The Last Stand at Sorrow's Gate

The initial surprise and irritation of the dwarven host quickly hardened into grim resolve. Their war horns blared, a deep, baying sound that promised slaughter, and they regrouped for a full, overwhelming assault on the ruined palace – what the defenders had grimly come to call "Sorrow's Gate." Wave after wave of iron-clad dwarves, their axes rising and falling with brutal efficiency, crashed against the makeshift barricades.

Elmsworth, his face smeared with grime and the blood of a shallow cut on his cheek, was no longer the distant commander. He stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the starving farmers and the few remaining guards, his own scavenged sword, heavy and awkward in his unaccustomed hand, parrying desperate blows. He fought with a cold fury born of despair and a desperate need to protect the flickering lives behind him. His old knowledge of tactics surfaced in shouted warnings and desperate commands, helping to anticipate and counter the dwarves’ disciplined formations, but for every dwarf that fell, two more seemed to take its place.

The line was crumbling. A section of the ruined outer wall, pummeled relentlessly, finally gave way, and a tide of dwarves poured through. It was Sir Kaelen, his breath rasping, his rusty armor dented in a dozen places, who saw the imminent collapse. With a rallying cry that was a mere shadow of a knight’s proud bellow but still carried the weight of unyielding duty, he gathered a handful of the bravest defenders. "For the Kingdom that Was! For the Dawn that May Be!" he roared, leading a suicidal charge directly into the breach. His ancient sword, somehow finding its mark time and again, bought precious moments. He went down under a storm of axe blows, but his sacrifice momentarily stemmed the tide, allowing Valerius to pull the remaining defenders back to an inner courtyard, a tighter, more desperate perimeter.

Further within the chaotic ruins, Mistress Elara, propped against a fallen statue, her eyes burning with a feverish light, saw a unit of heavily armored dwarven shock troops preparing to shatter this new, fragile line. She knew she had little left. Drawing on the very dregs of her life force, she thrust her gnarled staff towards the sky, her voice cracking on syllables of immense power, words of a forgotten, potent magic. The air crackled. The ground beneath a precariously leaning bell tower near the dwarves trembled violently. With a groan of tortured stone, the ancient tower twisted and collapsed, not with a deafening explosion, but with a sickening crunch, right atop the surprised dwarven unit. Dust and screams filled the air. Mistress Elara slumped to the ground, a faint, serene smile on her lips, her spirit finally extinguished.

As the battle raged, and the inner courtyard became a slaughterhouse, Flicker, his body wracked by coughing fits that brought up blood, was not among the fighters. He moved like a ghost through the hidden, crumbling passages of the palace, passages he knew from a youth spent exploring its underbelly. He gathered a small, terrified group of non-combatants – mostly children and the very old – who had been sheltered in a deep cellar. "This way," he wheezed, his voice barely audible above the din of battle. "Quickly… before the wolves find the lambs." He led them through a near-collapsed servant's tunnel that emerged far beyond the palace walls, deep within a choked, dead orchard, guiding them to precious safety with his last, gasping breaths before sinking against a withered tree, his duty done.

Despite these acts of incredible, desperate heroism, the Red Kingdom’s defenders were being systematically annihilated. The inner courtyard fell. Elmsworth, fighting amidst a dwindling handful, saw the end was near. Yet, as the dwarves pushed forward over the bodies of the slain, a strange pause fell over their advance. The dwarven commander, a grizzled warrior with a look of grim pragmatism, surveyed the scene: the sheer, unexpected ferocity of these starving defenders, the mounting dwarven casualties, and the utter desolation of the land around them. There were no riches here, no bountiful orchards of Crimson Comforts, only dust, death, and desperate defiance.

He barked an order. The dwarves, while securing the ruined palace, did not press their advantage to hunt down every last fleeing survivor through the wider, blighted lands. The cost was proving too high for a kingdom that was clearly already dead and offered none of the promised spoils. For the few like Elmsworth who managed to slip away into the smoky, chaotic aftermath, this grim calculus was their only salvation. They had been shattered, but the dwarven tide, for now, had been fought to a bitter, bloody standstill just beyond Sorrow's Gate.