Recaps

Heshima tried to preserve the Iron Bone Tribe’s morale after its blocking force was defeated, but scouts reported that the southerners had occupied the Shattered Ice River’s main crossing points. With retreat blocked and pursuers behind them, Heshima and Keledu agreed to attack the enemy camps and force a road home.

• Heshima spread the claim that the enemy’s mysterious weapons could not fire in the rain to keep the Iron Bone Tribe from panicking over the defeated blocking force.
• The Barbarians continued north toward the Shattered Ice River, hoping to cross and escape their pursuers.
• Messengers reported to Heshima and Keledu that the southerners had established camps along the river’s north bank and controlled the main crossing points.
• Heshima told Keledu they had to either turn back to fight or break through the blockade, and Keledu pledged the Faith Order’s full support.
• Heshima and Keledu decided to march to the riverbank, rest overnight, and attack the enemy camps early the next morning.

The Iron Bone Tribe reached the Shattered Ice River and mistook the army across it for a weaker southern force they could defeat to return home. The Northern Alliance nobles debated the Barbarians’ unexpectedly calm behavior, but Count Albert stopped Viscount Jeno and Viscount Tese from fighting.

• The Iron Bone Tribe reached the southern bank of the Shattered Ice River, where messengers relayed Heshima’s orders and explained that the army across the river was a southern force, not their pursuers.
• The Great Chieftain ordered the tribe to rest and cross the river to attack the city the next morning, preserving their morale.
• The Northern Alliance Army watched as the Barbarians calmly set up camp, puzzling the border nobles who expected them to attack.
• Viscount Jeno proposed an immediate assault, but Viscount Tese argued that abandoning the Alliance’s defenses would be foolish.
• Viscount Jeno and Viscount Tese drew their swords until Count Albert invoked the Duke’s ban on private duels and ordered them to stand down.

Count Albert stopped Viscount Tesai and Viscount Jeno from fighting and accepted Count Benjamin’s plan to keep their troops in reserve. The Northern Alliance Army prepared to hold its fortified camps and watch for a Barbarian attack while waiting for Duke Alex’s main army.

• Count Albert threatened to send Tesai and Jeno and their private armies home unless they stopped their feud, and they apologized.
• Count Benjamin proposed placing their troops in the general reserve, and Albert agreed to keep them out of the front line unless reinforcements were needed.
• Count Benjamin advised the nobles to hold their fortified camps and wait for Duke Alex rather than attack the dispersed Barbarians.
• Count Albert ordered every house to post enough guards overnight, while Count Benjamin promised to keep the reserve ready to respond.

Heshima and Keledu inspected the Northern Alliance Army’s river camps and found that the crossings were thoroughly fortified, leaving the Barbarians with no easy route through. They returned to a guarded camp for the night, while the Northern Alliance prepared to trap the Barbarian army between its forces and the arriving Expeditionary Army.

• Heshima and Keledu rode out with their guards to inspect the battlefield for an unblocked crossing.
• Heshima and Keledu found the Northern Alliance camps linked along the river, with muddy palisades that made a fire attack impractical.
• Heshima and Keledu concluded that the Northern Alliance had prepared in advance to block the Barbarians’ retreat.
• Count Albert’s month-long effort had built the camps, which would let Alex and Victor attack the Barbarian army from the front and rear once the Expeditionary Army arrived.
• The Barbarians finished their temporary camp, adding a palisade, a ditch, patrols, and sentries to guard against a night raid.
• Heshima and Keledu returned to their camps, and the Barbarian encampment fell quiet under the watch of patrolling cavalry.

The Northern Alliance Army prepared for an attack as Heshima and Keledu launched a six-pronged crossing of the Shattered Ice River with elite Barbarian troops. Under heavy arrow fire, the crossing suffered casualties, but Heshima rescued a young soldier and saw no sign that the enemy possessed the Two Rivers Army’s mysterious weapons.

• The Northern Alliance Army noticed smoke and movement in the Barbarian camp, sounded the alarm, and took up its battle positions.
• Heshima and Keledu organized six contingents of elite warriors to cross the river on sheepskin and wooden rafts, with the two leaders accompanying the main attacks.
• The Barbarian contingents began crossing the icy Shattered Ice River, where drifting ice capsized rafts and swept some soldiers away.
• When the rafts reached midriver, the Northern Alliance Army fired volleys of arrows and crossbow bolts, inflicting heavy losses on the crossing forces.
• Heshima pulled a young Barbarian soldier from the freezing water and ordered him to paddle, then noted that the enemy had used only arrows and showed no sign of possessing the Two Rivers Army’s mysterious weapons.

Heshima led the Iron Bone Tribe’s first wave across the river and into an assault on the Northern Alliance Army’s camp. After many Barbarians fell to the defenders’ spears, others used throwing axes and climbed over the wall, beginning the fight inside.

• Heshima jumped into the shallow river and led the Iron Bone Tribe warriors toward the camp.
• The first wave of Barbarians crossed under arrow fire, using shields and return shots to reach the palisade.
• Northern Alliance Army defenders thrust spears through the wall’s gaps and killed many of the leading Barbarians.
• The Barbarians hurled small axes through the gaps, striking down the defending Pikemen.
• Barbarian warriors boosted one another over the wall, where they drew their scimitars and attacked the defenders.

Heshima’s Iron Bone Tribe broke into the camp, but a Northern Alliance cavalry counterattack nearly drove them out before a second Barbarian wave turned the battle around. Earl Benjamin’s reserve force arrived as Viscount Papari’s defenders collapsed, and Viscount Rayne confronted Papari outside the camp.

• Heshima directed his troops as they breached the palisade and poured into the camp.
• A messenger warned Heshima that Northern Alliance cavalry had counterattacked and killed the Legion Commander, but Heshima ordered the defenders to hold.
• A second wave of Iron Bone Tribe troops charged in with cavalry and long weapons, split the Northlands cavalry, and helped defeat it.
• Viscount Papari fled with his remaining cavalry as the defenders lost their will to fight.
• Earl Benjamin’s reserve force charged past Papari into the camp, and Viscount Rayne approached and addressed him.

Raine led Count Benjamin’s Golden Pear Horsemen to rescue Viscount Papari’s camp after the Barbarians had overrun it. He drove the enemy deeper into the camp but held back from pursuing them into its cramped interior, where the cavalry would lose its advantage.

• Raine rebuked Viscount Papari for failing to call for reinforcements and warned that losing the camp could endanger the entire river defense line.
• Viscount Papari pleaded with Raine to save him, and Raine agreed because the camp’s capture could give the Barbarians a route across the river.
• Raine charged into the camp with more than a thousand Golden Pear Horsemen, crushing the victorious Barbarian force.
• Raine killed the Barbarian Legion Commander in their first exchange, and the horsemen drove the remaining Barbarians deeper into the camp.
• Raine stopped the cavalry from pursuing the Barbarians into the camp’s complex interior, wary of losing their mobility and suffering heavy casualties.

Viscount Raine used Viscount Papali’s troops to retake much of the camp, but the Barbarians withdrew behind the walls and burned buildings to stop the pursuit. After Count Benjamin ordered Papali to obey Raine, Raine prepared an assault on the Barbarian-held wall positions, leaving the defenders advancing behind a wall of great shields.

• Viscount Raine forced Viscount Papali to regroup his troops and clear Barbarian ambushes inside the camp.
• Heshima ordered the Barbarians to burn buildings and retreat beyond the walls as their casualties mounted.
• Viscount Papali extinguished the fires but refused Raine’s order to attack the Barbarians outside the camp.
• Heshima reorganized his remaining troops, secured the breaches, and used archers to harass the defenders.
• Count Benjamin ordered Viscount Papali to obey Raine, who took command and prepared the camp for a cavalry charge.
• The defenders advanced toward the walls behind iron-plated great shields that withstood the Barbarian arrows.

Viscount Rayne prepared to use his Golden Pear Cavalry to drive Heshima’s Barbarians back toward the river. When reinforcements appeared crossing the Shattered Ice River, Rayne launched his charge before they could land and organize.

• Viscount Rayne used Viscount Papari’s shield troops and skilled archers to suppress the Barbarian archers as the shield wall advanced.
• Viscount Rayne planned to send his Golden Pear Cavalry through gaps in the camp wall against Heshima’s lightly armed troops.
• Heshima considered withdrawing because his small group of pikemen could not stop the cavalry.
• A guard spotted the third wave of Barbarian reinforcements crossing the Shattered Ice River on rafts, and Heshima’s soldiers cheered.
• Viscount Rayne heard the cheers and led the Golden Pear Cavalry through the shield wall toward the camp’s outer wall before the reinforcements could land.

Viscount Rayne led the Golden Pear Cavalry in a desperate attack on Heshima’s Barbarians before their reinforcements could land. Viscount Papari joined the fight, and as the Barbarian formation began to collapse, Heshima’s guards decided to force him to retreat across the river.

• Heshima arranged his troops behind crude wooden barricades, placing pikemen in front and archers behind them to hold off the cavalry until reinforcements landed.
• Viscount Rayne led the Golden Pear Cavalry over the barricades, and the charge smashed through the obstacles but stalled against the Barbarian pikemen.
• Viscount Rayne ordered his cavalry to dismount and attack on foot, while Barbarian archers shot down many of the advancing riders.
• Viscount Papari led his private army into the battle after seeing the reinforcements landing and realizing the danger of letting the Barbarian force grow.
• Rayne and Papari’s troops pressed the Barbarians from both sides, compressing their formation until Heshima’s guards decided to force him to retreat across the river.

Barbarian reinforcements crossed the river and stabilized Heshima’s battle against Viscount Raine and Viscount Papali, but Northern Alliance Army reinforcements soon arrived. Heshima rejected retreat and decided to keep fighting for the camp.

• Barbarian squads charged from the river and attacked the enemy flanks, stabilizing Heshima’s forces.
• Viscount Raine and Viscount Papali found the riverbank terrain prevented them from using their numerical advantage, and both sides remained locked in a bloody stalemate.
• Two Legion Commanders told Heshima that the other four river-crossing forces had been driven back, allowing their boats and rafts to reinforce his and Keledu’s forces.
• Northern Alliance Army reinforcements arrived, leaving Heshima to weigh attacking the camp against withdrawing to support Keledu.
• Heshima rejected retreat and decided to hold on until he captured the camp.

Heshima kept fighting to secure a foothold across the river, while the Northern Alliance Army struggled against the growing Barbarian force. Viscount Rayne’s Golden Pear Cavalry suffered heavy losses, but Viscount Pim arrived with the elite Iron Mask Army, whose armored infantry struck back against the Barbarians.

• Heshima continued feeding troops into the battle to draw Northern Alliance Army forces away from Keledu and preserve Barbarian morale.
• The Barbarians pushed the Northern Alliance Army back and nearly took the camp, forcing Viscount Rayne to lead a rearguard retreat.
• Viscount Rayne escaped death when his metal prosthesis blocked a Barbarian warrior’s killing blow, though his cavalry suffered more than four hundred casualties.
• Viscount Pim arrived with the Golden Pear Iron Mask Army and gave Viscount Rayne a suit of heavy lamellar armor.
• Viscount Pim’s heavy and light infantry formed a wedge and charged into the Barbarian troops, smashing their front ranks.

The Iron Mask Army and accompanying noble private armies reversed the Barbarian advance and reclaimed much of the camp. Heshima learned that Keledu had captured a camp and secured the river-crossing area, so he ordered his forces to hold their positions and protect the crossing.

• The Iron Mask Army charged into the camp and routed the Barbarian vanguard, while noble private armies encircled the scattered troops.
• The Iron Bone Tribe Legion Commanders tried to block the Iron Mask Army, but its Heavy Infantry shattered their formations.
• Heshima received word that his vanguard was near collapse and reorganized his forces, though the Northern Alliance Army had retaken much of the camp.
• Heshima learned that Keledu had captured a camp, repelled encirclement attempts, and secured the river-crossing area for the Faith Order's followers.
• Heshima ordered every unit to fortify its positions and hold the enemy back from interfering with the river crossing.

The Iron Bone Tribe held its captured camp against the Northern Alliance Army while another Barbarian force secured Keledu's river crossing. With enemy troops redeploying and the front stabilizing, Heshima returned to the Main Camp to seek another place to cross the river.

• The Iron Bone Tribe withdrew into the camp's defenses, using Pikemen and archers to halt the Northern Alliance Army's attack.
• A messenger told Viscount Pim and Raine that the Barbarians had taken another camp and that Count Benjamin ordered them to remain while other nobles' private armies withdrew.
• Keledu's forces seized their camp after a Bed Crossbow killed its defending noble, then repelled Count Albert's attempts to retake it.
• Pim and Raine counterattacked with the Golden Pear Cavalry and Iron Mask Army, forcing Heshima's troops to stop pressing their assault as the private armies began leaving.
• Heshima found the camp's granary intact and relied on its provisions while the Barbarian main force reinforced Keledu's crossing and Faith Order craftsmen began building a pontoon bridge.
• Heshima crossed back to the Main Camp to direct other Barbarian forces and look for another river crossing.

Heshima prepared to renew the river crossing with a larger force after learning how the earlier attempts had failed. The chapter ended with the defenders of his chosen target camp spotting the crossing and urgently calling for reinforcements.

• Heshima returned to the Barbarians' Main Camp and saw the tribe working together to build boats, rafts, and pontoon bridges.
• Heshima questioned the four defeated Commanders of Ten Thousand, encouraged them, and brought them along on his next expedition.
• Heshima assembled a force of 5,000 men from the four commanders' strongest squads and his personal guards, then crossed the river by boat.
• The target camp's commander spotted Heshima's force, sent for reinforcements, and ordered his troops to prepare for battle.

Heshima’s Barbarian army crossed the river and battered the camp’s wooden walls, leaving the defenders close to collapse. Count Benjamin arrived with reinforcements, and a fierce new force drove the Barbarians back from a massive breach.

• Heshima sent the first Barbarian soldiers to charge the walls, allowing the rest of his army to cross and reform under cover of the fighting.
• Barbarian Cavalry used lassos and warhorses to tear down sections of the camp wall while Barbarian archers suppressed the defenders.
• The baron welcomed Count Benjamin, who ordered him to lead the way to the threatened walls despite the baron’s concern about the size of his force.
• The Barbarians opened several breaches and then brought down a stretch of the northwest wall more than ten meters wide, further undermining the defenders’ morale.
• A force that charged from the rear reached the large breach and defeated the Barbarians trying to enter, astonishing the defending knight.

Count Benjamin arrived with five thousand elite regular troops, turning the battle against the Barbarians and allowing the defenders to retake the walls. The chapter left Benjamin’s forces driving the Barbarians from the camp.

• Elite reinforcements arrived and relieved exhausted defenders along the wall breaches.
• The knight recognized that the powerful reinforcements belonged to Count Benjamin after seeing his lord arrive with Benjamin.
• The baron asked the knight to report the battlefield situation, and Benjamin stopped him after hearing the basic details.
• Benjamin’s guards counterattacked, drove the Barbarians from the breaches, and helped the defenders reclaim the walls.
• The chapter revealed that Benjamin had brought five thousand regular troops, equipped to a high standard and rich in Civil War veterans.

Heshima’s Barbarians seized the camp’s ruined outer wall but could not break Count Benjamin’s inner defenses before Northern Alliance reinforcements arrived. Heshima withdrew across the river, leaving the Barbarians with two footholds on the northern bank.

• Heshima ordered the four Commanders of Ten Thousand to launch a desperate assault before more Northern Alliance troops arrived.
• The Barbarians used their fallen comrades to breach the defenders’ spear formation, but Count Benjamin ordered his guards to withdraw to a stronger defensive line inside the camp.
• Heshima learned that the Barbarians had taken the wall, then saw the attack stall against the new defenses as reinforcements bolstered the defenders’ morale.
• Count Benjamin’s guards and the arriving troops held the second line while the original defenders built more defenses, and the Barbarians failed to break through.
• After further Northern Alliance forces arrived and Barbarian casualties mounted, Heshima gave up the assault and withdrew his troops by boat.
• The Barbarians retained two footholds on the northern bank, while Count Benjamin judged that his mission to hold them back had been accomplished.

The Barbarians struggled to move their army across the Shattered Ice River and weighed how to secure another crossing point before the Northern Alliance Army and the approaching Expeditionary Army could trap them. Heshima planned to use an expected night raid on Keledu’s camp to create an opening for his troops.

• The Northern Alliance Army officers decided to launch a night raid against the Barbarians’ two occupied areas while waiting for the Expeditionary Army to arrive.
• The Barbarians estimated that Keledu’s camp could hold only forty thousand people, and boats had carried thirty thousand across so far.
• The Faith Order’s craftsmen expected to finish a pontoon bridge that night, which could speed the crossing but would not be enough without another secure crossing point.
• The Barbarian commanders considered having Heshima capture the camp he had attacked earlier or seize a different camp to open another crossing point.
• Heshima sent word to Keledu to watch for a night raid, hoping the enemy’s deployment would leave an opening for Heshima’s troops.

Heshima sent a vanguard downstream to seize another crossing point while Keledu’s stockade faced a major Northern Alliance attack. The vanguard crossed undetected, leaving its attempt to take the stockade still to come.

• Keledu surveyed the Northern Alliance Army’s preparations and readied the stockade’s defensive weapons as more than twenty thousand enemy troops gathered around it.
• The Northern Alliance Army attacked Keledu’s stockade around ten at night, and both sides suffered heavy losses in a fierce battle.
• Heshima heard the battle raging across the river and led troops downstream to attack a different stockade.
• Heshima chose one volunteer to command a three-hundred-man vanguard and assigned the other volunteer to lead the second wave.
• The vanguard crossed on small rafts without torches and reached the opposite bank without the stockade’s defenders noticing.

The Commander of Ten Thousand led Barbarian soldiers over the camp wall and hid them from the defenders’ patrols. Once nearly a hundred had entered, they ambushed and wiped out a patrol squad.

• The Commander of Ten Thousand chose a section of wall and ordered his soldiers to climb over before the patrol returned.
• More than thirty Barbarian soldiers crossed the wall, hid by the tents, and stopped when a patrol approached.
• After the patrol moved on, the Barbarian soldiers resumed crossing until nearly a hundred were inside the camp.
• The Commander of Ten Thousand split the troops, sending one group to attack the returning patrol and another to wait for reinforcements.
• The Barbarian soldiers ambushed the patrol squad and killed its members before they could raise an alarm.

The Barbarians seized a Northern Alliance camp after their vanguard overwhelmed its defenders and the noble commander fled. Count Benjamin led a force to retake it, but after three attacks he realized the camp would not fall that night.

• The Barbarian vanguard broke into the camp, set fires, and drove the noble commander to flee despite the defenders still outnumbering them.
• Heshima’s main force entered the camp, and Bazak was praised and promised a future leadership position for the vanguard’s success.
• The Barbarians equipped themselves from the camp’s warehouses while Heshima sent for more troops and supplies to prepare for a counterattack.
• Count Albert wanted to punish the fleeing noble, but Count Benjamin took command of the response and assembled more than ten thousand troops.
• Count Benjamin found the deserter and ordered his execution before advancing on the captured camp.
• Heshima’s troops received weapons from across the river, repelled three attacks, and kept Count Benjamin from retaking the camp that night.

Count Benjamin and Count Albert both halted their attacks after failing to retake the Barbarian camps, and the Northern Alliance Army withdrew to prepare for the fighting ahead. Heshima and Keledu recognized that the enemy commanders had cut their losses, while Barbarian morale rose after securing the river crossings.

• Count Benjamin abandoned his attack on the fortified camp and surrounded it with guards and nobles' private troops.
• Count Albert halted his assault after concluding his forces could not take the other camp, then sent a battle report to Count Benjamin.
• Count Benjamin received Albert's report, wondered how his son-in-law and nephew's Expeditionary Army had defeated the Barbarians, and withdrew his troops.
• The Northern Alliance Army stopped attacking on both fronts, and Heshima and Keledu realized the enemy had given up retaking the camps but would continue defending its line.
• The battlefront fell quiet, and the Barbarians celebrated their gains as morale rose in their Main Camp.

The Barbarians completed a pontoon bridge and moved their followers and supplies across the river while the Northern Alliance Army failed to destroy it. As Heshima and Keledu prepared a night attack, Alex and Victor’s Expeditionary Army arrived after a night march, and all three forces paused until daylight.

• The Northern Alliance Army’s flotilla failed to break the bridge, and its fireboats were intercepted by the Barbarians.
• The Barbarians completed the pontoon bridge, moved their followers, livestock, and supplies across the river, and fought the Northern Alliance Army in several engagements.
• Heshima and Keledu decided to launch a night attack to break through the Northern Alliance Army’s defenses.
• Alex and Victor’s Expeditionary Army arrived at night, startling the Barbarians and halting the planned attack.
• The Northern Alliance Army, the Barbarians, and the exhausted Expeditionary Army stopped fighting and rested until daylight.