“How long are we going to rot in this place, Isengrim? Can’t we at least check out the castle?” A female voice spoke smoothly, though Isengrim wasn’t fooled.

  Turning his head towards the woman sitting on a fallen tree, he mustered his best glare.

  Aevinne’s posture radiated relaxation as she played with her black braid, her bow sitting unstrung next to her. The young elf met his glare with large eyes radiating innocence.

  “The castle,” he spoke slowly, “is clearly not abandoned, considering the tracks we saw. You know this.”

  “I don’t care about the castle,” she replied, though this time the whine was clearly audible.

  Isengrim closed his eyes, “We will wait until I grow confident that the Aen Saevherne was full of shit.”

  Why did he, out of everyone in his band, have to get stuck with Aevinne? Shouldn’t leadership come with perks? He could be watching the forest, listening to birdsong and relaxing right now. His people were hidden all around them, so there was no danger.

  “That doesn’t tell me anything. Aren’t they full of shit most of the time anyway? Can’t we just go kill one of the kings? Like the good old days?”

  The Iron Wolf frowned, the scar on his face twisting with the motion, and Aevinne shut up.

  “Do not speak to me of the good old days, Aevinne,” he responded after a few seconds.

  The two sat in awkward silence, the gurgling of a nearby creek the only sound in their vicinity.

  Eventually, he sighed. There was something annoyingly familiar about the way the young elf acted.

  “I understand that you came with us because you desire to act,” he began, “But if you wish for our success, you will need to learn patience.”

  “Patience,” she muttered, “I am patient enough. What I dislike is the reason why my patience is being tested.”

  Isengrim raised a questioning eyebrow.

  “We are here to grovel before some snot-nosed dh’oine!” Aevinne burst out.

  Isengrim smiled. It was a very ugly kind of expression, made even worse by his disfigurement.

  “You will need to unlearn a great many things you’ve learned in the Blue Mountains,” he said, before standing up.

  Aevinne looked on curiously. She was totally unprepared for the lightning-quick kick that hit her side.

  “Pride first,” Isengrim spoke, unsheathing his sword.

  “Now grovel,” he said, placing it at Aevinne’s neck.

  The elven woman’s, girl’s really, wide eyes darted around, uncomprehending.

  “Why is it you are not grovelling, Aevinne? Do you not value your life? Is your pride more important? Is it more important than our cause?” He spoke coldly.

  Just as it looked like she might start, he sheathed the sword and pulled Aevinne up with his other hand in one smooth motion.

  “You are unlucky, Aevinne. The era of pride is over. Our ancestors made sure to enjoy it, but left nothing for us,” he paused, chuckling, “Of course, the old ones don’t like admitting it. They like to pretend that nothing has changed. That this world still belongs to us. But look around us, Aevinne.”

  He made a sweeping gesture with both his arms, indicating the world around them.

  “What do you see, Aevinne?” He asked.

  “A, a forest?” She stammered out.

  Isengrim chuckled, but his eyes had little mirth in them, “I will tell you what I see. Enemy territory. This place does not belong to us. It does not welcome us. Once, the forests were ours, even after we retreated from our cities. How many elves do you think live in Erlenwald, Aevinne?”

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  Her eyes darted around, but Isengrim spoke before she could think it through, “None. There is not a single one. Not even our name for this place has survived. It is only Erlenwald now. This far west, the only forest that is not under the complete control of humans is Brokilon. This is not our world anymore, and its new masters are not keen on competition.”

  “Yet, our fate is still our own,” he continued. “You can choose whether you wish to starve in the mountains, bow your neck to the dh’oine and live in their slums while they spit on you, or try something new.”

  Aevinne stayed silent.

  “I was not terribly enthused with the idea at first either, though I’ve come around to it. If humanity is the problem, is it not poetic to turn them into the solution? We might lack the numbers to drive them back to the sea now,” he paused, his eyes getting a faraway look, “but they certainly have them, while being as united as a pack of jackals. There is an opportunity for us to exploit, if we can thread the needle. Ess'tedd, esse creasa.”

  Deep inside Nazair territory, on a hill called Blanik, a tower stood. A harried-looking young man was ascending the steep steps towards it, breathing heavily. He was dressed in the uniform of the royal couriers, a prominent blue rose on a gold background denoting his allegiance, though his once pristine uniform was marred by dust now.

  Finally reaching the summit, he lifted the heavy, dragon-head-shaped door knocker. Then he waited. After five or so minutes, he hesitated briefly before knocking again.

  Urgency and fear soon gave way to annoyance, and so the courier resumed knocking, though this time, he did not stop.

  Soon, grumbling could be heard from the other side, before the heavy oaken door swung open, revealing an old man with a long white beard, dressed in a blue robe with golden stars stitched on it.

  “Who the hell are you?” The sorcerer spoke, examining the courier.

  “Venerable Wenceslaus, our kingdom is in peril! As you have instructed the late king Cassimar, we have come to ask for your help,” The courrier delivered the prepared speech smoothly.

  “Oh?” The sorcerer asked, “You should have led with that. What does the kingdom need from me?”

  “Cintra is stirring. King Severin has received reliable information that they plan to build a fortress in Marnadal, likely to be used as a staging point for a future invasion,” The courier explained.

  The old man frowned, “So war? That’ll be extra.”

  The courier blinked, “His Majesty hopes it would not come to that. However, both he and the Highlander clans are in agreement, the construction must be stopped.”

  “Sounds like war to me, young man. You have the gold?”

  The courier frowned, “Gold?”

  “Yes? I gave that lout my rates, though I do hope you’ve adjusted for inflation. After all, it’s been a few decades. Don’t think you are fooling me with this ‘not a war’ thing, I’m not some young fool who’ll let himself get swindled out of his rightful pay.”

  The courier opened his mouth, then closed it. His expectations were thoroughly dashed, “I’m sure His Majesty will be amenable to making a deal.”

  “Hmph, it’ll do.”

  Isaiah Coehoorn sat in his office in the imperial palace, his mind drifting back to the topic which had recently occupied much of his free time. An entire kill-team, painfully smuggled far, far North, gone. Just like that.

  The issue, he mused, was the distance. He knew their target, of course, but without knowing what went wrong, it was difficult to decide on further steps and even harder to investigate.

  Did the girl kill them? Did they just get unlucky, stumbling over some monster’s lair by accident? Did the witch bring a more capable escort than anticipated? Or, was the operation botched somehow? Perhaps the hired help turned traitor?

  Braathens, the Emperor’s pet sorcerer, had been confident that the strategy they had created together would be enough to overwhelm the vast majority of mages, which meant that the first option was unlikely, considering the lack of combat experience when it came to their target. Similarly, he had enough confidence in his mage hunters to navigate the wilderness safely.

  Tapping his fingers on his desk, he looked at the map lying on it. The ambush had taken place near Maribor, which was more or less the extent of their penetration. While they would eventually bring civilisation everywhere, crossing the Yarra was a matter of the far future.

  Unfortunately, Isaiah had to devote the majority of his attention to the Empire’s new provinces. While the mages of the barbarian states tended to be on the more apathetic side of things when it came to patriotism, they couldn’t exactly leave them be. After all, there was no guarantee any such mage would not decide that they actually liked their nation better before it became a province. It was far safer to handle them preemptively, before they could organise. If a resistance was created with a strong mage core, the price of dealing with it could slow Nilfgaard’s conquest considerably.

  The rest of his attention had to be devoted to Geso, Maecht, Toussaint and Nazair, the four nations next to be civilised. Cintra’s fifth place was quite far behind the first four. Fortunately, Toussaint’s vassalisation was already a foregone conclusion, considering the ties formed during the time of Emperor Torres. The Usurper was touting it as another of his victories, though Isaiah doubted anyone but the serfs actually believed the claims that he was the former Emperor’s illegitimate son. Not that anyone would speak up, considering the fate of the actual son. Isaiah, being one of the people with the dubious honour of knowing what had happened to the grandson, was even less inclined to speak out.

  Still, some attention on Cintra was not none.

  Though Isaiah had to admit that he had already gone beyond that. The utter failure of what should have been a very simple operation galled him.

  “Damn witches,” he muttered.

  If nothing else, at least their new Emperor’s policies on the foul creatures stayed the same.

  Wenceslaus, Cassimar and Aevinne are all invented by me.

  Yarra = how nilfgardians call the Yaruga, the river that works as the Cintran-Temerian border.