The plains beyond the mountain pass should have felt like deliverance.
For the Threian column, it was the first clear ground they had seen in weeks ... a sea of golden green grasses waving under a hard blue sky. The wind moved like breath across the land, whispering over the helts of the weary soldiers. Yet to Major Gresham, it felt wrong. The quiet was too clean.
He rode near the vanguard, his horse's hooves crushing brittle stems. Behind him ca the line ... stretched thin and tired. The wagons carrying the wounded rolled slow, creaking under the strain. The Griffon Knights patrolled far above, their shadows sliding over the grass like birds of on.
The Baron of Frost had flown ahead at dawn to scout what is up ahead of the column. That left Gresham command of the column for the day. He had ordered his n to stay alert, but fatigue dulled everything.
They had been marching for hours when his Lieutenant approached, reins slack in one hand.
"Ground's too quiet," he said. "Even the carrion birds are gone."
Gresham nodded grimly. "I feel it too."
He looked over the plain ... endless, rippling, almost beautiful. A perfect place for an ambush, his mind whispered. Yet where could an enemy hide in such open land?
Unseen by either of them, the grasses ahead were already alive with waiting shapes.
*****
The fallen orcs had returned.
Two nights before, they had crawled from their defeat at the hands of the Griffon Knights ... not in body, but in will. The Baron's frost had shattered their warlocks, but not all the corrupted had perished. Those who survived the rout had dragged themselves through the lands, broken, wounded, and burned, carried by hatred more than life.
Now they crouched among the tall grass, their armor blackened with soot, their skin stitched with ritual scars that pulsed faintly in the dark. There were thousands of them .... remnants of once-mighty bands, united by vengeance.
Their leader, a massive brute with a jaw half-seared from frostbite, spat onto the dirt. "We strike the center," he growled in their guttural tongue. "Crush the wagons. Cut their throats as they burn."
At his signal, the fallen orcs slid their crude blades free ... curved, chipped, but hungry. They waited as the Threian column approached, their breath slow and even.
The Griffons were high above, wings catching the sunlight ... too distant to see the threat crouched beneath the grass. The wind's whisper hid the faint clink of tal.
And then, as the first wagon reached the heart of the plain, the world erupted.
*****
The ground split with a roar.
Dark forms surged from the golden sea of grass, screaming curses in a tongue that burned the air. Spears hissed upward in black volleys, tearing through the first ranks. Horses reared. n shouted. The column buckled in panic.
Gresham wheeled his horse, drawing his sword even as a javelin flew past his head. "CONTACT FRONT!" he bellowed. "SHIELDS UP! FORM LINE!"
But there was no ti. The fallen orcs had sprung up in the center of the column, where the wounded were carried ... where the line was weakest.
Flaming projectiles arced through the air, bursting among the wagons. Canvas ignited, spreading fire and smoke. The wounded scread ... so trapped beneath collapsing fras. The sll of burning flesh and pitch rolled across the plain.
"Protect the wagons!" Gresham shouted, spurring his horse forward. A group of infantry rallied to him, forming a rough wall of shields as the orcs crashed in.
It was slaughter. The orcs fought with an inhuman frenzy ... no formation, only speed and hate. Their blades were sharp and short, ant for close killing, and every swing left streaks of red in the grass.
A wounded man tried to crawl from a burning wagon. An orc seized him by the leg and drove a cleaver into his back before Gresham's sword split the creature's skull. Blood sprayed across his visor. He ripped it free, his breath ragged.
"Hold the line!" he shouted again, voice cracking. "FOR THREIA!"
The soldiers answered .... so screaming, so sobbing, but they fought. Spears stabbed through the smoke, piercing orc throats. Shields locked, and for a mont the Threians held.
Then ca the drums.
From the western side, more orcs appeared ... reinforcents pouring behind the cover of the tall grasses, painted in ash and blood. They rushed forward with haste, roaring, and the Threian flank began to collapse.
Gresham's heart sank. "Where in the hell are the Knights?"
Above, faint at first, ca the sound of wings.
*****
The Griffons broke through the cloud bank like a storm given flesh.
The Baron of Frost led the dive, his sceptre blazing with ice. He saw the chaos below .... the fire, the wounded, the circle of orcs closing on the column's heart .... and fury hardened his voice.
"Down!" he roared.
More than ten pair of wings cut the sky. Griffons plunged like spears of white and silver, their riders unleashing magic that froze the very wind. The first wave of orcs shattered under impact .... bodies crushed or hurled through the air by bursts of frost.
The Baron landed in the thick of it, his sceptre swinging in a blur. Each strike left trails of ri that spread across flesh and iron. An orc lunged at him ... he caught its blade with the tip of his weapon, then impaled it through the chest before bursting magic through his body. Steam rose as the corpse froze solid.
"Rally to the Baron!" Gresham shouted, hacking through another foe.
The Knights dismounted, forming a ring around the wagons. The wounded were dragged free from the flas, wrapped in torn cloaks, while soldiers and griffons fought side by side.
But the fallen orcs would not break. They hurled themselves forward again and again, heedless of loss. Each ti they fell, more rose behind them.
One Griffon Knight was pulled down, his mount shrieking as blades pierced its belly. The Baron turned, saw it, and unleashed a storm. A cyclone of frost swept through the attackers, freezing dozens mid-stride. The wind scread, and shards of frozen grass whirled like knives.
Still, the orcs ca.
They surged against the Threian line, pressing toward the burning wagons. Gresham fought until his sword arm went numb, until his horse collapsed beneath him. He rose, bleeding, and found himself face to face with the seared-jawed orc leader.
The creature grinned, teeth black with soot. "You die slow," it hissed in broken tongue.
Gresham swung. The orc parried, countered, and slamd him to the ground. A dagger flashed down ... and stopped short as a blade tore through the orc's chest from behind.
The Baron wrenched his weapon free, frost blooming across the corpse. "Get up, Major."
Gresham staggered to his feet. "I thought they were finished."
"So did I." The Baron's eyes were cold as steel. "Hatred has a way of surviving the impossible."
He turned toward the remaining orcs. The Griffon Knights regrouped, forming a wedge. "We end this now."
They advanced.
*****
The final clash was a storm of madness.
The Baron's sceptre swept arcs of pale light through the smoke. Knights fought with spell and iron, conjuring walls of ice that turned to shrapnel under impact. Griffons dived low, ripping apart stragglers with beak and claw.
When the frost cleared, the field was unrecognizable .... a wasteland of trampled grass, frozen corpses, and smoking wagons. The survivors of the Threian column stood in clusters, trembling, weapons slick with blood.
The Baron moved among them silently, searching the bodies. There were no more orcs moving .... only the wind through the dead stalks.
Gresham limped beside him, his armor dented and stained. "How many did we lose?"
"Too many," the Baron said. "Half the wounded. A dozen more in the fight. And three of my Knights."
Gresham exhaled, his breath misting. "If you hadn't arrived…"
"You'd have joined the rest," the Baron finished quietly. "But we held."
He looked north, where the plains stretched toward the horizon. "They'll co again, Major. And next ti, they'll be ready for both of us."
The sun sank, painting the field in red and gold .... the color of fire, blood, and dying light.
Gresham closed his eyes. "Then we march before dark."
The Baron nodded. "Yes. We march."
He mounted his griffon, the beast's feathers still flecked with ash. The surviving Knights took to the air once more, circling the battered column.
Below them, the dead lay thick in the grass .... Threian and orc alike .... the plain drinking their blood in silence.
And as the wind passed over that place, it whispered the mory of the fallen ... a promise that the plains would rember that the fallen would always seek vengeance.
*****
They had been there long before dawn .... the Verakhs, standing like monunts against the paling sky.
To the Threians and the orcs dying below, they were ghosts on the horizon: a line of unmoving silhouettes at the edge of the plains, black against the morning light. But to themselves, they were witnesses. Observers.
Their armor was of fine tal — dark plates etched with no sigils or any markingt. Their faces were hidden beneath smooth helms.
The wind dragged ash and smoke from the battlefield across their ranks, carrying with it the scent of burning flesh. None of them flinched.
Below, chaos had begun.
The fallen orcs had burst from the tall grasses like a flood of shadows, and the Threian column had folded into panic and fire. Screams echoed faintly up the slope, distorted by distance. The Verakhs watched it all with perfect stillness.
At the center of the formation stood theirs. His eyes fully focused on the chaos in the distance.
"Observe, and watch the fallen, it won't be long before we will have to fight them," he intoned, his voice low, almost mournful.
"The cycle renews itself again. Blood follows fear, fear births rage, rage returns to dust."
A second Verakh, younger in voice but no less solemn, stepped forward slightly. Her na was Issariel, once a scholar among their kind. The faint hum from her armor deepened as she replied.
"It is as before, Keeper. They kill without understanding. Their gods sleep, and yet they fight in their nas."
Vael Kareth inclined his head, the faintest movent.
"And still they dream of victory. Even as they die in the mud."
Below, a wagon exploded ... fire blooming upward like a flower of ruin. The Verakhs could see it all with inhuman clarity: the wounded burning inside, the Threian soldiers charging into the flas to drag them free, the fallen orcs cutting them down in turn. From this height, it looked like a tapestry of violence stitched in red and smoke.
For a long while, no one spoke. The only sound was the wind, sighing through the grass.
****
The Verakhs gaze lingered on the field below. The Griffon Knights had arrived now ... streaks of silver and frost cutting through the chaos. They recognized the Baron's weapon, the way it shattered the orcs like brittle clay. To them, it was not heroism. It was desperation given form.
"That one fights as if he would freeze the world to keep his dead warm," a young warrior murmured.
"He has already lost too much," the Captain replied. "Humans are creatures of grief before they are creatures of hope."
"Should we not aid them, Captain? The orcs are remnants .... twisted by the sa rot that devoured most of the tribes. If the Threians fall, they will be next."
The Captain did not answer at once.
"We are not their saviors, nor are they our allies" he said softly. "We are watchers. This is their fight. They must learn what we did not."
"And if they fail?"
"Then the wind will bury their nas beside ours."
****
Below them, the battle reached its peak.
The Threians had ford a circle around their burning wagons, the Baron's frost magic colliding with the orcs' fire. The air shimred where heat and cold t, bending the light into phantom shapes. Screams rose and fell like waves.
A Verakh on the left flank ....a veteran of many skirmishes — tilted his head. "Their commander bleeds. See how he still calls his n to hold line even as the ground drinks his blood. Why do they cling so hard to survival?"
The Captain replied, "Because they still believe life is theirs to own."
Soone gave a sound like a dry chuckle. "And you pity them for that?"
"I envy them," he said, "They get to fight a good battle."
The Verakhs turned their attention to the wounded, who crawled from the wreckage only to be cut down. The fallen orcs did not kill cleanly. They tore and broke, shrieking praise to their demon masters long drowned in their own filth. It was butchery.
One orc looked away from his slate. "If this is the pattern, then it is madness that drives creation."
The Captain answered, "Madness is creation's shadow. Both are necessary. Without ruin, there can be no beginning."
The land trembled faintly as the Baron unleashed his final spell ... a storm of frost that swallowed the orcs whole. From above, the Verakhs watched the transformation: flesh turning to crystal, blood hardening into rubies in the ice. The silence that followed was vast, absolute.
For a mont, the entire plain glowed blue-white in the dawn. Then the wind carried the ash away.
*****
When the fighting ended, the Threian survivors gathered their dead. Smoke rose in thin pillars from the burning wagons. The Griffon Knights circled above, their cries echoing faintly across the emptiness.
Below, the Baron of Frost mounted his griffon and took flight. His shadow swept across the field, passing briefly over the ridge. For the smallest heartbeat, it seed he sensed them .... his head turned, eyes narrowing toward the distance. But there was nothing to see.
Only the empty ridge and the whispering wind.
The Verakhs did not move, though several of them murmured softly, the old tongue curling like smoke in the air.
The Verakhs watched as the Threian column began to move again ..... slow, broken, leaving behind the dead in neat rows. From above, it looked like a scar stretching across the land.
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