Tanya's Third Life as a Barbarian Queen, Chapter XLVI

I will have the chapter as links to download at the bottom of the post. As well as a link to the Google Document page.

Kontia

Ser Paetus Rosianus, Wyvern Knight.

The sun beat into our backs, furious and blinding it cast the world into a burning hue and set stark black shadows upon the earth far below. I shifted in place, the ropes that bound me to Dolabella’s saddle pressed against the thick furs and gambeson that protected me from the cold of the sky as I clung to the spines upon her back.

Dola shuddered under me and I quickly reached forwards to rub the softer scales at the front of her neck to sooth the furious drake. We were flying into battle and she could sense it, she longed to announce herself to the city before us, especially with how far she was from her kin. 

We approached Kontia, a devastating force of sixteen Wyvern Knights, to end this farce of a war here and now. His majesty Emperour Molt Sol Augustas was correct in a way, we flew to fight a foe that could cast us from the sky. But he did not understand the slight that offered to the order, no mage had the right to contest the might of our Order. No maddened slave to unnatural powers should dare believe themselves superior to the great dragonriders. 

Should mages grow greater than our order than all that is good in the world would fade into memory. The world would be ruled by the abhorrent whims of mage-kings who would do as they pleased. The good people of the world would be enslaved to the delusions and madness of minds addled by spellcraft.

Should Rondel come to know of the powers of this far off barbarian they would pursue such power and bring ruin to the Empire. It was for that principle that we made our unsanctioned flight from Sadera. But of course this would not be a simple task.

Kontia had fallen, that was clear, even if most of the Warrior Bunnies seemed to be making a settlement to the north of the city there were no more signs of a siege. The people of Kontia had surrendered and thus there were innumerable locations where the Sorceress could be hiding. It would be fortunate if she were to be killed in our first attack upon the city, but that was highly likely, it was far more probable that she would have the opportunity to strike at our formation first and we would have to react to it.

The plan was simple, we would cover our approach with the setting sun and rake across the City with our mounts firebreath while taking care to keep some distance between each other. When the Lepus Queen used her magic to attack us the rest of our number would converge upon the woman and turn her to ash.

I saw the high walls of Kontia and its long bridge approach. Noting that at some point the long bridge across the miles long river had been damaged and was undergoing a repair with some scaffolding being built. I wondered for a moment if that had been the actions of Saderans fleeing the Lepus or a measure from the Barbarians to deny access from legions marching to Kontia. 

With the wide river running for such a distance. From the far eastern mountains all the way to the vast lakes of the lizardmen in the west the bridge represented the only way to deploy a legion and combat the Tanaoi tribe. Wyvern Knights however, we were not stymied by such petty limitations. Yes, there was no other Saderan force who could bring this tribe to heel. There was no other force that could slay this Queen who would challenge us in our skies. Any assassin who sought to strike at the Head Hunting Rabbits would be merely a prize for even the most mundane of their kind.

Molt had been correct that in fighting our lives would be at risk, that we would be spending blood for this victory. But he was wrong not to refuse us this sacrifice for Sadera. 

I drew Dola closer to the earth, watching the ground turn into an indistinct blur of green, brown and yellow. I felt the sudden buffering of the air high over the city wall resisting my mount's passage.

It lasted but a moment, and then I was over the tall and cramped insula. 

I pressed a hand to Dola’s neck and she eagerly brought up her wings to slow her passage and took a deep breath. In an instant I inflicted death upon the conquered city. If any of the barbarians had reacted to my approach or called for an alarm, it was impossible for me to tell. But as my mount slowed to draw fire along narrow streets the sound of horns blowing and screams could at last reach me.

I felt my heart thunder in my chest, my eyes darting from battlement to battlement, building to building. The Tanaoi Queen could appear from anywhere and the sense of pure vulnerability, the threat to not just my own life but to Dolabella also was overwhelming. Half of our number maintained their high altitude, flying in a lazy circle as they kept watch as the rest of us kept apart to inflame the city.

I felt Dola drawing back out of the city, the drake knew what to do, destroying settlements did not come naturally to Wyverns but it was simple enough to train them to rake their fire street to street and turn settlements to ash. I made another pass waiting for the Tanaoi Queen to make her move.

I did not have to wait for long, there was a thunderous crack. Familiar, familiar enough to make my heart skip a beat as I felt my breath quicken and I felt Dola flinch. It took me a moment longer to realise that I was not dead, that the very world around me had not been violated by that dark magic. I scanned the skyline and watched horrified as one of my peers fell from the sky, his mount roaring in agony as he crashed though the thin walls of a low class insulae. 

Atop one of the battlements a number of Lepus fussed over the golden scepter she had carried in that field those weeks ago. 

We had her!

I felt a grin, wide enough to hurt, my teeth ground together as I could do nothing to ease the intense burst of eager bloodlust filling my veins except cling to the beast that had been with me since I was a boy.

I grasped Dola’s spines and drove her towards her target, driving my heels into her sides to bring up her blood. Her roar sounded out with her peers as every Wyvern dived upon the Tanaoi Queen, I felt my fear fade as we cut though the air to cast this depraved mage from the world.

There was another crack and I blinked at confusion then another, and another. I looked about frantically only to see another Warrior Bunny settling another scepter upon a distant wall. Two scepters.

Another crack, this time with a pained roar in concert. I banked away from what I believed to be the Tanaoi Queen as a flurry of cracks sounded out from across the city and I watched horrified as a trio of Wyverns fell from the sky on broken wings or with terrible wounds carved into their bodies faster than I could blink.

I watched as my peers turned the section of the wall, and a handful of scepter users to ash, the wall blasting apart from the hateful flame of furious Wyverns. Half melted stone showered the buildings close to the wall as more cracks sounded out from more and more of the damned barbarians. They flooded out onto the walls, onto roofs, climbing up the walls like insects to get closer to us as they loosed slingstones at us while more and more of the magical scepters were carried forwards to spit their invisible magic at us.

I swept a rooftop with flame sending a dozen of the humanoid beasts screaming to the street below in flame as I tried to process what was happening. The Tanaoi Queen had somehow imparted her power to her subordinates. She had constructed more of the scepters in such a short amount of time.

I felt something akin to a slap on my back as one of the spells cast by the scapters barely missed me and out of reflex I pulled Dola up into the sky to draw her away from the danger.

Only to realise too late that in gaining hight I was sacrificing speed.

My scream joined Dolabella as the sky faded and we began to fall. I looked back to see nothing but mangled meat where my leg had once been, the limb simply gone as bubbling crimson joined my Dola’s own fading lifeblood escaping from a ragged hole in her chest.

In my final moments, I was grateful at least that we left this world together. I pressed my cheek against her neck to soothe her as we fell. 

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Kontia.

Diabo, Imperial Prince.

I staggered though the Domus squinting my eyes from the harsh smoke that had engulfed the structure in moments. I rushed though the unfamiliar building half blind and wheezing for breath as the flame eagerly ate into the wood about me and turned the world into a furnace. 

I rushed though the cracking wood, what had seemed a modest abode now seemed expansive and winding. What must have been moments stretched on without higher thought as I could do nothing but stagger though the acrid smoke. The Gods must have favoured me because shortly after I had started my flight from the tablinum I staggered onto the street and took in a breath before letting out a hacking cough, tears rolling down my cheeks from stinging eyes. 

Even outside of the domus the air was hot and beset by smoke and ash. The buildings around me burned just as brightly as the setting sun far to the west and I stood dumbfounded for a moment as I beheld the squadrons of Wyvern Knights overhead. For a moment a dark thought occurred to me, that Molt had sent the Knights east despite the show he had given me in setting aside the Order in matters of dealing with the Tanaoi. 

No, that made little sense. I watched as one of the great beasts was cast from the sky and my mind went to the ‘cannons’ from the secret missive I had received. Another booming crack filled the air and another. It seems the claims that there were many of these new weapons of the steppe were true. 

I staggered forwards when one of the rooms of the Domus suddenly collapsed and sent embers flying up into the sky as a dozen great Wyverns were struck by the loud and terrible weapons. Now and then one of the beasts would scream in agony and fall to the city below only compounding the great damage she had already suffered.

I made my way though the city as what could only be the children of the Headhunting Rabbits rushed though the street with long hooked poles and sledgehammers and began pulling down entire buildings that had not yet even been touched by flame. They moved with a Legionary procession, standing ready in blocks for orders from slightly older children as they were dispersed here and there.

As the children seemed to fight fires, the adults threw themselves as high as they could to sling stones at the Wyverns to little effect. I could see plainly that it was the cannons that would rend the great beasts from the sky even if I could not see where exactly Queen Tanya was currently organising the impromptu defence of the city. 

Unsure where to go and without any of my bodyguards I joined a procession of Humans and Demihumans who the Lepus were pushing towards the central plaza. A wide open space made of stone seemed prudent for the moment so I joined the terrified men and women of Kontia in fleeing with no one seeming to give me a second glance.

Before the terrible flame of the Wyvern Knight, we were all but wretches it seemed.

Thinking to the Wyverns overhead I looked up and felt an odd mix of horror and relief as I could only count half a dozen of their number still dominating the sky, the attention of the great beasts firmly on the walls of the city where it seemed a great many of the cannons had been placed to loose into the order squadrons. 

I was so entranced by the deadly dance of the Wyvern riders attempting to dodge the blasts of the cannons. Alongside the Lepus losing the deadly weapons before rushing elsewhere before flame consumed the stone where they had once stood. That I staggered in shock when a familiar looking Felis close to me screamed in pure terror. 

I stared dumbfounded but her eyes did not meet mine, instead they looked up to the sky. I whirled around and felt cold dread as the black silhouette of a Wyvern turned about in the sky with deadly agility and abandoned its attack upon the wall.

Instead it turned its attention to us. 

So fast I had barely the time to process what could have possibly possessed the Knight to turn his beasts flame upon the people of Kontia I could only watch in horror as the Wyvern spat yellow death upon the street and raked the ground towards us, Lepus, Human and Orc in it’s path consumed and turned to ash. 

There was nowhere to run even as hundreds around me tried to. In that moment I cursed the Gods who had seen me safely from the burning Domus only to have my life consumed along with all the other innocent Saderans of Kontia.

“There you are.” 

As if she were simply walking about her city on a market day I watched as Queen Tanya strode forwards. Time seemed to move strangely as she regarded me and calmly turned to the Wyvern bearing down upon the plaza. She carried an uncut crystal, a large smokey quartz that must have been a hundred pounds or more was slung over her shoulder like a sack of grain. 

I blinked, feeling the sensation of blue odiously seeping from the stone upon her shoulder as she sauntered forwards to meet certain death by Wyvernflame.

I opened my mouth to speak only to let out a shout of pain as the world around me was consumed by light. 

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https://docs.google.com/document/d/18Tiu7HxwaRNfUSYjX6Q37AaNL8BhV0NcZFkXwRYapX4/edit?tab=t.0