Madness.
Few men of rank in the Greater Eximian proper, the Grand Duchy of Lena, where Vysnovet and his House held reign, were of common descent. Tradition, sentiment, and the shameless self-interest of the Church had granted the title of Emperor to Vasa, the bearer of Starlight, where by all rights and rule of law it should have passed to him, the Grand Duke, whose claim carried the highest weight of status and authority. And so the Lords that remained faithful to Vysnovet, defying the tides of fate and favor that carried the unscrupulous pretender, were men for whom duty and honor were the rule, not merit and practicality. These men had iron faith in the ethos and obligations of blood and nobility - as their Grand Duke leaned, without reservation, upon their own. As the thirdborn son of one of Sighorn's barons, Leto had not worked his way through the ranks, as a commoner would. Command had been set aside for him since birth, as one of the few remaining uses for the younger sons of minor nobility.
So he'd taken to it, reading books and histories and any advisory accounts he could get, knowing that in the absence of brilliance, experience was the surest path to ability. And once, briefly and in what had then been thought a fit of madness, he'd even arranged to enlist himself, under disguise, into one of his father's columns.
That experience had been, very nearly, as valuable as all the others put together. All commanders learned of the value of shock on the field; they learned how a pointed charge through a single, weak rank could break a formation, scatter its constituents through the field. They learned that morale alone was no surety against this. They learned that it was discipline, above all things, for which they drilled their footmen. So they could match step, and march along, and move efficiently across the distances, certainly - but so that routine became their resort in battle, rather than instinct, most of all.
This was why armies spent years training their horses, and weeks - if not months, - training their soldiers, on such simple, mundane repetitions, rather than honing their individual strength and prowess at-arms. When a mount stampeded, ten more shied and bucked at their riders alongside it. When one man stumbled on the march, ten more behind him faltered.
What Leto learned in the columns was that in the midst of an army, with shields and shoulders on all sides, no room to leap, maneuver, or dodge, only the first few ranks ever truly saw what was to happen to them, and knew what to expect - and there was neither time nor thought to spare for sharing words about it. Delays, standstills, the giving of any ground - these things were not instinctively or intuitively coordinated. Where a frontline shied from the first strike of lances, the ranks became confused - and where confused, so much more vulnerable to the lances that followed. The army whose footmen could see a lance graze over their helms, and not so much as flinch from the impact, was an army that could not be scattered. Killed, yes, but never scattered.
The Horde of raiders and deer-trackers that had overrun his footmen could hardly be called an army, so wild and untrained was their migration. Indeed, they were more like an armed mob rushing the battlements, so misshapen and fluctuating in their composition. A mob of the sort that mere dozens of shining castle guards, the general knew, could disperse in short order, though their targets massed in unwashed thousands, in the cities of men.
But the difference here, Leto realized with slow-blooming horror, was that these were not men.
Madness.
It is one thing for a mob to riot over taxes, or piety, or scandal. Such gatherings could be conveniently ignored unless they became violent, and quickly, easily, (if not bloodlessly) dispersed then. It was quite another thing, however, to deal with rioting of the famished. Such men were beyond thoughts of self-preservation, which drove them equally to either side of the conflict in any case. They knew that unless they grasped at victory, their only choice lay between a quick death on the streets, or a slow one, in their homes. Only a fool would think of driving them off without the strength of numbers, and this, Leto realized, was exactly what he had just done.
There was no shove and press, no confusion in the mob of raging bodies where the iron riders struck. Those who hesitated, turned away, stepped back, or even fled from the lances did not stall ten more behind them. They were simply shoved to the dirt or cut down, slain, trampled by the heedless masses behind them. Those mammoths driven to stampede by the sight of blinding flames, smell of scorching hair, and sound of tortured screams were simply executed, whether through inspiration, impatience, or some base, innate sort of wisdom, before they could cause any real damage or confusion along their unstoppable, uncontrollable charge. Somehow, the urge to kill seemed to lay deeper, stronger, in each individual orc, than the regard for his own safety and survival.
Could it be that they were starving?
Or simply monstrous?
Leto watched the last of the horsemen disappear over the distant hillside, trailing after their Count and his Enchanter. The soldiers, at least, still had a chance to live. As for the men of rank… the Count, and his sons… they answered to the Sleepless Lord, Vysnovet. They had failed him, and so their choice was clear: A quick death in the field, or a slow one in the square.
This was why Leto had fled to his men, rather than away from them, as the Count had. He had thought to have been slain by now, and had never accounted the possibility that anything would even slow this Horde, let alone stop it. Let alone the command of a single, mighty warrior.
“Lay down arms.” He commanded, head spinning, yet strangely aloof from the roots of his thoughts. He could not fathom how this had happened. He could not fathom how such a mass of creatures so murderous, whose malice overrode their very instinct so greatly as to override the very foundations of centuries of warfare, could be moved in mere seconds to negotiation. He thought he understood what sort of creature this orc that commanded them so must be, and the hairs rose along the nape of his neck for having considered it. Lay down arms! He shouted suddenly, realizing his mens’ confusion. He realized, also, that his choice was the same as before: a quick death on the field, or a slow one in the square. But his men were only a resource, not to be faulted for their own misuse, and need not share the same fate.
“Petrious” the general called numbly, to the lieutenant beside him, amidst the clattering of falling swords. “You have command.” The man nodded, he saw in the corner of his eye, and did not question. His men never questioned. He climbed down from his horse, looking blankly ahead, not bothering to think about his next moves. If he thought, then he’d fear; and if he feared, he’d hesitate. Already he trembled, as he walked forward to face the regal Orc, one hand absently unbuckling the straps of his helm.
General Fosas Leto, Commander of Ava, drew his sword with one hand, and took his helmet from his skull with the other. A part of him dared hope that his men would question now, entreat him to reconsider, but he swallowed it into suppression. He tossed the helmet ahead of him, where it rolled, clattering, to a stop at the great Orc’s feet, and he pointed his blade in the creature’s direction - a challenge that, for all the words that continued to fail him, could not fail to be understood.
He had never been a pious man - God, as the Grand Duchy’s lords and ladies were fond of repeating, had quite enough to deal with in the East already. And so he did not pray; for though the temptation struck him to do so, he had always lived his life as an honest man. He would die, at least, the same way.