Silas met everyone’s eyes one by one when he finished reading the Demon Lord’s message. “It goes without saying that we will not be handing over Daniel. We are drafting a response to send back stating as much and laying the blame on the demons who attacked the Wall months ago. Dey is protecting its borders and its own. If I hear any talk of handing the [Hero] to the demons, I will personally throw you from the highest point of the Wall.”
Orrin felt a rush of emotion to the man who had once tried to have him killed. Silas was a political animal, with snake-like cunning and the ability to shed his personal feelings for the greater good as he saw it. There were likely a half dozen reasons that Silas was protecting Daniel in this moment but Orrin appreciated the immediate result. Daniel had tensed during the message but smiled with relaxed shoulders at Silas’s addendum.
“Perhaps an acceptable compromise could persuade a peaceful resolution,” Leanthun said, quickly holding up his hands in supplication at the angry looks thrown his way. “Nothing to do with Daniel. I merely think putting the offer of abandoning the Pass completely might placate the demons. His talk about forays into forbidden lands must mean the many expeditions into the demon lands that you humans have sent over the years.”
“You’ve traded with the demons, too,” Daniel said, placing his hands on the table and leaning forward. “Using the dwarves as middlemen doesn’t make your hands any cleaner. It doesn’t sound like that matters to them. What I’m stuck on is that the demons think you summoned me. Did you?”
Silence covered the room like a fog, heavy and thick.
“To summon a [Hero] is no easy feat,” Lord Tarris spoke softly. “The ritual requirements are costly and the knowledge closely guarded. In all of Dey, I can say that no single family or person could accrue all they needed to perform the summoning in the last fifty years. This I swear by the name of my family.”
Silas nodded. “I searched and spent no small amount of time and coin in an attempt to find a source and can confirm that no one in Dey performed the summoning, Daniel.”
Leanthun raised an eyebrow as everyone looked at him. “I can’t speak for the council in this but I doubt it was the elves. Summoning a [Hero] goes against much of what we believe is our role in life.”
“We can’t rule out Veskar,” Finley said, drawing the attention his way. “I’ll admit that I don’t know much about the magical side of things, but if Odrana summoned Daniel, we would have made sure to get to him before anyone else did. From what I’ve heard, Daniel appeared in the Untamed Forest. The Forest borders parts of Odrana but mostly Veskar to the south of us. I wouldn’t put it by one of the smaller powers to attempt a [Hero] summoning. There are attempts at unifying all of Veskar with risky plans every decade or so. You’ll notice the more established states of Veskar have failed to send much help, if any at all. I’ve not seen any forces from Khubet or Karn. The few orcs I’ve met around camp are not from the Rinid empire, which isn’t surprising since they rarely leave or let others into their lands. Vas is too busy attacking Odrana to send fighters to save the world. My bet would be one of the kingdoms or city-states of Veskar is behind the summoning. Perhaps Karn… the mages there are skilled enough.”
Silas sighed. “We’ve received supplies from Karn, as well as Khubet, Fanlo, and Spalril within Veskar. Vas and Rinid did not respond. Gendy said they would send backup but until today, I didn’t know for sure that they were sending anyone. I don’t know the leader of Darmon but we sent a message to him anyway. The messenger didn’t return.”
Finley winced. “Yeah, I could have told you not to send anyone to Darmon. Even the prisoners we get to talk from Vas don’t know a thing about what is happening in those borders. Where are the Gendy forces? They’re not the worst you could get from Veskar.”
Madi cleared her throat. “Gendy sent the crown prince.”
Finley groaned. “That psycho? That’s a worst-case scenario. Every time his mother brings him to Odrana for diplomatic meetings, he gets into fights or seriously injures people weaker than him.”
Madi grimaced. “We saved him from a Guild quest for clearing monsters in the Pass gone wrong. He attacked us and we turned him over to be deported.”
Finley laughed and Silas rubbed his eyes. Orrin was lost. All the names of places within Veskar were new to him. He’d not had a reason to study the different city-states and kingdoms that made up Veskar. It looked like it still didn’t matter if nobody was coming to help. Finding out who summoned them might be interesting to know but it wasn’t going to help them in their current situation. Something that Daniel picked up on as well.
“While I’d love nothing more than to know who to beat up for bringing me into this mess, I think we should focus more on what to say to the demons,” Daniel said. “If we offer to pull back to Dey, what assurances do we have that the demons won’t just attack anyway?”
One of the generals to the side of the table finally spoke. “Should we even make an offer? We could launch a preemptive attack. The camp is clustered together now that they’ve unloaded those monstrosities they brought with them. They have the spiders resting behind them. I would hazard a guess they are transports only and won’t attack. A few high-powered attacks from our elites could take out thousands of the demons. Their defenses aren’t strong enough to keep out a bombardment of various magic spells. They can’t block a cloud of arrows falling upon them.”
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“That’s a lot of assumptions,” Orrin muttered.
He thought he said it under his breath but every person at the table turned to him.
“What’s that young man?” The general asked. He wore dark grey armor with golden embellishments down the sides. His long black hair and bushy beard helped mute the hawkish nose but his piercing blue eyes glared at Orrin like a small mouse running across the field. “Speak up so everyone can hear you.”
“General Andrew, that is Orrin. He is the one who scouted the enemy camp,” Silas spoke quickly. “Orrin, do you have something to counter the general’s plan?”
Orrin wiped his sweaty hands on his pants. “They have some sort of magical boundary set up around the camp that stopped most of my spells from working inside. You are looking at that camp like it’s an invitation to attack, which is exactly what they want you to think. I would bet the moment a spell hits the perimeter, it fizzles out. I have no idea if there are protections from regular attacks but if we send a cloud of arrows like you said, there are still way more of them than us. We’d need to bring our people out into the fields between this Wall and the camp to make any attack like that and then we lose the only advantage we have. The protection of the Wall and the Pass. Some of those demons are a higher level than anyone I’ve seen in Dey, well above what I thought possible. We need to assume they will be able to take down dozens of people at a time, which means targeting any high-level attackers with designated groups. If we fight them on the field, it’ll be a slaughter.”
“I advocated for a first strike, not a full turn out of our forces,” General Andrew said, tapping his fingers on the table. “How sure are you that their defenses would stop a concentrated magical attack? How many high-level targets did you see?”
Orrin answered as best he could but after a few more questions, General Andrew shook his head in dismay.
“We don’t have enough information and the little we do have doesn’t cover more than a small fraction of their forces. I withdraw my suggestion. We should spread our people out in smaller clusters to reduce casualties when they attack. This will be a fighting retreat with skirmishes if what this young man says holds true for the entire horde.” General Andrew tilted his head until his neck cracked audibly in the tent. “I’ll compile a list of our stronger groups. Dragoon, Lily, Hornet, and Wendigo are set up already but I think we could muster another three or four elite groups to hit these high-level demon targets outside of their protective circle.”
He accepted what I said and didn’t argue with me, Orrin thought in disbelief. He looked around for the other shoe that had to be dropping soon.
“Thank you, General. You as well, Orrin. Now, I’ll explain the plan for the majority of our forces. Bring up any issues you see at the end.”
Orrin listened as Silas explained the guerrilla warfare tactics that Daniel pushed for, along with the experienced solutions to problems outside of Daniel’s limited experience in warfare. Everyone was assigned specific duties to attend to but the main idea was to harass the demons in a slow retreat to the original Wall. If they could not turn the Horde back before that point, the remaining combined forces of Asmea would make a last stand while the people of Dey were evacuated.
“It makes more sense to evacuate sooner, right?” Daniel argued after the final details were hammered out. “They can always move back into the city once we make it safe. Is there any reason to risk it?”
Lady Timpe pointed to points around the city map. “These are manufacturing and processing plants for food, weapons, building materials, and more. If we abandon those points before the last minute, the infrastructure behind the entire war machine we’ve assembled is lost within days. Do you have any idea how much food it takes to keep this number of people satisfied? How many bandages for small injuries we’ve already gone through or the amount of money spent to keep tents over our people’s heads and blankets over their backs? No matter the outcome in the coming weeks of this war, we’ve spent thousands of gold coins to fund this defense. Everything begins in the city. If we empty anyone out of the city, the chances of a mass flight from Dey could be triggered. Our families are still in the city to assuage the masses. Despite the fact that I want my children far away from Dey, we must risk everything to have a chance at victory.”
Orrin watched the faces around him. The grim acknowledgment that they could die was written on every frown and furrowed brow.
“I will draft the response to the Demon Lord. If you feel you are needed elsewhere, attend to your tasks. Keep to your roles and show bravery for the common soldiers. The first battle for their hearts and minds has already begun. Remind them why we are in charge and be steady in the days to come,” Silas spoke softly at first, building his voice up with a passion that Orrin rarely heard in the man. “This will not be our last strategy meeting but the people in this room represent our greatest minds in leadership, strategy, and magical prowess. I respect each of you and know you will help steer our future to a safe harbor once more. Thank you for your time. Dismissed.”
Most of the generals left at a brisk pace to set up their troops. Leanthun ducked out from the tent as well, moving toward his waiting messengers. The lords and lady of Dey whispered together over a blank scroll of paper as they discussed the best response to the Demon Lord’s letter.
Daniel moved from the other side of the table and moved to Madi, Orrin, and Brandt. “This is happening. We’re about to be in some deep shit.”
“You heard Lord Catanzano,” Brandt said, his pride in the man obvious in his worshipful tone. “We have the best people on the job to defend Dey.”
Daniel raised an eyebrow. “You realize he included you in that statement.”
Brandt turned red as he stammered. “He meant the generals and other lords. If he meant anyone else, it would be you three.”
Orrin threw his arm around Brandt’s neck. “Either way, the guy is giving too much faith to our ragtag team of misfits.”
Madi laughed and Orrin saw Silas glance their way. He smiled at his daughter surrounded by his friends and noticed Orrin watching. Silas nodded his head at Orrin. Orrin smiled tightlipped and raised his head in turn.
“It’s funny. I thought Silas was smart,” Daniel stage-whispered to Madi, “but then he has to go and ruin my image of him by saying Orrin is smart.”
“I’m going to kill you and throw you to the Horde.”
Silas closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
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