Jebidiah's Change Bk. 01 Ch. 14

Welcome back gentle reader

Only one chapter to go after this one! Originally I had intended to tell this story from multiple viewpoints, perhaps concentrating on a single individual character's point of view each chapter. I may still try that out in a different book or series where there are less moving parts, but for this effort I decided to stay focused on what Jebidiah was up to. As complex as the storyline is, the different viewpoints can get massively confusing. Just look at Jordan's Wheel of Time series after book 8. His series will always be one of the top 3, but man he had a lot going on and a group of us on Dragonmount tried to chart it all out. I added Kelek's perspective into the mix just because her thought processes and reasoning are not something I could portray through Jebidiah's guessing, plus her antics will only increase as we go along through the overall story arc. Kelek is based on one of my daughter's characters and the fun we had with her was something I just had to memorialize. Another of my daughters started with an Orc Bard, but well, let's just say that one got out of hand quickly. I may reprise her character at some point. Back to my point, there are more of these changes in perspective in the remaining chapters, I hope it does not detract or distract.

Once again the standard disclaimer, multiply ages by roughly two to get equivalent Earth ages. Everyone is a consenting adult.

-- Somewhen, Somewhere --

Comlain watched the activity on the material plane with growing concern, approaching panic. Someone had put a piece into play he had not foreseen and the shadow the large figure cast upon the land below it filled him with a sense of dread he had not felt in a long time. How had he misjudged this so completely? It would not be long before the shape reached its destination.

-- Chapter 14: Soldier's Rest --

-- Third Tenday of Yantaen 813 AGR --

Fate does not seek our consent.

- Goodkind

"There sure are a lot of them." Jebidiah thought to himself. He stood on the southern ramparts of the city wall, looking at the enemy arrayed before the city, just out of bow and spell range. He was, however, well within both ballista and catapult range and was reminded of it every few minutes. The defenders of the wall were resting, mostly sitting with their backs to the merlons lining the parapet, waiting for action if and when an attempt to storm the walls would happen. The nearest archers sitting near him, from where Jebidiah watched the activity beyond the walls, were his own soldiers; he recognized most of the faces around him.

There was much debate, most of it heated, about how the Faltha forces managed to set up a siege along with heavy ranged weapons and siege towers without notice. Magic was the obvious answer, but it did nothing to explain what magic it was. Jebidiah had not really cared, what was important to him was what they were planning on doing about the siege. The planned response did not sit well with him. "I don't like this, Hiro."

"Which part, Jebidiah? There are too many things I don't like, you need to pick one."

Jebidiah snorted but didn't answer right away, watching intently as a ballista crew frantically cranked away on the winch mechanism. Dana stood by his side, examining the field with equal interest. Stern, Olga, and Yantzee we arrayed a little further along the wall, Stern and Olga conversing with each other in too low a voice to be overheard.

"We could always do what we did last time, attack them at night with just the ten of us." Stern said, pulling himself out of his private conversation.

"That was fun." Olga said with a grin.

"It was something," Jebidiah had to admit. He began to take a pull from his wineskin.

"There's a bit more than a company out there, Stern." Yantzee said with his own grin.

"Target rich environment."

Dana let out a loud guffaw before catching herself and cutting it off while Jebidiah sprayed the wine in his mouth out over the wall and sputtered. "I was drinking, damnit. Fuck that was painful."

The laughter around him did not help his dignity. "What do you know of sieges, Hiro?"

"I now have several hours of experience, what would you like to know?"

Jebidiah rolled his eyes. "Is it going to be one of those afternoons?"

"The prospect of death at the hands of several thousand enemies chunking large rocks and giant pointy sticks at you tends to sharpen the mind and wit, it puts things in perspective."

"Don't get all philosophical on me now, Yantzee. Seriously, if you were them, what would you be doing right about now, or in the next couple hours? Continue chunking large rocks and giant pointy sticks?"

"Honestly, no. I would have charged the walls first, expecting to be repelled, but they completely gave up surprise to lay into a siege. I don't have an answer for that one. Tactically it was a blunder, and their current arrangement and lack of activity calls into question their strategy but I don't have all the information and I'm not in charge."

"It was damned stupid," Dana added. "They had surprise on their side. Should have moved on the walls in the darkness instead of standing out there and going 'BOO!' at daybreak."

"How many are there by your guess?" Jebidiah was having difficulty estimating the enemy numbers.

"Looks close to 5,000. A full army, five divisions by my guess."

"How many divisions are in the city?"

Hiro snorted, "Three of the Stockmar, Four of the Regular, Two of the Bh'orel. Plus some scattered forces, such as our company."

"So they attack a fortified position against twice their number? To what purpose?" Jebidiah was having difficulty coming to grips with the absurdity of the enemy actions. "What do they hope to accomplish? They can't take the city."

"It does call into question their strategy." Silence stretched after Yantzee's response.

"There's more than five divisions. I've counted twelve banners now. Their units are understrength because they did this quickly or they have held much in reserve." Stern said quietly.

"I had only caught ten banners, but I would agree, Stern. Good call." Stern couldn't help but unleash a beaming smile at the compliment from the older Corporal. "Something's off. This whole scenario stinks. They have to know that the General will send out a superior response and sweep them off the field."

The sounds of horns from behind made them turn. Movement below the wall caught Jebidiah's eye as a group of women dressed in work tunics walked by, not seeming to care about the sounds of war around them. Jebidiah nodded toward the group, "The locals don't seem to care about what's going on, at least not all of them. Do you reckon this happens a lot?"

"Not that I have heard." Hiro answered. "They are in mourning, perhaps they have other things on their mind?"

"Mourning?" Jebidiah examined the women with more interest, missing what was apparently obvious.

"The hair. Women in the south wear their hair in that style when mourning a family member passing. Usually lasts for a tenday."

"Think we can find out if there was a large-scale battle recently?"

Yantzee look of concern over Jebidiah's attitude increased. "Why? What is going on, Jeb?"

"There's an awful lot of women in mourning."

Yantzee started to reply then stopped and scanned the area below the walls as well. There were several groups of women with the same hair style walking through the area, at least a dozen groups, maybe seventy women in total. He looked over to one of the city guards crouched near them, "Private, find the watch commander and ask them to join us when convenient."

A flood of mounted women and men flooded out of the avenues leading to the barrack areas to assemble in ranks before the gates. "Calvary instead of foot?" Jebidiah asked Yantzee.

"They are the armswomen. Each is trained for horseback In instances like this, think of them as dragoons though there will be a few actual cavaliers, each company's foot will mount up in a larger formation when called upon. The company archers and mages are assigned to the walls, well most of them. Some of the archers will ride out with the rest, firing from horseback in support of the charge. They should be focused on the opposing mages."

"But then the platoons will be split from those they normally fight with? How do they train for combined tactics if they are all from separate companies?"

He got a shrug in response. "They just need to know what the horns mean, where to ride, and where the pointy end goes."

"The regulars practice it at least once a month, whatever troops are available at the time." Dana added.

Yantzee raised an eyebrow and looked to Dana. "I was unaware."

"It's not done near the Academy. You should get out in the world more often, Corporal."

Yantzee just chuckled at the verbal jab.

More ranks of the calvary assembled until they became uncountable in number. Jebidiah guessed maybe 2,000 or more. It was an impressive display and he would not have looked forward to meeting that charge. In the center of the mass he spotted his own banner. "Are all of our women committed?"

"For this sort of action the Regulars, both Tonstar and Bh'orel, and the House guard are combined."

"Where are our mages?"

"The General held them back. Just one more confusing thing about today."

"Who set all this up? The platoon compositions, the unit sizes, command structures, field tactics, all of it? The doctrine."

Yantzee gave him a look. "It has been set up after hundreds of years of experience in the field testing out what works and what doesn't. Don't expect to have some hidden insight that changes how warfare has been fought for generations."

"Well met, Jeb." He turned to see Michael, Shirley, Farrah, and Tenner approaching, distracting Jebidiah's latest attempt to mess with established doctrine.

"Fine day for a stroll, isn't it?" Jebidiah smiled in greeting.

Michael quickly looked over their forces behind the gates then scanned the field of battle. "There sure are a lot of them." Jebidiah and Dana laughed in response and Yantzee chuckled. A slight giggle escaped Shirley.

Michael looked confused at the laughter, "Something I said? ok, Shirley?" She blushed at the question and looked down without answering but he caught the flare of her nostrils.

"Your appraisal mirrored my own." Jebidiah answered, still with a smile.

Another horn sounded and the gates began to open. Shirley giggled once again. Once the gates fully opened yet another horn blared its sound into the crisp air. "I recognize that one." Jebidiah said to himself as the cavalry formation surged forth. Once past the gates they immediately split into multiple columns, for the most part five riders wide with the center position slightly forward from the rest to form a wedge shape at the vanguard. They spread distance between ranks as well. "Why do they split so?" There must have been twenty different lines of horse women charging around the plains now in a twisted motion, seemingly random and chaotic. From their viewing position over the field it reminded Jebidiah of what would happen when one dumped a basket of snakes on the ground.

"Give it a few more paces and you will see."

Walls of various elements began to rise from the ground or take form in the surrounding air. Fire, rock, water, ice, many varieties, all trying to guess the route of the riders. The snaking, twisted lines of the attack made sense now as nearly all the attacks failed to find their targets. Nearly all. Jebidiah watched as one set of riders rode directly into the wall of flame that had sprouted up before them, horse and woman alike collapsing on the other side of the flame, their corpses also burning. The next rank of five were too close to fully escape the flames but the rest bypassed the wall to continue the attack. Some of the archers riding at the rear of the formations began firing into the enemy forces. Fireballs and lightning lanced out in response knocking down more of the riders.

The more mundane defenders on the siege line had arranged a wall of spears and shields to fend off the horses while ranks of archers behind them blanketed the approaching columns in a rain of arrows that were having an effect. It looked like more than fifty of the city's defenders that had ridden forth would never ride again. The clash of steel rang out when the various lines of horse clashed into that wall of spears. Jebidiah thought it would have been more effective to have a massive solid front of horse women lance into the defending line, pushing the entire defense together to look for a breach. Instead the twenty different formations, five riders wide and twenty ranks deep, smashed into a few spots. Most made it through, sounds of oaths and screams both human and equine mixed in with rings of steel. Shirley's stifled giggles became more frequent and Jebidiah noticed her shy demeanor changing yet again as her hair began to dance in the absence of wind.

"Soon, Shirley, you can taste battle again." Her golden eyed gaze met his and she gave him one of her rare sharp toothed grins, a forked tongue licked her upper lip.

Horns sounded from the field, drawing Jebidiah's attention back to the action. A cloud of dust had kicked up into the air from behind the siege lines, the source of which was obscured from those watching on the walls. Maybe half of the horse lines had breached the shield wall and were now rushing through the lines of archers behind it, laying waste to those not quick enough to dodge. The horse columns that failed to breach the shield wall had bounced back and away, leaving dead behind but otherwise largely intact. The rain of arrows and spells still pelted the remaining formations dropping more women. More horns blared a discordant note and suddenly those surviving riders behind the line wheeled and burst back through the shield wall, wherever they happened to be, the general mass reforming and pushing hard to reach the city gates. The opposing forces, now relieved from the press of the attack, created gaps in their formation and their own riders, having finally reached the action, burst forth to chase the city's retreating forces.

"Now we know where some of their other troops are." Yantzee remarked. "Even with those added, we still outnumber them, and this testing of their lines made the disparity better in our favor."

Arrows streaked out as the enemy calvary reached the outer range of their own archers while defensive ballista continued hammering into the approaching enemy lines. Shirley laughed and then released her own spell, the magic of which flared a brighter red than Jebidiah had encountered before. A fireball darted forth reaching impossibly far to hit the leading edge of hard charging horse women, the unexpected attack turning aside a larger chunk of the attackers than were burnt by the blast. More spells answered Shirley's howl of glee as they shot forth from the walls including ones from Michael and Farrah but none reached as far or were as effective as Shirley's first.

Their city riders made it to the walls and re-entered the city, immediately dismounting to check horses and injuries, clerics rushed into the mix but despite the new flurry of activity the morning's excitement was over. There were a lot of dead scattered on the field, both from the city defenders and the attacking siege and it all seemed pointless to Jebidiah. "Why? To what purpose was all that death?"

"It was just a test of their lines and resolve. I would have to say it was a good result." Michael answered. Yantzee nodded his agreement.

"Good? We are throwing away human lives, population is not a commodity we have available to just throw away on a whim."

"No, it isn't," Yantzee answered. "But it has been several hundred years since the kingdom has seen a siege like this or had to field this many women in this type of engagement. This test was also determining if the established tactics from so long ago still hold. In many ways this is all new to everyone involved. Only the Starn have survived recent sieges and that was against Orcs."

"We could use some Starn's about now," Tenner said more to herself than anyone else.

"Lest I forget, the Duchess requests your presence, Lord Valor." Michael gave him a glance before looking back over the field. "That was why we came anyway, but it was at an opportune time to help here. The written accounts of these sort of engagements do not give justice to the reality."

"Ok. Shall we see what her Grace needs? Dana, Stern, Yantzee, I think I'll be fine with Michael and his escorts. Would you mind staying here to keep an eye on things?"

Dana, still staring out over the field, absent-mindedly waved a hand beside her head, Hiro nodded in acquiescence, and Stern answered with one of his patented grins.

Their group made their way through the main boulevard where Jebidiah made sure to stop and check on his guard that took part in the probe of the enemy lines. They were in high spirits, flushed and excited from their recent exertion, even the couple of wounded that waited for the healers to stop by were chatting excitedly. Combat always raised Jebidiah's adrenaline rate but it was never something he had looked forward to and he found it hard to understand what was going through their minds.

They made their way further through the city, heading into the militarized half where the bustle of activity outshone even what the Tonstar Promenade saw on Trade Day. Jebidiah discussed the fighting spirit of the soldiers with Michael but it was Shirley that surprised him with her input.

"There is something about battle that gets the blood boiling. What I experience won't be the same, I sometimes feel like my blood might actually be boiling, my skin gets incredibly hot to other's touch, but that is part of my infernal heritage. I think it is the same feeling for humans and others, if not the same physical reaction, and it tends to lift one's spirits and speak to your soul, like some of the dried leaves we burn or consume during ceremonies and rituals. I wouldn't call it drunk with bloodlust but it comes close."

"Is that why you laugh during battle?" Tenner asked her, a smirk on her face.

Shirley blushed and did not answer, withdrawing from the conversation again.

"She's just teasing some, Shirley. Don't feel the need to be so shy around us, please. I do not judge. Well, I do judge, but not in the way you might think. We value your insights. I have learned much from your magic lessons but I think we all would enjoy learning more about the woman behind the magic, as it were."

"I do not fit in well with most people, my Lord. Especially humans and even my own kind. Humans are very destructive, they fear what they do not understand and they tend to kill what they fear. I have to be careful how much fear I instill."

"I can understand some problems with humans. I have problems with humans, and I completely agree with your assessment. I fear that this conflict at our gates is in part because House Crag and Faltha do not understand how my wives, let alone our House, can let a man be in charge. We do tend to kill off what we fear. But what of other Tiefling? The few I have met have all been very different in appearance so it can't be physical differences causing the issue? Is it political or family related? I confess I know nothing of your culture."

"There are... reasons I cannot go into. My people don't have a culture, nothing as grand as that. We have no homelands, nothing more than the curse that runs through our veins. It is not the Curse of your kind, where your Change is decided. Ours is a taint in the bloodlines caused by the rift between planes that allowed the Dragons in and caused the Hells to boil over. We are the seepage into this world, just one of many. The Dark Lord watches over each of us, I can hear him in my sleep most nights. He cares in his own way, but most do not understand and seek to eradicate us from this realm. I was lucky enough to find employment in the Academy where I have found a small measure of acceptance." When no more words came Jebidiah realized it was the most he had heard her speak outside of magical discourse.