The Princes surely knew they were coming now, and it had the nation in a tizzy. Word had spread that tens of thousands of undead had been destroyed, their necromancer masters reduced to dust, and several minor nobles revealed as vampires or ghouls or wights themselves, to boot! The word spread across the entire nation, and while the noble wizards were frightened and rather united by this lethal threat that dared to kill them in their towers, necromancers or not, their subjects and the common folk were pretty much united in massive approval for whoever was doing this.
And, as was pointed out with grim satisfaction, over and over, there was no law against killing the undead, and wizards killed wizards all the ti. If a week went by without soone to bla, the matter was dropped as if forgotten by the governnt, and friends and families were the only ones who could avenge the fallen.
Not many were willing to avenge the undead, even if they were relatives.
House Caergard and House Bulgarov made loud and impressive noises about terrorist attacks, murderers, and criminals, and made points of preparing their personal forces for direct attack.
More pointedly, the Princes who had Banners of troops under the command of Morphail and Cannarl urgently had them returning ho, before such could be commandeered and turned into sacrifices for the ambitions of the two necromancer Houses.
Whispers were that Delpha had heard of the significance of the Radiance and dispatched wizards to terrorize them. Others were that a sacred band of warriors of Quarzion in one of His many forms had finally beco overco with outrage and embarked on a holy quest in Zanzyr to purge the undead from existence, not caring if the magocracy outlawed them. The fact glimpses of folk raising Symbols radiating blessed sunlight had been seen did nothing to ease the mindsets of the Princes.
Kicking out individual Clerics and bullying them was all well and good, but going directly against the will and mortal forces of a truly powerful Immortal? That was suicide, and they knew it. One of the truly major churches could declare a crusade and probably wipe Zanzyr off the map, and succoring so many undead was like a pri invitation for sothing like that to happen!
The neighbors of Zanzyr stirred, particularly the dwarves of Rukheim and the Golden Khanate of Tukhman, both of which had extrely poor relationships with the magocracy. Many dwarves had not forgotten the treatnt of their kin during the Years of Infamy, and seeing virtual civil war rocking the realm of wizards was truly a delight. Even knowing the truth of the plagues and the fact they’d spread it had only served to take so of the edge off the hate and assign that guilt where it was due. The Zanzyrans had done absolutely nothing to blunt the edge of their enmity themselves, save for the Elves of Erendyl, who had carefully allowed Rukheim trade caravans into their Principality.
The savage nomad horsen of the high plains were god-fearing warriors and spirit-serving priests in numbers, who regarded the Immortal-defying magocracy as a great cancerous blot on the land to be expunged at all costs. The Golden Khan had ambitions of conquest, it was true, believing his n were the most dangerous and lethal ard force on the planet. Crushing the people of Zanzyr under the hooves of their mounts was among the most fervent dreams of many a Tukhman.
The House of Bulgarov held the most northeastern of the Zanzyran lands, closest to the Tukhman plains and thus the most vulnerable to invasion from that angle, while Caergard and Lhamsa held the eastern border with the Titanhall mountains. The border had been made much more dangerous over the decades by sealing off pass after pass from easy access by horse or even by foot, resulting in very few avenues the nomads or nifloids of the mountains could use to invade. Those were always well-defended by the spell-ard soldiers of Zanzyr, and strong fortifications controlling access through the rugged hills and mountains which surrounded the countries.
The nomads were nothing if not opportunistic, and being horsen, could move with frightening speed when mobilized. In seemingly no ti at all, thousands of horseman had ridden into the ancestral lands of the Guyagai tribe and were threatening to move into Skullhorn Pass, so nad because of the thousands of nifloid and nomad skulls hung on spikes on the walls of the pass over the decades after bloody battles to take it and maintain control of it. The sound of the wind going through the skulls could be heard for miles, and naturally there were rumors about spells wound into the skulls to cause fear and the like.
So were even true.
The House of Lhamsa shared the obligation with Caergard to maintain control over the Titanhalls, and Fort Skullhorn was the main gathering of strength there, although there were several secondary camps all along the Pass that could be used as fallback points.
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The nomads stirred at a safe distance. Safe, because one group of overeager riders had charged up at the elfin having tea under the sun, and the sky had fallen in on them and reduced all of them and their horses to ash and dust under the cool mountain skies, along with a couple acres of scrub grass and stone.
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The teors looking like great flaming black skulls falling from the sky with marrow-chilling screams had been kind of impressive too, if they way the surviving nomads ran away was any indication.
They’d shot a volley of arrows at her, remarkably accurate and powerful, from distances of over two hundred yards. Indeed, it was uncanny just how accurate those shots were, scarcely any of them missing.
Then those arrows had co hurtling back nearly twice as fast as they’d gone out, burying themselves in the chest and faces of the shooters, swatting them out of their saddles. Over two hundred more nomads had died instantly to their own arrows turning back on them. Multiple shots, because they were good archers and had several arrows in the air at once!
“I am the Lady Edge, and I am awaiting the Golden Khan,” I announced to all and sundry within three miles, and in their own tongue, taught by clansn of Lhamsa at the Great School, as I raised an artful porcelain cup to my lips. “Please do not disturb my tea. It might be fatal.”
The scouts milled about uncertainly, but decided that trying to ride past might be extrely unwise… especially after a small group tried stealing past on the extre north side of the Pass.
Four Thunderbolts of blood-red lightning leaving black afterimages and shrieking like banshees ca down out of the sky and obliterated all of them, well over half a mile away from .
I totally ignored them, shaded by the umbrella of my table, enjoying the mountain breeze when it wasn’t cut by the stench of the grease-covered and very unwashed horsen.
I was patient, and the horsen moved quickly. The Khan was less than an hour behind his advance wave, expecting reach Skullcatcher Gorge at the least before eting real resistance. Zanzyr didn’t have anywhere near the troops required to mount any offense against the horse archers, and so would have to defend against an invasion.
Granted, the defense of a place with so many wizards could be extrely costly to any invading forces, but I was definitely an outlier. Defending by sipping tea and not appearing to be Casting any magic at all, although elves were known spellcasters, was definitely making them nervous.
Blood-red lightning and falling flaming skulls were definitely sothing to give the superstitious nomads second thoughts, and the shamanic Priests among them asking the spirits about were only going to get reverent or fearful replies… maybe ardent hatred from the evil ones who wanted to encourage them to attack and get themselves offed, who could say?
I was patient, and the spells had durations of hours and to dawn respectively for the lightning and the arrows. I could bring down a dozen teor Skull-Swarms if I had need to, which would also be extrely impressive, but they weren’t my really impressive attack.
A dozen Shards each Chained out through another two dozen nomads in unerring streams of energy and death from violent Kicker damage capable of killing three hundred of them per spell, almost guaranteed, was far more dangerous here. But they didn’t need to know that until they died from it, so I was going to keep it under wraps for now.
So, like that, sipping tea in the sun under a sun umbrella, I waited for a fellow who considered himself the greatest warrior in the world, and his n the greatest army.
It only took about an hour, while the army of Tukhman nomads flooded into the pass and began filling it from one side to the other. The ground around was blasted white, the n killed by their own arrow fire still laying there, their own people indifferent to their fate or disposal of their bodies. The couple of Priests who’d tried to stealthily Dispel saw the angry red Skull trailing lightning co down out of the heavens, blowing open the vault of the blue sky to starry night for a mont, and then descend on them screaming vengeance, blasting the priests, their mounts, and any riders around them into bloody bits that soon Burned unwhite upon the charred ground, with bloody red rose petals scattered all around.
They never saw raise a hand. The spirits of this place were making the shamans shudder when they tried to cajole the spirits into action against … and the Elentals and Fey were having absolutely none of that action.
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The Golden Khan ca up, his armor all gilded, accompanied both by marching dwarves in gleaming silvered steel and his elite multi-tribal band of riders and personal guards. They ca marching up without stopping, the other horsen shifting quickly out of the way of them. The Khan was obviously not going to be showing any weakness before his n at this auspicious mont of ti, especially to an elf and a female, at that!
I watched him co, doing nothing more than moving the pot of tea from the table to a heating rock, which rapidly reddened with heat under his gaze.
He reined in about thirty feet away from , his dark eyes eting my gaze with imperious power… and I drank it in and consud it utterly, completely unimpressed with him, while at the sa ti very, very obviously taking the complete asure of him and letting him know it.
If he had chosen to remain mounted and sidled up to the table, I would have remained seated and been ready to reduce the surrounding acreage to ash in a second. Instead, he reined in his strong white pony with the immaculate black mane and swung out of the saddle. A grunt and his hand held back his guards, and as he stepped forward, I finally rose to greet him.
“Your Majesty Hiangti,” I greeted him coolly. “Captain Hoofcracker.” Two chairs of white stone rose from the ashen ground and shaped themselves into floating seats for the two of them. The dwarven commander of the footn there, looking very suspicious at hearing call his na, shared a glance with the Khan looking back at him. “I am the Lady Edge. If you would be kind enough to share so tea with , I think I can save all of you so ti and troubles.”
A glance from the Khan was enough to allow the dwarf to join us. Both the squat but powerfully-built Tukhman nomad and the stout dwarf glared suspiciously at the chairs… but the one was the perfect height for the forr, and the other dropped to the perfect height for the latter.
Unwilling to show any weakness before or their troops, both n took their seats imdiately.
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