Kerite's Drakes
Kerite's Drakes is a mercenary company led by Devia Kerite. The company includes ten thousand soldiers, including dragoons, Breachers, glassdancers, and artillery who fight all over the world and overwinter in the Glass Isles. They have a reputation for being brutal against those they are hired to fight. They fly a mercenary flag with three blue dragons and a field of green and employ Nasuud-language passwords amongst troops. Several members of their company, including Devia Kerite and Captain Hellonian, are members of the Glass Knife.
STORY
Before the war between Grent and Ossan, Kerite's Drakes had been hired by the Nasuud to put down a revolution in Purnia where they brutally killed the revolutionaries. After Adriana Grappo's murder, Sammi Stavri began negotiations to hire Kerite's Drakes on behalf of the Ossan Empire in their war against the Duchy of Grent. However, somehow, negotiations broke down, and Ossa loses the bid to the Grent government. Upon signing a contract with Grent, Kerite's Drakes immediately land just south of Harbortown and marches toward Ossa, forcing the Ossan Foreign Legion to pull out of Grent to cut them off.
Under the leadership of Devia Kerite, the mercenary company employs several strategies, including killing Ossan scouting parties, attacking at twilight in unexpected assaults, cutting off communication lines between Ossa and Harbortown, blockading Harbortown, and even using orphans as human shields. They win several battles against the incompetence of General Stavri. After General Stavri is killed, the Ossan military, under the leadership of Demir Grappo, comes up with equally brilliant strategies, including the Grappo Torrent and using cavalry units armed with sightglass after dark.
When the Kerite's Drakes reserves arrive, the mercenary company pivots to take Harbortown, forcing Ossa to change their defensive position once more. Demir notes that they look sturdy and impenetrable compared to his own troops, and he fears facing them in open battle rather than in strategic skirmishes, which had given him a much more equal footing against them.
Meanwhile, Idrian Sepulki and his flying glassdancer hunting party speculate that the monster might be something that the Kerite's Drakes discovered somewhere in the world during their travels. They speculate that perhaps people in Purnia, Marn, or Nasuud might have discovered a way to use godglass to alter their bodies to become intelligent monsters.
Just before their final battle against Ossa, Kerite's Drakes are alerted of the position of Thessa Foleer's phoenix channel expedition to the Forge by Kempt's secret flare. Captain Hellonian takes some dragoons and corners Thessa's party, demanding their surrender for being in an active warzone, explaining that they will be ransomed back to Ossa. Though Thessa and Tirana Kirkovik try to negotiate their freedom by identifying themselves as a scientific expedition, Breenen Alvari orders his enforcers to capture Thessa and the others when he sees the mercenaries are with the Glass Knife. This contingent of Kerite's Drakes is later completely disintegrated to a man when Thessa ungrounds her phoenix channel just before lightning strikes it.
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