The soldiers were tired, cranky, and sore. They looked at the young upstart who'd marched them far from where they thought they needed to go. The person wasn't what they wanted in a leader, but they quickly learned, the person was what they had NEEDED as one. -- Anon Guest
Of all the fates that an army could ever despise, it was being under the command of an untried, untested Noble with no knowledge of the battlefield. The stripling prince was barely old enough to shave his entire face. Only the fact that he was one of the realm's prized Demon Lords stopped the entire population of soldiers from quitting on the spot.
That said, they knew their objective. What General Mokesk couldn't understand was how the seventeen-year-old Prince Benevolence thought he was doing any good by going around the other side of the mountains.
On the plus side, there was good forage and decent places to camp on the way. On the other hand, they were going the wrong way. If it wasn't for the Prince sleeping in the same kinds of tents as them, or making certain they were all well fed, they would have rebelled some weeks ago.
If the Prince wanted to go the wrong way and end up accidentally betray his father the King, it wasn't their problem. They got paid, they got fed, and they didn't die for it. It was the other armies that would suffer for this mistake. They were the ones paying the price in their lives.
It was when they came through a previously unforseen pass that Mokesk realised what their leader was doing.
Their force was not just a flanking manoeuvre. It was a surprise flanking Manoevre. Badrask was heavily fortified in all other directions. The remaining forces of Whitekeep were merely decoration. Siege engines set up to menace. Encampments of troops set up to look threatening.
It was Prince Benevolence leading the true attack.
Under his command, they set up a dark camp just inside the treeline, overlooking Badrask. The young Prince gathered Mokesk and the other nineteen generals. Drawing a tactical map on the ground between them.
"They're keeping the slaves here, here, here, and here," he said, showing large buildings where ordinary siege engines were guaranteed to strike and kill. "Their leaders are in these structures here, here, and here." Also large buildings with a similar architecture, but a slightly more expensive material. Well out of siege engine shot. "Those are our targets. We believe the guardhouse here will provide the most opposition, and it would be ideal if we could eliminate the leaders with a minimum of lives lost."
Oh. So he was his father's son. The child had learned deviousness at the Thrice-Sworn King's knee. He may not strike like a shadow in the night, but he still knew how to strike to the best effect.
"The extra swords," said Mokesk, "they're not for us. They're for the slaves."
"Yes," said the Prince. "Let them enact what revenge they whist. The king my father wishes all his allies to know what happens when they tempt his ire."
The walls of Badrask would be painted with blood, Mokesk was certain. If anyone living there were to survive, they would either be in chains or in cradles.
"Divide your forces to their best effect, gentlemen. I will be taking a basket of swords to the biggest slave house. We move two hours before dawn."
When all the guards on watch would be drifting off and when most in the city would be fast asleep. When the fowl and the hounds would be making the most noise and therefore ignored.
"Your father gave you this strategy, didn't he?" said Mokesk.
"My father gave me the objective," said the devilborn Prince. "I've been thinking of the strategy since we embarked." A pointy and pointed smile that was the very echo of the king's. "This has been my test."
Mokesk had to know. "What objective did he give you?"
Prince Benevolence deepened his voice and added a Teutonian accent, "Fuck them up without getting fucked in turn."
[Photo by John Cameron on Unsplash]
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