Fall of the Chateau Saffalore

[Scarlett]

The great cacophany of falling rock awoke Quintus Scarlett with a start.

"M'lud," said Ser Magnus Dodd gloomily from where he stood in the doorway, his sword lain across a nearby table.

Quintus blinked his way to consciousness. "That sound," he observed, "is not the adoring masses come to exalt their favorite Duke," he asked, or rather stated.

"Not exactly," replied Quintus' lieutenant.

Quintus rose to his feet with some effort. He was old; he felt old. But the lines of his face were hardened into resolve, if not battle-resolve. "What is our status?"

"Per your instructions," Dodd replied, "we did not recruit any new militia; Aurvandil seems to have observed this fact and arrived to overwhelm what militia we had. So we have very few men and the walls are coming down around us."

Quintus looked thoughtful. "So the battle is lost, we have few men, and a large pile of gold. Fetch me a writer of fairy-tales and a curly black moustache; we have perhaps two days to perfect our mad cackling before they break down the gates."

Dodd furrowed his brow, uncertain how much of the request to take seriously. "Lord Hireshmont has also been seen in the area--"

"Pain," Quintus interrupted, "comes in two varieties: the kind that makes you stronger for having endured it, and needless suffering. I despise the unnecessary. Strike the standard of the Republic from the battlements," he said. "Raise the white flag and open the gates. If there is to be a reckoning, let us get it over with; I never thought I would say it, but I do wish that Mendicant were here instead of wherever the blazes he has got off to."

Dodd did not reply, but merely turned to carry out his orders. A short while later, the green cross-and-clover of the Republic ceased flying over the Chateau Saffalore.

[Scarlett]

The garrison had put up the sort of defense that one puts up when one is hopelessly outnumbered against an enemey well-supplied with siege engines: anything that could be thrown, launched, or tossed over the walls at the invaders had been thrown, launched, or tossed, and there was an initial melee right at the walls to keep the ladders from gaining easy purchase, but this was not a scene of anyone fighting until the last man.  When Duke Quintus had fallen during the battle, the garrison surrendered en masse, and the whole thing was over in perhaps an hour.

A couple of days later, after the invading army had sufficiently made its point by carrying off the very stones of the castle until only the inner keep remained, the courtyard of the keep rapidly transformed from 'keep everybody out' mode to 'keep everybody fed and watered and happy' mode. After a couple of couriers had gone riding between the Duke's quarters and the siege camp, things began happening very quickly: a whole wing of the keep was turned into a hospital for Terran and Aurvandilian alike with food and medicine provided to any of the injured. The granaries of the Chateau were full and had been unmolested by either invader or defender, and they were thrown open.

Shortly after sunrise the next day, the Duke's personal retinue gathered in the courtyard. Where previously the courtyard had a half-dozen banners of the Republic of Terran, they now flew the family standard of Quintus Scarlett, with its red chevron upon a white crest. The few soldiers that attended the Duke likewise wore the uniform of a House Guard; the Duke himself was attired in a fine if simple white surcoat with his arms emblazoned on the torso and the Ducal coronet on his brow. Though a much older man - not quite threescore years - he moved slowly more on account of an arrow rumored to have struck him in the side than on account of his age.

The retinue fanned out on either side of the Duke, adopting the expressionless poise of professional soldiers in ready anticipation of a much larger retinue soon to surround them; not a single muscle moved out of order or formation, and the only speech was a low conversation between the Duke and the giant man who stood beside him: Ser Magnus Dodd, Quintus' lieutenant, slightly younger than his master but a good six inches taller, forty pounds heavier, and the unmistakable shape of a warhammer strapped to his back. He did not appear injured but even with his handlebar moustache he was not the most of handsome of men to begin with.

Quintus tapped the hilt of the ceremonial sword he wore at his side and squinted at the sun cresting the battlements.

He waited.