Free The Chesian Wars (A Griffins & Gunpowder Collection) by Joshua Johnson

room.
    "Surrender!" a voice shouted, thick with a Chesian accent. Kasimir answered with a pair of pistol shots through the open doorway. "Your fortress is taken. You have no choice but to surrender."
    "Why don't you come in and tell me that to my face?" Kasimir shouted defiantly. He kept one eye on the doorway as he slid new cartridges in his revolvers' chambers.
    "Kasimir, you are surrounded!"
    "General Hollatz?" Kasimir's eyes were wide and he dropped a cartridge.
    "Throw your revolvers out the door and we'll talk about it!" the general ordered. "There's been enough bloodshed already, there doesn't need to be any more."
    They must have taken him prisoner , Kasimir thought.
    It was the only way that the general would order him to surrender his weapons to an enemy in the middle of his fortress. Even a man as respected and brave as him would do as told when there was a pistol shoved in his face.
    Kasimir wondered how the Chesians had been able to breach the fortress walls without anyone sounding an alarm. The sentries would have been able to see any force crossing the open fields, especially under the double full moons. He tried to remember who had had left on sentry when he realized that all of his troops had been sent to the racks just after dark. The well-rested troops from Aldris had taken over watch and had been put on sentry duty.
    The two regiments had escaped a cavalry force more than ten times its own size, but how? Chesian heavy cavalry was the most ruthless and feared cavalry in the western nations and would not have given up easily. The regiments had escaped completely intact.
    "How much did they pay you to sell out your nation?" Kasimir demanded.
    "It wasn't like that, Kasimir," Niklos said, his voice suddenly less harsh. "They had Aldris under siege, with more soldiers than I've ever seen in one place. One volley from their artillery would have crushed the fortress walls and it would have just been a matter of cleaning up the bodies at that point. They offered me a way out of all of that bloodshed. A way to keep my soldiers alive."
    "Yet you completely refused them when it came time for me to have the same offer?" The general didn't answer. "Cat got your tongue, old man?"
    "Why don't you just throw the fucking pistols down and surrender. I can still get you a commission with the Chesians. It's not too late for you."
    "What about for all of the soldiers that you killed tonight? What about all of the soldiers that are going to be killed because you handed our enemies two of the main fortresses that stood in their path?"
    The fortresses beyond Demitas would not be ready for an assault so early. They would have expected Demitas to hold the attackers at bay for days, and the garrisons would still be on the road to their strongholds. If the Chesians were to make their move before those soldiers made it to the safety of the inner fortresses, it would be a massacre.
    "It had to be done, Kasimir. They sent a merchant to talk to me last year. They told me that they would kill every man in my garrison if I didn't go along with them," Niklos said. "They offered me a way out and I took it."
    "And what happened to the rest of the garrison at Aldris? What happened to those who stood against you?"
    "There were losses at Aldris, far greater than there were here. I tried to convince the commanders to surrender the garrison and play their part. Commander Garis tried to raise the alarm; I had to shoot him in the back."
    Kasimir grimaced. Florian Garis had been in the same class as he had in the Malkalan Officers’ Academy. They had studied tactics and artillery together.
    "This is your last warning, Kasimir," Niklos said as he leaned into the doorway. He pulled back when Kasimir brought his pistol up. "I don't want to have to sacrifice any more of these men to get you out of there. They have families too, Kasimir, remember that."
    "What assurance do I have that they will honor what you promise me?" Kasimir asked as he stood. He