"Cleaning up a battlefield is one of the worst jobs there is after a battle, to be honest. I'd rather get stabbed and spend a week in the infirmary rather than clean up so many corpses again." - Francz Hikzsa, retired soldier.

"Hah! Bloody hell! About damn time they came!" said Angus Harscape, Graf von Bærengant, with both joy and sorrow in his voice as he watched the cavalrymen plough through and trample the few surviving zealots.

He had not received word to expect them, but when he thought of it logically, it made sense. His first detachment had no cavalry because his region was unsuited for their use, and thus their raised troops lacked them.

On the other hand, the troops that gathered in the capital would definitely possess a cavalry troop, and it was not too unexpected to send them ahead to come to his group's rescue.

The relief from survival warred with the grief of having lost so many people in the old dwarf's heart, and he slumped down and sat on the dirt, suddenly too tired to keep standing.

"I guess we lasted long enough in the end," said Reinhardt as he plopped down beside the Graf with a relieved sigh.

Neither of them looked good. The Graf had a large cut on his face that cleaved through his left eye, and at least half a dozen broken spearheads that failed to penetrate deeply due to his armor were still stuck on his torso. Reinhardt himself was bleeding from many cuts and stabs, half delirious from blood loss. A couple arrows still protruded from his chest and shoulder.

"Hope they brought some fucking *cough* good healers with them," said Elfriede as she nearly collapsed against Reinhardt's side while coughing up pink, frothy blood. The wound on her leg had worsened, and a broken spearhead protruded from her right chest, its point inside her lung. Her breathing was ragged and weak, interspersed with bloody, frothy coughs. "Otherwise we might *cough* not be around to celebrate."

"Speak of the devil," said the Graf as he saw some of the cavalrymen who followed behind the charging group turn and rode towards them. "I think you might just be getting what you asked for, lass."

The leader of the group of cavalrymen was an old dwarf with long, white beard who made a clicking noise with their tongue when they noticed the Graf amongst the surviving defenders. They stopped their steed just a few steps from where the group were seated, and hauled themself off its back with skill despite their apparent age.

"Angus you old coot," said the old dwarf, identifiable as female from the timbre of her voice, as she laid a hand on the Graf's shoulder. A bright light shined, as the old female dwarf plucked the spearheads that remained with her other hand, and Reinhardt could see the Graf's injuries mending. "Still playing with the soldiers at the frontlines like a brat."

"Frigg you old wench," said the Graf back in a relieved mood. He apparently knew the old female dwarf from elsewhere considering the way they addressed each other. Several other dwarven healers had spread out to help the wounded, while others went straight inside to help those in the warrens. The few others near the Graf like Reinhardt and Elfriede were left to the old female dwarf's hands, it seemed. "Still got the sharp tongue, I see."

"You see far worse, you dumbass, at least half as good, I'd say," said the old dwarven matron, Frigg, in a more incisive tone. Reinhardt understood what she meant. She was a light affinity healer, and those fare poorly when dealing with delicate injuries like eyes and spines. The Graf's left eye was likely blinded for the foreseeable future. "All right, you should be good now, let me tend to the rest first before we speak."

The dwarven matron moved to Reinhardt next, but he gestured for her to help Elfriede first. Elfriede's coughing had gone worse over time, and she was visibly weakening from the wounds she suffered.

"Oh dear. Grit your teeth, lass, this will hurt a bit," said the old dwarf as she repeated what she did with the Graf. While she kept her healing magic flowing, her other hand grasped the shaft that protruded from Elfriede's chest, and she yanked the bloody spearhead out with one pull. Elfriede just gritted her teeth and had not uttered even a word of complaint while the woman did that.

"You're that lad Sigrun and Hogarth adopted some decades ago, aren't you?" asked the old woman while she worked on Reinhardt next. Grünhildr was also pretty bad off from the fighting, but she was conscious and insisted that she could wait a while more. In the meantime, a young dwarf had climbed to the bell tower and helped carry Salicia down as she was too hurt to do so herself. "Did Ingrid make it?"

Reinhardt answered the old dwarf's question with a sad shake of his head, to which Frigg gave a sigh. By then the young dwarf who went to help Salicia had gently set the one-eyed woman down on her side. She had at least a dozen arrows protruding from her body, some on her back, others on the front. Two had struck her left leg at the thigh and behind the knee, which made it impossible for her to climb down on her own.

While the old healer worked on Grünhildr and Salicia, Reinhardt felt Elfriede snuggle closer to him. Both of them were still dog tired, and half delirious from blood loss. Their wounds, while treated, still throbbed with pain and left raw, red scars on their flesh. Yet their lives were no longer in danger.

"We get to live another day, I guess, huh?" said Elfriede as she leaned her back on Reinhardt's larger form, uncaring of the blood and viscera that caked his fur. Not that she looked any better, to be fair.

Reinhardt took a deep breath before he answered. The fresh morning air smelled horrid, tainted as it was with the overwhelming scent of blood, piss and shit from thousands of corpses. It was the scent that accompanied death, a scent he was used to from many battlefields.

"I guess we did, indeed," he said with a faint smile as he draped an aching arm around his wife's shoulder.