Eirik turned north, towards the rise. Sunlight glinted off polished helms and heavy oak shields.

  Gunnar's veterans hadn't moved an inch.

  They were stationed on a low, rocky rise. The rise wasn't a mountain, but it was strategically perfect. Fifteen feet high, its slope slick with frozen scree. Behind it, the ground rose more steeply towards the true foothills of the Icefang Peaks, a natural fortress wall.

  To Gunnar's left flank, dense woods bordered a frozen stream. To his right, open ground fell away towards the wider Frostmire clearing. His fifty men formed an unbroken shield wall facing the direction Eirik had emerged from the forest, and were guarding the only viable approach—a steepened slope.

  Hold the high ground. Anchor the flank against impassable terrain. Eirik's tactical mind dissected Gunnar’s tactics. It was simple yet brutal. Gunnar had basically eliminated all of his options for him, leaving him with one—charging into Gunnar’s disciplined warriors uphill.

  And it'd be suicide. For Eirik.

  "Lord Eirik!" Olaf materialized beside him. "Reporting!"

  Eirik gave him a nod.

  Olaf was breathing hard, wiping blood from his face. "We got all of them. Horses, armor, good weapons."

  "Our numbers?"

  Olaf's grin faded. "Forty-one Talons still standing. Nine of us were too hurt to fight. Mostly Leif's lads got caught when Garrick's knights smashed the center."

  Forty-one tired men against fifty disciplined killers holding perfect defensive position. The math was brutal. Worse, Gunnar had seen everything. The traps, gas bombs, flanking maneuvers. All his tricks were exposed.

  Gunnar wouldn't be lured into the trees. He wouldn't charge. He'd just sit there and let Eirik break himself against it.

  Leif pushed off the tree, swaying. "So, Lord Eirik. We broke the peacock. Now what?"

  Ignoring Leif's venom, Eirik scanned the rise again. The slope was steep, rocky, dotted with scrub. To the west, land fell sharply into thick woods—the chokepoint Gunnar was guarding.

  To the east of Gunnar's rise, the terrain climbed even steeper, culminating in cliffs of dark, jagged rock dusted with snow. A sheer barrier.

  A memory sliced through his assessment. Basil II. The Battle of Kleidion. The Byzantine Emperor facing a formidable fortress on steep hills. Direct assault was impossible, so Basil had sent soldiers on an impossible night march—scaling treacherous cliffs, emerging behind the defenders at dawn, striking from the rear while his main force attacked below.

  Could it work? His gaze fixed on the cliffs above Gunnar's position. It wasn't a sheer cliff, but steep enough. Icy rock faces mixed with snow-choked gullies and jagged outcrops. A brutal climb.

  But he had prepared for this.

  "Olaf, Leif. With me. Now."

  He strode towards larger boulders offering cover and vantage. They crouched.

  "Look," Eirik pointed towards Gunnar's hill. "The Marshal isn't an idiot. He saw Garrick fall for every trick. He won't come down. Charging him head-on is feeding men into a grinder."

  "Then what?" Leif demanded. "Surrender?"

  "No. We crack the rock. From behind." He shifted his finger upwards, tracing the line to the dark cliffs. "There."

  Olaf squinted. "The slopes? M'lord, those are ice-glazed. No one climbs that without ropes from the top."

  "They're climbable. For me. I get up. I secure ropes. I pull up a small team. We get behind them."

  Leif stared, disbelief warring with horrified hope. "You're insane! Scaling that? Alone? In daylight? They'll see you!"

  "They won't. Not if we make sure they're looking down here. Not up there." He gestured towards the forest below Gunnar's position. "Gunnar expects an ambush in the trees. He saw us do it to Garrick twice. We let him think that's exactly what we're doing."

  Olaf rubbed his chin. "Make a big show of moving men into the woods below him. Rustling bushes, flashing steel, maybe dropping visible bait where scouts might find it. Make 'em think we're setting the same trap."

  "Exactly. Gunnar'll think he's outsmarted us. He'll hold firm, confident, eyes locked on the forest... while you spider-crawl up the mountain."

  "We need to sell the deception," Eirik continued. "It has to look real. Like our only hope is drawing him into the woods. You, Olaf, lead that show. Leif, you're key. Rally your Fenrir men for a desperate forest stand. Bleak but predictable."

  Leif swallowed hard. "He won't fall for it. He's too smart."

  "He's smart and experienced. But he's also cautious and confident. He saw a tactic work twice. He'll expect the third try." Eirik looked at Olaf. "Hold his attention down here. Skirmish safely. Taunt. Make it look like classic ambush prep."

  "I need climbers. Strong, agile, steady nerves. Who?"

  "Bjorn," Olaf said immediately. "Recruit Twenty-Two. Used to scrambling cliffs stealing eagle eggs. And Twenty-Nine. Helga—she could climb a greased pole in a snowstorm."

  "Two more?"

  "Goran. And… Thirteen! He could climb."

  Eirik looked at Leif, who still couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

  "Get them. Fast. Bring ropes. Sturdy and long lengths. We move now."

  As Olaf hurried off, Eirik turned to Leif. "Your job is vital. Make it real. Your despair, defiance, focus on the forest ambush as the only way. Gunnar needs to believe it."

  Within minutes, the camp became a flurry of noisy chaos. Olaf bellowed orders, herding thirty Talons – a mix of his recruits and some Fenrir guards – back towards the forest edge.

  "RIGHT! YOU LAZY SODS! MOVE THAT LOG! BIGGER ONE! THEY'LL SEE IT FROM THEIR PRETTY HILL!" Olaf roared, pointing at a hefty fallen pine trunk near the treeline.

  Men scrambled, grunting as they heaved at it.

  "NO, YOU IDIOT, FORTY-SEVEN! THE OTHER WAY! MAKE IT POINT AT THE BLOODY CLEARING! TRAP THEIR FLANK! THINK!"

  "OI! WHERE'S THAT BARREL OF PISS-VINEGAR?!" another recruit yelled, loud enough to carry. "CHECK THE BACK TREES!"

  "TRIGGER LINES HERE! RUN 'EM DEEP! DON'T WANT THE OLD PUSSY SEEING 'EM TILL IT'S TOO LATE!" someone else shouted from deeper within the shadows.

  It was loud. It was clumsy. It looked exactly like a rabble trying desperately to set up hasty forest traps under pressure. Logs were dragged with much grunting and shouting. Arguments broke out about positioning. Men tripped over ropes.

  It was all for one audience member: Marshal Gunnar.

  While the forest theater played out, Eirik was alone with a pile of the shields and spears his men confiscated from Garrick’s force and had them piled together. He had told everyone to leave him, and made sure nobody was near him.

  He focused. Store.

  One shield vanished from the pile.

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  Store. Another.

  Store. Store. Store. Store. All shields gone.

  Store. Store. Store. Store. Store. Store. The spears followed.

  ————

  Marshal Gunnar sat atop his warhorse on a snow-dusted rise near the northern edge of the Frostmire clearing. Not the highest point – Baron Cedric's viewing platform claimed that – but it offered clear sightlines to the tree line fifty paces away where Eirik's rabble had vanished, and across to where Garrick's force had massed for its doomed charge.

  More importantly, it anchored the left flank of his veteran block.

  Gunnar's mind mapped the terrain. Frostmire clearing at center. Dense Blackroot Forest east. Thinner woods bordering a frozen stream west. The rise gave his fifty veterans elevation advantage and anchored them against the western woods. Anyone flanking through those trees would be channeled into a narrow gap between the rise and stream bank.

  An attacker would have to come head-on, across open ground, into his shield wall.

  He'd expected Eirik's force to break immediately before Garrick's charge. Then his disciplined block would advance and mop up the scattered remnants. Easy. Clean.

  Behind him, his fifty men remained motionless. Their shields formed an unbroken wall of oak and iron, locked tight, overlapping. These were men who knew how to wait. Victory often came not to the first attacker, but to the one who watched and struck when the enemy was off-balance.

  Minutes crawled by. Only the wind sighing through ancient pines and distant murmur from the noble spectators broke the silence.

  A scout materialized beside his horse. "Marshal," he rasped urgently.

  Gunnar didn't turn. "Status?"

  "Eirik used tricks. Gas, traps. Garrick's men were beaten like pigs in a pen. The bastard's rabble swarmed them. Garrick yielded."

  Gunnar finally turned. "Yielded? Already? Confirmed?"

  The scout nodded. "Aye, Marshal. They used log traps to take out two knights at the charge front. Then jars, Lord. Clay jars."

  "Jars?"

  "Yes. Jars. It released a thick, yellow-white cloud. Like the worst fog mixed with vinegar and pepper spray. Horses went mad. Knights who breathed it went blind, choking, useless. Some fell right out of their saddles."

  Gunnar’s lips thinned. Vinegar? Pepper? Garrick’s knights had lost to this?

  His scout continued. "They're preparing something in the trees, Marshal. Loud noises. Hammering. Shouts about logs and jars. They dropped… looks like an empty sling and some tools near the edge."

  Gunnar’s second-in-command, a grizzled sergeant named Madsen, spat onto the snow. "Pathetic. Think they're fooling us, Marshal?"

  Gunnar remained still as the rock beneath him. "They're desperate, Madsen. They beat the spoiled whelp through trickery and numbers. They think the same will work on us. They're setting an ambush in the trees. They want us to leave this hill and chase them into their traps."

  Madsen chuckled. "That gas’s nasty stuff. But here?" He gestured at the clear, open slope before them and the solid rock at their back. "Wind blowing towards them, not us. If they charge that shield wall uphill, they'd break before they got halfway."

  "Exactly," Gunnar murmured. He saw a recruit near the forest edge stumble and drop his end of a log, earning a cuff from Olaf. The shouting about vinegar barrels intensified.

  "Their commander knows it. That's why the noise. Trying to bluff us into moving."

  He turned to address his line. " The Bastard thinks he can pull the same trick twice! He's scurrying into the woods to set his petty snares!" A low chuckle ran through the ranks. "But we are not Lord Garrick's pretty fools! We hold the high ground. We hold the pass. They want a fight? They come to us!"

  He slammed his fist against his shield. "HOLD!"

  A chorus of guttural "AYE, MARSHAL!" answered him.

  ————

  Eirik halted his team behind a cluster of massive, frost-rimed boulders.

  "See the cliffs above Gunnar's hill? That's our target." He traced an invisible path with his finger through the dense woods. "We loop wide. North, then east, then back south behind the cliffs. Approach from the blind side. Follow my steps exactly. No talking."

  They moved deeper into the Blackroot, the canopy thickening. They wove through dense thickets of thorny holly that snagged cloaks and tore skin. They crossed the frozen stream, testing each step carefully, the ice groaning ominously underfoot.

  After thirty minutes of painstaking progress, Eirik raised his fist again. They crouched low in the shadow of a towering granite outcrop, the dark, jagged face of the cliffs rising directly before them. This side was steep, shaded, and layered with treacherous verglas.

  "This is it," Eirik pointed upwards. "That ledge, thirty feet up. Then that chimney crack leading to the summit plateau."

  The climbers followed his gaze. Helga sucked in a breath.

  "We wait here. Stay silent," Eirik commanded. "Olaf needs to make his move. Gunnar needs to be looking the other way."

  The minutes stretched. Did Olaf time it right? If Gunnar glances this way, even once… we're exposed.

  Then it came.

  A sudden crescendo of noise erupted from the forest below Gunnar's position – shouts, the crash of wood on wood, the unmistakable clang of steel meeting steel. Olaf's voice carried a raw edge of command and aggression.

  He looked sharply at his climbers. Their heads were all turned towards the noise.

  "That's the signal." Eirik stated. "I go first. When I secure the rope, I'll drop it."

  He pulled the familiar iron chisel from his belt. He looked up the forbidding ice-glazed rock face. This is where his climbing grind earns its keep.

  Taking a deep breath of the frigid air, Eirik stepped forward and jammed the blunt tip of the chisel into a thin crack at waist height. He twisted, wedging it solid. The metal shrieked faintly against the rock.

  His enhanced spatial awareness flared. The route unfolded in his mind's eye – a sequence of cracks, tiny ledges, and icy bulges.

  He hauled himself up on the chisel, his boosted grip strength locking onto the cold iron. His left foot found a crystal knob, barely a bump. His right boot pressed flat against the icy bulge, relying on the friction control granted by his skill.

  He moved fluidly, pulling the chisel free with a practiced twist as he shifted his weight upwards.

  [CLIMBING EXPERIENCE +1]

  [MANA FRAGMENT +1]

  Focus. Ignore the cold. That ledge is ten feet away.

  He slammed the chisel tip into a crack, twisted it sideways. It bit solidly. He hauled himself up violently, his free hand shooting out, fingers scrabbling for the lip of the ledge. They caught. He kicked wildly, boots finding momentary purchase. He heaved, muscles screaming, and hauled his torso onto the narrow shelf of rock.

  [CLIMBING EXPERIENCE +1] [MANA FRAGMENT +1]

  He risked a quick glance down. His climbers were tiny figures huddled at the base, faces upturned. The sounds of his men were still loud and chaotic. He looked up. The route got tougher.

  The next section was a deep, shadowed fissure in the cliff face – a 'chimney', maybe three feet wide, choked with ice and loose scree. The walls leaned inwards slightly.

  He pressed his back firmly against the cold rock, braced his boots against the opposite side. He pushed upwards, shuffling his back and feet in a laborious caterpillar motion. His hands scrabbled for cracks and ledges on either wall.

  He paused, pulled the chisel, and carefully tapped at an icy overhang. Shards rained down harmlessly. He cleared a handhold. Up he went again.

  Loose rock! Right handhold crumbling!

  His fingers scrabbled as a chunk of stone gave way. His heart lurched. Instantly, his left hand clamped onto a protruding edge, his core muscles locking tight, arresting the slip. Pebbles clattered down the chimney wall.

  Too close. Focus. Test every hold twice.

  [CLIMBING EXPERIENCE +1]

  [MANA FRAGMENT +1]

  Ten feet. Twenty. Thirty. The chimney widened slightly near the top. Daylight beckoned. He could see the edge of the summit plateau – a flat expanse of wind-scoured rock and snow, mercifully empty.

  Final push.

  He braced his feet firmly, pushed his back hard against the wall, and reached high overhead. His fingers found a deep, solid crack. He pulled the chisel one last time, jamming it deep horizontally. He hauled himself up and over the lip with a final grunt, rolling onto the snowy summit plateau.

  [CLIMBING EXPERIENCE +3]

  [MANA FRAGMENT +3]

  He was exposed. Instinct screamed at him to get low. He scrambled behind the nearest large boulder, scanning the plateau. Empty. Just snow, rock, and howling wind. The ridge crest separating him from Gunnar's position was maybe thirty paces away.

  Perfect. They won't hear a thing over the wind and the battle below.

  Time for the ropes. He focused inward, retrieving the first coil from his Storage Ring. He moved quickly to the chimney edge, staying low. He looped one end around the jammed chisel handle twice, tying it off securely. He let the rest spill down the dark crack towards his waiting climbers.

  Three sharp tugs on the rope – safe, climb!

  He moved back, retrieved the second coil, and anchored it to another solid rock protrusion. Two ropes were faster than one.

  He crouched behind the boulder again, scanning the ridge crest, listening to the distant clamor of Olaf's diversion. Come on, Bjorn. Move!

  Below, Bjorn grabbed the first rope the instant it went taut. He tested it fiercely, then grinned at Helga. "Go!" He jammed his boot into the chimney wall and started hauling himself upwards, hand over hand. Helga took the second rope.

  They ascended rapidly.

  Goran watched them go, then looked at Thirteen. "You ready?" he whispered. Thirteen just nodded, his earlier nerves channeled into intense focus.

  Bjorn appeared over the lip first, rolling onto the snow beside Eirik, breathing hard but grinning fiercely. Helga was seconds behind. "Get low. Behind the rocks. Secure the ropes for the others."

  Goran came next, grunting with effort, followed closely by a panting Thirteen. Both collapsed onto the snow behind the boulder shelter.

  "Frost's teeth," Goran gasped. "Thought my heart would burst."

  "Quiet," Eirik hissed. "Listen."

  The wind howled, but it was enough. From just over the ridge crest came the sounds of men – the clank of armor shifting, low murmur of voices, the stomp of boots on cold ground. Gunnar's veterans. Fifty professional killers. Less than fifty paces away, separated only by a jagged spine of rock, utterly unaware of the vipers now coiled at their backs.

  Now, he had the high ground.