Gra Gryning

[Cherico]

General Isack brook

On the siege of Mackinac, it was a necessary action for our victory in Michigan, which was complete and utter. You see at the end of the day our success required us to be able to work with our native allies and that meant we had to get rid of any forces that got in the way of that alliance.
Both sides had bad apples and bad actors, people that would ruin our chances of victory in the west, fort

Mackinac was where we sent those bad apples. I had intelligence reports, I knew that the fort itself wasn't as important as the island itself, and how limited their supplies were.
We could put the fort to siege, keep the troublemakers from bollocksing up our plans, and our plans were simple, use our native allies to cut off their supplies, use british and canadian regulars to attack and crush their militia forces and then use overwhelming force to crush the actual american military forces.

We spread misinformation, we made them chase ghosts, we used natives to launch surprise attacks on their magi forces and do the dirty work that was necessary for victory. Through out the war in the west these tactics worked but they required an iron will, knowlege of the lay of the land and teamwork.
We held Michigan throughout the entirety of the anglo-american war and I like to think I was a part of that, the americans celebrate the siege of Mackinac but I consider a small fort to be a much lesser prize then an entire territory.

Then came the next part of the campaign, the Ohio campaign, our work with our native allies was our greatest strength but it also proved to be our greatest weakness. I met Tectumsusia and deeply respected him, he in my opinion had more vision and clarity of mind then any other native leader in the conflict, and in those early days probably had a more organized government then the americans.

I honestly think that with our victories in Michigan and main and other fronts that we probably could have gotten a negotiated settlement with in that year. The empire did have the napoleonic campaigns to deal with and this sideshow, and a drawn out conflict with a nation that had more then 8 million people and held the greatist concentration of magic in the world was not in our interests.

Unfortantly Techumsa's control over the numerous allied tribes that made up confederacy was at times sporatic at best, and massacres, rapes, looting and other atrocities were unfortunately the norm despite our efforts to prevent it. There were even cases were surrendering troops were tortured and murdered. We punished the men responsible of course but by then it was much too late.

That magic I talked about earlier made communication from occupied Michigan to the rest of the country rapid, their newspapers reported all of it, much of it exaggerated of course but it pretty much crushed any chance of an easy settlement at that time, and the defense of Ohio proved to be a lot stronger then Michigan.

To this end we asked for allies, with more money, men, and ships. It was thought that we could get a negiotated settlement eaiser the war was now much harder to win. Spain at that time was our ally and deeply resented the fact that many rebels against their authority recieved magical training in Compass. Deeply resented the rampent smuggling, it didn't take that much effort to convince them to join our cause.

Denmark was a surprise, they had been a neutral country during the napoleonic campaigns but with two great empires at war with a far weaker country they thought they would be able to recieve a colony with a short victorious war.

With this alliance in place we thought the americans would immediately come to the negiotating table, and then our war aims would be met. The americans would stop smuggling goods into Europe, the whole issue of impressment would be put off until the conflict was over, our native allies would form a buffer state that would protect Canada and block american expansion, the danes would receve a colony, and for Spain only people from an approved list would be allowed to study magic.

Unfortunately those massacres convinced the americans that the conflict was a war of national survival, the rather unfortunatet killing of surrendering american troops convinced their military that surrender was not an option, and what should have been a limited conflict that was a sideshow of a much greater one turned into something that proved to drag on.

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton

1813, a new year. It was still cold and still snowing as we made it to New Hampshire. As we went east the roads got better stronger, wider. Most major roads were made with massive stone blocks, they were good solid roads built to last and I wondered secretly if they would outlast the country that created them.

I saw burned villages, wounded and signs of conflict all around me. Men walked around nervously with guns out in the open, what buildings I saw were boarded and ready for attack, one time we saw a woman's corpse, her head had been scalped. We worked together to bury her. We went to Zone through a southern route to hopefully avoid most of the fighting and we had been ordered to do that.

All of us felt a sense of weakness, of impotence, of frustration but we kept that to ourselves as we marched. When we finally got to Zone we saw corpses, thousands and thousands of corpses. I felt worried terrified, the bodies were mangald, burned and in pieces, then I saw men in purple uniforms digging holes. They looked at me with dead eyes.

"What happened?"

One of the men walked towards me.

"The british attacked, about a week ago, we won."

He put his shovel into the earth.

"Do we know what their plans were?"

"Knock Zone out of the war quickly as possible, the militia men were damned useless, they ran instead of fighting or they broke or they were just terrible, and there were not enough of us."

"So?"

"When Maine fell a lot of people started running, there was no organization and not enough actual troops, everything was a mess. Then it was mostly defense, they didn't move. Should of known they were gathering up troops, preparing for something big, they cut through us like a knife through butter."

He looked up.

"Then they attacked Zone."

"So prisoners?"

"None... the magi they killed them all, they didn't run, they didn't hesitate they just killed. I've known people who have trained for war their entire lives, seen them hesitate or not actually shoot the enemy. It takes a lot to train people not to do that."

He looked at the city warely.

"The magi though they just killed and killed and then they were fine, like it was all normal, like it was part of a deal, like a part of a contract or something."

"We're in the middle of a war, isn't that a good thing?"

He put his shovel in.

"Maybe so, it's still not... it's not natural."

We passed the man and let him continue his digging, we saw a glowing bird in the air and then we were stopped by a man in purple.

"Business?"

I showed him my papers.

"Good, wish you had gotten here a week ago. Follow me."

I followed him and saw a giant wall. Doors were opened and I saw men in uniforms, strange ones, wearing glasses that were strapped to their heads with rubber straps. Then I saw strange contraptions, they looked like ships but they had something that looked like a sausage above them, they were also purple.

"Sir what's going on?"

"You and your men are not longer in the US army."

New uniforms were brought to us, I saw men load small cannons into the contraptions.

"Whats going on?"

"We're in a new war now, we have responded to that by creating a new wing to the military, a new way of fighting. Welcome to the US Air force Lieutenant Hamilton. Let's pray to god we all survive."

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton

I was walked around the strange contraptions.

"What are these things?"

"Airships, not the first ones of course, the old bird's been experimenting with them for awhile trying to make something for the postal service."

"The postal service?"

Building flying machines for postal workers, it was insane until you thought about the possibility of raids, accidents and other disasters.

"Yes, well anyways when the war was declared, without informing us about it by the way, that old project was put into production. The result are three models of airship, Crow, Seagull, and Pelican."

I nodded.

"Crows are the smallest ones, their job is to act as scouts and transport mail."

The Crow was the smallest of the three.

"This is the Seagull, medium sized its job is to act as a bomber. It carries one 50 poundColumbiad cannon, rifled for accuracy. This ship's job is to help destroy enemy ships."

"A single cannon isn't going to sink a man of war."

"It isn't supposed to, your job is to take out their masts, take away their abilty to maneuver so that it will be easier for the Navy to sweep in and actually destroy them. If a gull actually sinks an enemy ship we won't complain but that's not what they're built to do."

"So solid or scatter?"

"Solid shot, scatter isn't accurate enough from the distances you will be firing at."

"So?"

"Your ship will be a Seagull. Last of the three the largest is the Pelican, its job is to help transport troops and goods. We need Autumn magi to control the air around the ships in order to guide the. Iif we don't have one they would just go with the wind."

"Which would be bad, I gathered."

We followed the officer as he led us outside and to a boat.

"Where are we going?"

"To get trained on how to fly and use these things."

"Wouldn't it be best to go to the fort or um..."

"The airfield and no we do not have enough time to do that. We need fully trained crews yesterday, fortunately the old bird finished a major project."

"What kind of project?"

"Something that lets you learn a whole lot faster, we won't be the only ones using it of course."

Our ship sped off into the water and landed at the tree. Servitors looked at us and waved us past. We were marched into an elevator and put into a dark room with things that resembled a peapod.

"And this?"

"Welcome to your classroom."

The pods opened and we were put inside, the world changed and I saw a warped human and a strange wooden room.

"Well.... Well well... welllcome to your.... your training...training... simulator we,we will start your train... training now."

Needless to say I was not filled with confidence.

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


The training was odd and dull but it did work, the secrets of fighting in the air, of cannon,of firepower and codes had been drilled into us, the process seemed to take months but only actually took a couple of days, then we were shown to our airship and allowed to train on it for real.

After the time in the pod it was easy, others were put into pods and then the army, the navy and the newly born airforce came together, a mirror was placed before us on a field, and we saw in that mirror President madison. Only those of higher rank were allowed to talk. A large area in the middle was cordoned off. When Merlin landed we understood why.

"These are dark days for our young republic, the british empire has come back to destroy us, to steal our liberties, they come with an army of savages. All of you know what happened to Michigan, you understand what will happen here."

We had read the newspapers and we nodded.

"They do not come alone, other despots have agreed to join them in our attack on our nation, the spanish and the Danish the survival of the republic of our country is at stake, Merlin what do you think you can do?"

Merlin tilted his head.

"Both Spain and England have some magical defenses, not strong ones not dedicated ones but enough to keep me from doing anything big, and portions of their leyline network are tapped which makes it even harder, Denmark though is completely undefended."

"Then as president I command you to take them out of the war."

Merlin stared at the president.

"How do you want me to do it?"

The president had bags under his eyes in my spot I could see the weariness.

"I want you to bring darkness to the land, I want you to silence the voices of war, I want their navy destroyed I want to make sure that the Danes will never forget what happened when they crossed the united states of america."

Merlins voice was hesitant.

"Are you sure about that? There is no taking this back sir it will make enemies."

"This is what I command as president of the united states what congress demands."

Merlin shrugged.

"I will try my best to limit civilian casualties then, so about my request."

Madison sighed.

"In lieu of financial repayment for your loans and services, we will allow you to take one island of choice from the enemy to do with as you please, we have also considered your proposed amendment and it is likely to pass."

"Great, well good luck gentleman I have work to do."

The president looked at us.

"As I said war has come to our doorstep, we are outnumbered and we all must work together to survive this great crisis. In light of that, in the west the great savage army is lead by a man named Techumseh I promise to promote any one in the military who successfully kills him to the rank of general or its equivalent. Please fight hard and pray that god helps save our country."

His image vanished and two men carried the mirror away. We went into our air ship, our duty would be to patrol the sea lanes in the gulf of mexico to damage spanish ships and report them to the navy so they could be finished off. Even with these new machines we had had nerves, but as I saw the world below us, as I observed the sky I felt like it was maybe worth it.

"It's beautiful."

Yancy's voice was full of awe.

"Yes it is."

I put my hands on the wheel and guided the ship with my magic.

"What will we call her? The ship I mean?"

I thought about it.

"The purpose."
​

 

[Cherico]

Christian the 8th of Denmark


It was on the 13th day of the 13th year that Merlin came to Copenhagen.

I watched as the palace guards fired everything they had at him, and watched as the bullets froze in midair. We froze too then, silent. The creature was huge, bigger then a horse, he glowed with power.

"I heard you have declared war on my country."

His danish was flawless, his voice reminded me of someone's grandfather, he spoke to us as one would speak to a disobedient child. The then current King, my half cousin Frederick, stood firm.

"Yes we have."

He looked at the king who looked at him defiantly.

"Good then I'm not wasting my time."

He looked at us.

"You have 3 days to surrender, do so and this conflict will be over."

"And if not?"

"Well I already destroyed any Danish ship heading towards the Americas so I guess I would finish the job and just sink your entire Navy."

The King crossed his arms.

"You wouldn't dare."

The creature the monster shrugged.

"I can be very daring when I wish, you have three days, see you soon your highness."

With that he flew away, the bullets we had shot at him fell to the ground.

"This is nothing to worry about Chris, it's an empty threat that monster can't hurt us."

Three days later on the 16th day of the 13th year he came back, we were ready for him though our men sprang up we used muskets, cannon and then watched as every cannon ball, every bullet froze in the air, we felt cold and none of us could move. The creature looked at us at the king.

"Are you ready to surrender your highness?"

"Never."

The creature sighed.

"Very well, but I am not without mercy, I will destroy your navy, your armies, your ability to fight, but I will not harm a single place of worship, a single place of learning, and try to spare many innocents as I can."

He flew away into the air, our cannon balls, our bullets fell to the ground, and then it started raining. I had never seen a hurricane before, never seen just how terrifying and dangerous they could be, for three days there was rain, for three days we watched every ship we had be destroyed before our eyes. We watched as fortresses were ripped from their foundations.

But true to the creature's word not a single place of prayer was damaged, not a single school, the palaces of the nobility, the great fortresses of our country were demolished but the houses of the common folk were passed over. For three days this happened, on the third day the creature came back.

"For the sake of your country, for the sake of your people surrender King Fredrick of Denmark."

"FIRE!"

The palace guards had even more guns, even more cannons, they did nothing. The glowing creature the monster stared at us in boredom.

"Fredrick of Denmark if you had surrendered when I first talked to you, you would havemerely lost some ships, because of your pride your navy is destroyed, your army in ruins you are defenseless, surrender now and this will be the end of it."

The proud king of Denmark stared at the monster in defiance.

"Never."

"Fredrick of Denmark, I know that you love the stars and the sun in the sky, because of your pride I will take them away. Fredrick king of Denmark I know that you love music and conversation because of your pride I will take them away. Fredrick man of Denmark I know that you love the outside world because of your pride I will take it away from you."

He stared at us.

"I will see you in a month, take care."

He flew up into the air, it was noon then the sun high in the sky, the world went dark. I was a young boy then and I was frightened so I screamed, but no sound came out. None of us could speak, none of us could make any noise. Merlin had brought darkness and silence to our country.

We learned though that we could still communicate with the written word by candlelight. Our people tried to escape to the outside world but found that some strange invisible wall prevented anyone from entering and anyone from getting out.

We spent that month rebuilding our countries fortresses, rebuilding our army in darkness and silence, the people of Denmark would not be cowed. When that creature came back to Copenhagen the entire danish military was there, we used every cannon we had, every bullet we had. We watched as the bullets flowed around him

The bullets and the cannon balls became red hot and melded together, a statue was built out of these bullets, an exact replica of the king. Then he landed. The King stood his ground defiant.

"I give you permission to talk King of Denmark."

My cousin the king cursed the monster, he used every insult he knew, none of us could move, none of use could speak.

"Are you ready to surrender?"

"Never monster."

"See you in a month then."

The silence returned, the people of Denmark took the second month harder then the first, but we were still determined, still willing to bravely resist the monster, but we prayed more, and the mood was more somber. There was just the darkness, and the silence, but we worked together.

The monster returned on the second month, the people of Copenhagen were ready, we threw bombs, we used missiles, we fired cannons, and guns, some of us used arrows and even balistas, we used weapons blessed by every holy man we had.

They did just as much damage as last time, we watched as our weapons did nothing watched as an even bigger statue of the king was created. The creature landed and yawned.

"So are you willing to surrender yet?"

The creature snapped its fingers.

"Never."

"See you in a month then Freddy."

The silence returned, the mood of the third month was much uglier, sadder, the look of defiance on our faces faded the monster returned, once again we tried to kill him once again, once again we failed and once again a statue was created.

"Are you finished with this nonsense yet?"

The king shook with rage.

"Go to hell."

The monster cracked it neck.

"Oh I talked to the people in Norway, lovely people by the way, they declared independence so I don't see a reason to include them in our little grudge."

A book floated towards the King, he read it and in the torchlight I saw his face go red.

"See you in a month."

A depression covered the land of Denmark, the silence got to us I think, the monster came back on that forth month another statue was created and another month passed.

When the 5th month came people started to go mad, there were suicides, murders, and bouts of madness. People got angry they wanted the light back, they wanted to live in a world without silence. When Merlin came back people from around the country came to shoot at him, the entire country stood as one and once again it did nothing.

The King gave a speech in front of his people he talked of god, he talked of country, he talked of our willpower and our history.

"So you're not surrendering then?"

Merlin shrugged and flew away, the silence returned, the 6th month was when the attacks began, when the revolts against the king against us began, they were small in scale at first and then grew as the nation became madder and madder. We were able to put them down successfully but at great cost.

When Merlin came on that 7th month we didn't fire a single shot, our people looked at him with eyes filled with defeat. The King looked at him, he didn't stand up straight he just kind of slumped.

"What do you want monster?"

"Going to surrender?"

The King of Denmark my cousin looked down in defeat.

"Yes, what do you want?"

"Well, before you became stubborn I was only going to ask that you stop your war with my country but now that you have wasted 7 months of my time? Now I think I want an Island. Greenland sounds nice as my personal property to do with as I please."

"So be it."

The proud people of Denmark surrendered that day, our ministers, our king, our royalty, we surrendered, and then the light came back to our land, then the noise came back to the land, we had surrendered we had been defeated but we were so glad to have light and sound that we had great celebrations and parties.

My cousin was less proud after that, less haughty. We never got Norway back, not within my life time at least, and those of us who lived through it never forgot that dark year.

 

[Cherico]

General Isack brook


1813 proved to be a much more difficult year for us.


The Danes proved to be completely useless, yes they got hit by a storm yes much of their navy was destroyed yes many of their armories were destroyed but the storm only lasted 3 days, the vast majority of their cities were completely untouched, but for the next 7 months all they did was mope.

They didn't talk to our diplomats, the people were extra rude and standoffish, for 7 months and then they surrendered, and no I don't believe this 7 months of darkness and silence nonsense that the danes insist happened. I had family members who visited Denmark, the sunshone the entire time, if anything people were too loud while they were there.

People from other countries were there, traders, merchants, diplomats and students, and they all agreed that the sun shone in the sky, that there was plenty of noise, and it was pretty easy to move back and forth between the country. It was just the danes being overly dramatic about one storm, and anyways Norway would have gone through the exact same thing except they mentioned they just remembered feeling depressed for a couple months and declared independence because of the war.

If Merlin was capable of covering the land with darkness and silence why didn't he do it to England? Why not Spain? And why was it that only the danes saw this darkness? I attribute it to a collective bout of madness and cowardice.

Meanwhile for me I had to deal with the american's new warmachines and their selfrighteousness.

Which bothered me because they started the whole bloody war!

So on the western front and our eastern front we fell into a stalemate. We couldn't get past their lines and any time there was an advance into our lines we cut off their supplies and knocked them out. The new american air force made life more difficult for us, but not in the way every one thinks.

The seagulls guns proved to be wildly inaccurate when it came to hitting men on the ground, I don't know of any one who actually got killed by their cannons. The americans, to their credit stopped, using them on us within three months, but its those three months that somehow defined the campaign in the british imagination.

No the real threat to us where the damned Ravens. I loathed seeing those little puffs of purple because it meant that the americans would know we were coming, and there always seemed to be at least one of those bloody things around. The second threat were the pelicans because they allowed the americans to redeploy troops quickly.

This meant that any advance would be caught and that troops would be there to meet us, we couldn't advance into american territory and they couldn't advance into ours. The wizards and witches and magic didn't change that. The americans put most of their magic users into either the navy or the new airforce. When we encountered magic users it was normally as a part of a much larger unit.

The only time we encountered a mass of them working together was the Zone campaign, which I advised against. With Denmark out of the war and with a stalemate on the ground Spanish and English forces decided to focus on a naval campaign.

The new airforce though meant that their ships always knew where we were, their communications were better then ours, and with magic their ships were faster, but we had more sailors, more ships and more production. It was thought that in time we could push the american's into a negotiated settlement, but with the loss of Denmark that possibility became more distant. The fact that the entire spanish empire was on fire only made things worse.

With that said we need to get to the elephant in the room as it were, the battle of Zone. I respected General Drummond or as I called him Gordy he had quite easily smashed an attempted advance into canada by the americans and then successfully managed to captureMaine before being slowed then stopped cold in New Hampshire.

He had been told to behave defensively, but he thought that it would be best to defeat the americans as quickly as possible, to this end he thought it would be best to gather a goodly amount of native allies, and canadian forces and attack the City of zone directly and quickly. With the city of magic destroyed the rest of the country would fall with it.

I advised against it but he had a secret plan, and I learned some thing that deeply troubled me.

Project Rubbish

After the revolution and the creation of compass a decision was made to disrupt the school. It was thought that the best way to do it would be to overwhelm the school with sheer numbers.

So a collection of british PMs gathered orphan children from around the isles, scotland, england, wales, Ireland and sent them to Compass to zone. We would be free of useless beggars and the school would collapse under the sheer weight of our garbage.

This did not work, so project rubbish decided to look for damaged children, the blind, those who couldn't walk the sickly the insane.

This also didn't work, so we decided to send deaf children everyone knew they were unteachable the term deaf and dumb existed for a reason this also didn't work. One of the members of project rubbish had a membership on the board of the East India company.

He decided that if the rubbish of england wasn't enough then maybe they should go to india, so he asked for beggar girls, girls because it was known that girls were not as capable as men, he even put a bounty on them, with bounty's rising according to how disabled they were.

Blind, deaf, missing limbs, and female, was the gold standard, project rubbish didn't have a lot of money so the india project was only able to get maybe 100 girls from india a year but it was quality over quantity in their case, point is none of this worked, and after 30 years of failing their official task project rubbish became more about removing england's trouble children.

But we had agents in Zone, and even if they were unwanted they were still english children and General Drummond believed they could be turned towards our cause. Our agents contacted these now grown up children with a plot to take the city from within.

They would be rewarded with land in the homeland, the indian girls would be returned home to their former lives of begging. The agents reported success and General Drummond moved in.

It was a trap.

Those children? They were no longer english, no longer welsh, no longer scottish, no longer irish, most of them had been sent as small children and either didn't remember the motherland, or had distant memories, some of them deeply resented and even hated us for abandoning them.

They didn't think of the head master as a monster, to many of them that creature was a father figure, their teacher, in some cases their god. The city was warned, troops melted away and the city of Zone murdered every single man we had, General Drummond included.

The loss of men, material, and the sheer shock of our loss ended up causing us to lose Maine. It was only with quick thinking and luck that we were able to save canada.

When I found out about the Zone massacre I was faced with a sick realization that we had crafted the weapon that might ultimately cost us the war. At the beginning Zone had at most a population of 4,000 people. Because of our efforts Zone was at that time the third most populated city in the americas.

51,000 people rounding down, most of whom were magi, the largest concentration of magic in the entire world, and it hated us.

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


We were the first men to ever truly fight in the air in a dedicated manner.

"Its overrated."

Oxhorn looked bored as he looked through the telescope.

"Its a brilliant masterpiece how can you say that?"

Yancy looked offended by my second's beliefs.

"First of all I didn't like the so called hero of the story."

Yancy made a coffing sound.

"He was a man of poetry and love."

Oxhorn sighed.

"He was an overly pompous fop who fell in love with a woman. Thats fine, everyone falls in love but then he finds out the woman is engaged."

"Yes tragic."

"No no it isn't, the girl he's in love with, Charlotte? She has family to look after she has responsibilities yes she was marrying another man an older man but Werther actually got to know him and finds out he's actually a good man."

"I know torn between his love and his duty."

"When he found out he should have left, this ruse to befriend both of them? Its unsettling."

"Its love."

"Yancy I have been in love, I am married I have three children two of them are girls. If my girl was engaged and I found out some other boy was trying to get up her petty coats? I'd punch him, I'd punch him right in the face."

"You would get in the way of young love?"

"I would be protecting my daughter and her reputation in a harsh world, so going on this Werther ok maybe he thought he had a chance while she was engaged but they got married, at that point he should have moved on with his life, the only thing he could do at that point was make things worse for every one."

"That's sad. Its tragic."

"Its life, my wife wasn't the first woman I loved there were others but it didn't work out. That doesn't mean there was anything wrong with them or with me it just was not going to work out. They married other men, good men. It may have hurt at the time but I learned how to move on from it. Grow from it, I didn't kill myself."

"But it was the only way to settle things someone had to die."

Oxhorn looked up at Yancy.

"No, no it wasn't. People deal with unrequited love every day and they don't kill themselves. The only admirable thing he did was not follow through with those feelings and destroy a perfectly good relationship."

"She mourned for him."

"Yeah having your friend kill yourself has a tendency to make people sad. I honestly don't know why this tripe is so popular as it is."

"Goethe is one of the greatest authors of our time."

"Boy if thats true we clearly live in dark times."

"All right Oxhorn sir what do you consider to be great literature."

Oxhorn continued to study the ocean below us.

"I brought a couple books about appletrees and all the products you can make out of it, the cider section was very useful."

"A book about apples."

"My family owns an orchard its practical, this book about a lovesick idiot who kills himself isn't practical its just kind of annoying."

He sighed.

"We have ships, they're spanish."

I looked outside at the darkness.

"You sure?"

"You specifically enchanted this thing to see in the dark, Im seeing spanish flags, and we definitely have a warship."

"Is it heading north, west, or south."

"West, to Mexico."

"Lets sink it."

"Our guns don't have the power to do that by themselves."

"We can use the cannonball I've been working on, the one I carved runes into."

"Which would require us to actually hit the ship, we normally miss a couple times before we land a direct hit."

I thought about it.

"I can alter things make the possibility of a hit more likely, it would take time."

Oxhorn shrugged, the wind was with us, so when I sat down and drew circles on the airship we continued to follow the spanish warship.

"You know this ship has friends right?"

I smiled.

"And none of their guns point up."

Killing a galleon took luck, a lot of fire power and patience. We lingered over the largest warship of the small floatilla as I cast a spell to minimize the sound. Sure the drain would not be fun but it prevented what was about the only way to locate us at night.

"Yancy?"

"Lining up the shot in my sights, aiming at the center mass."

The cannon flashed and I looked at Oxhorn, he waited and then we smiled as bright lights and fire filled the view.

"What did you do?"

"Made an enchanment, so it would explode after impact, one that would set the ship on fire."

Enchanting cannonballs was quite simply time consuming, finding targets also time consuming, properly aiming a shot time consuming. It would often take 2 weeks of work to set up the destruction of a single ship.

"Well they know we're here by now."

My men pulled the gun back and reloaded the cannon, I moved the ship until Oxhorn told me we were in position. We used normal shells and after that first hit we mostly missed, but we were able to damage the flotilla, hit their masts. As the sun rose in the sky we flew away, we were too far from any american ships that were capable of finishing them off but the damage we caused would have to be fixed.

The spanish would have to go to the nearest port and fix that damage and in that time more ships could be lost, and since mexico was in rebellion that meant that the loyalists would have less reinforcements. Or that was what I told myself to keep going.

"How are we doing on cannon balls?"

"Out again."

I sighed.

"All right back home gentlemen time to restock."

Every little bit helped.

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton

New Orleans I felt the sense of unease as our ship landed, the city had been chosen to be one of the major bases for our new air force, but that didn't mean I particularly cared for the city. It had at one point belonged to spain, then to france, then to us and the result was a city that didn't feel like it belonged anywhere. If cities were books then new orleans was a jumbled up mess of stories that didn't quite fit together.

I split off from my men and went to an officers club, to relax, to get my bearings. As I walked in I saw a woman on the stage, I frowned at her purple uniform but I let those feelings of frustration go. We were in a time of war and had no choice but to tolerate this nonsense.

I sat down in an empty chair and listened to her as she played some odd instrument. While the other patrons listened to her play, I noticed her skin was dark but it wasn't the darkness of the african slave, her features were white maybe she was a mullato, or spanish, or indian I couldn't quite figure out what to make of her. As the light of the windows struck her body I noticed that her hair was a vivid shade of green. I looked away, as my nether regions reacted to her figure.

I dismissed those feelings as being caused by too much time away from the fairer sex.

"What do you want?"

"A Largar, some thing light."

The serving girl shrugged, the service might have been terrible but the air of this room of the bar was cool and refreshing even in the dismal heat outside. A glowing blue mass of crystals in the center of the room was responsible for that and radiated out coolness. I noticed that rank grew higher and higher as you got closer to said blue crystals.

When my beer came the music ended.

"You're in my seat."

I looked up at the green haired woman I was tired and perhaps didn't feel like a gentleman at the moment.

"I don't see your name on it."

"Its on the back of the seat, Kalki cant miss it."

I got up and turned the chair around and saw her name carved deep in the wood.

"I apologize then."

I looked around all the tables were full. blast.

"Mind if I take a seat?"

"Its a free country well unless we let the damned Limeys ruin every thing."

I took the seat opposed to her and sat down.

"So um the song I don't reconize it."

"Vivaldi summer I thought it was appropiate."

I noticed the compass mark on her uniform.

"Magi."

She nodded.

"Summer, and you?"

"Autum."

I prepared myself for a little comment.

"Hmm good season."

She sipped some thing and we sat there in akward silence.

"So, Kalki I never heard that name is it spanish or something?"

"Indian."

"Oh what tribe?"

She frowned.

"Actual india, india I have no idea why you call the tribals indians they're nothing like actual indians"

I shrugged.

"I don't know, so I have never met an actual indian before, I heard your pagans."

"Yes so?"

"So what are your gods like?"

She studied her drink.

"I don't have any Im an atheist."

I felt a sense of shock and horror.

"Why?"

I mean I could forgive her being a pagan but not to believe in any god?

"When I was a child, I was a beggar. I lived on the streets with other children and begged for money because I was born into the wrong caste, and it was the will of the gods that I be born into absolute poverty and be treated like garbage my entire life."

She sipped her drink.

"A life time of suffering and pain because I had the wrong parents, funny isn't it? But that didn't last when I was oh I don't know 6,7,8 I didn't know when I was born so I cant tell you my age some big burly men came and took me. I screamed for help and no one came, I prayed but those gods never helped me."

She paused.

"I was taken into a dark room, my arms were placed on a board and then they chopped them off, my still bleeding arms were shoved into hot coals. They let me rest after that for awhile, but then they brought out a red hot poker and well put it into each of my eyes, they finished it by using a mallet to break my back so I couldn't walk. After that they took me to the docks to those good christian englishmen and sold me like property."

She picked up her cup and swilled it.

"You see there was this school run by an evil monster and they wanted to destroy this school so these men of god bought girls like me and put them into the school to weaken it, to force it to collapse."

"Compass."

She nodded.

"Yes, we traveled there in the hull of the ship most of us died, a few of us lived, I spent months in that horrible darkness unable to see, unable to move, and with out my arms taken away from every thing I had ever known. My whole life had been nothing but pain and suffering but I was still alive. When I got there I prayed for death."

"And?"

"And I met him, Merlin, he told me that I could have my eyes back, my arms back, be able to walk again but I would lose my black hair."

"And you choose green?"

"Its a good color, I had my arms back, I could walk again, I could see and he made me an offer I could walk away or I could become his student. If I became his student he would feed me, cloth me, I agreed. For my entire life no one wanted to help me. Its strange a so called monster did more to help me then any human ever did."

She smiled.

"Best years of my life, he taught me how to read, how to write, he made me strong and helped me get started in my new life. When I finished my education he helped me find a job, it was a good living."

"That doesn't explain why your an atheist."

"Well some preacher came by and told me Merlin was a monster sent by the devil. Thought about him and his god, who always seemed to need some money, thought about the old gods of india who just wanted me to suffer and die because I wasn't one of their damned chosen ones, and I realized some thing. There is no god, it's all just stories humans made up so they can feel superior, to puff themselves up."

I may not be a pious man but I felt scandalized.

"Maybe god brought you here to be a mage to improve your life."

She rolled her eyes.

"Yes yes gods mysterious plan which involves lots of people suffering for some reason, I have heard that nonsense before."

"I think I can convince you its true."

She finished her drink.

"Tell you what, I'm stationed here in New Orleans, this is where I spend my free time, playing music, I will let you try to convince me about your invisible sky god if you let me try to convince you that it's all a load of nonsense."

I gritted my teeth.

"Very well, I will be back."

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton



"Reading that book we got you?"

Oxhorn turned the page, as yancy talked to him, one of our quieter members had the duty of searching for ships for us to hit.

"Unfortunately yes I am."

Yancy smiled.

"Great isn't it, the bard's a classic."

"Eh its all right I guess?"

"All right? this is romeo and juliet the best play ever made."

Oxhorn shrugged.

"Im not a big fan of plays to be honest."

"It's the greatest love story ever told."

Oxhorn stared at Yancy.

"Did we read the same story? because this looked like a cautionary tale to me."

"What are you talking about Oxhorn, it's a tale of tragic romance."

"No Yancy this is a story about two hormonal youths who ruined their lives because they thought with their lower halves instead of their brains. If their parents had been remotely responsible it never would have happened."

"You look at a story about two starcrossed lovers and that's what you see?"

"Romeo starts the story moping about some girl who rejected to him, got attached to the first pretty thing he saw, married her without asking for her father's consent while, remember this, their families are having a lethal feud and then he doesn't think to tell any one about the marriage."

Oxhorn paused.

"Which is forgivable because clearly their parents are not doing their job."

"All right Oxhorn how did you meet your wife since you're clearly a romantic."

He looked up.

"There was an add in the paper of women looking for husbands in america, I wasn't courting any one at the time so I decided to put in my name. The marriage agency gave me a chance to write to the girl and we wrote letters. She paid for my passage to the united states and we got married."

Yancy stared at him.

"You're not american?"

"Scottish actually I think, I grew up in glasgow."

"But you don't have an accent."

"It's easier to get promoted if you don't have one."

"So the family farm?"

"Was some thing my wife set up and created before I ever came to this country."

"And then once you married her you left her."

"Excuse me?"

"Well you joined the army."

"Because the farm wasn't doing very well and we needed money, I love my wife and my family deeply, but the apple orchard never sold enough apples or cider to really be a going concern to survive. Kentucky has a few forts so I joined up."

"And ended up in michigan, you live on the frontier what would happen if the indians attacked?"

"Lots and lots of dead savages, Yancy that's what would happen. My wife's a witch compass trained."

"Oh, so you um married a witch. How do you deal with well the issues that causes."

Oxhorn turned the page and looked up with boredom in his eyes.

"Can I tell you a secret Yancy? All women are witches mine is at least honest about it."

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


I was reading from my bible as we headed back home, we had run out of cannonballs again which meant going back to New Orleans.

"I assume you're going to talk to Kalki again."

I looked up with a look of annoyance at Oxhorn.

"Yes, your point being?"

Oxhorn laid back on his hammock.

"My point is that you should be honest about your true intentions with her."

"Im trying to save her soul."

Oxhorn rolled his eyes.

"You are the last person who should be spreading the word of god to any one."

"Why would you say that Oxhorn?"

He got up and sat on his hammok.

"You litterally spent close to a 4th of your life obsessed with revenge."

"I admittedly had a misspent youth but I have prayed to god for forgiveness and changed my former ways."

"You bragged about how you murdered him last week."

"Admittedly this was a recent change but I am dedicated to this new path."

"You bragged about how you killed him a straight razor yesterday, when Yancy dropped a cannonball on our heating system."

"Its damned cold up here, it was a moment of weakness."

Oxhord leaned back and groaned.

"Some times I feel like I am the only adult in this bloody contraption."

"I am very mature thank you very much."

"Then just admit you fancy the girl, every time we go to New Orleans you go out and talk to her every day."

"I am trying to spread the word of god Oxhorn."

"The woman is a firm atheist, she is very open about that fact and you are not going to change her mind and I think you know it. This is an excuse to go see a girl you fancy."

"I do not fancy her, my motives are entirely pure."

My sergeant put his hands under his head.

"My wife will be visiting New orleans."

"How, isn't the farm um?"

"Its being protected by my son, he learned how to fight from me and how to use magic by his ma, my girls are all witches too so the farm is safe."

"Good."

"But if you meet her you need to remember one thing, don't mention her voice."

"Good to know."

"She's very sensitive about it."

"I gathered."

"Also don't mention her height."

"Is she short?"

"Very, she isn't a dwarf but she is very short."

I looked over at Oxhorn who was a massive bean pole of a man.

"And you're very tall. How did you manage to have children at all."

Oxhorn smirked.

"Well when two people love each other very much they do a special hug and."

"Stop, I already know the mechanics of how it all works I was being sarcastic."

"If you don't want disturbing answers then don't ask disturbing questions John."

I sighed as my ears made a popping sound.

"Almost there."

We got up and opened the door, I took over the wheel and started guiding the ship back to land.

"By the way how do you control the ship when you're sleeping?"

"I don't."

"So um why didn't we just end up anywhere then?"

"I put the ship on a leyline, think of them as being like rivers of power, from there we can linger or just follow the river, theres a pretty big leyline that goes through new Orleans, nice nexus there."

"Really."

"Too bad about the rest of the south though."

He leaned forward.

"What do you mean?"

"Theres a big giant magical dead zone going from the states east of missipi river, south of Virginia, and north of florida."

"And florida?"

I shuddered.

"Some things wrong with the network there it just feels off."

I landed the ship and streched we walked outside.

"SCOTTY!"

A young girl ran towards us and hugged my lumbering ox of a sergeant.

"I missed you so much."

She had a high squeeky voice, something normal for a girl her age, and chestnut brown hair. She nuzzled into his chest.

"Missed you too lynn, this is my wife John."

I looked at her.

"Oh um so you married her young then?"

Oxhorn cringed and the girl stopped and frowned.

"Excuse me?"

"Well um you look."

Her eyes flashed with anger.

"I'm three years older then him."

"I didn't mean any offense M'am."

I felt a brief flash of power and had the sinking realization that her mana reserves were far, far larger then my own. She moved her hands and her voice changed, becoming older, sultry.

"I bet you didn't."

The illusion was broken and I saw that yes she was a full grown woman a short one and the voice.

"I apologize."

She nodded.

"Well come on Scotty we need to head to the hotel now."

"Lass I just got home."

She smiled.

"I know, I hope you have gotten a very good look at the ground because you're not going to be seeing anything except the ceiling for awhile."

She waggled her eyebrows.

"We're in public woman."

"I regret nothing."

"Shameless."

She shrugged.

"Come on I brought your dress."

"Its a kilt woman not a dress."

"Kilt, dress don't really care what you say it is. What I care about is that you look damned good in it."

I sighed.

"I give you leave Oxhorn."

The man shrugged.

"From one master to another then, well at least this one is better looking."

I faked offense and let him go off with his wife, arm in arm.

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


"In this part of the bible he walked on water."

Kalki looked at me with an amused expression.

"Both of us can do that, I don't know a single magi who can't walk on water."

I frowned.

"The miracle of the bread and fish."

"Charmed baskets that used closed space to hold more then it should. You're familar with the topic, we use to the same principle in all of our airships to hold guns and your sleeping quarters."

"That's secret."

"We have been selling enchanted mirrors and cabinets that do the same thing in zone for over 30 years now, that's not much of a secret."

"It's still a secret."

"We can always say its just a rumor like the one where our magi rediscovered the secret of greek fire."

I stared at her and she shook her head.

"Greek fire, the byzantine empire supposedly had that and it could set water on fire? Did you litterally just spend your entire time at compass obsessed with revenge?"

"How did you know about that?"

"Every one knows about that John, you talk about it when ever you get drunk."

I frowned.

"I don't."

Kalki sighes.

"Hey Brownie tell em the story."

The darkskinned bartender rolled his eyes.

"I tracked the scawlywag all the way to Brazil and brought out my straight razor and then I put my razor against his neck. The man looked up at me in horror and I said you said I am John Church Hamilton you killed my father prepare to die."

Kalki turned to me.

"See."

I may have told that story a few times, Kalki looked up as the crowd fllled the bar.

"Well this seat isn't going to earn itself."

She snaped her fingers and fire leapt from her finger tips and lit the candle. She walked towards the stage, her hips swayed back and forth. She stood on the stage.

"Im warrant officer Kalki Green, US army, and I'm going to play a song for you. It's a very old song, from a dead world and a dead people but tonight we're going to make this song live, this is Save Tonight an old phenix love song."

Ghostly images formed behind forming a band, she blew on her saxophone an instrument of a long lost people, of an era and people that were gone forever, the bartender put a hand on my shoulder.

"We understand."

I stared at him.

"If you fancy her."

And then I looked away.

"Shame she's a witch, scares people away, but you're a brave man and a wizard."

"I um am just trying to save her soul, thats it."

The bartender rolled his eyes and served whisky to sailors, airmen and soldiers in the bar. Wewatched Kalki as the ghostly images played music. Some of the men cheered, others listenedpatiently. Soon she returned to my table as the entire bar clapped.

She sat down across from me.

"What did you think?"

"It was alright I guess."

Kalki rolled her eyes, her hand brushing up against mine.

"So another sermon preacher man?"

I sighed.

"Ok rainbows thats a sign of god's love and."

"Is caused by the refraction of light by water droplets as they fall from the sky, before you go into it rain is caused by the the sun evaporating water with its heat and that water vapor coming down through condensation."

"And how do you know this stuff?"

"I actually paid attention in school, and took classes that didn't just involve punching things. You should try it some time."

"How long were you at Compass?"

"Hmm roughly ten years or so, finished the basics in magic in three so he taught me other things, science, engineering, music. More magic, eventally I grew up and I joined the miltary because there wasn't anything else to do preacher man."

"Going to keep calling me that?"

"Going to keep preaching?"

She sighed.

"Better get back to base."

"I better escort you safely back then."

Kalki laughed and then blinked.

"Oh you were serious."

She laughed harder.

"New Orleans is not a safe place for a woman."

Her hands lit up in fire.

"I think I can handle myself just fine preacher man."

"I'm still escorting you."

Kalki shook her head and smiled, my heart skipped a beat.

"Fine preacher man lets go."

We walked down the now dark streets close to each other Kalki's hand would periodically brush against mine.

"Kalki what does that mean?"

"Destroyer of filth, so naturally when I finished my education it was either join the army or become a maid. What does John mean?"

"I don't know."

"You know thats completely unfair."

"Why is it unfair I honestly do not know."

"Yes but I did, therefore I deserve compensation."

"I give you permission to feel smug and superior."

"I feel that way all the time anyways John, I want some thing else some thing special."

"Like what?"

She grabbed my shirt and pulled me down, her lips crashed against mine, my arms went around her back and we kissed. Too soon it ended there was a silence and awkwardness.

"A little forward?"

Kalki smirked.

"When you're dealing with a dense object a direct approach is always warranted. See you again soon preacher man."

She walked away, I watched as her hips shashayed back and forth, it was only then that I realized she called me dense.

"HEY I AM NOT DENSE!"

I had a feeling that would be much more effective if I had said the words sooner.

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


"We have a job for you."

My commander looked at me.

"We need you to move some things for us."

"My ship's a bomber sir."

"This is an offiicial order Hamilton. Are you questioning it?"

I frowned.

"No sir."

"Your ship will be filled with goods, these goods are classified. You are not to open these goods, you are not allowed to touch them or have any of your men touch them, what you're supposed to do is fly to Zone at a reasonable speed and then come back home."

My commander looked at me.

"But we did so much in the sea of mexico sir."

"I know and thats why we trust you with this mission. Don't ask questions about it, just do your duty and come back to New Orleans."

I took a breath.

"I understand sir."

"I know it's not as glorious as going into battle but everyone has to play their part."

With that said and done we waited. Oxhorn kissed his wife one last time and she got on her carpet and flew off back home, we got into the Purpose and flew towards zone.

He drank from some odd kind of cup.

"What is that?"

"Something my wife made for me."

I stared at it, it looked odd. Its color was somewhere between white and yellow.

"Glass?"

Oxhorn smiled, finished his cup and threw it to the ground, my eyes opened in shock and then the cub bounced harmlessly off the ground and settled down.

"What the devil is that?"

"Plastic, my wife learned how to make it out of corn husks in compass. Don't you know how to make it?"

I closed my eyes trying to remember my lessons in compass and frowned.

"Hmm no, I may not have paid attention to that lesson."

"Why not?"

I sighed.

"Because If it didn't involve tracking things, or hurting people, I didn't pay attention to it."

Oxhorn shrugged.

"Sounds about right."

I frowned.

"I'm not stupid."

"Didn't say you were but you do have a pattern of behavior. But it does make you a great warrior."

I smirked.

"Damned straight."

"But what happens to a warrior when the war is over?"

I looked away, feeling a sense of panic in my veins.

"There will always be war, there will always be conflict."

"But what if there isn't? What if peace comes to the land to the world what then."

I couldn't think of anything to say to that.

"Maybe instead of moping about this mission you should think of it as an opportunity. If the war ends then there will still be use for you."

"And what's your use Oxhorn?"

"I'm a father, a farmer, a tinkerer, a lover and sometimes a slayer of spiders."

"Slayer of spiders."

"They get very big in Kentucky."

"Your wife is a witch."

"And yet the task of slaying the mighty spider is still my task, and sometimes when the moon is full I also open jars."

I rolled my eyes, but remained silent. I continued to fly onwards, thinking about those words. What would happen to me if the war ended, who would I be? It disturbed me more then It should have.

In the distance I saw a bright glowing light.

"We are here."

We landed the ship in one of the airfields, Oxhorn handed over a manifest, men carefully moved barrel after of barrel of material. On of them dropped it a black substance leaked out.

"Move it."

The damaged barrel was removed quickly the black goo was removed, my crew was moved off the ship. We walked aimlessly around the base, and suddenly I froze. A newspaper was on the ground. I stared at the headline filled with both hope and a sense of desperation.

"Denmark Surrenders."

I stared at the headline.

"Two more to go."

The roof of my mouth was dry at Oxhorn's statement.

"Yeah two more to go, thats great."

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton



"I need to talk to him."

Oxhorn shrugged, I went onto my carpet and flew back to the tree, to Compass. There was a line of people, I waited my turn and found a golem.

"Professor."

I felt a sense of worry, it had been years.

"Welcome back John."

I stared at the golem.

"You remember me?"

"I remember all of my students John, all of my memories are like fly's frozen in amber. I heard you got your revenge?"

"Yes."

I suddenly felt a little lost.

"Well then come down with my golem, I'm looking over a few things."

"You're not busy?"

"Im always busy but I finally cleaned up that purple dye mess, so I'm in a good mood. I'm in one of the upper levels, if you want to talk person to person."

An elevator opened and I followed a golem.

"Heard you joined our new airforce."

"Yes, was that all your work?"

"I wish, I had a lot of help with that from former students like yourself."

The door opened and I blinked, I saw a temple of some sort.

"Where am I?"

"An exact recreation of a place long lost."

I followed the golem into a large building and saw scrolls, servitors lovingly maintained them. I followed the golem through the twisting corridors of greek pillars until I got to the center where Merlin stood over a scroll.

"What is this place?"

"When do you think I became aware of earth?"

I shrugged.

"I don't know."

"52 BC, one of my probes discovered your solar system."

I heard the sound of snapping fingers and saw an image.

"Earth 50 BC, it discovered your world it explored a great many places scanning them, 90% of the information that probe took was of one place, a library in Egypt."

I shrugged, it didn't sound important.

"I had protocols, orders. If life was scanned scan as much as possible, if intelligent life was found find a library and get an exact scan. Then look for more. That little probe gathered so much information that its stealth systems completely crashed."

"Stealth systems?"

"Didn't know how advanced a life form would be or how hostile, the system failed around May 18th 44BC."

he sighed.

"It took around 300 years for that probe to come back to me, it took me another thousand or so years for me to wake up from my cryosleep and then it took so long for me to get to your world."

"But you're a master of magic."

"The Milkyway is big, really really big, and I am not a god."

I looked at him.

"What is my purpose in life?"

"I do not know."

"What is the meaning of life?"

"I don't have a clue, I don't know if life even has a meaning."

I frowned.

"Is there a god?"

"I honestly do not know, I hope so."

"What happens to us after we die?"

Merlin shrugged.

"I have no idea what happens."

I felt a sense of frustration.

"How much does a human soul weigh?"

"21 grams or .741 of an ounce if you use imperial this is average weight some people have larger souls then others."

I stared at him.

"You know the weight of the human soul but you don't know what happens to us after we die?"

"The human soul is a measurable variable. Heaven, hell, reincarnation I don't have the instruments to measure that."

I felt a sense of desperation.

"I remember when every thing was clear, when I had a purpose and now that I fullfilled it I don't know what I'm doing, who I am."

"I'm sorry John but I can not give you a purpose, thats something you have to create for yourself."

"This would be so much easier if my father was around."

"Maybe so."

He turned back to his scroll.

"Can't you just give me ansers?"

"Not without lying to you John, a part of being wise is recognizing that you're not infallible and that no one knows every thing, that we have strengths and weaknesses. Thats why I'm trying to get professors that know more about other subjects to teach here."

The bubbling frustration came to a head.

"Then lie to me."

Merlin tilted his head.

"No."

I froze.

"What?"

"No, John. This has been a habit of yours. You want the world to be a simple one, a story where you're the hero. Well other people have stories John, other people are important too. You're not the only student I have had John, you're not the only one with a burning ambition, or a desire for revenge or just feeling lost."

He paused.

"You came here looking for power, to get your revenge. I offered you more then that but you refused it."

"Congratulations about your victory in Denmark."

"You're changing the subject John. Every time you feel some discomfort that doesn't fit your view of the world or of yourself you try to avoid it, that's one of the reasons why you feel lost."

I felt a sense of akwardness, of realization.

"I, I think I wasted my time here, wasted my life, I spent so much of it on one man and now I don't know who I am anymore."

I sat down on a stone table.

"I know what that's like John."

"Really the great and wise Merlin, was once a failure?"

He looked at me with tired eyes.

"I am very very old John, I have failed numerous times, I have made numerous mistakes and I have a lot of regrets. I have felt just as lost at you do at this moment, and I pushed through it and in time so will you."

I looked down.

"Thank you."

I got up.

"I'm sorry for being a pest."

"John I have had many students, and some of them have been annoying, some of them have been proud and some of them arrogant. It is true you were a very challenging student but I'm still happy that you came here, problems and all."

A servitor came forward and I saw a book.

"What's this?"

"A gift, some thing to celebrate you finally growing up."

I stared at it.

"Margites, never heard of it."

"Its a little obscure true but the author wrote some good stuff in the past and I think you will like this."

"Who's Homer?"

Merlin sighed.

"History teacher, humanities, I have to hire some actual professors clearly."

I smiled.

"Thank you sir."

"You're welcome John I wish you luck."

I turned around and started walking away.

"Oh and John?"

I looked back at him.

"I forgive you for the purple dye prank."

I froze, a feeling of terror in my veins.

"Thank you sir."

"I trust it won't ever happen again?"

My mouth was dry.

"No sir it won't."

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


"You have been very quiet."

I flew the Purpose in the darkness.

"Oxhorn."

"Yes?"

I thought about the book that Merlin had given me. It was funny but part of it hit too close to home.

"Am I an idiot?"

"Yes."

I glared at my second in command.

"Aren't you supposed to soften the blow or try to put it in more polite terms?"

"Sir with all due respect the first step to solving a problem is admitting you have one. Since the lives of our men depend on you being smart enough to control this ramshackle device, it is vital for me to help you get your head out of your ass."

"So I am an idiot."

"If it helps you're becoming less of one as time passes but yes you have done extraordinarilystupid things."

I frowned.

"But you're not the worst officer we have had by a long shot, if you're an idiot at least you're a salvagable one. Why, in time we may just turn you into an man of average means and thinking."

I took the information in.

"Thank you for your honesty."

There was no use in punishing the messenger.

"So I need a slight favor."

"And that favor?"

"A stop by my home in Kentucky."

"And that's?"

"On the Ohio river you can't miss it."

I changed course and we flew along the river, Oxhorn had a lively happy look on his face and smiled as we got closer.

"We're here."

I took our ship downwards. My eyes opened in shock as I saw a giant building, and trees, lots and lots of trees, in nice neat rows. We landed inside one of the massive walls. Then the ground shook, I felt a sense of fear and terror as a giant contraption walked towards us.

Oxhorn smiled at the monstrosity got closer to us.

"What the hell is that?"

He shrugged.

"A giant mechanical spider."

He said it in a bored tone as if that made complete and utter sense.

"SCOTTY!

The giant machine lowered and Oxhorn's wife jumps off of it and into his arms, she nuzzled into his chest.

"So glad you're back home."

"Good to see you."

I looked around.

"This is big... Um, so who helped you build this?"

She smiled.

"No one, well that isn't correct Merlin helped me learn all the principles. I had to learn a lot about water treatment, agriculture, and he helped give me the seeds, oh and it took a lot ofarchitecture lessons too."

"Architecture?"

"Yes, can't have any stairs, I wanted to be able to maximize space and cut down on labor. You see there are over 5000 kinds of apples out there and I wanted to have the very best apple farm. Here on Lynn's farm we grow around 500 varieties, using a mixture of open air growingand green houses. Of course the whole thing is built on a leyline nexus, took me a while to scout it all out and find a nexus with river access but."

I stared at her as she went from topic to topic, my eyes glazed over as I tried desperately to stay awake, Oxhorn had a look of silent pride on his face.

"And that's how I was able to figure out how to get a constant stream of apples instead of having to wait for the right season."

"Sounds um....impressive?"

"Really, what part impressed you the most?"

I willed my brain to find an effective lie that would make me look at least somewhat educated.

"I have no idea what you said and don't understand any of those concepts."

I really hated my stupid brain.

"Its all just engineering, all spring Magi get a full course on it."

"I'm not a spring magi, I'm an autum one."

"Oh well then you took a class in hydrodynamics right?"

I shook my head.

"Architecture right?"

I grimaced.

"Well not medicine because that's just a bad idea for you lot but biology?"

My head went down.

"Compass requires all of its students to learn some kind of trade, Ok lets go over the basics, blacksmithing, glassmaking, pottery, tailoring."

"I um... kind of only learned the minimum and forgot quite a bit."

"You have to have learned some thing, Compass requires all graduates to be capable at least one non magical trade."

I smiled.

"I passed the bar exam."

Lynn stared at me.

"You went to the biggest largest school of magic."

"Yes."

"One that has knowlege about astronomy, chemistry, biology, and engineering that is far in advance of most schools on earth to learn law."

"Yes."

She stared at me.

"Why?"

"Because my murdered father was a lawyer and it was my way of honoring him."

Lynn stared at me and nodded.

"That's an acceptable reason."

I decided to take what small victories I could and smiled.

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


"Bringing some Hard cider into town. Want to come with?"

When asked wether you wanted to ride a giant mechanical spider or not the correct reply is always yes.

"I'm in."

I helped put the barrels of cider onto the giant behemoth of a machine and Oxhorn smiled as the machine roared to life.

"Missed this."

The machine jumped over the walls and started going down hill.

"Rambling around in a giant mechanical spider?"

"Yes."

I looked back at the castle.

"So it looks like your whole apple operation is a good one, why is it doing so badly?"

"Labor."

I stared at him.

"What?"

"The problem is getting people who are willing to work at a enchanted castle for relatively low wages."

"Can't you just buy some slaves I mean its legal here right?"

"No, slavery was made illegal about 1799, I get why you think that. We are next to Virginia and Tennessee where slavery is legal, but it isn't legal here."

"Why?"

"Officially some preacher named David Rice managed to convince the people of Kentucky of the evils of slavery and got us to collectively repent. The real reason is because of Big Tobacco."

"Tobacco?"

Oxhorn stopped the spider and brought out a bar of metal.

"Bend that with your hands."

I tried and failed.

"I don't see the point of this."

Oxhorn pulled out a small box and brought out a pipe, he put a substance inside.

"Light?"

I lit up the pipe and he took a small smoke, then he grabbed the bar with his hands and bent it easily. My eyes widened.

"Bullrush, made using tobaco and some blood from a bull, a single puff makes you 10 times stronger for a couple hours. There are other varieties crow's flight, eagle's vision, deer's speed. Tobacco is one of the best reagents out there and the amount of magical combinations you can have with it is astounding. We call the products made from this process alchemical tobbaco."

"Why haven't I heard of it?"

"Because the demand for alchemicals is that high. You see in the orient, China to be exact? They love the stuff, every year like clockwork they buy out our entire stock. Thing is there's a downside."

I looked at him.

"It's poisonous?"

"Um no, not that. First step of making tobbaco a useful reagent is to remove the toxic aspects. No the real downside is this, a reagent's usefulness in magic is based on its metaphysical value. Slave labor destroys that metaphysical value."

"Is there any way to prevent that?"

"No, or at least we haven't found a way to by pass that, we found out about that problem pretty early. In virginia and other tobacco states slavery is pretty entrenched. Here in Kentucky though, while there were a lot of slaves and plantations, you had small tobacco farms."

I leaned in.

"The untainted tobacco it could go for 3 times the price of slave tobbacco and these farmers started getting rich, other people jumped on the band wagon and soon you had an entire industry, but the best growing land for tobacco was in the hands of the plantation owners."

"So you made slavery illegal?"

"Aye, it completely ruined the plantation owners lively hoods, bankrupted the lot of 'em. With nothing to their name they didn't have a choice but to sell, and the alchemical market grew. These days its the single biggest export our state has."

"You send the tobbacco to Zone?"

"No we brought magi over to Kentucky and do all of it here, but since all the money is in alchemicals farms that do other things like mine are not able to afford the labor costs that Big tobacco can pay out. Not with the chinese buying out the states supply of alchemicals."

The spider started moving and I saw a small town in the distance.

"And so you had to join the army?"

"It's not as bad as it used to be, my younger brother moved in with his family and my children help out where they can."

I nodded my head.

"So I learned something new today, slave labor screws up reagents."

"And more, even if slavery was legal some thing about it... Well it makes you magi people, um sick. Every time I've seen a magi inherit a slave or go into the business they just get really sick and waste away and die. So you know, don't do that."

"Really?"

"Really, I don't know what it is about you magic folk but it's one of those things you just can't do."

I stared at the ground as we entered the town, the townsfolk didn't look at us with terror, no to my surprise they looked at us with bored resignation, a giant mechanical spider was in theirmidst some fear should be warranted.

At the very least I should have the right to laugh maniacally. An old man stepped forward.

"Brought the cider?"

Oxhorn nodded.

"Good, we need more hard stuff, got a lot of boys who will be getting off work soon enough."

"We're driving a giant mechanical spider."

The old man looked at me.

"So?"

"Giant mechanical spider."

"Your point being?"

"Doesn't that impress you?"

"Boy what would impress me would be enough hard cider for all my customers."

I took a breath.

"Well I think it's impressive."

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


We flew back to New Orleans the next day, our ship was filled with barrel after barrel of hard cider.

"There is no way the brass will accept this."

Oxhorn shrugged.

"Im sure that Colonel Jackson can be persuaded to be reasonable."

I stared in Oxhorn.

"The same Jackson that has killed over a dozen men in duels? that Jackson?"

Oxhorn shrugged.

"They had a chance to apologize."

I sighed and grimaced as we landed in the airfield, we got out and I felt a sense of fear and terror.

"Supreme commander Jackson its good to see you."

My heart beat faster, as he walked past me to Oxhorn.

"You have the cider?"

"Yes sir?"

"How hard is it?"

"Good enough to prevent the dread curse known as sobriety sir."

"I will be the judge of that."

A barrel was brought out and I grimaced as he opened it and took a sip.

"Strong stuff."

"Is that a problem?"

"Not in the least, my boys will take this away, the money will be placed in a separate account."

The commander's eyes bored into mine.

"There are not enough pelicans, your ship will spend the rest of the year transporting goods toZone. Then if you make a stop off in Kentucky and pick up more of this cider for the troops... Well I can find it in my heart to overlook it."

He looked at me and my crew.

"You and your boys should rest, for now go out drink some whisky."

We saluted him and I stared at Oxhorn.

"You made a deal?"

"If I can serve my country and save my farm at the same time that would be a good thing right?"

"This seems like a misuse of government property."

"You and the rest of the crew will get a portion of the profits."

"I salute you for your dedication to our cause Oxhorn."

He smirked.

"Thought you would see it that way."

With that I made my way to the bar, I smiled as I saw Kalki play on her Sax. She looked up and smiled at me, a red headed woman sang next to her.

"She is handsome, she is pretty she is the belle of Belfast city."

I sat down across from Kalki's chair as the Irish woman sang about some girl. I saw some people dancing along to the song. Eventually, all too soon, it ended. Kalki took her seat.

"Missed you preacher man how are you doing?"

I sighed.

"It occurs to me that I have not been entirely honest with my intentions."

Kalki raised an eyebrow.

"Really?"

"I, well a part of me, likes you for less then honorable reasons."

"Honor can be highly overated. I'd rather win."

I coughed, and Kalki put her hand on top of mine, her fingers intertwined with mine.

"I missed you John."

"I missed you too."

Her hand squeezed mine.

"So, are we um, lovers now?"

"No, I know what it's like to live without a father, I wouldn't put that onto anyone. I'm afraid, if you want to get into my bed, that I'm going to need commitment, but I am willing to talk to you more."

"Take this slow?"

"As slow as a war will allow us to, if you want to back out now I will understand."

I smiled.

"I think I will stay right here."

"A smart man then."

She smiled and I felt just a little bit better, the future was uncertain, but for that one moment I was content.

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton

Time passed, and the month of may came all too soon. My ship transported that mystery substance to zone, stopped in Kentucky, picked up hard cider

"Hey."

I looked up at the familiar voice.

"Hank?"

He sat down at the bar, tired, as Kalki played on.

"Captain Hank these days."

"The fort?"

He sighed.

"We got every one out of there and then charged the inner walls, I'm told the explosion covered the entire island. Took a couple months to get that kind of charge for it."

"And they promoted you?"

He shrugged.

"I heroically held my post for around half a year against the british and their savage allies, I'm now officially a hero."

He said the word hero with resignation.

"What happened to everyone else?"

"The civilians are in Ohio, everyone else was split off into different units spread around the country. Goodwitch asked for permission to go off hunting."

"Deer, Elk, Bear?"

"Techumsa, the leader of the savages. Her husband died during the siege, she took it badly."

I winced.

"So you didn't grant it right?"

"No I did, Glenda did a lot for us, all of us, before the siege and during it, I owed her that chance, so I wrote up a letter and let her go hunting, that was... God that was months ago."

"Is she still alive?"

Hank sighed.

"Don't know, I hope she is. Glenda's good people."

"Think she will pull it off?"

Hank laughed bitterly.

"No way, Glenda's good, one of the best but she's not that good, no one's that good. It doesn't matter that she was taught magic from the age of two, it doesn't matter how experienced she is, there are simply too many of them and it's far too deep in enemy lines."

"So what brings you here?"

"Well now that I'm officially some kind of defensive genus, General Jackson has tasked me with organising the defense of the city."

"And?"

"I told him I don't have a damned clue what I'm doing and I just got lucky, he told me I better get lucky again if I know what's good for me."

He took a drink of whisky.

"So with that done, I've studied every map I could of the area, the cities leyline's."

"And?"

"And all I did was try to organize the magi forces and get them to all work together to bring what ever horrible nasty idea they had to fruition."

"And?"

"It's like herding cats, every one had some devil idea, and all I'm doing is getting every one on the same page, don't know if any of it will help at all."

It was then that I noticed that Hank was thinner, he sighed.

"Are you doing well?"

"No these Quinine rations give me a painful migraine."

"Quinine?"

"Some substance made from the bark of some tree, apparently it helps prevent you from dying from malaria."

"Does it work?"

"Oh yes it definitely does, there hasn't been a single death from malaria since the general started making every one in the army have it, but it tastes horrrible and and it gives me these damned migraines and nightmares."

"That bad?"

"Ugh it could be worse, so you're an airman now?"

I shrugged.

"I got drafted into it."

"It works for you. I'm thankful the service exists, none of us would have gotten out of thatsiege alive without your help."

We stared at each other and Kalki sat next to me, I worried for a moment, what Hank would think. She was a good woman but she was also colored and as Kalki's hand went on top of mine I worried.

Hank looked at her.

"You courting this man?"

Kalki shrugged and Hank sighed.

"Good."

I blinked at the comment.

"Keep this airman's feet on the ground and head out of the clouds."

"I will try sir."

Hank nodded.

"Well I better get back to it, there's another damned meeting, more math and some more agonizing over the maps, and then I have to go sooth some hurt feelings."

"Hurt feelings?"

"Interservice rivalries, some Navy boys and army boys and air boys got in a fight now I have to go make sure they all get along."

He got up.

"So what's it like being a hero Hank?"

Hank sighed.

"Exhausting, but that's going to be over real soon, the british arn't going to attack this city not with Nappy at their heels, pretty soon I will become irrevelant again and can hopefully get another post in the middle of nowhere where it's nice and safe and nothing happens."

"You think?"

"Yeah I mean what are the chances of me having to deal with another siege?"

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


I walked next to Hank as he inspected maps, and looked up as magi worked on rune work.

"Good job folks, keep it up."

He wrote down some more notes.

"That quinine stuff tastes like garbage."

Hank shrugged.

"I know but rules are rules, if you go into the swamps you take a quinine ration. It isn't as horrible if you mix it with hard cider."

"So what are you writing?"

"Notes on who is doing the best work so I can give them proper credit."

"Not going to try to take credit for all of this?"

"Hell no John, I am not going to risk getting a promotion, My plan is to get all the defenses up, get the supplies lined up so it looks good and then make damned sure some other fool gets all the credit."

"So that's the plan?"

Hank chuckled.

"Plan? No I do not have a plan, what I have is a series of priorities. Every magi out there? They have a plan, an idea, the only thing I do is try to get them all organized so they don't get in each other's way."

He nodded.

"Good news every one! Plan C is now officially executed, everyone thank Tom for his idea, with Plan C enacted that means we can start working on plan D."

"Plan D?"

"There's a million plans so to get all the magi working together I put the best ideas on a list, once one is finished we can move on to the next one. I reward the best team with chocolate."

"Chocolate?"

"I called in a few favors when the old bird got back, he's not exactly happy that Glenda left but he appreciated me allowing her to do what she needed to do enough to give me a load of chocolate."

We walked back to the base and he stopped the small army of around a thousand magi.

"Good good, since everyone's finished with Plan C you all have leave, Rob here will give you a list of things you're allowed to brag about to the whores, or fast ladies or just in general."

Paperwork was passed out and the magi scattered.

"List?"

"Look in my experience you're always going to have at least one loud mouth who wants to talk about how great he is and nothing's going to stop him, so rather then have him brag and screw things up I'd rather give him some thing that puffs him up and doesn't foul everything up."

"Sounds cynical."

He shrugged.

"It is, but If we do have spys I'd rather have them walk the enemy through the most well defended trapped part of our defenses then actually hurt us."

"Doesn't sound fair."

Hank smirked.

"Life's unfair, and I'd much rather it be unfair in my favor, come on lets get you another quinine ration and some hard cider."

We walked inside his small office and had a drink.

"Paper sir."

A small boy put a newspaper on his desk.

"Thanks Joe."

He tossed a coin at the boy who smiled and left.

"Who's the boy?"

"An orphan who just got out of the accelerated Magi program, I have them help out the older magi."

He smiled.

"I also have them spread rumors."

"Really?"

"All of it lies of course, but children talk so best to have them talk about nonsense right?"

"Right, right."

We toasted drinks.

"To the first day of June."

The paper was opened revealing the headline.

"Tecumseh slain."

We stared at each other and read the paper further, Hank's hands shook as he read it, he then put down the paper.

"Well."

He paused.

"It appears that she pulled it off."

"They're not going to make a woman a general are they?"

Hank sighed.

"John never question if Madison is mad enough to do some thing."

He opened up the paper.

"General Goodwitch."

"They don't mention that she's a woman."

"No they don't, but its best to be polite, she does out rank us after all."

We continued to sit in silence.

"You think she will do a good job?"

Hank shrugged.

"Don't have a clue, but I doubt we will be hearing much more of her, the president will either put her somewhere far out of the way or give her an impossible task. He might be a man of his word but he's not going to let this get much more exposure then it's already gotten."

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


Boredom, extreme overwhelming boredom.

"Yancy?"

"Not seeing anything sir."

With Merlin back in compass they made more pelicans, the ships took over my old job of transporting whatever that substance was. Hank graciously got me a position standing guard over the air. We lingered high in the air and spent 8 hours a day looking for enemy ships approching New Orleans.

"Of course."

3 months, 3 months of nothing, It was boring infuriating work, I killed time by working on cannon balls.

"What you working on John?"

I looked up at Yancy.

"Another cannonball, just enchanting it with the nastiest runes and spells I can. When I'm finished put it with the others."

"Yes sir."

With all the free time in the world and nothing to do this became my hobby, try to create the nastiest explosion possible. After a couple days the entire ball would be covered in glowing runes and then put with the others.

"Glad it's september."

Yancy was just making small talk now about the slightly less horrible weather. We all shrugged.Yancy liked to talk a lot, there was some part of him that hated silence and he would just talk and talk and talk."

"Commander?"

I looked up at Oxhorn.

"Yes?"

"Message from the base."

I sighed and looked at the strange man in the mirror.

"We just got a message from one of our ravens, enemy ships. We need you to see if anything's there."

I nodded.

"All right."

"We're getting all the other gulls outfitted and waking up all the troops and sailors just in case but it never hurts to have a second pair of eyes on it."

We flew our ship out and I froze in terror as I saw the ships.

"Command, we have ships."

I counted them.

"Around 120 of them heading to shore."

The man nodded.

"Where are they going?"

I gave the coordinates.

"Permission to strike, sir?"

The man went away and came back.

"No, the word from command is to wait, let them drop off all of their troops and then strike their ships."

"But sir."

"This order comes from Supreme commander Jackson himself, wait for the other gulls to arrive, let them unload their troops and then strike and strike hard with every thing you have."

We got above them, and loaded the cannon with the special cannon balls, I watched with trepidation as the ships unloaded their men, in the spy glass I saw thousands of them walk out.

The other 20 gulls came out and joined me, we kept them informed about the progress.

"Tell us when they start bringing out cannons artillery."

We waited and then the men got off I saw a mixture of british and spanish forces.

"Cannons, I see cannons."

"Strike now."

We were still on a ley line, I summoned that energy and power.

"Careful, we cant afford to miss."

I stepped to the wheel and carefully manipulated time, and fate a ship exploded as our cannon hit dead center, months of boredom and hard work paying off.

"Another one."

I drew hard on the ley line, my hands went through the motions trying to guide fate.

"FIRE!"

Another ship gone, the other gulls were firing, we concentrated on the ships that were unloading cannons. I dragged hard on the lines again and moved my hands as my boys put another special into the cannon.

"FIRE!"

Another, ball another hit, I lost track of time of place there was only the ships below and the pull of magic.

"Another one."

"We're out of enchanted balls."

I looked up at Oxhorn.

"Then aim at the masts and use normal balls."

I continued to pull on magic for more mana, my very soul felt like it was burning, every part of me felt exausted and then every thing got darker and darker.

"Sir?"

There was a trick I learned at compass, I pulled on my health my own body for extra power, I coughed up some blood.

"Another."

The other gull's concentrated fire on the remaining ships I didn't see a mass on any of them.

"The ships are disabled."

"Then keep firing!"

"The navy's here sir we."

"KEEP FIRING!"

I pushed myself harder trying to manipulate fate itself for another shot and passed out every thing went dark, and I felt the floor.

When I woke up I felt some thing cool on my forehead, my vision cleared.

"Awake, preacherman?"

I looked up.

"Kalki?"

She sat down next to me, I saw that I was in some kind of bed, I felt sicky, smelly and weak.

"Yeah."

"Good, its October by the way."

I got up and groaned.

"Where am I?"

"New Orleans."

"The battle?"

"Well we destroyed their ships before they could unload most of their artillery."

"Good."

"Then our ships used their cannons on their troops, killed quite a few of their men. Got to give the brits and the spanish some credit they didn't break, they marched away in good order."

"Yeah?"

"Right into the most horrible and nastiest magical defenses we have."

I winced.

"Don't know why they did that, killed even more of them, they lost what few cannon's they had in those swamps."

"Did we win?"

Kalki nodded.

"Fighting lasted about two weeks, they got to the very edge of the city but when they got to us they were a mess and didn't have any cannons left. Killed quite a few of them in the fighting."

"Good for you."

She smiled.

"I know. About the second week they broke, tried to run."

"Yes?"

"Right into out gravity traps, and a bunch of trees enchanted to explode at will. Finished them off in the swamps."

"Any survivors?"

"A couple of them managed to surrender we got one of their generals, some officers, I think around 500 of them survived, they're in some camp now."

"So we won?"

Kalki nodded.

"Yes, we won, I was told to tell you out of all the airships you got the most kills. Enough that they made up a new title for you."

"What?"

"Ace, from the playing cards, any one who sinks more then 5 enemy ships gets that title."

"Nice."

She nodded.

"It is."

She kissed me on the forehead.

"Get better soon John."

I smiled.

"I will try."

 

[Cherico]

General Isack brook


The loss of tecumsa hit me hard on a personal level. I considered him to be a personal friend. Meeting him was like meeting someone who was great, between the two of us I honestly considered him to be the better man. He had a skill for warfare, for statecraft, for negotation, and diplomacy. He deserved a chance to be the father of his own country.

That chance was stolen from him in the middle of the night, someone hid in the darkness killing his men. Killing his friends, guards and others and he went to investigate, that killed him. It wasn't a stand up fight, it was one angry witch in the dead of night. It angered the tribal alliance.

They didn't break with his death, not immediately. Instead they got angry and they attacked and attacked hard. There was no more restraint against civilians, not any more, we made progress in that mad frenzy of revenge, but it didn't last. In their zeal to attack, our allies attacked positions on terrain favorable to the enemy. They made mistakes and made bad ones, and our progress was pushed back into Michigan and then the news came it got worse.

120 ships, and over 20,000 men dead.

The battle of New Orleans was by any measure a failure.

Why did it happen? Bad intelligence. Our spies in New Orleans, and we had a large amount of them, told us about a path towards the city, one that lacked any defenses at all. If we could just get through that path we could strike the least defended part of the city and claim it.

With New Orleans in our hands we would have control of the mississippi river and would be able to prevent the americans from ever expanding west again. With their expansion checkedCanada, our west indian properties and our native allies would be safe. The balance of power in north america would be permanently tilted in our favor.

We asked the spanish for help in this venture and they produced matching forces to aid us. The problem was the airforce, communications and inteligence, our forces were caught during the landing. The biggest ships were destroyed first, then firepower was concentrated on the remaining ships.

Then the american navy came out and trapped what remaining ships we had in a vice. Every ship was sunk, with this done, their ships came forward and struck our forces on land. We were forced to leave behind what little artillery we had and march toward the city in an effort to take it as quickly as possible.

The path through the traps, the safe road, turned out to be a lie. Explosions, fire, lighting filled swamp water, illusions. I'm told it was an unnatural nightmare world. By the time our forces managed to get through that horrible path, half of our forces were dead.

Then the empty part of the city that was supposed to be undefended wasn't. Walls had beenerected and the enemy faced us. They understood the terrain, they had artillery, and they had magi, over 500 of them.

It's to our credit that our forces lasted 2 weeks, we barely had any supplies, didn't know the terrain and walked directly into a trap, and on top of that was malaria, honestly disease and malaria killed more of our troops then the damned enemy did, though the enemy killed more then their fair share.

It was a defeat, by itself it wouldn't have amounted to much, but after the Zone slaughter, the siege of Macinack and the death of Tecumseh, feelings in London were getting nervous, and our spanish allies were of the opinion that our original plan to slowly whittle them down and cripple their ability to make money with a blocade just wasn't working.

The americans seemed to come up with one nasty trick after another and time just seemed to make them more dangerous not less. After New Orleans the Spanish had leverage. They had a plan, an all out attack on the enemy's capital. This time Spain was determined not to take any chances, men were summoned from around the empire, ships were summoned from around the empire and not just naval ships merchant ships as well.

It was one of the most massive undertakings of the war, it was some thing unprecedented and they needed our help with logistics, with bases, with money but they made it work. The spanish called this vast undertaking operation pesadilla. With the end of 1813 I hoped and prayed that 1814 would be a better one and that operation pesadilla would be a success.

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


"New orders all pelicans and seagulls to zone, no exceptions."

The orders seemed odd to me but I followed them to the letter. When we got to Zone every pelican was loaded with strange barrels, every gull was also loaded with them. We were given some powder and cannon balls but were told not to fire unless we were told to, then we flew to a small town in Maryland named Bladenburg.

The Pelicans dropped off their wooden drums, going to zone then back to Bladenburg in a circle. It was around 2 weeks later that we were told to fly East and then I saw the ships.

So many ships heading towards us, towards Bladenburg.

"Commander, enemy ships."

"We know."

"I can't stop them all but."

"No one fires until the order is given, let them into the river."

I wanted to fire, to protect my country but I followed orders, then I noticed some thing the river was turning black.

"Everyone, attention! throw the barrels overboard into the river! don't question it just do it!"

We opened up the back of our airship and complied. Our barrels either missed or did nothing to the ships below us, that seemingly endless parade of ships. Suddenly the entire Potomac river was seemingly full of ships. I saw them unloading men, material. It was horrible, I felt weak, impotent in the face of this invasion.

"Is the entire fleet in?"

"Yes sir."

An entire fleet unloading an army of men.

"All Gulls to the mouth of the river the one that leads to the ocean, shoot any ship that tries to escape."

I begrudingly left that poor port city behind and went to the mouth of the bay.

"Good, Now."

Then the river caught on fire, even from the distance I heard the screams of the enemy. I saw naval vessels, our naval vessels, sally forth and block the entrance of the river. We followed our orders to the letter. Shooting at any ship that tried to escape.

We could all hear the screaming of the dead and dying men as they were burning alive, we could all smell the stench of cooked flesh, a part of me felt disgust and revulsion. This wasn't war any more, this was slaughter total and indiscriminate.

"Don't let any ship escape."

We followed our orders our stomachs sick as the river burned. Eventually as it got darker the screaming stopped, the fires died down and we saw the burnt wrecks of the ships below us. I stared at the devastation we had caused and felt sick.

"Attention all seagulls, you are to return to your posts, Pelicans you are to head to the capital."

I couldn't speak, maybe it was from the smoke, maybe it was from the sheer emotion of the event, but I didn't say anything. I just took my ship down to new orleans.

The enemy captured the city of Blandenburg without a fight. They were able to land troops, cannons and material there, enough for an army, one of the largest armies of the war, we destroyed their ships and in return this army was heading to our nation's capital.

Blandenburg didn't feel like a victory to me, to any of us. The entire crew flew home in hushed silence, maybe it was guilt, maybe it was the enormity of the event. When we finally got back home to New Orleans, none of us talked about it. None of us bragged about it, it just seemed some thing too terrible to talk about.

 

[Cherico]

James Madison



I kept my word.

Yes she was a woman, yes she was a witch, yes she had killed him using less then honorable methods but techumseh was dead and she had been raised by Merlin. It wouldn't do to upset him not when he had done so much to help make my victory possible.

Glenda Goodwitch, she wore glasses, her hair was a bright gold held in a tight bun, her face was in a frown, she looked severe and overly serious. I purposely kept my eyes away from her bossom. She looked younger then her years suggested. It was difficult to take her seriously.

General Glenda Goodwitch, I didn't give her an official command in the field. Instead I ordered her to see to the defense of the capital keep her out of battle where she could be hurt. When she got the order she simply asked me.

"What is vital? What are you willing to sacerfise, and how badly do you want to win?"

I considered the question absurd, I drew a circle around a map of the capital.

"Every thing in here is vital, the rest I don't care about, do what ever you need to do."

I gave her some magi to control, not the best of course it was a small contingent of around a thousand or so, of the deaf and dumb. People who had volunteered but were useless for actual fighting. After all how could you fight if you couldn't hear the enemy.

"What resources do I have for the defense of the city?"

I shrugged.

"If you need any thing ask your father, or take anything that isn't being used by someone else."

I waved her off.

Walls were erected around the capital, I didn't pay attention to it, there were complaints but I didn't listen to them, the city needed walls. Then I got messages of stone pillars being erectedaround the city but I ignored it, I had bigger concerns.

One of these bigger concerns was the buildup of the spanish navy their preparations to take our capital. There wasn't one spy who got the information back to us but a multitude. An operation that large was difficult to keep secret, some of our sources were working for independence movements. Some were whores, some were men looking for extra money, and some of it was just overheard talk.

Operational secrecy wasn't some thing the spanish were particularly good at, and they were convinced that a strike force of this size would be more then enough to win them victory, and they were right.

If they had caught us unawares, if we didn't know the location and date of the attack they would have been garanteed victory, magi or not, but we had been preparing.

Greek fire, made from this black oily substance over a period of months of a period close to a year stock piled incase of a major naval landing. We used up every single drop we had, we turned the potomic black with that sludge and then we set the river on fire.

The spanish fleet died, the british fleet died, but they had managed to successfully unload most of their men, equipment, and supplies. eighty thousand men from around the spanish empire, and five thousand british regulars.

All of them heading towards washington, towards the capital. I ordered a complete evacuation generals, materials, my own wife it was then that I found General Goodwitch standing on the walls of the city. I tried to order her to leave and she looked at me.

"I have been ordered to see to the defense of the city, I will defend it to the last."

"We will lose, there are too many men."

"Then we have a duty to hold off them off, to give our forces time to recover."

Her eyes were as cold as ice, and I felt a sense of shame that a woman had more courage then me. I decided to stay, I told George Clinton my vice president to rule as best he could, to keep up the faith and the cause.

I would die with the capital, with my city and with my republic, armed with the knowlege that I was doomed, that I would die, I felt a sense of calm. I had been a sickly boy and then a sickly man, but I would die a brave one and for what ever my faults I could rest easy knowing that we had made them pay dearly for their victory here.

Glenda stood there calmly, as the troops surrounded us, their numbers seemed endless. A deaf man around the age of 20 came up to us his hands moved and Glenda nodded, her hands also moved and the man left.

"What was that?"

"The army or at least the vast majority of it is past the pillars."

She pulled out a small box and opened it.

"What are you doing?"

She looked at me.

"Winning."

She pulled out a small silver bracelet, it glowed with red symbols at the center was a single red ruby, she put it on and studied the bracelet as the enemy got closer and closer.

I said nothing, accepting my fate.

"Good."

She snapped her fingers and fire rose up from the ground, pillars of flame all around me, I saw that small force of the deaf and dumb their hands moving as the flames rose and comsumed every thing in sight, by some miracle the fires stopped right at the walls of the city.

All I saw was fire it was as if the fires of hell had comsumed the earth.

"Fire, in order for fire to exist it needs three things, heat, fuel and air. So I had children bring dry brush, wood and other things into the circle inbetween the walls and the pillars, took me months but I filled that entire area with dry brush."

I stared at the wall of fire.

"Its called a firestorm its a fire so strong that it creates its own wind system it normally happens only with the largest brush fires and wildfires, it takes a lot of work to make one of those happen here, but I had time and plenty of it."

We watched as the fire continued to rage around the city, consuming everything in its path.Eventually, in time, they died down. My throat felt dry as I stared at the devastation, at the dead burnt bodies and mangled remnants of cannons.

Glenda looked almost bored by the devastation.

"My men."

I blinked.

"They deserve a new name, I think I will call them the silent legion."

I nodded at her, as my heart beat in my chest.

"Sounds fair."

"Mind if we grab some airships?"

"Why?"

She smiled.

"I think it would be nice to visit spain this time of year, after all they took the time to visit us it's only fair we return the favor."

I steadied my nerves.

"It seems entirely reasonable to me."

"Very well, when our forces return to the capital I will gather up some men and supplies, oh and does your wife want anything? The shopping in Madrid is limited but I do want to pick some thing up for Dolly."

"She likes silver."

Glenda nodded.

"Excellent, well I'm off to go finish off the stragglers, can't have them off causing problems."

I continued to stand there as she left, watching the burnt remains and ashes of the world outside the cities walls.

 

[Cherico]

Ferdinand the 7th of Spain



It was a simple plan, use overwhelming force, put down the americans and stop the flow of magic to the rebellions in the americas. We sent one third of Spain's ships. Not our navy, our ships period. Naval vessals, merchant ships, what ever we could gather, and in one battle they were completely destroyed.

That loss hurt but our troops had managed to get onto land, if we had captured the capital we could have won, the gamble could have paid off. The result was a second defeat, a second slaughter.

After the news came back to us we saw purple clouds in the sky, from the heavens we heard drums. A box landed in front of my palace the americans were here. General Goodwitch, the woman who had slaughtered my men were here to talk terms.

A space was opened and she slowly floated down to earth on a carpet.

"Your highness our demands."

I looked at the paperwork, at the maps, everything north of the Rio Grande river, the americans would hold both coasts. In return spain would be paid a sum of money.

"This is madness."

"Your navy is destroyed, your empire is rebelling enmass, the french still hold the northern stretch of Spain's motherland. Your country is massively in debt and much of your productive capabilities have been destroyed. The only way your empire can continue to exist is if you accept the money and use it to build a new navy."

She paused.

"If you end the conflict with us and act quickly you might be able to salvage a part of your navy."

"And if I don't?"

"You don't have the power to project power onto our country any more, our airships and navy will continue destroying what is left of your merchant shipping and what is left of your navy until there is nothing left."

She paused.

"While that is happening my forces will destroy Madrid's defenses, with your city taken we will invite Napoleon over and then we will negotiate with him."

"You wouldn't."

Her eyes were cold.

"We have negotiated with Napoleon in the past, we can do so again, so your choice is this, give up a mostly empty portion of your empire to save what little remains or lose everything."

I didn't have a choice at that moment, I knew that.

"When can I expect payment?"

"Half now, half when we are sure that you have complied with our demands."

I looked at the offered payment.

"This is about what you gave Napoleon, for the lousiana purchase."

"Exactly what we gave him."

I closed my eyes.

"I will gather my ministers and we will surrender."

There was no grand ceremony, no music, no celebrations. Instead there was a treaty, and a signature. They left the money in aluminum ingots. I suppose I could have turned around, used that to build a navy and get revenge, but the witch had a point.

My empire was in shambles, my country was partially occupied and we were near bankrupcy again. The american adventure was my idea, I had arrogantly thought that the might of Spain would easily crush the upstart nation. I had been warned against this course of action.

I had ignored those warning and this was the price.

It was a painful meeting, that meeting with the witch, but the war was over now. If the english wanted to continue the war they could do so, too many spanish ships had been destroyed, too many of us had died and it was all my fault.

 

[Cherico]

General Isack brook


The Baldenburg slaughter, the DC nightmare.

The spanish had gambled and lost. On April 1st 1814 they surrendered, they admitted defeat and sold the americans land all the way to california. If the goal of the war, if our policy in the americas had a point, it was to limit the growth of american power.

To contain them, and keep them from being a threat to canada. This had proved to be an utter failure. The Zone massacre, the New Orlean's rout, the disaster of Baldenburg, and the destruction in washington were horrible pieces of news. The surrender of Spain, that was the last straw.

This war over the impressment of a few sailors simply wasn't worth it. It was clear that we needed a large alliance to defeat the american's and our allies on the continent were in firm agreement that it wasn't going to happen.

Napoleon came first.

We came to terms with Madison, we agreed to stop impressing american sailors, some things about trade, and that the border between canada and america would be at the 49th parallel. Our native allies, who had fought so hard for us, were left twisting in the wind.

We demanded reparations, a way to assuage the blow caused by the war. To our surprise the americans agreed to pay it, on the condition that it would be in goods instead of currency.

Our diplomats agreed to those terms.

We also had a final demand, Merlin would no longer be allowed to fight in america's wars. This demand was also met, with the provision that exceptions would be made if the survival of the human race was at stake.

We agreed to those terms as well.

In May 25th the war of 1812 ended, our leaders pointed to the reparations and tried to say it was a british victory, no one really believed it. The mood was glum and sad and we concentrated our full attention on defeating Napoleon once and for all.

It took us till 1815 to finally do it.

We expected the americans to dither, to stall with their reparation payments. To our pleasant surprise that didn't happen and if anything they overpayed us.

I still have no idea what we are going to do with all that purple dye.

 

[Cherico]

Lighting Jaque Chabot

1768-1815


Jaque Cabot or lightning Jaque was the best known member of Napoleon's bodyguards and agents. Jaque, according to french legends, sold his little sister to a wizard in exchange for great power and his magic sword Justice. This interpretation is greatly unfair to Jaque. The wizard in question was a family friend and was very wealthy.

His sister Andrea loved her new wizard husband dearly and would give him seven children. Far from cutting his sister out of his life he wrote letters to her till the day he died. Lightning Jaque, after almost losing his family to a revolt, became rather conservative but he also blamed the old regime for the near disaster.

Being a young boy at the time he decided to focus on his military career. While young Jaque wasn't particularly gifted as an officer, he was a great warrior and with his abilities and magic sword was a terror on the battlefield. Time after time he proved his worth, helping to turn difficult battles into victories and eventually becoming the most dangerous swordsman in France.

His gift in combat was noticed by napoleon and he was inducted into his personal guard. As Napoleon's bodyguard Jaque and his sword became infamous to the enemy, with his sword killing officers, nobles and any one who declared themselves an enemy of france.

Attempts to kill him on the battlefield routinely failed, assassination plots using poison failed and attempts to kill his master were likewise foiled, with Jaque blocking an assassins bullet in 1810 with his own body and then beheading the assassin with his sword.

He became infamous for rushing into battle alone, or outnumbered, and coming out victorious. Second only to napoleon himself lightning Jaque was feared. He loyally served Napoleon for his entire life, dying with his master in 1815 in the battle of waterloo.

Upon seeing his dead body the duke of wellington ordered his artillery to fire upon it to make sure he was dead. Then he claimed Chabot's sword justice for himself. Someway though, due to bad luck, he lost the sword and it somehow made its way to Jaque's son, who would also go into the military and fight for france.

Today Lightning jaque is a celebrated hero inside of France and a villain outside of it. His magic sword justice remains in the hands of the Cabot family, somehow always managing to return to their hands despite being lost several times.

 

[Cherico]

James Madison


The war was over, and we had won.

We had gone into the war without much of a plan, thinking that our militias would be more then enough. We almost lost everything because of that, we went into the war thinking we didn't need a national bank and then had to be bailed out by the same old bird I insulted to get to my current position.

That could not be allowed to happen a second time.

So new legislation was drawn up and financial support was given to the army, to the navy and the new airforce. We could not afford a repeat of the mistakes of the past.

"He's waiting for you."

I got out of my office and headed towards the back of the white house, I took a brief moment to look outside the walls of the city to see the devastation and destruction that surrounded us and then left.

Dolly was back, congress was back, our country had expanded all the way to the west coast, we had defeated three empires single handedly. For someone who had always been rather sickly it was hard to think of myself as a military genius, which was fortunate because I wasn't one.

The doors were opened and I looked at the giant glowing bird who had saved our country.

"Its good to see you james."

"Good to see you too Merlin."

The silence was an akward one.

"So it's over."

My words came out suddenly.

"If you're talking about the war you are correct but in my experience nothing ever really ends."

I nodded at his statement.

"They're calling me the napoleon of the west."

Merlin tilted your head.

"I hope you realize that isn't a compliment."

"I know but I will take it as such, and I want to apologize for my statements on the campaign trail."

"That I'm a horrible devil?"

"If you are, you have proven yourself to be our devil, sorry. You have done much for us all of us. I recognize the mess I got this country into and I thank you for saving us."

"I had quite a bit of help."

"I know, the 13th amendment passed by the way, all magi have the right to vote, hold office, and can not be legally discriminated against or enslaved."

"Good, I am thankful you kept your end of the bargain."

The two of us stood there.

"So what will you do with Greenland."

Merlin shrugged.

"I talked to Mordecai Noah."

"The former consul?"

"And current writer, he's quite well connected. This war showed me that I need dedicated teaching staff and what few I have are not enough. The jewish people have a lot of educated professionals and professors. I have a land without a people, they are a people without a land."

"And in exchange for sending professors you would give them their own country?"

"At heart I'm a teacher, not a leader of men, Mordecai has talked to jews around europe for me and they agreed to my terms, Im partially here to get your approval."

I nodded.

"Congress was worried about Greenland and what you would do with it, if you wanted to start your own country."

"And?"

"And with my current popularity it would be easy to get recognition for the new state of Israel. I will ask Mordecai to be our first ambassador to the new country."

I looked over at the sky it was cold and overcast. June gloom my wife called it.

"You're right this isn't over, this isn't an ending, it's a new beginning for the country for us."

I stepped next to merlin.

"I'm told George Washington rode you into battle."

"This is true."

"Can I..."

Merlin sighed.

"Come on, get on my back."

"Really?"

"We just defeated 3 countries, almost doubled the size of the nation and created the first jewish nation in over a thousand years, I think that earns you a piggy back ride."

I got on top of him and felt the breeze in my hair. I smiled at the ground before me. The country I had helped build would live on long after I was gone. My place in history was secured.

Life was good.

 

[Cherico]

John Hamilton


I looked at the entrance to the orphanage, I knocked on the door and one of the waifs let me in.

"Don't be nervous."

Kalki held my hand as we moved forward into the building. We opened another door and I saw my mother reading by a fire.

"John."

I nodded, she looked at Kalki with confusion.

"So is she."

"Yes. Kalki, this is my mother Elizabeth Hamilton. Mom, this is my wife Kalki Hamilton."

The room was silent.

"She's um colored."

"Yes she's indian."

Mom tilted her head.

"Which tribe, the good ones or the."

"Indian indian."

She nodded.

"Oh...well Kalki I'm sorry I didn't meet you sooner."

She got up and smiled at her.

"The orphanage is a bit of a mess right now, mind taking a seat?"

We did so and she went over to fix us some coffee.

"So are you going to stay in the airforce?"

"No, my first sergeant, well his home town is in need of a good lawyer, and I passed the Bar for Kentucky."

"Good and your wife?"

"War's over, so I think I will become a mother for a bit."

Two cups of coffee were put on the table and my mother smiled.

"Good, John I'm really happy that things are going well for you."

"You're not upset that Kalki's not white?"

Mom looked over at Kalki and glared at her, her eyes narrowing.

"Kalki?"

My wife stiffened.

"Keep this lumox from doing anything stupid."

My wife smiled.

"Of course Mrs. Hamilton."

My mother took a sip of coffee.

"Well that takes care of all my objections", she pushed a cup close to each of us.

"Its been too long John. You really should visit more often, and don't use the fact that you live in Kentucky as an excuse I know about that flying carpet and I deserve to see my grandchildren."

"Yes mother."

"And now that you're a married man, stop doing crazy things."

"Yes mother."

She smiled.

"It's good to see you back home, I really did miss you. Even if you cause me more worry than all my other children combined."

I smiled.

"I missed you too."

In the end I discovered that home was less a place and more a feeling, a set of friendships, a sense of things. Wherever I went with Kalki felt like home and that was good enough for me.

 

[Cherico]

The golden age of magic 1815- 1914


With the end of the napoleonic wars, life in Europe and the world had changed. The countries that had embraced magic had either punched far above their weight or had won significantly. Those that had ignored it, or decided to wait and see, often either regretted their choices or were forced to rely on the few adventurous souls who had gone to the Americas and returned. Those who had banned it though either fell behind or paid a price, the ottoman empire being the biggest example.

The ottomans responded to the now proven existence of magic by officially closing the country. The new leadership wanted nothing to do with the outside world and were willing to enforce this new isolationist policy by force. The Sultan stirred up religious animosities to enforce their anti magic ban. But religious zeal is not a genie that can be bottled up easily and a mob's purposeful destruction of the french embassy, and the slaughter of all inside it, would bring Napoleon into conflict with him.

The Ottoman empire itself was saved by the ever growing coalition of forces against their new enemy but they still lost all their territory in the balkans during the liberation of greece. The independent nations created by Napoleon after the liberation would continue to exist after his fall.

Rather then learn from this experience the ottoman empire doubled down, banning all learning, technology and trade from the outside world. This incensed the British, who had spent blood and treasure trying to save them, but in the name of the balance of power they continued to support them.

As for the winners, the united states fought against three empires and exited the war owners of two coasts. The Jewish people had a new home land after centuries of exile. The European empires swallowed their pride and sent their students to Compass to learn the mystic arts.

They brought the art of magic home. For the most part magic was limited to the elite, with the job of magi becoming one of the trades that noble spares would go into. There were of course exceptions.

The americans allowed pretty much every one to use magic, countries like Poland and Israel were forced by conflict with either man or nature to teach magic to the masses. Others like greece slowly built up a cadre of magi for both defense and future plans of conquest and revenge.

The golden age of magic would prove to be peaceful and prosperous for Europe. Conflicts tended to either be mercifully short, or outside what was considered to be properly European. Yields of crops went up, populations exploded and were sent to settle their empires or move to the new world. For most of europe it was considered a golden age of prosperity and progress, and some thought it would never end.

 

[Cherico]

The Hatfield Mccoy feud
1881-1891


In order to understand the Hatfield-Mccoy feud one must understand the rivalry that exists between the two states where they dwelled, Kentucky and Tennessee.

Kentucky ended slavery before the war 1812 and the state was rich in magic, being crisscrossed with small leylines and nexus.

Tennessee didn't have any leylines at all and remained a staunch supporter of slavery up to the american civil war. The two states, which once had similar cultures, quickly diverged.

Kentucky became proud of their magic and the wealth it brought to their state, the state'sculture became one deeply invested in the mystic arts. Nearby, Tennessee found itself left behind economically and grew to resent their northern neighbor. The state became a hot bed of anti magical sentiment, which their northern neighbor resented in return.

Tennessee and Kentucky both started out with an anti-intellectual streak but with their southern neighbors insulting their way of life the people of Kentucky decided to use their vast wealth to build schools, libraries and colleges and started to praise education, seemingly as a way to spite their southern neighbor.

Tennessee responded by becoming even more anti-intellectual and religious and referred to their northern neighbors as godless heathens. Offended the people of Kentucky, who had before been indifferent to slavery, slowly became a hot bed of abolitionism. The rivalry grew stronger and more toxic and when the civil war came the two states fought on opposite sides.

Enter the Mccoy family who fought for the union and the Hatfield family who fought for the confederacy. Tennessee militia's used terrorism, targeting civilians, burning down schools and using guerrila tactics. Kentucky responded with harsh reprisals.

When the war ended the hatred between the two states was, if anything, even stronger, with attacks continuing long after the war ended. One of these attacks was orchestrated by Devil Anse Hatfield and killed Randal Mccoy's crippled younger brother.

Devil Anse was never charged for this crime and after the war became a wealthy timber merchant in northern Tennessee. Randal Mccoy owned and operated a grainery in southern Kentucky using the power of one of the southernmost nexus's to grind grain and corn.

During the war the two families had fought, after the war insults, lawsuits, and fights would break out on regular occasions. It looked like the feud would end when Devil Anse's son got into a relationship with Roseanna Mccoy. The two were wed and, when she moved into the Hatfield estate, some of the dairy cows started producing sour milk.

Roseanna was blamed for this and in 1881 a very drunk group of Hatfields took Roseanna and tied her to a stake and burned her alive. Roseanna was not a witch and didn't know how to use magic, she was also 6 months pregnant.

The participants were given a trial and an all Hatfield jury acquited them, this enraged the Mccoy's and, when news of the trial got into the papers, the state of Kentucky. The Mccoy's snuck into Tennessee and killed the 4 men who had killed Roseanna. This caused revenge killings and counter revenge killings and the war between the two families spread, bringing in other families from Kentucky and Tennessee.

The feud continued to spiral out of control until one day Hera Mccoy's husband was killed. She had begged her husband to stay out of the fighting and he had agreed, staying out of the conflict. After a hard summer he had decided to take the children to buy some icecream.

Three Hatfield men saw the Mccoy family and opened fire, killing both her husband and her children, and then ran back to the Teenessee border, escaping justice. For Hera this was the last and final straw, while Roseanna and most of the participants didn't know magic, Hera did and in fact came from a long line of Magi.

She went north and retrieved the family's mechanical spider, an heirloom from the first witch in her family, and headed south to the city of Clarksville, Tennessee and then proceeded to enact her revenge. The Hatfield family was having a party inside the small town and Hera used this oportunity to kill as many Hatfields as possible.

In her rampage, which would soon be known as the Clarksville massacre, she managed to successfully kill Devil Anse Hatfield, several members of the Hatfield family and destroyed much of the city, leaving it in ruins. This prompted more rage and the united state's army was forced to intervene to stop the feud.

The leaders of both sides were put into prison for their actions and the Army would patrol the state's borders for the next decade, making sure that the feud would not restart.

Today the feud is mostly in the past but the rivalry between the two states remains strong and vicious. As for Hera, her spider is on display in a Kentucky museum and after a life time of prison, she was buried in a Louisville grave.

Her gravestone is inscribed with the words, "I regret nothing," As per her last request.
​

 

[Cherico]

Ralph Essen


"Jupiter is beautiful this time of year."

We had left Kore and had finally ended up on the swedish home world of Icoste.

"Yeah it is Lee."

He looked around.

"Lots of snow."

I shrugged.

"We're in the northern reaches of Icoste, the rest of the world isn't like this, well not all of it."

"And we're here?"

"Because there's a large cluster of leyline's here, and because its relatively close to the inhabited part of the swedish homeworld."

Because, even with 120 million extra people, it's not enough to populate an entire planet.

"How did the old bird do this?"

"Ritualistically sacrifice a supergiant blue star."

Lee stared at me.

"What?"

"The process takes around a thousand years, the process has been tried on other star systems but blue supergiants have a mystic resonance that other stars simply do not have. Of course in order to do this you basically have to create a dyson swarm of absolutely insane size, dominate all the leylines within the solar system."

"Insane."

"It's the same principle you see in a lot of ritual magic just applied to a much larger scale. Even with that sacrirfice you need to program each seedling, get the resonance with the body you want to terraform."

"And you know this because?"

"Merlin gave me a pamplet. Anyway where do you think the extra mass comes for to make these new worlds earth sized? Or where the energy came from to build their atmosphere or create the artificial sun you see in the sky?"

"How long will they last?"

"According to calculations, we have around 12 billion years before the power that keeps our new worlds terraformed runs out. Which means it will outlive the sun."

"Good to know."

We stared at the horizon.

"Watched some thing, a cartoon."

"Yeah?"

"Had bugs bunny, in it there was a feud of some kind and they asked him if he was a harefield or."

"A McCoy, let me guess it started with a witch telling her husband not to fight in the feud."

"Yes and it ended with Bug's cornered and the witch destroying the town with a big mechanical spider."

I sighed.

"Based on a real story."

Lee blinked.

"What."

"A town in Tennessse was destroyed by a giant mechanical spider."

He stared at me.

"What?"

"Hatfield-Mccoy feud, keep in mind it was a really small town. Around 300 people lived there,max."

"A giant mechanical spider destroyed an entire town."

"It wasn't that big about the size of a small bus and it was a really small town."

Lee's mouth opened.

"That doesn't make it suddenly better, oh high a giant mechanical spider destroyed a town but hey it was a really small town so it doesn't matter. Why haven't I heard about this before?"

"It wasn't that big of a deal."

"A giant mechanical spider destroying an entire town is a pretty big deal Ralph."

"How many chinese cities were destroyed by Japan during world war two, or were destroyed during the civil war?"

"That's different."

"How?"

"They were not destroyed by a giant mechanical spiders."

"The end result is the same."

"Giant mechanical spider."

I sighed.

"Well we at least put the person responsible for it in jail."

"And obviously you destroyed the spider."

I cringed.

"You did destroy the spider right?"

I took a breath.

"Its, kind of, sort of, on display in a Louisville Museum."

Lee's jaw dropped.

"So it wouldn't happen again, right? I mean the man who did that."

"Woman actually."

"Woman who did that has to be thought of as a complete monster, right?"

"Um no, Louisville named their major league baseball team the spiders in honor of her, and I think they named a small city after her, called Heraville."

"Why?"

"It"s Kentucky."

"Thats not an explanation of why you would name a town after someone who destroyed an entire city."

"Small town."

"With a mechanical spider, how did you people end up being the leaders of the free world?"

I blinked.

"I honestly have no idea."

Lee sighed.

"That makes two of us."