The Murdering fields

The prosperity of the Empire was failing for a reason that has been rendered unknown to present historians. Greed and contempt further tore at the weakened national fabric which was not strong enough to prevent the nation coming apart after the death of King Sycklear.

The king had three sons born on the same day and within the same hour. Their desire for the throne was a shared thing as had been everything else in their lives, but it was always understood that two of them would clearly loose out. No nation could have three kings, and Sycklear had foreseen the danger that would arise upon his death.

He mistakenly planned and believed he had come up with a solution that would satisfy all of his sons craving for power. The successor would be decided by order of birth as always but all would be given some power in order to preserve the peace. Sycklear’s plan rather than reducing the strife forced it to manifest itself in a more disastrous way. The youngest son by minutes Simon was given reign over Camensea Province. Camenseas’ close proximity to both the Dorea frontier and the barbarous southerly nation of Kusch had made the Province develop along different lines than the other provinces. Camensea was mountainous and was critical in keeping open the Far East Road the bulk of the army was encamped there to repel the raiding Dorea Tribesmens, and to protect the road. The major commodities produced there were accouterments of war, horses, wool, wine and other spirits.

The next older son, Aurthur was given the Ember Province, with all the major seaports. Emberhad provided theproducts of, education facilities of higher learning, fishing, and other products derived from the sea.

The oldest son Brande was to rule over all from the central Province of Brinde. That province produced mostly lumber, Cattle, and grain crops.

The capitol of the empire was moved from Brandel which was renamed Syklea to Kent, located near the center of Brindee, and the trouble immediately began.

Simon closed the Far East Road, and seized control of the army units stationed there. He marched the army toward Brindee intent on smashing through the weak defenses he expected to find moving onward to Kent. The campaign went wrong from the beginning. Simon knew nothing of logistics or engineering, and when they reached the Brindee River they found the bridge had been destroyed. The army was assigned the task of replacing the span, but lacking the engineers who all remained in Brinde the progress was slow leading to the depletion of provisions, and eventually starvation of horses and men. The army began to desert in hoards, and before long Simon gave up the venture.

Many of the soldiers who had deserted returned to Brinde where they were reconstituted into the new army of Brindee Brande Mounted an expedition to reopen the far East Road and soon found that without a supply of mounts from Camensea, and all the other war fighting materials produced there the effort was futile, and he withdrew his forces.

Meanwhile Aurthur closed the Ember Border expecting Brindee to next move against him. Aurthur also made an unprecedented pact with Agron, and even sent envoys into the Kusch. The brothers at a stalemate tried to punish each other as much as they could economically. Ember began to grow in strength and soon was in a position to go on the offensive. Brande and Simon realizing the danger formed a pact, and awaited the attack that never followed. Aurthur was content to maintain things as they stood. His new nation was growing in prospect while Brinde was left to stagnate.

Simon was a poor ruler, and was usurped by Animen, a Menite chief of the Doria stepps, and the Far east road was permanently closed. Simon escaped to Brinde, raised an army and launched an invasion into Kusch where he was killed and the remnants of his army stranded. The Kusch invasion led to the nation of Kusch eventually growing from the pervasive knowledge and influence of the stranded soldiers.

Over the years the nations of the separated brothers grew into new lands that had forgotten their shared history, and the origins of the distrust that still plagued them.

Eventually Camensea became known Campens, Brinde became Branell and was still called an empire. Ember became Embria, or Embrey. The nation of Kusch became a stable nation even though they were steeped in many old tribal ways.

The remnants of the old empire grew farther and farther apart and eventually the languages though the basic structure remained the same took on subtle differences.

The kings of Branell and Embrey, three hundred and fifty years after the dissolution of the Brindeai Empire, fell into dispute over a small patch of land next to the southern sea. For many years the dispute existed as a war of words, and when enough time had passed the two nations gave up their incessant spilling of Bile and they chose instead to spill blood. What was known as the Border war began with neither nation really ready for action. The first battles were poorly run things where the casualties on both sides were insignificant with neither side making any clear gains. After two years the war was ended by truce though not decided and both nations started the preparation for the next event. Almost ten years later the two nations found themselves allied in a bloody war against Kusch that lasted a short six months but took nearly three hundred thousand lives.

Then came the Actinite war far to the south. In that war the later contenders provided both land and naval forces in what was truly a regional conflict. The black men of the Actin and their misunderstood religion were stopped from farther northerly expansion after eight years and another one and one quarter million battle deaths. By now most that had taken part in the original Border war were long dead or very old men, but the disputed land was still a thorn with enough venom to re-ignite the conflict with a ferocity unheard of in the first. The contender nations had grown up in the interim and were well versed in the art of war, and when the two armies first met the blood ran in rivers.

The first battle was not even named because it took place in a scattered fashion and was in reality more like twenty simultaneous battles.

Close to half a million died in the first twelve days a large number being civilians on both sides. The war was not settled and the battle lines remained nearly where they started, but both nations had paid such a high price that it took almost six months before another large scale battle took place. When it happened it was not planned what started out as a minimal skirmish escalated when the forces of Branell were thrown into full retreat at Tarlton. The Embrian commanders feeling that a breakthrough was at hand threw in two full brigades to exploit the breach but were countered by an equal number of Branell forces and the ensuing Battle of Tarlton lasted a week and took another hundred thousand as the reserves were thrown in and the battle raged on. At its ending in an Embrian victory the disputed land was firmly in their possession.

The Branelll forces within three day launched an attack forty miles to the north of Tarlton at a place called Tamin Junction. The Embrians had gutted their forces in that area in order to win the battle of Tarlton, and the result was a Bannellian victory. The battle of Tamin Junction was one sided and ended in the forces of Branell committing a terrible atrocity when they executed almost all of the Embrian prisoners in the aftermath. Branelll lost only six thousand men in the battle while Embria close to eight thousand. The twenty-six thousand Embrians that surrendered were put to death five days after the battle had ended when Embria would not trade the captured Branell land for the prisoners.

Embria then launched a number of reprisal raids all along the border in what they called Operation Victory and killed nearly seventy- thousand civilians and home guards.

The Branell forces immediately started a retaliatory series of raids but they were ended before much damage was done, and a few officers put to death for committing unauthorized attacks against noncombatants.

Embria once again sent in their marauders and another fifteen thousand civilians died, but this time the marauders also payed in blood. Close to four thousand were captured and killed and the captured ones were all executed at Kenwort in a large public spectacle.

The nations kept up the exchange in a series of smaller battles while both sides entrenched along the border. The defensive fortifications that were laid resulted in a near stalemate that reduced the war to a series of raids. The combatant nations were by this time launching deep incursions and employing spies and assassins.

In a largest naval action of the war the Embrian Navy aided by strong support from Agron destroyed a large force of Branellian ships near the mouth of the Kuesa River off the coast of Kusch and threatened to close the only seaway access to Branell.

The nation of Kusch allowed the overland transport of goods though to Branell and caused Embria to launch an invasion of northern Kusch to cut off these supplies. Kusch responded by sending all available forces north and destroying the Embrian forces and beach head along with twenty ships.

Embria sent diplomats to Kusch to pay a bribe fee and keep Kusch from actively entering the war on the Branellian side.

The war was in a degenerative stage and both sides considered the most drastic action in order to continue. Branell brought in men from the Far East who carried toxins and plagues that they nearly let loose against the Embrian populace. The kings spiritual counselor hearing news of what was planned dissuaded the action and won out with the King thus ending the project. The Embrians considered mounting large force raids to continue the murder of civilians, and even more raids into Kusch disguised as Branellian forces but they were too hard to properly coordinate and were never launched.

Finally during the summer of the fourth year of the war it grew exceedingly hot and dry and the Ember River nearly dried up. At the crossing named Wallingford, the river was no more than a trickle. The commander of the Embrian forces saw this as a potent break in the Branell defensive line and gathered his forces for a decisive attack. The Battle of Wallingford started with a lightning assault By the Embrian Third Cavalry against a home guard force composed of mostly old men and worn out soldiers who had spent too much time at the front.

The weak defense collapsed almost instantly but as it turned out the Twenty-Second Battalion of the Third Composite Brigade was on the road just behind the town of Wallingford. As the Embrian Third Cavalry assaulted through the town they met the Twenty-Second under the command of Col. Berhin.

Berhin deployed rapidly and surprised the third with a defiant stand and a ferocious counterattack from his point skirmishers and ax men. But as the battle continued twenty thousand Embrian Infantry arrived on the scene and rushed into the combat. The Twenty-Second was overwhelmed in a matter of minutes, and as the few who survived pulled back to prepare a last defense, the Branellian Eighth Infantry Brigade arrived from their post five miles east. The Embrians were thrown back across the dry river bed and met with the rest of their brigade who was late in arrival. The cavalry swung the balance and as the day ended, both sides were rushing all the available forces to the battle.

From the land of Kusch the Branellians had recruited a large number of tribal mountain men who would eat certain herbs and concoctions in preparation for battle. They came to the field as darkness fell and held their secret rituals and consumed their plants. They surprised everyone when out of that force, a seven thousand strong assault contingent attacked at midnight.

The effects of the herbs dilated the eyes and stimulated many of the other senses allowing the Kusch warriors to nearly see in the dark. They dislodged an anchoring force on the Embrian left and caused the total collapse of the line, but the Branellian failure to exploit the breach turned into a disaster.

By morning the Embrians had reconstituted their lines five miles back at the edge of the Delwe Wood. The rest of the day was wasted as both sides only probed while they brought up more forces in effort to gain the upper hand. At the end of the second day the total amassed forces on both sides was nearly half a million men.

The battle resumed on the third day with a massed Branellian attack against the Embrian right. At first all seemed to be going well until the Embrians swung twenty-five thousand men through the wood and flanked the attacking forces. Both sides threw in more forces to simply see what might develop. And once again as night fell the two armies pulled back to reconsolidate their lines and none but the scouts and point skirmishers roamed the no mans-land that existed between fighting desperate if tiny actions through the night.

Though no one counted at the time it is estimated that the total casualties for the battle by then had already exceeded eighty thousand.

Day four the Branellian commander noting the total absence of Embrian forces twenty miles to the north inserted a deep incursion force of six thousand men to cut across the mountainous frontier heading toward the Embrian capitol and port city of Sykes. Their purpose was to destroy the docking facilities along with wharves and warehouses. It was not a suicide mission the men were to commandeer as many ships as necessary to make their escape and destroy as many others as time would allow. Also that day in another location the Embrians abandoned their gains to the south and pulled their forces back to the Ember River in fear due to lack of forces that Branell would also attack in force there..

On the field at Wallingford the battle resumed with both sides committing all their forces minus their reserves. The ensuing battle was nothing more than a futile shoving match where neither side could gain the upper hand, with the fighting continuing well into the night because the action made clean disengagement impossible.

The Brenellians pushed hard against the left in effort to cause the Embrians to shift forces and facilitate a disengagement, but the Embrians countered and the forces became intermixed with both sides losing control. The forces who could disengage fell back while others, less fortunate, became trapped, cut off, or anhilated. Some units fought till daylight and in the morning the field was strewn with dead and wounded. The action continued all through that day as it did the previous day until just before dark both sides as if on cue disengaged to avoid the difficulties of the night before.

The sixth day began with pointed attacks by both sides in effort to avoid the all out slugfest of the previous two days. The exhausted soldiers on both sides were unable to continue as they had been and the action remained light throughout the day.

By this point in the battle the estimated casualties on both sides stood at one hundred and forty thousand.

The seventh day the Embrians stole a march and moved close to ninety thousand men to a clear jump off point and broke the Branellian left flank. The battle became one of defense on the Branellian part until the two brigades of the Kentwort Horse entered the battle and pushed the Embrians back. The Kentwort horse valiantly pushed the action for four hours until they were nearly nonexistent as a force.

At Wallingford the day ended with a slight edge going to the Embrians, but far across the nation the Branellian deep incursion arrived at Sykes accompanied by a lone teenage assassin.

As the port went up in flames the assassin somehow broke through the inner defenses of the palace of Sykes and killed the regent with a well placed dagger thrust.

On the morning of the eighth day of the battle both sides attacked in force as on the third day in effort to destroy the enemy force and the casualties were intense. The reserves were all committed on both sides and the battle raged till midnight. When the two armies pulled back they were so exhausted that the generals were all afraid that the next day they would be totally swept away but in that time the sizes of both armies almost doubled as all the available forces within miles had been summoned and the men who had already done their time in the hell of Wallingford made up their minds that there would be no tomorrow.

As the sun rose on the ninth day one million men faced one another across a dry river bed and waited the order to attack.

As The Branellian commander was about to give the order the Embrians sent out a parley under flag of truce. He was General Chang and was met by his Branellian counterpart General Douglas. Surprisingly Chang carried a message calling for a real end to the war with a commitment to keep Embrian forces out of the disputed southern land.

Later the generals again formally met and the issue was resolved. The forces stayed in place as they gathered their dead and counted the other expenses. The politicians later met and with the battle of Wallingford ended with out winner the war ended again without a true resolution. Men on both sides of the border were still filled with hate and mistrust in the long standing rivalry over long forgotten dreams and uncountable disavowed offenses.

The Battle of Wallingford cost the lives of three hundred seventy two thousand men.

The wounded were mustered out to starve on the streets as all useless men do.