A Soldier's Account of the Great War
Volume 3
The Phantom Hounds - Haunted Heart
Tuesday March 17, Sixth Year of the War; The Barrier:
People told me how big this damned desert was, but I never really understood. The entire heart of the old empire, and then some, all nothing but sand and rock. If the Fallen Lords were capable of this, then I can't understand how there's still a soul left alive in all the world. Maybe it's because forty years ago, when all this happened, was the only time they were ever really unified. Or maybe the easy victory just left them disgusted and bored.
In any case, we've arrived. We spent the past four months in preparation, filling our numbers after the losses we suffered at the Toven and honing the new men until they shone like the edge of a Heron's sword.
Now that we're scores of miles from the nearest Legion outpost, with no danger of the word spreading, the Captain has revealed our mission to us. Everyone knows the story of how the Heron Guard became the Journeymen, imposing a heavy penance upon themselves after the fall of Muirthemne. In this, they were led by a man Eight Coyote Comet, one of the oldest members of the Guard and one of its greatest heroes. The victories he and his new Journeymen won over the Dark, even after they had buried their swords, are the stuff of legend. But then he vanished.
Five months ago, word reached Maeldun that Eight Coyote Comet was still alive, held captive in the catacombs under Muirthemne by Reiner, one of Balor's shades. No one knows why they haven't killed him, but the Journeymen say that Eight Coyote was a prophet of some kind, and the Dark may want to make use of his knowledge. We're to free him and bring him back to Maeldun and preferably to deal with Reiner in the process, though I doubt the shade will give us any choice in the matter.
Everything is almost in place. The main body of our troops is within a week's striking distance of Muirthemne, and we sent a small force ahead to secure one of the old walled imperial waypoints. Unfortunately, we've had no word from them, which doesn't bode well.
The Captain is personally leading a squadron to investigate.
We've been through the fire, and we've been chosen. Our greatest mission is about to begin.
Friday March 20, Sixth Year of the War; The Moonlight Wall:
We're only a day out from Muirthemne now, We'll be breaking into the city tomorrow…at least, if all goes well tonight.
The sun is setting behind us, and we're two hours' march from the Moonlight Wall, the fortification that runs in a ring all the way around Muirthemne ten miles out from the city's main walls. Connacht built it, and it used to keep out the barbarians and bandits, but by the time Balor came, centuries of peace, had made it something altogether different. There are tales of the farmers who tended that fertile ring holding midnight picnics by the ghostly lights along the wall, and the people of the city coming out to join them.
Tonight, it's hard to imagine that it's the same wall. Our scouts report undead guards all along it, holding every narrow archway, but they also say there's a huge gap ahead where water still flows through from a spring that survived the warping of the landscape. The plan is to punch through one of the smaller openings and attack the guards at the breach
from both sides, which will give us the opening we need to get all our men through in a hurry, without alerting the shade's entire army.
Quick and bloodless is the Captain's hope for this whole mission. If we can take Reiner by surprise, we may be able to get in and out with minimal fighting. All things considered, we're lucky to have gotten this far with only a handful of losses. It's probably too much to hope that our good luck will last.
Saturday March 21, Sixth Year of the War; Outside Muirthemne:
What do you say when you look upon the ruins of what was once the greatest city in the known world? The sand piled up against the walls, the wind roaring through the great breaches in the stone where entire sections were blasted away, The maze of rubble inside where buildings once stood. The old sandstone is like dead bones, and it looks like the emptiest place in all Wyrd's creation.
Except that it's crawling with the undead, and our scouts have heard the footsteps of the Trow on the cobbles.
There's no chance of taking the city by force. If we march all our men in, we'll go the way of everyone else who once lived here. Instead, the Captain is sending a few small groups of our best men to slip through the cracks and find a way into the catacombs. From there, all they have to do is find the prophet and get him back out. It's daring, I'll say that. If we succeed, we're likely to kick a hornet's nest in the process. But this is what we're best at.
I can only hope they return quickly. I thought Muirthemne would remind me of everything we're fighting for... but the sight of it just weighs heavy on my heart.
Saturday March 21, Sixth Year of the War; the Catacombs Under Muirthemne:
I'm writing this on the run. We have barely even stopped for water and rest in the last three days, and the best I can do is fill in the sentences as I march. But this is a story that should be told. If any of us ever make it back alive, they'll be telling the story of what we did at Muirthemne for generations.
But there, the survivors tell me, was where the fight really began. Down in those dark, gloomy halls, with the enemy's footsteps echoing through every tunnel, they faced their greatest trials... and Reiner was waiting at the end, just as we suspected. But they came back to us, and they had Eight Coyote with them. In the chaos that has followed, I haven't been able to get the full story yet, but I will do my best to record it all here.
Whatever else happens, at least we have this victory. Everything may have gone to hell, but I hope that our tale will get back to Maeldun one way or the other, and the Free Cities will fight on for the memory of that day.
Friday March 27, Sixth Year of the War; Somewhere in the Barrier:
We've been running for a week now, and we're all exhausted. None of us have much hope of escape anymore. The Dark is gaining on us little by little, and we skirmish with their advance elements daily.
The undead are everywhere except ahead, and we lose men every time they hit us. Every time someone is wounded or can't keep up and falls behind, they are lost. We can wait for no one. The Captain fell two days ago, and we couldn't give him a burial, couldn't stop to remember all that he had done, couldn't even recover the armor he was so proud of, But at
least he died wearing it.
The worst of it is, we're going the wrong way.
Not back west toward Maeldun and the Cloudspine, but east, toward another range of mountains whose name I don't even know. Eight Coyote Comet leads us now, but he's not exactly what I thought he would be. Most of the time, he's silent. When he speaks, it's sometimes in that calm, wise, soothing voice he has - and sometimes he raves like a madman. Even when he seems lucid, he speaks of things that no one understands, even the other Journeymen.
He seems to be insisting that east is the way we must go, which is just as well, because the hordes of the enemy haven't given us a choice since we broke the prophet out of the catacombs. Even if we wanted to turn back, Eight Coyote would not go, and we can't very well make a break through enemy lines while dragging him. Nor would the Journeymen allow it. They treat him with the utmost reverence, as though he's some kind of high priest.
Ahead, he told us, we would find a great chasm, running across the desert as far as the eye can see. and sure enough, we have come to it. There are only a few crossings, all seemingly sculpted of the very stone from which the chasm was torn. On the largest of the bridges, an image of a gauntlet is scorched into the rock. None of us know what it means. But it is here we will make our stand.
Thursday April 3, Sixth Year of the War; Edge of the Untamed Lands:
I cannot believe Lam still alive. All I can do is stare at the sky and give my meager thanks to
Wyrd.
What we faced at the chasm was worse than the Toven. It was worse than anything I have ever known. I remember becoming numb to the knowledge that I would die, and the rest is barely more than a blur, like a nightmare from which I am still not sure I have woken.
Most of the men we came to the Barrier with are dead.
But it is not over yet. Eight Coyote Comet continues to lead us east, and we've come to the foothills of the eastern mountains. It's an empty land, and at first I thought there was nothing out here at all. But last night, I heard long, low sounds in the deep of the night, like the thundering of great bellows. Once, I saw a flickering orange light on the horizon.
From what the prophet says, my impressions are not far off; there's a forge out there, though not like any I've ever seen. Eight Coyote says that the last priest of the Trow has led some of his people out here, far out into the wilderness beyond the reach of men.
He has already begun the work of building a new Forge of Nyx, the combination of factory temple, and sorcerous nexus where the Trow once created the iron for their greatest works, including their impenetrable suits of armor. If the forge is completed, Balor will be all but invincible.
So we are preparing ourselves for this final battle.
I have looked upon the skeleton of Muirthemne. I have glimpsed a world without life. Such will be our fate if we fail.
Friday April 4, Sixth Year of the War; Edge of the Untamed Lands:
The last priest of the Trow lies dead, and whatever dreams he had for his people are broken now. But we have not turned-back toward home.
Eight Coyote Comet is still leading us East. Today we entered a clay bottomed valley that I’m certain is beyond the edge of any map I've ever seen. On the other side of it is the Untamed Lands: an entire continent where almost no one has ever gone, a place that lives only in the wild tales of the few who have ever returned from it, and in dreams. Or nightmares, perhaps.
The prophet mumbles mostly to himself as he walks at the head of our diminished band.
The journeymen confer with him, but from the looks on their faces, I doubt they are any happier than the rest of us with what they hear, or understand it any better. Eight Coyote Comet whimpers in his sleep, and wakes every morning with a muffled scream.
Whether it was the desert sun or his imprisonment or the horror of the future he sees that has affected him so, I'm not sure. But I think he's only half with us, and I hate to think of where the rest of his soul may be. In his best moments, he speaks of a man kneeling in the shade of a great tree, its branches dark with rot. It's a strange vision, and I can only guess what it portends.
Yet we cannot return without him. It would be a failure to do so. With all we've lost, none of us can stomach the thought. And if he's right…
…I don't know. But what other hope do we have?
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