A Dance With Dogs And Monsters

Two hours later, the army had finally arrived at the location. Three hundred meters of nearly flat, snow-covered land stood between them and their prize: the God's Bed, where the World Mother slumbered.

As the legends described, the place itself was like a stone palace, just beyond the wall. The wall, a shimmering barrier of ancient blue magic, stood a distance before them, tall enough to touch the sky and wide enough to encircle the kingdom, with no man ever truly seeing its end. From this one point, however, it was already showing signs of cracking near its base. The shield was failing, and soon the monsters would come pouring through.

"Alright, archers, load up and assume your positions," Jordan shouted as he traveled between the ranks of his men, moving towards the front of the crowd. "Remember, I only need one hundred swords to pierce the heart of the enemy and move through to the God's Bed. The rest of you will alternate between offensive and defensive maneuvers."

"Sir, yes sir!"

The archers took their positions at the back, lining up to form a wall, two columns of one hundred each, readying their bows as the carriage carrying the High Priestess rolled forward, still being escorted by the imperial guards.

Jordan signaled for them to move ahead into the battlefield, about forty meters before stopping.

"That's enough!" he yelled, cupping his hands to the sides of his face, hoping his voice carried over the field. "Infantry, fall in!"

A flood of one hundred of his best men suddenly rushed forward, surrounding the carriage on all sides. Spears raised and pointed outward in front of them, they created a makeshift shell of spikes around the High Priestess's wagon.

"Mages!"

At the commander's order, the imperial guards around the carriage suddenly activated their magic, forming a shimmering shield to cover the group. The Turtle Spear. That's what the Lord Commander called it. The formation was designed to pierce through the battlefield, past the barrier, and into the God's Bed itself. For months, the men had practiced it tirelessly, and now it was finally time for their training to bear fruit.

This was his plan: a simultaneous offensive and defensive tactical maneuver. Their goal was to deliver High Priestess Elena to the palace beyond the wall. They couldn't achieve that by standing still and trying to fight off all of the enemy like in previous cycles. They needed to press ahead while the battle raged on.

As everybody settled into their posts, the Lord Commander trudged forward to the frontmost part of the formation. His direwolves marched alongside him, the muzzles of the giant dogs smoking in the bitter winter air.

Bobo was to his left, and Hoppleite to his right. The rest of the youngins were a little scatterbrained as they ran ahead of the group, but at least they were instinctively moving in the right direction.

They would serve as the sharpest point of the spearhead, cutting a path through the enemy's heart. After all, the wolves were the most powerful creatures on the battlefield, unmatched in raw strength, speed, and ferocity. They were the reason why, despite the heavy losses in previous cycles, the survivors who returned were still in the thousands.

Sixty meters into the battlefield, Commander Jordan and his wolves finally stopped. The remainder of his 300 infantry platoon rushed up behind them, their swords raised.

"Alright," he muttered, gazing ahead at the further weakening barrier. "Let's see what form the enemy takes this time."

For a long second, nobody made a sound. Everybody stood frozen in silence, waiting for that exact instant when all hell broke loose. At some point, a repeated boom, boom, boom could be heard coming from the other side as the ground beneath their feet rumbled in response. Sensing the hero's barrier weakening, the monsters on the other end were no doubt further applying pressure to speed up the process.

The wolves began growling in unison. Jordan took that as a signal and pulled his sword from its scabbard.

"Ready!" he shouted to his men behind him.

Boom.

Another impact shook the ground.

Boom.

Snow poured down the surrounding mountains, disturbed by the vibration.

Boom.

This third one weakened the wall just enough that for a moment it turned transparent, small, gray shapes visible on the other side.

Boom.

For a brief second, there was silence. No more impacts came from the other side, and one could almost think the enemy had given up and turned back. The wind blew across the battlefield. Jordan breathed, tightening his grip on his weapon.

A few more seconds went by, and not even an inch of movement could be heard from the other side.

Then, in the very next moment...

Boom.

The wall instantly burst open, pushing out a thick fog as monsters, creatures straight from children's nightmares, came swarming out in droves. They were gray, tall, and spindly, possessing a woman's head on top of a body with four arms and four legs. Their movements were unnatural as they ran forward, limbs bending at odd angles, legs splayed open, each step jerky and wrong.

And their screaming...

Oh God, their screaming.

"For the Mother!" Commander Jordan yelled as he broke into a sprint, charging the incoming horde. His men echoed the cry behind him, pressing forward with the Turtle Shell while archers loosed a volley of arrows that soon began raining down upon the enemy.

The wolves surged ahead, crashing into the monsters, tearing into flesh with claws and ripping throats out with their jaws. Others leaped upon the creatures' heads, bringing them down before they could strike.

From beside Jordan, Bobo bounded forward with the force of a battering ram, pushing ahead quicker, faster, his heavy footfalls pounding the snow as his massive frame plowed through the horde with intensity. Whatever direction his muzzle turned, bones and sinew were crushed under the mighty weight of his teeth.

Despite the monsters standing nearly two meters tall, cutting them down was no difficult task for Jordan and his three hundred men. They moved as one, blades flashing in wide arcs, taking off heads, limbs, and legs before the creatures could get close enough to inflict damage. Jordan, in particular, didn't have to worry about sneak attacks since Hoppleite always remained nearby.

She moved with him in tandem, snapping at any creature that dared draw near. When one lunged from the side, she leapt and met it mid-air, her jaws locking around its throat and knocking it back before it could reach him.

Of course, as soon as they began fighting, men began dying. The supporting infantry were the first to take heavy casualties. Some creatures simply picked up the knights with their overwhelming strength and tore them apart. Others were disemboweled as the creatures plunged their hands deep into their stomachs. Some were slammed aside like ragdolls, bones breaking, blood spilling, staining the snow with a familiar crimson. Despite this, his men pressed on, holding strong.

The monsters that managed to slip past the front lines, however, were quickly swallowed up by the barrage of arrows raining down from the archers behind.

The formation was working, Jordan noted as he briefly glanced over his shoulder. They were pushing forward, slowly but steadily, inching closer to their objective. At least for now.

The center of the vanguard moved as one, the carriage carrying the High Priestess, her shields still active, the spears still pointing outward from the protective bubble that surrounded them.

The archers continued to rain down arrows. The wolves continued to push deeper towards God's Bed. Some of the monsters had started to leap upon the shield, pounding it with intensity, trying to get at the men inside. However, Jordan's one hundred chosen held firm, plunging their spears into the stomachs of the creatures as they dared come close.

Ninety meters.

One hundred and twenty meters.

One hundred and fifty meters.

The monsters continued to relentlessly pour out of the breach in droves. The wolves, Jordan, and his infantry kept pressing forward, the Turtle formation following close behind. Archers made sure the sky remained thick with a barrage of endless arrows, and now at two hundred and fifty meters, that was when the first casualty from the dogs was suffered.

There was a sudden yelp of pain as one of the direwolves had been killed.

Something twisted in the commander's chest. From beside him, Hoppleite howled in sorrow before instantly launching ahead in a sprint of pure rage.

Jordan was stunned, but there was no time to mourn the pup. Hoppleite would find her way back to him in time.

At exactly two hundred and ninety meters, the God's Bed was all but visible through the crack in the barrier behind the breach. A Stone Temple, just as the legends had described.

The Turtle formation was now being pounded by the enemy from all sides. The spindly creatures swarmed from every direction as the front lines grew thick with the abominations, but Jordan and his men couldn't stop now. Not when they were already so close.

"Press forward! Don't stop!" he shouted at the men behind him.

He paused for a moment to wipe the blood from his brow that had momentarily obstructed his vision. His sword slipped from his hand and fell into the snow. As he bent down to retrieve it, he was struck from the side by one of the spindly monsters. Jordan flew back and crashed down, spitting blood from the impact on his ribs. The monster rushed forward, ready to finish him, but an arrow streaked through its forehead and it dropped dead.

It was only a single arrow this time, not the usual barrage that came in intervals. Jordan's heart dropped when he realized what that meant.

Still lying on the ground, he quickly spun around and found that the archers providing cover were under attack. Most of the creatures were no longer coming directly at him or the Turtle formation. They were running around, avoiding the main force, trying to envelop the entire battlefield from the sides. They were aiming to take out the archers before going after anyone else.

That had always been the plan from the start, eventually using the two hundred archers as a stationary distraction while the main force pushed through to the God's Bed. But seeing it happen in real time, human beings being slaughtered and pulled apart under his command, becoming nothing but glorified sitting ducks, was different. He had basically ordered them to their deaths, and in their loyalty, they had agreed.

"May we meet again in the warm embrace of the World Mother," Jordan whispered in a small prayer as he quickly got back up to his feet.

Another yelp from the horde told him all he needed to know. A second pup had died.

"Bobo!" he called out in anger, gripping the handle of his sword tighter as the wagon continued to approach. Now three hundred meters.

The giant black wolf pounded over, his heavy breath steaming in the frigid air. His jaws were slick, dripping with blood, not his, and his eyes burned with an intense fury. For a brief moment, Jordan almost flinched. The beast looked like something from a nightmare, even to him. But he held his ground.

"We need to clear a direct path through to the God's Bed!" he told the wolf, reaching over with his arm and swinging himself onto its back.

It's about time we brought this madness to an end.