Chapter 30: Lord of the Berwick Islands (8)

Simon could see the fires from leagues away.

The largest port on the Berwick Islands’ northwest was the city of Balmos, home to over fifty thousand inhabitants according to the latest imperial census. While most of Lord Maublanc’s war navy docked in Carcas, Balmos still hosted quite a few galleys meant to intercept whoever dared to attack the island. Conquering it would be a priority for any invasion force.

Louis’ airship fleet didn’t bother to seize it. It simply followed the true-and-tried procedure used by the Imperial Air Force against enemy states: aerial bombardments from mages casting fireball after fireball from their airships’ decks.

Simon had watched the horrific scene from atop a hill in the distance, his fiancée covering her mouth in horror at the fiery spectacle. The airships had set the city ablaze in a vicious onslaught until the flames and plumes of smoke reached all the way to the clouds, then continued their course eastward on their way to Carcas. No doubt they would visit the same treatment upon all fortresses they found in preparation for an amphibious landing.

Airships flew too high for most siege engines to reach, but House Paimon’s troops included entire squads of griffin riders among their number and Lord Maublanc was a terrific strategist. The Berwick Islands should be able to mount a successful counteroffensive once they mobilized, yet losses would continue to mount in the meantime.

Did Lauriane authorize this raid? Simon couldn’t believe it. His sister wouldn’t stand for this brutal annihilation, especially if it risked harming him or Anna. Did Louis sideline her or keep her in the dark? If only I could talk to her…

Simon couldn’t help but recall his discussion with Louis in an earlier reign, when he compared the people of the capital to vermin and complained about overpopulation. Was this his solution? There was no way Louis could have built a fleet this size in only two months, so he must have been building up his forces in secret long before their father’s death…

Simon glanced at his fiancée, who stared at the burning city in the distance with a hollow gaze and forlorn expression. She visibly struggled to hold back tears at the sight of her homeland ablaze.

“These are our people,” Anna lamented. “Our subjects, yet Louis would turn his weapons against them all the same. I didn’t… I couldn’t imagine…”

Simon took a deep breath. “Anna–”

“He will pay for this.” Anna ground her teeth so hard that Simon could hear them creak. “I swear to you, Simon. Louis will pay for this barbarous act.”

“He will,” Simon reassured her. “We will rally the Islands’ forces and storm the mainland the same way our fathers did.”

It was more of a wish than a promise at this point, but Anna was right. Such senseless destruction couldn’t go unpunished. The mere fact that Louis could even conceive of bombing their own population made Simon worry about what would become of Endymion should he take control of it.

“Anna, Simon, we need to go before they spot us,” Tiella called out to them.

“A last-minute escape through the woods wasn’t my idea of a honeymoon, but you were right about one thing, Simon,” Anna said as they rejoined their escort. She was trying to lighten up the mood a bit, but Simon could tell from her scowl that she was only putting on a brave face to deal with the situation. “My life will never be boring with you in it.”

Simon wished that it could have been a good thing.

“These last few months were the best of my life,” he admitted. “I thought I would need to abandon the Magnos name to finally taste happiness, but I was wrong.” He shook his head in shame and guilt. “I just wish those days of peace could have lasted longer.”

Anna’s smile didn’t reach her eyes. “You couldn’t have done anything.”

She meant well, but she was wrong. Simon could have been more prudent and avoided giving himself away. He could have married her without bringing war to her doorstep. Simon had the perfect life within his grasp, and he let it all slip through his fingers because of his misplaced greed.

This reign had gone off the rails, and he still had so many of them ahead of him…

No, I shouldn’t think this way, Simon told himself as they rode into the woods towards the safehouse. This is only the start of a long battle. I’ll have to live with my mistakes, but I can still make the best out of this situation. I have Anna, Tiella, and a social status I could only dream of once… I can’t throw all the good things away with the bad. I can’t go back and lose everything.

So long as Simon had Anna by his side, he could do anything. He refused to lose the time he had spent with her.

The marshes and woods ahead were thick with thorny bushes, a dense canopy that partially obscured the stars, and faint mist hanging in the air. Owls chirped and wolves howled to the moon as the wind blew the smell of distant smoke through the whistling leaves.

Perhaps it was the fear of discovery or the tension in the air playing with his mind, but Simon began to feel watched. He could see that his allies also shared his sense of unease as their horses slowed down upon entering a wide clearing, before finally stopping.

“What’s going on?” Simon inquired.

The horses remained eerily quiet.

Simon’s Perks compelled animals to see him as a figure of authority and allowed him to talk to them. His words should have at least elicited a response, yet their mounts simply stared into the woods.

Anna immediately put on her Class outfit. “They’ve been charmed.”

Immediately realizing the danger, Simon subtly cast his Fiendmask spell and put on a fake Dreadnought outfit to hide the Overlord armor. Tiella and their escort also changed, with the latter being a balanced crew of plate-wearing Knights and spear-wielding Soldiers. Both were mass-produced Vassal Classes that lacked extraordinary abilities, but could hold their own in a fight.

Everyone unhorsed and formed a defensive circle as the forest literally shifted around them. Branches and trunks subtly moved to reveal shadows surrounding the group from all sides. Most of them were humans wearing owl masks and feather cloaks, each of them armed with bows, sarbacanes, or axes; likely disguised hunters and foresters from nearby settlements.

But the ambushers included other tribes among them. Tiny fairies hardly taller than Simon’s own finger darted around on wildly colored butterfly wings; a pair of dire tigers, each the size of a horse, growled at Simon’s group; and he even caught a glimpse of an elven woman bearing a bow of white wood pointed straight at him.

Their leader arose from the ground like a woman rising from water.

She was a creature of great beauty, tall, with skin the color of bark and green leaves for hair. She resembled an elf, albeit with moss for a dress and eyes pale like milk. She looked young, fit, and fertile, like the forest she ruled over and the young manatree whom she embodied.

A dryad had come to greet them.

This is bad, Simon thought as he immediately attempted to parlay. “The Green Mother, I presume?”

He had heard dryads could speak and understand the tongues of all living things. That one answered him in common Endymian with a voice akin to rustling leaves in the wind.

“You would know of my name, you fiend who has helped the white priests burn so many of my children.” The dryad’s fair face twisted into an expression of absolute hatred and disgust. “You reek of the Dark. It pours out of your soul like magma out of a volcano and burns hotter than your metal birds’ flames. Your every step befouls this land, demon.”

“I am no fiend, nor your foe,” Simon replied in a desperate attempt to de-escalate the situation. “Let us through, and we may part in peace.”

“There can be no peace with the Overlord, only death or slavery.”

For a very brief moment, Simon hoped she only spoke in metaphor, and that she simply referred to the Overlord as the figurative embodiment of the empire… until he saw the glare she sent him; the pure and naked hatred she felt not only for him as a person, but all that he represented.

She knew.

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“How?” Simon asked, his men exchanging glances. He guessed that Lord Maublanc had likely briefed them on his true identity, since they were to escort him to a safe place.

The Green Mother sneered with disdain. “Humans see this place as an island cut away from everything, but my people’s roots connect all across the world. My sisters from Illusea have told me of the vile Balzam’s death, and that you deceived your own kin to slither your way into my forest, Simon of Endymion.”

How could they—did the elves have spies among Euphemia or Louis’ inner circles? That didn’t matter right now. Simon could tell she wouldn’t let them escape the woods without a fight.

Her manatree is very young and we’re far from it, so she shouldn’t be able to use her most dangerous abilities or call powerful monsters to help her, Simon thought while recalling the bestiaries he had read. Killing her will only be a temporary measure so long as her tree stands, but she should be down for at least a few days.

Nonetheless, the very forest around them answered her commands. Fighting her meant fighting the land, the air, the wind, the trees, unless…

Unless he wrestled control of it all.

“Leave this incarnation of evil to us, so that his foulness may be sealed away beneath the earth,” the dryad told Simon’s allies. “The rest of you may depart my forest with your lives.”

“This is pointless,” Anna argued, her finger pointing in Balmos’ direction, “invaders are bombarding our home as we speak! Our forests will burn, and our people will suffer unless we repel them!”

“Your cities will indeed burn, Lady of House Paimon, as they have many times in the past… but these lands and forests are vast, and my children have many places to hide. They have survived far worse than your metal birds. The Overlord, however, is a threat to all life in this world and cannot be allowed to flee.” Wind blew through the Green Mother’s hair of leaves, and her courtiers readied their bows. “I will ask you again for the last time. Leave this wicked demon to us and go on to defend your cities, or perish.”

Anna glanced at Simon. She looked deeply, deeply unhappy about how all of this turned out… and maybe a little excited.