by G. R. Cooper
“Not until I see you run up to the church and bind your ass here,” she smiled.
“Yes, mom,” he grinned. They had time. The keep door was still burning, and Snorri would make easier work of the entry if the wood was blackened first.
His smile froze as he saw Lauren’s gaze shift past his shoulder. Her jaw dropped.
“Shit,” she muttered.
Wulfgar turned as the sound of the hooves of several horses thundered into the square. The small orc arrows rained down on the newly arrived warriors, but were ineffective against the heavily armored horses and men. One or two of the riders nearest the keep derisively flicked away a few of the volley with their large, kite-shaped, metal shields. He heard the yells of his friends in the assault force as they mistook the orc volley for Wulfgar’s distraction and charged the keep door.
The blood drained from Wulfgar’s face, and his stomach fell.
On the center horse, perched high and standing in his stirrups, Tim grinned triumphantly and, pointing at Wulfgar, bellowed in laughter.
“Capture that one! Take him alive!”
Epilog
Darkwind Knightfall sat back in the saddle. It had been an easy morning’s ride from the little village on the edge of the frontier between the lands of King Clive and Wulfgar. He smiled - whatever anyone else said, he wasn’t prepared to give the upstart player the title of “king”. Not until he’d earned it to Darkwind’s satisfaction.
And he’ll have to go through me first, he thought.
“Jay!”
Darkwind looked up at his name; his real name. He usually went by that with other players since it was less of a mouthful than Darkwind Knightfall and, even though he had been in this world for a long time he was still used to answering to the name he’d had since birth on Earth.
He spurred his horse to answer Tim’s summons, then reined in next to the wizard’s mount. He nodded to the general of King Clive’s army.
Tim smiled, “Feel like a little scouting run?”
Jay shrugged, “Sure.”
Tim turned in the saddle and pointed across the river and past a well built stone bridge that forded it, “Head up there. To that little hill on the other side.” He turned and looked back to the knight, “I want to make sure that we aren’t crossing into an ambush.”
Jay nodded and pulled on his helm while once again urging his horse forward. The view through the skull adorned helmet was restricted, but he would be alone.
Better safe than stupid.
He looked to his left, to the south, and then to the north as he crossed the bridge. His horse’s hooves clacked along the stones and accompanied the swirling gurgling of the river rushing beneath. As he reached the far side and once again began moving over grass, he pulled his sword and held it high. Focusing on the blade, he activated his Lightning spell and empowered the weapon with one shot of the spell.
The next thing he hit would be blasted with a level ten lightning bolt in addition to the awesome damage inflicted by the mighty blade. As soon as he’d discovered the Knight Magus path and decided to work his way toward it, he’d practiced his Lightning spell as often as he could. Even without the blade, the spell did a high amount of damage. It had taken work - just about any skill or spell in this world advanced slowly after the first few levels - and he was eager to try his new path’s primary skill for the first time in combat.
He smiled. He almost hoped that there was an ambush on this side of the river.
Leaning forward, he spurred his horse into a gallop and made the top of the hillock that Tim had indicated. There was nothing waiting on the far slope nor was there anything that he could see up the hill in the distance as it climbed to Wulfgar’s village.
He turned his horse through a full circle, looking for any sign of danger, but the area was clear. He sheathed his sword and pulled the reins, stopping the horse facing the river. He waved twice and saw that Tim began moving forward to meet him.
Jay laughed a little. Tim made sure that several of his warriors led the way across the bridge, and that he had several at his back as he crossed. The wizard wasn’t a coward, but he wasn’t stupid. The raid was almost all tank. All heavily mounted and armored warriors. Jay was the highest level but not by much. Tim had chosen seven of his heaviest hitters to accompany him on this scouting mission. A reconnaissance in force, as the army would have said.
Tim had, rightly Jay thought, said that in addition to just seeing the lay of the land the current mission would be valuable in determining the strength of Wulfgar’s forces. They not only wanted to be able to do as much damage as possible, they wanted to make it so that Wulfgar needed to show his order of battle to defeat them.
The had all laughed while drinking at the inn the night before; they might even have enough power to defeat Wulfgar on this raid alone.
Jay doubted that was true, but the other denizens of the inn seemed impressed. One, a rather rotund player sitting with a little old lady and small child, had been especially inquisitive. The guy had passed around a number of bottles of brew he said that he’d made and Jay had to admit, it was the best beer he’d had in this world. The man had also given out an incredibly delectable handful of jerky that had been mouthwatering. Advertising, the man had said, for his food shop in Edonis. Jay had no doubt that he would look up the place after this raid. The food and beer were amazing.
Tim had made a play at recruiting the player, but the man said he didn’t have any combat skills.
Jay shrugged. The recruiting hadn’t been going as well as Tim had hoped it would. There were no more than a couple of dozen players who’d committed so far. If the rumors that Tim’s recruiter, Rydra, had told them were accurate, Wulfgar already had nearly three times that many players in the town. That had disconcerted Tim. Jay had suggested taking everyone on the recon mission, but Tim had felt that the untrained group wouldn’t be able to move quickly enough to make it en masse to Marchstone before resurrection was turned off.
Jay shrugged again. He was going to do everything he could to help King Clive win, but he wasn’t going to lose any sleep if they lost. He was in it for the reward - his war quest had been tied to a level twenty Lightning scroll. A one hundred percent boost in spell power for him. He wanted it, badly, but there was no other real reason he cared about the war. He didn’t particularly like Tim and he didn’t particularly hate Wulfgar. His character sheet showed his Alignment as Chaotic Good and that fit him pretty well, he thought, but he didn’t necessarily see King Clive as good and Wulfgar as bad.
Jay just hoped to have some fun and get a kick-ass reward. He smiled. Chaotic indeed.
He watched as the party regrouped on this side of the bridge. Tim once again took the middle of the loose cloud of mounted warriors. Some of those guys, Jay mused, were true believers. They had been with Tim for a while. Well before this business with Wulfgar anyway.
They had all had a good time the night before relating the first time they’d met Wulfgar and his friends in that very village. How they had been about to wipe the town square with them when a strong cavalry troop of guards had shown up and saved Wulfgar’s ass. Tim had been enthusiastic about how badly Wulfgar’s group would have lost and Jay didn’t doubt it - some of Tim’s guys were proper Abrams tanks. Heavy hitters.
Jay pulled off his helmet as the group reached him. Laying it across the pommel of his saddle, he saluted Tim lightly, “Nothing to report, sir.”
Tim laughed, “I didn’t think there would be. But it’s probably a good idea to play it smart.”
So I would be the only one lost if there was an ambush, thought Jay. Not that he disagreed with the sentiment or begrudged his choice as the sacrificial lamb. Jay probably would have picked himself as well.
He turned his horse and, melting once more into the group, spurred his way up the hill toward Wulfgar’s little kingdom.
As they rode, Jay reflected on the past several days. Tim had constructed a camp outside of the walls of Edonis and begun training
players as they arrived to join the fight. Rydra had told them that Wulfgar was busy building a wall across the only pass that led into the valley, so Tim had decided that his army would train against a wall - the wall around Edonis. Jay admitted that it made sense. They had been busy building siege engines, specifically a helepolis.
That was just a large tower on wheels that could be pushed to a wall. It had been invented by the ancient Greeks and used in the siege of Rhodes around 300 BC. It allowed players cover and protection as they climbed within the tower and reached the height of the wall. They would then be able to shoot down on any defenders as well as jump across the gap and attack the wall-top itself.
Jay doubted the utility of being able to move this beast across the entire kingdom and push it up the mountain and into the pass, but he kept that counsel to himself. Tim was also building and training on the use of basic siege ladders. Those would be much easier to transport to the wall, but would be much more dangerous to use. It required an overwhelming force of attackers to take and hold the walls that way; and since there was no way to prepare the army before resurrection was turned off, each death at the wall was one fewer soldier. It was going to be a tough fight.
They had spent a day learning to form a shield wall. Learning how to kneel and duck behind it as arrows from Edonis’ guards on the wall flew at them. Jay had been surprised at how few of the players actually knew anything about medieval warfare. The training was going to be real, and necessary. It was going to take a while to turn the MMO rabble into anything resembling a functioning army.
It had been fun, though, and even the newbiest of newbs seemed to be enjoying themselves. It was a new experience, a new adventure. Jay had been almost sad to leave the training behind when Tim had pulled his heavy armor away for the recon mission.
As they rode through the kingdom, Tim had obviously enjoyed the notoriety that his new role provided him from player and NPC alike. He seemed to revel in having each of the lowly peasants doff their cap and tug their hair, kneeling, as he passed by. He played the role of the general of King Clive’s army fully and enthusiastically. Jay found it a little off-putting, but not terribly so.
Tim had spent much of the ride speaking to each member of the raiding party, getting to know them better. Jay admitted that the man could be personable when he wanted to, and it didn’t come across as disingenuous. Among themselves, though, each of the group seemed aloof. There wasn’t much talk, especially between Tim’s old guard and the new recruits. That suited Jay fine; he wasn’t really in this to make friends.
Jay reined his horse in from the gentle trot they’d been using to climb the hill into the alpine valley. They were a bow-shot away from a low wall that stretched between two jutting mountains that formed the bookends of the pass.
“That’s it?” laughed Tim derisively. “That’s Wulfgar’s big bad wall?” He turned to look at Jay and the others, smiling.
Jay nodded but thought that the wall, though only a meter tall, was pretty damn good if Wulfgar’s people had only been building it for a week. If they weren’t able to get their army trained and moved in quick order, the fortification would be much larger by the time they got back here with the siege engines.
Movement caught Jay’s eyes. One very tall and several short figures scrambled out of what must be a moat in front of the wall and ran toward the stone keep that centered the pass. They quickly disappeared behind the stone fortress.
“C’mon,” said Tim, spurring his horse forward.
Jay pulled his helm from the pommel and dropped it onto his head. He followed Tim’s horse, spurring his own to overtake the general. As they got nearer the pass, they could see that the wall wasn’t complete, even at its shortened state. The left, southern, side of the wall didn’t extend to the mountain on that side of the pass, so Jay reined his mount in that direction. He intended to keep himself as far away from the little castle as possible.
The group stopped after they crossed to the south of the wall and looked northward, along the fortification. Though only a meter tall at this point, the wall was fronted by an equally deep and wide trench. It looked like the material for the wall was taken from the ground directly in front of it.
Jay nodded in his helm, that was lucky. For Wulfgar. He wouldn’t have to drag the heavy stones to where he needed them, and digging them out of the ground had the added benefit of creating a moat in front of the wall. It was likely to become an impressive fortification. He looked back toward the east, down the hill they’d just climbed.
“This will be kind of a bitch to attack up.”
Tim nodded thoughtfully, “It will. Especially if that wall gets any higher,” he said softly.
Jay looked at Tim, narrowing his eyes. The general’s initial comment on the wall didn’t reveal his true feelings. Tim knew that the wall was going to be difficult. His derision had been for the group. To show no fear. To show no concern. To instill his troops with his own feigned confidence. Smart.
Narcissist or not, Jay thought, Tim has the makings of a leader. He reflected that King Clive had chosen well.
“What do you think?” asked Tim quietly.
Jay grunted, “We’re not in New Hampshire anymore.”
Tim nodded, “Seriously, though.”
“Seriously?” he sighed, “Seriously, this thing could be a nightmare. If we don’t get a lot more recruits, the odds are that we won’t be able to take this wall if it gets much higher. We don’t have a lot of time if this,” he pointed along the pass, “was what Wulfgar was able to build in less than a week.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Tim frowned. He sat back in the saddle and brushed his long, dark hair from his face. “I may just have to rethink my plan. It might be better to get back to Edonis and quickly get everybody moving. Soon. Tomorrow.”
The wizard looked back down the valley, “Even so, it will probably be a week before we can get everyone here in any sort of order. We still have to get our equipment. We need arrows. We need more shields. More pole-arms.”
“The helepolis?” asked Jay.
Tim shook his head, “Useless. Not only is it going to be much too tall, getting it up that hill,” he pointed at the path they’d just climbed, “is going to be too much, I think.” He thought for a moment, “No. We leave that. We’ll bring the ladders though.”
Jay nodded. If nothing else, they would probably be needed to bridge the moat. He pointed back down the hill, “The crest of the climb is within bow range. It’s going to be hard to get everyone advancing up that slope in order. With overlapping shields. Once they reach the flat, it shouldn’t be a problem.”
Tim frowned, “Yeah. The plus, though, is that it will be harder for the archers to hit us as we’re climbing. Assuming we are able to get a good shield wall going. We’ll already be angling up.”
Jay didn’t think the slope was sharp enough to make much of a difference in that regard, but he nodded anyway. Time would tell who was right, and he couldn’t think of anything that anyone could do about it anyway. Except prepare.
“We should probably spend a day or so down the slope. Training the troops in climbing in a shield wall.”
Tim laughed and smacked Jay on the back, “Good damn idea. We’ll do that. Thanks,” he leaned forward in the saddle, “that helped. A lot. I feel a bit better about the problem, now that I know I have guys like you working on it with me.”
“Look!” shouted one of the tanks, further past the wall and sitting on his horse near the base of the southern mountain. He pointed to the north, past the small keep.
Jay looked toward where the warrior was pointing. A column of black smoke rose into the sky, several kilometers distant. From the height of the billowing dark cloud, it had been burning for a while. It was, Jay thought, far too large to be from a campfire. Something of substance and size was burning.
Tim whooped and shouted, “Follow me!” as he spurred his horse in the direction of the fire.
Jay followed, his horse galloping as fa
st as it could. Jay didn’t even notice the desultory arrow or two that came from the keep as they sped past.
“Capture that one! Take him alive!”
Jay looked as Tim stood in the saddle, pointing across the village square at a tall, leather-bound man. He was standing next to a small, blond woman in dark plate armor. He looked to be around two meters tall, with long dark hair and beard. He was built like a warrior, not a rogue magus.
So that’s Wulfgar.
After seeing the smoke rising, the raiding party had ridden as fast as they could toward it. Almost as a single entity, they had leapt their horses over a small stream and pounded around a tanner’s shack and into the center of the small town. There seemed to be nothing to the place. A small, open, dirt covered square centered by a small stone fountain. On the north and south sides of the plaza, half a dozen or so old-English looking buildings faced each other, lining the way that led to the burning inn on the eastern side. Beyond the flaming hotel, a decent sized stone keep rose. It looked to be four or five stories high, with a rectangular base from which the tower rose. The fort looked much more substantive and defensible than the one in the pass.
“We’ve got him!” shouted Tim triumphantly, “We can end this now.” He thrust his hand toward Wulfgar and repeated, “Take him alive!”
Jay spurred his horse again, and it leaped over the fountain and skidded to a halt on the far side. Several of the other tanks took up his flank as he dropped from the saddle and hit the ground, raising a small cloud of clay colored dust. A few light arrows plunged into the dirt at his feet and one bounced off his breastplate. They were too small, too ineffectual for him to be concerned with.
He drew his sword and proffered his shield, inviting the pair to combat. Wulfgar looked tense. Worried. He looked to his left and right.
“You can’t run,” said Jay lightly. “You can only surrender. You can’t defeat me.”
Wulfgar opened his mouth to speak and his eyes blazed in shock as a blade appeared in his mouth, thrusting through between his open teeth. His eyes rolled as he dropped to his knees.
