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Brewing Storm
Topic Started: Aug 26 2012, 11:07 PM (250 Views)
Cyrus Stormhold
Member
[ *  * ]
Stormhold was an ancient fortress, one that has stood for centuries or longer. High in the mountainous regions of the northernmost reaches of Gryphonia, on the tallest peak in the Talos region, it was an indomitable fastness, a mighty fortress that had never in recorded history fallen to enemy action. Walls constructed of solid stone, several feet thick and incredibly high, have withstood terrible assaults from time immemorial, but never were they breached or overcome. The citadel, standing high on the mountainous peak, could only be approached by land via one single path, twisting and winding up the incline. Checkpoints placed regularly throughout that pass ensured the identity of any who might wish to visit the citadel, as well as acting as additional fortifications in the case of assault. Each of those checkpoints had been razed, torn down to the foundation, but their loss had provided the citadel itself with time to prepare for the coming assault, and always they were rebuilt. Even an aerial assault was nigh-impossible, as the perpetual thunderstom that gave the citadel its name ensured that only the very greatest fliers could possibly survive the approach.

In the highest room of the citadel, at a rickety table illuminated by the light of a single candle, sat General Cyrus Stormhold, the current Lord Warden of Talos. He studied an tattered map, though not an old one - it was tattered from the sheer use it had seen. It showed Gryphonia, along with several of the other surrounding region. Most of it was unclaimed territory, sparsely populated at most, but there were still countries, largest of which was the hated Equestria. He sighed and pushed the map away, rubbing at his eyes. He stopped at the sound of a knock at the door.

His voice rumbled through the room in response, deep and commanding. The voice of a leader. "Enter."

The door creaked open, and one of his personal guards entered. He snapped off a salute, his clenched claw held to his chest, and bowed his head. The salute was...not quite sloppy, but very fast. The soldier was agitated.

"What is it, guard? Speak!"

The guard hesitated for a moment, as if he could hardly believe what he was about to say. "You have a visitor, my Lord. It...it's the King."

Cyrus stared for a brief moment, blinking in surprise. He then dashed down past the guard and descended to meet his sovereign at the gates of Stormhold Citadel.
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Darius Hightor
Member
[ *  * ]
Before Darius and three members of his elite guard had even alighted on the West Spur, local guards were ready to challenge him. He let the guard at his right wing do all the talking and exchange the necessary passwords, drumming his talons ever louder against the ancient black stone in a show of impatience.

Eventually, he burst out at the guard. "You will let me through at once. I am your king. You know who I am, my face is on your coins. I have no time for such trivialities."

"Begging your majesty's pardon," said the guard, "but our security protocols contain no exception for royalty. Changelings certainly don't, nor does unicorn glamour, nor does- "

"You do realize that if I am made late because of your paranoia, I will be within my rights to rip out your trachea with my own beak?"

"Should Stormhold be infiltrated due to my carelessness, I would readily offer your majesty my throat. All the same, sire, I must check you."

Darius scowled, fixing the guard with his icy glare as he reached inside his cloak. The normally stoic guard could not help but wince, certain that whatever emerged would be the instrument of his death. Instead, he heard the clink of a small bag of coins.

"...Your majesty?" Was he being offered a bribe? Stormhold had strict rules about bribes, as well- regarding both what happened to those caught accepting them, and those who reported attempted bribery to the Lord Warden. Besides, a bag that size could contain no more than-

"Five days' pay. Your diligence is commendable." The king smiled, and the guard allowed himself a very nervous laugh. "Finish the test. I'll make it ten days' pay if you can finish in a few minutes: I wasn't lying about being in a hurry."
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Cyrus Stormhold
Member
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Cyrus paced by the gates of the citadel, waiting in the drenching rain for his king to make his way through the checkpoints. It was exceedingly rare for the king to travel to Stormhold - it was one of the most isolated fortresses in the kingdoms, after all. Stranger still, he had received no word of his arrival. Cyrus had quickly conferred with his postmaster on the subject - nothing more than the routine missives from Gryphus had arrived. And strangest of all...the king had traveled without his standard entourage, bringing with him only three of his personal guard. It all suggested a matter of great import...and secrecy. That was worrisome.

Cyrus shook his head slightly and calmed his nerves. Whatever his king required of him, he would fulfill. That was all that mattered. He stood alone at the gates of Stormhold Citadel, ready to welcome his king and invite him into his home.
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Darius Hightor
Member
[ *  * ]
As Darius paced the well-worn steps to Cyrus' study (both the Primary and Secondary meeting halls would be unnecessarily cavernous for a conversation between two gryphons), he mentally rehearsed for what seemed like the thousandth time (but could not have been more than the 80th) exactly how much he intended to share with his most trusted general.

This was not the sort of council that could be trusted to messengers, and few indeed were the messengers who could be expected to brave the constant storms around this mountain. These factors contributed to Darius' decision to make the hazardous, hours long flight, and would likely have sufficed to justify it. All the same he admitted to himself that, frankly, he wanted his friend's reassurance regarding the decision he was about to make. He saw a bloody path stretching ahead of him, one which he had spent the better part of a decade preparing.

The First Gryphon Dynasty were said to have had the gift of prophecy. Darius is unconvinced that, once vagueness and confirmation bias was accounted for, they were significantly more accurate than any random stargazer. One thing was for certain- references to the King's gaze piercing the veil of time had long since been reduced (assuming it was once something more) to an allegory reserved for ritual forms, forms which the less egotistical kings rarely insisted upon.

There were, of course, rumors that such ancient powers had resurfaced in Darius. He made a point of denying them in terms that would only encourage their spread behind closed doors, chiefly because it helped conceal his sources of intelligence. More than once, he has joked to Cyrus that he would gladly give his left eye to make such rumors true- in reality, he was simply good at showmanship, better at math, and better still at psychology. He couldn't read the future, but he could read the past and present... and extrapolate.

He was no prophet. He did not see a single path ahead of him leading to a single bright future. He saw multitudinous compound branches of possibility, many of them twisting off and getting lost in the gloom. While he'd spent years carefully pruning and shaping, this was still a gamble. The events of the next few days could send the future spinning off in any of half a dozen different directions he has anticipated, plus whatever unknown number he has not.

Disturbingly, nearly all the branches that were not dripping with blood had been cut away. He was all but committed, and indeed many of the heaviest wheels were all in motion, but... but what? He wanted his friend to talk him out of it? To convince him to leave the dogs and the zebras to their own devices, to let one more bloody pointless war go by as a historical footnote- just an asterisk recording this many towns razed and this many myriad dead, with nothing accomplished? Perhaps even to halt the war altogether? To discard the best chance he was ever likely to have for Gryphon Ascendancy and the overthrow of the Tyrant Sun, to buy peace in his lifetime at the cost of liberty in the next ten thousand? No. He'd weighed the costs and probabilities literally hundreds of times, from different angles, and he was still willing to bet that this was a path worth walking.

No, Cyrus would almost certainly not be able to talk him out of it, and he'd probably only even try if he were so ordered- which kind of defeats the purpose. The results of such a conversation were essentially predetermined- Cyrus would follow him into Tartarus itself if he but asked (he would, likely, insist on leading the charge)- and so there was no sense double-counting it.

All the same, even the greatest geniuses occasionally make bloody idiotic oversights- and Darius made a point of frequently reminding himself that he was almost certainly not the greatest tactical genius ever to live, that he should count himself above the mistakes of history. Hubris was not a survival trait. Cyrus was the only gryphon he could trust to (maybe) notice such flaws, and upon noticing, report them honestly.

He ordered his personal guard to wait outside the study, eschewing their usual sweep of the room. If Cyrus had prepared it, it wasn't getting any safer.
Edited by Darius Hightor, Aug 27 2012, 01:07 AM.
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Cyrus Stormhold
Member
[ *  * ]
The king and his general traveled through the halls of Stormhold Citadel in relative silence, their faces carefully composed. Their friendship as fledgelings was hardly unknown, but in public they acted exactly as expected of a king and his vassal, and no more. Anything else would send dark whispers of favoritism worming through the ranks of the aristocracy, and there were still those unscrupulous lords and ladies who would only too happily take advantage of such unrest for their own purposes.

As they marched through the Citadel, curious guards and housekeepers surreptitiously watched their passage. After all, even for those who lived in the most ancient keep in the kingdoms, the king himself was hardly a common sight, especially not arriving in such a fashion.

Cyrus's study was in the highest tower of the citadel, from which he could see far around the land. It was there that the two gryphons would speak. He dismissed their guards, ordering them to wait outside, and they entered the study.

Cyrus turned to his old friend and nodded. "For you to arrive unannounced in such a manner...the matter must be grave indeed. Should I call for wine before we begin?"
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Darius Hightor
Member
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"Very well, but I'm afraid that I did not fly for most of a day through these raging storms just to wish you a happy hatching day." Besides, that wasn't for another three weeks. The king had long since responded to the official invitation to the feast.

"There is-" he took a deep breath, as much from necessity as for dramatic effect, "a Storm on the horizon." There was always a storm on the horizon when viewed from this citadel, but he trusted that his friend would recognize the metaphor. "A war is coming, the likes of which no gryphon alive has yet seen. The signs and portents are clear, and I'm sure you realize that it wasn't easy pointing those signs at exactly what we wanted them to portend."

"There has been spear-rattling among the Lords Warden and Regulant, as there has always been when the lesser races troop across the ground in force of arms- or indeed under it. You received, as did every Lord, the standard reminder of exactly how many legions they are allowed to keep in readiness, with Stormhold as usual permitted one extra due to its indispensable defensive position against the wastes to the North. Does your latest intelligence as to which Lords are maintaining guerilla legions 'without my knowledge' match my own?"

"Well, add an extra over-strength legion to Lord Grimtalon's count, and two full-strength legions to Lady Nightbeak's. They both think I've bankrolled them to play against the other, and both seem to have overlooked the fact that I've installed commanders with little love for them..."

For more than fifteen minutes, Darius detailed military assets- legions, armories, artifacts, war machines- that were on neither the Official Books nor on the Official Unofficial Books, marking them on a chalkboard as he went. To most beings, they were senseless squiggles before and senseless squiggles afterwards, but to someone who knew gryphon strategical shorthand, they told a rather different story. If one squinted at the wary detente against Equestria, one would notice that it would take at most a couple of days to prepare a full scale invasion.

He finished with the best available assessment of the strengths of the Zebrican and Diamond Dog militaries, their assets, scattered intel (and a good many best guesses) regarding secret weapons, and conspicuous empty spots where more battalions could probably be assumed to be hiding.

At no point did he actually state his plans, or indeed say anything about the future. He simply described the present to the best of his ability, trusting that a strategic mind as brilliant as Cyrus', when presented with information previously unavailable or ambiguous, would see the obvious next step.

"So... what do you think?"
Edited by Darius Hightor, Aug 27 2012, 02:05 AM.
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Cyrus Stormhold
Member
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"...I think it's dangerous. Mighty though our military is, the horsefolk are numerous as the stars in the sky, and their foul magics are hardly anything to quickly discount. But.."

Cyrus gently traced several lines with a claw. He had his suspicions that Darius had been playing his cards even closer to his chest than normal - while he knew the king trusted him, he was still a very cautious individual. Some might say paranoid. But that was a personality trait that might be expected in one who had lost his own brother to an assassin's cowardly blade.

"The Diamond Dog armada and the tribes of Zebrica. My eyes-and-ears had reported that there were dealing between them, as well as communication between both races and members of our own...you were behind that, I suppose."

He shook his head.

"My lord...are you certain? Even with the aid of such allies, who might not even be worthy of trust...can we stand against the might of the Tyrant Sun, or the Traitor Moon?"
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Darius Hightor
Member
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"Equestria's armies may be many, but not so many as to equal this," he gestured at the map showing the forces of the hypothetical coalition. "Furthermore, they have for the most part grown fat and lazy with long years of peace, and many of them should, in the first days at least, be counted as simply well-equipped militia. I have identified several enemy commanders who should be worth worrying about (moreso than usual), and we should not forget that these are the sorts of conditions that tend to produce tragic young prodigies...

But nevermind that- you have touched immediately on the obvious problem. The Princesses-" names have power, and it does not do to say the name of such a being while talking behind their back "Are, I must admit, essentially goddesses made flesh. From what I've heard, only the most outrageous stories about them are actually hyperbolic. While the true extent of their power over the heavens remains a mystery, we must assume that they at least have the ability to- somehow- bathe a region in eternal night or day.

I've heard of dozens of tricks that might incapacitate one. For a little while. If we got the drop on it. And expended a lot of power. And timed everything exactly. And if the speculations and ancient myths about the trick in question speak true. Plenty of good Plans C and D and E, suitable for a last-ditch save but not something you would actually set out to do from the beginning.

And when I put it that way, it almost makes the... obvious alternative sound appealing."
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Cyrus Stormhold
Member
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Cyrus did not wish to even consider what the "obvious alternative" would be. Frankly, the mere thought sent a nearly imperceptible shiver down his spine. Leaving the Princesses alone would almost be preferable to that...

"I think that must be only our very last resort, and only if we can be sure it will not backfire onto us. After all, ancient history is rife with power-mad fools who thought they could control terrors beyond mortal ken..."

He realized where his line of thought was leading him and shut his beak with a snap. Even if Darius was his oldest friend, he was still also King.

"...You are certain of your path, Darius?"
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Darius Hightor
Member
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Certain? Heavens no. If Darius had learned one thing while spending hours perusing many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, it was that overestimating one's control over such entities was just about the most dangerous thing it was possible to do. He would be loathe to invoke even the least and most malleable of gods unless every other alternative was worse. Alas, nearly every path seemed to lead towards a moment when that was the case.

He articulated this much. "But unfortunately, I fear that our allies may not see things so clearly. They see the same problems we see. They see the same potential solutions. But they do not realize just how bad an idea those solutions are."

"I've done everything I can to discourage that line of thinking. I can only hope it will be enough, that if the likes of the Changer of Ways or the Black Goat should walk this world again, it will be at a time and place of our choosing."

He sighed, knowing that he would have to choose, again and again, between bad and worse. But what else was new?

"I do not know how we will defeat the Tyrant Sun and Traitor Moon, old friend, but I know of a good many ways in which we might. And surely you understand why that's necessary, why their power needs to be broken."
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Cyrus Stormhold
Member
[ *  * ]
Cyrus nodded, slowly and sadly. Ever since the hated sisters had spread their domination over the land, the Gryphon race's rightful rule had dwindled. Where once they had a proud race, and under their benevolent rule the land had surely flourished, they now were left to eke out a relatively meager existence in barren, inhospitable mountains, with scant few fertile valleys in which to grow crops and raise livestock. He saluted to his king.

"I will stand with you, your majesty. May you lead us to glory."
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