The night before the war draped the forest in a labyrinth of shadows, the moon a frail sliver bleeding pale light through skeletal branches. Nova and Louis rode ahead of their two generals, their boots crunching softly on frost-kissed leaves, the air sharp with pine and the faint musk of fear. The camp lay behind them, its fires dwindled to embers, the snores of 25,000 men a low hum in the stillness. It was 22:21, the hour heavy with dread.
"We'll lose," Louis whispered, his voice trembling like the wind-rattled leaves, his breath fogging in the cold. "Otto will kill us—slaughter us like dogs."
Nova turned, his eyes hard as flint, glinting in the dimness. "We've come too far to falter now. Keep moving." His tone was a whip-crack, though his own heart thudded with the weight of their gamble. Louis's face was pale, a ghostly mask of doubt, but he nodded, clutching his reins tighter.
The generals trailed in silence, their hands resting on sword hilts, the faint clink of steel a quiet promise. They combed the woods, eyes darting for threats, planning to return by 23:00 to rouse the men for Napoleon's midnight strike. The forest whispered around them, a chorus of rustling leaves and snapping twigs masking the danger creeping closer.
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Friedrich and Klaus moved like wraiths through the trees, their serpent-trimmed cloaks blending with the night's embrace, the crimson sigils coiling up their sleeves a faint gleam in the dark. Behind them, 500 Serpents fanned out, their steps silent as snowfall on moss, no horses to betray them with a snort or clatter. Otto's orders rang in their ears—no bloodshed unless necessary, a directive born of his desire to turn these men to his side, not bury them. Friedrich and Klaus, once the kingdom's sharpest spies, wore the same black tunics, their faces shadowed beneath hoods, eyes glinting with lethal intent.
"Remember," Friedrich whispered, his voice a breath against the wind, "no killing unless forced. Otto wants them alive—crippled, not dead." The Serpents nodded, splitting into the woods around the camp, a net of shadows tightening.
The camp sprawled ahead, a patchwork of tents bathed in ember-glow, its guards drowsy and distracted, their murmurs slurred with exhaustion. Friedrich raised a hand, and the Serpents nocked darts tipped with quinine—a bitter compound that raced through the bloodstream to induce unconsciousness, its faint medicinal tang lost in the night air. From elevated perches—trees and ridges—they aimed for the aorta, the neck's pulsing lifeline. *Thwip. Thwip. Thwip.* The darts sang, and guards crumpled, their bodies slumping silently into the dirt, breaths shallow, eyes rolling back.
---
The Serpents flowed into the camp, their training a symphony of precision in the dark. They poured chloroquine along the tent edges, a liquid distilled to gas on contact, its bitter, acrid scent drifting through the canvas walls. Within minutes, the camp fell silent, 25,000 men knocked out clean, their snores replaced by the stillness of drugged slumber. A few stragglers spotted the intruders—wide-eyed, mouths opening to shout—but Serpents were faster, fists slamming throats or cloaks smothering faces, silencing them with brutal efficiency, no alarms raised.
"Cannons first," Friedrich ordered, his voice a low growl, the lavender sprig in his pocket brushing his chest as he moved.
The Serpents dismantled 112 cannons, their iron barrels cool to the touch, bolts clattering faintly as they worked with surgical speed. Food stores were emptied—120 kilograms of salted meat, grain sacks, and dried fruit, the savory tang of jerky mixing with the earthy grit of oats. Three crates of ammunition followed, their contents clinking—lead balls and powder kegs pilfered into waiting sacks. By 23:00, the Serpents were gone, vanishing into the forest, leaving a camp stripped of its teeth, its cannonballs abandoned in mocking piles without barrels to fire them.
---
As they retreated, Friedrich paused, his senses honed to the night's pulse. A flicker of movement caught his eye—Nova, crouched among the trees, his face pale as moonlight, eyes wide with dawning horror. For a heartbeat, their gazes locked across the shadowed expanse, Friedrich's piercing Nova's like a dagger through fog. The Serpent's smirk was a silent taunt, a curve of lips that whispered, *You've already lost.* No words passed, but the message hung heavy—war was a formality now, the princes' fangs pulled before the first blow.
Then Friedrich turned, leading his 502 men—Klaus at his side, the Serpents laden with spoils—back into Bavaria's embrace, their cloaks swallowing them into the dark. The forest swallowed their steps, the spoils a quiet clatter in the night.
---
Nova's heart pounded, a drumbeat of panic as the Serpents vanished, their shadows melting into the void. He stumbled back to the camp, his boots snagging on roots, his mind a whirlwind of dread and fury. "Wake the men!" he barked, his voice cutting through the silence, sharp and raw. "We attack at midnight!"
The soldiers stirred, groggy and confused, their heads heavy with chloroquine's lingering haze. "Where are the cannons?" one rasped, his voice rising in panic as he stumbled over the useless cannonballs, iron spheres mocking their plight.
"Gone," Nova snapped, his fists clenched, the cold biting his knuckles. "But we still have blades, horses—cannonballs if we must hurl them by hand. We'll make do." His eyes burned with defiance, though the weight of Friedrich's smirk gnawed at him—war was lost, yet he'd fight to the last breath, Napoleon's dawn assault their only lifeline.