Rise of the Horde

On the twelfth day, Khao’khen evacuated Millbridge.

The entire Horde. Eight thousand warriors. Every piece of equipment. Every supply wagon. Every Rhakaddon. The Snarling Wolf banner. Everything.

The evacuation was conducted in six hours during daylight, the column moving south through the valley toward the corridor with the organized speed that the Horde’s march discipline allowed, the movement visible to every Threian observation post on the northern ridgelines, the departure unmistakable and deliberate.

By the afternoon, Millbridge was empty. The market hall was vacant. The defensive positions were unmanned. The valley that the Horde had occupied for weeks was unoccupied.

Aldrath received the observation reports and convened an emergency council.

"He is withdrawing," Colonel Drev said.

"He is not withdrawing," Snowe said. "He does not withdraw."

"The valley is empty. The column is moving south. Every formation is in the column. The scouts have confirmed it."

"Our scouts have confirmed it," Snowe said. "His scouts have been feeding our scouts specific information since the campaign began. The column is moving south. The valley is empty. Both things can be true and the conclusion you are drawing from them can still be wrong."

Aldrath studied the map. The valley was empty. The corridor to the south was open. The Horde was moving toward it. Every piece of intelligence confirmed the withdrawal.

"We advance," Aldrath said. "We take the valley. If he is withdrawing, we gain the position. If he is not withdrawing, we discover what he is doing by being in the position where his plan requires us to be."

"That is exactly the decision he wants you to make," Snowe said.

Aldrath looked at the old general. "I know. But we cannot hold this position for five more weeks while the valley sits empty and the council questions why we are not advancing into ground the enemy has abandoned. The political requirement is the military requirement. We advance."

The combined force advanced into the Meren valley on the morning of the thirteenth day.

* * * * *

The valley was not empty.

The valley was empty of warriors. It was not empty of the preparations that three weeks of occupation had produced. The preparations were invisible because the preparations had been designed to be invisible, the work of the troll specialist corps and the Verakhs operating at the intersection of engineering and concealment that Khao’khen had been developing since the campaign’s first engagement.

The road’s paving stones had been loosened at specific intervals, creating the appearance of a maintained road surface that was, at twelve specific points, a surface resting on removed foundations that would collapse under the weight of cavalry horses or supply wagons.

The farmland on both sides of the road had been seeded with fire sphere caches, buried in the irrigation ditches that the valley’s agricultural system used, the clay vessels resting in the water channels where their presence was invisible and where the water’s temperature kept the Bufas extract stable.

The bridge at the valley’s center, the stone structure that carried the road over the Meren river’s main channel, had been prepared with a modification that the troll engineers had spent three nights implementing: the bridge’s central support stones had been replaced with stones of identical appearance whose structural integrity had been reduced by the precise removal of material from their load-bearing surfaces. The bridge would hold infantry. It would not hold cavalry in formation or heavy supply wagons.

The combined force entered the valley in march column, the advance guard’s infantry leading, the cavalry following, the supply train behind.

The infantry crossed the road’s loosened sections without incident, their weight insufficient to trigger the collapses.

The cavalry’s horses triggered the first collapse at the valley’s midpoint, three horses dropping into the road’s opened surface, the riders thrown, the column halting in the compressed formation that the road’s width enforced.

Forty fire spheres erupted from the irrigation ditches on both sides of the halted column, the Bufas extract igniting on contact with air, the incendiary compound spreading across the road’s surface and into the farmland where the compressed cavalry could not maneuver.

The column’s rear elements, pushing forward to assist, reached the bridge.

The bridge held for the infantry. It did not hold for the supply wagon that followed.

"Grak’thar!" The war cry came from the ridgelines where the 3rd and 4th Warbands had been positioned since the previous night, two thousand warriors who had separated from the main column during its "withdrawal" and had moved to the ridgeline positions in darkness.

"VRAAK DUUM! Tear it apart, no retreat!"

"Zug zug, pinkskins!" Krak’thul’s voice erupted from the 4th Warband’s position with the volume and clarity that three months of shouting insults at Threian formations had refined to an art form. "Your horses are in a hole! Your bridge is in the river! Your supply master weeps! NAK’ROSH!"

The Roarers on both ridgelines opened into the compressed column.

Aldrath ordered the withdrawal within twenty minutes, the professional decision of a commander who recognized an ambush that he had been warned about and had entered anyway because the political requirement was the military requirement.

The withdrawal cost four hundred and thirty dead and the supply train’s lead section.

At the corridor’s entrance, Khao’khen received the engagement’s results from the Verakh relay.

"The valley is ours again," Sakh’arran said. 𝑓𝑟ℯ𝘦𝓌𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝑐ℴ𝓂

"The valley was always ours," Khao’khen said. "We left it so they would enter it. They entered it so we could demonstrate what entering it cost. The next time we leave, they will not enter. And the time we spend not being in the valley is time they spend not knowing whether the valley is prepared or empty, which is a problem that consumes analytical capacity that they need for other things."

"Morg!" Dhug’mhar said. "Grombash krul! The strong have earned what is before them! Perfection is pleased to report that the valley’s performance exceeded expectations, which is unusual because Perfection’s expectations are already set at levels that ordinary operations cannot reach."

"The valley’s performance was the troll engineers’ performance," Arka’garr said.

"The troll engineers are part of Perfection’s operational environment, and Perfection’s operational environment performs at the level that Perfection’s presence elevates it to."

The Snarling Wolf returned to Millbridge that evening, the banner raised above the market hall in the position it had held before the evacuation, the wolf’s snarl unchanged, the wolf’s direction unchanged, the wolf’s message to the combined force clear: we were here, then we were not, then we were. You cannot be certain about any of it. And that uncertainty is the weapon.