Dawn arrived pale and timid, like a maid bearing bad news.
The morning mist still clung to the folds of the valley when the soldiers of Sir Galvano da Torre, battle-hardened troops of Aurelia, ate in silence, seated on drums, stones, and corpses covered by tarpaulins. The smoke from breakfast mingled with the stench of mass graves. There was no time for mourning, nor space for regret.
Sir Galvano, mounted on his grey charger and wearing an armour that was spotless – perhaps too spotless – observed the surrounding hills with calculating eyes. He had lost soldiers, yes, between two thousand seven hundred and four thousand, according to Valeria's scouts' estimates, but for a commander with thirty-four thousand troops, they were acceptable losses. A fair price. And even more so now, with the arrival of reinforcements: ten thousand soldiers from Duke Lorenzo Granadoro, and ten thousand well-ordered muskets from Duchess Isabella Coronaforte. Galvano's true strength was yet to be revealed.
Baltasar Douramar, the brave, the impetuous, was now reckoning with the raw reality of his enthusiasm. Four thousand casualties, of which two thousand five hundred were either dead or mortally wounded. One thousand five hundred souls had fled in the silence of night, without looking back. The name Douramar, once spoken as a synonym for strength, was now muttered through clenched teeth with shame. By Valeria's order, his division would be withdrawn to the rear. They would remain in reserve, not as punishment, but out of necessity – to cover gaps, tend to the wounded, bury the dead, and perhaps, just perhaps, reclaim some honour in the dark hours to come.
Valeria saw them all: the living, the dead, those trembling with fever or fear. She did not trust numbers. A general's accounts rarely matched the truth of the trodden ground. But one thing she knew for certain – with all the strength the enemy now had, with twenty thousand fresh reinforcements marching to the sound of new drums, they expected to bury her name in the same place where Baltasar's city lay.
Still… she would not retreat.
As she had said that morning, her voice hoarse with dust and pride: 'If we are to die, let it be standing, with our hands on our weapons and our eyes wide open.'
Beautiful words, yes, but her twenty-seven thousand eight hundred soldiers would have to fight with the fury of gods to emerge victorious that day against Sir Galvano da Torre's fifty-two thousand.
Valeria climbed a small rocky promontory, once perhaps an altar to forgotten gods. Now, it was hers. And her words'.
Her cuirass did not gleam. It was scratched, stained with dried blood – her own, and that of others, a somewhat macabre reminder of her past campaigns. Silence fell over the soldiers, thousands of eyes fixed on her. Men and women of all ages, united by a single breath: the anticipation of death.
Valeria took a deep breath, like one diving before the final fight, and spoke with a clear, steady voice that did not ask for silence – it demanded it.
– For years, the lords of Aurelia looked down on us. They laughed at our fields, spat on our people's name. Called us backward, barbaric, useless. As if we were dogs barking from across the border.
She paused. The wind blew stronger. No one moved.
– And now they are forced to look us in the eye. To bring fifty thousand muskets to silence what they cannot understand: courage. Pride. Love for this land that will be ours. They bring numbers. We have purpose. They bring gold. We bring soul.
Her words poured like strong wine into hardened hearts.
– Yes, we are fewer. Yes, many of us will fall. But look at me – and they all looked – I know who you are. I know that one of you is worth ten of them. Because you fight for your home, not for a crown. Because you bleed for justice, not hollow honour.
A murmur began in the front ranks. Then voices. Then cries. Like fire running through dry brush. Clenched fists. Raised muskets. Eyes brimming. An ancient sound, as old as the world itself: the hunger to win.
– This is our place. This is our moment. Here, where the mighty think us weak, we will prove who we are! Ventora does not kneel! Ventora never kneels!
And in that instant, it was not Valeria who spoke. It was the voice of all buried kings and queens, of all mothers who had buried sons and daughters, of all burned and reclaimed fields. The hill roared with a fierce cry that could shake the walls of any city:
– VENTORA! VENTORA! VENTORA!
The ground shook. The crows took flight. And Valeria, at the summit, allowed herself the trace of a smile. She knew the battle was not won, but she also knew she had men and women willing to die for her.
In the distance, the dull beat of Aurelian drums could be heard, like a mechanical heart announcing the arrival of Solarius to the battlefield.
The bombardment began. A dry thunder tore through the skies and, in an instant, the trenches shook. The ground vomited earth and fire, and Ventoran lives were ripped away like weeds from soil.
Sir Galvano's batteries had begun the day of battle – and he came with his golden uniform and black powder.
Projectiles rained on all fronts, but it was Ventora's right flank that bore the weight of the hammer. That was where Galvano aimed to break through, where he was ready to stake his victory.
His salvos came in cadence, rhythmically, as if Aurelia's gunners had turned war into a symphony: first, the heavy pieces; then, the howitzers; then, the mortars. And in the midst of the thunder, the screams of the dying blended with the roar of the explosions.
A Ventoran captain tried to maintain order among his troops. He no longer shouted commands – he shouted to survive the noise.
– Get down, for all the gods' sake! Dig those damned holes deeper or you'll die standing like rotten posts!
Some were already dead. Others crawled in flames. And others stared at the sky with empty eyes, as if their souls had already left their bodies.
The sound of the bombardment still echoed through the hills when the messengers set off, one by one, like arrows loosed from Valeria's own hand. They rode exhausted horses, eyes squinting through the smoke, orders pressed tightly to their chests. None must fall. None could fail.
– Let all division commanders receive my words – she said, without raising her voice, yet in such a way that no one dared interrupt. – Hold position. Do not pursue. And return fire with precision, but only when the enemy is within proper range. Nothing more. Nothing less.
From the top of her hill, she could see the Aurelian lines shifting, confused and tense. The orders reached the posts in under an hour. On the hills flanking the field, the black mouths of Ventoran cannons answered back.
They wanted blood, and they had just been unleashed like slumbering beasts.
The hill that defended the right flank was harsh, with dry soil, covered in sharp rocks and thorny shrubs. It had no name on the maps, but the soldiers who survived there came to call it Blood Hill.
Sir Galvano sent the first assault shortly after the eighth bell. Five thousand fusiliers. He thought the exhaustion of the dawn and the loss of psychological ground had broken them. He was wrong.
The low walls, hastily reinforced with sandbags and broken carts, held like ancient fortifications. From above, the Ventorans unleashed concentrated fire from muskets and short-range cannons. The thunder echoed like storms in an iron tempest.
The first assault lasted twenty-seven minutes. In the end, the Aurelians retreated, leaving behind over a thousand corpses, many of them face down, as if still trying to grasp the soil of the hill.
– They'll be back – said Captain Merval Argentos, of Fausto Campodouro's Eighth Infantry Regiment, as he wiped the blood from his brow with the back of his hand, not knowing if it was his own.
And they did return.
The second assault came before the wounded could be collected. This time, with more weight: eight thousand soldiers, bearing Galvano's divisional banners. They came running, shouting, trying to break through the northern flank, where the terrain appeared more accessible.
But Valeria had been expecting this.
She had ordered small powder charges to be buried beneath the soil. When the weight of the Aurelian soldiers stepped on the right spot, the ground exploded. Bodies flew like rag dolls, and the front collapsed into screams and ashes.
The Ventorans did not shout victory. There was no time. Every minute, the musketeers reloaded, the artillerymen cleaned the barrels, the wounded were either carried away or left to die.
Around ten in the morning, Galvano launched the third wave. Now with ten thousand troops. Fresh reserves. Mounted officers. Drums beating an implacable march. It was brute force. And it almost worked.
The Aurelians reached the walls. They fought with bayonets and teeth. There were moments when the banner of Aurelia fluttered on the parapet… for a moment.
In the end, the Aurelians retreated for the third time. Another four thousand dead. A thousand missing. Ventora's right flank still held.
Valeria watched from afar. Her eyes fixed on the battlefield through her monocular and one hand over a map. She did not celebrate.
– He has more hosts – she murmured. – But each charge costs him blood.
While Sir Galvano da Torre pushed against Ventora's right flank, Isabella Coronaforte – of old family name and iron pride – had orders to strike the centre of Valeria's formation, while Lorenzo Granadoro – a cautious man, beloved by his troops – had been tasked with assaulting Ventora's positions on the left flank.
The centre's defenders numbered only six thousand, but they had the advantage of terrain: deep trenches, barricades reinforced with stone and timber, and a line of seasoned riflemen under the command of Gaspar Salinaterra and Silvano Rocaviva.
The first Aurelian charge broke like a wave against rocks: hundreds of bodies torn apart under the concentrated fire of muskets and light artillery. But Isabella did not retreat. She ordered the iron drums to sound and attacked again, and again.
The Ventoran lines were narrower than ideal. If Aurelia broke the centre, it would have a chance to open Ventora's heart. Isabella Coronaforte sent her soldiers forward until Ventoran blood drowned her own feet.
The battles raged for hours. Every inch of ground taken was quickly retaken by a fierce counterattack. The Ventorans held the line with determination, through smoke, screams, and shattered flesh. Many died with their hands still clutching their rifles. Others died standing, impaled on bayonets fixed to muskets, without taking a single step back.
On the left flank, Lorenzo Granadoro attacked as well.
There, the forest closed like a fist over the swamp, and the swamp, ancient as the bones of the world, did not forgive haste. The maps called it Leech Field, though few knew why. They were about to find out.
Granadoro attempted lateral manoeuvres, but the ground gave way beneath their feet. Ammunition wagons sank to the axles. Horses were swallowed by the thick mud. The men and women marched and fell, and for each one who fell, two hesitated.
The Ventorans, already familiar with the terrain, in addition to conventional tactics, used guerrilla methods. They ambushed from between the trees. They fired accurate shots through the fog. They also laid traps and placed mines hidden inside hollow logs.
It didn't take much to kill Aurelians on that flank. Improvised defences had been prepared, and the riflemen fired without much return fire. But the swamp did not forgive. Many Aurelians, once trapped, became easy prey for the southerners, who struck before they were even seen.
Midday arrived like a burning blade, slicing the morning in two with a harsh light that spared nothing: not the corpses, nor the wet blood on the stones, nor the exhaustion etched into the faces of every soldier. This was the critical phase of the battle, where generals are distinguished from butchers.
The combined forces of Galvano da Torre, Isabella Coronaforte, and Lorenzo Granadoro launched their most ambitious manoeuvre: a disguised flanking. A wide, encircling movement, aimed at taking the hill from the side, where the terrain was more exposed, more brittle. Crushing the front was not enough – they had to break Ventora's spine.
Light columns, scouts, and rapid infantry units began to move in wide arcs, skirting the front lines.
But Valeria was not blind.
Since daybreak, Ventora's artillery had remained silent on the far right flank. Not from lack of ammunition, nor fear – but due to strategy. The hilltop cannons had been carefully placed in positions that criss-crossed the terrain's blind spots. They had waited for this. For this move.
When the first Aurelian detachments emerged on the flanks, thinking themselves hidden by trees and rocks, the hill awoke in fury.
Crossfire fell upon them – not a blind salvo, but coordinated shots, pre-calculated, meticulously tuned. The iron mouths spat chained projectiles, lead shrapnel, and balls heated red-hot. Trees exploded into splinters. Soldiers screamed, not knowing where death came from.
– Hold! Hold the cadence! – Valeria shouted, pointing with her spyglass and marking time with her arm like a conductor of the apocalypse.
The Aurelian soldiers, caught between two angles of fire, could neither advance nor retreat. They tried hiding in ravines, behind rocks, beneath corpses. All in vain. The dust and smoke made the air unbreathable.
From the top of the hill, Valeria gave her final order. Her voice, deep and unadorned, echoed among the runners and officers like a death knell for Aurelia's hosts. The six thousand soldiers of Baltasar Douramar – now hardened and thirsting for vengeance for what their compatriots had done to their city – left their reserve positions with cold precision. They did not march like saviours, but like reapers.
The hill where the Ventoran centre had held, besieged and struck without pause for hours, roared back to life. Douramar's golden banners tore across the horizon, and their drums beat a rhythm not of parade, but of punishment.
On the right flank, where the walls and the slope of the terrain had scythed down Galvano da Torre's men and women like a sickle cuts wheat, the defenders – wounded but unbroken – charged down the hill in a limited but savage sortie. They were few, but they struck with cruel precision.
Among the Aurelians, many were already trembling before steel ever reached them. The lines broke into cries of confusion and contradictory orders. The standards began to fall back – some folded, others trampled in the bloodied mire.
Isabella Coronaforte, at the centre, tried to reorganise her companies while Douramar's soldiers struck like a burning hammer. Shouts of 'crossfire' and 'to the rear!' cut through the chaos, but few knew where they came from or where to flee. The soldiers of the Aurelian line, exhausted by the fruitless charges of the morning, retreated without order, without honour – only the instinct for survival guided them.
On the left flank, where the swamp had already swallowed hundreds under Lorenzo Granadoro's command, panic spread like wildfire through dry brush. Granadoro, still mounted, shouted at his men to hold formation, but his eyes said what his mouth dared not: it was too late.
Only on the right flank, under the iron hand of Galvano da Torre, did the Aurelians hold – but they were alone. The general rode among his troops with his sword drawn, cursing the gods, the king, and his own soldiers. He held back the advance of chaos, but he could not reverse it.
The sun was already beginning to descend, and the sky turned red as though in mourning for the thousands of men and women covering the field. The earth was soaked with blood, and in some areas, the wounded cried out, unable to move. The second day of the Battle of Porto Dourado had come to an end, but there was no triumph in the eyes of the living – only weariness and awe.
Valeria remained still, still mounted on her horse, her clothes stained with smoke and gunpowder, as she watched the final skirmishes dissipate like mist in the wind. Neither army had the strength to continue. Soldiers who, hours earlier, had marched with blazing eyes and hearts full of fervour now lay dead or staggered like broken spectres.
When she returned to the Ventoran camp, the royal standard was raised beside her tent, but no one had the strength to shout victory. The battle had not been won – only survived.
Inside the tent, the silence was thick like coagulated wine. Valeria removed her gloves and stood beside the map table, waiting. When her daughter entered, there were no embraces or smiles – only a slight nod.
Lucia Ventoforte's face was smeared with soot, but her eyes were clear and sharp as ever. In her hand she held a parchment marked with dried blood.
– How many? – Valeria asked, without taking her eyes off the map.
– Four thousand eight hundred – replied Lucia, her voice as firm as the steel of a blade. – Two thousand three hundred on the right flank, one thousand two hundred at the centre, five hundred on the left flank, and two hundred from Baltasar Douramar's reserves.
The Queen did not blink. Those numbers were not just men and women – they were fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, brothers, and sisters. But they were also inevitable. The price of resistance. The tribute of honour.
– And the Aurelians?
Lucia inhaled before replying.
"We estimate that Sir Galvano da Torre lost six thousand soldiers. Isabella Coronaforte's division, two thousand. Lorenzo Granadoro's, three thousand. In total, around eleven thousand dead or gravely wounded.
A heavy silence fell over the tent. Valeria raised her hand and slowly placed it on the map, beside the hill that had so nearly been taken. The Queen's eyes briefly rested on her daughter.
– So then – she said at last, in a voice that seemed to rise from an ancient tomb, – we made them pay more than they were willing to. But they have not yet given up. As expected. Leave me to my thoughts for now, my daughter. I must consider what we shall do to end this tomorrow.
Lucia nodded. Outside, the crows were already dancing over the corpses.
The canvas of the tent still swayed lightly with Lucia's exit when Valeria was finally alone. The amber light of the evening filtered through the fabric, casting golden shadows over the map. For a moment, she simply stared in silence. The distant murmur of the field – the crackle of torches, muffled groans, weary voices – sounded like the whisper of the dead.
The Queen of Ventora slowly raised her hands. They were a warrior's hands, calloused by steel, stained with ink, sweat, and the touch of others' wounds. Hands that had signed death sentences, sealed fragile alliances, and raised swords against men and women who had once sworn her loyalty.
Now they trembled.
No one saw her fall to her knees. None of her generals, her counsellors or soldiers knew that, that night, Valeria – the Queen of the Winds, the Lady of the Southern Rocks – broke down in tears.
She wept as if drowning. As if the names of the four thousand eight hundred men and women lost that day echoed in her chest like an empty cavern. The names she did not know. The faces she would never see. She cried for those she had sent to die. For the young who had shouted her name as they marched, certain that victory was written. For mothers and fathers, wives and husbands, who would not have the bodies of those they loved to bury.