The walls which the city of Tabsyfiide had been so proud and confident of

 over the seven decades since they first erected the towering fifteen foot stone

 circle about them, now were, beaten, scorched and in sections fallen into

  rubble, over the city it once stood tall and straight over. Its desperate

 defenders now seeking to erect  barricades from the heaps of broken and     cracked quarried stone.      In that doomed nest of twisting streets, its   

 people’s unraveling hopes hastened with the echoes of  the Ak Ghana’s

 drums rumbling through their souls.   A new drumming set in particular

 added more ashes to the burnt out husks of wishes: they once were the

 distinctive sounding beats of the Ras Duilanshangi now being played as

 mockeries of all they once believed.           

 Veterans watched silently while rising murmurs of frightened novelty came

 from newcomers and those less aware of the changed arts of war beyond the land of Mazimensah, as great towers moving on huge wheels beneath them rumbled towards the walls. To the shock of many a defender they recognized the flayed skinsof fallen nobles, their heads still grotesquely attached, one rumored to be the heir to the Ras Duilanshangi, the RasDuinomo himself. 

In a day soon to be infamous, the horrifying sight of the desecrated remains,

reduced to deterrents against the flames of the defenders, shrank the morale

of the Tabsyfiide fighters, as they envisioned themselves and their families

 treated in such a manner.   On the south wall, the towers advanced under the covering fire of the deadly trebuchets and mangonels, a portion of  the wall  collapsing, bringing shouts of  triumph from therevenge minded forces of the Ras Welquna, who led up his first wave,his winged body armor instilling fear into those in the city who opposed him.

 This time there was to be no heroic counterattack of spirited warriors the

Fate of their kin and city no longer borne proudly.  The Ras met not those

coolly professional warriors: now desperate men and women on the heaped

and bloody masonry of all classes and occupations: professional sell swords, soldiers of Mazimensah, militia and maddened citizens of weapon bearing age even if it was a simple but nevertheless deadly club, and crushed them all leaving their bodies on the broken stone.

His horsemen swept through the soon opened gates, the barricades on

 the main streets leading from it decorated with the bodies of the fallen of

 both sides.

 At  the same moment  ramps of the towers touched down on the wall and the rush of the Ras Augyhellsi and his grim eyed warriors, their dyed yellow

horsehair crests flowing behind them as they leapt amongst the foe,their shields with great oval bosses in the middle of them painted with the individual designs of the fighter.  Ikedreto of Uwecheegosoon poured

his heavy horsemen into the stricken city trampling the defenders into

the dust, their lances and maces hardly used. With one voice, the guardsmenof the Ak Ghana cried out, then swarmed into the city in a mail clad tide.The scaling ladders they used to climb and beat down the west wall’s defenders grim monuments to their success.  Their captain, Waljalesle the Fire-Hearted swung her blade two handed; her harvestfor the Toll of theIron Road climbing higher still.  Some of the defenders, either inspired by their likely fate, or the inspiration of a braveleader, fought gallantly, a step by bloody step battle until overwhelmed by thesteel of the loyalist Ne Varii.

 But many others after a brief clash would soon break for some grotto or

 niche to hide, the most honorable fled to their homes, while others raced

 to find an imagined safety in the overcrowded temples, a few would

 debase themselves and offer themselves up as receivers of the loyalist

 the same sex.  Soon all forms of organized resistance had like a lamp been extinguished. 

        The Ak Ghana was determined that all pits of iniquity that riddled

 the landscape of Mazimensah would see what fools who chose resistance

 suffered when his outstretched hands of peace turned red taloned; divinely

 blessed smile became the ravenous fangs of the War God’s Son  Volhufmoku who like a leopard, tore apart and devoured his foes without thought ofmercy brightening his armored form.