Chapter 97: BROKEN WARD VICTORY

RAIGORO’S POV

"Now we move."

The signal did not send Blackharrow charging into the dark.

Raigoro had spent the entire battle refusing the enemy’s invitations.

He was not going to become stupid because the first good opportunity had finally arrived.

He sent the CONTROLLED ADVANCE signal first.

The beacon chain carried it toward West Rime.

Another line carried it toward North Spur.

The beacon carried no tactical explanation because none was necessary. The outpost commanders already knew what CONTROLLED ADVANCE required: reclaim defensible ground, force pressure away from the ward, and stop at the outer markers.

"Arven."

The captain stepped close.

Raigoro pointed toward the southern formation.

"They are still built around pressure toward the center."

Arven followed the line.

"West side is thinner."

"Because they never expected us to advance."

Raigoro looked toward the remaining infantry.

"First company fixes them in the center."

"Second?"

"With me."

Captain Veyr stood beside Meris.

The gray dragon could fly.

That was not the same as being ready for another engagement.

"She stays down," Raigoro said.

Veyr nodded.

Raigoro looked toward the last active Dragon Host pair. They had driven the carrion drakes high enough to make one controlled strike over the southern approach.

"One pass," he ordered. "Break their escape line before they know they need it."

Raigoro wanted one controlled opening, not another prolonged aerial engagement.

The first company advanced five paces behind its shields and met the enemy without breaking formation. Raigoro waited while they took another five.

The stonebacks compressed toward the center.

There.

"Second company. Left."

A runner from Holt reached them before Raigoro moved.

"Your Grace."

Raigoro looked over.

"Central brace is carrying, but Master Holt says the service span remains temporary."

"Load limit?"

"No massed formation over the marked center. No wagons."

Raigoro looked toward the route he had intended to use.

The engineers had saved the junction, but the service span was still temporary.

He pointed west of the marked service stones.

"Second company uses that lane."

Arven followed the direction.

"Narrower."

"Yes."

"Slower."

"Also yes."

Raigoro turned to the runner.

"Keep the casualty wagons north of the span. Nobody decides victory means Holt’s restrictions have ended."

"Yes, Your Grace."

The runner left.

Raigoro looked back at the enemy.

Even the counterattack had to fit inside what the engineers had managed to keep alive.

Raigoro went with them.

They did not charge.

They moved fast enough that the enemy could not easily reform and slow enough that the infantry remained a formation.

The thinner line showed Kian’s absence. Vharos’s absence showed differently: one Dragon Host pair remained overhead where the black dragon should have dominated the sky. Raigoro knew every resource he no longer possessed.

He built the attack from what remained.

The last active Dragon Host pair crossed above them.

The dragon swept fire across the open ground behind the western cluster.

Ash hounds caught directly in the flame went down before they reached cover. A stoneback at the edge of the pass staggered as its gray corrupted hide split across one shoulder.

The Dragon Host pair climbed before the fire could reach Blackharrow’s advancing infantry.

The western creatures turned away from Raigoro’s line.

Exactly.

The pass had done what Raigoro needed: it made the enemy turn at the moment he needed them facing the wrong direction.

The turn opened the southern formation.

Raigoro saw it before Arven did.

The corrupted creatures were no longer supporting one another. Their pressure had separated into three smaller fights.

Raigoro did not wait for them to recover.

"Forward!"

Blackharrow drove into the openings.

The six-limbed creature remained where Vharos had brought it down. With the front joint exposed and its supporting formation broken, an infantry spear team reached the opening beneath its armor and finished it before the advance passed.

Infantry kept formation.

Archers denied regrouping.

The stabilized network held beneath them.

The southern formation began breaking apart.

Later, the western beacon confirmed:

LINE ADVANCING.

Then North Spur answered.

LINE ADVANCING.

Detailed casualty counts would take hours.

Raigoro did not need them to know the strategy had changed.

The enemy was being pushed away from all three positions.

Captain Arven came beside him.

"Pursuit?"

"To the markers."

Arven looked downhill.

"And after?"

"Scouts."

Raigoro wiped blood from his sword hand.

"I have spent enough men proving I can recognize bait."

The advance stopped where Raigoro had ordered it to stop.

Some corrupted creatures fled.

Others had to be killed where they fought.

The last heavy survivors disappeared into the lower trees under distant observation rather than reckless pursuit.

No cheering followed immediately.

Soldiers were still counting.

The junction’s outer works were broken, North Spur had lost part of its outer defense, and West Rime remained damaged. Men were dead, more were wounded, and others were still missing.

Victory did not make any of those things smaller.

Raigoro did not reach Vharos until the southern line stopped moving. He had wanted to go sooner, but the Dragon Healers already had Vharos and the soldiers still fighting under Raigoro’s command needed him elsewhere.

Vharos lay beneath a temporary windbreak near the northern slope.

A field Dragon Healer had completed the first examination.

Master Clair and Healer Lou were being sent the findings through the normal return chain.

Vharos would not be moved until the field team believed flight or transport safe.

Raigoro stopped outside the marked treatment space.

"Major fracture?"

"None I can establish."

"Wing?"

"Severe strain through the old injury. Exhaustion. Pain."

"Breathing?"

"Poor after the fall. Better now."

"Internal bleeding?"

"No clear sign. That is not the same as none."

Raigoro nodded.

"Can I go to him?"

The healer looked at Vharos.

Then at Raigoro.

"Briefly."

Raigoro crossed the marked line.

He put one hand against Vharos’s jaw.

The bond answered with exhaustion, pain, and familiar irritation.

Alive.

Raigoro closed his eyes.

"You are an idiot."

Vharos did not open his eyes.

The irritation strengthened.

Raigoro stayed only until the healer told him to move.

Then he returned toward the junction.

On his way back, Raigoro passed the carcass of the six-limbed corrupted creature.

One of the broken chains still hung from its shoulder.

A field evidence clerk had marked it but not moved it.

Something dark coated the metal where the restraint had entered corrupted flesh.

The substance was not blood.

It was resin.

Raigoro stopped.

He had seen the same black material after the road attack and on the wounded dragon.

He looked toward the valley filled with dead creatures, broken transport fittings, chains, and abandoned equipment.

The battle was over.

The investigation had just acquired a battlefield.