Battle for the Royal Palace
The first major conflict of The Revolution, as well as the most famous, in which King Tarquin III was captured and killed, and The Republic of Nerevarn first declared.
The Conflict
Prelude
When Carr Tharn had taken de-facto control of the North Bank in Illyria, with the the Temple of Dianecht taken by surprise, the other temples remaining neutral, and the traders and common people mostly rising in support of her cause, she marched her followers over the Great Bridge and to the walls of the Palace, demanding the surrender of King Tarquin III and his relations. When this was refused, the revolutionary crowd took up siege positions at all the Palace Gates.
Deployment
The rapidly forming revolutionary army was consistently supplied by traders from the Market District and farmers from the village then known as King's Hamlet, and armed by the forges of the city - with the notable exception of the Dwarven Forgespark Smithy which refused outright, daring the revolutionaries to kill them if they dared. Knowing the secrets of master smithing that would be lost, the majority-middle-class leadership of the uprising advised against it, and the Dwarven Quarter remained mostly untouched by the ensuing siege and battle, despite its proximity to the Palace.
With little military experience, the revolutionaries camped outside the Palace relied on enthusiasm for the cause, and hatred for the King, to maintain discepline at first. However, as the weeks dragged on, with adrenaline fading and the fervor of the crowd draining with every day of inaction camped at the gates with no sign of change, Tharn decided that despite being heavily outmatched in equipment and training, an attack was necessary to revive the fire of revolution.
Battlefield
The Royal Palace, now the Senate Palace, was well defended from external attack, but had not been built with the intention of repelling an attack from within the city it governed. While the walls were high, they were not well defended, having been built more for privacy and separation than to keep out a determined assault. The great gate into the military encampment of the Royal Guard was a formidable obstacle it is true, but since the revolutionaries simply bypassed it and instead scaled the walls of the Palace where they met the residential areas of the city, its defences never played a significant role.
The Engagement
Having scaled the walls, the first wave of revolutionaries threw open various means of entrance to allow the rest of the waiting crowd to pour in. The Royal Guard fought admirably, but while staffed by the most elite warriors Nerevarn had to offer, they were more bodyguards than soldiers, and usually relied on the sheer numbers provided by the City Guard to fight off anything more than a targeted assasination attempt. Since many of the City Guard were either fighting with the revolutionaries or abstaining from taking sides - Tarquin having made himself a reputation for cutting or entirely witholding their wages - the Royal Guard were hopelessly outnumbered.
Outcome
Despite loosing many hundreds of lives in the assault, the revolutionaries simply overwhelmed the outnumbered Royal Guards, most of which died in the brutal hand to hand fighting which ensued. The only survivors were those too injured to resist capture and fight on. Since all Royal Guards swore to die in defence of the King if necessary, at least two are known to have taken their own lives after being captured in this manner, considering their lives forfeit. The battle was essentially the death of an entire generation of Royal Guards - perhaps necessary for the birth of the Republic, given their unwavering devotion to the monarchy.
Once the inner areas of the Palace were breached, the revolutionary crowd spread out in all directions searching for the King and his two younger siblings - both known to be all but prisoners there, given Tarquin's famous paranoia that a family member might attempt to overthrow him. Had either sibling been found, it is possible the fervour of the crowd, not yet solidified into any unified goal, might have turned in favour of replacing Tarquin with one of them. However, since neither were found, they were presumed either dead (and so useless to the cause) or escaped (thereby declaring themselves fugitives from the revolutionary forces), and such a plan never became an option.
Finally, when the King was found clinging to his throne in the Great Hall surrounded by the last living Royal Guards, the crowd surged forward, overwhelmed the unfortunate sworn protectors and dragged the King from the Palace. It is unclear exactly when or how he died, as he was simply dragged around the city beaten and stabbed by any who could reach him, including long after he was obviously dead. When the crowd reached the river with the now-mangled body dressed only in torn remnants of royal clothing, the body of King Tarquin was thrown in the water to angry and victorious shouts and cheers.
Once the body sank below the surface, there was a moment when it seemed as if the crowd would gradually disperse. The great tyrant dealt with, their opressor dead, it was very possible that the revolutionary sentiment could have faded away, and the people returned to their homes to await whichever of his family sucessfully claimed the dead king's throne. It was at that very moment however, that the body of Carr Tharn, now the greatest martyr of the revolution, was brought out from the Palace gates by several of her hastily-appointed generals, wrapped in one of the Royal Banners of the purple lilly, now stained with a streak of bright red blood. The crowd, incensed, rioted, declaring any who would not support the new Republic declared by Tharn before her death a traitor to the people, and Tharn's generals quietly began negotiations with the commanders of the City Guard - soon to be renamed the Army of the Republic. The flag which served as Tharn's shroud became the first flag of the Republic of Nerevan, and the purple lilly streaked with red is the sigil of the Republic to this day.
Aftermath
The news of Tarquin's death and the declaration of a Republic spread throughout Nerevarn. Some places held out in support of the monarchy, hoping a clear sucessor would emerge, but given the disappearance of Tarquin's siblings and a lack of legitimate royal heirs, they were left without a figurehead, and the campaign by the new Army of the Republic took each holdout one by one over the next few years. Only Verdorn, the wealthy city known as 'maiden of the mountains' and 'city of gold', sucessfully escaped inclusion in the new Republic.
Included under Conflict
Conflict Type
Siege
Battlefield Type
Urban
Start Date
2119
Conflict Result
The death of King Tarquin III, and the first declaration of the Republic.
Location
Belligerents
Strength
Around 100 Royal Guards and the small number of city guards who remained loyal to the King - perhaps another 200 or so.
Around 13,000 lightly armed and untrained civilian millitia at the start of the uprising and siege, dropping to around 7000 by the time Carr Tharn called for the assault.
Casualties
Almost all of the Royal Guards died in the fighting, with only a few wounded and captured. None went on to fight again.
Estimates vary between 2000 and 2500 dead, with at least another 2000 wounded. 1267 wounded were recorded as being treated for their injuries at the Temple of Thea, with the additional reports of the wounded and dead collated later by historians.
Objectives
Defend the King and the Royal Palace, and put down the revolutionaries.
Capture and execute the King, capture his two younger brothers.
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