Chapter 33

  Lord Grohl, the acting head of the Gray Lords, stood on the outer curtain wall of the fortress of Felswacht and stared into the hazy gray of the southwest. The Baron was a man with the stature of a siege tower, his beard as wiry and gray as the stone his ancestors had hewn this fortress from. He held the dispatch, which had arrived barely an hour ago via an exhausted mounted messenger from Drymon, firmly in his gloved hand. The seal of House Sothar had already been broken.

  Behind him, his brother came stomping up. Borin was the younger of the two, but he possessed a breadth of shoulder that almost put Grohl in the shade, earning him the paradoxical family nickname "little, big brother." Borin wore his heavy plate armor with such ease it seemed like a second skin, but the metallic clatter of his steps betrayed his restlessness.

  "More paper from the capital," Borin grunted, leaning against the battlements beside his brother. He spat over the edge of the wall into the deep abyss below. "You’d think Thivan Sothar would have enough to do sweeping his own front door instead of giving us dictates on how to garrison our walls. Reinforce the southwest flank. Double the patrol intervals. It’s always the same with these city folk."

  Grohl shot his brother a brief, annoyed sideways glance. "It’s not a suggestion, Borin. It’s a royal command. And it’s not as if the warning came out of thin air. If the reports about the Scar-Horde are true, then the Orcs aren't just out for plunder. This is a migration with axes."

  Borin snorted contemptuously and crossed his massive arms over his chest. "Commands. I don’t like the word. We are the Gray Lords. We’ve held this pass for generations without someone in a silk chair in Drymon having to tell us where to place our guards. This constant interference rubs me the wrong way. We reinforce our defenses because we deem it right, not because a Sothar has a bad gut feeling."

  "You’re acting as if this cooperation is a one-sided humiliation," Grohl countered calmly, carefully folding the dispatch and tucking it into his belt. "I hate to remind you, Borin, but you were the one who signed the unification of the Border Houses with the Crown just as I did. You placed your rune on the parchment before my ink was even dry."

  Borin grumbled something unintelligible into his beard and looked away, out toward the barren plains where the wind drove the dust before it. "That was a political necessity, and you know it. Stability had to be secured."

  "It was a commitment," Grohl corrected. "And now the Crown is calling in that commitment. We are part of the realm, whether it fits your pride or not. Thivan isn't sending us orders to annoy us, but to ensure the Scar-Horde doesn't simply march through our living room while we’re arguing over who’s in charge."

  Borin turned back to him, a mischievous, if slightly provocative, glint in his eyes. "Oh, come on, Grohl. Be honest. You’re only this obedient because Sothar’s sister has your daughter so completely wrapped around her finger. Those two have been inseparable, writing letters and hatching plans for God knows what. You don’t want to sour things with the relatives."

  Grohl paused. He knit his brow into deep furrows and looked at his brother with a mix of confusion and genuine incomprehension. "What?" he asked dryly. "What is that supposed to mean? Do you think my daughter loves another woman?"

  Borin stared at him aghast for a moment, then burst out laughing. The laughter echoed off the stone walls of the fortress. "What? No! By the ancestors, Grohl, that’s not it at all! How did you come up with such nonsense?"

  "You said she had her wrapped around her finger," Grohl defended himself, his voice becoming a touch more defensive. "In my day, that meant either magic or a very specific kind of affection."

  "That’s not what I meant," Borin said, wiping tears from the corners of his eyes. "I meant political influence, you old blockhead. The Princess talks your daughter into believing the Gray Lords must be the shining heroes of Caleon, and then your daughter comes to you and chews your ear off until you sign everything that comes out of Drymon. It’s about flattery, friendship, and how they get us to do the dirty work while making us feel important."

  Grohl visibly relaxed, though the confusion hadn't quite left his face. "You express yourself very strangely sometimes, Borin. My daughter and the Princess are friends. They share an interest in the administration and history of the realm. It’s not a conspiracy, it’s just... well, a connection."

  "A connection that’s now earning us extra guard duty in the rain," Borin muttered, though the biting undertone had vanished. He slapped his brother’s shoulder plate, producing a dull, metallic thud. "Fine. If the Orcs come, they’ll find that the stone of the Gray Lords doesn't splinter so easily, no matter who gave the order to guard it."

  "They will," Grohl agreed. "And we won’t be alone. If Thivan keeps his word, the first units from Ironbrand should be here soon. We need their firepower if the Horde is truly as large as this Maira reported to the King."

  "House Ironbrand," Borin made a face. "Hotheads. Everywhere they go, it smells of burnt hair and sulfur. But I’ll admit, their flamethrowers are useful when dealing with an Orc tribe that has more limbs than brains."

  The two brothers stood in silence on the wall for a while. The dialogue had ended, as it often did with them, in a kind of peaceful truce. They knew each other too well to argue long over orders or pride when a real threat lurked on the horizon.

  "Do you think the Scar-Horde is truly that dangerous?" Borin asked after a while, this time without any mockery. "Orcs are tough, but we’ve beaten back tribes before."

  "The reports say they are united this time," Grohl answered gravely. "No internal feuds, no fights over succession. They are following a call. When Orcs stop smashing each other's heads and start marching, we have a problem. Reyn seems to be pulling the strings in the background, and that makes things complicated."

  Borin nodded slowly. "A mage controlling Orcs. Just what we needed."

  At that moment, a deep horn signal sounded from the southern watchtower. It wasn't an alarm, but the rhythmic signal for arriving allies. Grohl and Borin straightened up and looked down at the pass road that wound through the jagged rocks up to the fortress.

  First, there was only the dust, then the glint of polished copper and brass in the pale sun. A column of soldiers in the distinct red-and-gold armor of House Ironbrand moved with discipline up the slope. Officers on heavily armored horses rode at the front, followed by heavy wagons carrying the notorious flame projectors and mana tanks. Finally, the golems appeared, their hands ending in fire. It was an impressive sight that momentarily filled the barren landscape with color.

  "There they are," said Grohl. "Punctual, I’ll give them that."

  "And they brought the big toys," Borin added, eyeing the heavy artillery on the wagons. "Maybe it won't be such a boring month as I thought."

  The vanguard of the Ironbrand reinforcement reached the outer gate. The unit commander, a man with a conspicuous red helmet plume, raised his hand in greeting as he spotted the two Barons on the wall.

  Grohl gave a brief nod in return. He felt the tension in his shoulders ease slightly, but he remained vigilant. The Gray Lords were no longer alone, but the arrival of Ironbrand was only the first step. The Horde was still out there somewhere in the wastes, and the true test for their walls and their alliance was yet to come.

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  "Come," Grohl said to his brother. "We should receive them. I want to know how much ammunition they really have and how quickly their firewalkers are ready for action."

  "And I want to know if they at least brought some decent ale from the south," Borin grinned. "If we're fighting for the King, we won't do it with dry throats."

  The two brothers turned away and descended the stone stairs to the inner courtyard of the fortress. The wind continued to blow cold from the southwest, but the clatter of arriving armor and the murmur of soldiers gave Felswacht a new, bustling energy. The defense was set. The alliance held. For now, there was nothing left to do but prepare for what was to come.

  -

  The Night-Howler let out a deep, mechanical growl; sweat ran into Sk?ll’s eyes, and the adrenaline that had whipped him through the battle for hours began to turn into a leaden, burning fatigue.

  He could feel it in the movements of the pack. The forty-six golems that had charged across the field like young hounds at the start of the battle had lost six of their comrades. Four had been crushed by the force of the Titans, and two more had collapsed under the sheer weight of the Dragon-kin infantry after their joints were jammed with explosive bolts. The remaining forty machines now acted more cautiously. The lust for the hunt had given way to a cold, grim instinct for survival. The first rush of killing was over; the bloodlust was stilled, not by satisfaction, but by exhaustion.

  The golems had now positioned themselves in a defensive wedge formation before the main gate of Fortress Wolfsgrund. They still dominated the battlefield, a ring of steel and mana against which the waves of Dragon-kin and stone monsters shattered. While the betrayal of the Heartfire Legion had momentarily disrupted order, the men of Wolfsgrund had adapted. They were now fighting with their backs to the wall, and a wolf defending its den is far more methodical than one on the hunt.

  Sk?ll saw through the Night-Howler’s optical sensors as a group of Dragon-kin attempted to bypass the left flank. He threw a lever, and the golem spun around with a speed that seemed unnatural for a machine of its size. The hydraulic shock absorbers hissed as the Night-Howler shifted its weight. With a fluid motion, Sk?ll swung the heavy plasma blade of the right arm in a wide arc. Three legionaries were simply swept aside, their shields shattered under the kinetic force.

  “Hold the line!” his father’s voice, Burnar, boomed over the comms. The Iron-Bite stood only a few meters away, its armor blackened by soot and marked by deep furrows, yet the Baron’s movements remained precise and relentless. “Don’t let them get to the weak points of the joints! Activate infantry-defense mode!”

  Sk?ll obeyed instantly. He switched the internal cooling systems to maximum power to counteract the overheating of the mana cores. The Night-Howler’s sensors showed him a tangle of heat signatures and movement patterns. He saw the remaining Titans—those massive constructs of rock and arcane gold—slowly retreating. They no longer attacked directly but kept a safe distance, as if they were waiting for something.

  The battlefield before the fortress was a picture of devastation. Wrecks of golems, carcasses of Dragon-kin, and the debris of Titans lay scattered everywhere. The ground was plowed so deep that walking was nearly impossible for normal soldiers, but the multi-ton machines simply stamped the mud firm.

  Sk?ll felt a deep vibration in his seat. It wasn’t an impact, but a rhythmic pounding coming from the distance. He zoomed his optical sensors toward the end of the plateau, where the ground was still cracked and glowing. Reyn, that shadow-weaver, stood up there on a ledge—his figure small and unassuming against the chaos of battle, yet his influence was palpable everywhere.

  “They are retreating, Father,” Sk?ll reported, firing another salvo from the shoulder cannons at a charging group of Outcasts. “The Legion is reorganizing behind the hill, and the Titans aren't moving. Have we broken them?”

  “A Wolfsgrund doesn’t believe in breaking until the enemy’s throat is bitten through, Sk?ll,” Burnar replied dryly. “They are gathering. Reyn didn’t come here to fight a few golems in the mud. He has a goal, and we are just the obstacle.”

  Sk?ll took a deep breath. He checked the Night-Howler’s status displays. Energy reserves were at sixty percent, ballistic launcher ammunition was almost depleted, but the plasma blades were functioning perfectly. He felt as if he had merged with the machine. Every groan of the metal was like a tug in his own limbs.

  Despite the exhaustion, the dominance of the forty golems was undeniable. The Dragon-kin had realized they stood no chance against the steel wolves in the open field. Their flamethrowers could only singe the thick composite armor on the surface, and their spears bounced off the arcane shields. The betrayal had led to losses, but the pack's morale remained unbroken. They were defending their home, and in this state, every pilot was prepared to push their machine to the point of self-destruction.

  Sk?ll watched as a Bear-golem in the second row caught a falling boulder with its bare hand and hurled it back into the enemy ranks. A brief moment of triumph flashed in Sk?ll’s mind, but he suppressed it immediately. A wolf could not afford to be careless.

  “Sk?ll, do you see that?” Burnar asked suddenly. There was a new nuance in his voice—not fear, but a heightened state of alertness.

  Sk?ll pivoted the Night-Howler’s sensors to the east, toward where Reyn stood. The mage had raised his arms. He held no weapon, no staves, nothing. Yet the air around him began to distort. It wasn't a magical glow, but a purely physical displacement, like heat shimmering over a hot pavement.

  “He’s drawing another card,” Sk?ll muttered grimly.

  Behind Reyn, from the deep fissures in the ground left by the Titans, no new giant emerged. Instead, the earth began to sink over a wide radius. It wasn't a collapse, but a controlled descent, like a massive elevator platform. And from the depths came a sound that made the hair on Sk?ll’s neck stand up—a metallic scraping, amplified a thousandfold, sounding like iron grinding on stone.

  The Dragon-kin legionaries, who had been standing indecisively on the field, immediately began to disperse to the left and right, forming a wide lane. They clearly knew this maneuver. They were making room for something far more massive than anything that had appeared on the field so far.

  “Pack! Formation ‘Iron Wall’!” Burnar roared over the radio. “Close ranks! Shoulder to shoulder! Now!”

  The forty golems reacted like a single organism. The heavy machines stomped toward each other, interlocking their shields and anchoring their massive feet deep into the ground. It was a wall of forty-ton steel blocks that now almost completely sealed the entrance to Fortress Wolfsgrund.

  Sk?ll positioned the Night-Howler directly next to the Iron-Bite. He could feel the heat shimmer from his father’s engines through the armor. He kept his plasma blade lowered, ready for the next assault. He no longer looked at the Titans or the Dragon-kin. His entire focus was on the platform that had now almost reached the level of the battlefield.

  Reyn took a step back, almost as if to make way for what he had summoned from below. He looked small and fragile next to the dark opening in the ground, but the smirk, which could only be guessed at from this distance, spoke volumes.

  From the darkness of the pit, long, jagged metal outriggers first pushed forward. They looked like the legs of a gigantic spider but were crafted from the same dark, crude iron as the siege towers of ancient wars. Then followed the main body—a massive, flat block of metal and stone, upon whose top heavy ballistae and catapults were mounted, already manned. It wasn't a creature; it was a mobile fortress, a siege tank of such absurd proportions that it seemed to fill the entire plateau.

  Three of these behemoths pushed out of the earth one after another. They had no wheels; they moved forward on dozens of mechanical legs that simply crushed the ground beneath them. The Dragon-kin did not cheer; they fell into an awed silence as they reformed behind the flanks of these giants.

  Sk?ll felt the fatigue in his bones momentarily displaced by a cold clarity. This was no longer a simple fight against wild beasts or titanic piles of stone. This was mechanized warfare on a scale Wolfsgrund had never seen.

  “Those are Reyn’s Siege-Crabs,” Burnar said over the comms, and his voice was now so calm it was almost frightening. “He had them built. He’s not just drawing cards, Sk?ll. He’s playing a different game entirely.”

  “Let them come,” Sk?ll replied, tightening his grip on the controls. His heart beat steady and firm. “We are wolves. We’ll bite through iron too, if we have to.”

  The golems of Wolfsgrund stood firm, a lonely wall of steel against the dark backdrop of their home. The three Siege-Crabs began to move slowly, the mechanical scraping of their legs now drowning out every other sound on the battlefield. Reyn still stood on his ledge, arms crossed, watching as his new card dominated the field.

  The moment of defense had begun. There was no more hunting, no more charging. There was only holding the line against an overwhelming force of steel and stone. Sk?ll activated the targeting system for the crabs and waited for the first salvo to hit. He knew this fight would go to the last drop of oil and the last spark of mana. Wolfsgrund would not yield.

  The first Siege-Crab emitted a dark cloud of smoke as its steam pressure rose. The catapults on its back were winched tight. Reyn had made his next move, and the battlefield before Wolfsgrund held its breath for a tiny, terrible moment.

  “Get ready,” Burnar commanded.

  Sk?ll nodded inside his cockpit, even though no one could see it. The Night-Howler growled softly, ready to meet iron with iron.