The last time Jadis had walked this road, she’d been heading in the opposite direction and had travelled the distance between the bridge and the old abandoned fort in just a couple of hours. Things had changed a lot for her in the few intervening months, gifting her with many companions and far more personal possessions than she had started with. Heavy, bulky, necessary to survival possessions. Pulling a giant wagon loaded with people and things behind her three selves meant the return trip took significantly longer. It wasn’t until late in the day that the expedition force drew up to the outer ring of cleared trees and put eyes on The Crossroads.
The structure wasn’t much different from how Jadis remembered it. A large, stone wall with crenelations along the top encircled an inner courtyard. A stone tower with a pointed roof stood in the middle of the courtyard, tall enough to give anyone who might be watching from the upper windows a clear view of the surrounding forest. There were four gates in the cardinal directions, with one road leading from each of them except the southern gate that they were facing, which had two roads leading to it. The gates stood open, just as they had been when Jadis had found the fort all those months ago. But that didn’t mean the fort had remained as empty as she’d left it.
The two forward scouts on horseback, this time Achim and Sofie, had come to a stop at the edge of the clearing. Kerr was standing with them, slightly apart and within an easy sidestep of being behind the cover of a large pine tree. They were waiting for the main wagon group and, while Jadis couldn’t yet overhear what they were saying, Jadis could sense the unease by their posture alone.
Looking at the abandoned fort, Jadis couldn’t help but feel apprehensive herself. The place had been a ghost town the last time she’d been there, nothing but bone thieves inhabiting the dilapidated structures. But as she looked at the lichen covered walls and dark tower windows, memories of the ambush back at Alawar flickered through Jadis’ mind.
Bringing the wagon to a stop, Syd strode forward with her lance in hand while Jay and Dys retrieved their weapons from the wagon. Captain Willa rode her horse forward, matching pace with Syd, and the two joined the scouts at the edge of the clearing.
“What’s the assessment?” Willa asked without preamble.
“Clear signs of recent activity,” Achim replied, pointing to the road ahead of them. “Boot prints and wagon wheels, though no sign of animal prints, auroch or otherwise.”
“There are tracks going north on the other side of the fort,” Kerr added, her tone indicating she was in business mode. “Fresh, likely from this morning at the most. And I can smell old embers on the wind. There was a fire here last night, put out before we got here but not long enough ago to erase the scent.”
“Long enough that we never spotted the smoke,” Willa said without taking her eyes off the fort.
“What about traps?” Syd asked. She couldn’t see any obvious signs, but she wasn’t the expert on such matters and the ones that had been back at the riverside cabin had been hard to spot even with them pointed out to her. “Anything around the wall or on the road?”
“I haven’t gone close enough to the wall to know for sure,” Kerr said with a slight shake of her head. “But nothing on the roads or around the outer ring of the clearing. It’s a lot of area to cover, though.”
Indeed, it was. The Crossroads fort was much larger than the temporary wooden ones that Bernd’s Blades and other mercenaries had set up along the border of the forest. This fort was probably twice again as large and the clearing around it had been cut to give hundreds of feet of clear view for the defenders. There was no sneaking up on the fort, not unless you were small enough to hide amongst the brush and pine saplings that had started to slowly take over the clearing. Anyone taller than a gnome would have a lot of trouble with that proposition.
“Based on the tracks you saw going north, how many were there?” Syd asked Kerr.
“More than the number I saw at the cabin. Two dozen, at least.”
That information hung in the air for a solid moment before anyone spoke.
“So the question is, did anyone stay behind?” Willa stated with a tap of her gauntlet against her saddle bow. “And if they didn’t, are there any other surprises waiting for us inside?”
“Only one way to find out,” Syd said with a determined set to her shoulders.
Jay and Dys came up behind her at the same time, their heavy weapons in hand as their steel shod boots clanked against the cobblestone road.
“You three aren’t much for subtlety, are you?” Willa asked dryly.
“No,” the three Nephilim answered in unison.
“Give me a moment,” Willa said as she turned her horse around. “Let me give my men some orders before we start this. I’ll ride with you. If this is a situation that calls for Imperial authority, I have the right to speak on Vraekae’s behalf, on legal matters, at least.”
Conceding to the request, Jadis waited while captain Willa gave orders to her troops. While the soldiers readied themselves, Jadis’ companions came up to join her and Kerr.
“Keep your distance,” Jay commanded, her tone making no room for argument. “Stay at range until we signal the all clear, then come ahead and join us at the gate. Once we’re inside, no one goes anywhere alone until every building has been searched.”
“Kerr, stick with Aila. Thea, protect Eir. Bridget, cover Sabina,” Dys pointed at each woman in turn. “Don’t separate from your partner no matter what until the fort is cleared.”
There was a general murmur of agreement, though Bridget motioned in Jay’s direction.
“What about you? Er, you three? What are you three going to be doing?”
“We’ll be moving as one,” Jadis said through all her selves at once. “Let us take point, just keep an eye on our backs.”
With a plan in place Jadis’ three selves strode out into the clearing, accompanied by Willa and the two orc soldiers, Jaxton and Landry, on horseback. Jadis noted that both Willa and her two subordinates had their shields on their arms but hadn’t drawn their swords, instead keeping their main hands free. Since it was entirely possible that anyone that might be hiding in the fort could be friendly, Jadis kept her own weapons on her shoulders in an attempt to seem, if not friendly, at least not actively hostile.
The six of them made it all the way to the southern gate of the fort without challenge. No sign of movement on the walls, no shout or whisper from inside. Looking into the fort from up close, Jadis noted a few changes from the last time she’d been in the place.
The open courtyard area around the central tower looked like it had seen a lot of recent activity. The mud was churned up, as though dozens of feet had moved through the place regularly. The buildings placed along the inner ring of the wall didn’t stand open anymore, either. The doors and window shutters that had once hung open or had been torn off the hinges completely had been fixed and closed, offering no view to the interiors behind them. The tower, too, had seen some work done. Large timbers had been used to shore up the giant hole that had been made in one side of the wall, giving the structure some stability. The repair looked rough, nothing like the orderly scaffolding she’d seen back in Far Felsen when the city had needed repairs, but the tower no longer looked like it was going to fall over with the next stiff breeze.
“This is Captain Willa of Copper Ridge, a duly authorized representative of Magistrate Vraekae Aedraheill, the lawfully appointed ruler of Weigrun,” Willa shouted abruptly, nearly making Jadis jump in her boots. “If there is anyone currently inhabiting this fort, please come forward and present yourself! So long as you remain peaceful, no harm will come to you!”
As Willa’s shouted words echoed, Jadis readied herself for whatever response might come. Hostile people might or might not attack, but if they had read the situation wrong and there were demons in the fort, that amount of noise was sure to draw them out. Which might have been the point, Jadis realized.
A few seconds passed without response. With no sign of activity, Jay looked towards Willa and gave her a shrug.
“Maybe no one’s home?”
“Maybe,” Willa frowned, her expression half hidden under her helmet. “But we’d better make sure.”
Half turning in her saddle, Willa waved a hand back towards the rest of her soldiers, signaling them to come forward. All but two, Ada and Lutz, followed their captain. The remaining two soldiers stayed back to guard the wagons. Taking her cue from Willa, Jay also signaled for her companions to start moving forward.
With the main body of their forces moving in, Jadis started forward into the fort. The churned mud squelched under her boots as she scanned the surroundings. Making sure to keep an eye in every direction, she checked above and behind, seeing no one hiding on the walls behind and above her. As she marched further in, Willa, Jaxton, and Landry dismounted and moved their horses off to one side so the gate wasn’t blocked.
“We’ll leave that to you,” Dys said, motioning at the tower with her axe. “We won’t fit in there.”
“Understood,” Willa nodded before motioning the two orcs toward the building located to the right of the gate. “It’s best we clear the immediate area first, though.”
“That’s the inn,” Syd replied while pointing towards a two-story building on their left. “If I remember correctly. We’ll clear that one.”
The large inn was right next to the southern gate, the only structure between the gate and the inn a half-destroyed building that had probably been a stable once before catching fire sometime long ago. Since the insides of that ruined stable were visible, Jadis skipped it in favor of the inn. If anyone were to have set up camp in the fort, she was sure that was the place they’d choose to do so.
“If anyone’s in there, say something now,” Dys called out as she came to a stop before the large wooden door.
Well, large for a regular person. For Jadis, the top of the door didn’t reach her shoulders. Dys waited a few seconds for a response, but after getting none, Dys grabbed hold of the door handle. Giving it a push, she found that the door had been locked and wouldn’t open easily.
“Good thing I don’t give a shit about property damage,” Dys murmured.
With Jay and Syd standing to either side of her, Dys took a step back, then kicked the door with all of her considerable strength.
The door crashed open, flying off of its hinges from the force of the kick. In the same moment, even before Dys’ foot had come back down on the ground, the shuttered window on the second floor directly over the front door burst open. From the dark interior rocketed a large sack on a stick of some kind. Acting instinctively and with all the speed her high agility stat allowed, Syd grabbed hold of Dys and pulled her to the side, just barely getting her out of the way of the swinging trap. However, as Jadis quickly discovered, the sack hadn’t been designed to strike the person who triggered it.
Acting as some kind of smoke bomb, the sack exploded in a grayish powder that rapidly filled the air around Jadis’ three selves. Whatever the powder was, it was a noxious irritant, making Jadis’ eyes water and her throat itch. She couldn’t help but sneeze as her three selves blindly backed away from the inn.
“Ambush!” Jadis heard Willa shout out from somewhere nearby, along with another shout, this one from someone she didn’t recognize.
“Pull it down, boys!”
A loud cracking and snapping sound alerted Jadis to the danger. Turning towards the noise, Jadis’ three selves struggled to see through the obscuring cloud. What she did see sent a chill through her bones.
The looming central tower was leaning. No, not just leaning, falling. And it was falling directly towards her.
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