“You can take all the men you recruited, as well as the original members of your former militia band that bear the Mark of the Swan on the back of their hands, which we will now call 2nd Company,” Smythe said, giving her a penetrating look when he mentioned the Swan Mark. “Meanwhile, I’ll take most of the old hands who fought with us before, as well as those recruits without the mark.”
“Yes, Captain,” Falon said stiffly and then had to ask, “I must ask, Sir, do you disapprove of the Swan Tattoos, Captain Smythe?’
The Captain’s mouth twisted. “Let’s put that conversation back in its sheath for now,” he said evenly. “Moving on, you’ll take with you Sergeants Darius and Gearalt.”
“Captain!” Falon said with alarm.
“I don’t want to hear it, Lieutenant,” Smythe growled, causing Falon’s mouth to close with a click. “You will take advice from the Sergeant and work with Gearalt and his men, who are I assure you are experienced foragers all,” Smythe said, leveling a finger at her. “Your job will be to look, listen and most importantly, to learn. If there’s a question you let the Sergeants hash it out among themselves, as that’s their job and not yours…at least not until after you’ve got some seasoning under thy belt. You’re battle proven, Rankin, but as you’re about to learn there’s more to the business of war and the care and handling of fighting men than can be easily learned during service on only one battlefield.”
“I’m to let the Sergeants lead the men, Captain?” Falon asked carefully.
Smythe looked at her sharply. “If there’s a battle, then you are to take charge,” he said flatly, “the same holds for any non-foraging situations; you are the Lieutenant and I expect you to act like it. On the other hand, when it comes to foraging for supplies, you are to issue any instructions you think necessary and then sit back and let the Sergeants carry out those orders however they see fit to do so. Are we understood, Squire?”
Falon blinked. By addressing his last question to her as Squire Rankin, instead of Lieutenant Rankin, he was making a point that she was to obey him on this issue without question. As a Lieutenant she might have cause to question the Captain, but as her Squire to his Knight, he was making the point that she owed him unquestioning obedience.
“Clear as glass, sharp as steel, Captain,” Falon said quickly. She had no desire to question Smythe on this; truth be told she was more than a little intimidated by the large, powerful man.
“Sharp as steel,” he muttered, shaking his head. Falon braced to attention, waiting to see if there were any new orders. “Get out of here and back to your men, Falon,” he growled.
“Yes, Captain!” she saluted, her fist thumping into her chest, before turning and scurrying away.
Chapter 16: Tulla’s has Eyes
Tulla sat in the opening of her tent and huddled for warmth against the driving rain and the drop of water that inevitably saturated the tent.
Well, she silently chided herself, I am just an old woman with a knack for magic and a taste for revenge. One day the Invaders were going to suffer for what they had done to her Mother. Retribution had been far longer in coming than she had ever imagined, but the first glimmerings were finally in the air, like the scent of freshly cut grass on the summer wind.
Which was why, in addition to not using her magics even for modest conveniences in order to avoid attracting the attention of the Invader Wizards, she also had a pair of eyes on a certain section of the camp vital to her new interests.
Her sharp, old eyes spotted a pair of young legs churning along the saturated grass as he dodged around tents, as the purpose-driven warrior moved from one end of the camp despite the rain.
“Speak of the devil,” she muttered, pulling her goat skin cloak tighter around her. For shedding water and cold there was nothing like well-prepared goat hide. It also didn’t hurt that such material added to the crazed-down-to-the-heels, magic woman façade she had carefully crafted so long ago that it had become more than a second skin; it had, for most intents and purposes, become her actual life.
But life had not always been like this, and even if the Common Brood would rather forget their heritage and the inconvenient truths at times, this old Branch would not. She remembered…and in remembering, the fires in her belly smoldered.
“Two daughters and a son they’ve taken from me,” she spat, “well, well…all and good for them. They may have forgotten old Tulla and her dead brood, but this old Branch has not forgotten them. Neither Invader nor Common Brood has been forgotten.”
“Madame Tulla. Madame Tulla!” the little camp urchin cried as soon as he was close enough to be heard.
“Well come on out of the rain and dry yourself, you fool boy,” Tulla said shortly, cut to the quick by just how much this mongrelized mix-blood reminded her of her own son Jarlath, who had been chopped down in his youth in a futile rebellion so many years ago. If sometimes the boy benefited from her sharp tongue at the unpleasant memories he stirred, she had also been known to donate an extra bowl of soup, or a threadbare cloak free of charge when the memories he stirred had been good ones.
“I’ve news on the camp ye got me watching,” the boy said triumphantly, before his rain-soaked body erupted in almost violent shivering.
“Enough talk,” she said softening at his distress. Children were supposed to be a blessing from the goddesses, hard as that was to remember betimes, “Shuck off that shirt and hang it over the brazier to dry.”
“Thank you, Madame,” the boy said through chattering teeth, ducking his head as he did so.
Tulla scowled sweeping him from head to toe with a gaze. “And just where is the cloak I gave you not two weeks ago?” she asked, drawing herself up with displeasure. “Fool boys should know better than to run around in the cold and wet without something to keep them warm, Dani.”
Dani placed his hands next to the bright cherry coals in the fire and despite her pique over the cloak she picked up a metal poker to stir the coals to increase the heat.
“Well,” she said direly. Foot tapping as she waiting for an answer.
“Some older lads stole it when I wouldn’t give them my cheese and stuck it into my mouth instead,” Dani shrugged.
Tulla looked at him sharply.
“We’ll get to that matter in a moment,” the old witch scowled, vowing to track down the thieves with her magic and make them suffer in ways such as they had never experienced before and would pray to never again once she was done with them. “But if thy cockles are warmed, how about the news?” she pressed, picking up an old shawl and hanging it around the boy’s shoulders for warmth.
Dani perked up at her words the excitement returning to his face. “They’re breaking camp, Tulla,” the scamp said, eager to relay his new.
“Oh,” Tulla asked looked into the coals as if uninterested, “I don’t suppose you know where they’re going, would you?”
Dani puffed up with pride. “They said the Prince himself sent them out a-foraging for foods at the Captain’s orders.”
“Interesting,” the old witch said contemplatively.
“Did I do good, Madame Tulla?” the boy asked hopefully.
Tulla slid a glance to him and saw the way he was eyeing the remains of her first meal: a half-eaten drumstick and a crust of bread so hard she had feared for her teeth and soaked it in a little water before trying it again.
“Possibly,” Tulla hid a smile, “I might even feel inclined to a reward. What do you think about that?”
Dani’s eyes lit up. “Ye wouldn’t happen to have an extra bite of cheese would ye, Tulla?” he asked so hopefully that at that moment he resembled nothing so much as a hungry puppy. “That would be ever so good!”
“I may have,” Tulla said contemplatively, and the little boy’s eyes shined. Then her expression turned strict, “But only for particularly well-behaved young boys.”
The little scamp visibly drooped. “I was afraid of that,” he said so sadly she wanted to smile.
She bustled arou
nd the tent setting this and that to right until she reached the place she had hidden the cheese. Deftly palming it—because, adorable little scamp or no, you couldn’t trust an urchin with the location of something like cheese—she went back the brazier.
“However, for little boys who promise not to lose their cloaks in the future…” she said, drawing the words out and then producing a knife and the cheese.
Dani’s eyes followed her hands like a hypnotized snake.
“Oh, here you go,” she half laughed, half sighed, unable to keep up the ruse in the face of such innocence.
Shoving the cheese in his mouth faster than he could eat it, his cheeks quickly bulged as his face seemed fit to burst with cheese.
“Here’s another copper,” she told him dropping a coin into his hand and closing her hand over it, “I won’t need any help for a while.”
The boy’s face, still half-stuffed with cheese, fell.
“But,” she said lifting a finger, “I want you to keep an eye open and tell me the moment the Swan Battalion comes back into camp.”
“Sure can, Tulla!” Dani said with renewed excitement.
Tulla sat down and smiled until after the young scamp had left. Then her face slowly hardened into a calculating mask, as she thought through all the possibilities and the angles. She was tempted to use the binding magics but the urge quickly faded. She wasn’t needlessly cruel; she was only cruel when it served a purpose.
“You may have thought you slipped my trap, clever little Thorn,” Tulla mused, “but my bindings are firm. That will never happen. So enjoy your freedom, brief as it will be. When you return it will be time to begin your instruction…you need to learn who holds your leash.”
She cackled quietly. The one she had her eye on was of mixed metal, but when old Tulla was done with her she would be forged into a weapon of war such as had not been seen in these lands since the Last Witch Queen. It was time the men of these lands knew fear—real fear, the likes of which they now felt safe to chuckle about around the campfire.
Fear of the Witch Guard.
“Oh yes, my precious little Thorn, run while you can,” Tulla whispered. “Not even your Mama can help you now. For are you not within the clutches of an old Branch Witch? She will not let you slip through her fingers so easily. Generations of our sisters, mothers, daughters and our friends cry out, for even if long forgotten, still they shall not be denied! I am Tulla, of the Deep Magics, out of Queen Dina by Tuatha Finobar, and I can still hear their cries.”
Giving one final cackle, the old Branch Witch shuffled around and headed back into her tent. As she stirred the coals in their raised metal container, a wind blew in that was cold enough to wake the dead and she shivered. For the first time in a long while she seriously considered using her magic to make her tent waterproof, even if it would make her appear as slightly more than the charlatan magicker she liked to appear to any of the more discerning eyes.
Chapter 17: On the Forage and Finding Food
Falon stomped down a trail that didn’t have more than an inch of mud under her feet and wanted to thank her lucky stars, she really honestly did.
“They’ve stole the seed corn!” shrieked the goodwife, throwing herself on to the muddy ground at Falon’s feet and rolling around like she had been stabbed before tearing at her hair.
“Please, goodwife, calm yourself,” Falon tried to soothe her but the woman was having none of it.
“Thieves! Men with swords! They’ve stolen the seed corn,” the woman climbed up to her knees and started wailing like she had been stabbed in the liver and knew her time was short.
“Good—” Falon started, only to have the farm wife grab her knees with both muddy hands and pull herself closer, “woman…get off me! Have some shame; your children are watching,” Falon hissed, glancing at a trio of pale, young faces staring at her through the hut’s door. She tried to surreptitiously push their mother away, as no child needed to see their mother making this kind of scene.
“They said they served the Prince and then they took it, every last scrap of food in our home,” sobbed the woman, and far from going quietly she instead wrapped her arms around Falon’s legs and held on for dear life. “How will we get through the winter? The harvest is already in!”
“They said they worked for the Prince?” Falon’s brows shot up.
“Thieves, they’ve stolen the see-” the woman once again started wailing her complaint, completely ignored the question.
Falon bit her lip briefly before coming to terms with the situation. She hesitantly opened her hand and slapped the woman across the face, much as her big sister had done to her when she had been out of control. “Where did they go?” the young Lieutenant shouted immediately after the stinging slap.
“There,” the goodwife startled and blinked refocusing on Falon and then she pointed, a vicious smile crossing her face as she indicated the direction. “Put their heads in the noose and get us back our food, Lord Captain.”
“Er,” Falon said shaking her head, “I’m just Squire Lieutenant.”
“Me and my kin will dig the graves for you, General,” the Woman said cunningly, in an instant turning from a bereaved housewife into a vicious, would-be grave digger.
Darius strode over. “What seems to be the problem here, Lieutenant Falon,” he asked harshly, his eyes boring into the desperate housewife.
“This woman said warriors claiming to serve for the Prince just stole all their food, even the seed for next planting, Darius,” Falon explained, shocked and more than a little surprised that anyone serving the Prince would take anyone’s entire supply of food. Then, seeing the good woman about to open her mouth once again, Falon lifted a hand and asked in a more formal tone, “Do you think it’s bandits that have done this, Sergeant?”
“What did they look like?” he demanded, and the hundred meter stare he was giving the woman seemed far more dire than the farm wife deserved, at least in Falon’s opinion, but it did have the benefit of forestalling another round of wails.
“They had a big one they called a Sergeant, and a nasty man with a scar across his head, and a younger one who liked to play with his knife!” the farm wife cried. “I can’t remember the rest.”
“Names,” he snapped, “who were they?”
“I can’t recall,” the goodwife hesitated.
“Did they give you script, woman?” Darius turned to look down his nose at the woman when he asked the question.
“They gave us nothing! Them’s the sort that only took,” she snapped savagely.
“What does a scrap of paper have to do with this, Darius?” Falon said indignantly. “This woman’s family has been robbed!”
“This way, Lieutenant,” he said, placing a hand on Falon’s shoulder and urging her back. When the goodwife clutched her leg, refusing to let go, Darius reached down and grabbed her by the hair, shoving the farm wife off. “Unhand the Officer or lose it,” he said coldly.
“Sergeant, there’s no need for such—” Falon protested, shocked at his treatment of the woman.
“And you said they’re this way?” Darius asked the goodwife, ignoring Falon as he pointed in the direction the mud-streaked woman had already indicated. “How can you be sure?”
Far from being discommoded by the Imperial’s rough handling the farm wife seemed completely unfazed.
“My boy saw them break an axle in the mud heading over Stumpy’s Ford,” the goodwife said with a sadistic gleam in her eye. “They need about a candle mark to repair it, and it’s been half that already. Ye can still catch ‘em, Sergeant!”
“But,” Falon spluttered.
“Come along, Lieutenant,” Darius said sharply, “we’ll leave the goodwife to tend her family while we take a gander.”
“You get ’em for me good, hear?!” the woman shouted, shaking her fist in the direction she claimed her food had disappeared.
Falon waited until they were out of earshot of the farm family and the rest of detachment before rou
nding on the Imperial.
“There was no need to lay hands on that poor woman, Sergeant Darius,” she said stiffly. “What’s been done to her family is terrible but…” she shook her head with heavy disapproval.
Darius gave her a level look, one that said she’d just failed an important test.
“What?” she asked defensively.
Darius pointed to something behind her but Falon wasn’t about to be swayed.
“Tell me,” she said stamping her foot with finality. She wasn’t a child to be lead around! She was a Lieutenant, and—
For answer, he grabbed her chin and forced her head around to look back at the farm. “All of that family’s food was taken, Lieutenant,” he said, her rank turned into a thing of scorn in his mouth, “including next year’s seed for planting?”
“So what,” Falon demanded looking at the livestock, before jerking her head out of his grasp, “there’s a sow and three piglets. Big deal.”
“So where there’s a sow and piglets left behind by ‘the Prince’s men who took everything they had to eat’, then I’m dead certain that there’s more than just those pigs left on this farm,” Darius said condescendingly.
Falon flushed. “Even still, that’s no cause for stealing their food! I mean just because she exaggerated a bit…” Falon trailed off, realizing the farm wife wasn’t exactly the most calm of individuals, and staking out a position in favor of the woman and against Darius’s greater experience might not end very well.
“You’ve lived on a farm, Squire,” the Imperial said patiently, “how many farms don’t have a hidden cellar for hiding people and food?”
“Not many,” Falon allowed cautiously.
“Did the door to the house looked forced, and all the livestock taken?” he demanded abruptly.
“Well, no…” she trailed off with a sinking sensation, realizing she may have just been played.
“Then use the noodle in your head for what the good gods put it there for and think,” Darius said shortly.
The Painting (Rise of the Witch Guard Book 2) Page 12
