We were woken hours before dawn, so we could get ready. I made sure that my men all were equipped with one of the shields we had looted. If we were going to be moving up and down the switchback, we would need some cover. I had also had my wood and metal mage transform some of the looted stuff into shovels, so we could dig some small trenches. I was uncertain if there would actually be stone mages to build those fortifications Ballard had talked about.

Sixth Battalion was standing east of the gate, while Fifth was to the west. Fifth would be moving out first, while Sixth would follow. Behind us, there was a squadron of mancers, most of them seemed to be women, meaning they were expendable. Whether that was my influence as well, I did not know.

Since we had the honour of being First Squadron, we were standing at the back of the formation. An honour I would rather have been without, because it meant that though we might be last of the battalion to arrive at the foot of the mountain, we would also be the very last squadron to leave as well. Which would be dangerous.

The arrival of the suicide cavalry was announced by a thundering of hooves and horses neighing, echoing through the night. Amplified by the mouth of the tunnel leading to the portal cavern. We could hear them for a full minute before they came rushing by us. The outer riders in every third rank were carrying a torch, announcing the arrival of the cavalry long before necessary.

While stupid, it was nevertheless needed because it was impossible to see anything. The night was black, the moon and stars hiding behind the clouds, I worried that it might rain. It felt like forever as we waited for the last rider to pass by us, but as soon as they did, Fifth Battalion was on the move.

When it was our turn, we set out in what Hrothgar informed me was a double march. Jogging five steps, marching five steps. Of course, I had not bothered with training my troopers to march, I had concentrated on them learning to fight, so our formation was not as impressive looking as the rest of them. Not that I really cared. We quickly enough managed to get with the program. The mancers were stumbling behind us, their dresses slash robes were not really meant for moving about a battlefield.

Even as we moved out of the gate, we could see that bonfires had flared up, as the elves were responding to the sally. The first of the cavalry units were already at the base of the mountain, spreading out.

When we got there, the others were already there, formed up in lines. We had no light source, and the cavalry was already wreaking havoc all around. Ballard and Fifth’s high commander were with us, and they started barking orders for how they wanted us to spread out. It seemed like they chose to give each squadron a single stone mage to build fortifications.

Because we would be leaving last, we got a placement off to the side and slightly behind the others. Which suited me just fine. The woman we had been assigned sounded out of breath. Just from the contour of her figure that I could see, she looked old and frail.

“Milord, we should get the men started on digging,” Hrothgar commented.

“Right,” I said. “Get the men digging a trench, dirt forward of course.”

He chuckled. “I’ll remember to tell them.”

“Good,” I turned back to the mage. “What’s your name?”

“Alma,” she replied, then quickly added, “Milord.”

“Karth,” I said and took a look around the place we had been given. It was hard to make anything out at all. We were almost back to where the road up started. “We’re grateful for your presence, hopefully, you can save a lot of my men.”

“Milord, I don’t know anything about fortifications,” she said timidly, looking down.

“Don’t worry, as long as you follow my instructions, we’ll try to get you home safe,” I said with a smile though she could probably now see that. “My men are digging trenches, I need you to make a slanted roof over them.”

“I’m not really sure what you want me to do, Milord,” she murmured. “I’m only rating two, I can’t do much before I run out of mana.”

“Fucking hell,” I shouted. I could hear other people complaining from the other squadrons. It would seem I was not the only one who had found out that we had been shafted. Being levies and not actual professional soldiers seemed to mean that my men and their ilk meant very little.

“I’m sorry, Milord,” Alma hurriedly said and shied back from me.

“Matters not, take these mana crystals,” I said after taking a deep breath and handing her a couple of mana crystals. Ethan was not using his magic for much, so he turned out a lot of crystals. “We do what we must. See if you can make four thin stone columns. The two in front a metre and a half, the two in the back at two metres. Then make a thin slanted covering between them. You can see where my people are already digging, do it over there, as much as you can.”

“Yes, Milord,” she mumbled and went over to do what I had asked.

“Hrothgar,” I called, still not able to see exactly who of the moving figures in the dark were who.

“Milord?” a figure stopped moving and asked.

“When Alma has made what she can, have the men rig the columns with ropes, so we can pull them down when we’re pulling out,” I ordered. “When the first sections go up, place Seventh there, then Fifth.”

“Understood, Milord,” came the reply.

Time moved slowly. I prowled up and down the increasing trench. It was not a very deep one, less than half a metre deep. However, the little dip coupled with the earthen parapet they were forming in front of the trench, would lower the amount of their body they would need to protect with their shield. Hopefully, we would survive this.

I needed a better view of what the hell was happening out there, so I retreated a bit up the road and pulled out one of my liberated spyglasses. Alan had the other. Changing my eyes to that of a cat, I started observing the battlefield. The cavalry was fighting skirmishes against the elves in the distance. Tents were set ablaze, magic was thrown around, though I did not need the spyglass nor the night vision to see that. For the moment it seemed to me that elves were busy catching up, having been caught out a bit by the sally. That would not last long in my opinion.

“How’s it looking out there, Milord?” Alan asked.

“Like someone stirred up a hornet’s nest,” I answered, with some anger and resentment in my voice.

“That was the idea wasn’t it?”

He was right of course, however, that did not mean it was a good idea. “Yes, it was the idea, but as soon as dawn arrives, it’ll be like they threw a hornet’s nest at our feet. We’ll be hit hard by angry elves and it’s not going to be fun.”

“We could always retreat now. The cavalry is gone,” he suggested.

“I raised that point earlier when Ballard came to give me the punishment. He said that anyone leaving before the orders were given, would be executed.”

“Always heard rumours that it was bad here at the Bastion, but this is worse than I ever could have imagined,” he mumbled.

“Most of the men here are levies, not professional troopers. They’re expendable. We’re expendable,” I pointed out.

“I guess so, Milord,” he said with a thoughtful tone.

“Well, let’s get down there and relieve the men digging for a few spans.”

“Milord?”

“Never ask your men to do something you would not do yourself,” I explained.

He thought about that for a minute as we walked back down. “I can see how that would garner some goodwill with the troopers, Milord, but the other commanders will look down on you. It’s not what a commander should be doing, even less so a lord.”

“I give a fuck about what the other commanders or squadrons think about me. They’re not the ones that I need to follow orders,” I replied. “I need the men to trust me with their lives, and I have to trust them with mine. Even if it goes against the fibre of my being. I can maybe kill a lot of elves on my own, but there’s too many for me to handle on my own.

When we got back down to my men, I saw that Anders and the beautiful lady were there. It was the first time I had seen her out and about when there were fighting to be done. Or to be precise, I assumed that the hooded figure standing a step behind and to the right of Anders was her. Even if it had not been dark, the voluminous robes would make it hard to say for certain. I only recognized Anders because he was asking where I was.

“I’m right here, Anders,” I said and waved an arm to get his attention. The figures of my guest moved over to me. “What can I do for you?”

In English, he replied, “They are fucking us over big time.”

“I know. I might end up helping the elves by killing Farnsworth myself,” I said, in English as well.

“Please don’t talk about coldblooded murder in front of me. I still have a moral code you know,” he grumped.

“Oh, sorry, did I offend your sensibility in the middle of a battlefield?” I asked mockingly. I could not help myself. Sometimes the asshole in me could not be held back by my nearly non-existent diplomacy dyke.

He took a deep breath. “You’re an asshole.”

“Yeah, sorry about that, can’t help myself sometimes,” I replied with a shrug.

“They gave me a fucking rating four to help build fortifications,” he complained, switching back to the original conversation.

“Better than mine, I got a two, and you got stone magic on your own,” I pointed out.

“Yeah, I’m just taking a break to recharge my mana.”

“At any point, you might get tired of your helper, send her back here. I could use a hand. I’m last to leave,” I said.

“I know, I’m second last to leave, remember?”

“Right, but that’s still before me,” I countered.

“Well, I better get back to work,” he said and turned around. As he walked away I narrowed my eyes. He was up to something. The whole friendly banter thing was suspicious. Was he just interested in a way out of the Bastion? Or was there something deeper and more sinister going on?

I would not get the answer by standing around, and forcefully questioning him would not yield any positive results at the moment. So I put that out of my mind and did what I had told Alan I would be doing. I relieved one of my men and started digging.

I checked Alma’s progress and it was not great. With a sigh, I surreptitiously started adding to her work, with the stone magic I had gotten from bonding with Alena. The old bond I had with Mary had been replaced with the new bond to Alena, changing my fire magic to stone magic. I reckoned that she would soon be out of mana, and then I would have to take over.

I was still debating whether I should try to hide my abilities, I had heard no comments about my use of fire or healing magic from Anders or anyone else. Except for my own troopers, but I reckoned they were pretty loyal at the moment. I had healed most of them after all.

Dawn came all too soon, in the distance we could still see the cavalry galloping about, fighting elves. However, with dawn came the fact that the elves discovered us. It was not immediately, but before sunrise an hour later, there was a large force gathering and turning their attention our way. The cavalry was mostly out of sight by this time.

Between Alma and I, we had managed to put up a few dozen metres of covered trenches. Enough to give some of my platoons cover. Most importantly, Seventh and Fifth, musket and crossbows respectively. Around sunrise, the two high commanders went around collecting all the stone mages, and they started working on the road. They would be sitting up tall thin slabs of stone that could be used for cover.

It was all bullshit. It was just another way to use us all as bait. I fucking hated it, and while I would have dearly loved to skedaddle during the night, I chose to remain. I had my Hold to think about. If I went AWOL, it would most likely come back to bite me in the ass. I had made a deal with Ballard too.

Not that I was above breaking it, but even if we used my escape route, I would need to get back into the castle again if we wanted to get back with the portal. Otherwise, it would be a long journey back. It would take at least five months, and that was peaceful travel. We would be behind enemy lines, we would be fighting the entire way back.

No, using the escape route would only give us an option to go out and raid, gather supplies so we could survive the next three months or so before we could get back home.

I was roused from my musing when the front most troopers started firing their muskets. The sound carrying. They were almost two hundred metres further ahead of us.

“Look lively lads,” I said to the troopers around me in the trench. Catching sight of some of the females I added, “And ladies.”

They did not respond, but all of them checked their muskets. I unslung the long rifle and pulled out my spyglass. Looking around for targets, I saw that harpies were closing in on the foremost squadrons. I spotted a flash of red wings. For a moment I hoped it was that guy that had escaped, but it was a woman. Nevertheless, I created the links.

“We’re going to be targeting the harpies. Hopefully, the powers that be will recall us before the infantry gets too close,” I informed the soldiers and put the spyglass away.

It was time to test the new rifle. I grabbed one of the paper cartridges. I bit the ball end off, poured a bit of powder into the pan, closed the frizzen, poured the rest into the bore, spat the ball down the barrel and stuffed the paper wad down. After ramming it in place, my selected target was throwing fireballs at the guys in the front.

She swooped in for her attack runs before pulling back. She stopped, hovering in place, seemingly to take stock of the situation and probably pick a new target, which was when I fired. The noise the rifle made was louder than the normal muskets, but the ball was also a larger calibre. The accuracy of the rifle was pretty amazing, I barely felt a pull on my mana as the link corrected the trajectory of the ball.

One mage down. The only one I had spotted amongst the harpies. The troopers around me had started firing as well. I reloaded and chose a new target, them being so close that I did not really need the spyglass to get an approximate link. Over the next few minutes, I fired several times, most of my targets fell to the ground, though a few managed to fly away after being wounded. Because of the length of the rifle, it took longer to reload, however, the prepackaged cartridges saved a lot of time too, so my shooting speed was only slightly slower.

The harpies fell back, and the arrow rain started. Less than a minute after that started, the bugle that signalled our retreat sounded. The foremost squadrons started running for their lives, trying to get out of the arrow rain. As they passed by those behind them, those squadrons fell in, and soon the first squadrons were moving past us.

I really wanted to tell my men to join, but I saw Ballard standing at the foot of the road, keeping an eye on things. The arrow rain followed the retreating troopers, and soon it started falling on our position. Only a few other squadrons had picked up shields.

The plinks as the arrows fell on the stone roof reminded me of the patter of raindrops on a window. Oddly soothing. What was not soothing was the thunks as the arrows hit the shields of my people, nor were the screams of pain when an arrow got lucky. After the first volley, it did not seem like any of my troopers was hit, the same could not be said for those around us.

Soon I noticed that Anders’ men were moving out of their fortification, so I called out to Hrothgar, “Prepare to retreat. Give the order as soon as Anders’s troopers are close.”

Less than a minute later, Hrothgar gave the order, and my men started an orderly retreat, trying to keep the shield wall intact. On the way out we collapsed the structure we had made. I did not have a shield, but my bodyguards kept me guarded. I concentrated on healing my wounded men on the move.

Despite my best efforts, a few of my men fell before we had gotten to the first slab that the stone mages had made. I was surprised to see Ballard and a handful of the mages there. He saw me looking, and said, “We’re going to weaken each one as we go. No reason to leave structures behind as we go.”

“This was a stupid idea,” I replied and flinched as another of my men fell with an arrow in the leg. I quickly moved over to where a couple of the others were dragging him along. Ballard moved with me, enjoying the cover provided by my bodyguards.

“Nothing we can do,” he said with a shrug. “We’re the bait.”

“And I just bet that it was a coincidence that my squadron is the last one out of there.”

He shook his head. “No, Farnsworth hates you. You managed to piss him off, which is why he’s not raising a larger stink about your High Lord screwing you over.”

“Me and my big mouth,” I mumbled.

He obviously heard me but did not comment on it. “We need to get moving before this gets any worse.”

“Like that?” Alan asked and pointed. I looked out, paled as I saw the trebuchets were firing. The first crashed into the side of the mountain above us, luckily to the side.

“Fuck those slabs. We need to move now,” I said.

Hrothgar was on the uptake, and he started sending platoons off at a run, one at a time, to spread us out. We would probably lose more to the arrows that way, but being quashed by those large stones seemed like a much worse fate.

It became the most intense run that I had ever experienced, several times we had to flatten ourselves against the side of the mountain, as rocks came crashing down the side of the mountain. The arrows were just a bit of extra excitement. Not to talk about the lightning mage that joined the fun. A quick shot that caught him in the arm convinced him that it would be unwise to participate after the first couple of lightning bolts.

How long it took to get back into the gate, I did not know. I felt like hours. Looking around I saw that I had again lost men. Including two bodyguards. Alan had broken his leg when he pushed me out of the way of a falling rock double the size of my head. I had to carry him the rest of the way back.

The mood in our quarters was at a low-point. We had lost a total of 34 troopers, including my two bodyguards. I was down to 104 Troopers, 6 senior squad leaders, 2 commanders, 2 bodyguards, and 7 cooks. I had of course not counted any of my mages. I kept those separate. I had luckily not lost any of them, but it would just be a matter of time. It was only a few more days before the new supplies came through, and if Wilbur were still playing games, I would use my way out.

I had retreated to my own chamber and the elves were keeping me company. I had questions for them. “Do any of you know the terrain around here? Or maybe just where there are towns and so on?”

They all looked ill at ease, it was Siphanien who voiced their concern, “Why do you ask, Milord?”

“Because if we stay here, Farnsworth and Wilbur will see me dead. Either on the wall or through starvation,” I said and then explained the information Ballard had provided me.

“But if we provide you with this information, it’ll lead to the death of innocents,” Ilmadia protested.

Yathanae nodded. “I like what you’ve done for me and Emma, I’ve even killed elves for you, but they were soldiers. I’ll not help you hurt farmers, merchants, and children.”

“I’d prefer not to do that,” I said in a reasonable tone. “Yes, I plan on liberating supplies from the farms around here. However, I don’t want to take everything or hurt anyone.”

Yathanae narrowed her eyes. “Why not? From what I know of you, you would have no moral qualms about that.”

“True,” I replied with a wry smile. She had me figured out pretty well. “It’s a matter of economics.”

“Economics?” they asked almost in unison.

“Yes, let me set up an example. Let us say we surround a large farm, it might have twenty adults and eight children. They grow enough food to feed twice that number if they were just eating the bare minimum, maybe five times that number,” I started my explanation.

“Those numbers are unrealistic unless there’s a herbomancer,” Siphanien objected.

I had to repress a sigh. “The realism of the number is not important. I’m trying to make an example and pulling the numbers out of my ass. Anyway, say we surround the farm. The farmers can fight us, they will certainly die. If they give up all the food, they’ll die from starvation or be driven from their home.”

“With both options, they’ll die or lose everything but their life,” Siphanien pointed out.

“Yes, horrible options, which is why we offer them a third one. They give up half their food, and we let them live,” I said looking at all of them. “Now what option would you take?”

“The third one of course,” Siphanien said.

Ilmadia nodded, but then asked, “Why would you let them live though? They’ll just tell the army where you are?”

“There are ways around that. Like tying them, take a hostage for a day before letting them go,” I answered. “Most importantly though. If we kill them, we’ll have to fight. We’ll lose men, and though it might be a few extra days, it’ll be clear that we’ve been there. And while we’ll definitely be hunted by the elven military, if we don’t burn down everything like a marauding band of orcs, they might not deem us a big problem.”

Yathanae nodded. “I can see that.”

“Also, if you heard rumours about how someone else got to live by not fighting, and not lose everything, you’re more likely to give up without a fight,” I explained. “There might be times when we need to make an example, I can’t promise you that it won’t. However, I’ll never condone killing a child, and I’ll do my utmost to limit casualties. I give you my word on that.”

They looked at each other for a while. Yathanae finally said, “We believe you.”

“I’m glad. Now, what can you tell me about what we’ll find at the top of the mountain?” I asked. It was Yathanae that took the lead and explained what she knew about the area, supplied with a few tidbits of information from Ilmadia. Siphanien said nothing. When I asked her why it turned out that she was not familiar with the area. She had lived to the southwest of the Thirteen Kingdoms.