A small castle sat atop a low hill surrounded by the winding streets and low wooden buildings of North Reach. The ocean crashed ashore on the beaches on the North side of town. Well-tended fields stretched off away from town in every other direction. Three Imperial Roads, straight and wide, came in from the East, the South-West and the West. Each road entered the 15' wooden pallisade that surrounded the town by one of the three large gates. These gates were each gaurded by four of the Duke's men wearing chainmail under their brown tabbards and carrying a broadsword and a shield with the Duke's insignia on it.
It was a warm, clear, moonless night. The town was relatively quiet this late at night with only adventursome, or stupid, people about. There were a half dozen patrols out tonight, each consisting of ten men, six with sword and shield and the rest with bows. They spent the night patrolling the streets, breaking up the occasional fight and taking bribes from those who wished to engage in less ethical pursuits.
The castle itself was surrounded by a wide, shallow moat and a 20' wall of smooth stones. The lone entrance through the wall was covered by a drawbridge that spanned the moat, when it was down, and met the back of the well-fortified barbican. Both the front and back doors to the barbican swung out away from the castle with a steel portcullis behind it. The front doors were open and four gaurds with halberds, half plate and wide-brimmed helmets stood beside the closed portcullis. They had an unobstructed view in front and to the sides and had orders to challenge anyone approaching the barbican. They were supported by an unknown number of archers within . . . probably four to six.
Casandra went over the plan in her head one more time, and reviewed the changes to the defences she had learned about since she arrived. The doubling of the gaurd at the gates and barbican was to be expected. As was the manning of the lookout towers along the outer pallisade. The dozen or so archers along the top of the castle's outer wall were not a surprise either. But the alertness of the gaurds was a little surprising, and maybe problematic if she wanted to pull this off without killing any of them. It seemed that the Duke's threats to dock two weeks pay for anyone found to be inattentive had been well heeded. Especially after he started the surprise inspections and made examples of a few unlucky souls.
Casandra could hardly blame the Duke of course. After he had kidnapped the Prince and Princess of neighboring Ilmyria, along with their two teenaged sons, five days ago he had brought them here. Meanwhile, his brother King Cirius had sent 2,000 soldiers up from the South who would arrive in another two days. They would reinforce the 400-500 man garrison here and should be sufficient to hold the town and provide a large enough escort to keep the captives safe on their way down to the capital. Needless to say, King Solan had immediately started gathering his own army and sent it to rescue his daughter, son-in-law, and grandchildren. They had finished assembling this afternoon and should be here in a couple of days. Who arrived first would probably determine who won, and the Duke wanted to ensure that his garrison was prepared, even if no action was expected for a couple more days.
Knowing that his troops probably would not arrive in sufficient strength before reinforcements arrived, King Solan had contacted Casandra and pleaded for her assistance in rescuing his daughter and her family. She spent a couple of days creating a trump for Princess June from portraits and relatives' descriptions. She contacted the Princess late in the evening and found that she was being held by herself. She had only been allowed to speak briefly to her husband and sons and had no idea as to their whereabouts. She was able to describe her own quarters in sufficient detail that Casandra was able to pinpoint it on a copy of the Castle's blueprints that she had acquired. Another two days were spent on the same routine for Prince George. He was also able to describe his own quarters well enough to place them, but had no idea where his sons were located.
There was not sufficient time left to create trumps for the children, especially given the lack of recent portraits of them. So Casandra had spent most of the next day planning the operation. She contacted her operative in North Reach and trumped in. He had taken over a small farmhouse outside of town. Her operative had some updates for her, including the three most probable locations of the two boys. Casandra then contacted her choosen force commander and brought the troops and their equipment through. By early evening they had all of their equipment set up and had been briefed on the operation itself. Like all of her teams there were thirty individuals in this one. Thirty would be directly involved and the other twenty would be in reserve, monitoring the action.
There were five teams of six on this mission. Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie teams would secure the three gates. Alpha and Bravo would then take the place of the gaurds there while Charlie team joined up with Echo team to take the barbican. Delta team would split up and watch the patrols and plot their whereabouts. Echo team would make sure that no new patrols appeared until they took the barbican. Once the barbican was taken, Charlie team would man it while Echo team infiltrated the castle and rescued the prisoners.
Casandra looked down at her watch, even though she knew what it would say . . . 02:57:47. She was with Echo team, watching the barbican. She took a last look over to the two others watching the gate from the front, and then up at the four team members who were already in position on top of the barbican. At 3:00 a.m. her teams took the gates in a series of brief, bloodless fights. Five minutes later Alpha and Bravo teams had stowed the gaurds and were manning the gates. At 3:10 a.m. Charlie team arrived at the barbican and got in position. They had five minutes before replacements were to arrive from the castle.
The four team members on top of the barbican silently repelled partway down the front so that they were positioned just above the gaurds. They dropped down on them just as Charlie team sent smoke grenades and tear gas canisters into the interior. The archers inside were unable to open the back door in the confusion, and were easy enough to subdue when they were able to get the front portcullis open. Now came the tough part.