Date: Fifteenth of March, year 810 Post Seminal War (810 PSW)

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Morlen Daxana eyed the new letter on his desk, the reply to his inquiries about the local guides. “Brenwhen, I’m going to need you to fetch Sergeant Oakheart for me.”

“Sir.” Brenwhen saluted and headed out the door.

Morlen put his face in his hands, pulled them down to his neck, and forcibly shoved the idea of a drink out of his mind. Enra Thalia, Princess Enra Thallia, was commanding the local guides. So she must have found something that had managed to kill her, and was going back with backup after one of her companions had managed to bring enough of her out to get Reincarnated. Bold, brash, fearless, and foolish to have gone in unprepared. Still, Morlen found that he couldn’t exactly blame Princess Enra. Thanks to Brenwhen and his access to the rumor mill of the merchants and middle class, and his own access to the Lord’s gossip-circles, Morlen knew that Princess Enra had taken an arduous thesis. Digging into the history of Altheim, the myths of its near-destruction during The Seminal War… that had to mean going into dangerous places on occasion. Perhaps she had delved just a bit to deeply and found something she hadn’t prepared for. Morlen thought about that for a moment, nodding slowly to himself. Princess Enra was no fool, but the unknown was dangerous by nature. You couldn’t know anything about it, which meant that you had to make some assumptions. Making the wrong ones was deadly dangerous.

“Brenwhen said you needed me Sir?”

“Sergeant Oakheart, come in and close the door, we have some intel to go over.”

The door swung shut with a firm click. “So what’s the news?”

“Princess Enra is one of our local guides.”

“Shit. Sir.”

“My sentiments exactly.”

“Any word on the terrain?”

“Didn’t get that far, so let’s go over it together. Let’s see here... Overland to Scratchtown will take about a day, perhaps two depending on how fast the others can move.”

“Guild scholars? Depends if they’re used to going out in the field or not. Even odds of that Sir, so plan on not to be safe.”

“Agreed, and It won’t get much better on them from there. Another half-day or so to a cave, then underground. From there to the actual objective is a bit of an unknown distance. Princes Enra estimates about a day, based on how long they took last time. We’ll gain some of that from having a known path and then lose it again with a larger party and the scholars.”

“Best plan would be to camp at the cave mouth and rest before going in then. Camping in a cave won’t be comfortable Sir. We’d be fine, probably, but the others…”

“Princess Enra and her team must have slept in the rough before on expeditions, it’s not like she’s taken along a huge entourage every time.”

“From what Brenwhen has found out Sir, this group of five is The Princess’ entire team. Herself plus the Index out of the Trebor Library, plus a recently graduated Sorcerer and a relatively clean street-rat for muscle. Rumor has it that the Street rat managed to clean herself up all the way and stay clean, even came to the royal wedding, so she should be trustworthy.”

“That would be lady Sly Malon. I only met her on that day, and my memories from then are whisky-sloshed, and therefore not the best. I do recall that she was well muscled for a human female. Probably unsure about her social standing and cues, but willing to follow Princess Enra’s lead and confident in her own abilities.”

“As you say Sir. They picked up one after they brought those Urd back from Varr Barak, a Cleric of Bahamut, and then came out here.”

“Where they found something that managed to take them down. It does speak well of this mr. Arseoth that he not only survived, but was clear headed enough to bring back the needed… parts… for Resurrection spells. And resourceful enough to fund the needed rituals, somehow.”

“Brenwhen did manage to scrape together a bit of information on that Sir. Job came back with some gold and a few gems from wherever Princess Enra’s expedition had been, probably everything valuable they found, and even then the Druids did the work at cost. Any word on what our actual objective is, or why the Crown requested the entire Royal Scout platoon instead of just an escort section?”

“Not much was said, but enough. Mapping an underground city; well-preserved but at least partially inhabited by the usual underground creatures. Princess Enra reported that her team took down a feral mimic and being harassed by kobolds on their way back to the surface.”

“So an urban or ruins environment, probably riddled with feral creatures and traps, under cave-dark conditions? After this expedition is over, I think I have a few new ideas for training operations Sir.”

“Sergeant Oakheart, you are an elf after my own heart. Much as I trust in the Brea and Alth Regiment’s martial splendor in the open field, these ruins would make for a good training ground for urban fighting. At least a section of uninhabited, self-contained city and adverse conditions by default?”

“Black Regiment would love it Sir, and our own Bera comrades in arms could use the challenge.”

“Be that as it may, our primary responsibility is the safety of those whom we are escorting. We have about five days of training time left; we’re most familiar with open terrain, and decently familiar with cramped quarters.”

“As best we can be Sir, given our training conditions.”

“Agreed. Urban fighting… not so much.”

“Best bet Sir? Borrow from Black Regiment doctrine. We have ten five-elf sections, counting command and officers, and we’ll need round-the-clock sentries at least once we encamp at the objective.”

“Hmm, I don’t like splitting down that small in unknown territory. Squads of ten, double sections, would give us five squads. One resting, one on camp guard, and one in reserve puts two out on patrol.”

“Match one of those patrols with Princess Enra if and when she leaves the camp, and put the camp where the Guild Scholars are working… That gives us a squad to spare for scouting Sir.”

“We’ll need to play it by ear once we get down there, but we should plan on keeping them close. Rotate the squads through being at base and stagger the patrols out in ‘day’ and ‘night’ shifts perhaps?”

“ ‘morning’ and ‘evening’ patrols would be best Sir, at least in terms of keeping the men rested and alert.”

“I can’t argue with your expertise on this issue Sergeant. We’ll mix in small-unit urban drill in the time we have available. You’re going to be effectively in command, as I’ll be trapped playing diplomat most likely. Grab your section and one other for the command squad, and pair off the other sections as best you see fit. Slip the command squad into the standard patrol rotation, but make sure that they get paired with Princess Enra whenever she heads off on her own.”

“We’ll try not to make it too obvious Sir.”

“She’ll probably spot it anyway, but let’s at least give The Princess the illusion of not having any child-sitters. She’ll be less likely to try and duck them that way. I know that worked on me.”

“How much in the way of food should we carry Sir? How long is this deployment supposed to last?”

“The orders mentioned two weeks at most, but see if we can’t pack a little extra just to be sure. I’d rather have it and bitch about carrying it then not and go hungry or unarmed. I’ll burn some of our discretionary requisition funding if we need to… But I’m also not going to question anything that ‘turns up’ too closely.”

“We’ll keep the scrounging to survivable levels Sir. The men are going to want to know about looting too.”

“Umph. This is an escort mission, not an invasion or raid, but it is unto unknown territory… I think I can justify Adventurer’s Cut on anything that the Guild or Crown doesn’t claim. Don’t tell the men that up front though, let’s keep their minds on the mission instead of treasure hunting while out on patrol.”

“Head money for ears then?”

“Or equivalent unique parts. I know they’ll be keeping the loose coinage anyway, but we’ll try to keep pilferage to a minimum.”

“Seems a reasonable balance Sir.”