand of them, had enchanted armor. And not just any enchanted armor— these were freshly forged or altered sets, created over the last year with the explicit purpose of resisting gunpowder weaponry. He pitied overworked smiths and artificers of the Sporaton Kingdom, but their work had paid dividends. Seareye didn’t think he could take the youngest and weakest of the Knights in a fight. Not while they were in their armor, at least.

But a Knight, as he had been told so many times, was not one creature. It was a word for a pair, a unity of man and beast. Of the two halves, Seareye found the warhorses even more impressive than their riders. With broad flanks, long, thick legs, and stout chests, the animals made the common steeds of the officers coordinating the peasantry look like newborns by comparison. Seareye had learned from his time in the north that many of the Knights of Sporatos rode horses with a lineage that could be traced back to the founding of the Kingdom itself— their steeds borne of a thousand years and untold generations of careful training, husbanding, and breeding.

They were nothing like the Krapeu of the Empire. The animals were fiercely, unhesitatingly loyal to their masters. It seemed a Knight was not unlike the Beastmasters of the Empire, whose creatures always aged at the rate of their masters instead of the natural pace for their species. Many of the horses had been with their Knights since they were young, and even now, fifty years later, the animals were as hearty and hale as their riders.

The care that was taken to ensure such a long lifespan was evident in the armor the creatures wore. Their broad backs supported heavy discs of interwoven steel, creating a waterfall of sparkling metal that clung tightly to the creature’s flanks, going so far as to wrap around and under their bellies. Their legs were covered in the same sort of plated armor that protected their riders, their long noses sported thick-slabbed wedges, and even their eyes were hidden behind slitted orbs, ensuring that nothing but the thinnest blade could slip through the protection. If he were on foot in a fight against a lone mounted Knight, Seareye couldn’t think of a single way to kill them. Were he to find himself in such a foul circumstance, he honestly thought he’d choose to kneel down and pray, asking the gods to place an errant ditch in a place fit to snap the warhorse’s leg. Then, if his prayers were answered, he’d leap up and run as if a gate to the hells had opened behind him, hoping he was faster than the Knight who’d doubtlessly give pursuit on foot. He hadn’t the weaponry or strength to so much as draw a drop of Knightly blood.

Of course, Seareye thought, looking down at the green scales of his own building-sized steed, I very much doubt that I will have to fight a Knight on foot.

Taotri lifted her head, sniffing the air, then made a displeased chuffing noise. It was as loud as a herd of oxen, the exhalation visibly warping the air before her with its heat.

“They have been gathered in one spot for so long that the peasants have found need to relieve themselves, yet they haven’t dug a single latrine. It is foul. When will we be done with this farce?”

“Soon, I expect,” Seareye reassured her. “They have assembled here for the King to review his forces. A matter of symbolism, I understand. It is important that all the lords under his command are seen to have provided the troops asked of them.”

“And this could not have been seen on the march?” Taotri asked. “A waste of time.”

“The King seems to think it isn’t. He’s made many cryptic comments about the importance of this gathering, you know.” Seareye turned in the saddle, looking past the tall spines that rose along Taotri’s back. “They even asked that all our Wing’s griffons are assembled for the event, and he is soon to give a speech. At the very least, I expect it will be most fascinating to hear his justification for marching half his countrymen into the empty wilderness to wage war on a Chosen.”

“It’ll have to be one helluva speech to make people happy to be doing something so stupid,” one of Taotri’s riders muttered. Seareye knew who said it, but pretended he couldn’t tell as he called back.

“None of that, now! We are the King’s guests, and we will treat him accordingly. His enemy is our enemy, his goals our goals, and his victory, may it swiftly arrive, our victory. Listen to his words well!” In a lower, more sardonic voice, Seareye continued. “After all, I anticipate that our own people’s agents will be rather curious as to the full implications of its contents. Break out some papers and quills, if you would. The exact wording might be of interest to our spymasters— that is, our contacts.”

A smattering of wry laughter went around, and Seareye found himself satisfied. Many of the soldiers assigned to Sporatos still chaffed at the duty, but he’d grown adept at managing their distaste for the northern wastes and those that lived in them. So long as you framed a task as being an important duty for one’s country, it was easy to convince a loyal soldier to do nearly anything.

Seareye turned to watch the King, who wasn’t far away. He was encircled by advisers, admirers, Knights, Lords, Ladies, mages, and the ever-present gaggle of sycophants squirming between them. He was on his own steed, a horse so massive that Seareye wondered if it had been subjected to some sort of growth-enhancing spellcraft. The King’s armor shone like a beacon amongst the crowd which followed him, matched only by the animal beneath him— named Silverblood, if Seareye recalled correctly.

“That thing again,” Taotri growled.

He chuckled. “What, the horse?”

“Yes. It is an unnatural thing. I detest it.”

“You detest the animal because it was the first of its kind to not be intimidated by your presence, dear Taotri. Don’t let your pride taint your opinion of the creature.”

“It is unnatural for a mere horse to stand firm before a wyvern,” she insisted, scales hackling. “Animals should know their place.”

“I do not believe that creature can be called a mere animal, I’m afraid. Not anymore.”

Taotri was right about one thing, Seareye had to admit: Silverblood’s bravery was so complete as to be unnerving. When the stallion had first stood before Taotri, it had appraised her with one eye, turned about, and raised its left rear leg for a kick as it glanced over its back— as if daring her to come within range of its hooves. Seareye had gotten the distinct impression that Silverblood’s confidence was not entirely misplaced.

As they watched, the King’s attendants began to disperse, save for a few of the robed mages. Seareye felt Taotri’s neck stretch forward, her eyes narrowing.

“What is it?”

“Those are not normal mages,” she murmured. “They are Archmages. I can smell their power from here.”

“Archmages? Are you sure?” Seareye shaded his eyes as he inspected the figures. They looked like middle-aged men and women, but that was true of virtually any Archmage. “The King told us that he could not find a single one of his High Mages willing to pit themselves against a Chosen, nor even the Tiger of Salacia. Has that changed? Is that the purpose of this gathering?”

“If the King truly had Archmages at his beck and call for matters of war, I do not think he would need this rabble army,” Taotri responded. “Interesting indeed.”

Seareye couldn’t help but agree. He sat up straighter in the saddle, watching the King carefully.

From atop his mighty horse, the King of Sporatos raised his hand, gauntlet clenched in a tight fist. The army’s rumble of conversation cut off, all eyes turning forward. A mage at his side made a few quick gestures before nodding to the King, who took a deep breath.

“My subjects! My soldiers! My people!” The King’s voice boomed across the fields, carrying far and wide. “You who have answered my call! Hear me well, for today we embark upon a Holy War!”

Against a Holy Chosen, Seareye thought sarcastically. How will he spin this, I wonder?

“I know many of you fear what is to come! That is natural! To be expected! You wish to be in your homes, tending your fields, caring for your family. I understand! I do! And for the war that is to come, I have no choice but to offer you, my loyal subjects, this: my deepest, most sincere apology.”

Oh? Seareye shared a surprised look with the rest of Taotri’s crew. That wasn’t what he’d expected.

The King nudged Silverblood into motion, moving across the front of the army. “The gods gave our lands a gift! A Champion of our own, Amarat’s own representative in the flesh! She saved our land from the foul influence of insidious rebellion, revealing the traitor in our midst. And I was grateful!” He paused for effect, speaking the next few words mournfully. “Too grateful, it would seem. For, upon the request of the noble Champion, I spared the life of the traitor’s daughter! By Ancient Powers did I bind her to the Champion, for I believed that in servitude and slavery there might be redemption for her crimes.” He spoke even lower, quieter, yet his voice carried all the same. “I was wrong, my subjects. This mercy was a poison more foul than I could have ever known. For exposure to the Traitor’s Daughter corrupted the Champion herself!”

The assembled armies shifted in place uncomfortably. To claim that an aspect of the Divine could be corrupted was flirting with apostasy. To claim that a slave could do such a thing was even more dangerous a claim. But the King did not allow the peasantry to dwell on the notion.

“In the months and years since, the Champion has been twisted! She has wrought evil upon the lands, defied destiny, and created unholy abominations! The order of the world itself is shuddering under her cruel assault! Even when I first marched south, I did not understand the depths of her depravity, of the foul influence held by the Traitor’s Daughter!”

As if in prayer, the King bent his head low. After a few seconds, he shook it.

“It is for this mistake that I offer you my apology. I have failed my duty. I have allowed a great evil to grow and fester at our borders, threatening our very way of life. My Loyal Subjects, I have already asked for your service, and I am glad to receive it. But now I must ask for something greater: your forgiveness.”

Seareye was shocked. The King he had stood beside these last months was nothing like the man who spoke before this army. There was a profound humility to this new figure, a sense of genuine regret. It was a compelling vision. Seareye could see the shock on the peasantry’s face— and their awe. They had never imagined the minor Lords and Ladies that owned their lands would admit fault, much less their King. They found the man’s honesty enrapturing.

“Today, Subjects of Sporatos, we begin a new conflict. Not one of conquest, or defense, but of mercy! I ask of you, I beg of you, to give me your utmost efforts! A Corrupted Champion sits upon a dark throne, sheltered behind a fortress of smoke and fire, ignorant of her own evil! The Champion of the Gods has been lost! We fight not for ourselves, but for our future! She wishes to tear down the ancient order, the just order! She wishes to build a world where children will not know the fruits of their parent’s labor! Where there is no class, there is no inheritance, and every man and woman must fend for themselves, lost in the sea of faceless humanity. No leaders, no rulers, only the barbaric chaos of disloyalty, of rivalry and ambition, mediated by nothing but the greed of those most willing to lie, cheat, and steal!” The King’s horse reared up on queue, hooves flashing as the King raised an enchanted mace. “If you wish there to be a future for you and your kin, we must save her!”

Taotri chortled. “He does not do things by half-measures, does he? To possess the bravery to even air such a bold claim is remarkable.”

“Truly,” Seareye murmured, watching the army’s reaction. They were wet clay in the King’s hands, their thoughts and emotions his to mold. “I am surprised the gods did not strike him down where he stands.”

“Perhaps there is some truth to his claims?”

“Doubtful. Perhaps enough of the gods oppose the Chosen that the Pantheon of Emotion cannot act so dramatically. Either way, if there is…” Seareye trailed off, his eyes catching something in the distance. He gripped the saddle horn before him, leaning forward. “What… is that?”

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Chona

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Flitting along at fifteen hundred meters with twelve emcotton rockets slung beneath their wings, Chona was shocked to see their speedometer hovering at a consistent eight-point-five. Though hundreds of kilograms of rocket were weighing them down, the combination of a sleeker airframe, variable prop pitch, and dual engines had them maintaining most of their speed.

“I’m about to try a dive,” Tinvel announced. “I’m going to drop us to taxi speed, but get ready to feather the props flat. With this much weight, we’re going to drop like a stone. I don’t want to rip the wings off just yet.”

“Ready whenever you are.”

“I’m going to aim for that berm that the North Star Fort uses for cannon practice. I’ll call out when we go for the dive.”

“Got it.”

They zipped over the North Star Fort, freshly-polished cannons glistening in the noon light. Chona could see puffs of smoke from a few wall sections, indicating that a few infantry squads were practicing their gunnery. A cannon loosed a shot on the eastern wall, sending an explosive shell into the ocean a mile distant, splintering a floating target that the Tulian Navy had towed into place for just such a purpose.

“Alright, get ready,” Tinvel announced. “There’s going to be a-“

“Wait,” Chona interrupted, straining against her seatbelt. She pointed. “What in the hells is that?”

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Sirian “Seareye” Tailya, Captain

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“Stand strong!” The King roared. “Stand proud! The enemy’s weapons will be foul, but we are ready to face them! You have the authority and will of a righteous cause at your back! Remember this!”

Suddenly ignoring the King’s speech, Taotri stood, neck raising to its full height as she inspected the distant peculiarity.

Light was warping around the army. A ring of off-color energy was carving a line on opposite sides of the assembled force, one from west to east, the other east to west. With every pace further that it traveled, the light grew more solid, taller, until it was impossible to miss.

“The enemy thinks you cowards! They think you will shrink and flee under their foul magics and their evil weapons. The Corrupted Champion has misled them, warped their minds, convincing them that they are all Lords unto themselves, your superiors in every way! But they are not! Stand strong, charge well, bring them to task, and you will discover they bleed as easily as any man! I promise you this!”

“Should we leave?” Taotri asked nervously, shifting her weight, wings spreading. “This is powerful spellcraft. I do not know what is happening.”

“No,” Seareye said quickly. “The King prepared for this. The True Adjutant entrusted us to his service, and we will see it through.” He turned, casting his voice toward the griffon riders. “Hold position! Do not flee!”

The King’s heels tapped his massive steed’s flanks, sending the massive stallion trotting forward.

“You will be shielded by our mages! Our Knights will harry their ranks! So long as your spears meet the enemy, victory will be ours! They will not be ready for what is to come! I have made sure of it!”

The walls of energy became opaque as they rose, now curving inward. Seareye saw the Archmages of Sporatos standing at the perimeter, facing inward. Their hands were raised, the fabric of reality crumpling under the ministrations of their twisting gestures and unheard chanting.

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Private Tavin, Third Rifleman Division

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“Outta the way!” Tavin huffed, shoving through the onrushing column of soldiers. “Outta the way! I’m on orders, gods damn you!”

The others ignored him. The concrete barracks of the North Star Fort had hallways too narrow for the influx of troops that were rushing about, responding to the gonging bells above. Tavin was struck by shoulders, elbows, and gun butts as he ran against the tide. Soldiers were loading their weapons as they went, tossing helmets on their head, or dipping into a passing room to grab any equipment they could get their hands on, assigned gear be damned.

“Shit,” Tavin gasped as he took another unintentional gut blow. “Had to take a fuckin’ piss… worst time ever…”

The constant drilling that the Tulian Army underwent proved helpful, thank the gods. The hallway emptied in mere minutes, leaving him clear to sprint as fast as he could down the corridor, heading for the stairs at the furthest end of the barracks.

He threw the door open and took the steps two at a time, nearly falling as he hit the ground. The room’s other two guards jumped in surprise, swinging their muskets around, but thankfully didn’t point them his way.

“Orders, ma’am!” Taven gasped, doubling over. “We need orders!”

Artillery Lieutenant Shale, imprisoned commander of the North Star Fort, looked up from the cot she’d spent the last few months laying across.

“What’s that?”

Still out of breath, Tavin started fumbling with his belt full of keys, searching for the right one as he walked up to the cell doors. He didn’t know which damn key it was! This was only his second day on the duty! “Somethin’ strange happening up north, ma’am,” he gasped out. “Don’t know what, but it’s big. Miles across, maybe. Magic goin’ like crazy.”

Lieutenant Shale stood, stretching her arms over her head. Compared to what most people might’ve expected from a prisoner locked in a cell for months, her clothes were clean, empty of stains. That had surprised Tavin when he’d joined the squad assigned to guarding the most famous officer of the army: that New Tulian even treated its prisoners well.

“Does anyone know what’s happening?” She asked.

“No, ma’am,” Taven shook his head. “But I seen it myself. Big wall of light, real strange, but with ghosts inside. I can see soldiers, I think. Northerners, Knights, spears and all that.”

“How far away?”

“Front of the strangeness seems to be about at the kilometer range markers, ma’am.”

“What’s the rush for getting me, then?” Lieutenant Shale asked. Her question was almost… lackadaisical? Taven nearly dropped the key ring in shock at her attitude. He caught it just in time, jaw slack as he looked up at her.

“Whatdya mean, what’s the rush? Ma’am, we think that- that the whole Royal Army is about to be on the North Star’s doorstep!”

“And what do you expect me to do about that?”

Taven sputtered in disbelief. “What?! Ma’am, this is what I was told y’were here for! Taking command if the enemy came!”

“Sure, sure.” She held her elbows out and twisted left to right, back popping audibly. “But they don’t need me quite yet. You can slow down, kid. Nothing I could do right now other than confirm they oughtta follow standing orders.”

Taven blinked, trying to think. He’d been part of the South Star Fort detail before this, working to finish the massive defense array as fast as possible. It wasn’t fully done yet, but at least the outward-facing parts had been completed, leaving the city-facing parts to be covered well enough by the cannons atop Tulian’s walls. He’d never been told anything about standing orders.

“And what’re they, ma’am? Something we can- ah!” Finally finding the right key, he jabbed it into the lock, giving it a twist. “What should we be doing?”

Artillery Lieutenant Shale laughed, looking to the older, more experienced guards. “Well, ladies? Do you know what my standing orders for the defense of Tulian are?”

Smirking, one nodded.

“If the enemy is in range, fire.”

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Sirian “Seareye” Tailya, Captain

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“Spearmen forward!” The King roared. A great crackling energy had begun to battle for volume with even his spell-enhanced voice. The world outside the barrier began to shift and bleed, colors running and shapes distorting. Seareye could see new lands taking form beyond the veil. “Knights of Sporatos, prepare to raid! Your leaders have maps! Find the villages of Tulian, their works, their foul weaponsmiths, and put them to the blade! Purge the land of their cruel weapons! Leave none left who know their evil! Allow none to seek shelter within the city!”

With a sudden whoomph, the most powerful teleportation spell Seareye had ever imagined was completed. They were in a different land; a greener one, a hotter one, the gusting wind carrying the scent of sea spray. Turning around, he saw the dirt and grass walls of the Tulian fortress rising up and away, distant bells clanging.

“We begin the war now!” The King called. “We know that the enemy is leaderless! The Champion and her wives are deposed, facing the consequences of their foul deeds! They have no commanders, no one to give spine to their cowardice, and you have your King! The enemy is not prepared! Fight well, fight hard, and end the battle today!”

Spellcraft rippled across the army. More mages than Seareye could ever remember seeing in one place took up their craft, creating shimmering barriers across the entire force. Defensive shields crept flickered into existence above every squad of spearmen, densest over the Knights on the flanks. The army was shrouded beneath the scales of great shell-backed armor, a Leviathan on land.

“Seize the advantage! Strike before they can muster a response! Fight for our—”

An ear-splitting shriek rose above the King’s voice, followed in an instant by the sharp crack! of detonating artillery. A black burst of smoke and shrapnel tore into the ground at the feet of the Knights, striking just below the shield. A half-dozen horses fell with whinnying screams.

Another shot landed less than a second later, striking the center of the peasant spearmen. The shield deflected it up and away, but the size of its detonation was colossal. Larger by far than any firearm explosion he’d yet seen, Seareye could feel the concussion in his chest even from so far away.

“Fight for our future!” The King cried, lifting a mace and pointing it forward. “Fight for our way of life! Fight for—”

From up and behind, Seareye heard a strange sound. A collection of loud whooshes, one after the other, then a quiet whistle. He and Taotri turned around as one, looking for the source.

They were just in time to watch smoking white lances spear into the ground at a forty-five degree angle, producing a volley of explosions that tore straight through the center of the Imperial griffons. Blood, smoke, and heaving soil leapt into the sky, dozens of Imperials and their griffons cut down by a line of detonations that traveled forward for fifty paces or more.

Seareye looked up as a metallic clanking shot overhead, blinking in disbelief. The wooden craft pulled up and away, its artificial engines growling loud as it strained for altitude. Its shape was nothing like the craft he had seen before, but—

“The Red Wing!” Taotri bellowed, raising her wings high. “The hunt begins!”

Seareye gripped the saddle tight as Taotri launched into the air, sweeping over an army that, even as they began to charge forward, was being bombarded by a rapidly increasing hail of explosive shot.

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