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I had been fully prepared to argue with Ged, to beg and plead, to do whatever I needed in order to convince him. To my surprise, none of that was necessary.
While Ged had the officers recalled for another emergency meeting, we used the crystal ball network to brief Uncle Owen, Mother, Rod and Uncle Matthias, who was looking after Amelia. Mirna was again providing anti-eavesdropping measures, and Uncle Owen settled my last questions about her by greeting her warmly as an old acquaintance. Uncle Matthias clearly knew her as well.
I passed off my remarkable reconnaissance abilities simply as ‘Vampire Magic’ without explaining any details. I could see in the eyes of both Mother and Uncle Matthias that they wanted those details, but they didn’t press me on them. In the end, everyone agreed. We couldn’t let the army sit and wait for whatever the demons had in store.
By morning, the officers had met, the sergeants and corporals had organized the troops and the army was on the move.
In the first analysis, the very last direction we wanted the army to go was eastward, toward Cara Ita. But the officers concluded that if we feinted that direction, the demons might wait to see how close we approached to their waiting force before adjusting their strategy.
Orestanian military doctrine is all about speed. A Royal Army camp is a mobile object, its wheels greased by the excellent skills of our combat engineers and the training of our soldiers. The tent that I spent three hours meditating inside after meeting with the King was struck and packed away in minutes while I grabbed a cold ration breakfast. The stockade walls would be left behind, but the magic tool shields went into the hands of infantry squads, to become vital components of their tactical equipment should the enemy attack them on the move.
The enemy wasn’t going to just stand and watch while we pulled out, naturally. But they didn’t attack immediately. We had more-or-less caught them by surprise. At least, they didn’t figure out we were leaving until the tents started coming down. So rather than come at us, they began moving in parallel, staying near to us while their officers sorted out how to deal with the unexpected development.
Ged mounted up and rode out of the camp with his knights and a pair of intelligence officers. They were on horseback, but surrounded by a team made up of Demon Patrol members and special forces soldiers. The fragile Mirna had a horse, and the pair of halflings had ponies, but the rest of the security team were on foot. Aenëe and I joined the security team. Since we couldn’t ride horses– fairies and mortal horses don’t mix– we would have preferred to scout from the air, but Ged had implored us not to disappear for hours again.
Although I did run one important special mission once the army was underway, flying to the spot where Aenëe’s sword had fallen to retrieve it for her.
It was almost eight hours into our march, well after lunch, before the enemy revealed their hidden piece.
“Reporting!” I heard one of the special forces men bark. He was pressing a magic communication tool to his ear as he repeated its news to the prince. “Large scale demonic signatures, to our north!”
I saw the same question appear in Ged’s eyes as I asked it myself.
To our north?
It was the one direction clearly occupied by our side. Our eastward progress was moving into unoccupied territory loosely patrolled by both sides. Only our north flank was secure. If a large-scale force was coming from that direction, how had nobody seen it?
Ged quickly issued orders to shift some of the combat mages to the north side of the column, but I had a bad feeling about the situation and couldn’t sit still.
“Your Highness, I’m going to fly out and check it,” I announced. Not giving him any opportunity to object, I grew my wings and bounded into the sky.
Keep your senses wide open, Old Man, I told Durandal, then I began again expanding my mind into my spiritual vessel. My little [Blood Tracker] bat could fly without supervision, but I needed someone to watch the [Blood Sigil]s so they wouldn’t become a distraction. Kwelabi again took up the task, while Sirth began organizing the Wind spirits once again.
I wondered idly as I flew if Sirth wouldn’t be better at flying than me. Should I hand the controls over to her?
-Maybe when you’re flying that little ship of yours, Princess, but not now. Can’t hardly imagine having wings, much less trying to fight with ’em. Can’t hardly imagine swinging that big blade, either. There are fights that you are the best choice for.
Kwelabi didn’t send a verbal reply, but I felt his agreement.
I expanded my fairy sense outward, scanning the empty grassland ahead, looking for the reported signature. But it was Durandal who saw it first.
In the air, My Lady! he warned.
I had been extending my sense beyond my normal range where I could watch in all directions, but I had it trained on the ground. I raised it and immediately saw the strange swarm I was rapidly approaching.
At first, I thought of Trisiagga’s blood insects, but the [Blood Sigil] on her back showed that she was far behind me, with the Hamagaaran forces. And I quickly realized these were a very different existence.
I was facing tens of thousands of demonic creatures. A majority appeared to be the size of crows, with most of the remainder ranging a bit larger. Nothing of dragon size, or even approaching it, but the largest were big enough to carry hooded demons.
For a moment, I thought I was looking at wyverns, mostly because of the similar tails, but I quickly corrected myself as my royal knight training provided their identity. They were zilants, demonic snakes with pairs of raptor-like talons and lizard-skinned, bat-like wings.
Clearly, some of the zilant riders were demonic beast handlers, herding this mass of crows, bats and flying lizards. It had to be more than that, though, given the sheer size of the attack. Some large-scale magic had to be organizing this, to make them fly in a single, organized flock like this.
My first impulse was to attack, but I ruled that out immediately. I could have put a satisfying dent in the oncoming wave, but meanwhile, the rest would fly past me and onward to attack the column. I cloaked and flew as hard as I could back to Ged to report.
Soon, Orestanian combat mages were preparing air defenses behind screens set up by the squads equipped with magic shields. But at the same time, the cavalry units at the end of the column, forming our rearguard, were reporting the appearance of the orcish troops we had seen the previous day.
“We’re probably seeing a modification of that ‘sweep’ you mentioned,” Ged mused, speaking to me. “They mean for the aerial attack to keep us hemmed in on the north while the orcs drive us eastward into the demons.”
“It doesn’t seem like enough,” one of the intelligence officers protested.
“Originally, they had another element attacking from the north,” Ged decided. “Maybe they had a plan to get their ground forces around us.”
I frowned. “Or maybe they still do. Are we sure the entire Hamagaaran force has been following along our south?”
I had just checked on Trisiagga’s position. She was on the west end, near where the orcs were trying to enfilade our rearguard. It was awfully far back, compared to our main force.
Ged frowned, then rattled off several orders to the intelligence officers, asking for magic reconnaissance to count the enemy forces.
“I can check it faster,” I declared. I still had my wings grown.
“Ti…” Ged started, but I was already flying that direction, cloaked.
Estimating force sizes is a tricky job. It’s not like you can point with your finger and count the individual soldiers, one, two, three, four… I had methods that involved counting the flags, counting the supply wagons, counting the mounted officers. It depended upon the situation which method made sense.
Right now, I had to just do an educated guess, but my education was telling me very soon that my fears were justified. The army I was seeing was not the army I saw yesterday.
The ‘flags’ weren’t even proper unit flags. There were a few real ones here and there, but I was seeing things like sticks flying torn pieces of tent cloth faking real flags. The current force on our south side was at most three companies!
I poured on the speed, quickly reaching Trisiagga’s position and flying past it, into the space beyond the orcish force.
It became clear immediately why the orcs had been able to appear behind our rearguard so suddenly. A fog bank like the one that hid their forces the previous day had kept them out of view. And beyond that fog, I found the remaining Hamagaaran force, currently marching hard to flank our column.
Normally, this would be a dumb move. The Hamagaarans had too few people. They had too far to march if they wanted to get around onto our north side. There’s a reason you use cavalry forces for the rearguard in this kind of warfare. They are too mobile to be caught like that.
But that wave of demonic flyers currently rolling in our column might be enough to change things up.
Aenëe! Listen carefully! I sent, then began describing the situation to her.
I would have sent it to Ged, but I had difficulty hearing his thoughts in return. Aenëe had the more developed spiritual strength that had allowed her to become a fairy knight in the first place, that allowed her to form clear replies to me as long as I was listening to her.
Wait, wait! she begged in the middle, then relayed my words before saying, Go ahead, so I could continue.
The din of combat began reaching me about that time, mostly combat mages firing magic weapons, although regular soldiers also warded off creatures with their shields and normal weapons as they attacked.
I finished the report, then told her, Warn him I’m taking over back here.
He says, ‘Understood’.
She managed to imitated his stiff, clipped way of talking as she repeated his word.
I swept around to the north side, where the Hamagaaran mortal forces had reached under the cover of the unnatural fog bank, then pulled out my combat fan.
It was the first time I wished I had kept the Fan of Empress Rephale that I had turned over to the Royal Archives after I recovered it from Trisiagga. Uncle Owen had suggested I keep it, after all, but I couldn’t imagine carrying around something that precious. It was far beyond the level of carrying around Oberon’s mithril sword.
My combat fan was pretty good, but I decided it wasn’t quite up to the task. I pulled out the Starfire Jade Writing Brush, holding it with the brush end outward. Then I began summoning up the absolute limit of the Wind mana I could manage.
I was in midair, so I didn’t use my precious supply from my blood core. I drew it from the surrounding air. My effort was enough to cause a rushing noise in the air, as if a colossal being were sucking in a lungful of air.
It was the mana, rather than the gas, but I pretty much was doing exactly that.
When I had everything my body and my spiritual vessel could manage, I dropped my cloak and flew toward the fog bank. Sweeping my fan in a wide arc, I dumped mana through it, sending out a gust. There was a visible effect, but I couldn’t send enough out at once.
I tried the Writing Brush, using it to paint a broad slash of Wind, and I saw more of the fog blown back. But it still wasn’t enough, to my frustration. My sense was that I should be able to do this. I felt sure I could blow the fog back, exposing the troops hidden below.
-Princess, drop Kwelabi and me for a bit. Use your whole mind.
I frowned and protested Sirth’s suggestion.
-The limit is my tools, not my mind.
Kwelabi countered – The limit is your mind and your choice of technique.
Then I could see in my memory what they meant. Senhion had a technique for this situation. I put the fan and brush away, signalling my agreement.
My companions stepped off the stage and I expanded my mind to its limit, while pulling in a new mass of Wind mana.
Then I dashed up at the fog bank, nosed upward and over, then gave a mighty flap of my wings as I let the mana pour through them.
