Herald of Steel

According to the captured Lord Bernard, although he did not know exactly when the fleet had set sail, he could confirm that they did and that judging by the rough timeline, they should be getting near.

This was enough to set a furious fire under Alexander.

He wasted little time ordering his army to make haste, even commanding them to leave most of their supply wagons and siege equipment behind with the servants.

The possibility of impending enemy reinforcement was too great to ignore.

Of course, the best case scenario would be for the relief force to get swallowed up by some disaster at sea, thus allowing Alexander to take his sweet time here.

And his hopes for this were not too exaggerated either, as in this era, the chances of wooden ships getting overtaken by the waves were so common that it was hardly worth commenting.

During the first punic war, Rome even lost two fleets this way, each carrying a hundred thousand men in this way. That was equal to twenty percent of all their able bodied men. And if not for their entire populace being not quite right in the head, just that loss might have likely won Carthage the conflict.

But although Alexander could certainly take inspiration from such events, he could hardly put too much stake in them.

They were far too mercurial event and a far wiser move would be to prepare for the worst.

Hence with Lord Bernard's assurance that the Heeat family was still at the top of the hill, Alexander finally dropped his suspicions over any possible ambushes and ordered his men to break formation and immediately start a rapid march to try to catch up to the retreating Margraves.

He wanted to force them to give battle before they could reach the foot of the hill and call for Lord Parker's help.

As for the possibility of Lord Bernard lying about it all, Alexander found that very unlikely.

From the way the man acted to the fact that all the things, he revealed till now matched quite well with the rest of the things Alexander observed independently here today.

Hence now his top priority became to solve his conflict before Duke Heeat come join the fray.

.....

"My lord, our scouts report enemy forces are just a few kilometers behind us! They seem to be chasing us! What do you command?"

The rapid progress of Alexander's roughly 25,000 men was naturally quite hard to miss for anyone in the vicinity.

After observing the enormous cloud of dust that was being whipped up, the scouts Lord Bakerfield placed in the rear quickly informed their commander of the impending danger.

"Dammit!" It was unknown just how many times the elderly lord had pronounced this curse within the short time today.

First was Remus's sudden appearance, then the mad chase by the Helvati, and now this.

Everything seemed to be going from bad to worse for him as he could not believe their enemy had caught up so quickly.

'We wasted too much dealing with those brutes'. Lord Bakerfield first cursed to himself, referring to how the last remnants of the chasing Helvat had just been dealt with- first baited into attacking them, then surrounded, and lastly struck down to the last man.

But despite the wasted time, the nobleman could not really complain since the sight had brought some much needed soothing relief to his wounded heart.

Rather, Lord Bakerfield turned to hastily order,

"Order the men to initiate a rapid march. We are close to the hill! Let's not stop now!"

Lord Bakerfield's quick march strategy would indeed pay off, managing to reach the foot of Lord Parker's camp some decent time before Alexander's expected arrival.

Even though the Margraves had various stumbles, the fact was Alexander also experienced many hiccups, taking a lot of time marching his army slowly and carefully, rescuing the Helvati, and hearing Lord Bernard out.

Thus on paper Lord Bakerfield should have had plenty of time to slowly regroup his forces and put up a good defensive position.

However the problem was….

"What? The brat refuse to send aid?" Lord Bakerfield's roar sent the reporting scout's heart beating like a wild fawn's as he almost fell on his butt in fear.

But the elder noble was not in any mood to care.

Rather he roared with great vehemence, "Did you properly tell them that Alexander will be here any moment now? Did you… you little brat?"

In his moment of immense need, the desperate lord would rather hope that his messenger was incompetent than believe his close ally was stabbing him in the back like this.

While facing this interrogation, the scout quickly sensed that his life might be in mortal danger of being forfeited if he continued to dally.

Hence picking up his voice, he bravely insisted,

"Yes! Yes lord. I delivered the message just as you asked. I personally met Lord Parker to inform him that we could not risk scaling the hill due to fear of Alexander's rider catching up and then asked the ducal lord to send a few men to hold back the enemy while we marched up.

However, the lord refused to deploy his men citing they were needed to defend his own camp."

"*Bang*!"

No sooner that messenger had finished repeating his report, he got a tight slap on his cheeks for his efforts, delivered by the now enraged and irascible Lord Bakerfield.

Not daring to blame Lord Parker given his status, this elder nobleman resorted to venting his anger on his lessers.

Now, the man was not usually like this and usually was considered the model nobleman by his peers.

Which perhaps also went to show just how much Lord Parker's rejection had affected the man. It was like seeing his last lifeline get severed or finding that the last lifeboat he was counting on was not there.

If Lord Bakerfield had the time, he would have cursed and huffed at Lord Parker's fourteen generations for being such traitorous scoundrels.

For now though, Lord Bakerfield could only swear, 'I will never let the Margraves ally with the Heeats,' before turning his attention to the impending battle.

"Order the army to take over the nearby town! We will defend there until sunset!" He ordered, thus swiftly taking shelter behind the walls of a town situated on the western side of the hill's foot.

"Dammit"

But although taking the town for the eleven to twelve thousand men army was a piece of cake, Lord Bakerfield gravely wondered if he could hold it from Alexander's encroaching forces.

This doubt was generated upon seeing the place's defenses, which for all tasks and purposes might as well not have existed- situated in a flat, wide ground without even a ditch or moat to protect them, there was only a single layered wooden wall that was more like a fence, designed in a fashion much like Lord Janus's place.

But then again, what could Lord Bakerfield have realistically expected? This was a typical small town out in the boonies, not some grand metropolitan.

All rural settlements were like this- their defense really only designed to handle wild beasts and the occasion thieves and bandits.

If anything major happened, like facing an invading army, these people would usually abandon the place and run to the safety of the walls of Caira, which was less than a day's march away from here.

For this time period, that sort of distance was like being just across the pond.

Hence Lord Bakerfield had to come back to the second part of his statement, not to fully stop Alexander but only stall him until dusk.

It was already approaching late afternoon by now and given the still shorter days, sunlight was expected to disappear within a few scant hours.

Once that happened, Lord Bakerfield could finally pray for rescue once again.

He did not believe Alexander would dare to chase him at night up the rocky hill, especially not under the threat of a possible ambush from Lord Parker's forces.

Or at least that was what the old man forced himself given the abject circumstances.

........

"Lord Pasha, we have spotted the Margraves troops garrisoned in a nearby town. The Heeat forces however are still up the mountain." Alexander's forward scouts were quick to get him information about the enemy's deployment.

"It seems Lord Bernard was right! The Heeat and Margraves alliance have basically broken down."

The one to make this gleeful remark was none other than a very excited Remus. Because given their marching speed, he thought that the enemy would have already slipped through his fingers by now.

Menes was there to quickly agree too, humming out from the other side,

"Mmmm! By all accounts, the Heeats should have helped the Margraves save their forces. Divided they number half of us. But it seems Lord Parker has hedged all his bets on this hill, not even willing to come down to save his allies. Heh!"

The usually taciturn black man's thick lips curved into a disdainful smirk as he snorted the last bit of his lines, his eyes turning equal parts disgusted at Lord Parker's behavior towards his allies and mirthful at the man's foolish assumption.

"Have the Helvati charge the garrison. The legionaries will attack the hills!" Alexander's orders on the other hand were swift and succinct.

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