When Wolves March

The gates of Tathar's Cross opened with measured purpose.

Viscount Auren Drevhal watched from atop his armored stallion as the first ranks marched beneath the arch, sunlight flashing from their helms. Their banners fluttered behind them the falcon on white, crossed with gold.

He wore silver-plated steel, unblemished and ceremonial. A green velvet mantle hung from his shoulders, fastened by a brooch of electrum. He looked every inch the Empire's chosen vanguard.

His command rode behind him a hundred mounted knights, banners gleaming, voices quiet. Behind them marched his infantry two thousand strong, armed with pikes and tower shields. Half veterans from northern posts, half fresh-faced border guards drilled into discipline.

They marched to drums. They marched without haste. The road ahead the one that bent eastward into the forest had been cleared and watched. Scouts returned that morning with news.

"The Harkoraal encampment is splintered," one had said. "They're hiding in the tree line. We spotted scattered cookfires, not camps. They're too thin to defend."

Drevhal hadn't smiled. But he had nodded.

"They're running," he said. "Which means we hunt them. Which means glory for us."

The hills beyond the Cross undulated gently, soft with late summer grass. The road wound through them before pressing into the edge of the Eastwood where Harkoraal had made its stand.

Or, he believed, its retreat.

The supply wagons clattered in rhythm behind the main column. Archers marched in staggered units. A detachment of light cavalry patrolled the flanks.

It looked, to most observers, like strength.

But to Senjar, watching from the ridge beyond the forest, it looked like an exposed throat.

The forest swallowed them.

Not all at once not like a mouth snapping shut but like a fog rolling in. The Imperial columns thinned as they entered, the road narrowing beneath old boughs and crooked roots. Light filtered through in green tinted shafts. The drumbeats quieted.

Viscount Drevhal rode at the center, flanked by knights, the hooves of his stallion striking softened loam. He glanced to either side but saw only trunks and leaves. Birds kept silent. No wind stirred.

The Eastwood had always felt wrong to him. Too old. Too still.

"We're ahead of schedule," said a captain beside him. "Should reach the glade in less than an hour."

"Good," Drevhal said.

He turned to one of the younger riders nearby. "Send word ahead. Double the scouts."

The messenger nodded, spurred his horse forward.

Behind them, the sound of boots on dirt echoed in staggered rhythm, muffled by moss. The rear guard came into the trees slower, hesitant.

From far above, a falcon wheeled once, then vanished behind the canopy.

None of the Imperials saw the figures watching them from behind the roots.

Cloaks mottled like bark. Faces painted in ash and mud. Longbows gripped but not drawn. Spears set ready but still.

They waited.

Among them crouched Rell, motionless behind a boulder split with vines. His eyes tracked the Viscount's standard like a hunter marks a stag.

He waited for the right moment.

The horn sounded.

A sharp note, urgent and short.

Rell's men four hundred strong broke into sudden motion. Their formation scattered along the path, and then they ran. Not wild, not panicked. Controlled.

Calculated.

The Imperials saw what they expected a routed force, fleeing through narrow woodland paths. Their commander, Viscount Drevhal, stood in his stirrups.

"Ride them down! Spear them to their last man!"

The order carried. Horns answered. Imperial cavalry surged forward into the trees, hooves slamming the dirt. They pursued in long columns, eager, reckless, angry.

They didn't see the shadowed figures hiding just beyond the oak line.

Didn't hear the signal.

Until it came.

A three-note whistle, sharp and clear.

Then the forest answered.

From the left and right, Kaelric's flanking force erupted from the underbrush eight hundred Harkoraal warriors, steel flashing from all directions. The trap sprung like a jaw snapping closed.

Kaelric was first into the fray, moving with deadly precision. He struck once, twice, then vanished again into leaves. His voice cut through the chaos.

"Split them! Keep them scattered!"

Imperials shouted, turned, tried to rally but there was no room. The forest choked their formation. Riders collided. Archers couldn't loose. Every tree hid a blade.

The screams rose fast.

Within minutes, the path was soaked with blood and mud.

From his perch above the slope, Corien sent blades of wind slicing between trunks, cutting down any who turned their backs. Rasa moved like water, dancing from kill to kill. Aelynne's voice whispered frost into the earth, freezing Imperial boots where they stood.

They were surrounded.

Then came Gavren.

A blast of heat pulsed from his hand, and a tree exploded into flame beside the Viscount's banner. Panic surged. Horses reared. One captain was thrown from his saddle and trampled underfoot.

"Fall back!" Drevhal shouted. "Back! Out of the trees!"

He tried to turn the line. A few units broke away, desperate to reach the edge of the forest to open ground, to air, to escape.

That was when Senjar struck.

They burst from the woods just as the sun crested the far ridge.

Open plains.

And waiting there at the tree line ahead were eight hundred horsemen. Spears lowered. Swords drawn.

Harkoraal's banners flapped in the rising wind.

Senjar stood at their center, black cloak catching the sun. Behind him, the archers of the high ridge stepped forward, bows drawn.

The Imperials froze.

Some tried to turn. But the forest was fire behind them. Others dropped weapons. Drevhal's own guard hesitated, torn between death in the trees or slaughter in the open.

Senjar raised his hand.

Steel rang once more, then silence.

The last Imperial sword clattered to the ground, its owner slumping beside it, bleeding into the soil.

The woods behind still smoked faintly. The bodies of the dead lay thick between the trees imperial helms, shattered shields, hooves snapped backwards under broken riders. Harkoraal warriors stood among them, bloodied but steady.

Senjar dismounted on the rise, the plains wind tugging gently at his cloak. His horse was lathered and streaked, flanks flecked with crimson.

For a long moment, no one spoke.

A hawk circled above, alone in the pale sky. The fires hissed low. One Harkoraal soldier knelt beside a fallen brother and closed his eyes with two fingers. Another lit a pipe with shaking hands. Across the ridge, a boy too young for battle stared down from the trees.

The wind changed direction.

Kaelric walked toward him from the treeline, wiping his blade with a torn banner. His jaw was clenched.

"Over fifteen hundred dead, by count," he said. "Two hundred more fled the way they came. But we've captured nearly two hundred soldiers, officers, some standard bearers. And him."

He tilted his head.

Two warriors dragged a struggling man across the trampled field. His armor was fine, but dented and scorched. His face bloodied. His cloak torn but still bore the silver thread of his station.

Viscount Drevhal.

They threw him at Senjar's feet.

The Viscount spat into the dirt.

"You broke the laws of the Empire."

Senjar stared down at him, unmoving, with faint smile.

"This land has no laws," he said. "Only memory. And in memory, you drew first blood."

Drevhal tried to rise, wincing.

"You think this changes anything? You'll be hunted. The Baron will..."

Senjar held up a hand. "Baron Renault will soon be dealt with."

He turned to Rell. "Line them up."

"The prisoners?"

"All of them."

Within the hour, a long line of captured Imperials stood in the valley, on their knees, hands bound. Some prayed. Some wept. A few stared ahead, defiant.

Senjar stood before them. Behind him, the full host of Harkoraal watched in silence nearly two thousand men, all hardened, all still. Wind moved through their banners like breath.

"No coins will buy peace," Senjar said to no one and everyone. "No offers of tribute will save what rides against us. Let the Empire count this day. Let them remember what it means to ride into our lands."

He gave the nod.

Blades flashed.

One by one, the heads of the Viscount's men dropped into the dust. The earth drank their blood in silence.

Drevhal was last.

He didn't beg. He didn't speak.

When it was done, his head was mounted beside the fallen banner of the falcon.

A fire was lit below it.

The field burned into twilight.

And across the borderlands, fear marched faster than any army.