Virginia sweltered under the June sun.
Fields once green with spring wheat now lay blackened by hoof and cannon wheel, the air forever heavy with the scent of powder and death.
For a year Elias's Greybacks had haunted these lands.
From Manassas to Williamsburg, they had turned battles, stiffened Confederate lines, and left behind trails of Union corpses.
Yet attrition had gnawed them down.
Five thousand remained from the near eight thousand he first cast into America, veterans now, tempered in fire and mud.
They fought wherever the killing was fiercest, earning whispered names in the ranks of blue and grey alike—"the stone-faced," "the walking dead," "devils in iron."
By June's end, they still marched with Lee's forces, appearing without herald where the lines faltered, fighting with a precision and fury unmatched.
But five thousand alone could not break the great Northern tide, each engagement their numbers dwindled further.
That was why Elias had emptied his coffers.
Across the Atlantic, the vaults of his headquarters clanged hollow.
Every ingot of stolen iron, every bar of Confederate gold, every ounce of smelted cannon had been burned away into a single summoning: ten thousand new Greyback riflemen.
They landed at Charleston under cover of darkness, their disembarkation masked as yet another delivery of supplies pilfered from Union shipping.
Within days they marched north in grim columns, faces pale, rifles gleaming, boots striking the road like war drums.
The Confederates who glimpsed them whispered in awe.
Some crossed themselves, others spat, muttering of witches and revenants.
But all agreed on one thing: they were soldiers unlike any other, reinforcements from across the sea to join their brothers, demons of battle in the war against the north.
At last, in late June, the fresh host joined their weathered brethren outside Richmond.
Fifteen thousand Greybacks now stood in Virginia.
Union commander George B. McClellan had driven his army up the Peninsula with dreams of ending the war in a single stroke.
Richmond lay only a few miles beyond the Chickahominy River, guarded by Johnston's battered Confederates.
But as McClellan prepared to cross, reports began to be received, citing entire companies being annihilated while others were in full retreat, running from 'demons'.
The truth struck on June 25th, when Union skirmishers probing near Oak Grove stumbled into Greyback patrols.
What they thought a thin screen of pickets erupted into volleys of murderous precision.
One New York regiment broke in minutes, leaving behind their wounded screaming in the summer dust.
Survivors babbled like idiots repeating about the horrors brought by the men of the south, men capable of firing 10's of times per minute bringing death and destruction with every shot.
The next day, at Mechanicsville, the hammer fell.
Lee, newly in command after Johnston's wounding, hurled divisions at the Union right.
At the center of it marched Elias's veterans, their line reinforced by ten thousand fresh brethren.
They advanced through musket fire as though through rain.
When Union guns thundered, the shells burst among them with less effect than McClellan's officers could believe—ranks closed seamlessly, bayonets gleaming as they pressed on.
A Pennsylvania brigade fought stubbornly in the woods until Rex himself led a charge, three Greyback companies sweeping them aside with steel and rifle butts.
By dusk, McClellan's right had buckled, driven back toward the river in bloody disorder.
It was beyond humiliating of a defeat, the 'great offensive' was completly repulsed, and McClellan army was almost all but destroyed
As the Seven Days Battles raged, Elias's hand was felt everywhere.
Greybacks stiffened attacks at Gaines's Mill, stormed redoubts at Savage's Station, and held the line at Glendale.
When Lee's divisions faltered, the Greybacks pressed forward, driving Union forces with implacable fury.
Confederate morale soared at their side, men who had thought themselves beaten suddenly finding strength in their presence.
By the end of June, McClellan's grand advance lay shattered.
The Union army reeled back to the safety of the James River, leaving behind tens of thousands of casualties.
Richmond breathed easier—for now.
Recruitment drives in the north started to slow, as the public began to see signs of the war being lost, contrary to the story the government sponsored papers would try to have them believe.
Tens of thousands of wounded were brought back from the frontline, bringing with then stories not of victory but of defeat.
The Richmond papers remained silent, bound by the unspoken rule.
They praised Lee, they exalted Confederate valor, but they did not name the Greybacks.
Yet their shadow spread.
However Stonewall himself did write to Davis about ramping up recruitment for in his own words without the foreign volunteers, Virginia's lines would not have held, and as a result Richmond itself might have fallen to the union hands, the only reason that Arkansas, Tennessee, and most of Kentucky remain in their hands also comes from the victories delievered by these foreigners.
While Virginia burned in union blood, the seas too trembled under Elias's touch.
His piracy had grown into something more—an undeclared war upon American commerce.
The lottery draws, combined with the smelting of captured prizes, had swelled his fleet beyond what even he had thought possible back when the war first began.
Sleek blockade runners multiplied.
Ironclads slid from his secret slips.
Long, black-hulled cruisers prowled the North Atlantic, striking terror into Yankee merchantmen.
By late June, Elias commanded not a handful of raiders, but a flotilla worthy of being called a navy.
He gave it no flag, no name—only silence and steel, acting as true pirates, who only ever flew a flag when docking in at Confederate ports.
Union contracts began to strain, as shipments meant for Britain and France to secur needed materials for their people were instead raided and provided to the confederates, or worse taken in by Elias himself.
Coal convoys vanished, wheat ships never arrived, and arsenals complained of shortages, as across the frontline forts a lack of ammunition was become apparent.
The insurance houses of New York and Boston neared collapse, bankrupted by claims from ruined shipowners.
The Union Navy spread itself thin across the coasts, hunting shadows that struck and vanished, only to find that they themselves were being hunted.
To Elias, the reports brought satisfaction deeper than victory.
Each ship melted, each cannon smelted, poured new credits into his vaults.
Already he had begun to plan fresh drafts, summoning yet more vessels, and riflemen squads to swell his power, while also considering deploying gatling guns into the field of battle as well, to create defensive lines the union could not break through.
While the Union bled in Virginia, he grew stronger across the sea, and their only real success was the continued advance in Louisiana, but with their navy suffering soon, they would need to pull back, while in future oaklahoma (indian territory) American forces were being driven back with territory even being lost in South Kansas, with Arizona and new mexico reeling under repeated Texan assualt.
By month's end, Elias stood once more over his maps in the fortress of Bar, the gaslamps flickering on his pale features.
Virginia was secure, for now.
Richmond had not fallen.
The Union had been driven back in bloody ruin, and worry was that D.C would be the capital to fall not Richmond.
But he knew it was not victory—only reprieve.
The North's forges still thundered.
New armies would come, larger and more terrible than before.
The South would squander its chance yet again, and when they faltered, his Greybacks would be needed more than ever.
His fingers traced the seas, where his black fleet prowled like wolves.
"Let them come,"
he whispered.
"Every step they take, every ship they launch, will feed me. And when they think themselves strongest…"
He paused, smiling faintly.
"…then the storm will break."