Gav Thorpe - The Crown of the Conqueror

As he walked along the files of warriors wending their way down the pass, he conceded that the Mekhani were not as savage as he had once thought, and the knowledge that they were but the remnants of an advanced civilisation gave him some pause for thought. For all that, an upbringing built upon prejudice and disdain could not be easily overcome and Erlaan considered his new allies clever animals at best. Their superstitions alone were reason enough to dismiss them as anything more than useful minions. Come the war with Salphoria, Erlaan would put his trust in good, honest Askhan legionnaires. If the Mekhani proved capable he would consider admitting them to the legions in due course.

With such thoughts occupying him, Erlaan passed the long day of marching. He felt not the slightest fatigue from his walking, his body sustained by the same aura of energy that the denizens of the Temple existed upon. Part of him hoped the people of Aarisk would put up a fight; he had already felt the small thrill of feeding upon his near-dead father and the thought of drawing on the essence of several thousand deaths filled him with excitement.

The day and night passed without incident; apparently Ullsaard's shadowing force had thought better of coming into the mountains after the Mekhani. They were most likely dashing back to hotwards to inform their master of Erlaan's cunning change of route. Though he tried hard not to listen to the false praise of the shamans and his warriors, Erlaan realised that he was truly marked out as special. Each day, testing himself against Ullsaard and the elements, Erlaan felt stronger and wiser. There was not a challenge he could not overcome.

Early in the following day's march the rain came again, hard and steady. At first the Mekhani had delighted in the water that fell from the sky, so rare in their lands. Now they endured the wet and cold in silent misery, quietly pining for their sun-drenched homes and the cool evenings of the desert. Erlaan barely felt the pattering on his thick skin, though the rattle of rain on his armour became a thunderous din if he concentrated on it.

Mile after mile the army trudged, down towards the plains of Nalanor. Though he had hoped to come upon Aarisk that day, the constant rain made even the surest path a quagmire to wade along, and the king-messiah was forced to call a halt at dusk; the terrain was too treacherous to press on through the night.

"The town will wait for us," he assured his followers with a smile. "Before the sun sets again, you shall see for yourselves our next prize."

Erlaan no longer had the need to sleep, though sometimes he would lie down and close his eyes, picturing the palace of Askh or the fields of Nalanor. There were coughs and sneezes from across the camp, each sounding near at hand to Erlaan's supernatural hearing. The thought of disease reared in his mind; something he had not previously considered. The chill and the damp might prove more of an enemy than he had thought. He would do well to head dawnwards from the mountains, towards the border of the Greenwater between Nalanor and Maasra, where the climate was hotter. He considered towns along the route that would make suitable stopping points and drew up a mental map to follow. When he had marched with Ullsaard, he had not paid a second thought to the problems of feeding and equipping an army; all of that had been carried out by lesser officers. The Mekhani had no such appreciation of logistics and so he would have to do his best in absence of quartermasters and caravans.

As dawn broke on the next day, the day when the Mekhani would fall upon Aarisk like a red storm, the scouts were sent out and the rest of the army prepared to break their makeshift camp. Erlaan was eager to get moving and chivvied the shaman-chiefs into action, impressing upon them the closeness of their goal. Aarisk was built upon the shoulder of a mountain at the far end of the pass, perhaps no more than four hours away. The Mekhani had already passed several huts and lodges and farms — abandoned for the moment — which had caused considerable interest and excitement in the desert warriors. They seemed as enthusiastic for the coming attack as their king.

Tasking the shamans to hurry up, Erlaan headed after the front of the column, wanting to be the first to lay eyes on the Nalanorian town that would become his base for attacks into the rest of the empire.

Midmorning, Erlaan guessed it to be around the second or third hour of low watch, a party of scouts returned. They were agitated as they reported their findings to the shaman council. Erlaan intervened to find out what was wrong.

"The town, it is broken," one of the scouts was saying.

"Broken?" said Erlaan, wondering if he had misheard. "What do you mean?"

"It is broken, great Orlassai, ruler of the skies," the scout said again, struggling for the right words. "It is empty. The walls, they are broken. The fields, they are no more. There is nothing but the dust and the smoke."

"Smoke? Dust? Make sense!" snapped Erlaan.

"Come with us, great Orlassai, and we shall show you." The scout pointed to a ridge that curved coldwards, cutting across the arc of the valley floor. "This way is quickest."

On foot, the scouts led their king up the slope and, picking their way carefully between the rocks and scrubs, they ventured out onto the narrow ridge. The wind was strong, but Erlaan was grateful that the rain was little more than occasional showers.

Following a well-worn goat track, the party made their way along the ridgeline, at times meandering around great cracks in the rocks, sometimes scrambling across fissures and over patches of loose scree. In places the slope dropped down sheer. Though he was certain his toughened skin and flesh could withstand sword and spear, the king-messiah eyed these cliff faces uneasily, not certain if even he could survive such a drop. The Mekhani were labouring by the time they reached the height of the ridge, though Erlaan's heart barely beat any faster and his breath came easily.

He pulled himself up the last stretch of an escarpment after the others. From here he could see down the length of the pass, and into the hills and plains beyond.

Aarisk sat on the shoulder of the pass entrance as it had always done but it was… broken. The scout had been right. The buildings were half-ruined and burnt, and there were gaping holes in the curtain wall. The streets and houses were blackened with soot, and the gateway was unbarred by gates. Towers had been toppled on to the road that wound up the hillside, and a pall of smoke hung over the mouth of the pass. Through the haze, everything was dark. The hillside pastures were dead. The woods further up the mountains were a swathe of stumps and still-smouldering fires.

Everything had been destroyed.

Erlaan growled and clenched his fists. This was Ullsaard's doing. The people of Aarisk had razed their town rather than let it fall into the hands of the Mekhani. The Askhan king was willing not just to sacrifice Ersua, but to employ a scorched earth policy wherever the Mekhani might advance.

"What has happened, mighty Orlassai?" asked one of the Mekhani. "What shall we do now?"

Erlaan looked down at the man's red face, eyes wide with doubt and pleading. It sickened the king-messiah. Every decision was his to make. Every detail, every smallest inconvenience, was his to resolve alone. The Mekhani were pathetic. They were like children, looking to him to solve every problem.

With a surge of anger, fuelled by Ullsaard's ruthless approach and the naive bleating of the scout, Erlaan grabbed the man by the throat. His fingers snapped his neck without effort, blood surging through the king-messiah's grip and splashing to the rocky ground. With a snarl, he hurled the corpse away, tossing it easily from the ridge.