The Great Siege of Radasanth (FQ Main thread)

[Shinsou Vaan Osiris]

One day before the siege

Shinsou found himself not journeying west, as he had planned to, but instead south. A message to his friend Veritas had finally got through, and the response was clear and concise.

We assault in two days.

Trudging over slick moorland that had been further churned by the recent rain, the Brotherhood’s remaining forces marched with the tempo of a troupe keeping their eyes in the backs of their heads. They had originally chosen the hard earth to the west to lose the dragoons that had chased them halfway up the country, but now they were headed south. Although it was reassuring to know they would soon be uniting their strength with Storm’s own legion, they had to first get there, and the route ahead was despairingly exposed to the advantage of those Coronian riders. Each second in an open field felt like a jolt of electricity in each man’s soul, and with every new open piece of land the rhythm and pace of the march quickened nervously.

It probably wasn’t helping the progress of the march that Shinsou wasn’t paying attention to where he was going, more than once losing his footing. Instead, his attention was fixated firmly upon the skies above, and upon the flicker of crimson that danced there amongst the black of background cloud.

The hell? Don’t remember seeing that before…

Admittedly, he had been somewhat neglecting his Althanian astronomy recently, but even so Shinsou couldn’t ever recall seeing a red star hanging so curtly in the sky. Of course he been so involved in the events surrounding Tylmerande and the siege that he hadn’t time for keeping a steady eye in the skies above. Glancing to his left to spy one of his captains, Shinsou could tell that the nameless man felt the same as he too peered up the heavens with the same puzzled expression. As if sensing the thoughts from above, the captain pointed and turned to his superior.

“Sir, what’s that? It doesn’t look like a star.”

“Not sure. Could be a planet, or just an anomaly. Let’s just focus on the path, we’re nearly there and we can’t afford any distractions.” Although gingerly put, the statement had served only to pique the entourage’s curiosity, who now chatted amongst themselves. He, too. realised the question echoed in the back of his mind.

Soonafter, The Telgradian turned his attention back to the matter at hand. It was so easy to fall into the trap of believing that he was the only one to labour under adversity, and he wondered how Storm and Hayate had both fared in their respective roles. Despite their collective power, Shinsou was sure he wasn’t alone in that respect. The Coronians were far more ruthless in the defence of their nation than he had given them credit for, and everything since Tylmerande had seemed a bit of a gamble. But wasn’t that the whole point of this? To venture out and challenge the unknown? To take gambles, to face danger… to run the risk, every now and again, for a better world?

It will always be worth it, Shinsou told himself. As the final field fell away into a slight dip, the Brotherhood could be heard sighing their collective relief. The Veritas camp was close by now; he could make out the sentries posted out on first picket on the western perimeter. Their tell tale green cloaks made them look like bandits or common citizenry to those outside of the know, and the white of the canvas tents beyond were well enough hidden to not give the camp away to anyone this far out. That was the hallmark of solid, organised security.

On approach, when challenged, Shinsou gave the man a signed affidavit to signify his friendly status and lack of hostile intent. It took a moment to get any sign of acknowledgement from the statue-like silhouette.

“Executor Osiris,” the man said coarsely, eventually snapping to attention, “We are honoured by your presence. Executor Veritas has asked you to his position as soon as you are able. Our men will attend to the horses and your men can join the general population to find food and beds.”

He better have something good to drink, he said in his mind.

“I’ll head there now.”

The joyful chatter from his men behind was almost lost to his ears as Shinsou concentrated on pounding the ground beneath his feet. The flickering lights of the corridor of tents and campfires bobbed and weaved as he rapidly closed the distance towards himself and Storm’s part of the encampment. It was an extremely odd feeling for the Telgradian; he was a de-facto revolutionary attending the camp of an intended siege of the country’s capital city, and so there was urgency in his professional capacity, and yet he felt warmth in the knowledge he would finally be in his friend’s presence again. As he approached the tent that had clearly been earmarked for his electromancer counterpart’s official use, Shinsou slowed, dusted himself off and peeled back the corner of the tent.

Sure enough, behind a desk that looked like it had been thrown together in a hurry, that finery clad man stood and perused a number of documents. As usual he was over-presented, as if attending some sort of well to-do bachelor party instead of leading an attack on a major population centre.

As Shinsou walked over, he spent a moment looking Storm up and down, before warmly smiling and offering his hand.

“Fucking hell, are you going to a ball or toppling a government?” was the only thing Shinsou could think to ask.

******

A few hours later, a re-united Brotherhood stood firm outside of the city gates in darkness. Smoothly dismounting their great black mounts, Shinsou and Storm strolled together to within a kilometre of the town gate.

Ever thinking behind his stoic visage, Shinsou began formulating a plan if shit went south, which it almost always did. Given the plethora of risks they faced from those he knew were defending the city, including Philomel Van der Aart, the Telgradian knew that one of those plans might have to be the one he least wanted to attempt. Shinsou could count on one hand the amount of times he had ever had to push himself to fight an opponent, but he knew that the monstrous goat form of an already enraged faun would be more than a handful and would require much more than his standard issue barrage of dark lances to put down if it came to it.

Turning back to Storm, the Telgradian brushed the loose bangs of hair from his face and looked ahead, towards the gates of the city of Radasanth.

"I like this plan. It’s very…you" Shinsou observed to Storm as they observed the wagon being prepared for rollout. "I think we'll have ten, maybe fifteen minutes of confusion before the message gets up the chain of command. We need to make sure we don’t rest on our laurels. Get in there, make as much of a foothold as we can, and then push to the assembly."