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Penny's Interests

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Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

“If you give up the peasants they will let us depart,” Beaumont began but Camilla held up her hand to forestall him.

“We aren’t giving up people who have sworn fealty to me to be executed or enslaved,” she said with a steely undertone to her voice. Below them the score of knights were forming up in a loose semicircle, though if they expected to charge the hilltop, they would find that riding uphill into fortifications was an expensive proposition. Sir Guy was shaking his fist and yelling as he took an inferior horse from one of the squires who straggled at the back of the knights line. Knowing what she did of Brettonian horses, she had just cost the knight a princely sum by killing his horse.

“Zey cannot hope to take us,” Matis said contemptuously, hefting his own pair of pistols, good for two Knights from what Camilla knew of his shooting. In the Empire it was the infantry who were superior, their were Knightly orders as good or nearly so as the Brettonians but no knight could hope to stand against a formation of halbiders and handgunners. Matis had the faith of an Imperial, which might be misplaced in this half trained band of peasants.

“He wont need to,” Beaumont replied stiffly, gesturing to a pair of squires racing away down the road.

“He is sending for more men, and the local lords will support him to put down your little peasant band,” Beaumont explained patiently.

“By noon he will have enough men to invest us and starve us out.” Camilla saw fear flicker over the faces of the listening peasant but she gave them a confident smile. Spending years in the company of mercenaries and armies had taught her that a confident commander went along way.

“Well I don’t think we need to keep him waiting that long…”
Camilla and her party burst from the ruins in a sudden gallop, the difference between Beaumont’s warhorse and her Arabian as compared to the pack horses and nags the peasants were riding was instantly apparent as the group began to straggle. Most of the peasants could only cling to their horses, doing well to merely hold on. They thundered down the reverse side of the slope and onto the road opposite the semicircle of hostile knights. Guy let out a warcry and the knights thundered after the fugitives, warhorses kicking up great gouts of the muddy roadway as they eagerly sprang forward. The twenty knights lowered their lances as they spurred onwards. Camilla felt her heart leap into ther throat, there was no way her disheveled party would last beyond the first impact of the lances, and there was no way the peasant nags could outdistance trained steeds. The screaming peasants obviously came to the same realisation.

Guy and his men raced past the hill, their visors down but their faces doubtlessly split in grins of triumph. Afterall, no peasant rabble could hope to stand against the fabled Brettonian cavalry. A horn rang out with a sudden shattering blast. Camilla wheeled her horse and pulled both her pistols from the silken sash around her waist. The knights charging wavered slightly at the unexpexted sound but in their armor couldn’t pivot enough to see what was happening. A knot of knights, Beaumonts companions who had not ridden to the early parley, raced down the slope and into the rear of Guy’s men, the downslope and the hesitation at the horn blast allowing them to close the distance. The battered veterans struck with their unadorned lances of new cut wood. Several of the enemy were pitched forward over their saddle bows in the opening seconds of the fight. Horses screamed and lances shattered to pulpy ruin.

“Charge!” Camilla shouted spurring her horse back into the mass of clashing steel and shouting men. Beaumont raced past her towards Guy. The enemy knight had only a moment to react but with the skill long training his shield came up in time. While a normal lance might have shattered the green wood of Beaumont’s weapon bent like a bowstave and then straightened, pitching Guy from saddle in a flash of flying mail. Camilla shot one of the Knight’s horses out from under him and spilled a second from the saddle with her remaining pistol.

“Back!” a big knight carrying a banner draped lance yelled. The knights loyal to sir Guy wheeled and raced back down the road. A straggler was punched off his horse by a pistol shot, a bright flash of arterial blood marking where Matis’ shot had shattered his neck. Once, Camilla might have regretted the needless loss of life, but since Cydric’s death, it was hard to care about much of anything. She slowed her horse with a gentle pressure of the heels, he was trained to be used by a mounted archer, but it was easy enough to adapt him to a pitsoler’s tactics. The horse obeyed instantly and subsided to a trot. Most of the peasants behind her hadn’t pushed their horses back into the skirmish, which was a good thing because they would have been butchered by men in mail. As it was the casualty count was low, one of Beaumont’s knights was nursing a sprained wrist, another had been thrown from his horse and had broken an arm. Among Guy’s men the tool was hire, three men lay dead on the ground, two killed by the knights flanking attack and the one Matis had shot. Another trio of men seemed to be alive but stunned, knocked from their horses in one way or another. To Camilla’s considerble suprise, the man she had shot in the chest was among this number, a great concavity in his breasplate where the ball had struck, but none the less still alive. Of the squires who had accompanied them there was no sign

Guy was pulling himself to his feet and grasping for the sword he had dropped. Camilla bought her horse to a stop and leveled her pistol at the striken man.

“Do you yield Sir knight?” she asked politely. Guy looked up at her and then pulled his visor back, his blue eyes gazing hatefully up at her.

“To a woman?” he sneered.

“You can yield to Sir Beaumont if you like, or I can shoot you,” she offered, though the pistol hadn’t yet been reloaded. Guy hesitated and gave up the attempt to find his sword.

“Will the bodies of my companions be respected?” he asked bitterly. Camilla nodded solemly.

“Yes,” Camilla responded, “though I suggest you have them burned or beheaded if you cannot get them back to your castle before dark.” Guy sighed and removed his helmet.

“Then I yield,” he said sullenly, making certain to look at Beaumont when he said it.

“Will you ransom me?” he asked the other knight. Beaumont opened his mouth but Camilla cut him off with a curt gesture.

“You are free to go, provided you swear not to harass me or my followers,” she told him, “otherwise I will accept your word of honor to return with a thousand gold florins.”

Guy looked at them incredulously.

“We are not your enemy Sir, we are merely trying to destroy the undead that plague this land,” Camilla told him. Guy spat into the ground.

“So long as you harbor run away serfs you are the enemy of every Knight of the Realm. You cannot be allowed to roam about fermenting rebellion,” Guy snapped. Beaumont looked decidedly uncomfortable at his words but opted to say nothing.

“Shall I take it you will be returning with a thousand gold florins then?” Camilla asked. Guy ground his teeth, a sum like that was a significant portion of the rent of even a great estate. It would all but beggar even a rich knight.

“Very well, you have my vow that I will not raise arms against you,” he growled. Camilla lowered her pistol.

“Then I suppose you are free to go Sir Knight,” she said. One of the peasants cleared his throat, a sandy haired man clearly uncomfortable speaking those he percived as his betters.

“Ummm M’lady, should we take the weapons and armor? We could use the steel,” he asked differentially. Guy’s face turned purple with rage and Beaumont stiffened, affronted by the very suggestion.

“No Jaq,” Camilla said, “these men aren’t truly our foes, their weapons and armor will go to their families.” How she would have felt if some of her own people had been killed she couldn't say, but it was bad enough that a group of knights had been humiliated by her little band. Luckily most of the glory for the exploit would land on Beaumont, if peasants along had beaten the knights she could probably look forward to every noble from here to Courrne hunting for her. Guy still bristled but at least it didn’t appear that he was about to suffer a bout of apoplexy. She turned her back on him.

“M’lady, what about the horses,” Jaq asked. Camilla was about to ask what he meant when it dawned on her. Beaumount groaned in disgust. Camilla who had eaten horse at the siege of Prag and at numerous shady taverns throughout the Empire bridged the gap between the peasants desire for meat and the nobles disgust for it.

“Leave it Jaq,” she said wearily, as she nudged her horse into a walk, “we don’t have time to butcher them and I strongly suspect that Sir Guy’s friends will be back here with whatever forces they can gather before noon.”

“Form up!” Leofric bellowed and the unmounted peasants lopped down from the hilltop carrying bagage to drape over the pack horses which had been pressed into service as improvised cavalry mounts. There were no spare mounts for Guy and wouldn’t have been given one if Camilla had one to hand. Within a surprisingly short amount of time the small force was on the road, picking its way north towards the Forest of Chalons.

Grim Galaxy: Shots and Chances

Junebug glanced around the strange room, regardless of its original intent it certainly served their purposes well. The walls provided perfect cover and the profusion of them meant that grenade blasts and other explosives would be of limited use. Whatever this vessel was, it was certainly no Terran treasury ship, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t valuable. Alien technology, particularly alien technology this divergent from the galactic norm, was valuable, but there were only a few buyers for it and you had to be careful how you doled it out, lest a Terran warship arrive and seize the whole thing.

It did mean the Canek was going to be very disappointed if and when he managed to fight his way back here. He certainly wasn’t going to get the quick cash turn around he had wanted to start his mercenary company which meant getting the Highlander fixed was still going to be a problem. A problem if they lived anyway.

“Well I can imagine better circumstances to visit an alien sex dungeon,” Sayeed observed wryly. Neil and Saxon both snorted laughter and even Taya smiled.

“We aren’t going to call it that are we?” she asked incredulously. Junebug checked the load on her stolen weapon. It held nearly a hundred rounds, probably originally intended as a squad support weapon. Raising it to her shoulder she peered through its iron sights tracking the length of the barrel with her eyes. By now the sound of firing from outside had died away, meaning that either Canek had been destroyed or his men had pulled back out of effective range. Neither of those boded very well for the four trapped mercenaries. Momentarily Junebug was back on the freighter where she had earned her nom-de-guerre, running through the hallways with an empty rifle and a bloody bayonet, hacking into the neck of a federal conscript with a powered cutting bar.

“Junebug?” Taya asked in a tone which suggested it wasn’t the first time. She blinked her eyes, skin prickling as she shook her head to clear it.

“Right,” she interjected, giving herself a moment to gather her thoughts, “Here is what we will do.”

It took the enemy nearly an hour to find them. Neil and Saxon had time to do a little scavenging, but beyond tools that had been used to partially disassemble sections of the ship there was little enough to find. They were just dragging in a box of welding rods when yells and gunfire announced that they had finally been spotted. Saxon let out a roar and ripped off a burst with his integrated cannon before the man and the Hex dived through the door and slammed it shut. Without power there was no way to lock it. Sayeeda lay prone on a ledge halfway to the back of the room. There was enough of a lip to allow her to rest her stolen weapon without use of a bipod.

Neil and Saxon just managed to take cover behind the nearest wall when the door jerked open and a pair of grenades sailed in. They detonated with a shocking actinic that was instantly stunning to anyone in the area, sending sparks and electrical discharge crawling over all the nearby surfaces. Whether Neil or Saxon were effected Sayeeda couldn’t say, but her combat helmet blanked the discharge easily, throwing up a wire frame approximation of what was going on, synthesized from the thermal and millimetric radar displays. Three figures rushed through the door, guns chattering as they sought to overwhelm the defenders. Sayeeda dropped all three with careful bursts. To her annoyance the weapons feed was too fast to allow for single shots but by careful trigger control she kept each burst to two or three rounds. The wireframe’s slumped to the ground as more figures fired from the cover of the door, spraying the interior of the room with bullets. Sayeeda fired twice more and then ducked back as the gunmen at the door tracked towards her muzzle flash. Neil and Saxon popped up and cut down another pair of gunmen who had been wrong footed by the move. Then Saxon leaped the wall, seized the door and slammed it shut in the faces of the shocked survivors. Taya jumped forward with a heavy industrial rivet gun and stapled the door to the wall, freezing it in place, at least until the attackers could organize a real breaching team.

There was a great deal of pounding on the door and some gunfire, but they weren’t able to penetrated it. Junebug slipped down and examined the weapons and gear that the attackers had carried, gratefully accepting a second rifle and a bandolier of ammunition to supplement her own depleted gun. Taya looked vaugely sick as Junebug and Neil quickly and effectively stripped the dead. Hearing a crackle Junebug pulled an earpiece from the ear of one of the corpses.

“... get in there and kill the bastards!” someone was shouting over the radio. Junebug’s helmet AI matched the frequency for her automatically.

“This is Captin Cyckali commanding the intrusion team in this vessel,” she declared formerly.

“We’d like to talk terms with whomever is in charge of this shit show.”

Priest & Hawthorne Investigations - A Modern Fantasy Adventure!

POKE!

Star Crossed: The Duke's Rebellion

Tychon blushed furiously at Mia’s tone and shook his head mutely. Rene supposed it was possible that one eventually got used to Mia, but he certainly hadn’t as yet. The Hydralics groaned as the ramp was extended and Rene stood and clasped the fisherman forearm to forearm.

“I hope we meet again,” he said honestly. Solae rose from the controls for a moment and murmured her farewell to Tychon and then Rene walked him to the landing ramp, the air outside was biting with ozone roiled from the thrusters but if it bothered Tychon he gave no sign of it. Rene paused for a moment, and raised his hand in farewell, and then touched the control that began raise the ramp. Tychon turned and shouted something, but it was lost over the sound of the Bonaventure.

A sudden beeping came from the cabin and Rene swiviled his head to see what was going on, before he could however Mia’s voice interrupted him.

“There are several aircraft lifting from the local air field,” the computer explained with the sensual relish of a debutant announcing that her parents wouldn’t be home for several hours. The sensors on the Bonaventure were not Fleet quality, but even the most rundwon tramp needed to be able to chart interstellar space and so they were more than enough to pick up a couple of jumpers lifting in response to an unexpected starship launch. Rene swore and turned to glance through the narrowing aperture but Tychon was already trotting away toward the treeline, plenty far enough that they could light the thrusters.

Ducking back through the companionway Rene clambered into his seat beside Solae and strapped himself in. The sensor board registered the contacts almost two miles away, almost precisely in the center of San Roayo. It was very unlikely that they were armed, and even less likely they would fire on the vessel without knowing to whom it belonged but there was no percentage in waiting around for what, at best, would be an awkward discussion. Solae waited till his buckle clicked and he nodded to her, letting her know Tychon was clear, before she lit all six thrusters and they rocketed skyward, drawing enough Gs to squeeze them both against their seats. The ship rocked and buffeted as it sped up through the atmosphere, leaving the slow moving aircraft far behind. There would be logs of the encounter of course, but at the very worse they would be identified as an interloping freighter, dozens or hundreds of which plied this area of space.

The atmosphere peeled back like a veil and suddenly they were faced with the dark backdrop of space. Behind the Bonaventure streams of vapor trailed like a comet’s tail as the last of the water vapour and atmospheric material burned away. The sensor switched seamlessly from their atmospheric mode to their stellar configuration and Rene’s display a three dimensional view of space centered on Panopontus sprang to life. A trio of small bright dots trailed notations. One was BVT, the computer designation for the Bonaventure, the others were labeled COS and CAP. Rene touched each dot and expanded the names. The transponders identified the as the City of Saint Lawrence and the Cappadocia, both unremarkable freighters of unremarkable registry. There were no warships or suspicious vessels on the screen. Rene leaned back allowing himself to feel safe for the first moment since they had dropped out of jump space days before.

“Looks like we are clear,” he breathed swiveling his chair to smile at Solae, his face transfigured with relief.

“So what is our next move?” he asked before throwing his arms around Solae and kissing her in relieved delight.

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

The morning dawned with shafts of sunlight streaking from the eastern sky. Camilla awoke blinking at the unexpected light. It seemed weeks since the sun had shone down from the perpetually overcast sky. Even today storm clouds were beginning to roil up in the east and unless Camila missed her guess the clouds would swallow the sun before too long. Still, it felt unexpectedly good to stand in the sun for a few moments.

The rest of her small band were also rising. Per Camilla’s instructions no fires had been set during the night, but now the remaining wood was being piled into small cook fires and Oderic, the self appointed quartermaster, was doling out lean portions of grain and meat to each man from the supply wagon. He seemed to take particular pleasure in serving Beaumont and his knights the same portions as the rest of the men. Initially the Knights had hired some of the runaway serfs to do their cooking but Camilla had flatly refused to allow them to draw rations for their would be employers. It had been a minor act of spite but one which had unexpectedly buoyed the morale of her little band. Beaumont and his men still glared, but they had to eat.

“A Good sign nien?” Matis commented as she stepped from the canvas tent she had strung against a crumbling corner of stonework. There was enough of an overhang that she could use the tent as a door for the small space at the intersection of two stone walls. The Witch Hunter was looking off towards the sunrise, looking as though he had stepped from an Altdorf tailor rather than having spent a restless night on the ruins of a castle. Camila settled her blue cape around her shoulders. She was wearing a divided riding skirt in the Brettonian fashion along with her thigh high riding boots of tilean leather and her tooled leather breastplate. The piece had been laboriously decorated with a pattern of ivy vin that wrapped around the left side. In Brettonia it was surprisingly difficult to find high quality equipment that wasn’t also artistically embellished.

“I hope so,” she answered without much enthusiasm. Matis tossed her a loaf of bread underhanded, which she caught out of reflex. She peered at it as though uncertain what she was expected to do with the coarse peasant bread.

“Eat it,” Matis ordered folding his arms across his chest. Camilla looked at the bread without enthusiasm.

“I’m really not hungry,” she objected but Matis shook his head.

“You weren’t hungry last night either and it's not as though you have any extra weight to lose,” he commented.

“If you don’t want me to spend the day singing devotional Hymn’s…” Camilla held up her free hand in surrender and took a bite of the bread and began to chew. It was hard, baked several days ago, but as Matis had said it had been a while since she had eaten.

“Myrmidia’s tits you are annoying,” she muttered around the mouthful of bread. Matis nodded his head in agreement and then produced a wineskin from his small bundle of possessions. He passed the skin to her and she unstoppered it and drank greedily. The wine was a sweet red typical of Brettonian, without the sour tang that Tilean vintners prefered, but even Brettonian peasant wine would have been welcome on any Imperial table.

“Service has its rewards,” Matis said piously, his tone making it clear he was quoting something. Camilla shrugged her shoulders and passed the wine skin back.

“I’m not sure I’m serving anybody,” she replied.

“Mademoiselle?” Leofric, a tanned and lean poacher who had taken the role of sergeant for her little band, more or less by virtue of being willing to do it, picked his way across the rock strewn ruins, followed by the three peasants that had asked to join her the previous night. All three looked nervous and a little uncomfortable. Camilla knew by now that even the small rations of her camp were a feast for men who spent their lives half starved in the Brettonian villages, hungry amid the plenty of Aquitaine so that their lords and masters could live in silks. All three immediately fell to their knees. Camilla felt a stab or irritation at such obsequiousness, The Empire had its problems but at least its citizens would look you in the eye.

“Oh get up,” she snapped and the peasants leaped to the their feet with such fear in their eyes that Camilla immediately felt worse. Leofric held back a snicker with evident effort. He had been a man at arms he claimed, though as far as martial distinctions went that wasn't much of a boast, but he had the right attitude for a soldier.

“We wish to serve you Mademoiselle Aqua,” one of the new comers declared nervously, the others nodded in enthusiastic agreement.

“You are all from Bienvine?” she asked, referring to the village a few miles from here whos destruction had bought her here in the first place. All three men nodded.

“Did you have trades?” she asked, experience had taught her that most peasants were agricultural laborers, and those that survived the raids tended to be shepards or hunters who were away from the village when the dead attacked.

“I was a fletchers apprentice,” the youngest of the men responded unexpectedly. The other two men looked unhappy not to be able to volunteer similar skills.

“You are all welcome to join us,” she said after a moment, holding up hand to forestall immediate agreement.

“I cannot promise much, other than food and fighting, until either the undead are destroyed or we are,” she cautioned.

“That is more than we ever had before,” the oldest of the three responded.

“Then you are welcome among us,” she said simply.

“We swear to serve you faithful,” one of them responded, perhaps nonplussed at the lack of formality.

“We swear,” the other two parroted. Camilla crossed to them and touched each man on the shoulder, trying to give them the dignity they were obviously seeking.

“Join us then,” she said, smiling at each man in turn. It was an actress’ smile, not quite reaching her eyes but convincing enough. Matis would take over training the men to use spears and swords, but the work was slow and there wouldn’t be enough time to make them truly competent. Likely they would all die the first time they met the undead, but with luck one or two of them would live long enough to learn something.

“Riders!” shouted a look out perched atop one of the nearby walls. Camilla’s head snapped around to the sound of the voice, the scout was pointing to the southern road. All around the camp men were babling in fear and confusion.

“Arm yourselves and make a circle!” Leofric’s voice bellowed, cutting through the babble of voices like a sharp knife through canvas. The confusion subsided as men grabbed for pikes and bows. Their progress was disorderly but within a few minutes the had managed to make a passable defensive line around the crest of the hill.

“Looks to be knights, from Acue by their banners,” Beaumont called. The knight was already in the saddle and the rest of his companions were either mounted or in the process of doing so. Camilla sprang into the saddle of her bay and guided the horse forward to where two large piles of stone made an improvised gate in the waist high tumbledown. A score of mounted men, all bedecked in gorgeous tabards trotted along the road. The remains of the pyres smouldered by the road side in grim contrast. The leader of the men, a young knight in quartered white and purple, held up a mailed fist to his companions commanding a halt. The great warhorses obeyed though they stamped and pawed at the ground. He came forward alone.

“Villains!” he shouted, “Come down and explain yourselves!”

Beaumont and Camilla emerged from the ruins, side by side. Beaumont’s battered armor and fresh cut lance made a marked contrast to the glittering finery of the new comer.

“Good morning Sir Knight,” Camilla said, her courteousness a slap in the face to his bellicose shout. The knight stiffened in his saddle and then reached up to remove his helmet. He was dark haired and might have been handsome if there wasn’t a slight pinch of cruelty to his features and his brown eyes were agate hard.

“Ah you must be the Contessa I have heard so much about,” he replied in an oily voice, eyes flicking dismissively to Beaumont.

“Well if I must be then I suppose I am,” Camilla responded, stopping her horse ten feet from the knight.

“I am Guy D’acue, my father is lord of these lands and holds the lordship of Bienvein,” the knight responded haughtily.

“A pleasure to meet you Sir Guy,” Camilla responded without warmth.

“Why are you trespassing on my father’s land?” Guy demanded, making a broad gesture to indicate the surrounding countryside.

“This is the King’s Highway Sir,” Beaumont responded stiffly. Guys eyes cut to the other Knight, glittering with anger.

“If there is nothing else Sir Guy we will return to our…” Camilla began but the Knight rounded on her.

“You are harboring fled serfs from Bienvein! I will have these men returned,” he snapped. Camilla arched an eyebrow.

“As you must already know Bienvein has been destroyed by the undead,” she explained with artificial patience.

“Or destroyed by bandits?” Guy rejoined with a look towards the armed peasants ringing the shallow hilltop.

“These men are my entourage Sir Knight,” Camilla responded with icy formallity, “You have called them villains and bandits already, do the Knights of Acue treat all travellers in their land with such disrespect?” Guy drew his sword from his saddle with a rasp of steel on leather. Beaumont gripped his own hilt but didn’t pull it free, perhaps vacillating on whether there was enough distance between them to properly set his lance.

“You are harboring runaway serfs, these men are our property. The Knights of Acue won't be robbed by foreign chits with fancy titles,” he snarled. Camilla who had been snarled at by Chaos warriors in the past, sat impassively, unimpressed.

“You go too far Sir Knight, I demand satis…” Beaumont began, but Guy was already wheeling his horse around to face his men.

“My friends, It seems the Noble Contessa has been kidnapped by Brigands and false knights! It us our duty to rescue her and string everyone of these men up for their crimes. He finished his rotation and faced them again, grinning impudently. The Knights behind him drew their swords and shouted challenges.

“Your move, Contessa,” he said mockingly. Camilla drew her pistol and fired in a single smooth action. The bullet punched through the skull of Guy’s horse, spraying the fine white fabric of his tabard with gore. The horse spasmed as it died pitching the knight to the dirt with a clatter like a bull in a cutlers shop. Without wasting further words she wheeled her horse and galloped back up the hill with Beaumont at her heels, Guy screaming invective at her as she passed through the narrow gate to the ruined keep.

Penny's Interests

Bump!

Star Crossed: The Duke's Rebellion

The mud squelched underfoot as Tychon and Rene hauled the fueling pipes across the uncertain footing. The muddy surface of the caldea sucked and pulled at their boots. It was tough work, particularly because the hose kept sticking against the crack in the rock and one of them would have to hike back an unsnare it, but the hose was to heavy for one man to move alone so they couldn’t spare one of them to watch it. Finally, sweating and half coated in mud and volcanic ash, Rene lifted the hose to the fueling nipple and clamped it shut. With some difficulty he pried open the manual fuel controls and removed the safety pin from the emergency fuel dump control, a large lever of faded red plastic.

“Stand clear!” he called, even though Tychon was already well clear of the discharge ports, it paid to be careful afterall, and then threw the lever. Liquid helium three sprayed from the three discharge ports on the starboard side in a cloud of gaseous vapor, flash freezing the water and cascading rainbow iridescence across the water. The sound was loud enough that Rene had to cover his ears with his hands, but it was short lived. The tanks were already low and the high pressure drove the fluid out in a few seconds, sublimating it to gas as it passed through the one way valves in into the atmosphere. A green led light up in the control box, indicating that the tanks had been evacuated.

“How are you doin out there in the gardens?” Solae’s voice rang in Rene’s ear. He grinned although couldn’t see the expression.

“All is well M’lady,” he replied with a warm feeling spreading through his chest.

“Can you light starboard 3? We need to run out the lines,” he asked. There was a moment's hesitation as Solae either found the control or relayed the instruction to Mia, and then the rearmost starboard thruster, the one furthest from Rene, roared to life. With its petals irised fully open the thrust was dispersed enough that it only rocked the vessel slightly. For a moment it poured fire down towards the ground and raised a hissing cloud of sizzling steam, then it stuttered and went out, all the fuel expended. Because starship reaction mass needed to be ionically pure they had to empty out both the tank and the lines before they refueled. WHile Helium 3 wouldn’t react with fluorine, a sudden drop in purity would cause the reaction to fluctuate unsteadily, not something you wanted to worry about when the word ‘fusion’ was in anyway involved. Rene was once again glad for all the shit jobs that had been heaped upon him during his training. If he had known that pulling extra duty on landing craft would save his life, he might have gone to it a bit more gladly.

“Alright Tychon, Start the pumps,” Rene called through cupped hands. The hoses thrashed for a moment as the powerful pumps on the boat came online and Rene felt them thrum beneath his hands as fluorine began to pulse through the lines beneath his hands. A minute later Tychon appeared from the gap in the caldera wall, a sack cloth bag thrown over his shoulder and a small wooden handed shovel in his hands. Rene sighed eloquently. Join the Marines they said, see the galaxy they said.

It took Rene and Tychon almost a half and hour to place one of the poppers under each landing skid. It was a dirty job, digging down through the ashy mud to set the small explosives before covering them back up and packing the dirt down on top of them so that the blast propagated properly. Rene was a little uncertain about the whole idea but Tychon was certain that it would work and the Marine could only defer to his greater experience. They made a sorry pair when they both clambered up the access way, covered in mud and soaked to their skins, but the job was done and Rene was eager to be away. The pumps had transferred over 80 percent of the fuel, and would complete the job within another ten minutes.

“Sir Rene,” an arch yet slightly disapproving voice, greeted him as he stepped through the open airlock.

“You are hardly in a fit state to entertain your paramour!”

Tychon blinked taken aback both by the disembodied voice and by its sensuous tone. AIs were common enough in the upper echelons of Imperial society, but it was unlikely that there were more than one or two on the entire planet of Panopontus.

“That is Mia, she is our…” Rene trailed off as he realised that he had no idea how to end the sentence.

“I am Lady Solae’s Major Doma,” Mia purred. Tychon blinked clearly having no more idea of who or what Mia was than he had a moment ago.

“Uh, I am Tychon, pleased to meet you,” he replied uncertainty.

“Welcome Sir,” Mia replied, “If you would proceed to the bath house…”

Rene surrendered and ten minutes later he and Tychon, freshly showered stepped onto the bridge where Solae sat at a holographic terminal. The had dressed in the cast offs they had salvaged from the previous crew, which if not perfectly clean were at least comfortable. Rene smiled, well they didn’t have much time for shopping on this planet fall.

“I uh..,” Tychon began glancing around the bridge in wonder. It was a fair bet he had never been on a starship before. The Bonaventure was hardly the bright light of anyone's fleet, but the level of technology casually on display was certainly greater than anything Tychon had ever seen.

“I just wanted to say thank you,” Tychon burst out, “for saving my daughter and all that you have done!”

WoT: The Dark One's Own Luck.

Mave dipped her spoon into the broth and tasted it carefully. It was gamey but surpsingly spicy, not at all unpleasant. During her childhood she had eaten very well and the bland diet afforded by the life of a Novice had been a trial. Having grown used to the simple fare of the Tower, and having gone hungry as often as not since fleeing she found this oddly pleasing. Perhaps it was that Ari had cooked it specifically for her.

"Well...," she hedged, reluctant to scare Ari but conscious that he had a right to know. She took another spoon of stew and chewed for a moment. What was chasing Ari was a good question, but one that was difficult to answer given the information she had.

"Fades and Trollocs are bad enough, but they cant move openly through the country side except in wild places," she made a broad gesture to encompass the forest that surrounded them on all sides.

"In villages and towns there are darkfriends," she said, a trace of bitterness in her voice. In the Tower as well there were darkfriends, though it curdled her soul to think on it.

"The Dark one has other servants I have read about, darkhounds which hunt in the night and grey men who your eyes slide off. I think I would sense their presence but if you find yourself ignoring someone despite how much you think you shouldn't ..." She trailed off and cleared her throat.

"While we are within my wards we are safe," she explained, "and once we get moving again, well, even a fade cannot fly."

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

“Contessa! Please, I would be dishonored forever if anything happened to you,” Beaumont called from the edge of the roadway. The half decayed corpses lay where they had fallen, shattered by lances, or crushed beneath horses hooves. More than a few had been blasted by pistol fire. The zombies and skeletons would have been almost immune to such weapons under normal circumstances, but the pistol balls that had been used were of struck silver, each impressed with the hammer of Sigmar and blessed by one of his priests.

Camilla lowered her twin pistols and allowed her horse, a rangy Arabyian rather than the massive destriers the Brettonians favored, to carry her back towards Sir Beaumont. Squires were already heaping the dead into piles and bringing forth faggots of dried timber for fires. The sky to the west was already darkening and it would be hard riding to reach any safe place by nightfall.

Beaumont was a shadow of his former self. Gone was the neatly pressed tabard and painted lance. His armor was scratched and dented despite his squires constant efforts to buff it and his lance was of plain oak, green and cut from whichever glade had been handy. The other half dozen knights with him were similarly drab, weeks of hard fighting haven worn off the peace time polish, if not the chivalric core of the men. The squires were a mix of hard faced veterans, and bright eyed boys, the later replacements for the fallen.

It had been nearly three moons since Cydric’s death, though part of Camilla’s mind refused to accept that he was gone. Without a body there was no sense of finality no closure, just a gaping wound where her lover had once been. After the lifting of the curse they had scoured the inner keep for days, searching every passage and crevice for signs of Cydric, but not a thing had been found. After ten days, even Camilla had been forced to give up the search as hopeless.

“Ze Frauline ist not concerned with your honor sir,” A voice replied in Riekspiel sharp enough to make every word a whip crack. The words came from tall lean man replied from his seat on a fallen log that lay beside the road. Pipe smoke wreathed his head, curling around the distinctive hat of a Sigmarite Templar, or a Witch Hunter in the common parlance. Matis Von Koneinswald lifted the pipe to his lips and drew back, the smouldering flame in the bowl illuminated his craggy features for a moment before fading. A heavy wave bladed zwieldhier was propped against the moss covered stump. The massive sword seemed to large for someone as skinny as Von Koeinswald to wield, but he fought with a fury that would have impressed Norscan berserkers.

“I thank monsieur for his opinion,” Beaumont sniped, though his heart wasn’t truly in the jibe. They were all tired, and all wary of the coming darkness. Camilla had written to Matis a few days after Cydric’s death, describing the dark form which had fled the apparitions womb when Camilla had withdrawn the blade that transfixed her. It had been on her mind merely to report the problem to the Sigmarites and then depart, but without Cydric she had found herself listless and without direction and thus had still been lingering under the counts guest right when Matis arrived a week and a half later.

Matis was a scholar of sorts and had access to the records of the Temple of Sigmar and he believed that the spirit was the soul of an ancient necromancer from Araby who had been killed during the Crusades of Beaumont’s ancestors. By using his dark arts he had implanted his soul into his slayers wife’s womb, hoping to be reborn into the world. They ploy had been forestalled by the thrust of a faithful retainer who recognised the fell working of magic upon his legie lord’s wife. The husband, driven mad with grief had become the beast Cydric had slain. Removing the sword had lifted the curse, but freed the ancient lich to travel the world once more. Rumor said that strange lights had been seen in The Forest of Chalons and that dead men had been heard chanting an ancient and accursed name. Even before Matis arrived to impart this information, reports of the undead moving had been received from all over Aquitaine. At first isolated travellers had been taken in the night, but the creatures had grown bolder, attacking isolated villages and swelling their numbers with the dead.

The Lords of Aquitaine had at first dismissed the problem, blaming, at first bandits, and then the unscrupulous ambitions of their fellow Lords. Even know, when the problem could no longer be denied, most of them remained in their castles, attempting to defend their own domains without stirring themselves to aid their neighbours, so strong was the hatred and distrust of their fellow magnates. Years of peace had given honor obsessed men too long to sharpen their own grudges, and do the cancer grew.

Despite Beaumont’s objections that it was no place for a lady, Camilla and Matis had begun ranging the countryside, tracking and destroying bands of the undead and trying to learn what they could. The count had been generous in rewarding her for lifting the curse on his castle and had provided her with gold and the offer of noble title. The gold she had accepted, but the title, which she suspected was little more than a trap intended to allow him to marry her off, she had spurned, much to the horror of the assembled knights and ladies. The wealth she had used to buy horse and new pistols as well as to keep the tiny Sigmarite chapel in Bordeleaux blessing bullets night and day.

“Mademoiselle Aqua!” A voice called from the light woods that bordered the road. Behind the trees rose a modest hill that was crowned with ruins of age tumbled stone. It had been a castle once but long abandoned for its lack of water. The undead had made their lair in the place, at least until Camilla had ridden past alone, drawing the creatures out and precipitating her current not-quite-argument with Beaumont.

Mademoiselle Aqua. Mistress Blue. In the early days when it had just been her and Matis she had worn a blue cloak, merely because it had been handy but the name had caught on. Camilla didn’t personally care for the name, but it had been hard, was still hard, to care about much of anything with Cydric gone.

“If you object to my actions Sir Knight, you and your kind escort are more than welcome to depart,” she said with a slightly waspish undertone. Beaumont colored but she wheeled her horse to the source of the call before he could reply. A pair of woodsmen in leathers and green cloth were emerging from the trees. Both had long bows slung across their backs and swords at their hips, weapons of far better quality than a Brettonian villan ought to wear, but horses were not the only thing money could buy. Both wore a band of blue silk tied around their right arm. Three other men, dirty unwashed and wretched were with them, all clutching farm implements as improvised weapons.

“Mademoiselle, we found these hiding in a cave, they are from the village that was destroyed, shepherds they say,” the older of the two woodsmen said. All three men climbed over the fence and promptly fell to their knees on the dusty road.

“Mademoiselle Aqua! We wish to swear our fealty to you,” one of them blurted out, the others were nodding so vigorously Camilla was afraid they might do themselves an injury. The regional accent was thick but after three months she found she could understand it nearly as well as anything that was spoken in the capital. She grimaced, if these men were from the village it was possible that their loved ones might be among the corpses being piled for the pyres, she hoped not.

“Contessa,” Beaumont began stiffly, “You cannot keep enrolling serfs they belong to their lords if…” Camilla held up a gloved hand to silence Beaumont. Matis snorted in amusement and blew out another cloud of smoke. The Knight was happy to provide his ‘escort’, Camilla though he was even pleased to have the chance to fight the undead that his Lords turned their blind eyes to, but he was still a noble at heart. It rankled his soul to see peasants abandoning what he saw as their proper place.

“For now you are welcome to travel with us,” she told the kneeling serfs.

“We have food and ale. In the morning you can decide if you want to join us,” she told the men in what she hoped was a compassionate tone. They would swear then, whatever she said. There were nearly a score of them now. Former peasants and foresters who had lost everything and decided that following her and fighting the undead was preferable to a life of penury. The ate well and she armed them with real steel, which was better than most Brettonians ever got. Beaumonts assertion that she was harboring runaway serfs might be true, but it was hard to care too much about what the future might hold. If the Lords came out of their castles to claim their serfs, maybe they would kill a few undead in the process. Not that Camilla would surrender men who had sworn fealty to her without a fight of course.

The squires had finished piling the bodies and were setting torch to timber. Thunder crackled overhead, though it was doubtful it would bring any rain. It had been a dry spring and the early summer had been beset by nearly continual cloud cover with afternoon storms that bought ferocious lightning without rain. Matis thought it was some spell being worked to allow the undead to move without fear of sunlight. Camilla privately suspected it was the melancholia in her heart writ large.

“We had best camp in the ruins,” she called turning to one of the gruff former pesants who was dressed in leathers and a mail coat.

“There is no where close enough to reach before we lose the light and I dont want to be on the road if the lightning strikes,” she explained.

“M’lady,” the peasant said, knuckling his forehead and turning to bellow orders to his fellow voulnteers. It was laced with profanity and invictive so vile that it made even Camilla wince, but the men were moving, leaving the road and picking their way up the hill, leading their few draft animals and the single cart that held most of their supplies.

“Would you care to join us Beaumont?” Camilla asked as she turned her horse of the road and started up the hill.