[IC] Shields of the Empire

[Penny]

A hot wind blew down from the distant ridge bringing with it the smell of warm sand and desert flowers. The night was clear and as chill as the next day would be hot. The cavalry were encamped on one of the small rocky rises which rose from the floor of the desert at intervals, ancient mountains which had been ground down by millennia of grit blowing in off the Atvari plateau. Several hundred tents were pitched in rows as net as the terrain permitted. Horses were picketed in neat rows beside small fires, kindled on the scant fuel the cavalry could scavenge in such inhospitable country.

Phaedra Comnemnos sat on a boulder staring out into the night. A small dagger in her hand whittled slivers of iron hard trail jerky which she popped into her mouth and chewed with soldierly determination. Like most of the natives of Miravet, a distant province on the other side of the Empire, Phaedra was a trim woman with wiry muscles, olive skin and dark, slightly almond shaped, eyes. Miravet was a barbaric place on the borderland of great Kajari steppe and it bred cavalry soldiers that were prized by the Empire. The Miravet wore heavy coats of scale mail and were equally adept with long swords, lances and powerful compound bows which they fired accurately from horseback. Peculiarly all Miravet cavalry were female, the lighter weight allowing them to carry more armor and equipment than their male equivalents. This oddity of Miravet culture as well as the excellent quality of the riders made them a popular choice by Emperors and Empresses who would worried perpetually about generals making a claim with their swords. Women, it was thought, did not have the same kind of dynastic ambitions as men and the Miravet, like other semi-barbarians tended to view their oaths somewhat more seriously than the cosmopolitan Imperial heartlanders did. The current Emperor had a Miravet wife in point of fact, though she had only produced a daughter and it seemed unlikely that the Empress would present him with a son.

Like most Imperial officers, Phaedra had been inducted into the lowest rank of nobility, though she lacked land or income beyond her army pay and booty. Neither she nor her two thousand lances had seen much of either. The Atavari were an ancient enemy of the Empire and they were tough and canny foes. The latest war was a challenge to an aging and rather feckless Emperor, started on some pretext. As was their custom, the Atvari had come over the desert to pillage and raid the costal province of Keylara, falling back when Imperial forces had struck back from the their forts around the great cities of of Kestos and Pravis, driving the proud Atvari back into the perrenially contested borderlands and then into the desert. Phaedra, who had campagined in this part of the world before, was surprised at how quickly the enemy had been beaten back, even as the Imperials sacked several of the smaller towns the followed the river Kitri through the desert. There was even talk that they might capture Sidris, the capital of the western most Satrapy, though it was still more than three weeks march from the most advanced elements of the Imperial force.

"Phaedra," a voice called and she turned to see Eudoxia, one of her officers, crossing quickly towards her. Recognizing the posture Phaedra came to her feet, her hand straying to her spatha.

"What is it Doxy?" she asked, using the diminutive of her old friends name.

"Something is moving out their captain," Eudoxia said urgently. The cavalry commander turned her eyes to the darkness, she was about to to dismiss Eudoxia concern when she caught sight of something in the moonlight. Focusing her attention she thought she picked up a glint of moonlight on metal. She stiffened at once.

“How is that possible, Georgius and his men are out scouting?” Phaedra began but she shook her head before Eudoxia could respond. It didn’t matter how it had happened, she had no doubt the enemy was sneaking through the dark towards them, there were enough dry creekbeds in this cracked desert landscape to conceal several thousand men if they were cunningly used, and while the ruling caste of the Atavri were a haughty lot, they didn’t lack for desert auxiliaries.

“Pass the word, quickly and quietly as you can, when the horn blows, out fires and stand to,” she told Eudoxia quietly, slipping the jerked meat into a pouch and standing up as casually as she could.

“This might get interesting.”

When the horn blared, Miraveti reacted instantly. Blankets were tossed over fires and burning timbers, grasped from the fires with hands wrapped in damp cloth were hurled outwards in all directions. The result was that the center of the camp, went dark and a ring of illumination sprang up around it. Women grabbed weapons and shields and faced outwards in a loose circle. There was a sudden cry from one of the nearby creek beds and a flight of arrows fell from the darkness. Women screamed as the light Atvari arrows fell among them, but far more of the missiles thunked into their metal bound shields than pierced flesh. Warcries ripped the nights as a mass of Atvari infantry broked from the shelter of the creekbed. There were fierce looking men, bearded and wearing clothing of knotted linen. They carried light wicker shields and curved scimitars and triangular axes which had been blacked with charcoal to aid in their stealthy approach.

“Shields!” Phaedra shouted, shoving her troops into position to meet the oncoming rush. The burning brands were stuttering out now and the smothered fires were gone, leaving only the half illumination of desert moonlight. It was still better than having her cohort backlit by their own campfires and the moment of perilous night blindness was quickly passing.

“Zoe!” Phadrea shouted over the din of shouting troops and clattering equipment.

“Get your Tet mounted! Forget the armor,” she roared, ducking as an arrow shattered against her shield. Zoe, an abnormally short Miravet who served as one of the Tetrarchs, the four principle subcommanders of her legion, shouted something that was lost in the din, but held up her fist in an affirmative sign. There was no time for further orders as the charging Atvari were almost on the ragged line of dismounted cavalry women. A ragged volley of arrows ripped into the onrushing enemy, the heavy compound bows punching through light shields and men alike, hewing down a score of them in an instant. Phaedra would much rather her troops had focused on getting their shields locked, but no was no time for micro management. The Atvari hit the shields like a tide, axes and swords chopping down. The Miraveti formation bowed dangerously under the impact. Their smaller frames were an advantage in the saddle, but on foot and without their armor, they were dangerously out massed by the enemy. Men and women screamed as the they clashed. Long spathas stabbed from behind cavalry shields and scimitars arched down with brutal hacking cuts. Phaedra caught an axe on her battered oak shield and thrust up into her opponents belly from beneath the rim. The tribesman squealed and staggered back, intestines and blood pouring from his chest. She turned in time to see the woman next to her take a spear to the throat, dropping her in a spray of arterial blood, her hands still clawing at the terrible wound.

“Hold!” she roared over the din of battle and her troops closed up stabbing and striking as they struggled to maintain their formation. If they hadn’t been on the upslope of the hill, the weight of the enemy would have driven them under in a few moments. Phaedra pushed forward slightly, spatha cutting down another opponent as he reeled from a shield smash, a blow to her own shield numbed her arm and a scimitar point cut a long gash across her cheek. She felled the swordsman with an inelegant backhand blow that almost decapitated him. The press of shields and blades was intense, almost crushing, but they held, by The Huntress they held. With a shocking suddenness that made the Miraveti stagger, the pressure slackened. A volley of arrows, fired high over the front ranks from the increasingly organized Miravet riders, fell among the enemies rear ranks. The indirect fire robbed the arrows of most of their force, but it was still enough to kill or disable an unarmored man. Moments later the thunder of hooves announced that Zoe had managed to get at least some of her Tet mounted and the fine horses galloped into the night peeling out around the flank of the would be ambushers. The screams grew in intensity as Zoe’s contingent began to rake the Atvari from the flanks. No force of light infantry could stand against that murderous fusilade for long. Under normal circumstances the Atvari would have used their own horse archers or light cavalry to nullify their opponents, but their horses had been left behind in order to aid in their stealthy approach. They held for perhaps another thirty seconds before the panic that the scything arrows induced on the flank spread. The enemy broke and fled for the shelter of the creekbed.

“Pursue?” Zoe yelled as she reigned her horse in twenty yards from Phaedra, not pausing from the mechanical act of drawing and firing her bow at the retreating backs of the Atvari.

“Drive ‘em! But ware in case they have another ambush in the rocks,” Phaedra called, pausing to drive her weapon down into one of the badly wounded tribesmen. Zoe shouted a Miraveti hunting call and her troops wheeled and tore off after the retreating enemy, leaving Phaedra dismounted among the dead and dying.

There was no further ambush. Zoe’s troops ran the survivors for most of a mile, before they spotted the dust of onrushing enemy cavalry on the horizon. By that point there were perhaps two hundred of the thousand or so infantry left, a trail of arrow and sword pierced bodies leading back to the knoll.

“No chance it was Gerogicus?” Phaedra asked as the exultant Zoe dismounted, her horse lathered in sweat from the pursuit.

“None, we could see the moonlight winking off those damned pointed helmets of there,” Zoe said.

“Probably only six hundred of them or so, but more than I wanted to mix with with only half my Tet, and all of us naked,” Zoe explained. The riders had not been literally naked of course, but they tended to refer to themselves that way when they were not wearing their scale mail. The pointed helmets were a unique piece of equipment worn by Atvari heavy cavalry or Kahreeds. The peasantry might be wiley desert foxes but the nobility fought on horseback and in full armor, each noble with his own body guard of retainers. They were among the best heavy cavalry in the world and even the Miraveti respected them. A force of six hundred Kharreeds would have made short work of a hundred unarmored Miraveti.

“Are they closing?” Phaedra asked, fiddling with her scalemale to settle it properly. Zoe shook her head.

“Looks like they are turning of northwards, towards Zaldai, but I left a picket of scouts to watch them.”

“Speaking of scouts,” Eudoxia interjected as she walked over to them, the reigns of her horse in her hands and her full battle gear strapped on.

“The tents of Georgicus and his men were empty, took everything they owned with them,” she sneered.

“They deserted?” Zoe asked incredulously. Phaedra shared her puzzlement. Georgicus was an ass, and a top lofty noble to boot, but to desert? No that didn’t make sense.

“No they left us here, left us here where the Atvari could attack us,” Phaedra said, her mind working through the information in her mind, trying to make some sense of it. They had been sent out a week ago to reinforce Brasidas and his forces, Georgicus had been in overall command even though his own troops were only a quarter the size of hers. She thought back to her interactions with the man. He had been sneeringly superior, but she had taken that for his normal state. Could he have really sent her troops out here to die? Conspired with the Atvari? Why would he do that.

“How many did we lose,” Phaedra asked in a cold voice. Eudoxia, who doubtlessly had been coming to give her the butchers bill looked grim.

“Sixty seven dead, about as many wounded but able to ride,” she returned, her normally pretty features drawn back to make her face look like a skull. It could have been much worse, Phadera’s eyes tracked to the circling buzzards already descending to feed upon the Atvari. One way or another she would see that Georgicus paid for every one of those sixty seven dead.

“Do we have horses to carry the bodies?” Phaedra asked quietly. Miraveti funeral customs called for cremation. In theory it was supposed to be done with wood from the sacred yew trees of their homeland. Military expediency made this impossible, so as a compromise each soldier carried a twig of yew on a cord around their neck, to be used as kindling for their funeral pyre.

“Barely,” Phaedra responded, “alot of arrows fell among the horses.”

“Put the wounded in the supply wagons then, have the dead strapped to their horses,” she decided.

“Serve a cold breakfast then get the girls mounted up, we will strike east and join up with Brasidus, maybe he knows what in the name of the Huntress is going on…”

@POOHEAD189

[POOHEAD189]

"Straton, report."

The room, alight by torches and still warm from the fire, was suddenly brightened by the opened door. Somehow through the cool night, the sandstone of the walls kept the heat locked within through a strange structural design the locals had erected. Three men turned toward the door from their hushed discussion, the map upon the table they leaned over depicting the breadth of the Empire and the lands that bordered it, including the western half of the Ashvari Empire in great detail. Small figures whittled from the wood of fig trees were arrayed along the map to indicate the movement of their regiments, courtesy of Archanon. The men within the room were commanders all, two Protos Lochias of the infantry, a foreigner, and the Protos Kapetanos himself.

Straton breathed heavily, the Protos Lochias evidently hurried to tell his superior without sparing any of his men, leaving the lesser Lochias to keep discipline and cohesion. It was commendable, being personally left in charge of the scouts to keep their eyes open throughout the night. "They'll be here in a matter of minutes, Archontas." Straton related, and when he was given leave by a wave of his superior's hand, he pushed off the door frame and ran back out to rejoin his company.

"I will get my men ready," Sayf said, his voice thick with his native Khaslahar accent. The nomad was stopped in his tracks.

"No. We can't abandon the high ground. Go prepare your men, but not on their horses. You will take to the rooftops and windows until I make my move. You will know it when you see then." The Protos Kapetanos said, towering over the lean, short nomad. Sayf shrugged with his usual devil-may-care attitude, replying. "You are the boss. But if I see the heavens, you will owe me a drink when I see you there."

"And no doubt you'll drink me under the table." Brasidas Khalkós said as he walked out into the daylight, the rising sun touching his face and illuminating the town of Arbela and the men charging across its streets to better prepare. Once this city had been walled, but Brasidas himself had seen to it that was no more. Buildings made of stone, clay, and what timber there was were sturdy enough however, and they were situated on a great mound a dozen feet above the surrounding landscape. Shrublands and farmhouses covered the swathe of land surrounding the town, now all deserted to escape the Imperial army, who ironically were now the ones defending the frightened populace once more. Brasidas had given leave to send the villagers into the Citadel of Erbil for protection as the men fought upon the streets of the settlement. The Citadel could hardly live up to the name, utterly dwarfed by even a wing of the Imperial Palace in Basilos, but for the Ashvari villagers it was an impenetrable bastion.

"Loxos, Argyros, line your men up along the main road and set sentries at every causeway and street corner you can find. Keep clear of the citadel, and be ready to move at my orders, understand?"

"Yes, Archontas!" They said in unison, both turning to run in opposite directions to the east and west wings of Arbela. All the men including Brasidas had little sleep the last night, but in his experience it gave them the edge. They were tired, but crisp. Unused to the comfort of a bed, and now the steel of a sword wasn't so terrible as to shake them. They would do their duties and earn their rest after the fight. On the horizon, Brasidas noticed the rising of dust to the northeast, and he shook his head, breathing through his sculpted nose. "When is Tychos supposed to be here again?"

"Two days," Sayf said with a grin that showed his teeth. "Well, one day with this sunrise. Maybe the Panther woman will beat him here, yes?"

Brasidas snorted, knowing he referred to the Miravet woman, Phaedra. The Boreas man had at most spoken to her a handful of times in a professional capacity, and Sayf even less. She had an impressive military record, but it was difficult to say if she could pull off her great advance at the pace any of them had hoped. He supposed it was up to the Gods. "Do us a favor, if we live and you see her, remember rank." Brasidas said, then motioned for him to go to his men. Sayf did so at once, the nomad moving surprisingly quick on his feet for someone born on the back of a horse. Taking only one more moment to appreciate the warmth of the sun, he marched off to his company, donning his plumed helm, denoting his status as leader.

Brasidas was known as Khalkós amongst his regiment, meaning bronze skin. Both for the color, and his reputed invincibility in battle, some whispering as if his skin were actually wrought of bronze. He knew all too well that was false. The man boasted a build one might call 'heroic,' with a trim midsection of hard muscle and strong limbs, but he ached all the same, and the lines on his face showed the weariness of constant combat and campaigning since he was a boy. He wondered if his father was still looking down on him, and if he would ever live up to the man who died on that day at Mount Alkynos.

He mounted his warhorse Menelaus, the beast braying proudly at its master's familiar weight. Cataphract horses were another breed, built for strength and tenacity; able to hold up both rider, armor, as well as the horse's own armor, and still move with a thundering speed. As he readied his shield and matzoukion mace, the sun above pierced the town's minaret like a signal, and he heard a cry followed by the twang of recurve bows shot by the Protostate. Soon men and horses began to scream as arrows were traded midair, and from Menelaus he saw the first Kahreeds make it up the incline before they were skewered by the infantry formation; ten foot spears of ash and iron piercing into men and keeping horses at bay. Loxos pulled a man off his horse and plunged his spatha into his neck, the Kahreed having lost his helmet in the struggle. Another arrow hit the ground not twelve paces from Brasidas, bouncing harmlessly away. The man wished he could join the Protostates, but he had a duty with his Cataphracts. It was only when the sun passed the minaret did he roar out: "Lances!"

His wings readied their polearms, and those closest to him hefted their maces and broad bladed paramerion swords. Horses whinnied and the wind began to kick up, bringing the scent of blood in its wake. It drove the horses to new energy, and he realized the Gods were smiling upon them. Brasidas raised his mace, and behind him a horn blew, slow and loud across the emptied buildings. He kicked Menelaus forward, the horse cantering for a few paces before it began to run at a gallop. Two thousand pounds of metal and muscle rolled forward, with another three hundred cataphracts at his back. The horn had sent his men up front into the alleys and buildings, leaving the invaders at the bottleneck of Arbela's main street. Bewildered, they weren't prepared for the Imperial Cavalry as Brasidas bore down on them. Even with the cries and the arrows, he felt all was silent in the world until he struck.

His mace cracked the helm of a Kahreed Mamluk, and though he didn't see the damage, the man fell wordlessly from his horse. A saber passed across his cuirass of scalemail harmlessly, the Cataphract not pausing in his advance. He swung again, breaking the shoulder of a lost foreign infantryman, the horses behind him ending his cries of pain with their trampling. Like an avalanche they reached the mouth of Arbela, pouring down the slope and entering a fierce melee. Brasidas saw a cataphract fall off his horse with a sword in his neck as another felled a kahreed horse with his lance. With no more momentum, he dueled a scimitar wielding rider gracelessly, taking a small cut to swing his mace into the man's arm, shattering it. His next blow hit him in the cheek, blood and teeth spraying out. He then saw another duel between two cavalrymen, and he used his mace the only other way he knew how. He threw it, the metal head spinning until it gave a glancing blow to the Kahreed. He didn't see if it made the difference, as he felt himself getting grabbed, Menelaus rearing up in anger as its master was pulled out of his saddle by unknown hands.

"Die, craven!" An attacker shouted. He wrestled them even as he went down, taking out his knife and cutting into another man he bumped against. Blood and sand mingled with sweat and piss, and when he arose, three kahreed bodies were on the ground at his feet. All around him the battle was turning to their favor, but he knew it wouldn't be enough. He cut the flanks of an enemy horse, sending it screaming and galloping off until he caught sight of his steed again. "Menelaus!" He cried, running through the maelstrom to remount of horse, and finally he unsheathed his paramerion, sounding the retreat. His words were followed by the horn, and soon both sides struggled and tore apart, leaving the hillock of arbela to lick their wounds and assess the damage.

Brasidas and Menelaus were two of the last to make it to the top of the slope, and he turned to see the enemy army. He growled a curse, realizing they had fought perhaps a quarter of the enemy force. It had been a blow yes. But now it was going to be a seige. One that could last days, it seemed. Even as he lamented, Sayf and his men suddenly appeared like spirits of the sand, rounding the corner of the slope and firing off arrow after arrow at the retreating force, dancing around any pursuers that tried to about face before the main force could join them.

Brasidas shook his head. "Cheeky bastard."

[Penny]

Phaedra encouraged her horse forward with cries and a soft shaking of the reigns. It was not the Miravet way to spur horses except in the gravest of necessity, and they trained their mounts from birth to respond to a riders touch. They had raced through the night as fast as could be managed. The force of Khareeds behind them might be following but Phaedra rather doubted it. It wasn't the way of an Atvari nobleman to press home an attack. In their minds a battle was decided and the desert would finish off the loser. It was also possible that the ragged survivors of their abortive ambush, many bearing wounds from spatha strokes or pierced with heavy cataphract arrows, had convinced them that following a superior force was folly. Twice during the night Phaedra had detached her rearward Tets to take positions on the periodic rises along the river banks, giving the enemy a chance to overhaul them while the main body of her force slowed to a gentle canter, resting the horses. On both occasions the Tets had come galloping up an hour later with no sign of puruit. Had the Khareeds followed, she would have wheeled around and driven them up against her rearguards. It would have been over quickly unless they had significantly more men than her scouts had reported to her.

It worried her somewhat that the enemy didn't appear to be in strength. The further east into the Atvari heartlands they pressed, the stiffer resistance should have been. After all the Atvari had started this conflict by raiding Keylara in the spring. Both sides had paused over the hot summer before the campaigning season began again in the autumn. There should have been whole armies coming west from the central plateau that formed the heartland of Atvari. Phaedra scratched at her neck, the fine mix of sand a grit irritating where her armor rubbed against her collar. Somehow she felt that Gregorius's desertion was linked with the unusual behavior of the Atvari, but she couldn't figure out how. Not yet anyway.

"Protos!" Zoe called, her own horse galloping down the column. Like Phaedra she was dressed in full armor despite the fact that her Tet were serving as the scouts and flankers today. Zoe was unusually fair for a Miraveti, probably as a result of a foreign marriage but unlike many other peoples in the Empire, such details of birth were irrelevant among the horsewomen of that distant kingdom. A woman derived her status from her mother, fathers were incidental, though they may be important parts of the family unit, it was decent from the maternal line which determined a place in the Saleri, or hereditary regiments, which made up the forces Miravet tithed to the Emperor. Not that one had to be born into to belong. Long experience of campaigning across the length and breath of the Empire meant that a Saleri had to recruit as it went to maintain its numbers. Recruits from more patriachal socites were few, but there were always a few women who were willing to submit themselves to the often brutal training regimes. Once accepted a woman was considered as much a Miravet as if she had been born to it, and would be welcomed if she lived to take her pension and decided to return their. While the bulk of her Saleri were Miravet natives, she had under her command women from Chalcedon, Kumar, Trebzana, Tylis and other provinces of the Empire and beyond. THeir daughters would be Saleri and Miraveti also, if they lived long enough to have them.

"The outriders have reached the hills outside Arbela," Zoe said, wheeling her horse around in a spray of grit to ride alongside her commander. Her smile would have done very well for a wolf that had just discovered a flock of unprotected sheep.

"Several thousand Khareem are attacking the place, maybe six thousand with as many infantry in support. Armored ones, maybe from the Satraps army," Zoe reported wiping muddy sweat from her brow. Wearing armor in this heat was a bit like standing too close to a blacksmiths furnace, an experience made more miserable by the constant dust that was blowing up from the west.

"Brasidas and his men are still holding the place then?" she asked quickly, discomfort and heat forgotten by the prospect of action. Zoe nodded vigorously. Like most of the riders her long hair was braided tightly then coiled an pinned so it stayed under her helmet. She wasn't wearing the helmet yet, none of them would done it until they were ready to join the battle, so the braids bobbed as though agreeing with her assessment.

"Looks like they just repulsed an attack," the enemy is falling back and looks to be settling in for a siege," Zoe reported. Phaedra scowled, like most cavalry she disliked siege warfare, preferring the cut and thrust of battle where she could maneuver.

"Pass the word for Eudoxia and Iona," she called to a nearby trooper. There was no need, both women along with their subordinate tribunes were making their way towards her having seen Zoe make her report.

"Should we halt," Zoe asked, but Phaedra was nodding her head before she finished speaking. Brasidas was holding for now, and the enemy wasn't yet engaged. It was a shame they hadn't arrived a half hour sooner to take the engaged Atvari in the rear.

"Do they have scouts out?" she asked quickly. Zoe shook her head.

"Sorry bastards don't even have pickets," she said with a tone that combined delight and disgust. The column slowed to a canter and then halted. Cataphracts slid from their saddles and pulled open feed bags for their mounts, others began to lead their horses to the water, slaking their thirst alongside their mounts.

"Water the horses quick as you can, an hours rest," she declared, taking her water skin and pouring some of the precious contents over her face before tossing the skin to another trooper to refill.

"Zoe," she said to the scout commander, who knew from long exposure what her Protos Kapetanos wanted. Quickly and succinctly she laid out the terrain ahead for the command group. When she was done Phaedra nodded.

"If they don't send out scouts before then we are going to wait till either night falls or they try another frontal attack. The any fortifications they build will be facing the village so it shouldn't be a problem." As a group they all looked at the sky, gauging sunset to be perhaps an hour and a half away.

"Doxy, I want you to send have your Tet back to that ford we passed a mile or so back, have them cross and come up on the south bank. There is a ford at Arbela and I don't want the Atvari to be able to cross and use it as a strong point.

"Iona and I will take our tets up the center, Zoe, take your scouts, we haven't got time to put them in armor and seize the high ground north of the city. Drive in once we have them stired up, but don't press, I want them to be able to slip out to the north east, force them away from the river.

"We are going to ride through their camp and if any woman stops to loot I'll have them whipped," Phaedra went on sternly. That was the real risk, that her troops would get caught up in pillage rather than pressing home the attack.

"Plenty of time to pick the bastards clean once they are supping with Old Lady Winter," she cautioned, getting nods from her commanders also. Speed and shock were essential here and these were veterans, they knew the danger as well as she did.

"Questions?" she demanded.

"Are we going to warn Brasidas that we are here?" Eudoxia asked, clearly feeling that a coordinated attack had a better chance of success.

"How are we going to get word to him? He is under siege for the sake of the Huntress?" Iona demanded, she was the only one of the senior commanders not from Miravet but rather from the island of Patryia, her hair was red and her skin had once been pale before the sun had baked it a light tan. Dark freckles could still be seen across her nose. Phaedra's answering grin would have done for a wolf. Done very well indeed.

__________

The Atvari sentries noticed the body as it floated passed their siege line. It hadn't yet begun to bloat, but even in the moonlight they could tell the black skin of a several days dead corpse. It was dressed in what might have been Atvari desert clothing, another corpse floating down from the fighting further up river. Both of the sentries made quick prayers to Gathal'anan, the Great God, wishing the soul well in its journey to the Lavender Kingdom. It was a shame that the body was too far from the shore to be retrived, but eventually some fisherman would find it and see to the rites.

The Imperial sentries noticed the body too. They could hardly miss it infact as they were witness to a bonafide miracle. The bloateded black corpse, still with death, suddenly seemed to sit up, even more astonishingly it seemed to break into two pieces, one of which began to swim towards the bank of the river. To their utter astonishment, a woman, dressed in soaking black clothes and with skin which appeared to have been blacked with boot polish splashed ashore holding her hands up to show she meant them no harm.

"I have a message for General Brasidas," she said in accented Imperial, wiping uselessly at the boot blacking on her face.

[POOHEAD189]

It had been an eventful day.

The Kahreeds had made it up the slop thrice since they were first repelled, attacking in even greater force, though they sent increasing numbers of infantry. The terrain did not support their mamluk's tactics, and Heronticles the One Eye had seen their cavalry forces dismounted and camping, enjoying what food or drink they had. Some of them anyway. The others had joined their lesser infantry on foot; men with wicker shields and boiled leather and mail now marching with their more heavily armored brethren in wielding shorter, more devastating armaments. It was Brasidas's firm opinion that while the light kahreed infantry might be a match for militia, a Protostates will win one on one four out of five bouts. But with dismounted mamluks beside them, along with their strength in numbers, they could buckle at any time.

Brasidas had ordered his cataphracts to dismount, ushering their horses into the citadel to be under the care of the locals. The Imperial troops would protect their homes and keep them safe whilst they cared for the horses, with only a skeleton crew of sentries posted within the small fortress to keep an eye on things. The townsfolk might be Ashvari themselves, but they knew how the kahreed operated. There was a very real chance if they reconquered Arbela, they would rape and loot and claim it was the Imperials, and the kahreed garrison Brasidas had butchered had not been the best men to rely upon. And so Brasidas had forged an agreement with the elder, and now they were a single unit in the face of their besiegers.

Loxos had lost a finger in the last engagement, and Argyros had been awake for three days. If he continued his body would break, Brasidas knew, and so he took the post of his Protos Lochias and ordered Argyros sleep. He wished he could say it was out of charity, but he would be damned if he wasn't at the fore, and the only way his men would live to see the next dawn was if he stood among them. Taking a spear and reclaiming his lost mace, he stepped in front of his men and ordered their volleys, arrows scything past him into the enemy ranks as they tried to crest the hill, and he stepped back into his protostate formation and held the line. He thrust with his men, pushed back the enemy with his shield, and when they could no longer bear the weight, he told them to retreat as he called forth "Cataphracts!" Seven hundred men of hard muscle and heavy armor would advance to their leader, mace and sword and broad bladed axe cutting a swathe through the enemy whilst the crows watched above, blood spraying on the shrubs and sand before they would fall back, making sure never to reach level ground with their foe.

Loxos and Theron, a Lochias of the lower ranks, held the north and south of the town as Brasidas held the east, using the smallest but most elite troops to spare the rest from the brunt of the fighting. Even Sayf and his light nomads could do little, the enemy employing their own steppe archers; a rival clan Sayf explained. Such were the chances of a culture employed as mercenaries. It was unfortunate, however. He did not know what held his old friend, Tychos, or where Georgicus was. Before they had taken Arbela, he had received strange news of desertions and odd enemy movements. Brasidas had never been a pessimest, but he had a feeling he couldn't figure. It had been reinforced by a poor sight he had seen the other day, of a snake clutched in the talons of a hawk; an uncomfortable omen. In boreas, the elders taught such a sight meant great changes were coming.

It took a day for Brasidas to see any glimmer of hope beyond the fighting and blood, and it wasn't in the form he thought it would be.
-

"Archontas, this is the scout." Herokas said, the Protostate giving a salute as Brasidas permitted him to resume his patrol. The shielded spearman hustled away to the south, leaving the Protos Kapetanos, a Lochias, and two of his cataphracts alone in a townhouse with this strange woman who wiped blackened oil off her face, revealing amber eyes and tanned skin. So it was true, she was Miravet. He bid she rise, and so the woman did. She saluted him in the Imperial fashion, but made a vague sign with her hand. Miravet women were strange, but they had his respect from all he had seen and heard.

"Are you Brasidas Khalkós?" She asked, holding his gaze like a cobra. He nodded curtly, giving the greeting of Boreas, punching his fists together audibly. "I serve Protos Kapetanos Phaedra. She waits for the enemy's next attack before she strikes. Our forces are east, in the dried creeks of the lowlands. Prepare your men, Archontas Khalkós." The Miravet's first language was clearly not imperial, but she was also very obviously well versed in it.

"She has my thanks, as do you. It looks like we're going to have one wild night." He said, thinking Phaedra must be close indeed for so much of the boot polish to remain on this woman during her sojourn into the river. That, and thinking she could attack whenever the enemy saw fit to advance. "You may rest yourself, soldier, if it is what you wish. The wounded and tired are in the citadel. You have my aegis if you are weary from your service."

"Archontas," she said, stepping forward, squaring her shoulders. "I wish to fight and rejoin my sisters. Nothing more." The two cataphracts looked to one another, and the Lachios nodded in approval. Brasidas grinned.

"Then fight you shall, warrior. Kantos! Go get this soldier some food, water, and our finest spear. Before sunset they will attack again." He told them, and waved his men off to their duties, leaving him and the woman in the room alone. He spoke as the silence fell, though whether to himself or to her, it was difficult to say.

"There will be plenty of blood for everyone."

[Penny]

"There sure are alot of them," Zoe observed somberly. Phaedra and her chief scout were laying on their bellies on the top of a shallow hill peering out across the battlefield, both women had shed their armor for the task but it was still hot enough to raise a sweat. Below them they could see the border town. It was a simple place of mud brick, which was a good thing as the only smoke Phaedra could see was rising from cook fires. Arbella was situated at the last reliable ford in the Kitri before the streams draining from the higher ground to the north combined to broaden and deepen it to the point that boats were needed to make the crossing. There was great bridge that spanned it a hundred miles down river at the provincial capital of Sidris but Sidris was protected by high stone walls, and two great citadels protected either end of the bridge. Any Imperial campaign had to begin with Arbela. The deepening river also meant that the lands beyond Arbela grew steadily richer as the increased water allowed the locals to cultivate wheat, apricots, dates and pistachios. More farmland meant more Khareeds, and it seemed every one of them had come to Arbela.

Thousands of Khareeds and their infantry auxiliaries were encamped on the eastern side of the village. Rough seige works ringed the town, a shallow ditch faced with sharpened stakes. The stakes were sparce and mostly on the western side of the city, timber being too expensive to permit a proper invesiture. Phaedra curled her lip, while Miravet were not reknowned for their seigecraft she had spent enough time in Imperial service and worked with the Imperial Engineers enough to view the works with contempt. They probably wouldn't stop Brasidas from breaking out if he decided it was necessary, but it would slow the process somewhat, perhaps enough to allow the Khareeds to block him.

"Maybe ten thousand," Phaedra opined, sweeping the large Khareed camp with her eyes. Their fine horses with their colorful ramients were drawn up in lines beside their infantry, most of whom were lightly armored. Several thousand Khareeds appeared to be dismounted to fight as heavy infantry. That showed better judgement than Phaedra liked to see in her enemies. Again her Imperial service had corrected her native prejudices. It had been infantry armies which had established the Empire when it rose from a simple city of shepards five centuries before, conquering much of the known world with their short swords and broad shields, and too this day there were no infantry like Imperial infantry.

"More like tweleve," Zoe corrected, "I wonder why he isn't holding down the ford." The ford was visible as a patch of lighter water. A broad dusty track dipped into the river and rose on the other side, marked by cairns of piled river rocks.

"Dosen't want to split his troops, plus if Brasidas did cross, the Khareeds can just follow on this bank and hit them in open contry once the river gets shallower up stream. The Khareed commander would probably be delighted to get him out into open country. Khareed heavy lancers were among the best in the world, and it would go poorly for an outnumbered force in open country.

"Judging from the week encirlement he is expecting reinforcements from Sidris, that or he just wants to force Brasidas to withdraw to the north west, away from the water, let the desert finish him off," Phaedra continued.

"Looks like they are starting to form up," Zoe remaked, nodding her chin towards where knots of Khareeds were begining to form. Like mold growing on bread the force began to coalece around the noble horsemen. Phaedra wiggled back behind the rise, squinting up at the sun. It was still perhaps an hour till sundown, but the sun was low on the horizon now, it would shine into the eyes of Brasidas and his men as the Khareeds made their assault, giving the Atvari a considerable advantage. Phadera smiled tightly. It would also keep them blind to the Miravet at their backs until the last possible moment. They might be outnumbered nearly three to one, but by the Huntress, these sorry bastards were going to learn a thing or two before the night was out.

The sound of trumpets heralded the beginning of the Atvari attack. It had taken most of an hour to get organised, that was actually pretty respectable for Khareeds, whose network of noble commanders and competing senses of honor often made such things an all day affair. It had been time enough for Phaedra to detach two of her four tets. Zoe and her troops had road back to the last ford and crossed the river moving up along the southern bank of the Kriti. Eudoxia had swung north, keeping the low hills between them and the Khareeds before emerging on the high ground to the north east. That left Phaedra and Iona with just over a thousand riders of their own to carry out the main thrust.

"I think we might have done better to keep Zoe with us," Iona complained as she swung up into her saddle. She was in full armor now and had settled the distinctive Miravet helmet with its three leaf design down over her face. Phaedra passed the long steel tipped lance up to her and Iona settled it into the stirup cup of her mount so it stood upright, then tied the leather cord around it so it wouldn't be in the way of using her bow.

"If we dont shatter them completely, then we will just be a slightly less outnumbered force when we join up with Brasidas, four hundred more riders won't help us in the charge, but it might make the difference at the ford between a defeat and a rout," Phaedra explained. Iona grunted, unconvinced but unwilling to argue the point. In truth Phaedra had taken an extra hundred riders from both Zoe and Eudoxia to stiffen her main force. It would have to be enough. Phaedra swung herself up into her own saddle and accepted a lance from another rider. She didn't don her own helmet though, not yet. More tiny trumpet blasts sounded from beyond the screening hills. The attack was underway now, in her minds eye Phaedra could picture the dismounted Khareeds pressing forward towards the town, their archers rushing forward to trade arrows with the defenders. It wasn't until the first clashes of weapons could be heard that Phaedra rode forward.

"These Atvari bastards only think they want to get into town," she called, her horse prancing dramatically as though enjoying the moment, "but wait till they have a thousand of us up their arses to encourage them. I'll bet you the poor bastards try to grow wings!" A chant began among the ranks of riders. Phaedra! Phaedra! Phaedra! She grinned like a panther and settled her helmet onto her head before turning her horse to the east. These sorry Atvari bastards were fucked.

[POOHEAD189]

This would be the final push. The men could feel it in the air, bearing down on Arbela like the simmering heat that still permeated the air even as the sun began to set. Calls of action and hurried marching filled the air as men realigned their formations, every jogging man moving like the parts of a slowly ticking clock. Below them, the monster of an army began to stir like some great seabeast cruising beneath the waves; its massive dark shape swiveling toward Arbela, inexorably approaching to swallow the township up and end every life within its broken walls. Unfortunately for the khareeds, they had Brasidas to contend with.

"Loxos," Brasidas said, biting into one of the last apples in Arbela. The juices reminded him of just how thirsty they might all have been had there not been the river just south of their position. Sayf strung his strange bow beside the two, testing the string with one bulging eye. His Proto Lochias approached mechanically, having been summoned to discuss the plan of battle just before it started. Now that things were in motion, it was time to move.

"Yes Archontas?" He asked, saluting in the Imperial fashion. In one hand he bore a spear, and the Protostate almond-shaped shield was in the other, the construction of wood, leather, and iron on the central boss made it surprisingly resilient to damage even by Khareed Mamluks. Just as Brasidas, he wore the normal armor of an infantryman, save for some decoration on the helmet. No one, not even the commanders deserved more protections than their men. Sent the wrong message on priorities.

"The Kahreeds are mad at us, don't you think?" He asked conversationally.

"Yes, they are."

Brasidas bit into his apple again, nodding. "I think they miss their comrades. Why don't we give them back to these poor men? ... Let them go, and lead the left wing."

"Archontas!" He saluted, and hurried away. Brasidas respected the man's professionalism, him and Argyros. Sometimes he wished the two turned off on campaign at least for a moment, but he would rather the man be perpetually professional than not. Sayf was a bit too nonchalant, but as long as he did what he was told, Brasidas didn't reprimand him for it. Speaking of the nomad, he gave the Protos Kapetanos a satisfied smile. "Well Khalkós, am I to go join the others and fight on foot? I am not entirely sure my men's role here, and you have been silent as always. Do you think it is a showing of manhood to not speak?"

"You and your men support Loxos to the north, and when he gives the order, charge in and take care of your brethren. Let's see if we paid the right Scythians for our service, yeah?"

"You have a strange strategy Brasidas Khalkós, but who am I to judge? Pay me and my men and we will cut the throats of whoever you wish." He said, and the bow-legged man stalked off to find his horse, weaving through the streets as men charged to and fro, some carrying bags filled with their opening act, ushering them to the front. Brasidas donned his helm, and took his axe. The haft was wood over bronze, giving it extra weight in the swing of its bearded, iron head. The Kahreeds no doubt expected him to head the Cataphracts, and he called twenty of his best men to follow him to the front to watch the festivities commence.

"Apele theroste tous kratoumenous!" A man cried, and dozens upon dozens of Protostates stepped through the interlocked shields and opened bags of ox-skin. Out tumbled hundreds of severed heads, dried blood caking their necks and eyes filled with feasting gnats, rolling down the slope to their living comrades. Brasidas had them counted, and he watched as a thousand enemy epicraniums crashed into the ranks of advancing soldiers, crowding their feet and smacking into their knees. It slowed their approach and cries of fear rang up as protostate troopers opened fire, loosing their arrows from their long recurve bows. The arrows rained down amongst the enemy, but it was only to soften them up. Now came the true battle.

"Protostates!" Brasidas cried, cracking his axe against his shield in unison with his twenty Cataphracts, ringing across the wastes. "Follow me into Hades!" He roared. The muscled man cried a warcry and began loping down the decline in his full armor, flanked by his personal guard. The protostates did not hesitate, following their Protos Kapetanos down the hill, some throwing spears but many now unsheathing their spathas to pierce through the kahreed armor once they entered melee. It wasn't just Brasidas's command; Argyros and Loxos made their move, slowly but surely flying out from the north and south; Argyros appearing from the riverside, his men wielding a bristle line of spears, Eirene among them.

Brasidas himself first crashed into the enemy's ranks, hammering into the front line and cleaving into a kahreed's neck, kicking aside a militiaman with his iron boot as he felt a sword cut his arm. Behind him, his men rolled in amongst the confused but still very dangerous mass of enemy infantry, their arrows flying above them to try and kill some of the Imperials as they charged forward, but with little effect. No more hiding, no more defending. They would break the enemy here and now, or die trying. The Protos Kapetanos cried to his war god as he hacked with abandon, banging his shield against enemy armor and crying out to keep his men by his side. He could not see, but Sayf and his five hundred nomads rode out of the dunes to the north, trading arrows with their counterparts and screaming their undulating cries of battle.

Loxos hurried, but he would not make it to the battle before the next wing arrived. Thankfully, he was not supposed to. Wheeling round the hillock, appearing for the first time in days, the fully mounted Cataphracts thundered over the sparsely grass ground, lowering their lances and readying their maces as they approached, the enemy prepared for an infantry fight, not a charge of heavy cavalry! When they hit their lines, men were trampled by the dozens, and Loxos swept in to keep the melee air-tight. He was good at it. With Argyros at the south, keeping their mass from flanking with the wall of spears? It was now a blood bath, and only the strongest would live.

[Penny]

"These poor bastards," Iona chuckled as she watched the battle unfolding below. They were in full view from the battlefield below, but no eyes were looking there way. It wouldn't matter if they were spotted now in any case, there wasn't a commander in the world who could extricate a force from such a bloody chaotic encounter now.

"Lets save our sympathy for someone other than the stinking Khareeds," Phaedra said as she pulled her hair back and pulled her helmet down over her head. Iona matched the action and hefted her bow.

"With your permission First?" Iona asked formally. Phaedra nodded at her Tetrarch.

At first the Atvari didn't pick out the horn blast from the other sounds of battle, but the sound of five hundred hooves drumming the ground was harder to ignore. Even so it wasn't until the Miravet cavalry burst over the low rise in a cloud of dust. The Atvari recoiled at the sudden appearance of cavalry at their rear. The Imperials, forewarned by Eriene, were ready for it and they surged forward into the faltering enemy. As they crested the rise each cataphract drew her bow and released an arrow before hanging their bows on their saddle horns and drawing their lances. A rippling wave of missles fell on the enemy from the rear, punching through the light backplates of the Khareed armor and sending men and horses tumbling down in a bloody ruin. The armored horsewomen hammered down the slope at a gallop, closing the hundred yards to the rear ranks in under a minute. To their credit, the Atvari at the rear, seeing the danger, managed to form a ragged line. Unfortunately those at the rear were not the best or the bravest, those soldiers were already being spitted by Brasidas and his men. They also lacked polearms and so the long lances of the Miravet left them all but defenseless in the inital second of contact. Metal and men screamed as the wedge of riders smashed into the rear ranks, killing hundreds of men in a few seconds, many were spitted on lances, but many more were simple rode into the ground by the weight of horses and armor. Phaedra dropped her shattered lance and drew her spatha, thrusting downward as she drove her horse towards the center of the battle line. They were terribly outnumbered, but the sudden shock of their attack was armor for as long as it lasted. Phaedra could hear nothing, over the din of battle and the pall of dust that five hundred horses and several thousand men kicked up was enough to obscure her vision more than a few dozen yards. She simply had to trust that Eudoxia and Zoe were carrying out their own assignments.

"Forward! Press them!" she shouted uselessly as she split the helm of a Khareed with a blow from her spatha. The impact jarred up her arm as her horse carried her passed into the mass of the dead man's retainers. The force of the charge was spending itself rapidly and while the mass of the Atvari infantry was breaking as there were knots of resistance beginning to coalesce around the dismounted Khareeds. As Phraeda watched one of her riders went down as a spear thrust into her horses flank, the woman hit the ground on her back and was immediately hacked open by half a dozen enemy soldiers.

“Iona, sound the…” Phraeda began but even as she spoke a bloodied Atvari hamstrung her Tetrarch’s horse. The stallion screamed as its rear legs gave out. Unlike the previous rider though Iona was not caught by surprise. She stood up in her stirrups and vaulted clear landing heavily on the dusty ground. It would have been a perfect dismount if she hadn’t tangled her feet on a corpse, the slippery entrails staggering her. An Atvari raised a curved sword to strike her, but before he could drive home Phaedra drove the iron wrapped edge of her shield down into his face. The heavy oak shield shattered the Atvari’s face in a spray of blood and teeth. Iona regained her feet, stabbed the reeling infantryman in the throat, then leaped up onto Phaedra’s saddle, getting one foot into the styrip and pulling herself up over the saddle bow. As soon as Iona was secure Phaedra drove her horse away. Iona unslung Phaedra’s bow and began to fire back over her body in the steppe fashion. For her own part Phaedra pulled her horn from her saddlebag and blew three sharp blasts. The Miravet riders wheeled away from the line, following Iona’s example and sending volleys of arrows back over their shoulders as they pulled back. The technique didn’t provide the kind of nail driving accuracy of their normal archery but it slashed into the staggered mass of Atvari with brutal effect. There was another horn blast, this one off to the north.

“Eudoxia is bringing her riders in,” Iona shouted over the screams and clamor of battle.

“Keep up the archery and reform!” she shouted, “We will drive back in if we have to.” She hoped she didn’t have to. Without the lances and with the enemy prepared, casualties would be much heavier. With luck Brasidas and Eudoxia would be sufficient to break the stalemate.




A hot wind blew down from the distant ridge bringing with it the smell of warm sand and desert flowers. The night was clear and as chill as the next day would be hot. The cavalry were encamped on one of the small rocky rises which rose from the floor of the desert at intervals, ancient mountains which had been ground down by millennia of grit blowing in off the Atvari plateau. Several hundred tents were pitched in rows as net as the terrain permitted. Horses were picketed in neat rows beside small fires, kindled on the scant fuel the cavalry could scavenge in such inhospitable country.

[POOHEAD189]

Blood sprayed across the faces of Atvari and Imperials alike, what cohesion the units had was long lost to blood fury and fear. Cataphract fought alongside Protostate and auxiliary militiaman, and the kahreed men were equally as disorganized, having mostly gotten over the shock of their comrade's heads at their feet when their lives were on the line. Had they not held the highground, it would have been impossible to see. But the mounted cataphracts to the north were plainly visible, as were Phaedra's cavalry to the east. Brasidas had been in many melees, but this was truly an undisciplined slog.

The men might claim otherwise, but Brasidas would have been a dead man had he not been so armored. His lamellar scalemail allowed him to fight without the shield, axe in one hand and a kahreed iron rod in the other. An axe had more stopping power than a sword, but it was not nearly as versatile. Used with a shield or another weapon however, or in two hands? It was extremely effective. In the maelstrom of the battle, he shouldered an atvari man out of the way, turning and hooking his axehead over the shield of a Mamluk, yanking the shield down whilst simultaneously swinging the rod he had adopted, breaking the cheek plate of the man's helm and sending the man into shock, falling listlessly to the ground. Out of the gloom a spear stabbed at him. He knocked it downward with his rod, stomping on it and snapping the worn weapon with his heavy boot before cleaving the head of the wielder with the axe. A broad blade stabbed into his armor, biting him and causing him to cry out, turning to block the next swing of the royal Khareed Mamluk, weapons locked as they struggled.

The enemy was buckling, but not broken. As the arrows rained down from the east, Brasidas cut down the Mamluk and stepped back into his personal guard, calling for his horn blower. Moments later, the blast rang across the battlefield like a beacon, causing the men around the center of the melee to be silent just long enough for Brasidas to shout one word.

"Reform!"

Like the realigning of a snake to better move, the men up front stepped back as the men behind pushed forward, every Lochias knowing their orders from their commander's call. Spears were no longer an option, but a rough shield wall began to form, stabbing spathas out and ready to hack and stab at any kahreed that came close. Many protostates were cut down as they tried to join the makeshift phalanx, but enough of them were close enough to make an effective line. The kahreeds were no longer in striking distance of the Imperials. They were caught against their shields, just as they were caught against the spears to the south. As arrows fired in from the east and Loxos and the Cataphracts harried their flanks, the Gods smiled as another group of shrieking cavalrymen appeared over the dunes of sand. No, cavalrywomen!

A feral woman holding a standard attached to a land charged into view, sturdy and swift miravet cavalry beside her, forming a wedge as it charged. Arrows flew at them like gnats, but they did little to halt the momentum of the charge. Some of Brasidas's cataphracts wheeled round to join the miravets, plunging back into the mass of kahreeds for one last push into the fray; the rumbling of a thousand horses filled the ears of Atvari and Imperials until it was blotted out by the clash of steel and cries of the dead and dying.

"Push!" Brasidas cried from behind the shieldwall.

His men complied, shoving their shields forward and stabbing with their swords. Like the old legion they moved, stabbing into necks and under the shoulder guards, stepping forward and chipping into them like a serf upon the farms of the levant. The field was bloody, stinking with corpses and shit. The imperial noose began to tighten, and the kahreed's world was growing smaller as they closed in around them.

[Penny]

"We are going to need to go back in," Iona opined. The Tetrarch had remounted on a horse which had belonged to a fallen rider. Phaedra scanned the churning battlefield with a practiced eye. She drew an arrow and loosed, the arrow punching through the coif of a Khareed who was attempting to rally his troops. Eudoxia and her riders were cutting into the northern flank, their fresh horses and fresh lances were making the difference as was the reformed Imperial line.

"I think..." Phaedra began and then the Atvari broke. It was as though a dam had broken. At one moment they seemed like they would hold and in the next they were running for the ford like a human stampede. A few of the braver Khareeds were still attempting to rally resistance. Miravet arrows turned on those centers of resistance like the tongues of anteaters, smashing them before they could begin to stem the tide.

"Now we are going back in," Phaedra snapped, fitting her helmet back into place.

"It's over, why waste lives?" Iona objected.

"Sound the charge Tetrarch," Phaedra ordered, wiping the blood from her spatha. There were far too many Atvari wandering around to let this army regroup. None of them would be safe if the Atvari simply regrouped out in the desert. The horns blasted and the Miravet hung their bows, drew their swords and charged.

_____

"Now its over," Phaedra panted. Her arm ached and blood mattered her hair from a stray arrow which struck her helmet. The Atvari were streaming away into the desert. Zoe's riders were pressing them hard, but they would give off the pursuit soon. Night had already fallen and it would soon be too dark to risk chasing desert nomads who knew the terrain. The rout was more than complete. Thousands of enemy dead littered the dusty ground. Imperial soldiers were moving among them, delivering death blows to the worst of the wounded and gathering the less severely wounded for whatever care could be found.

A dismounted Miravet waved a bloody spear overhead as Phaedra approached. Erine, her skin still blacked with patches of boot polish she hadn't yet removed, was grining like a cat which had been at the cream. Phaedra couldn't help but smiling back. That young woman was in for a promotion.

"First!" she called, "Atronarch Brasidas is over by the gate." She gestured with the spear to a gate of mud bricks. It had once been a part of the wall, but Brasidas and his men had torn the walls down when they took the city. That had been good practice when there had been a large Imperial force heading east, but with Gergicous gone who knew where, Phaedra was no longer certain that was true. She trotted over to where the armored commander stood with a knot of men whom Phaedra assumed were his senior officers.

"Atronarch," she called, sliding from the saddle. The ground seemed unsteady after so long on horseback and her legs cramped. The feeling wasn't unfamiliar and she flexed her legs twice before clashing her fist to her breast and then extending her hand in an abbreviated Imperial salute.

"Protus Kapetanos Phaedra Commnenus," she reported, flexing the cramp out of her sword hand.

[POOHEAD189]

"That could have been nasty," Sayf said, a large scratch down the length of his dark arm. He still held his bow in his uninjured arm, gripping it tightly like it was the only reason he had survived the scuffle. "Too bad for the Atvari. They pay well, but they paid the wrong tribe." The smell of hookah wafted from his mouth, having already celebrated with his horsemen. Brasidas was not sure if it was a religious ritual or purely for enjoyments. He hadn't cared enough to ask.

"Straton?" Brasidas asked the Lochias as he climbed up the hill, helmet carried under his arm. His scouts were already combing the enemy camp for supplies. Tonight every man they could spare would rest and drink hearty. Though there was the matter of the miravets. He did not know what would happen with a regiment of women and a regiment of men camping together. It wasn't like wintering in a city and waiting for the campaigning season, and even if these women weren't their comrades, they weren't going to be demure maidens or whores looking for a gold coin or two. Everyone else might rest, but Straton and his men had a long night of guard duty, as did his cataphracts whom he would post on foot to patrol and keep watch.

"Hundreds dead, Archontas." He said. It sounded grim, but it could have been far worse, echoing Sayf's thoughts. "Hard to tell with all of them strewn about. We have seven hundred and thirty cataphracts left, eighteen hundred protostates, and four hundred and fifty nomads left. With the miravets, we should have thirty four hundred in all with only minor injuries, give or take a hundred soldiers."

"Good. Keep your men moving. When we head out, we'll let them in the carts, but tonight they need to keep their eyes open. Theron, take a century of your most rested men and grid them around in groups to keep any man from being greedy with the spoils or our reinforcements." He ordered, and the two men gave salutes, walking rather than hustling away. No man in their army had not been in that fight, and they were all exhausted.

Just then, a horseman rode up in a swift mount. In the dying light of the evening, he could scarcely tell it wasn't simply a slim man until she hopped off and spoke. She walked like Sayf, though with less swagger. When she saluted, he mirrored it almost simultaneously.

"Protus Kapetanos Phaedra Commnenus."

"Protus Kapetanos Brasidas Khalkós." He replied, taking off his helmet to better see her. His black hair was close cropped, though he sported a long braid that snaked down the back of his neck. He had a goatee, thick despite obviously being recently shaved. His eyes were copper, giving him an alien, bestial air. "You got here just in time, Kapetanos Commnenus. Thanks for that." He remarked. "Would you like to grab something to eat so we may speak? Because as much as I like the view on the slope, I've seen it a lot the last few days and it's a bit of an eyesore now."

Sayf poked his head in, eyeing the woman up and down.

[Penny]

"Food would be welcome, wine more so," Phaedra admitted. She pulled her helmet free and hung it from her saddle. Her hair, a dark lustrous black, was braided and coiled in a crown which sweat had plastered to her head. She gratefully took a a wet cloth from one of the protostates and wiped the spattering of blood from her face.

"We've army wine," Brasidas replied a hint of question in his tone. There were officers, Georgicus and his aristocratic ilk, who would sooner die than drink the harsh red that made up the standard army ration. The Miravet however were a frontier folk and wine of any kind was a luxury to them. Phaedra nodded gratefully, eager to wash the taste of dust from her throat. Brasidas led her back though the town. The damage of battle abated quickly, though the lack of civilians gave it an empty and haunted look. The entered a large square which fronted a modest temple, opposite the three pillared temple was a large stoa under which amphorae of grain, wine and oil had been stacked behind a barricade of wagons. A squad of Protostartes, all walking wounded, stood on guard, as much to keep their own soldiers from looting as to repel the enemy. They stiffened to attention as their commander approached though none of them actually saluted. They slid between two wagons and moved to a corner where several stools stood across a battered timber bar. Brasidas took a seat and Phaedra followed his examples. One of the soldiers ladled out two goblets of wine, not bothering to dilute it in the normal Imperial fashion. Phaedra drank gratefully, then squared her shoulder.

"I'm still waiting for a count," she began bluntly, "But I expect I have seventeen hundred riders still saddle ready."

"We had five hundred Keylaran's when we set out, garrison troops from Kestos," she explained, her voice so careful to avoid stressing the word 'garrison' that it was effectively a slap.

"Georgicus Andronikus was in command, but they vanished, deserted it seemed like," she continued.

"Right before we got ambushed by the Atvari, night before last," Phaedra explained.

"First?" came a woman's voice from beyond the barricade. Eudoxia pressed through the barricade, the soldiers didn't quite try to stop her, though they were clearly ready to do so if Brasidas offered any objection. Fortunately he chose not to.

"Eudoxia Eushenko, my second," Phaedra explained. Eudoxia gave Brasidas a measuring look but didn't salute.

"Zoe's back, she broke off a half hour ago, we have a hundred twelve dead, as many wounded," she reported. Phaedra nodded. It was actually better than she expected, better even than the ambush two nights ago.

"Let everyone out of discipline," she told her subordinate, "get some wine and food organized too."

[POOHEAD189]

"Deserted?" He asked, raising an eyebrow. That troubled him more than he would voice aloud. Recalled he could see, but he knew Georgicus as well as Phaedra, and Phaedra had been the only one who had come to their aid. They would either be dead or still under siege were it not for her. As he thought of this, he drank his jug of wine. The Boreas supped their drinks without watering it down, considered barbaric by many southern provinces, but from what he heard of Miravet women, they would like as not handle it, even considering how light they were. He noticed the lack of saluting when her second arrived, and he snorted lightly. Brasidas was a bit too tired to care, it was just funny at the moment.

"I have around three hundred men guarding any festivities tonight. We'll see how my boys and your girls do together. We might have a long march ahead of us, depending on where we're to go next. I had thought we were going to Gildygon, but I haven't received proper orders in weeks." He explained to Phaedra as Eudoxia went to perform her duties. "I was hoping to see if the palace truly had the skeleton of a bahamut."

Past the wagons, men laughed. Brasidas caught the sight of Arbela townsfolk now walking freely. He hoped none of his men took any homes that belonged to anyone still living, or he would hear about it in the morning.

"If we don't go to Gildygon, we don't need the siege works."

"The city would be difficult to take with our force, anyway." Phaedra added, placing her wine cup down with a clap. "It's not our orders that worry me..."

"In two days time or less, my second will arrive," he told her, not cutting her off but wishing to say his thought before he lost it to exhaustion and wine. "Once he gets here, we should have just short of five thousand soldiers between us. Maybe we should head north and send a missive to Talcidus, or the Emperor," He leaned back against a pillar holding outcrop of a roof they had over their heads. "or even the Patriarch. I've heard he's visiting the Sagdolians."

He shrugged and looked back at her, giving a handsign of apology, pointer finger and thumb pressing against the forehead above his ways and sliding his hand through the air toward her in a quick gesture. "What did you mean, worries you? Do you speak of Georgicus?"

[Penny]

Phaedra sipped wine from the clay cup as she considered her words. Desertion was a serious crime in the Imperial army. It was punishable by flogging at the very least, and desertion on campaign could be punishable by death. It didn't make any sense that a politically savvy and well connected officer like Georgicus to risk disgrace by abandoning his post.

"He and his entire command abandoned us just before we were ambushed by the Atvari," she explained, "left tents standing to make it look like they were coming back."

"I had considered that he was simply wiped out by the Atvari, but the tents were cleared out," she continued.

"It dosen't make any sense to me, he was technically in command," Phaedra told Brasidas. It was typical of the aristocratic class of the armies upper command that political connections went further than field experience and that was doubly true for regiments like the Miravet who were already considered only a cut above barbarians despite being part of the Empire for two centuries.

"Were you expecting more reinforcements? Even together we would have been up against it if we met those Khareeds in open, and the Satrap is only a couple of days ride from here, with what? Maybe twenty thousand plus whatever locals he can gather up?" She unfastened the clasps of her armor letting the scale hang rather than constricting her.

[POOHEAD189]

"Other than you and Tychon? No," he remarked, referring to the reinforcements. There was, of course, Georgicus, but that seemed to be a lost hope. What in the hells was going on? He loathed to pull back after they had fought for their lives to make it here, but even with Tychon arriving, it would be a deathwish to fight the Satrap as they were unless they found the right terrain and the favor of the Gods yet again, and it didn't do to consider them on your side in every engagement. The gods blessed you in the morning and cursed you in the afternoon, some said.

"I don't think either of us has sway over the other, so we can work in unison until they send another commander. But we can either push forward or pull back. Staying here will do us little good in three days time." Brasidas told Phaedra. She seemed a fierce but competent woman. Far more erudite than the stories of miravets told, but it was a similar myth about the men of Boreas so it surprised him very little.

Thinking on it more, there was a grumble in his throat and he cursed, realizing the best course of action. "A tactical withdrawal would be the best option until we find out what's what. In a week the satrap will be here, or he would be were I him. We're tired and have too little food for us to last a prolonged siege, and he could hold us here for weeks were he of the mind to." The force they had just repelled was one of the many vanguard armies that swarmed about the place. Now the ones that escaped would make it back to the Satrap and tell them everything.

"I say we follow the river until we reach the mountains and then swing round and head north." He downed the last of his drink, wiping his mouth with his scarred forearm. They could go north in theory, but he felt a malaise about marching through rough terrain with only a few spots to find water. Then again it was also the less logical therefore the less predictable choice.

[Penny]

Phaedra considered it. The goal of this expedition had been to punish raiders and repulse a possible Atvari probe. That had already been accomplished when Brasidas and his men had sacked Arbela, and doubly so with the crushing defeat of the local Khareeds. She wasn't best pleased to get all the way here only to have to march back to Kestos, but that seemed infinitely preferable to facing twenty thousand Atvari with miles of hostile desert between them and safety.

"Well we can do nothing till your man Tychon rejoins us," Phaedra replied, "and my Sisters have been riding hard for two days." Many Imperial units would have considered the entire march hard, but in truth Georgicus had set a fairly leisurely pace by Miravet standards.

"We can use a day to rest the horses and tend to our fallen," she said solemnly, waving away an offer of refill for her empty cup. There would be many tasks to accomplish before she turned in for what was left of the night and she couldn't afford to be slowed by too much wine.

"Lord! Lord!" came a cry from beyond the wagon barricade. Several distressed looking locals were being held back by the soldiers. There faces were anguished, though they obviously weren't going to try to force there way past armed Imperial troops.

"They are tearing down our houses! The house of my father and my fathers fathers. The devil women!" Phaedra placed her cup down and grimaced. The Miravet needed timber to build pyres and the only source was the wooden superstructure of the local buildings. Timber was expensive here and doubtless represented considerable hardship for the villagers who could do nothing but watch as the cavalry women pulled down their homes to feed the fires.

[POOHEAD189]

Brasidas shared a look with Phaedra questioningly, and then he pushed off the stool and drained the last bit of wine before placing the cup down. Brasidas called for Eudoxia to return, as well as all of the families who had currently had their homes dismantled, summoning them to the center of town.

Less than an hour later, he and Phaedra stood beside a great bonfire, surrounded by Cataphracts with closed faced helms and sheathed weapons, watching silently as Eudoxia approached. Brasidas saw nearly thirty men, women, and children collected together and filled with fear and outrage, or just faces of distraught at losing their homes. Brasidas asked for leave with dealing with this, and at Phaedra's nod he stepped forward.

"What is it?" Eudoxia asked, and Brasidas gave her a blank look. She looked past him at Phaedra, and at her nod she continued with "...Archontas."

"You just started to tear homes down, without the aegis of me or your commander?" He asked her evenly.

"We have a duty to our dea-"

"These people are under my protection!" He growled. "They are now citizens of the Empire. I have a duty to my dead as well, but not at the expense of the living, or are we the barbarians they call us?" The Protos Kapetanos let the words hang for a moment, and then visibly calmed. She seemed to take it well, her face a stone mask. "How many homes do you need to dismantle in order to burn your pyres?"

"Ten, Archontas...no, twelve. We've dismantled seven." She replied without emotion, glancing at Phaedra every few moments. Brasidas nodded, crossing his arms.

"Very well, twelve homes. The homes closest to the torn down walls." He said, much to the dismay of the townsfolk in the circle, and all that listened outside of the Cataphract circle. Brasidas motioned for silence, and when it was granted he said. "I am not finished! Tonight, those of the twelve with homes will have the time to gather their things."

"All night!? In the morning the bodies will-"

"Still be there," Brasidas finished for her, turning back to the crowd. "All men and women who lose their homes over these tearings will have a roof over their heads and food in their bellies. You have my word."

"Where, Archontas?" one man cried, and the Protos Kapetanos pointed behind him, past the fire toward the twenty foot walls that loomed over the township. Right at the citadel of Arbela.

"In there. You who give your homes for us, will be inducted into the new town council, and your quarters will move from your hovels to the citadel, where you will command the town due to your loyal service. You will conduct Arbela's affairs, control the river, and be forever loyal to the Empire, is that understood!?"

There were whispers, but a general cry of acceptance rose over the few smaller yells of denial. Brasidas stepped away from the villagers and Eudoxia, before turning to Phaedra, asked her before all of the town. "Is that acceptable, Protos Kapetanos?"

[Penny]

Phaedra's face was stony. Eudoxia set her jaw in a familiar expression that Phaedra had seen directed at many Imperial officers in the past. Phaedra could read the expression clearly: Was this man was kicked in the head at birth? The transperency of her second made her smile and broke her own tension. She didn't know if Brasidas really thought the town would be loyal to the Empire but if he did he was a bigger optimist than she even dreamed of being. In four centuries of warfare these border towns had changed hands many times but the Atvari would be back here, in a week or in a year and these peasants would give their loyalty cheerful to whichever army held the ford.

"See that the wood you have gathered goes to the dead from the ambush Second," she said formally.

"I'm sure that their Syndi are already asking for it." Miravet riders grouped into social groups of four in formal ceremonies. The four women formed would share campfires, tend a wounded member and, most importanly carry out the proper funeral rites if a sister fell. Though the group was primarily religious in origin, for practical reasons the women were always from different Tets. The practice meant that all four were unlikey to fall in a single battle, and was good for the cohesion of the whole force as different elements were kept in contact by the small groups. Those who had lost sisters in the ambush two nights before, would doubtlessly be eager to kind the fires for their departed friends whose bodies by now were blackening in the heat. The Miravet religion held that a woman's soul would remain close to her body until it was destroyed either by fire or decay. Fire was seen as the quickest and healthies way of releasing the spirt. Although there was no hierarchy, it happened Eudoxia, Zoe and Iona were the other members of Phaedra's Syndi.

"Tandi Pey," Phaedra added in the tribal language of the Miravet. The expression didn't translate precisely but was probably closet to 'it is what it is.' Eudoxia sighed.

"Tandi Pey," she agreed, too wise to say anything more even though it was unlikely anyone other than the Miravet would be able to understand.

"Better set to recovering arrows and stockpiling what you can find," Phaedra added as the thought occurred to her. Likely that had already started, Phaedra didn't doubt her troops were systematically stripping the dead of anything valuable and arrows, their own and others were always in demand. She might have suggested gathering spears and armor for Brasidas' troops also, but she doubted that would have gone over very well.

"Lets get it done Doxy," she told her second in command dryly.

[POOHEAD189]

The next day...

The Sunrise came with its expected heat, but it also brought something Brasidas wasn't expecting for twenty four hours. The Protos Kapetanos had finally slept after two days of hard fighting, going to bed shortly after the meeting the previous night. He had gotten the feeling it wasn't generally how the miravets did things, but like it or not he had to make some sort of show of it. These people had been subjected to weeks of fighting and to have their saviors tear down their homes wasn't something he could abide. He just hoped the Satrap would be gentle with them once they left, which they would do as soon as Tychon appeared.

Brasidas was in the middle of a good dream. A dream where he hunted a wolf in the Boreas mountains. It wasn't until later that afternoon that he would think back, and realize it had been a memory of his youth. As it was, Brasidas was shaken awake. Groggily blinking, his vision cleared and he was looking into the smiling face of Sayf the nomad, showcasing his famously bad breath that could wilt flowers and cause even hardened soldiers to cry. Brasidas coughed. "Gods damn you, Sayf! What the hell are you doing here?"

"I just thought you would like to know the big one is here." He said innocently, leaping back before Brasidas could swipe at him with a large fist. The Protos Kapetanos blinked and rubbed his eyes, before his mind jumped to the only conclusion there was. Tychon here, now? That was fast. The sun peeked through the windows in the room, but it was still quite angled, signifying the day was still very early. Considering he had fallen asleep just after dark, he had a full night's sleep. Hopefully the rest of the men and women did.

Sayf and he stepped out of the commandeered home and onto the street, saluting the sentries set to guard him before they both mounted. Menelaus knickered, Brasidas smiling and patting his trusted steed before they kicked their mounts off and galloped towards the front gate, Sayf leading with his smaller mare. Many of the soldiers were still asleep, but the two could see some having already stirred and going about their duties. Once he made it to the edge of Arbela, he saw Phaedra and Eudoxia among a few other women, and pyres stacked up in great mounds along the flat ground below the slope, the fires just now beginning to burn as the bodies were stacked upon them. Brasidas saluted Phaedra when she looked his way, but otherwise they went about their own duties.

To the north, a column marched like some fat snake over the land, rounding some of the deserted farmhouses a scant few miles away and making steady progress their way. The Commander and his nomad companion sent their horses down the decline, racing past the shrubs and fields of wheat and barley until they made it to the column of marching soldiers. At the vanguard of the line were the cataphracts, and at their fore was Tychon.

"Brass!" Tychon called, his voice booming as the two rode up to him as he sent his horse forward. The beast was two hands taller than Menelaus, and it needed to be to carry Tychon. They said his family were descended from mountain giants. Tychon was the largest man Brasidas had even seen, close to nine feet in height and with a personality to match. He was as loyal as a hound and as fierce in battle as a lion. "Did we miss the fun?"

"There's plenty more fun to be had, Tyke, unless I miss my guess." He said to his friend once they met on the road. They made quite the group; Sayf the small, Brasidas the tall, and Tychon the giant. "How did you get here so fast?"

Tychon shook his head. "We didn't end up staying at Valkos. We had to move. We heard Georgicus had disappeared." He explained to Brasidas, and then glanced passed his friend. "Are those miravet warrior women?" He seemed confused, and Brasidas laughed.

"Yes, old friend. So be nice."

[Penny]

The funeral rites proceeded properly. Phaedra watched as the yew twigs were removed from the necks of the dead women and then lit from a charcoal brazier before being thrust into the kindling beneath the pyres. The corpses were naked save for where their ancient tribal markings had been daubed in mud. The surviving members of their Syndi spoke the ritual words. There were only two Syndi who had lost more than one member, those pairs of women had been first to light their pyres. After the rite was concluded they would form a new group out of the two half Syndi. The others would remain threesomes until new recruits were found or casualties reduced them to pairs which could be properly combined. Idly Phaedra wondered whether the inhabitants of Arbela might furnish any new recruits. Judging from the hard looks they were shooting the Miravet, that seemed unlikely, but one never knew. In any community there were young women who wanted to escape their lots in life, and desert dwellers tended to produce hardy sorts who could take to the training. She would see to it in a while.

"They are Imperial," Zoe said in soft voice as she slid in beside her commander. The scout leader hadn't been in the field herself but she had scattered her own people out among Brasidas own scouts. Naturally they had verified that the approaching force was friendly. It was a hard learned lesson that not all Imperial outfits took scouting as seriously as the Miravet, though from what Zoe had said she hadn't found much to complain about in Brasidas' troops.

"How are we doing for arrows?" Phaedra asked as her eyes tracked eastward to the approaching force.

"Assuming our commander doesn't want us to wait all night to gather them up we should be fine," Zoe replied. Phaedra didn't quite manage to keep a smile from touching her lips at the dig. Already she could here the ringing of hammers from Arbela's few blacksmith shops. Phoebe, the blacksmith for the regiment, was already supervising the local blacksmiths as they hammered fresh arrow heads out of steel looted from the dead. Shafts and fletching would be affixed in due time, and if they had enough time, local arrows would be fitted with Miravet arrowheads.

"Think we will be moving out soon?" Zoe asked as they watched the swelling dust of Tychon's approaching troops.

"By the Huntress is that thing human?" Phaedra cut in. Zoe was also goggling at the enormous bear of a man who rode between Brasidas and Salf.

"That poor horse," Zoe empathized, though in truth the big draft mount didn't seem to be too upset with its situation.

"I think you had probably best have the girls ready to ride, while I think of it, do we have anyone who speaks good Atvari?"

"Thalia does, and Antonina," Zoe replied, "Hespia did but..." Zoe trailed off guesturing to the pyres sadly.

"Ok, Get Thalia and Nina and see if any local girls are looking to get out a life of dirt farming, or whoring," Phaedra instructed.

"Let them know we wont be staying here if they are worried about the Great King appearing to punish them," Phaedra continued. Leaving Zoe to her work she turned and headed for the entrance to town where Brasidas and his companions were approaching. With any luck Tychon had news and they could start making some concrete plans.

[POOHEAD189]

"Who leads here now?" Tychon inquired, leaving Demaratus to lead the men to camp before Arbela as Brasidas, Tychon, and Sayf galloped back to the front of the township where Brasidas spied Phaedra rode to. The Protos Kapetanos saw the pyres of her dead still burning brightly, and to the south his own dead were being interred. Some were burned, but others were buried under small cairns, as was the Boreas way.

"No one. Both the Miravet leader and I are Protos Kapetanos, so until we find someone higher rank we'll have to agree or debate on everything." Brasidas said with a shrug.

"Do we not have the larger force?"

Brasidas gave him a look. "They might be small, but they are soldiers same as us. The women made a good accounting of themselves yesterday, from what little I saw. If she and I have the same rank, we are equals. Besides, I'd rather follow her than Georgicus. At least she is loyal and fights her own battles."

"As you say, but I am still worried, Brass." Tychon said as Sayf rode ahead. It was clear he wanted to meet with Phaedra first. "We received an envoy a week ago. An envoy of the Great King."

Brasidas did a double take. "Why did you not say this before?"

"I wanted to when I had you alone." Tychon explained. "They were trying to hire us, saying something about fighting a losing war. Last I checked we were invading them, not the other way around. I sent them home and made it for Arbela with all speed."

Ahead, Brasidas saw Sayf and Phaedra conversing, the nomad making whimsical gestures with his hands in a no doubt ineffective way to woo her. The two commanders reached them not moments later, Brasidas giving Phaedra a nod in greeting, and gestured to Tychon. He was even larger up close, sporting a goatee that would be a full beard on any other man. He had no weapons with him, as they would be a bit too heavy to fit on his horse. Behind them, the army went to set up camp as runners headed up the slope to the town.

"Kapetanos Phaedra, this is Tychon. My second." He introduced, and then spoke to his old friend. "Tyke, tell her everything you were going to tell me. She needs to hear it as much as I."