Chương 415: 13.1

Count Parabuch once more stood ready with his men, another night under the stars, another night making the push into Wallachia against the Fiendish Patricide and his thralls. But tonight he did not bear the weight of one ring, the steel band had been replaced with two that had once graced the hand of his prince. High King Murad himself had stood present for the acceptance of his vows that very sundown as the army stirred for another night of war.

The lesser metal bands from the fallen had been given to the highest praised and most effective of the blessed soldiers now under Parabuch's command. All of his peers were lost to the Wallachian monsters now, of all of his Prince's vassals none had survived but Count Parabuch. When they attained victory in this war the High King promised him rulership o f the entire principality! If he could honor himself in this battle. In the interim he was given the gift of the two Djinn rings.

Not mere steel but shining filigrees of gold and red gems. Harder than the precious metal they had been wrought from, bound to the High King Murad and summoned back to him even when their former bearers had been torn apart and sucked dry of life. Now upon Parabuch's hand. Surrounding him were the set of new lesser Ringbearers. Seven to act to his command, interpose in his defense, practiced in the might of mere blessings but given sparse hours to even do the most basic of drills with this new power.

Depending on Count Parabuch's command and experience to guide them in these instruments of war.

"These minor rings of power will make you a match or even a superior to most of the fiends, but their power is limited, use them sparingly, alternate with your fellows, when one stills it is time for you to lunge, when you begin to feel the burning touch fall back behind me or a fellow ringbearer. My power can sustain itself for longer than yours."

They were nearly the same command he had received, with only the most minor of adjustments; earlier that evening he had drilled them more deeply in his own lessons, adjustments to the doctrine paid for in the blood of his prince and his fellow counts. For good measure he reiterated them.

"Do not push to strike beyond me, do not hold your life over my own. All of you together with me are stronger and we together and alive can hold the line better than I alone. We march as one and if you see me pulling ahead you call for me to halt! There will be no glory in death here, and for all that is blessed under the stars keep your ring hands back and guarded! The fiends have learned our weakness there!"

He'd already given the command, but these were mostly Soldiers, only four of them were even experienced Captains! But needs must, he'd rather have men most experienced in the officer training available to lead and remain in the lines then follow him into battle against the Vampyres, their fiendish dark lord and the yet to be tested might of the Shining Doom herself!

"Now with me! Together Magarska Prevails!" In answer his ringbearers and the other soldiers around them called the ingrained response.

"Magarska Prevails!" They marched out in formation, ranks solid, his ringbearers flanking him close instead of spread out among the ranks, Count Parabuch soon to be Prince Parabuch took the very front, where not just the enemy could see him but more importantly his own men and future subjects. Thousands of eyes that would some day look up to him as not just a Captain or even a Count, but as the full Prince of their homelands, a ruler and king!

To his left and right he saw the others among his number that would be princes, rising stars and if they survived this war his future peers, and then in the darkness ahead of them haunting and terrible northern horns sounded, echoing out of the dark beyond the heavens' sent light. A triple call like the yapping of mountain jackals, then tapering off into a long straining cry akin to an eagle.

It was the northern barbarians, it had to be, the beast led degenerates calling out from the dark in harsh and guttural tones, thousands of voices who were surely no better than the monsters that enthralled the Wallachians. What kind of people could they be but half animals themselves to allow a beast to lead them in war?! The Wallachians were victims, sorcerous black magic claiming their hearts and minds binding them to blood sucking Vampyres! But there was no such excuse or sorcery for the northerners!

He had long read letters and attended the court of his now departed Prince to hear of the northern savages! They had crowned the Countess wyrm themselves! Toppled their rightful ruler and offered her son to the beast as a coronation gift! The northerners were savage and mad and the way they bellowed and blew horns in the dark proved it so. The Wallachian near silence in war had been eerie, but he'd take it against the calling shouts and thunderous snarls that carried from the shadows before him.

He didn't see them yet, not even torches, just like the Wallachians they moved under darkness, but then at last he saw sign, two prongs of shadow emerging into the lit field like horns, gouging blackness and unlit night into the bright illumination of the chaplain's blessings. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. On his left, it took a fractional pull on his ring's power to see, drawing forth acuity and sharpness in his eyes to gain certainty, there!

The serpentine beast striding at the head of one of the penetrating forms of darkness, shadowy figures raising spears and what looked like mere farming implements in the gloom! The Shining Doom was not living up to her name, shrouded in darkness, scales pitch black despite the light of the heavens glittering on the armour of her entourage, looming three times her men's height, even taller than the greatest of the giants stationed in Murad's honor guard.

Turning to his right he saw the sinuous and all too familiar movements of the Wallachian advance. And if the blackness slowly cutting into their heavens sent light on that front was any telling? The Fiendish Patricide himself. The one who was a match for Murad himself in all his glory and enchantment. A match but not a better, driven back the last night when the rest of Magarska had pressed and slain into the forces set against it!

The wailing instruments called out again in terrible howls from the left and the right, the sound of marching steps up and down the lines, a host in the dark that for a moment shook Parabuch. All messengers and word had promised that the forces of the Shining Doom were insignificant, a fraction of the majority of her forces cowardly ravaging the northernmost principality of Magarska. But those footsteps sounded far too numerous to anything less than a vast army.

Had the fiends of Wallachia called up the entire population of the principality to drown Magarska in their blood and bodies? The voices intermingling between the terrible horns cried out again, but now as they were drawing closer Parabuch could hear it. Amidst the barbarity of the north were the far more discernable cries of the Wallachians. Voices he'd not heard clearly on any night of this awful grind of a war. Until now." Hail Count Vladimer Tepes!"

The march of the enemy was steady, he looked to the left and right, the darkness between the two spurs of enemy formation echoed with footsteps and voices." Hail the Liberator!" Parabuch felt the heavens clench on his throat, stronger than they had when he was given the mere steel band of a count. He was ordered to support Murad against the target he chose, but each of the greatest threats were split, moving on opposite sides of the approaching enemy.

High King Murad stood at the front with his closest guard glaring, Parabuch saw his head turning to survey to one side then another. The Shining Doom or the patricide? To the left the northerners screamed in rhythmic chanting barbarity, and then like thunder, the roar of the beast countess herself filled the air, rough and coarse and terribly grating, like hooks in his ears, like ice in his bones. His armor rattled in that terrible sound of senseless northern vulgarity.

But then in equal measure another voice called out on the right." Come to me cowardly slaves of Murad! Come to me! I thirst for the blood of ravagers, rapists, despoilers and thieves! Come to Wallachia Magarskans! Come to me and slack my motherland's thirst!" That it could even begin to match the volume and echoing power of the dragon on their left flank was almost more horrifying than the words themselves!

The darkness continued to encircle them, the spears of twin arcs making a growing crescent of shadow where nothing but starlight shined, gloom and black widening to either side like a great maw. Could it be possible? Had they somehow mustered a sufficient number to actually dare and try an encirclement!?

His orders were clear, they held his legs rooted in place, they were losing opportunity to act, every second both of their prime targets moved further apart, and the looming rhythmic strike of steps on ground and voices in shadow approached.

"Hail The Shining Wyrm! Mother of the blood!" The Wallachians were echoing in response to the guttural voices of the northerners.

"Hail the Vlach Count! Liberator of the people!" Alternating their praise for the beast and the monster.

"Hail the shining She-Dracul! Cleanser of Magarskan filth!" And then suddenly High King Murad was moving, neither turning left or right, but taking foot to running straight ahead, as one the army moved with him, the ring bearers quickly catching up, the rest of the arm falling in line to join. Parabuch moved as he was bound to by heavenly vows, even as he could not conceive of what his High King's plan was, he moved to support and strengthen it! His ears and bones hammered by the cry of the fiend's thralls."

Hail the Dracula, Son of Dragons!"