Rise of the Horde - Chapter 561 - 561

Night pressed down on the Threian camp like a living thing.

Fires burned low, not for stealth but because there was little fuel left that had not already been scavenged for stretchers or crude barricades. Smoke clung to the ground, mingling with the iron stench of blood and the sweeter rot of opened bodies carried in from the field. The wind shifted constantly, carrying with it distant echoes from the plains. Laughter. Drums. Orcish voices raised in harsh, rhythmic chants.

Those sounds alone were enough to keep most men awake.

But the real terror came from the dark beyond the fires.

Far from the glow of the Threian camp, shapes moved across the broken grasslands with practiced ease. Massive, low silhouettes slid between dips in the earth, their forms barely distinguishable from shadow itself. Red eyes gleamed briefly, then vanished. Heavy paws pressed into the soil without sound.

The Warg Cavalry had arrived.

They did not charge. They did not howl. They did not announce themselves.

They stalked.

Each rider leaned low over the thick neck of their mount, fingers knotted into coarse fur or wrapped around hooked reins. Their armor was dark, layered with dried blood from the previous clashes. Their weapons were sheathed. Blades only came out when blood was certain.

Among them moved other figures, slighter and almost impossible to see unless one knew what to look for.

The Verakhs.

They moved on foot, barefoot despite the sharp stones and trampled weapons littering the ground. Cloaks of woven grass and stitched hides brushed softly against their legs. Each carried a sharp pair of blades for close killing and a crossbow strapped across the back.

Where the Wargs were predators, the Verakhs were ghosts.

They circled the Threian camp slowly, deliberately, marking every movement. Where sentries walked. Where patrols doubled back. Which fires burned brightest and which areas lay in shadow. They listened to shouted orders, to cries of pain, to the constant murmured prayers of men who had never expected to survive the day.

A Verakh scout crouched atop a low rise and watched through narrowed eyes.

“Broken,” he whispered in a low, guttural tongue. “They bleed fear.”

One of the Warg riders snorted quietly, his mount’s lips curling back to show yellowed fangs.

“They always do after the first real fight,” he murmured. “The question is whether we are told to finish them.”

No order came.

Not yet.

This was not a raid. It was a hunt without the kill.

Inside the Threian camp, the tension finally snapped.

A sentry on the eastern perimeter froze as something moved beyond the torchlight. At first he thought it was smoke. Then the smoke blinked.

He raised his spear and shouted.

“There,” he cried. “Movement in the dark.”

Another sentry turned, then another. Shapes shifted again, closer this time. A massive head rose briefly above a ridge, eyes reflecting firelight like burning coals.

“Wargs,” someone screamed. “Warg riders.”

The cry tore through the camp like a blade.

Horns were blown too quickly, out of rhythm. Men surged to their feet, grabbing weapons with shaking hands. Archers scrambled for quivers that were already half empty. Cavalry troopers ran for horses that screamed and reared as the scent of Wargs carried on the wind.

“They are coming,” a lieutenant shouted. “Form up. Shields. Shields.”

But there was no charge.

No roaring horde.

Only watching eyes.

The Warg Cavalry deliberately allowed themselves to be seen now, stepping into view along the ridgelines, silhouetted against the stars. Riders sat tall, relaxed, some resting a hand on the sheath of their blade, others stroking the fur of their mounts as if calming them before a long run.

They wanted to be noticed.

The Verakhs began their work.

A shadow slipped behind a sentry and vanished again. A rope was cut. A tent collapsed. Somewhere on the far side of the camp, a scream rang out abruptly and was cut short just as quickly.

Panic surged.

“They are inside,” someone shouted.

“They are everywhere.”

Aliyah Winters emerged from her command tent, scepter in hand, her face pale beneath the grime of battle. She took in the chaos in seconds. Men running without orders. Officers shouting over one another. Archers loosing arrows blindly into the dark.

“Hold,” she shouted, her voice amplified by magic and authority both. “Hold your lines. Do not pursue shadows.”

Too late.

A knot of infantry broke from the perimeter and rushed forward, shields raised, weapons trembling. They vanished into the darkness beyond the fires.

Moments later, Wargs surged forward just enough to be seen.

Not to attack.

Just to loom.

A massive Warg stepped into firelight, its rider lifting his head and throwing back his helm. He bared his tusks and laughed, the sound deep and mocking.

“Run little pinkskins,” he called in a rough blend of tongues. “Run. We like it when you run.”

The infantry froze, then broke.

They fled back toward the camp, crashing into their own lines, spreading panic like fire through dry grass. Horses screamed as Wargs lunged close enough to snap at their flanks before withdrawing again. Arrows flew wildly, some striking nothing, others burying themselves in Threian backs.

Aliyah felt the battle slipping toward disaster again, not through iron and blood but through fear.

She raised her scepter, gathering light.

“Hold,” she commanded again, forcing calm into her voice. “They test us only. They do not attack.”

And she was right.

The Warg riders never committed.

After hours of stalking, taunting, and killing only when opportunity presented itself, the orcs began to withdraw. Silhouettes melted back into the darkness. Red eyes vanished one by one. The plains grew quiet again, save for the sobbing of wounded men and the low groans of those dying.

The Verakhs lingered longest, watching until the last horn call faded.

“Enough,” one whispered. “They will not sleep tonight.”

The Warg Cavalry regrouped beyond sight, riders grinning beneath tusked helms.

No blood soaked their blades tonight.

But the damage was done.

Back in the Threian camp, Aliyah sank onto a crate beside her command tent, exhaustion finally overwhelming her. She understood the message clearly now.

The orcs did not need to finish them.

They could wait.

And waiting, she realized, might be deadlier than any charge.

*****

Dawn on the third day did not arrive with light so much as it arrived with exhaustion.

The sun rose slowly over the plains, its pale glow cutting through drifting smoke and ground fog, revealing what the night had hidden rather than banishing it. The Threian camp looked less like an army’s encampment and more like the aftermath of a disaster that had never truly ended.

Tents sagged or lay collapsed. Wagons stood half dismantled, stripped for wood to burn or boards to serve as makeshift shields. Men lay where they had fallen asleep, weapons still clutched in their hands, armor never removed because no one trusted the night enough to bare their skin.

No one had truly rested.

All through the darkness, the sounds had continued. Not attacks, not full engagements, but presence. The padding of unseen feet. The occasional low growl that rolled across the grasslands like distant thunder. The flash of red eyes just beyond the reach of the firelight. Every hour, horns sounded somewhere in the distance, never close enough to fight, never far enough to ignore.

The Warg Cavalry and the Verakhs had done exactly what they were meant to do.

They had denied sleep.

They had denied peace.

They had denied hope.

Aliyah Winters stood at the edge of the camp as the morning light revealed the true cost of the night. Her scepter was planted firmly in the earth, her hands resting atop it as if it were the only thing keeping her upright. Dark circles ringed her eyes. Her mana reserves felt hollow, scraped raw by days of casting and forced restraint. Even the air seemed heavy, as though the land itself pressed down on her shoulders.

Reports came in one after another.

Sentries who had fled their posts after seeing shapes move too close in the dark. Archers whose hands shook so badly they could barely nock an arrow. Infantrymen found wandering beyond the perimeter, eyes unfocused, muttering about howls that never came. A handful of deserters caught before they could slip away, more who were simply gone.

And then there were the scouts.

Those who returned did so with fear written openly on their faces.

“They are coming,” one captain said, voice hoarse. “From the north and the east. Small groups at first, then larger. Not marching as an army, my lady, but moving all the same. Tribes. Clans. Warbands.”

Another added quietly, “They are answering a call.”

Aliyah did not need to ask whose call.

Word traveled fast in orcish lands, faster than any rider. Victory was a language all its own, and the name of a Great Chieftain who had broken pinkskin armies more than once would spread like fire through dry brush. Every warrior who had ever dreamed of glory, every clan hungry for blood and honor, would follow that scent.

And they were.

From every direction.

The realization settled heavily over the command tent as Aliyah gathered her surviving officers. Maps were spread across a rough table, their edges curled and stained with blood and dirt. Markers indicated known orcish positions, but with every report, those marks became less reliable.

“We cannot hold,” one commander said bluntly. His armor was dented and scarred, his left arm bound in a blood soaked sling. “Not here. Not like this.”

Another nodded. “Our right flank is shattered. The infantry is exhausted. The cavalry has lost too many mounts. The mages…” He hesitated. “They are spent. Some are already damaged. Permanently.”

Aliyah closed her eyes briefly at that.

Mana gems had saved lives, but at a cost. Several mages had collapsed after the retreat, their magic circuits burned out, their ability to wield the arcane… gone forever. They would live, but they would never cast again. That knowledge weighed on every spellcaster remaining, a silent fear that gnawed at them more effectively than any orcish blade.

“And the enemy,” Aliyah said quietly.

A scout captain stepped forward, his cloak torn and streaked with mud.

“They do not press us,” he said. “They follow. Always just beyond reach. When we slow, they appear. When we stop, they surround at a distance. They do not attack in force, my lady. They wait.”

Aliyah understood immediately.

They were being herded.

Driven toward a choice.

Stay and be surrounded, or leave and be hunted.

She straightened, her expression hardening as the last pieces fell into place. Pride had no place here. Ambition had no place here. Only survival.

“We withdraw,” she said.

The words hung in the air for a moment, heavy but inevitable.

“Full withdrawal,” she continued. “Orderly. Controlled. We abandon this lands and fall back from the orcish territory entirely.”

No one argued.

They had all seen the truth in the dawn light.

The army of the Blue Countess was no longer fit for battle.

Orders went out swiftly. Archers were assigned to rear guard duties, their quivers redistributed so every bow that could still be drawn remained useful. The remaining cavalry were split, one portion riding wide to watch for flanking movements, the other staying close to the main column, ready to respond to sudden threats.

The infantry moved slowly, painfully, ranks held together by discipline and the quiet desperation of men who knew that breaking formation now would mean death. Wounded who could walk were supported by comrades. Those who could not were given a choice no commander ever wished to give.

Some were carried.

Some were left behind with prayers.

As the Threian army began its retreat, the orcs made no attempt to stop them.

Instead, they appeared.

On ridgelines. In distant tree lines. Atop low hills that had been empty only moments before. Warg riders paced the column at a distance, their mounts loping effortlessly, tongues lolling as if amused by the slow procession of the defeated. Verakh scouts could be glimpsed briefly before vanishing again, ensuring that the retreat never became a rest.

Morale, already cracked, threatened to shatter entirely.

Men whispered as they marched.

“They are everywhere.”

“There is no end to them.”

“I heard more tribes are coming. Thousands more.”

Aliyah rode near the center of the column, forcing herself to remain visible, forcing herself to project calm she did not feel. She knew the danger better than any of them.

If they lingered, they would be surrounded.

If they tried to turn and fight again, they would be annihilated.

And if the pressure continued much longer, desertion would spread like rot through the ranks. Men would slip away in the night, hoping to hide or flee, only to be found by Wargs or cut down by unseen blades. An army did not need to be defeated in battle to be destroyed.

It could simply be unmade.

By midday, the signs were unmistakable.

More orcs.

Not in one great mass, but in a constant trickle. Bands joining bands. Warriors falling in behind the distant silhouettes of the Yohan First Horde. New banners appeared, crude standards bearing unfamiliar symbols. Drums beat intermittently, not to signal an attack but to announce presence.

The land itself seemed to answer them.

Aliyah looked back once, toward the plains they were abandoning, and saw the truth laid bare.

The orcish horde was growing.

Swelling with every hour.

A living tide drawn by victory and the name of a chieftain who had proven himself again and again against the pinkskins. Mighty warriors gathered under his shadow, eager for the next battle, eager for blood.

And her army, once proud and confident, now limped away beneath that gaze, harried, watched, and reminded with every step that survival had been bought at a terrible price.

As the sun climbed higher and the retreat continued, Aliyah understood with chilling clarity that her campaign was a failure.

And that the war, truly, had only just begun.