Faerie Knight 165

165 - The Battle of Lutetia II: The Lion Rampant

The fact that Narvonne’s first king was a general - the most successful commander of the age, by any reckoning - has shaped the character of our royal family ever since.

• François du Lutetia, A History of Narvonne

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17th Day of High Summer’s Moon, AC 297

Lionel Aurelianus, King of Narvonne, stepped his destrier to the left, shifting his position to put a bit of extra room around Lady Clarisant and her guards.  He needed to not only give his people room to fight, but also to present a tempting target to the daemon in the air above.

It would certainly be nice for them if the Marquise of Hearts was foolish enough to immediately take the bait they’d presented, but he would not count on it.  Instead, he would leave an opening too tempting for her to resist.

“Margaret,” he said, “Go break their walls.  Guiron, watch her back.  The rest of you, with me.  Lady Clarisant,” Lionel continued, raising his voice enough to be heard over the din, “I leave you in the care of your husband’s men.  Please remain far back, I would not wish you to risk your safety here.”

For a woman who’d never trained as a soldier, Clarisant du Camaret-à-Arden had no lack of courage.  She acknowledged his command, but her eyes never left the daemon in the sky above the city.  Lionel only hoped that he would never have to explain to Sir Trist how the man had lost a wife.  For a moment, he wondered what Ismet was doing, far to the south in Maʿīn.  The last word they had was that she was marching with an army at her back, to remove Valeria.

Behind them, trebuchets brought all the way from Falais, east to Rocher de la Garde, and then north to Lutetia, began to bombard the capital of the kingdom.  That would mean that Sir Florent had reached the heights, and as Lionel had anticipated, after the first missiles impacted the city walls, Sir Moriaen du Arsenault’s engines responded.

Lionel had first met Moriaen when he’d gone to the Barony du Champs d'Or on his father’s orders, to help suppress a group of brigands that had gotten out of control - the Vultures.  It was a pity that the man was on the other side now, because he had a talent for siegecraft that was unrivaled by any other commander in the Kingdom of Narvonne.

Indeed, Sir Moriaen’s tactical and strategic talents had been on full display during the long march north to Lutetia.  His men had never once been routed during the extended retreat, and the man’s use of daemonic portals to move the slowest elements of his force was ingenious.  He’d outpaced Lionel’s men easily, as a result, and other than near constant skirmishing between the scouts and screening forces of both armies, Moriaen had successfully avoided three of Lionel’s attempts to pin him down.  Now, sheltered behind the sturdiest city walls in the Kingdom, the old knight’s position was the complete reverse of when they had faced each other at Rocher de la Garde.

“We have no leviathan, however,” Lionel grumbled to himself, reining in his destrier just before the land fell down toward the river.  Lutetia sprawled to both the north and south of the Avainne River, just upstream of where it reached the Circum Mare.  The city nearly filled the valley, and was encircled by stout curtain walls that had been well maintained at great cost to the royal treasury.

“I’ll be your leviathan, Your Majesty,” Dame Margaret promised, continuing past them and turning the head of her horse east, toward the bay.  Sir Guiron nodded to Lionel as he passed, accompanying the other Exarch down to the sea.

“You are certain you want me to remain here?” Sir Bors asked, keeping his voice low and nudging his own horse close enough to Lionel for the two to speak.

“If any of our Exarchs remained near Lady Clarisant, the daemon would not take the bait,” Lionel said.

“I do not like it,” Bors protested with a scowl.

“Neither do I,” Lionel admitted.  “But I cannot afford to make plans based on how I feel.  I will use you as I need to, in order for us to achieve victory.  Take command of the van.  Wait for Margaret to be finished.”

“As you command,” Bors said, then inclined his head and kicked his own warhorse into motion.  That left Lionel with only his cousin, Sir Lorengel, and Sir Cynric.  He had successfully dispersed his force of Exarchs into three groups, each of which might now present a compelling target for the usurper’s daemons to defeat in detail.  The traps were set.

“I am still not certain you understand how dangerous this man is, Cousin,” Sir Lorengel said, from Lionel’s left side.

Lionel smiled.  “I know that you, at least, will always speak your mind to me,” he said.  “And you are probably right,” he admitted.  “I am no Exarch.  I doubt it is possible for me to have an accurate understanding of the gradations of power between you.  It is enough for me to know that he is at once the single most powerful piece on his own board, and the one that, if taken, will end the game.”

“One of two,” Lorengel said.  “The Sun Eater.”

“Yes, the Sun Eater.”  Lionel paused.  “Have you noticed that we have not actually seen the creature since General Ismet wounded it in the eye?  Instead of fielding it at Rocher de la Garde, or at any point along the march, they have kept it back and only used it to plunge the world into darkness.”

“Which has been bad enough,” his cousin countered.  “People are starving, and fighting at night makes for chaos.”

“The darkness is a double edged sword,” Lionel pushed back.  “It is why I feel confident sending Margaret down to the sea, now.  And they have their own army to feed.  No, I think that particular gambit has not played out quite as well as Avitus might have hoped.  And I do not think he wishes to send the daemon to face us now.”

“Why not?” Lorengel asked.

“Because he is afraid,” Lionel continued.  “It is the source of his power.  He did not bring it against the six of you when he attacked Cheverny, either.  Instead he sent it against a lesser gathering of Exarchs at Falais.  Because if the Sun Eater is destroyed, Avitus loses his power.  A piece that he cannot bring himself to use might as well not be on the board at all.”

Lorengel chewed on that for a moment.  “You believe Margaret can do what you’ve asked of her?”

Cynric spoke up for the first time.  “She will.  She is stronger, now.  And…” The Exarch of Lailahel looked up into the dark sky, as if he could see something that Lionel could not.  “There it is.  The Archer has taken the bait.”

“You can see her core?” Lorengel asked, but Cynric shook his head.

“No.  I can feel the monster’s heart.  She is a bundle of spite, lust, and pride, that all just leapt like a bonfire when a fresh log is thrown on.”

“Good.”  Lionel did his best to judge the timing.  “Both of you ride back.”

“You should keep one of us here,” Lorengel urged, not for the first time.

“They will have more pressing concerns than me in a few moments,” Lionel said.  “They are all about to be very distracted, and the night is dark.”  He slipped down out of his destrier’s saddle.  “I will meet you afterward, at the siege engines.”

“As you command, Your Majesty,” Cynric said, then turned his horse around and rode back toward Lady Clarisant and her guards.  Lorengel followed only two lengths behind, and Lionel moved back uphill toward Sir Florent’s position, handing off the reins of his horse.  He trusted Dame Margaret’s control, but he was also in no position to be careless.

The outcome of the fight against Loray the Archer was out of his hands now; he could only have faith in the plans he’d made, and the people who would carry those plans out.  It was the same for Margaret’s mission, and Bors at the front.

Lionel moved as quickly as he could, at a jog that covered ground but would also leave him with enough stamina to fight, should it be required.  He passed back through the reserves, waiting for their signal to advance, and then the men who were guarding siege ladders and rams for use against the walls.  Over his head, flights of arrows arced down from the heights into the valley below; he had carefully positioned his archers to take advantage of the high ground.

By the time he was among the siege engines, the sound was building.

“Here it comes,” Sir Florent said, reaching out his gauntlet.  Lionel raised his hand, and they clasped each other by the arm.  With a heave, Florent pulled him the rest of the way up the embankment.  To the east, a great roar was rising, an endless cacophony that only built and built.

“You’ve heard something like this before?” Lionel asked.

“When I was a boy.” Florent said, with a nod.  “Hold!” he cried.  “Any missiles we launch now will only be wasted, Your Majesty,” he said.

Lionel squinted into the darkness, trying to make out the horror he had commanded be brought into being.  Without a sun in the sky above, it was almost impossible to see anything… “The ocean,” he said.  “Where did it go?”

“They happen far less often on the Circum Mare than on the shores of the outer ocean,” Florent shouted.  “The sound is one warning.  The sea receding is the other.  By the time that happens, it’s usually too late.”

The older knight said something else, but Lionel could no longer hear over the overwhelming sound that built, and built.  Finally, he could see it: a wall of darkness, down where the bay should be.  A wall that was impossibly high, and somehow moving. 

“Angelus forgive me,” Lionel whispered, but no one could hear his words.

The wave crashed into the valley like an avalanche down out of the mountains.  Where it passed, it broke the walls of the city, carrying blocks of granite along as if they were no more than a child’s toys.  As the walls collapsed, the siege engines fell, and the men who had been manning them, as well, down into the frothing dark water.

Sir Bors, under cover of darkness, would have marched their van back up onto the heights.  With any luck, they would have caught Sir Moriaen off guard by first arranging their forces for a siege, and then feigning an attack.  The enemy units, at the bottom of the river valley, were directly in the path of the great wave, while Lionel’s army was safe up on the heights.

The roar had dulled now, and the great wave had receded, leaving instead a swollen flood and the piteous screams of those who had not died outright.

“How many people did I just kill, do you think?” Lionel asked.  He could not even comprehend it.  “Hundreds?”

“Perhaps thousands,” Florent guessed.  “Do we advance?”

“No.”  Lionel shook his head.  “Put the siege engines back to work, and the archers with them.  An hour of that should break what is left of the enemy forces.  By the time we go down, the waters will have begun to recede, I should think.”

“As you command,” the older knight said, moving off to speak with his engineers.

Lionel’s eyes moved to the right, over to the bluff upon which he had left Lady Clarisant and her guardians.  There was fighting there; he could hear it, dimly, and see flashes of it.  Whatever was happening with the daemon archer, it had not paused when the great wave hit the shore.

“Take the first one down for me,” Lionel whispered.  Behind him, engineers called orders, and the trebuchets began to loose their stones again, bombarding the flooded valley below.