Sand & Stone

Chapter 16: Bloody Battle

"Fighting the Empire is like impaling yourself on a pike. One simply shouldn't do it."

-Vice Principate Yan

The sound of pounding feet and angry shouts filled the air as a frenzied mob of villagers rushed towards the imposing stone walls of the castle. But standing in their way were a group of artifact plated guards, armed with swords and shields, their determined expressions unwavering as they braced themselves for the onslaught. Nearly three scores of them held that chokepoint interlinked. I witnessed the expression of the front of the mob grow from fury to panic to fear as they realized the guards were holding and that they could no longer retreat. I saw that fear turn into resigned dread as they were pushed upon the waiting blades in front of them. Then the expression faded into regret then finally nothing as their corpses fell and those behind them took their place. The cycle repeated.

With each clash of metal against metal and cry of pain, the guards fought on, not due to any sort of loyalty but from the primal urge to survive. If the mob got in they would be surrounded and die, there was no way out anymore, no one to surrender too. It was fight or die, so they fought. Their only hope was that the mob would falter and truth be told it was likely they would, to most, oppression was better than being dead.

However they had another threat from their back, Ironhold guards continued to release each other after the first few I had broken free. I had lowered the drawbridge for them myself, no doubt they'd have done it soon enough, but it had bought me some measure of respect and freeing them had bought me a little more. It was still pretty damn little, I had after all waltzed in here killed their boss and ordered them to fight a battle they didn't want too, I had to break a few arms at the start to stop them from betraying me right away but that was a distant wound, further than their families being used as hostages against them. Already I could see them whispering to each other, casting glances at Reji's guard holding the gate. The very guard who were looking over their shoulder shouting for the Ironhold folk to stay or be killed. Words that fell on deaf ears. Reji had made a mistake using their families against them.

I chuckled, twisting out the kinks in my neck, Reji had fell right into her trap just like she predicted. She was sharp. Three days of fighting had taken its toll on me, my last dose of brutes brew was a little over twenty hours ago and I had no more. I hadn't slept and Reji had thrown a fucking artifact crystal at me, my ears had rang for hours and my armor barely held. It had mostly been repaired but the shoulder underneath was still tender from Reji's blade.

Sitting was nice and it took most of my focus to not slip into unconsciousness, it would have been easy for me to kill those guards holding the gate. All grouped up like that I could just run into them and fall on them, let the mob run over me, but that rat Reji would run.

So I sat and waited, protecting the entrance into the hold ensuring no one escaped from that tunnel. Azeal wanted Reji dead and I did too. I stared up at him on the battlements and grinned at the frustration in his face. I heard a distant curse and saw him scramble down making no motion to come my way. Instead he made his way to his guard and began barking orders at them. Some of them peeled away turning grim eyes towards the Ironhold captives. He had told them to kill them no doubt.

Reji himself stayed in the gap, slicing a poor lad here and there shouting words like 'Treason' and 'Reward'. But he had made a mistake, only five of his guard had peeled away to dish out death and that would have been enough if they were all still tied up but they weren't any more, not all of them.

The Ironhold's didn't have weapons but they had a determination to protect their families, the bastards threw themselves at the guards without abandoning throwing fists and pulling them into choke holds even as they went down fast to the artifact weapons. It was a desperate struggle until a couple of the guards went down and their weapons were distributed. The other few died quickly after that.