gorgenmast

The Vampire princes

Ulrek Bathory gave a hateful grunt as he shoved the limp weight of the lifeless warhorse off of his thigh. With his legs free, the Baron staggered to his feet and gave a momentary glance at his slain steed. A crossbow bolt meant for the Baron was buried deep in the stallion's neck, bright red blood oozing from the wound matted the horse's silvery pale coat. Unhorsed early in the charge against the walls, Ulrek missed the ogres breaching the walls and the ensuing melee in the courtyard. The sounds of clashing swords resounded from inside the citadel walls, but the telltale shouting and screaming of combat could be heard all around him. In the thoroughfare behind him, Ulrek could see his men-at-arms and levies engaging the teeming throngs of armed commoners, held back from the attack on Castle Bathory by the citizenry's insatiable bloodthirst. Before him, Ulrek beheld the inner walls of the citadel, battered by cannons and ogres with a dozen ladders resting up against it. Beyond those walls rose the battle-worn spires of Castle Bathory itself: Edwards's last refuge and Ulrek's destination.

The inner wall of the citadel had been breached, though Ulrek could see a savage fight between his men and the remainder of the guard for control of the breach. The Baron had no intention of wading through the fray, intense and crowded as it was, and his eyes fell upon the siege ladders resting upon the walls. His eyes followed the ramparts over to where the spires of the castle met the interior wall, and noted doorways into the castle itself. Deciding this to be the path of least resistance into the castle, Ulrek made his way to the foot of the wall.

The fighting had moved into the castle's courtyard, and the archers up on the ramparts were now focused on firing down on the Baron's forces in the courtyard or fighting against the mercenaries who had scaled the walls. Ulrek took advantage of the shifted attention of the defenders and approached one of the siege ladders. The rungs were slick with grease that had been poured down onto the attackers, still quite warm to the touch. A pile of crumpled bodies lay around of the ladder, victims of some combination of boiled grease, arrowfire, or heavy stones meted out by defenders up on the ramparts. One of Halfbeard's mercenaries lay splayed out at foot of the siege ladder, droplets of boiled lard still steaming upon his breastplate. Gruesome blisters covered the mercenary's face and a heavy rock taken straight to the face had reduced his nose to a bloody mass, though bloodied eyes following Ulrek as he grasped the rungs of the ladder gave proof that the poor soul was still alive.

"Do a me a favor will ya?" Croaked the soldier. "Just go ahead and kill me." Ulrek ignored the dying man and began climbing the ladder up to the ramparts.

Though the fighting on the walls had died down, it had by no means ended. A few dozen feet down the wall from the Baron, an engagement between a castle guard and one of Ulrek's men-at-arms ended with the guard getting thrown off the wall to his death. The man-at-arms had little time to bask in his victory before one of Edward's crossbowmen planted a bolt squarely in the forehead. As Ulrek neared the lip of the rampart he reached for Pthaalma's hilt, knowing full well his entry into the castle would not go unchallenged.

The Baron surged through one of the crenels and up onto the ramparts, planting his feet upon the stone walkway slicked with coagulating blood. Drawing his blade from the scabbard, Ulrek proceeded along the ramparts toward the doorway into the castle on the far side of the wall. On the courtyard side below him, the Vampire prince caught the occasional glimpse of the battle for control of the castle. The castle guards were putting up a redoubtable defense against the onslaught of the ogres and Halfbeard's mercenaries, but it was clear that the guard was losing ground and would eventually be subdued. Despite the favorable course of battle, the Baron paid little attention to the fighting. It did not matter to the Baron if his forces won or lost at this point; his army had succeeded in getting him through to the walls of Castle Bathory. That was all Ulrek ever needed them for.

Up ahead was a knot of men stuck in combat - a pair of guards holding off a claymore-armed mercenary. Ulrek would have preferred to step around the fight and continue on to the castle, but the narrowness of the ramparts here precluded that option. The vampire would have no choice but to fight his way through to the other side.

The Baron came up behind the mercenary and shoved him out of the way, inadvertently casting him off the wall down into the courtyard below. The castle guards now standing before him beheld the sliver-clad being before them with wide, frantic eyes.

"That's the Baron!" Exclaimed one of the guards. "Take him down!"

A halberd-wielding guard lunged at Ulrek, swinging down in an attempt to cleave the vampire prince in twain. Ulrek didn't need to mind-probe the guard to see the attack coming long ago, and stepped off to the side and allowed the halberd's blade to clatter against the rampart's cobblestones. Ulrek planted his boot down on the flat face of the halberd and stepped down hard, pressing the polearm down against the ground. With his weapon immobilized, the halberd-wielder could only watch as Ulrek drove Pthaalma through his chest. Ulrek retracted the blade and allowed the guard to slouch over dead before proceeding to the remaining guard. This one was armed with a broadsword, and immediately slashed against Ulrek's silver and mithril blade. Ulrek probed his opponent's mind, saw in advance where the guard intended to thrust or slash, and easily parried every blow. The guard's fighting style was excessive and showy, foreseeable with predictable slashes meant to attract attention and steer the opponent's blade away from the body before spinning on his heels and delivering a slash to the body. Ulrek's swordplay was more methodical and calculated; anticipating and blocking strikes, moving his blade no more than necessary, allowing his opponent to wear himself down against his meticulous parries and waiting for the guard to make a mistake. The guard swordsman thrust at the Baron once more, but his heel slid on the blood-slicked cobblestones underfoot and overextended his reach. It was a brief error, but it was all Ulrek needed. The vampire's left hand left Pthaalma's hilt and clutched the guard's right wrist. In a brief, fluid motion, Ulrek yanked the guard in close before driving his sword down through the guard's clavicle. The defender spat a wad of blood as Ulrek withdrew his sword and unceremoniously cast his opponent down over the wall.

As the Baron watched his slain enemy tumble down over the wall, a flash of light appeared in his peripheral view. Out in the main thoroughfare, a rosette of glittering sparks manifested into being, followed fractions of a second thereafter by a burning shockwave that radiated out from the epicenter, washing over the embattled masses in the thoroughfare and market square in an infernal wave as a fireball rose skyward. A second tremendous explosion, and almost instantly later, a third. The resulting shockwave did not just fell buildings, but the ground itself. Utterly enrapt, the Baron watched the ground underneath the main thoroughfare collapsed in a billowing tempest of dust and smoke. Houses and shops collapsed and tumbled down into a fiery pit that opened up in the middle of the Capital as yet another flash of sparkling fire burst forth from the newly-formed chasm. This explosion must have destroyed the supports and beams holding up the ceilings of untold leagues of subterranean catacombs, sewers, and other spaces underneath the city, for a network of chasms and ravines radiated outward from this deep central pit, swallowing entire neighborhoods of the capital in billowing clouds of dust and fire. Another chest-rattling explosion was felt, but not seen, as the hill upon which the Old City was built heaved up and then imploded, and the Earth swallowed up the walled compounds of the vampire quarter as tongues of fire spewed out from underground. It was as if the Capital was collapsing into to the very depths of Hell.

The tremendous shaking had not left the citadel unscathed. Behind the baron, the gatehouse into the citadel's courtyard leaned in on itself - weakened perhaps by some collapsed tunnel or sewer below - and fell over into the courtyard. Two ogres thrashing against the spears and halberds of the castle guard were buried under a rain of stones. The outer spires of the castle listed too, crashing against the core structure of Castle Bathory before shattering and raining down on the lower levels of the castle and the courtyard in a rain of heavy stones and dust. A roiling cloud of dust descended over the courtyard and walls of the castle, engulfing the Baron. His mask, difficult to breathe in as it was, made it impossible for the Baron to breathe when the dust cloud descended upon him. Ulrek tore his silver mask off his head and cast it aside, exposing his gaunt, ratlike visage.

The vampire peered through the thick haze of dust, only able to make out the glow of innumerable fires raging through what had been the Capital. In the space of mere minutes, the city had been completely destroyed. Rebuilding after such thorough devastation would take centuries. A regrettable setback to be sure, but vampires lived forever; Ulrek had plenty of time to see through a two or three hundred-year rebuild of the capital. The populace, the Baron assumed, was completely lost. Good, he thought to himself. A suitable punishment for their treachery. Men were fecund and would easily reproduce to replace the lost populace of the city. Better to cull the traitorous populace outright and start anew.

Ulrek squinted through the settling dust and looked upon Castle Bathory, or what remained of it. The towers had all collapsed, but most of the core structure of the citadel remained intact, which meant that the throne chamber had survived. Expecting to find his brother there, Ulrek continued across the rampart to that door leading into the castle's interior.

---

"What a fuckin mess," snarled Halfbeard. "I've seen my share of sieges. I've seen some real messes. But this, boys... This is unprecedented."

Kharald Halfbeard stumbled over the thick rubble through a thick haze of suspended dust, accompanied by two of his personal guard. The scarred dwarf surveyed the devastation of the courtyard. The collapse of the spires had snuffed out all but a handful of the combatants fighting in the courtyard. Kharald had been fighting one of the guard captains when the Earth underfoot began shaking. The guard was struck by a falling stone and collapsed atop Kharald-shielding the mercenary captain from the shower of rubble. Halfbeard emerged from his fallen opponent to find most of the combatants on both sides dead or dying. Most of those that survived happened to be his mercenaries, those that weren't were finished off with a sword to the belly.

"You think the Baron survived?" Asked one of Halfbeard's attendants.

"Probly not," Halfbeard concluded in between deep coughs from the dust in the air.

"We're not getting paid for this, are we?"

"From the Baron, no," Halfbeard said matter-of-factly. "But look where we are, boys. When's the last time you 'ad an unguarded castle all to yourself? Think about all the treasures those bloodsuckers have been hoarding in there over their long lives, and with only a few dying guards to defend it. Fuck the Baron and his payment, each one of us is going to leave this place with a king's ransom."

Kharald and his companions made their way past the broken, barely-standing holly tree in the center of the courtyard on their way to the gates into the castle's interior. Laying before Kharald and his companions, half-buried in rubble, lay one of his ogres face down with a rivulet of dust-caked blood oozing out of a wound in his head. Kharald gave the ogre a tap with the toe of his boot.

"What a shame," Kharald sighed. "These ogres are going to be pain in the arse to replace. There's not a lot of 'em left anymore."

"They didn't even inflict that many casualties," complained one of Halfbeard's companions. "I seen em rout entire armies before. Here? Those five ogres mighta killed 50 men between them."

"Their guards fought like devils," noted Halfbeard's other guard.

"So they did," said Halfbeard dismissively. "And they died all the same. Just take this one 'ere for example. Fought bravely I'm sure, but for what? To die in the hand of this 'ere ogre? Not exactly-"

The telltale thwock of a crossbow discharging interrupted the dwarf mercenary mid-sentence. Halfbeard's eye widened as a crossbow bolt planted itself at the base of the dwarf's neck, just above the clavicle. Through gritted teeth, Kharald tore the arrow out of his neck, eliciting a grimacing wince as the bolt slid out of his flesh. Blood spurted quickly through the arrow's entrance wound, coursing down Halfbeard's armor and staining his lion's pelt cape. Halfbeard inspected the bloodied bolt for a brief moment, noting that the iron bodkin had been cut off, leaving only a whittled tip at the end of the wooden shaft.

Halfbeard's face twisted into a furious scowl. He drew his sword and marched over to the dying guard leader, but the profuse blood loss had already served to dizzy the dwarf. Halfbeard stumbled over the rubble and fell over, bleeding out just a few paces short of Yorrek.

"Not Ulrek," Yorrek rasped from within the clutches of the dead ogre, his crossbow tumbling out from from weak and trembling arms as his eyes shut for the last time. "But you'll do."

'Looking for someone' Help desk

Looking for vat-grown sec slave. Preferably a Slime Girl?

Whatever's in the budget ☆

@Semblance

Sounds a lot like my ex-wife! LOL

'Looking for someone' Help desk

Looking for BBW. Met via craiglist. Didn't get her name but remember she wore an old XXL Six Flags t-shirt that looked like it had been washed about 500 times. Hope I didn't knock her up LOL

The Vampire princes

Sorry for not posting yet. I meant to post yesterday but I forgot. I'll post as soon as I can. Maybe later today.

@Vampiretwilight

is kay

The Vampire princes

The gates leading out into Castle Bathory's courtyard creaked open just wide enough to allow Yorrek to step out from the interior of the citadel. Nervous faces of castle servants - women and men too old or weak to fight - peered out from between the iron-banded doors before pulling the gates back shut. Dull, heavy thuds sounded behind the sturdy wooden beams as the servants inside set about barring the gate shut behind Yorrek.

The manicured gardens of the castle's courtyard were unrecognizable from when Yorrek had seen them last. Lush bushes and shrubberies had been buried under a thick blanket of dust and ash, crushed underneath rubble shed by cannonball damage to the citadel's spires, and then trampled underfoot by the Royal Guard gathered in the courtyard for their final stand against Ulrek's forces. Stately trees that had stood since the childhood of Yorrek's great grandfather had been crushed under the weight of so many falling bricks and stones, reduced to splintered stumps poking weakly from underneath the omnipresent rubble. Only one tree - an ancient and gnarled holly tree planted at the very center of the citadel's courtyard - still stood. It too was heavily damaged, with entire boughs snapped off and its glossy leaves caked in dust, but it remained standing, its battered silhouette rising up into a hellish sky cast red and orange by the setting sun and by the fires burning unchecked throughout the city beyond the citadel's ramparts. Stormy gusts had bellowed the flames generated by Ulrek's bombardment and by the Madness the night before, setting significant portions of the Capital ablaze. Ash and dust carried on the wind, as did the cacaphony of battle.

Thousands of shouts and screams melded together into a single, roaring din carrying over the walls. Even now, Ulrek's hordes were charging the walls of the ramparts, their battlecries mixed with barked orders of the defenders on the ramparts who set about thinning the Baron's approaching ranks. Yorrek watched as archers fired through the crenelations on the ramparts, down onto the teeming attackers charging at the walls. Crossbowmen loaded their bows behind the cover of the battlements before pointing the bow out through the crenels, firing off a bolt, and reloading again. A few servants even filled ceramic vessels full of boiled lard from one of the boiling cauldrons placed up on the walls, covered their openings with burning wicks of cloth, and then hurled the vessel over the wall where it would burst with flaming grease amidst the attackers. Ulrek's forces responded in kind with crossbow bolts shot up from over the walls, most of which plinked harmlessly against the battlements. A few bolts from the attackers found their way through the crenels and found their mark on the guardsmen on the ramparts. Anguished shrieks rang out from atop the walls as the occasional arrow embedded itself in an archer. Yorrek winced as a servant manning one of the grease cauldrons caught an arrow to the side and lost his footing, falling with a crunching thud amidst the soldiers gathered in the courtyard.

Yorrek made his way from the gate to a gathering of pikemen gathered in a disorganized cluster before the near-breach in the wall created by the Baron's most recent cannon bombardment. Some two hundred faced the damaged segment of the wall, watching arrows arc over the walls with wide, fearful eyes and filthy dust-caked faces. Anxious, expectant eyes converged upon Yorrek as he approached his soldiers.

"Commander," one of the guard captains recognized as Yorrek approached. "I thought you'd be staying with the Prince."

"You know I couldn't let you lot have all the fun," Yorrek said with a toothy grin, glancing around at the guards around him. Yorrek had expected a round of laughter there, or at least a few genuine chuckles. Yorrek's grin melted away in the face of silent, empty stares from his men.

"I'm not an orator, men," Yorrek admitted with a sigh. "I wish I knew how to give you a rousing address and inspire within you lot some glimmer of hope in this dark hour. But I do not have the words in me, and I regret to say that there is no hope for any of us today. Ulrek's hosts and mercenaries outnumber us more than ten to one, and those Madness-gripped lunatics outnumber us greater still. For those of us inside this courtyard, this will be our last night on this mortal plane, so abandon any notion of mercy or honor when we face Ulrek's gathered multitudes.

"For us Royal Guards, there is no hope. But for our sovereign, for our families and friends beyond those walls, for our children and their children after them, some hope yet remains. If we can destroy his army, if we can kill the Usurper on the field of battle, then our wives and children will never know life under the heavy yoke of King Ulrek Bathory.

"That is what separates us from Ulrek's gathered hosts. The men we will soon be facing are motivated by greed and fear; desire for the freely-flowing gold vespers of the Baron's squandered fortunes, desire to keep their skins attached to their bodies. We are motivated by something greater: hope for our posterity. And so in a few short hours, when death looks you in the eyes and that terrified voice in the back of your head begs you to turn and flee for dear life... drown that pitiful, mewling voice out with one last defiant cry and make death take you thrashing and screaming!

Before Yorrek could incite the men into a rallying cheer, a bellowing roar from over the wall stole the attention of the guards. Frantic eyes went to the walls as archers on the ramparts confirmed everyone's fear.

"Ogres!" Screamed an archer on the wall. "The ogres are coming!"

"Concentrate your fire on them! Give them every-" Before the bowman on the ramparts could finish his command, a giant, wart-covered arm reached over the rampart and seized him, ripping him down off the wall. The archer's command turned into a frenzied scream, punctuated suddenly by a wet, popping crunch that could easily heard even over the sounds of battle. Mammoth ogre arms thrashed through the crenels of the ramparts, clawing at any defender within reach. The defenders on the wall pressed for the guard towers and stairs so as to get down from the walls and away from the reach of the ogres. Another terrible roar, and the wall shook as something heavy on the other side of the half-breached wall collided against it. Bricks tumbled down away from the nearly-breached wall, allowing Yorrek and his pikemen glimpses of the ogre battering against the breach. Yorrek could see the terror in the eyes of the guard, some backing slowly away from the wall.

"Form ranks!" Yorrek ordered, gesturing for a long pike from one of the guardsmen standing nearby. The pikeman handed his weapon to over to Yorrek, who briefly examined its long iron tip before pointing it toward the battered wall, raising it up to a 45 degree angle.

"Do not fear, good men," Yorrek ordered as the guards closed in together in a wide U-shaped formation around the breach, their spearpoints trained against the crumbling wall. "Ogres are strong and and their hide is thick, but do not think for a second that they are invincible! Their hide is thin at the groin, under the arms, and the neck. Press your pikes against these points, and brace the shaft against the ground! Let the brutes impale themselves on our pikes! We can kill them, but we must not fear!"

The ogre roared again as it threw its weight against the wall. The wall heaved and bowed, bricks tumbled off the wall and rolled down to the feet of Yorrek and his gathered pikeman. Yorrek glanced around to his men, and watched their wide and fearful eyes narrow into a furious gaze, their gauntlets tightening upon their pikes.

The ogre gave another roar as it threw itself against the wall one last time. The wall failed at last, bricks and rubble cascading down around the ogre as it stumbled through the gaping breach in the wall. Lumbering in through a curtain of dust was a twelve-foot tall ogre, its broad meaty shouldered embedded with no fewer than 50 arrows. The beast gave a furious roar as it laid eyes upon the gathered pikemen. Yorrek responded with his own battlecry, squelching the terror in the back of his mind as he gripped his pike and charged headlong at the monster.

The ogre was momentarily stunned as the screaming pikemen charged in behind Yorrek, confused as it had never before seen an enemy run toward it. Confusion turned to rabid fury as Yorrek planted his spearpoint deep into the monster's inner thigh, wedging the butt of the pike down into some rubble at his feet. Yorrek abandoned his pike and narrowly evaded the ogre's retaliatory lunge, drawing his sword as he charged toward a second ogre pressing in through the breach.

The ogre behind him howled in pain as it foolishly pressed its weight against the wedged pike. The shaft snapped under the beast's weight, but not before the pike's iron tip was driven through the thick hide down into the bone. It was enough time for the pike-armed guards to converge against it, planting their spearpoints against the distracted ogre's throat and then jabbing in with all their might. Dark red blood gushed forth from the heads of the pikes in spurting pulses, and the ogre slumped over sideways and bled out upon the rubble.

The second ogre was now upon Yorrek, throwing a heavy fist down at the guard leader. Yorrek sidestepped the ogre's blow and hacked at its heel with his sword. It was as if Yorrek had hit his sword against a tree trunk, as his blade only cut through an inch or two of warty, calloused skin. The ogre stepped away and swatted at Yorrek, ripping his red cloak right off his shoulders but narrowly missing him. His men had now caught up with Yorrek, and surrounded the second ogre with a wall of spearpoints, trying to press their spears against the ogre's thin skin under the arms or the neck. The ogre parted through the wall of spearpoints, shrugging off a few that embedded themselves in its shoulder and sternum, and then swatted at the pikemen. Half a dozen men were sent sailing into the air, and another handful were torn apart, their torsos torn from their legs. Horrified screams rang out as the ogre grabbed another soldier and threw him hard against the wall. A spray of blood was left upon the stones where the man impacted, his body tumbled down onto the rubble in a twitching heap.

The ogre snapped the pikes poking out from its skin as easily as dry reeds, stomping down on another pikeman before turning his attention to Yorrek. The ogre tried to grab him, but once again Yorrek stepped just out of reach and retaliated with a powerful chop to the ogre's hand, managing to sever one of the monster's digits. The ogre withdrew his hand and inspected the bloody stump where his index finger hand been seconds before, howling in pain. Taking advantage of the beast's distraction, Yorrek scrambled for a discarded pike laying upon the rubble, hoping for enough time to take up the pike and thrust it up through the ogre's chin. Yorrek had almost seized the pike when a thick bloody hand seized him.

Yorrek winced under the ogre's vicelike grip. He could feel his ribs snapping and collapsing under the ogre's remaining fingers. The ogre held Yorrek up to his wart-pocked, flabby face, regarding the guard leader with a contemptuous sneer. The ogre opened his mouth, revealing an arcade of worn, yellowed teeth, and lowered Yorrek face down into his open maw.

Yorrek tried to wriggle free, but the ogre's grip was unrelenting. Even so, the constant flow of blood oozing out from the ogre's hand provided just enough lubrication for Yorrek to slide his right arm out from under the ogre's fingers. Yorrek felt the monster's disgusting breath hot on his face, his head just inches from the warty lips of the man-eating beast, when he released his arm from the ogre's grip and planted his sword deep into the ogre's temple. The ogre's eyes immediately rolled into the back of its head and its grip tightened. Yorrek felt his ribs all snap, and he tasted blood at the back of his throat. With a throaty wheeze, the ogre tumbled over, collapsing face-first onto the rubble with Yorrek still clenched in his fist.

From the ogre's death grip, Yorrek could only watch as another ogre made its way through the breach. Through the ogre's giant legs, Ulrek's men charged in through the breach, silhouetted through the smoke and dust against the burning city behind them. With a roaring charge, the Baron's men clashed with the guards. The jarring clanging of sword meeting sword rang out as the fighting began in earnest. With each breath tearing at his lungs, Yorrek knew that he would not be able to guide his men through the remainder of the battle.

He hoped that his men fought bravely as his breath weakened.

---

Lord Orrin Goutfoot watched from atop his pony as the front of the Baron's army pressed in toward Castle Bathory. The dwarven lord was far behind Ulrek and the mercenaries at the front of the army, still stuck in the market square after the city's populace turned against the Baron's forces, several hundred paces away from the walls of the citadel. The mob had succeeded in separating the front of Ulrek's army from the rear, and from atop his pony, Goutfoot could see that the Baron was making no effort to try to rendezvous with the beleaguered rear forces. Ulrek's knights and men-at-arms tasked with defending Lord Goutfoot and his cannons had done a respectable job keeping the mob away from the dwarven cannon teams. Even so, Goutfoot's patience had run out.

"The Baron has abandoned us," spat Goutfoot, turning to a few of his dwarves in earshot. "I should have never followed him into the city. This is his battle to fight, not ours. Let's turn around and get out of the gates, I'm not loosing my cannons!"

"As you wish, Lord Goutfoot!" One of the dwarves affirmed, eager to try to escape this madness. "Turn the wagons around, boys, we're leaving!"

Lord Goutfoot guided his pony through the ring of men-at-arms around the cannons toward a mounted knight holding back a gaggle of men armed with tanning knives. The knight brought his sword down on the clavicle of one of the tanners, drew it, and lopped the head off another in a fluid motion.

"Ser knight!" Goutfoot called out, not knowing the knight's name. "We are falling back out of the city to regroup."

"The Baron gave us no such orders," the knight replied.

"The Baron has abandoned us, you boy!" Goutfoot chided. "Your Baron has left us to our fate. Are you going to continue to fight for him, knowing he wouldn't come to your aid?"

"I am not afraid of some enraged serfs," said the knight. "But I am afraid of what will happen to my kin if the Baron knows I deserted him."

"The Baron isn't leaving this place alive. Neither will we if we don't leave now. Help us leave this place."

The knight gave another glance at the castle, and then back at the city gate behind him.

"Retreat!" The knight cried out. "Fall back outside the city!" Horns rang out through the remainder of the Baron's forces, now slowly ceding ground against the surge of enraged citizens. Despite the fact that the majority of the Baron's remaining men were now falling back, the citizenry had no intention of allowing them to escape alive, and their assault remained just as vicious as ever.

Lord Goutfoot watched an old man ignite a grease-soaked table with a torch on a balcony overlooking the main thoroughfare, and threw the burning table down onto the soldiers below. Windblown embers erupted from where the table landed on the cobblestones, carrying on the wind throughout the dwarves and the Baron's men. On the roof of another house, a pair of boys had assembled jars and vases full of pitch. With a torch, they ignited rag wicks coiling down into the jar before casting them down on the retreating army. The jars splattered with with a spray of burning sludge, sticking onto the shields of retreating yeomen and men-at-arms. Embers scattered from each shattered vessel, whipping through the army. Goutfoot, however, noticed some of the sparks come dangerously close to one the wagons laden with firedust. The dwarven lord's eyes widened as the danger of the present situation manifested itself.

"Cover the wagons!" Goutfoot screamed. "COVER THE WAGONS!"

Goutfoot stumbled from his pony and barged through the men at arms pressed tight around the wagons bearing the cannons and their firedust propellant. The dwarf lord scrambled up onto the firedust wagon and frantically drew rolls of leather over the firedust barrels to protect them from errant embers. But the scrambling dwarf must have presented the boys up on the roof with an enticing target, and a well-thrown jar full of burning pitch burst upon the wheels of the wagon. Goutfoot had just enough time to watch an ardent droplet of burning pitch splash up onto a barrel full of firedust. The long, smoky tongues of flame licked at a patch of exposed firedust on the top of the barrel, and in the blink of an eye the world was consumed in a brilliant flash of orange fire.

The Vampire princes

A dull roar of frantic shouting outside the citadel's walls gave proof that the Baron had begun the attack on Castle Bathory itself. The battle for the future of the Lands Under Shadow was now underway. The valiant Guard would give their last breath to repel Ulrek Bathory and his hordes, bravely sacrificing their lives to the last man to buy the Chamberlain and his sappers time to destroy the supporting pillars in the undercroft in order to bring the castle crumbling down upon Ulrek's head. The Royal Guard would be the heroes of Ulrek's War, their valor and skill at arms the subject of songs of minstrels and troubadours for ages to come.

And while the Guard prepared for its last bloody stand, Guard Commander Yorrek looked on as servants gathered Princess Emily's belongings in preparation of the escape from the Castle. Under his vigil, the servants packed her dresses, scrolls, and books into small crates to be taken with the princess. With the royal couple and the few worldly possessions they could take with them, Yorrek and a cohort of the Guard's most seasoned and capable fighters would descend into the citadel's undercroft and then further still into the castle's sewage tunnel. There they would follow the subterranean stream of filth out from the castle, far below Ulrek's hosts and the Madness-gripped citizenry occupying the city, and emerge from a narrow crag near the city's harbor. There, they would buy passage aboard a vessel from the harbor - or commandeer one, if necessary - and sail far away from these lands and wait out Ulrek's inevitable defeat. King Edward would come out victorious, and that was all that mattered. But who would be the heroes of this war? Certainly the Royal Guard who stayed to defend Castle Bathory and the Chamberlain who gave his life to end Ulrek's.

But what of their Guard Commander? Yorrek thought.

How would history remember the Commander who orchestrated such a defense? Perhaps future historians would pen him as the imbecile who allowed the Usurper to gather a tremendous host and march on the centuries-old home of House Bathory, who allowed assassins to roam the castle and murder his King and very-nearly murder the crown prince. And when Ulrek's armies reached the citadel's walls, perhaps those chroniclers would note that that same commander fled with the Royal Couple to some foreign shore while his soldiers fought and died to deny Ulrek Bathory his father's throne.

Yorrek's fingers rapped against the pommel of his sheathed sword as he watched the servants pack Emily's belongings for the journey.

"Will you clumsy lot hurry up already?! Good men are dying out there on the ramparts," Yorrek snarled, pointing out the window of Emily's suite. "The least you could do is move lively!"

"We've been here for less than five minutes! We are going as quickly as we can but be reasonable!" Pleaded a servant woman, pale and wide-eyed with fear.

Yorrek gave an exasperated sigh and excused himself from Emily's suite. Out in the corridor, a steady stream of guards and servants were making their way out toward the courtyard in preparation for the defense. Everyone inside the castle, soldier or not, had been pressed into the defense in some fashion or another. Any man strong enough to wield a spear was now part of the defense. Nearly all of these new conscripts were volunteers; everyone within Castle Bathory knew that the Baron was notoriously cruel to his prisoners. Better to die fighting than to be captured and flayed alive.

The castle gongfarmers made their way past Yorrek down to the walls, all carrying a heavy iron kettle to be used to boil grease. Even the gongfarmers, those with the most humble and lowliest duties in the castle, were prepared to sacrifice everything to defend their sovereign and his home. And where would Commander Yorrek of the Royal Guard, Castle Bathory's most senior and powerful commander after Prince Edward, be when those brave servants gave their lives for Edward? Sailing away with the royal couple to some distant land, far removed from the impending slaughter.

"Make way! Make way!" Yorrek heard from somewhere down the corridor. The stream of defenders heading down to the courtyard parted for a cohort of honor guards clad in ceremonial plate armor and donning flowing robes dyed the brilliant crimson of King Zachaeus. Behind them were Prince Edward and Princess Emily, followed by a few more guards and a gaggle of crate-bearing servants. Edward and the guards came at Emily's suite and approached Yorrek.

"Commander, the Prince has his belongings gathered and is ready to leave," one of the guards reported. "Once Emily's possessions are boxed up, we will be ready to depart."

"All ready, milord!" The servant girl declared as if on cue, poking her head through the doorway.

"Excellent timing," said the royal guard. "Lead the way, Commander."

A deep, guttural roar could be heard outside the window of Emily's suite, widening the eyes of the servants and some of the guards. The Baron's ogres had been unleashed at last; Yorrek knew a grisly fate awaited any of his soldiers who faced those monstrosities. The thought of his men being torn to shreds by the Baron's assembled horrors stayed Yorrek's feet, even as the servants and guards began their trek to the undercroft.

"Commander?" The guard repeated anxiously, stopping the royal procession when he saw that their commander was not coming with.

"Captain Bartolomue," said Yorrek, "You know the way as well as I, do you not?"

"Y-yes, Commander," the guard stuttered. "Down through the kitchen cellar into the undercroft, then into the sewer tunnel from the southern storeroom, out into the harbor."

"Good," said Yorrek. "Bartolomue, I will be staying behind, and I don't expect that I will live to see your return, and so I'm naming you Commander of the Royal Guard."

"Yorrek the Castle is lost," said Bartolomue. "It is noble of you to stay behind and lead the defense. But the truth is that you are the greatest fighter in all of the Guard. Edward and Emily need you to protect them on their way to the harbor."

"You lot are capable fighters. Edward too is a force to be reckoned with. You will prove more than a match for any Madness-gripped lunatics."

"Yorrek, you do not have to-"

"History is going to remember me as the fool who allowed this catastrophe to occur. But I want posterity to know that at the least, I did my part to resolve it. Please, Commander," Yorrek pleaded, "let me redeem myself in the eyes of posterity. Let me have this."

Bartolomue's gaze sank to the floor. The shouting of soldiers and bellowing of ogres outside the walls carried on the breeze through the suite's window. After a moment of silence, Bartolomue placed his hand on Yorrek's pauldron.

"As you wish. Goodbye, Yorrek."

Yorrek gave Bartolomue a thankful nod and approached Edward and Emily.

"My Prince, and my Princess," said Yorrek, "With Commander Bartolomue, you and your house are in safe hands. I hope that the current calamity is but a brief footnote in your long and glorious reign. Let history forget the Baron and his war, but do remember the brave men who fought and died to secure your reign. Goodbye, Edward. Goodbye, Emily."

"Now go," said Yorrek. "We will hold the Baron's hordes as long as we can. But it is a long trek to the harbor. Make haste."

With that, Edward, Emily, and their guards and servants pressed on down the corridor toward the undercroft. As the procession of guards and servants went past, Yorrek halted one of the guards bearing a crossbow at the rear of the royal retinue.

"Your bow, please. And your bolts," commanded Yorrek.

"As you wish," the guard said without hesitation, removing the crossbow from the sling on his back and placing it in Yorrek's hands. Yorrek slung the bow over his back and drew his sword from its scabbard, and began hastily whittling off the iron heads of the bolts, leaving only a sharpened point of wood at the tip of the bolt.

"Yorrek," asked the guard bowman with raised brows, "what exactly are you doing?"

"Turning these bolts into stakes," Yorrek said as he placed the first tipless arrow back into the quiver. "If I see Ulrek in the fighting, I have no intention of squandering the opportunity."

Rhyme Time

Geriatric masturbating on webcam

Revelations

Wearing dirty diapers you found in the trash without microwaving them first. I mean just really raw doggin those dirty diapies. Yeah, thats really turns it up to 11 for me.

The Vampire princes

Dwarven cannonballs whistled overhead, arcing over the gray banners of the Baron's retinue before impacting against the walls of Castle Bathory with a thunderous crash. Waiting in the middle of the main thoroughfare running through the city up to the citadel's northern gate were Ulrek Bathory and his knights, riding out at the very front of a massive army snaking through the main road all the way back to the city's gate. Within shouting distance of the citadel's walls, Ulrek and his retinue watched the cannonballs crash down. Dust and bits of stone scattered from the impacts and shouting could be heard from the battlements.

"Fill up that breach, men!"

"Give the Usurper another volley!"

Archers on the walls of the castle drew longbows and loosed a small volley of arrows at the Baron's army. Some forty or fifty arrows arced up into the sky and fell well short of Baron's forces, falling harmlessly upon the main road. The bodkins bounced and scattered across the cobblestones, with a few coming to a rest just a few paces from the hooves of Ulrek's horse. The vampire's armored mask fell to the ineffectual arrows at his feet, then back up to the walls of the Castle some two or three hundred yards ahead.

"Still too far!" An archer cried.

"Bastard's just out of arrow range! Save your arrows!"

Through the veiled eyes of his somber-faced mask, Ulrek scanned across the ramparts of the castle. The citadel's walls were thicker still than the already-redoubtable outer walls surrounding the city. Even so, Lord Goutfoot's guns had already punched a sizeable hole through the upper portion of a segment of the wall near the gate, leaving a scree pile at the base of the wall that ran up close to the breach. The defenders had no intention of surrendering this wall, and even now busied themselves piling heavy stones and rubble up into the hole to close up the breach. Edward's forces had congregated around the gate and the damaged segment of the wall in anticipation of the inevitable offensive through the breached walls, though archers and token forces could be seen all along the ramparts in order to deter attackers from using ladders to scale undefended sections of the citadel.

"Won't be long now," Kharald Halfbeard noted over the report of another round of shots from the cannons. "The defenders are making a worthy effort trying to plug up that breach, but without mortar it'll be easily dislodged. The ogres will break through easily and make a terrific mess of the shield wall waiting for us on the other side. My men will follow them through and after that, this becomes a hunt for Edward in the castle. I'd advise sending men up to guard the high windows and the spires; we wouldn't want Edward trying to throw himself out of a window once he sees all is lost."

Ulkrek watched another pair of cannonballs impact. One cannonball sailed over the wall and crashed into the castle, punching a hole into the main tower of the citadel, the other found its mark against the wall and pulverized a battlement and the guards positioned behind it. An avalanche of bloodied rubble tumbled down into the scree pile.

"Goutfoot's aim leaves much to be desired," said Ulrek, noting the damage the last volley caused to the castle. "The moment you are able, begin the attack. I do not trust the Dwarf lord to leave the castle standing for much longer."

Before Kharald could respond, the wind kicked up again, sending the banners of Ulrek and his retinue into a furious flutter. As the wind tugged at the capes of Ulrek and his retinue, the knights' horses suddenly to whinny nervously. The knights looked around, trying to see what had startled their steeds, and then noticed yelling and shouting from the rear of their army.

"What's gotten into them?" Asked one of Ulrek's knights.

"GOD WILLS IT!"

Out of the side streets and alleys radiating out from the main road erupted a teeming and furious mob, immediately surrounding Ulrek and his knights. Halfbeard and the Baron's knights drew their swords and engaged the frenzied attackers, pouring out of tenements and shops and immediately charging headlong into the horsemen without any regard for their own well-being. Daggers, kitchen knives, sickles, sharpened trowels, and all other manner of improvised weapons flashed out from the hands of the attackers. Halfbeard and the knights could barely draw their swords before the mob was upon them. Unarmored and poorly armed and trained, the knights cut the peasants down easily enough. But their fearlessness and numbers were alarming. Ulrek watched an old woman armed with a sharpened fire iron charge through a pair of knights and thrust the iron into the chest of another knight's steed. The horse collapsed with a gurgling scream, sending the knight tumbling down onto the cobblestones. A wounded attacker, already bleeding out from a wound sustained by Halfbeard, crawled over to the unhorsed knight and plunged a fork down into his throat.

The same savagery was taking place all along the Baron's path through the city. Farther back, the yeomen and levies were taking the brunt of the assault. Every other shop or house was suddenly disgorging several enraged paupers, attacking the nearest soldier with such fervor and hatred. From the second and third floors of shops and tenements, burning furniture was cast out down onto the Baron's forces below. Even the infirm who could not fight participated by casting heavy objects down on the heads of soldiers from second story windows. The entire city had been turned against Ulrek. Pressing the paupers into such a spirited and effective ambush was incredible feat - a feat that Ulrek would have never imagined his brother being able to accomplish. Perhaps Edward was a more talented tactician that Ulrek had given him credit for. Or, as Ulrek was beginning to suspect, perhaps this counterattack was not the work of Edward Bathory.

"Your majesty, our levies are being overwhelmed! If we do not go back and support them, they will break!"

Ulrek looked back at his army winding out behind him. Savage fighting was occurring all throughout the city in a hundred ugly skirmishes along the main road. The fighting was intense, far more intense than untrained peasant levies could be expected to be subjected to and survive. The knight was not mistaken; the levies would soon rout if they weren't slaughtered outright first. But Castle Bathory, just two hundred yards ahead of him, was irresistible. Levies be damned, Ulrek would have his justice.

"Leave the levies," Ulrek ordered, drawing Pthaalma from its sheath. "Send the ogres and ladders and everything else against the castle walls at once."

"To the wall, men! To the wall!"

"Ladders boys!" Halfbeard shouted to his mercenaries. "Time to earn those golden vespers!"

A tide of mercenaries coursed around Ulrek's horsemen, crushing the hundred or so maddened citizens attacking the front of the army. With shields raised over their heads and wooden ladders in tow, they charged toward the walls of Castle Bathory. As the ogres lumbered up toward the walls and renewed arrowfire from the defenders rained down, Ulrek raised his sword and pointed it at the castle, directing his knights to charge after them.

The battle for control of the Lands Under Shadow had begun in earnest.

The Vampire princes

Commander Yorrek skirted around piles of freshly-fallen stone and debris on the ramparts of Castle Bathory as he surveyed the destruction from Ulrek's barrage. The last shot from the Baron's batteries had scored a devastating blow to the citadel, toppling one of the outer spires and sending a rain of rubble down onto the courtyard and walls. The rebels taken by the Madness had fallen back shortly after the collapse of the spire, affording the castle's guard a brief respite to tend to the casualties. Soldiers around him worked hastily to dig out their comrades buried under stone and rubble. Yorrek watched for a moment as a pair of guards yanked a dust-caked soldier out of a pile of crumbled bricks. His armor cuirass had been dented and beaten-in by falling brick, and a trickle of blood-tinged saliva oozed from the corner of his mouth. One of his comrades removed his helm and pressed two fingers just under his jaw.

"He lives!" Cried the soldier upon feeling a pulse under his fingers.

"Take him away for triage," Yorrek ordered. That made at least a score wounded and nearly as many men killed during the collapse of the spire. A mercy that the boy had not been killed, but Yorrek knew that he would be in no condition to defend the citadel. Against such numerous and merciless foes, the guard could scarcely afford to lose even a single man. And with the bodies already mounting, the odds of Castle Bathory surviving the siege were becoming increasingly slim.

"Clear this rubble away," Yorrek barked to another cluster of guards as he went along. "Sort out any heavy stones or bricks that can easily thrown and stack them up against the battlements. We'll want them as projectiles if they try to ladder up onto the walls. Throw everything else over the walls."

"Aye, sir." The soldiers replied. Brave, diligent soldiers; Yorrek knew that they would fight to the last man to defend their rightful sovereign. But steadfastness in the face of overwhelming odds would not be enough to change the nigh-certain outcome. Ulrek was going to take Castle Bathory and flay everyone inside, assuming the Madness-gripped rebels didn't storm the citadel first. The chamberlain had the right of it, the guard would not be enough to protect Edward and Emily.

Commander Yorrek followed the men taking the wounded up to the infirmary, following in the wake of the stretchers against the steady stream of soldiers streaming out of the guard towers and taking position on the ramparts. Dining parlors and guest suites of the castle were being used as makeshift infirmaries where those with less pressing injuries, or those with especially grievous wounds that would likely prove fatal, were taken. Badly wounded men who had a good chance of surviving - if given proper care - were being taken all the way up to the infirmary proper for intensive treatment. Yorrek followed the stretchers heading up to the true infirmary, knowing he would find Edward there beside his beloved Emily.

Everyone inside the castle was being pressed into the defensive efforts. Even the cooks were set to work; Yorrek watched the cooks haul two huge stew cauldrons out of the kitchen and down the corridor toward the stairs, followed by a number of guards and kitchenmaids rolling barrels of oil, water, and any other liquid on hand that could be cooked to a scalding boil and cast down off the ramparts on attackers. Servants gathered firewood from the countless fire hearths scattered throughout the castle to fuel the cooking fires with which to boil the vats of oil.

"There's no more wood!" One of the servants called out to his companions after rummaging through the ashes of a fireplace. "I've looked everywhere!"

"Well what about this?" Another servant asked, pulling a chair from one of the guest suites out into the corridor. It was exquisite chair of carved walnut, polished sleek and adorned with upholstered velveteen on the seat and backing. A fine piece of woodwork crafted to impress dignitaries staying at Castle Bathory; Yorrek guessed it to be worth a little more than what these servants earned in a year.

"Are you mad?" Asked one of the servants. "That chair must be worth a fortune. You can't seriously think to use it as fuel."

"Better to have it burn and contribute to the defense than to leave it for the Baron and his ilk to plunder," Yorrek chimed in as he walked past. "Use anything in this castle that will burn."

"You heard the commander!" Yorrek heard from behind him as he continued on toward the infirmary. "Let's get some hatchets and cut these chairs into manageable pieces, I'll start taking this wardrobe apart!"

Yorrek was greeted at the infirmary by a dozen groaning soldiers laying on stretchers just outside the doorway. Bloodied bandages were wrapped tight against many of their faces. These were the wounded with severe injuries that were not immediately life-threatening. They could afford to wait outside while the healers and nurses inside dealt with the more seriously injured. The Guard Commander regarded his wounded men with a somber grimace before entering the infirmary. Inside, there were dozens of healers and nurses tending to twice as many wounded men. The beds were all occupied now, and bedrolls, blankets, or whatever else to keep the glut of wounded men off the cold stone floor was employed to maximize the occupancy of the infirmary. Nurses with bloodied hands wrapped linen gauze over horrific head wounds, many of which were caused by falling brick and stone from the collapsed spire. Anguished shouts of pain mixed into a choir of agony as the healers worked fervently to save the dozens of wounded guards. Yorrek resolved to see that the Baron would be made to pay for all this bloodshed.

At the far end of the infirmary, surrounded by a contingent of honor guards, was Edward Bathory and his beloved Emily. Despite not feeling completely well yet, she had graciously given up her bed to a wounded crossbowman who had taken a falling brick squarely in the back and lost movement in his legs. Before the royal couple and their guard attache could leave the infirmary, Yorrek stopped them.

"Your majesty, the Baron's army has breached the city's fortifications, and he will be at the walls of Castle Bathory imminently." Yorrek drew closer, such that only Edward and Emily could hear him now. "The guard will fight to the last man to repel Ulrek's forces, but with his vast numbers and siege engines, there is no way that we will hold the walls. Fear not though, not all is lost. The chamberlain has a plan to destroy the Baron and the remainder of his army, but the castle will be destroyed in the process, and so we must take you and Emily of the castle."

---

"Those ones, these.... and then lastly this one," a white-bearded dwarf with thick-rimmed goggles said, peering up from a roll of parchment bearing detailed blueprints of Castle Bathory. "These are the primary load-bearing columns. Take those out, and the main tower collapses under its own weight. The rest of the castle will collapse with it."

The Chamberlain surveyed the cavernous undercroft of the castle, craning his neck up at the vaulted ceiling high above him, held up by row after row of thick stone columns, each one bearing thousands of tons of rock and castle and men. If they failed, Castle Bathory would collapse under its own weight, destroying everything within. If that happened with the Baron and his men inside the castle, Ulrek's war would be over.

"Well, you lot heard the engineer," said the chamberlain, turning to the two dozen or so servants he was able to muster together for this task, each armed with chisels, pickaxes, and prybars. "Let's tear these columns out."

"And bring the whole goddamn castle down on our heads?" Asked an incredulous servant. "No thank you, sirrah!" The other servants grumbled in agreement.

"If I wanted to kill myself, I'd just throw myself over the walls and not waste my final hours doing backbreaking labor."

"Make no mistake," said the chamberlain, trying to settle his disgruntled team of unwilling sappers. "I served under Baron Ulrek Bathory for many years. If we do not accomplish this task, then I assure you that the Baron will flay every single one of us alive. To die down here, toiling to bring ruin and death down upon the usurper would be a mercy. Better still, you need not die down here. The engineer said that the castle will only collapse once this final column is destroyed. I assure you, the castle shall not fall until this column is taken out. Demolish the others, but leave only this column. Only one man is needed to deliver the finishing blows against it, the rest of the party may escape with his Majesty after their work is done."

"Fair enough. But one man has to stay to finish the job though," one of the servants noted. "Who's the poor bastard that gets stuck with that detail?"

"I will," replied the chamberlain. "I want to be the one that ends that miserable beast, even if I have to die to see it happen."

---

With the clattering of heavy chains, the gates of the city drew open before Ulrek Bathory. Crossbow-armed mercenaries peered down from the gatehouse, giving proof that his forces had control of the gate. A solid door of mammoth timbers reinforced with a lattice of iron beams lifted up into a recess in the archway above. Ulrek, mounted and plated head-to-toe in silver armor, rode at the very front of the massive army waiting to enter through the gate into the capital. With a soft rumble high above, the gate stopped opening. With a kick to the haunches of his steed, Ulrek led his army through the gateway. Dwarf mercenaries peered through the murderholes in the gateway to watch the vampire prince lead the largest army these lands had seen in hundreds of years through the gates and into the annals of history. Ulrek rode at a canter, followed immediately by his mounted knights and mercenary horsemen. The slobbering, leashed ogres followed directly behind the Baron's retinue, followed directly by the unhorsed mercenaries that hadn't entered through the breaches, and they were followed in turn by the Baron's vast force of conscripts.

As Ulrek rode down the main thoroughfare of the capital, the mercenary capitain Kharald Halfbeard galloped up to him from a side street and rendezvoused with the vampire prince.

"There was no one on the walls, Baron. There's no one on the streets. No one in the houses or shops we searched. It's as if they evacuated the entire city," Halfbeard reported. "I've been in a siege or two in my day, but I have never seen anything like this."

"It would seem they've evacuated the northern wards of the city to around the harbor and other districts," Ulrek guessed. "It is fortunate. I would prefer to minimize causalities to the serfs, that their taxes may repay my debts that much sooner. If your men encounter anyone in the city, leave them and their belongings in peace. My quarrel is with my Edward and those who fight for him."

"As you wish, Baron. But I can see our enemy has at least a little fight in them," Halfbeard gestured to citadel at the far end of the thoroughfare in the center of the city. The red silken banners of King Zacchaeus fluttered defiantly in the tempestuous skies above Castle Bathory. Between the guard towers and battlements of the citadel, the ramparts could be seen teeming with guards. The battle for the future of the Empire Under Shadow would be fought on the very walls of Castle Bathory.

"We shall test their resolve shortly," said Ulrek. "Once Goutfoot and his cannons are within the walls, have him take position and take careful aim at their walls and gatehouse. It is imperative that the castle remain standing. But once inside the walls, spare no mortal man. The soldiers may do as they wish with whatever plunder and noncombatants are within the citadel."

"As you wish, Baron," the dwarf captain affirmed.

"But Edward must not be harmed," Ulrek added. "Not by anyone but me."