Chapter 746: The final reprisal(1)
By the dawn of September, the royal mustering had finally reached its end. A total of 3,800 men now stood ready under the banners of the crown, a force that was, in truth, the combined strength of two princedoms brought together under the command of a single man.
It was a sight to behold.
The sheer scale of it carried a certain sobriety, for such unity was rarely achieved so swiftly. In less than two years, Alpheo had managed to draw swords not only from his own loyal lords but also from the newly sworn nobles of conquered Herculia. In ordinary times, pacifying a territory so vast and so deeply scarred by war would have required no less than half a decade.
But Alpheo had wasted no time. He had poured coin, quite the good sum , into stitching the land back together, repairing roads, reviving trade, and sharing the spoils of subjugation with select high lords of Herculia to secure their stake in his rule.
The land had not returned to its pre-war prosperity, but it had been restored to a functional state, and the bonds, if not loyalty, of its nobility had been secured enough for them to answer his call to arms.
Still, pacification and assimilation were far from the same thing. For now, their allegiance was tied to his person alone. Were Alpheo to die, the Herculeian lords would likely be the first to rise against his heir. Fortunately, Alpheo was young, sharp, and very much alive, which he intended to remain, so he had enough time to weave these newly conquered lords into the fabric of Yarzat society until rebellion would seem both alien and unprofitable.
And, of course, there was the matter of his standing army, 1,300 hardened "demons" whose very presence was a deterrent to treachery.
In short, he had them all by the balls, and for even the smallest infractions, he would strengthen his grip.
Following the completion of the great muster, the Royal host began its march southwest, bound for the coastal city of Aracina. It was there, upon the wharves and within the new expanded harbors, that the first moves of the coming campaign would be made.
The army accompanied by its lumbering baggage trains, with mules and horses, and the endless tide of camp followers, was a spectacle impossible to hide. Even at the best pace, it took a day and a half to cover the distance, the sound of their passage carried on the wind long before the banners were in sight.
Only a fool would have imagined such a force capable of striking by surprise, Alpheo had no doubt that the enemy alreayd knew of their presence. They had stood encamped outside the capital for nearly a month, their banners flying, their drills visible to half the kingdom.
The notion of "stealth" in such conditions was laughable. It would have been as if a hunter stood in the woods shouting at the trees and then cursed his luck when no game came forth.
And honestly, the enemy prince, Sorza, was no fool.
Four years earlier, since Alpheo had basically handed him his crown early, he had poured every scrap of coin, labor, and steel into preparing for Yarzat’s inevitable retribution.
Especially since peace was not on the table.
The frontier cities bristled with new palisades and trenches, while garrison numbers had been swelled beyond comfort, and the storehouses on the border groaned under the weight of grain and salted meat.
Marching directly south into such defenses would be a labor worthy of a madman.
Even with 4,000 men, Alpheo knew the border fortresses would not surrender for fear alone, and storming them would bleed his army white long before they ever reached the Oizenian heartlands.
And should the Oizenian relief force arrive, any victory against it would still leave him mired in long, costly sieges. At best, he could expect to take a city or two in an entire campaign season, an outcome that held no appeal to a man like him.
Alpheo loathed the slow grind of a drawn-out war, he was a man of speed, not of constancy.
To do that, he needed to refuse the battlefield that Sorza had prepared for him and choose his own.
And wouldn’t you know it? The sea offered him just that.
It was the attacker’s privilege to decide when and where to strike, and Alpheo had no intention of fighting on ground chosen by another man.
The campaign’s first move would not be a march against walls,but a voyage into open waters, for after all Yarzat ruled the waves.
Above all, the strategic merits of his plan such as bypassing the enemy’s fortified frontier and striking where they were weakest, there lingered a motive far simpler, almost childish.
When a boy receives a new toy, he is seized by the urge to play with it. In much the same way, Alpheo, who had poured nearly 118,000 silverii over six years into the construction and outfitting of a royal fleet, could not be blamed for wanting to see it in action.
And why not? That much silver was a king’s ransom; any man would feel entitled to put such a costly prize to use.
It was this early, almost eager desire that brought the might of twenty-three galleys and six galleons into the harbor of Aracina, their hulls rocking gently against the quays, their painted prows gleaming in the morning light.
The entire fleet lay at anchor like a jewel set upon the sea, on full display for the royal eyes of the man who had paid for every plank, sail, and oar.
Waiting for him on the pier was the fleet’s commander, the current and, by circumstance, only admiral in the crown’s service, Sir Dandolo.
"As you can see, Your Grace," Dandolo began, bowing stiffly before gesturing to the rows of ships behind him, "this is the naval might of your reign. Every vessel is docked, supplied, and crewed. We await only your soldiers to embark before we set sail for the expedition."
Alpheo acknowledged him with a single nod.
Truth be told, Dandolo had not been Alpheo’s first choice for the post. Nor his second. Nor even his third. But the kingdom’s naval talent was... thin. He had initially hoped to fish a commander out of those that survived Harmway, apparently though the disastrous sea battle had, apart from having shattered the Romelian’s fleet years earlier, also killed most of the commanders and officers.
After all, the sea may have had no eyes, but it certainly had a big stomach.
And of those who survived, few were willing to abandon their ancestral lands for service under a young prince.
Alpheo had been forced to scrape the bottom of the barrel.
And there, at the very bottom, was him, waving up at him.
He was a man in his middle years, with a receding hairline that surrendered reluctantly to the black hair slicked across his scalp. His face was rough-hewn, square as if carved from a single block of granite, with a jaw that seemed locked in a permanent grimace.
He had been at Harmway, though not in the thick of the fighting, his command had been one of the rearmost ships in the formation. That unfortunate placement meant he was among the first to turn away when the order for retreat was given.
After Harmway, there had been little work for a naval officer in a empire with barely any ships left to its name. Stripped of his command, Dandolo drifted from post to post until Alpheo’s rebuilding program gave him new purpose, and, more importantly, a steady income.
Given he had no land...
It was not an ideal appointment, but it was what the young prince had to work with.
"I believe I don’t need to emphasize," Alpheo began, his gaze fixed on the admiral, "just how critical your ships will be to this campaign.They will be the lifeline between an army well-fed and an army starving. Between a successful campaign and a, humiliating defeat. They are the difference between you remaining in my service, or being free of it entirely."
Sir Dandolo stood straighter at the veiled warning, his mouth tightening.
"You have my word, Your Grace," he replied quickly, bowing once again. "The navy will not fail you. You’ll find no fault with us."
The admiral’s confidence wasn’t hollow. There was, in truth, little to fear.
The Oizenians had no navy to speak of, not a single warship patrolled their coast, and no fleet waiting beyond the horizon.
most serious threat he could expect were scattered pirate skiffs, and none of them would be mad enough to challenge thirty warships flying royal banners. Not even the boldest of sea-raiders would charge headlong into a line of galleons armed for war.
Alpheo nodded once, satisfied, before turning to the army waiting behind him and giving the final order.
At his words, a dozen horns sounded across the port like answering calls to a hunting cry. Officers barked orders, soldiers rushed into motion, and the docks transformed into a whirlwind of activity. The wood planks of the quay groaned under the weight of boots, barrels, and crates as soldiers formed into long, snaking lines bound for the waiting ships.
From the high terrace above the harbor, Alpheo watched as the might of his realm stepped aboard.
This was no longer theory or just a plan.
Now, the war was in motion. And the sea—his sea—was about to carry it forward to victory.