The next morning I awoke and had a breakfast of army rations. Not exactly gourmet food - we really should do something about this.
Sadly it wasn't going to be a relaxing day. Charity turned up to say that she had had another trump call to say that Benedict was in trouble near Ygg. She had actually managed to get in touch with Benedict this time, and decided that it wasn't a trap, and he really was in trouble.
We managed to get a small force together (about 40 soldiers, a few mages and shamons, and some demons) and trumped off to Ygg. Benedict wasn't close by so we started off to meet up with him.
We met up with Benedict after a few minutes shadow-walking, and he started changing his battle tactics from hit-and-run to more standard battlefield tactics. Forming a wedge we arranged ourselves to meet the oncoming hordes of demons - roughly 1000 against our 50 or so - it wasn't going to be easy.
The first wave seemed to be mostly small, easily dispatched demons. There were many of these though, so they did cause casualties amongst our number.
Behind them there seemed to be another wave which included some larger demons, and what turned out to be magic users with power words. I might take this into account the next time we meet them. They seemed to concentrate on Benedict (possibly unfortunately) but we did manage to hold the onslaught off long enough to retreat a little.
At this point both sides seemed to stop to consider their actions. The demons arranged themselves into a semi-circle to approach us, and we reformed to meet and stop the attack. We had to stop them getting to Ygg, as I believe the tree is making something for the next ritual (probably the next chalice).
When the demons did next attack things didn't go quite as well. Charity used some napalm, which had a much better effect than I'd thought. I created a magical shield which saved my from most of the attacks (in fact I came out of the entire battle mostly unscathed - certainly less injured than in recent episodes). Nevertheless this wasn't enough - our force was quickly reduced to just a few off us, and then finally myself and Benedict with Charity flying overhead. The others had either fallen, or in some cases escaped (mostly by teleporting, or something similar).
Just as it looked like it couldn't get any worse, and I considered retreating to take stock and find a better place for defence, the cavalry arrived - literally. Corwin arrived with mounted troops and some hairy footsoldiers. This finally turned the tide, and although they took heavy losses, the remainder of the demon army were pushed back and left the field.
Leaving Ygg with Corwin and Benedict, we returned to Deirdre's tower to check that everything was as it should be there. There was no trouble from the army outside the walls, and I quickly used my spare moments to do some more magical preparation for any further action I may be required to do. I even learnt a little about activating trump sketches - a useful way to get out of problems in a hurry. Perhaps this time I will be able to prepare properly before action, instead of having to turn up completely unprepared. Time will tell.
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| Hero of the Hour - Alfred | The Keep of the Thirteenth Hour |