Irabeth listens to Ayaal's report and Othniel's words with growing worry, her face showing the stress of the past few days more and more with every word. "These are troubling times indeed. There is so much to focus on, so much to do." She takes a second to collect her thoughts before speaking again.
”There is a friendly mongrelman camp below the city. Something to keep in mind.”
She nods, understanding. "The First Descendants will be welcome allies in the coming fights, I'll send some Eagle Knights down to work on securing the alliance officially."
"I do not know what the demons are doing now, but I do know what the have already done. The attack on Kenabres had a specific goal: to destroy this city's wardstone. The wardstone network is one of our greatest defenses against the demonic incursion we have been fighting back against for so long, and the destruction of Kenabres' wardstone has weakened the entire wall of defenses around the rest of the eastern border of the Worldwound. Word has gotten out of the attack, thankfully, but we have received word that Nerosyan and several other cities along the border are dealing with their own attacks. Thank Iomadae for the demons' inherent disorganization, or else we might have been taken down for good."
As anarchic as they are, I'm not sure they even have a headquarters, logistics, etc, but there's got to be something more we could do than wander the streets and attack any demon we see."
"Actually, there is something more that we can do. I am working on reorganizing the crusaders and rescuing as many survivors as we can, but it is slow going. We have intercepted multiple messages from what we believe are cells of cultist traitors that helped organize the attack." she shakes her head, as if the idea itself was alien to her.
"“They have spies everywhere, and have apparently been among us for decades. Only recently has proof of their presence been manifesting. I personally managed to root out one of their more powerful members—the leader of a group called the Hammers of Heaven. We all thought of Staunton Vhane as a model crusader, but as far as I was able to discern, he’s been working for the demons for decades. There’s even evidence he may have been the one to betray Drezen 75 years ago. They knighted me for that discovery, but I’m still not sure why, since he slipped through my fingers and is out there still, causing who knows how much more damage...” She shakes her head before continuing.
"He'll get his just rewards soon enough, but what we need to focus on now is the hidden cells of cultist hideouts. If we can't clear those out, any attempt to retake the city is doomed. Can I count on you to look into this?"
Ayaal wipes her face and nods. She was tired but game, "We aren't winning this war on defense. I'm ready to go after the enemy."