FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

The Dye Has Been Cast

I had to admit that my mind was feeling significantly clearer after my sabbatical. My body also felt ten years younger without the poisonous effects of the poppy lingering in my blood.

As such, I was grateful that my officers disobeyed my orders and forced me to clean up. A fox reliant on a good produced by the enemy is not an ideal commander, let alone a Dictator.

With the festivities, which I was unable to attend most of, over, we continued onto Pest, crossing the Danube and through the city before pausing at the eastern gates. I led my horse to the front of my army and gazed upon the cobblestone road leading off into the flat grasslands of Carpathia.

Philippe's treaty was dead but until I left the gates we were technically abiding by it. Local militias operating in the name of the Carpathian Republic were in the east, of course, but I had a standing army. The sweet little lie of joint rule of Carpathia would be put to rest the moment we passed the threshold.

There was no doubt in my mind what I wanted to do and my soldiers knew it. I did not utter any grand speech, instead I let my actions speak for myself and flicked the reins and guided my horse through the arched gate.

My ear twitched as I heard a distant howl, followed by another that was even further away. I shaded my eyes with my palm and saw the faint twinkle of a spyglass reflecting the setting sun.

"The wolves greet their new master," I said to no one in particular.

Undeterred, I continued down the road and my army followed.

Attacking the Alphate from Carpathia was no simple task. The Carpathian Basin is surrounded by mountains on almost every side with only a few passes that reach the other side. As such, with advance notice, the Alphate could muster enough soldiers to hold whichever pass we showed signs of favoring and although I know we could best them in the end, it would result in extending the war for too long.

In order to spread their defenses thinner, I order Vito and Livio to make two detachments. Livio would march decisively towards the northeast passage that led into the Alphate's most fertile ground to disrupt their food supply while Vito would head South into the Balkans to liberate territory.

I would head straight through into Transylvania, which had ample choice of mountain passes. I was not even certain which one I would take at that moment and most assuredly the enemy didn't know.

The intention was to reunite with Vito and Livio upon crossing and then perform the final march onto the capital with all haste, to give the Alphate too little time to reorganize their supply lines and react. Laurent told me that they had relocated to Lupercal, finding Romulus' capital to be too inauspicious, which was all the better for me as it was closer.

Obviously no plan survives first contact with the enemy but it was a solid plan. If Livio could not secure the countryside to the north, he would be certain to raze as much as he could, anything to help ruin the Alphate food supply.

Vito has a basketful of options with the south. There was a larger fox population there and they would be naturally more likely to side with their own kind but there was also a lot more urban centers with more nobles crammed into one area and where there's Alphate nobles, they've got their human slaves. Word had spread from my Emancipation Project and no doubt all it would take is a mere hint of one of my armies approaching and they'd gut their masters. No slave gets this kind of opportunity in their lifetime and even if Salvia saw fit to quash their dreams it would be too late for them to turn back the clock.

And myself? As mentioned, I had the most passages to attack from and the Alphate could not secure them all properly, not without leaving some weak-points, so I anticipated a rather boring campaign for myself.

Canis help me, how I was wrong.

Transylvania was decimated before we even so much as stepped an inch into it.

Ranches and farmland were burnt to a cinder, their cattle nothing more than cleanly-picked bones littering the fields.

The first village we came across had no survivors. All of them, fox, wolf, or human were found with their throats slit and unceremoniously left where they fell. There was no method to this, as far as I could tell, but plenty of urgency.

But why?

I dismounted my horse and examined what passed for a town square for this village, just an open field of dried grass in the middle of the settlement, surrounded by homes made of stone and thatch. There were panicked footprints in the dirt, mixed species in the square itself, but wolf and horse leading away from it. The Alphate's army definitely did this, slaughtered the locals to the last.

But why?

Wolves were capable of much cruelty but they weren't stupid. Living subjects keep the economy moving and it's far more appealing to a sadistic wolf to keep humans and foxes in servitude perpetually. It's both efficient and cruel.

This? There was no point other than to get one quick bout of sadism and move along. It made no sense.

It made even less sense when we moved onto the next village, hoping this was some kind of sick, isolated incident, and that surely we would be greeted as liberators at the next.

It was the same thing.

Same bodies, same devastation, same...pointless deaths.

I found myself wishing Livio and Vito weren't so far away now and contented myself with Laurent, Taj and Guy for advise.

Taj concurred with my sentiments. She could not understand for a moment why the Alphate would do this to its own so-called subjects. They claimed this part of Carpathia even under Philippe's joint-rule plan, why would they devastate it like this?

Guy stood up to give his own opinion.

"They are liquidating it," Guy rasped, his voice like fire. He was a hard fox to look at, covered in bare patches of burnt skin. "They cannot accept your rule over it but they know they can't hold the basin for long. They want to make your advance as painful as possible."

"I'm aware of scorched earth tactics, Guy," I grumbled and placed my chin in my palm. "But surely they don't think my supply line is so frayed this early into the campaign? I could order spiced stew from Pest in the morning and have it delivered into my paws by evening!"

"Be that as it may," Guy winced, clutching at his shoulder, "they clearly think that any inconvenience for you is worth pursuing."

"My spies in Aokus' court have reported nothing of this," Laurent interjected. "And Aokus, for all his faults, would never order this! Not even Romulus himself would have done this! It goes against any pretense of benevolence the Alphate has!"

"Then maybe the Alpha had nothing to do with it," Guy coughed, hunching over in pain. "Perhaps a General has taken it upon himself to do what poor, knotless Aokus is unable to do?"

I frowned, "Would the Alpha really permit that?"

"The Alpha is very far away and we are here. Said hypothetical General could do whatever they want and the Alpha wouldn't hear about it for a very long time. Long enough to make the atrocity a bit more easy to swallow when sugared up with victory, perhaps?"

"But to what logical end? How will this achieve victory?"

"We've stopped our advance to ponder it, haven't we?" Guy motioned around the camp. "Gives them extra time to think things over, maybe set up a few traps..."

"A massacre!?" Laurent shouted. "Just to make us confused!? That cannot be!"

"The wolves..." I brought a cup of water to my mouth and lapped it, "...follow a very centralized army tradition, much to their folly. I recall one anecdote of a garrison in the Baltics, a wolven commander saw an ursine fleet approaching and sent a messenger to the capital to request permission to engage and when said messenger arrived back he found that bears now occupied the fortress. Obviously this is an extreme example and it may or may not have actually happened but there is no doubt wolves have a chain of command that they follow more than foxes."

"If I recall, during war, the Republic demands all militias and armies to obey the orders of the Field Marshal without question," Guy narrowed his eyes. "Can you think of any fox who took exception to that tradition?"

My hackles raised but I dared not let my offense show. That fire had purged Guy of his self-doubt and he seemed to have a new fire in his belly, one that I could not hope to suffocate at this time.

"Because it was necessary," we both said at the same time.

Why was he doing this? He helped me purge myself of the poppy and now he waves his balls around? Who did he think he was?

Laurent suddenly piped in, "Beta Gamma-"

"In Foxen, please," I waved my paw before cradling my head in it. "No Alphate titles."

Clearing his throat, Laurent continued, "The Minister of Military Affairs, Shen Hege, has given his Generals extensive autonomy and that is all I know regarding their military movements. He seems more interested in calligraphy than giving direct orders and since most of our spies are in the capital-"

"Who are we dealing with, then?" I slammed my fist down on the table. "We can't succeed unless we get inside our enemy's head! If the Minister is attending to his hobbies, who's dealing with things on the ground?"

"The wolves usually deal with such matters on a top-down level..." Laurent cleared his throat, "that's why our spies-"

"Damn your spies, Laurent!" I banged the table again. "Give me something to work with!"

Laurent dug his claws into the table and closed his eyes before calling out towards the entrance to the tent.

"Bring in the dossiers and the slave."

I was greatly confused by Laurent's order but more than a little curious. A few minutes later, a gust of wind came sailing into the tent past the flap at the entrance, carrying the scent of rosewater inside and I knew moments before he entered that my precious wolf, Galip, was outside.

Sure enough, the gray wolf entered, carrying a stack of papers clutched tightly to his naked chest. My eye immediately went to his fuzzy sheathe just before he fell to his knees, covering it up with his legs and bowed.

"Alpha, Laurent asked me to go over some of the officer's profiles..."

His golden eyes peered up at me expectantly, like he felt himself deserving of a treat...or perhaps a punishment. I caught his nose twitching, no doubt smelling the air try and ascertain what I had in mind for him.

"Speak, slave," I leaned across the table.

"There..." Galip swallowed and licked his licks, "...are too many to isolate and the information is quite old...I'm afraid it might not be of use..."

I noticed Galip had his claws buried into different sections of the stack, seemingly at random. A thought occurred to me.

"Can we filter them? Lets remove any of common birth."

Galip immediately pinched one of the sections he held and pushed it out of the pile onto the ground. Whether it was borne out of a natural desire to organize his task or he was afraid of what me or Laurent might do to him, he had shown an uncanny bureaucratic talent.

"No commoners?" Taj raised her brow.

"None," I shook my head. "This is definitely the work of a wolven noble, someone who views the peasantry as mere ants to be squashed on a whim."

Guy crossed his arms, "You think a commoner is not capable of this level of cruelty?"

I shook my head, "A commoner knows the value of labor and people. I think they're capable of cruelty but not such useless cruelty. Burn the fields and slaughter the animals...but massacre the civilians? No..."

I snapped my fingers, "Are there any claimants to the throne in there? Rising families, disinherited cubs, or popular leaders?"

Galip was as fast as lightning and immediately grabbed around eight sheets of paper and passed them onto the table before gently laying the rest on the ground beside him and bowing.

"Canis," I gasped, grabbing a sheet describing a distant kinswolf to Aokus who was stationed near the western border as punishment for making a comment about how a true Alpha needs a knot of sufficient girth, "clearly I've been using my slave for the wrong purposes. A skillful bed-warmer and a bureaucrat!"

"Thank you, Alpha," Galip pressed his nose to the ground.

"How about removing any who have acted as bureaucrats or governors in this area?"

Galip immediately snatched a few, seemingly random papers off of the table without batting an eye.

"Remarkable," I muttered and continued to examine the Kutlar kinswolf.

Berat, was his name and due to his age, prestige, and military history, the document had a good deal of information about his doctrine.

"Defended against Ursine incursion into Karelia using a scorched perimeter tactic," I read aloud. "He would massacre villages just over the border and scorch their fields in order to intimidate the Ursines into not advancing any further for fear of running out of supplies and of what the wolves might be capable of."

I slapped the paper on the table.

"Sound familiar?" I asked.

"It does," Guy nodded and rifled through the papers on his section of the table, "though I would hesitate before making any assumptions."

"Assumptions are fine, so long as we don't get carried away," I crossed my arms. "I think this is who we're dealing with, unless the rest of you found anyone else?"

Laurent shook his head, "There's nothing very specific in these papers aside from that one."

Taj and Guy similarly shook their heads.

"Alright, lets assume this is our General. If so, we need to keep advancing and call his bluff. We have a long way to go before our supply line will be in trouble and we can't let a few dead bodies scare us away. We've delayed our advance long enough."

The hills of Transylvania were covered in a thick haze as we approached the next village on the road towards the heartland. At first we thought little of it, the morning air was wet and carried a mist, hardly anything out of the ordinary. As we marched further into the fog, our noses caught smoke and the distinct smell of rot.

Galip rushed to the side of my horse and passed a handkerchief to me, which I wrapped around my snout, coughing.

"Another bloody massacre, no doubt," I growled.

"Perhaps the wolves will clear a path for us all the way to the capital?" Taj suggested.

"If only," I hacked up some phlegm. One thing I noticed since quitting opium was how sensitive my lungs were even to a distant campfire.

Taj tapped me on the tip of my nose, "I bet you wish you had a shorter snout now, hm?"

I tapped her back and her tall ears twitched, "Is someone volunteering to lead the scouts into the village?"

"If my paramour wishes."

We leaned towards each other and rubbed our noses together while licking each other's lips.

"Canis, I love you," I whispered.

"I'll make sure to bring back a present," Taj smirked before ordering her horse away, 'If any still live, at least!"

Grinning, I watched her ride away into the smoke, keeping a close eye on her tail as she bounced along the back of her horse. Post victory sex with her was something else and I had to admit I was eager for a battle just to relive it, remembering all those long nights together we had in Africa.

Not to say we hadn't had some fun in the start of this campaign, but we had spent more time enjoying what Galip had to offer between us rather than just me and her.

I looked down at Galip, whose gaze was lowered and his tail raised, as I had ordered him to keep it high and show off his assets to anyone who might see. I would have preferred him to be totally naked but the march necessitated that he wear boots. Still, his ass and sheathe were on full display and I could smell, even over the scent of death and smoke, his calming rosewater odor. He was enjoying being subjected to my whims, there was not a hint of disobedience in him now, not even a whiff of outrage when I ordered him about.

I wanted to lift him up atop my horse and have him ride my cock while we waited for Taj's scouts to return. Knot him and fuck him until he howled loud enough for any wolf nearby to hear the sound of a Kutlar learning his place in the world.

Or perhaps get Galip to reward a random soldier? There was a cute spearman loitering nearby on the edge of a unit with yellow fur who kept breaking his rank to catch a glimpse of Galip's rear. Poor discipline on his part, but it was appealing enough of a quirk that I couldn't help but imagine him riding my slave. Would give him a hell of a story to tell his family back home.

As fun as it would have been to engage in such debauched fantasies, it was one thing when I was leading a ragtag rebellion, but I required to show some composure during boring times such as these.

Still, the urge to torment my slave was a bit too strong, so I leaned down closer to Galip and spoke.

"Slav-"

Galip's ear's perked and he immediately locked his eyes off on the distance, his tail darting between his legs.

I rose to attention and caught an orange flare darting through the smoke clouds into the air just before a deafening boom reached my ears.

"Taj?"

Was all I could whimper out as another explosion rocked the horizon.

I kicked my horse and charged without giving any order. I was floating across a sea of smoke, feeling nothing and smelling the wretched smell that tinged the smoke and realizing what it is only now far too late.

It was not the smell of rotting corpses, it was fertilizer.

Wolves began to howl and I could hear hoofbeats off in the distance. Were I in a more cautious state of mind, I would have stopped, but I could not.

There was one more explosion just as the village came into view. A wall of flames cut across the village entrance on my side. Nestled between hills, there was only one other entrance on the other side of the hills and I could see a raiding party of wolves atop horses streaming down into the village, swords and spears flashing in the flames.

Screaming, I forced my horse to keep charging. My soldiers, my Taj, they were trapped in there, behind the flames. I cared not for any burns I might suffer, the pain would only be temporary.

But my horse had no such courage.

He grunted and reared several feet before the flames, refusing to go any further no matter how hard I beckoned him on.

I could see my soldiers on the other side, hunkering down and waiting for the enemy to make contact. Many had abandoned their horses and braced their spears, uttering their prayers before the wolves were upon them.

Taj was there in the center, still atop her horse, and firing her bow, her husband, atop the heads of the soldiers.

A tidal wave of crossbow bolts collided with the soldiers and enough fell for the line to break. No more than a second later, the wolves broke through, many tossing aside their crossbows and drawing their sabers just in time to cut down a fox.

Most of the wolves were lightly armored, a stark contrast to their love of heavy cavalry, with one exception. A she-wolf with fur as bright orange as the flames themselves charged forward on a black stallion covered in dark steel barding. She wore a dragon-shaped helmet with a red feather plume trailing to the side of her head.

And she darted through her cavalry, straight towards Taj, and raised her saber on high...

A bolt caught me in the shoulder and I fell from my horse just as I saw my beloved fennec's head fall from her shoulders. I rolled into a ditch covered with old manure and laid there.

My shoulder was fine, the armor caught the arrow, it would only be a bruise.

But Taj...

She was gone.

I knew at any moment the ditch could catch fire and I would burn up, but I could not move. Perhaps I didn't want to.

It would have been a good time for it all to end, wouldn't it? Burn to cinders while several good soldiers and my beloved were slaughtered.

I laid there while the massacre went on and finally ended with the wolves withdrawing off into the hills while the flames still crackled nearby. It was all over before anyone could reach the battle, save for me, the fool who was stupid enough to rush to their aid.

A wolf's head appeared over the ditch and for a moment I thought I would have one final humiliation until I realized it was Galip, who pulled me from the ditch and forced me to walk, leaning on his shoulder.

My army had finally reached the village and I could see a few passing buckets to try and put out the fire. I turned my head back but Galip stopped me and pressed my face into my chest.

"Don't look, Alpha."

I sniffed and his rosewater scent managed to bring me down to earth once more but only enough to realize just what had happened and comprehend it.

"Taj..." I choked, covering my face up into Galip's chest so that no one could see me, "...oh Gods..."

"Alpha, it's...it's okay..."

"It'll be fine..."

"Please..."