The fall of Wexholm rippled across the countryside like thunder rolling over distant peaks. Its capture shattered the backbone of the Western nobility. Lesser barons and viscounts, once proud behind their walls, now bent knee before Renard's banners rather than risk the prince's wrath.
Castles surrendered without bloodshed. Gates opened to the royal host. Oaths were sworn anew, not out of love for the crown but out of the fear etched into their hearts after Wexholm's fate. Within a fortnight, the prince's authority spread like a storm cloud over the valleys and rivers of the west.
Yet conquest did not mean peace.
For in the shadow of every crumbled banner, a man named Marvin still lingered.
The Duke's grand tactician, renowned for victories against Kandaria in his youth, now turned his brilliance to war in the dark. With only fifteen thousand battered soldiers left under the Duke's banner, Marvin understood he could not meet Renard in an open field. Instead, he bled the royal army with the skill of a surgeon cutting vein by vein.
At dawn, horsemen would descend from the forests, setting fire to foraging parties. By midday, armoured bands struck the baggage trains, slitting oxen and scattering supplies into rivers. At dusk, a rain of arrows fell from unseen ridges, and then silence reclaimed the hills before the royal knights could give chase.
For seven days, this pattern repeated.
By the week's end, the Crown Prince's army had lost nearly a thousand men—slain in ambushes, crushed in night raids, or simply gone missing, stragglers dragged off into the wilderness. Morale faltered. Soldiers muttered darkly around campfires. Whispers spread of Marvin's genius, that the old fox was invincible, that the west itself fought for him.
Even seasoned knights began to glance nervously into the woods when marching. The army slowed to a crawl, harried, exhausted, demoralised.
It was then that Aleric Deryn stepped forward.
On the eighth day, after yet another raid crippled a supply convoy, Count Rick and Marquis Brandford debated furiously in the command tent. Some argued to split forces to guard every route. Others urged retreat to Blackwell to regroup. Renard listened, his features taut with frustration.
And then Aleric spoke.
"My lords," he said, steady but firm, "we cannot swat shadows. Marvin knows these hills better than we. If we stretch our lines further, we will bleed faster. If we slow our march, we will give him time to cut deeper. Instead, we must strike where he does not expect—by forcing him to reveal himself."
All eyes turned to him.
Aleric laid his plan: decoys of empty wagons and false foraging groups, marching under heavy guard in plain sight. Scouts and riders concealed along their flanks. When Marvin struck, he would meet not helpless victims but steel.
At first, some nobles scoffed at the low-born commander daring to lecture them. But Renard leaned forward, eyes narrowing with interest. "Go on."
"Marvin thrives on our disorder," Aleric continued. "We must show the men that the hunter can bleed. Once we break one of his ambushes and crush his raiders, our soldiers will believe again."
The prince considered, then nodded. "Do it. You will have command of the counter-ambush."
And so, two days later, Aleric's plan unfolded.
The line of decoy wagons creaked along the narrow valley trail, flanked by steep ridges carpeted in dark pines. Soldiers trudged beside them, faces slack with feigned exhaustion. Some leaned heavily on spears as though half-dead from marching. Others bandaged arms with strips of torn cloth, acting the part of the wounded. Even the oxen had been driven to stumble and groan to sell the illusion.
The valley was still—too still. Not a bird sang, not a squirrel chattered.
Aleric, riding a short distance behind the wagons with a small mounted guard, tightened his grip on his reins. His heart hammered, but his eyes never wavered from the tree line.
Then came the horn.
A raw, shrill note cut through the silence, and from the slopes poured down riders clad in the Duke's colours. Hooves thundered, blades glinted in the sun, and arrows streaked like black rain.
"They're here," one of Aleric's guards muttered, tightening his spear shaft.
The raiders charged, faces twisted with hunger for blood.
"Curses, they're weak as lambs!" a mounted brigand laughed, spurring his horse faster. "The fools left their wagons undefended!"
Another jeered, "Slit the oxen, burn the carts, leave nothing behind!"
The riders surged forward, their war cries echoing.
And then the wagons split open.
Canvas flaps were thrown back, revealing rows of armoured spearmen crouched inside. Shields locked, spears levelled, their polished tips bristled like a wall of iron. Hidden archers rose from ditches dug hastily the night before, their bows already strung and aimed.
The raiders' cheers turned to cries of confusion.
"What—?" one shouted, eyes wide.
"They're armed!" another bellowed.
"Gods, it's a trap!"
The valley erupted in chaos.
Arrows hissed through the air, finding throats and unarmored joints. Horses screamed as shafts drove deep into their flanks, tumbling riders to the dirt. The first wave of raiders smashed into the spearmen, but instead of scattering peasants, they met a wall of discipline. Spears punched through breastplates, skewering men clean off their saddles.
"Hold the line!" Aleric roared, spurring his horse forward. His sword flashed silver as he cut down a rider who broke through the spear wall. "Drive them into the rocks! Show them no quarter!"
The men roared with him, rallying around his voice.
"Curses, we've been deceived!" one enemy soldier spat as he tried to retreat, only for an allied knight to hack him down.
"They outnumber us!" another screamed, dropping his sword and trying to flee.
Aleric cut through the chaos like a blade itself. He blocked a raider's downward slash with his shield and countered, his sword carving a deep line across the man's throat. Blood sprayed hot against his cheek, but he pressed forward, eyes burning with grim determination.
A group of raiders tried to wheel away, seeking the slopes they'd descended.
"Archers, cut them down!" Aleric bellowed.
A volley answered. Arrows plunged into backs and horses alike, dropping them in tangled heaps of flesh and steel.
The valley floor became a slaughterhouse. Raiders shouted and cursed, some begging their comrades to hold, others shrieking in terror as they tried to break free.
One dismounted soldier, blood streaming from a cut on his forehead, fell to his knees and cried out:"Damn you all—it was supposed to be an easy raid!"
A spear punched through his chest before he could rise again.
Within minutes, the ambush collapsed into rout. Some raiders tried to scramble up the rocky ridges, only to be chased and cut down by relentless cavalry. Others fought to the death, cursing Aleric's name, but most scattered, dropping weapons in desperation.
By the time the last of them broke, the valley was silent again—silent but for the groans of the dying and the cheers of the royal host.
"Victory! Victory!" the soldiers cried.
They pounded their shields, voices echoing off the ridges. For the first time in a week, they cheered not in defiance but in triumph.
Aleric sat in the saddle, chest heaving, his blade dripping with crimson. He scanned the carnage, and though he knew it was but one battle in a larger shadow war, he saw the spark reignite in his men's eyes. They believed again. And that, he knew, was worth more than any valley or wagon.
Word spread like wildfire through the camp: Marvin's raiders had been bloodied. The terror of unseen foes dimmed, replaced by renewed determination. The march resumed with firmer step, the army once more willing to follow the prince's banner through fire.
Yet Aleric knew it was but one victory in a shadow war. Marvin still lurked in the hills, clever and elusive. The old fox would not give up so easily.
The news reached Lord Marvin's war tent at dusk, carried by a nearly lifeless rider whose horse stumbled and collapsed just outside the camp. Mud spattered across the tent floor as the messenger fell to one knee, his armor dented, his face streaked with sweat and blood.
"My lord—," he rasped, head bowed. "The raid on the valley… it failed. The wagons were not a true supply train. They were filled with soldiers. Hundreds of our men… were slaughtered. The survivors fled."
The words hung in the air like a death knell.
For a long, dreadful silence, Marvin did not move. His face was unreadable, the faint lamplight tracing the sharp lines of his cheekbones. Then, with deliberate calm, he placed the map marker he had been holding back on the table.
"Failed?" he repeated softly.
The messenger swallowed. "Yes, my lord."
Marvin's hand clenched into a fist. He brought it down on the map table with such force that the cups and dice scattered across the floor. "Damn them! Damn the boy commander!"
The aides in the tent stiffened, lowering their eyes. They had seen Marvin angry before, but this was different. His composure—always so precise, so ironclad—was cracking.
"He predicted me," Marvin muttered, pacing the tent. His eyes narrowed like a hawk's. "Not only did he predict, he baited us. He forced me to bleed my men for nothing. That is no accident. That is the mark of a mind… a dangerous mind."
He turned sharply to his captains, pointing to one as if to skewer him with the gesture.
"No more reckless raids. No more scattershot attacks. We will bleed them—but carefully, slowly, with the knife, not the hammer."
He walked back to the map and traced the route toward the north with a long, bony finger.
"They march for Ebonreach. The prince is too stubborn to alter course. Very well… let him march. We will cut him a thousand times before he reaches the walls."
Marvin's eyes gleamed, cold and calculating once more. "We shall burn his forage fields, poison his wells, and slaughter his stragglers in the night. When he arrives at Ebonreach, he will not come as a conqueror—but as a man starved and weary, his men too broken to fight. Then, and only then, will we strike."
He leaned forward over the map, his voice low as a serpent's hiss:
"And as for this… Aleric…" He spat the name. "I will break him. Either on the field… or in the shadows."
---
**The Royal Host – One Week to Ebonreach**
The valley of blood was left behind, its stench carried away by mountain winds. For the next few days, the prince's army marched with renewed spirit. Songs rose once again, the men sharing fire-roasted bread and watered wine without the old bitterness of despair.
Yet shadows still clung to the road.
Every night, a patrol failed to return. Every morning, a few corpses were found along the trail, throats slit, eyes staring. Arrows sometimes fell from the trees without warning. Fires blazed in villages ahead, their stores already burned by Marvin's men.
"Curses… It's like fighting ghosts," one soldier grumbled as they patched a burnt wagon.
"They strike and vanish," another spat. "Like jackals in the dark."
But through it all, Aleric moved among the ranks, speaking with soldiers, checking on their rations, keeping spirits from collapsing. He rallied them when fear threatened to return, reminding them of their victory in the valley.
"We bled them once," he told his men by torchlight one night. "And we will bleed them again. Hold fast. One week more, and Ebonreach will rise before us. And when it does, this war will turn."
His voice carried through the camp, and the men answered with cheers. Even those with bandaged arms and tired eyes raised their spears in salute.
And so they pressed on.
Through smoke-choked valleys, through villages stripped bare, through nights filled with the cries of distant owls—or raiders.
Seven days. That was all that remained between them and the looming black walls of Ebonreach, the fortress where the fate of the kingdom would be decided.