Sieges are to be avoided. Divines should be brought in to wipe forces away. Olephia, Anassa, Baalka and Irinika are all capable of causing enough devastation to breach castle walls and raze them to the ground. Without Divines, fortresses should not be sieged. Cities be starved out through the raiding and obstru of supply routes.

  It is a radical ge in warfare, but there is a simple reason. An army sieging faces inwards, to turn a city into a prison merely galvahe local popution. They see directly who the enemy is, they peer over the castle walls and immediately see who is responsible for turning their holds into a prison.

  Most importantly. An army sieging be ter-attacked from the rear.

  There is little to be done in a situation like that, there is o retreat when the rear bees a frontline, and the castle walls that orapped the local popution no you.

  Principles of Siegecraft, written by Goddess Kassandora, Of War, during the Great War.

  Kassandora stared up at the red bubble that protected tral Requisitions and the twenty thousand men within. The slight worry of being outnumbered was not a worry, but the st time an army of more thay thousand mages had been fielded was during Worldbreaking. Now, that slight tinge of worry had bee a slight tinge of dread. The numbers had been wrong, simply from looking at the army through Anassa’s shield, it was more than thirty thousand, maybe more than forty.

  Kassandora sighed and ighat slight tinge of dread. Shield two was already prepared and ready. Her orchestra alyed in her head, simple violins pulling quiet notes and a piano that idly pyed a tune of boredom. No bombastic trumpets, no grand ans, no drums, sieges only had those in books. Iy, a siege was merely a test of patience.

  And so, Essa caught Kassandora’s eye as she flew over the edge of the bubble and to i another of her ritual circles. The woman was smart, Kassandora had to give her that. The first day had bee simply preparing the terrain aroural Requisitions. For ten hours, a firestorm had raged around them, dev tree and bush and grass and leaving only ash. It had been guided by pyromancers, although the heat did not pee Anassa’s barriers, nor did the winds that swirled around them.

  Eventually, the firestorm had left nothing but grey ash around them. And then Essa’s mages started to terraform the ground. Veins of metals were pulled up from the ground, hard stones ed the dirt, and then fttened over it. A simple thing, but Iniri would not be able to cause any disruptions quickly if she had tear through a mile of underground stone first.

  Essa stopped in the very tre of the shield as Kassandora watched her. The Goddess of Magic was obviously not enjoying herself, her locks were unbrushed, with hairs stig out in all dires and her blue battledress was now almost bapalm’s smoke was to thank for that. She raised her white staff, spun it, and a tornado appeared again. This ritual happened six times a day now, whehe clouds started to return.

  The tornado, with nothing to feed it, was a mere swirl of grey dust. It lunged up into the sky like a striking snake ahe white clouds away, blowing the miles back with each slow wave it did. Eventually, Essa’s staff ceased to glow and the tornado ripped itself apart. The winds settled down and Arda’s Sun once again shone over the wooden fortress of tral Requisitions. That was a good way to destroy the cloud cover of the KAL, but Kassandora wondered what it was like from the outside. Anassa’s shield only allowed light to enter so the tornado had been silent, but from outside… She doubted any of the mages got more than a few hours sleep at a time.

  That was good. An army exhausted was worse than an army starving. Men could calm the pangs of starvation for a while, the drunkenness of tiredness was much harder to wash away.

  The twisting of bark and wood pulled Kassandora out of her thoughts. The inside of the base was usually silent, although there was little to produoise here. Everyone held a gun, artillery was already in position, engines cyg idly as they kept the barrels pointed upwards and ready to fire. Every now and then, there would be a song or a t, a man would cough, someone would drop something from the ptforms high up irees, but that was it.

  Kassandora looked down from her ptform. Iniri had grown this one on special request, the tallest branch of the tallest tree had expanded into a disk. A few other ptforms were pulled out from the tree in order facilitate Kassandetting up to her perch. She did have to jump from oo the other, but it wasn’t too difficult. Divines who were scared of heights had died out long ago. There were more trees f a tight circle, a thick green opy of bushy leaves and interwoven branches protected three of Anassa’s gemstones and blocked them from view.

  Holy, Kassandora could have gotten away with only bringing two, another could have beeo Zalewski’s front and the newly formed armoured brigades, but it was too te now. And there was no such thing as having too many backups anyway.

  Iniri was down on the red dirt, she waved up at Kassandora and Kassandora replied with a nod. Kavaa was standing on a branch that culminated in a circur disk, she stood in her full silver armour and her bde hung from a sheathe on a belt. Silver hair poured out from underh of the woman’s helmet. “You called.” Kavaa said and Kassandora nodded.

  “I did.” She said as Kavaa jumped from her branch to Kassandora’s ptform. The branch then curled bad retreated to the ground. Kassandora peered over the edge at Iniri, the woman was already returning back to the safety of ohe great oaks. Guards were about, everyone reparing. “Did y the radio?”

  Kavaa unclipped a radio from the back of her belt and ha to Kassandora. “What is it about? We ’t get signals out.”

  “Do you see the runes?” Kassandora asked. Joyeuse appeared in her hand and she poi at the smooth rock that made up the ground around CR. “Or not?”

  “I see them.” Kavaa replied. “Will they break through? They couldn’t in the past.”

  “In the past, we didn’t have armies purely of mages.” Kassandora said. She called upon her blessing and the men withiral Requisitions. They started to rise and stand up. Loaders prepared ammunition, drinks were put away, cigarettes snuffed out. Men hovered their fingers over triggers. “But this is enough to break through one of Anassa’s barriers.”

  “We have a backup though.” Kavaa said and Kassandora nodded.

  “It will most likely be today, or tomorrow, I want you to stay with me here.” Kavaa shrugged and looked around.

  “We’re exposed.”

  “That’s the point.” Kassandora said. “I don’t want Essa to cut through Iniri’s trees with mana, if she sees us, sees me, she’ll focus an attae.”

  “Oh.” Kavaa replied ftly.

  “And you’re here because I know I ’t withstand more than one, maybe two, bsts from her.” Kassandora said ftly.

  “Essa is not Alkom, if she ies you, I ’t heal that.”

  “I’ve blocked Essa attack’s before.” Kassandora replied, Kavaa only sighed as her armoured palm rahe hilt of her sword.

  “If you say so…” She said. “So? How long?”

  “I don’t know, but soon.”

  Soon was a day from now. Kassandora and Kavaa stood on their wooden podium. Kassandora silently cycled her troops with her blessing. Men would leave their positions without saying anything, and be repced by other troops pulled from the barracks at the base of the trees. They’d walk down stairs and climb dowhen go to tinas to refuel their stomachs. Meals were entirely supplied through Iniri, she a small orchard of trees and an even smaller field of vegetables were set up he edges of the barrier, where the Goddess of Nature would work tirelessly to speed up the growth of the various pnts. Large apples were picked by soldiers, or the trees would simply lower their branches and give them a shake to drop them into wheelbarrows which would be pushed straight into the kits.

  Then men would be sent to their beds. Others would wake up, their own minds addi more tiny violins to repce the ohat drifted off into sleep. It was a tiny choir. A tiny choir that became a grand orchestra when Kassandora saw the first signs of movement from the outside. Essa finished with aornado to once again push away crowds and reveal the sky. It was turning a brilliant purple, in the west, warm es and vivid reds were still in the far reaches of the west, and stars were starting to e out.

  Essa’s mages started to t, each magi joining hands with another, f small groups that surrounded each circur rune. Kassandora bothered to learn them a long time ago, this was a simple mining array. Nothing out of the ordinary, no terrible breakthrough magic that had been discovered sier the Great War. Nothing like that. What had Essa been doing for the past millennia? Had she actually just been teag her mages? Shouldn’t they have been stronger? Or was it actually just all a millennia of White Pantheon politics?

  Kassandora smiled to herself as she took a deep breath. This would be even easier thahought. The various ritual circles started to glow a bright blue. Kassandora stared at it i was really a simple mining array, a spell to quickly dig a hole. That was it, naturally it owerful. It could reach even the dwarven tuhat peed deep to the tre of Arda. But there was a reason it was never used in bat. The spell stole too much power, and o was started, it couldn’t be aimed or moved, only stopped. But then, forty thousand mages elimihe first problem and being in a siege elimihe sed.

  Kassandora looked up as beams of pure mana exploded upwards, then arced into the night sky and iwiogether, spiralling into the sky and culminating into a ball. It shot downwards, pure blue light that burned and ied and simply disappeared anything it touched. It should have at least. The beam reached Anassa’s shield. Blue magic spiralled out of trol and darkened with fshes of lightning ing out of it. Essa immediately flew close and cast her own beam into the mining spell.

  The lightning stopped, the mining spell started to glht again, the mages iual circles stopping panig. And Essa’s shield started to fill up. Slowly and slowly and slowly, a patch of pure crimson that expanded from the point where outside magic touched it. It filled and filled and filled over the course of aire day.

  Holy, Kassandora had only brought Kavaa up here because she thought there would be more powerful magivolved, things she hadn’t seen before. She waited until Essa’s drill started to create cracks in the clear red sphere of Anassa’s purest sorceries. She grabbed the radio as the cracks like currents of electricity running through a nervous system.

  Anassa’s shield cracked. The drill cut through immediately, making a small hole through a tree and further down into the surface of Arda. Kassandora saw Essa’s mages put up barriers as Anassa’s bubble simply shattered out of existence. Essa spun in the air, panting and sweating, but still obviously with enough energy to start a fight. Kassandora did not care, she thought of letting her men shoot, but then realised the sound would obscure her voice as she reached for the radio. For a moment, the only sound was the humming of Essa’s spell and Kavaa uhing her bde. Then a click. Kassandora flicked the switch of her radio.

  “Goddess Kassandora speaking.” Kassandora said. She waited for a reply. There were small radios set up all the base. With the loss of Anassa’s shield, Kassandora’s signal sniff out it prey. A reply came through almost immediately.

  “This is Headquarters, speaking. Over.” Kassandora anded men through her blessing. A group of ten broke apart limiters attached to the first back up gemstohat powered Anassa’s shield.

  “Initiate Operatioip.” Kassandora said. It was over. Kassandora smiled at Essa as the woman looked at the newly raised barrier in pure rage. Victory in Kirinyaa was only a matter of time now. She added yet another instru. “And give word to the Sed Spear, the heart is exposed.”