The citizens gave a feeble but enthusiastic cheer. I strode off, filled with a fresh sense of determination and purpose. My party companions had heard my rousing speech and had gathered in a group in front of the castle.
“Lord Vance, it’s … you? Sort of?” Rollar stared at me with one eyebrow raised and an expression of half-wonder, half confusion on his face. Being Fated, he could see through the illusion put on by the Beauty Mirror.
“It’s me in everything but body,” I said, “and even that’s pretty close. Just act as if this idiot’s body is, for all intents and purposes, mine. I hope you’re all ready for one hell of a battle tonight, because I’m fired up to fight and obliterate this Church of Light army.”
“I’ve had a chance to patrol all of the walls,” Rollar said, “and to thoroughly assess the situation. We’re heavily outnumbered, as you’ve no doubt seen, but the numbers don’t tell the whole story. I know that the Church conscripts will have barely had any training; back when I was with the Church of Light Army, it used to take us at least six months minimum to get a peasant boy into fighting shape. And by fighting shape, I mean barely able to deliver one or two swings of a sword, and not piss his pants at the first sign of battle. To get your average peasant levy into an effective fighting man takes at least a year, and the experience of a battle or two. The vast majority of these troops have had none of those, and they’ve barely been in the army for a month or two. If we can present them with a truly awesome and utterly frightening display of force, I think well over half of the bastards will simply drop their weapons and flee. They have no more interest in fighting you than any peasant does, and they’ve simply been forced into this campaign by the threats issued by Elandriel.”
Everything Rollar was saying was germinating the seeds of an idea. Now that I’d been able to completely possess the body of the actor and control it as if it was my own, I had an idea on how to destroy a large portion of the invading army from within.
“They’ll piss their pants when my undead wyrm bursts out of the ground from under their feet,” I said. “And then they’ll shit themselves when an army of undead harpies descends on them from the midnight sky. But I know an even more insidious method to wreck this Church Army from within. I’m going to need a light crossbow and some bolts. A child’s crossbow, one of those little ones that kids hunt rats and squirrels with would be ideal.”
“Uh, Lord Vance, you can’t do much to a man—especially an armored man—with a weak weapon like that,” Rollar said. “It’ll likely deal out a good sting and draw a little blood, but aside from that it’ll do nothing but piss them off.”
“I don’t need to hurt or incapacitate the enemy soldiers with this weapon,” I said with a grin. “I just need to infect them. Rollar, find me a child’s crossbow and some bolts. Anna-Lucielle, I’m going to need your Charm powers for this plan too. Everyone else, get your armor and weapons ready for battle. We’re going to hit these motherfuckers when complete darkness falls, which will be soon … and we’re going to hit them hard.”
While everyone else prepared themselves for battle, and I suited up in my gleaming black plate armor, Rollar found me a small child’s crossbow and some bolts for it. Using the Dragon Sword, my Death magic, and Anna-Lucielle’s Charm powers, I enchanted the child’s crossbow bolts with the same alchemical blend of powers that I’d used on the bone hairpin. With these enchanted bolts, anyone I shot would become a viable vessel for my spirit to control, and I could possess them as easily and effectively as I’d possessed the actor’s body.
“All right, Rollar,” I said, once I’d finished creating these enchanted projectiles, “it’s time to do some sniping. And using these simple little bolts, I’ll sow the seeds of mutiny in the Church Army.”
By the time we headed out onto the ramparts of the city walls to locate some targets for my new weapon, darkness had already fallen. The sky was clear, though, and the moon above us was bright, illuminating the enemy encampments surrounding the city with bright silvery blue light. I could easily see clearly enough to pick out targets.
“Who are you going to infect with your power, Lord Vance?” Rollar asked.
“Raw recruits, new conscripts,” I answered as I cocked the crossbow for the first shot. “They don’t want to be here and likely hate the Church for forcing them to leave their fields and families. Their minds will be a lot more susceptible to receiving the kind of message I’m going to implant in them than some battle-hardened crusading knucklehead who’s been brainwashed by Church propaganda for years.”
“How will you know who’s who?”
“Easy,” I answered, taking aim at a soldier a hundred yards from the walls. “You think the Church’s stingy commanders will waste good armor and weapons on their conscripted troops? These peasants are here only to boost numbers and to serve as arrow fodder, to take the heat off the more valuable regular Church troops. The conscripts are very easy to spot. Plus, the conscripted peasants are much more likely to be scowling and grumbling instead of walking around with the usual pompous broomstick-up-the-ass expression you usually find on the faces of holier-than-thou Church veterans. And I’m just lining up one of these discontented motherfuckers in my sights right now.”
The soldier I was taking aim at was most certainly a recent conscript. The only armor the young, lanky man was wearing was a boiled leather cap and a haggard old leather breastplate, which he had on backward. I could
