Not for the first time, Cinna entered the farspeaking room of Dvergarfjall Castle. It was dwarfed by its counterpart in the Hall of Seier, a fact that Cinna couldn’t help but to be acutely aware of. The castle only had so much space, so several farspeakers sat crammed into a space the size of three stable stalls. To prevent background chatter from seeping into every call, farspeakers here had to maintain spells preventing sound from entering or leaving their booths.

  One of the farspeakers waved Cinna over, so she stepped into the woman’s booth. It was a tight fit; hardly enough space for a seated operator and a single standing speaker.

  “Please ensure only I can hear this call and that even you cannot hear my own words as well,” Cinna requested. The operator nodded; she’d likely already taken that precaution.

  “Kamilla, you wished to speak with me? You’ll need to make it fast; the castle is under attack even now.”

  “You make it sound as if speaking to me is a burden,” Kamilla replied crisply.

  “Don’t be like that. You know I love you, and would gladly take any opportunity to spend more time together if I had the choice,” Cinna said.

  “Yes, yes, I love you too,” Kamilla countered dismissively. Cinna smirked at the embarrassment that crept through her sister’s attempt at indifference. Unfortunately, Kamilla still suffered from a terminal case of teenager and found any expression of familial love horrifically embarrassing. Nothing flustered her more than the words “I love you.”

  “Now that that’s out of the way…I was told you had important news?”

  “Father has recovered. He looks twice his age, but he has resumed his duties.”

  “I’m glad to hear that,” Cinna said with a relieved sigh. “Why did he not call me himself, though?”

  “Are you serious? Do you have any idea how much work piled up during your tenure as regent? Cinna, your neglect has resulted in our mining industry grinding to a halt. Nothing has been done to address the report of feral livestock, and multiple requests for tax relief due to poor harvests have gone unheard,” Kamilla scolded. Even without being able to see her, Cinna could picture her sister listing each point off on her fingers as she was wont to do.

  “I never received any reports about those things. I believe I addressed everything which crossed my desk,” Cinna argued, confused.

  “Because you dodged every vassal that attempted to bring their concerns to you!” Kamilla countered. Now Cinna was beginning to understand.

  “Only after half a day of the most inane requests I’ve ever heard,” Cinna defended. If she’d heard any problems of the scale Kamilla described she would have done something about it.

  “That’s why you’re meant to have someone screen them, not speak to everyone personally!” Kamilla’s voice grew shrill, her anger evident.

  “Surely Count Stromberg would have advised me if that were the case.”

  “I suspect he intended to give you enough rope with which to hang yourself, sister. You’re Crown Princess now, Cinna. You can’t keep ignoring matters of state forever,” Kamilla said tiredly. “About the only things you did right were fortifying the border, strengthening the army, and dealing with the rogue undead. Father is furious, but has elected not to reprimand because those actions are likely why we are able to have this conversation at all.”

  “Kamilla!” Cinna said sharply. “Do not speak as if Dalton is dead. I believe in him. He’ll find his way home.”

  “…you need to let Dalton go, Cinna. The rest of us have taken our time to mourn and come to terms with his death. This isn’t healthy,” Kamilla replied, her tone softening.

  “He’ll be back,” Cinna insisted stubbornly.

  “Believe what you will. I have to go; Uncle Tryggve wants to talk to you next. Stay safe.”

  Cinna remained silent while Kamilla stepped away. She wasn’t sure what to say.

  “General Selkarc,” Tryggve began. Cinna instantly snapped to attention, switching into soldier mode. “I hereby relieve you of your temporary position as High General and assume all responsibilities of that rank.”

  “Understood, sir,” Cinna replied.

  “I’ve sent Merethe to take command of Roland’s Redoubt. I need you to head north and lead the defense of Saltrvatrmarr Fortress,” Tryggve moved on immediately.

  “You’re assigning a general to all three of the major castles along the battlefront?” Cinna questioned. She’d assigned just Valto to the entire line. True, she’d essentially moved her base of operations there was well, but she’d been coordinating the actions of the entire army, not micromanaging the defense itself.

  Of course, she’d never actually intended to stay at Dvergafjall in the first place. She’d just noticed how much harder it was for annoying nobles to reach her there and never left. It would probably be a bad idea to mention that to Kamilla.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  “Aye. The attacks have been manageable so far, but my intuition tells me we haven’t seen the worst of it yet. Those frontline countries that were overrun had years of experience fending off the undead and their fortifications were reinforced by our own engineers. We haven’t seen anything yet; mark my words,” Tryggve replied grimly.

  “And you had to stick me with the worst one of the lot,” Cinna complained. But that was just tradition. She might complain, but was a proud member of Selkarc’s armed forces. She would carry through on the orders she was given.

  “You have the most experience in that type of environment. Valto’s fought in wetlands before, but only as a footsoldier, and Merethe was assigned to the mainland during the last war. You’re the only one that can do it,” Tryggve explained.

  Saltrvatrmarr Fortress stood on the edge of a saltwater marsh much like the wetlands Cinna had encountered during the Carissite War. It wasn’t a fond memory. Wetlands were difficult to fight in or even march through. The water both slowed and tired troops passing through it. Actually fighting in one was nearly unheard of, which was precisely why the Saltrvatrmarr Fortress had been placed where it stood.

  While Tryggve spoke of “fighting” in wetlands, the reality had been closer to an amphibious assault using shallow-drafted boats to bypass enemy defenses. There’d been some fighting on the edges as Cinna’s forces came ashore, but no pitched battles while chest-deep in water.

  As one of only three routes into Selkarcian territory, though, the saltwater marsh Tryggve spoke of couldn’t be overlooked. If defenses had been made only at Dvergafjall and the Redoubt, it would leave Selkarc vulnerable to a landing in the marsh. A canny commander could even raise walkways through the water or drain the marsh entirely. Placing a fortress there served mostly as a deterrent, though it also provided a base from which ships could be launched to counter an enemy advance.

  At least, so the logic went against living enemies. Undead could pass through a great deal of obstacles that a living army would never attempt. That had already been borne out in the way that draugr, skeletons, and liches were assaulting the walls and barricades stretching the width of the peninsula.

  “I don’t think my experience will be of much use fighting undead that can wade through marsh water without tiring. But I will hold Saltrvatrmarr Fortress to my dying breath.”

  ***

  Cinna arrived at Saltrvatrmarr Fortress to find it already under assault. Unsurprisingly. Ever since the first undead appeared the attacks had continued through every minute of every day. One of the greatest dividends of Cinna’s expansion of the army was that she’d had enough troops to rotate them in relatively short shifts.

  As she crossed the drawbridge, Cinna looked up at the fortress. It was built on relatively flat terrain, so its tall walls and towers were all roughly the same height, giving it a squat appearance from a distance. Up close, though, Cinna could tell that the walls were no shorter than those of Dvergafjall Castle.

  Inside, the fortress had the shape of a horseshoe. On the seaward side were the docks, where numerous longboats were moored. These ships were tiny compared to the carracks operated by the Royal Navy, but were much better suited to the nearby marsh. Towards the center of the fortress loomed the central keep from which the garrison’s commander issued orders.

  “Standby and await orders. Once I know the immediate situation I’ll be deploying you all as a team to reinforce sections of the wall where the defense is faltering. Hilda, Oliver, with me,” Cinna ordered as she brought her horse to a halt in front of the keep. She handed the reins to a stableman that had come running over.

  With her designate guards close behind, Cinna entered the keep and made her way directly to the command room several floors up. From there she would have a view of the walls in every direction. A powerful barrier made possible by an amplification tool in the basement protected the room, preventing it from becoming a target for enemy siege mages.

  “Captain Gunnarsen, I’m taking command of the fortress by order of High General Tryggve,” Cinna announced the instant she entered the room. “I need an immediate situation report on the defense.”

  “Yes, general!” Gunnarsen replied while saluting. This man was an untitled noble by origin; fourth son of some baron of an island fief. He’d been assigned his captaincy after many years of loyal service in the royal knights. “We’re holding steady. I’ve been sending out irregular longboat raids to cull the undead before they can reach the walls. The southeastern section was being hit particularly hard, but the pressure has slackened over the last hour.”

  Cinna had the layout of the fortress memorized, but she still took a quick look out the window to confirm. As Saltrvatrmarr Fortress had been built on the very edge of the marsh, only a very narrow strip of wetland actually abutted it. The section of wall in question had a small area of dry land running up to it, sandwiched between the marsh and a steep cliff that ran its entire length—in fact, the inland side of the marsh was essentially an open bay at the foot of the Geirarj?tnas.

  In practice, what the meant was that the undead on that flank were shielded from Gunnarsen’s longboats and had solid footing from which to assault the walls.

  “Are they concentrating their forces there and using the rest as a shield against the longboats…?” Cinna asked herself. “Wait…Gunnarsen, do I see ladders?” From her current position Cinna could only see the tops of the ladders, but she could clearly make out armored draugr scaling them to reach the battlements.

  “Yes…and no, ma’am. Those aren’t ladders; they’re skeletons mounted on each others’ shoulders,” Gunnarsen clarified. “I don’t know how they’re doing it. Their bones shouldn’t be able to support so much weight.”

  “When did this begin?”

  “Shortly before you arrived. But they’re fairly easy to topple, and the draugr climbing them can still only attack in single file.”

  “The undead are not known for their creativity and adaptability, captain. If they’ve advanced from creating ramps with their own bodies to makeshift siege equipment, that means there is intelligence behind their actions,” Cinna explained.

  “I’d rather deal with ladders than ramps. The ramps are harder to clear out. We’ve resorted to freezing and shattering them, then melting the remains to disperse them into the marsh, but they’re always in the process of forming another one,” Gunnarsen replied.

  “And what happens when they move onto siege towers while our mages are still relearning how to cast an explosion? No, we can discuss this later. You,” Cinna said, ending by pointing towards a runner waiting along the wall. “I’ve left a squad of knights in the courtyard. Inform them they’re needed on the southeastern walls.”

  “Isn’t the ramp forming in the center the higher priority?” Gunnarsen asked.

  “If our foe were mindless, then yes. But something out there is acting with a purpose. Let’s see what they do when their skeletons are reduced to splinters instead of merely toppled.”