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You had left Cousin Markwart in charge of the realm while you were away. As a member of the Greifswald's high nobility, he was perhaps the one most cut out for the job; that your mother was his aunt worked in your favour as well.
While you would leave the household in the care of Queen Anastasia, the matters of the realm and state would be given in care to Cousin Markwart; politically speaking, he's a moderate in most affairs. He is likeable but not too powerful, prominent among his peers, though in good part due to you being his cousin. Thus, he is as dependent on your appointment as you are on his good judgement while you are away.
Regents are often portrayed as insidious or scheming figures; Markwart isn't much of a schemer or all that insidious. You knew him well, and you knew your man when you saw one. He was as good a deputy as they come; of that you were certain.
While the winds were initially favourable to your fleet, they soon turned against you, as did a storm right off the approach to Ölfland, blowing away about a fourth of your fleet, and with it your army, of course.
You had spent most of the storm in prayer, though it thankfully proved to be a minor setback; not a single ship was sunk. As you surveyed the damage, you couldn't help but feel grateful for your skilled crew and the sturdy ships they manned. With the storm behind you, you would finally come to the island of Ölfland.
Yet things hadn't been as you had hoped; the storm had set you back about a week, which meant that Svegalian reinforcements were already on their way here, and you would have to act quickly now. To make matters worse, the quarter of the army that had been blown off course wouldn't come in as well.
The worst of the worst was that you had to land a few kilometres, of course, from the harbour you had intended to land by.
Undeterred, you had your squires put on your armour while the ships headed for the beach. From there, you would land in a smaller boat, together with Sophia, while Wittekind would be brought aboard a vessel made to disembark horses on the beachfront.
The beach itself was a mixture between rocky and sandy , making it difficult for the horses to land safely. In spite of it all, by about ten in the morning you had disembarked most of your men from the ships. Who would in turn await your next step.
Two lighter ships you had sent out to scout out the coastline of the beach notified you that a small Svegalian army had been sighted to the northwest and would most likely come in contact with you if you march upon the harbour.
If you took the harbour and the village that it belonged to, you would most certainly have to besiege the nearby castle, though thankfully it wasn't that big, though the Svengalian army would most certainly march to their relief.
