Volume 2: The Iron-Blood Baron Chapter 155: The Battle of Norlandenburg (Twenty-Nine)

By the God of Fire, you certainly gave me a fright, lad! I genuinely thought you had the nerve to defy the Lord's orders and drink on duty during a battle." Gamling raised his hand and playfully punched Barrett in the shoulder.

After taking the blow, Barrett chuckled and said, "Even if I cared nothing for myself, I still have a duty to this castle and the lives of hundreds of brothers. I am not a reckless man."

Looking out at the distant setting sun, Gamling smiled and said, "In any case, today's ordeal is behind us. Once night falls, I will send someone to deliver a message to the Lord, reporting on today's battle and asking for his instructions regarding the upcoming defense. What do you think?"

"Indeed!" Barrett nodded. "Agreed, let's do as you say! Oh, right, fetch two of the gatehouse guards for me. I need to ask them why they failed to notice the pirates placing flammable oil."

Here Barrett paused for a moment before continuing, "The Lord has that spyglass thing of his, so he undoubtedly watched our battle from beginning to end. He will certainly question why we failed to spot those oil barrels.

Rather than waiting for him to ask and putting the two of us on the spot, we would do better to investigate the matter ourselves and lay out the whole story for him. It will save us double the trouble later."

"Splendid! Your foresight is as sharp as ever. I'll go right now. There should still be five or six surviving guards at the gatehouse. I will summon them here, and the two of us can thoroughly question these lads to find out what on earth happened," Gamling replied.

Barrett stood up as well and instructed Gamling, "Don't be too harsh on them, though. Careless as they may have been, they are battle-survivors who fought bravely against the pirates. We should still treat them with a bit of kindness."

Hearing this advice, Gamling was torn between laughter and tears. Normally, it was the rough-and-tumble Barrett who disregarded the soldiers' feelings while Gamling was the one urging restraint. Today, the roles were completely reversed, which was truly bizarre.

"Rest easy, Commander Barrett. I know how to measure my words; you needn't worry about my approach. Hurry up and finish your drink so we can talk to them shortly," Gamling said with a smile.

Not long after, the militiamen who had been guarding the gatehouse during the battle arrived. Once Barrett and Balin had questioned them and learned the full details, they told the men to go and get some proper rest. After all, they would be counting heavily on these soldiers to hold the line in the upcoming major battle.

***

After the sun dipped below the horizon, two soldiers dressed in black night-gear descended from the battlements of Nordenburg. Once they reached the end of their ropes and shook them as a signal that they had touched the ground, the men on the ramparts hauled the ropes back up.

After scanning their surroundings and confirming it was safe, the two figures slipped away down the mountain. Leaving Stormwind Peak behind, they sprinted rapidly toward Green Hill Village, where Berillion was stationed.

Back in Green Hill Village, Berillion, feeling somewhat exhausted after witnessing another full day of warfare, had eaten a light supper and closed his eyes to rest on a lounge chair in his bedchamber.

This lounge chair had been crafted for himself by a carpenter who had settled in Green Hill Village, finished during his days off. The poor man had not even had a chance to enjoy it before the pirates arrived. After fleeing into Green Hill Village and learning that the Lord was also staying there, the carpenter immediately offered the chair as a gift to Berillion.

Though Berillion had no wish to accept gifts from commoners, he chose to accept it to appease the villagers' feelings, rewarding the carpenter with ten denarii as a roundabout way of purchasing the piece.

At the moment, only Bran was keeping watch by Berillion's side. Hearing Berillion begin to snore softly, Bran draped a woolen blanket over him, then sat quietly reading a book about figures from the Imperial era that Berillion had purchased in the city of Yanykeshu.

How much time had passed, Berillion could not tell, but his body suddenly jerked, snapping him awake. He sat up abruptly. Thinking Berillion had suffered a nightmare, Bran quickly brought over a damp towel for him to wipe his face, followed by a cup of honeyed water.

After wiping his face and drinking the warm, sweet water, Berillion felt considerably more at ease. He lay back down on the lounge chair, though he did not return to sleep; he was no longer tired. Although his sleep had been poor these past two days as he constantly turned matters over in his mind, the lingering absence of a report from the Nordenburg garrison left a weight on his chest that made deep sleep impossible.

Before long, the bedroom door creaked open. Someone tiptoed inside, leaned close to Bran's ear, and whispered, "Is the Lord awake?"

Just as Bran was about to stand and check whether Berillion had fallen back asleep, he heard Berillion's voice cut through the quiet: "I am awake. No need to look. Hake, is something the matter? Has the courier from Barrett arrived?"

Hake nodded and replied, "My lord, yes. You guessed right on target—the courier from the Nordenburg garrison has arrived."

***

Upon receiving confirmation, Berillion rose swiftly and threw on a heavy autumn nobleman's tunic. The thick garment warded off the biting chill of the late autumn night.

Descending to the ground floor, Berillion found the two couriers dropping to one single knee in salute, handing over a letter jointly signed by Barrett and Gamling.

Pleased to receive the dispatch, Berillion immediately instructed a guardsman to fetch some food from the kitchen. Judging by the loud rumbling of their stomachs, the two men had run all the way here without finishing a proper evening meal.

Food from the kitchen was brought out promptly, and the two couriers began to devour it ravenously, attacking the chicken legs and sausages on the table with a vigor that might have made an observer think the militia guarding Nordenburg was facing starvation.

In truth, Nordenburg held over one hundred thousand pounds of grain; the small handful of men under Barrett and Gamling could easily eat their fill for three to five years. Naturally, that assumed the number of men under their command did not increase.

While the two men ate with gusto, Berillion finished reading the letter. Although he had watched today's siege unfold from the roof of the communal house in Green Hill Village using his primitive spyglass, many details had eluded him.

Thanks to Berillion's literacy and writing programs, Barrett was now capable of writing, not to mention having Gamling as an articulate and well-educated assistant. They had used precise language to provide a detailed account of the day's combat, carefully listing the tactical gains and losses of the defense. It was a thoroughly conscientious report.

Through the letter, Berillion finally learned how the enemy had managed to set fire to the gates of Nordenburg. Because of the exceptionally high number of attacking pirates—and the fact that both sides were trading ranged fire while the combatants kept mostly hidden behind shields—no one had paid attention to the distant movement. As a result, the pirates had successfully slipped the oil barrels right up to the gates without the garrison ever noticing.