by Guy Antibes
“Well you’ve gotten part of your kingdom back. Would you like to see Unca’s holding? If you can arrange a few troops to escort us, I’d like to take you back and visit.”
“I wish it were closer to everything or I’d make it our winter headquarters. As it is we’ll have to commandeer an inn.”
“Winter? Easy enough to do in Sally’s Corners.” Willow took Sallia’s hands. “It’s so good to see you. I hope you don’t mind me being so familiar, Princess Sallia.”
“Never. Perhaps you’d like to live in Foxhome. Be a lady-in-waiting or an aide to the Chamberlain, putting Foxhome in order.”
Willow put her hand to her chest, just below her neck. “Not me! Well, maybe not me.” They both laughed. Sallia felt more like herself holding Willow’s hands. Someone she knew and trusted from before. She only wished Unca could join them. Perhaps he might break free from his hiding place.
The next day Sallia rode to Unca’s holding with Chika and a contingent of Red Roses. The trees were beginning to turn and the pond seemed to look more like autumn. Willow showed her around the house, her old room and the parlor where she spent hours and hours learning to be anything but a princess.
“I’ll fix some tea. I had to bring up more supplies and change the locks to the house and the storage cave. My son, Hal, helped himself to much of Unca’s supplies since he’s been gone and I’ve moved to Sally’s Corners.” She disappeared into the kitchen.
Sallia stole into Unca’s study. She didn’t notice any kind of difference. At one point she feared the house would have been burned down. She tried to pick up a scent to the room, but it smelled of musty paper and old leather bindings. Where had Unca gone? Her embroidered handkerchief had remained where she left it. Had it only been a few seasons? She felt the loss of his advice more acutely in the house where he once lived. She hoped he’d be able to return.
After tea, Sallia walked through the surrounding woods with Chika.
“I learned to snare rabbits in these woods.” She strolled along paths that she now remembered and recognized a spot where she had a snare. She poked through the undergrowth and came across a snare, broken down, but the skeleton of a rabbit, caught but never gathered, lay within it. The sight brought tears to Sallia’s eyes. She thought of Unca again. Had he been caught in Duke Histron’s snare? Could his bones be moldering in some forest with an arrow still through his ribcage?
She shivered and returned to the house and then to Sally’s Corners. She vowed not to return to Unca’s house until the wizard showed up.
~
The line dwindled as Shiro and Leef interrogated Fellon’s sergeants to assess what Fellon had done and not done. Anchor realized that this was a repeat of South Keep. Anchor couldn’t believe the deception that covered Besseth.
“Are we cursed?” he asked Shiro as the last trooper had been dismissed.
Shiro just laughed. “If you think this is bad, you should go to Roppon. We would have found multiple factions among these troops loyal to the Emperor, to various Lords and even to the Sorcerer’s Guild.”
How could Shiro be so blasé about the distrust? Perhaps Anchor was just too naíve. As Unca, he’d been accused of that often enough. Months as a young commander had driven some sense into his head, but he still had a way to go. He still kicked himself every night for unwittingly betraying King Billeas and with that thought he shuddered about the prospect of Sallia learning of his role in her father’s demise.
But Anchor refused to let those thoughts affect his decisions and actions at all other times. He still needed Fellon’s forces up north and hoped that Leef had located enough good farmers still willing to fight for their land.
~~~
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
~
COLONEL BAANTH, WHO NOW COMMANDED THE CASTLE NORATO, and General Leef stood with Anchor in the map room in Tassleton. “I have sent men to Bintz and Ashof to collect troops. Ashof will provide the most since they are quite worried about Deshine invading them.”
“I am as well,” Anchor said. He looked out the window at the streamers of rain descending from gray clouds. “Winter is close and we need to move all the way to Teryon.”
“You won’t have to worry about snow this far south, but there is the mud.”
Anchor only told the man, “Don’t worry about that. I have that part taken care of.”
Shiro entered the room.
“Commander Shiro.” Baanth saluted the Ropponi.
Shiro always smiled and bowed in response. “I have just come from Tishiaki’s headquarters. The snows have begun and Histron has finally withdrawn his forces out of Learsea.”
“And our efforts to reduce his army?”
“He leaves the field with a third of his men, thanks to the forces from the Southern Command and a column of General Montford’s Valetans,” Shiro said and bowed to Baanth. “One third is dead and the other third has joined us.”
“Joined you?” Baanth said.
“We let the troops we captured at the first battle infiltrate into both of Histron’s columns. They peeled away the most loyal and now they fight for Learsea until the last of the Histron forces leave. The way things worked out Histron didn’t have much chance at Learsea this year. Winter’s come to the north and he has had to withdraw or we would have destroyed his forces. We left him two corridors for retreat with the Valetans making sure they didn’t curve back around from the north.”
“But those soldiers will fight you another day,” the colonel said.
“Not on Learsea soil, Colonel,” Anchor said. “We will fight them in the Red Kingdom and they have had a bad taste of our tactics. Even with their own battle mages, they were ineffective against the Band of the Red Rose.” Anchor nodded to Shiro who bowed back.
“Once we are sure they are gone, most of my people will join us in the south,” Shiro said.
“Fellon was a fool,” Baanth said. “He thought you were incapable of command. No one heard of you before and now you are taking over all of Besseth.”
“Not me. The northern alliance has insinuated themselves into the Red Kingdom and will move very slowly south. Princess Sallia wants to minimize the damage to her kingdom.”
The colonel looked down at the map. “From the north to the south, the country will be devastated.”
“A narrow path, Baanth,” Anchor said. “I just wished we could have travelled over Histron’s lands. His domain is too far to the east from Foxhome. I would revel in the irony, but it’s not to be, this year. He’ll lose his domain and his head. I just don’t know in which order. Leef can fill you in on the details. Shiro and I will be spying in Grianne for a while. Just assemble the forces and get them trained. I’m not looking forward to the campaign to unite the Five Duchies.”
Leef and the colonel left Shiro and Anchor in the map room.
~
“Are you ready for Grianne?” Shiro said.
Both of them dressed in the mis-matched clothes and the armor bits of mercenaries.
“Let’s go,” Anchor said.
Shiro grasped Anchor’s hand and suddenly they stood in the middle of a mucky stubbled field. “We camped here for a few weeks when we first landed,” Shiro said.
Anchor squished and squelched his way to the built up road fifty paces or so from where they stood. “It will only add authenticity to our costumes,” he said.
Shiro laughed. “Authenticity.” He changed his face to that of Leef.
Anchor shook his head. “I hope he’s right about no one knowing him in the Duchy of Teryon.”
“Better a Bessethian face than Ropponi,” Shiro said.
“It gives me a shiver, but you are somewhat shorter so I’d be able to tell you apart,” Anchor said.
He could feel the warmer temperature on the southwestern side of Besseth. He’d been to Grianne often enough as Unca. As Teryon’s major port, they would find all kinds of information in the taverns. There weren’t too many other places in the southern duchies that Unca had visited.
Venato, the largest of the five duchies, was sparsely populated. The mountains that protected Learsea from the west ran right through part of Deshine and right down to the sea.
The road had once been made entirely of stone, but now gravel mixed with bitumen covered most of the old pavement. Still, Teryon had the best roads on Besseth. They were the only domain on Besseth that had tar and they used it for roads. Ships along all of Besseth’s coasts used the material to coat the hulls and preserve their ropes.
Anchor smelled Grianne before he laid his eyes on the port. Shiro just smiled and sniffed the air. “You do like the smell of the sea,” Anchor said.
“Perhaps I have better memories.” Shiro picked up the pace.
They walked around a bend in the road, forested on both sides and came to a barrier manned by a number of guards.
“You looking to get into the port?” a burly guard with a stubbled face said. “You look like fighters to me. The Great Duke of Teryon requests your presence in his army. My friends here will escort you. Don’t try to pull your weapons or you’re insides will be tickled by ours.” Six of the guards pulled swords from their sheaths.
It didn’t matter. Shiro would get him out of any situation that appeared too difficult. He’d rate this as close to a difficult one. But perhaps they would learn more in the camp than in the town proper.
“That wasn’t the town I smelled,” Shiro said. “It was this army camp.” They walked past the forest and found a sea of tents on both sides of the road. It went on for hundreds of paces.
Anchor saw uniforms of Deshine, Teryon and Venato in clumps as they walked through the camp. He spotted the multi-colored uniforms of a large contingent of mercenaries dressed much like them.
The guards led them to an officer sitting behind a large paper-strewn table underneath a wall-less tent.
“These two wish to join our army. They just don’t know it yet,” one of the guards said.
The officer looked up with bored brown eyes. “Your names.”
Shiro kept his mouth shut. He looked Bessethian but his disguise didn’t cover his Ropponi accent.
“I’m Vance Dessolo and this is Banner Horeli. We’ve been moving south from the northern edge of Venato for a while.”
“Not much in the way of pickings for highwaymen of limited abilities?” the officer said. “We only keep the nasty ones. The rest we just hang.” He pointed over his shoulder at a rank of scaffolds. Anchor quit counting at eight.
Shiro looked at him with alarm, and then Anchor felt a sharp pain on the back of his head.
~
Anchor woke up on the muddy floor of a tent. It looked like dawn, as he sat up, holding on to his aching head. Sleeping men covered the rest of the floor. He looked for Shiro, but couldn’t find him. His escape had just gone from difficult to impossible. Learsea lay a few hundred miles to his northeast. He’d have to locate his companion so they could get out of Grianne.
“Up, you brainless scum!” A Teryon soldier stuck his head in the tent.
Anchor checked again for Shiro’s face, Leef’s or his own amongst his fellow soldiers but none matched. His sword had been confiscated. He was glad that both of them had carried worn weapons. Shiro had hidden the Sunstone and he even refused to tell Anchor where it was.
He followed the men out of the tent and they walked for five or ten minutes through the huge camp to a mess area. Anchor didn’t appreciate the thin gruel and tiny biscuit for his breakfast. They were served watered down ale of such low quality that it reminded Anchor of wash water… not that he’d ever drunk any. If he had, he was certain it would taste like this.
His ‘squad’ was pulled up from their table and led to a practice field. Anchor looked up at the leaden sky and let the drizzle fall on his face. He wiped it with his hand.
A grizzled sergeant stood on a little wooden platform as more men were led into the grounds. Anchor spotted Shiro across the way. The man swayed on his feet and Anchor winced at the dried blood on the side of his face.
“You are the worst of the worst,” the sergeant began. We’ve dragged you out of every hellhole from the duchies. Now you are in the army of the south fighting for Teryon and the Red Kingdom. Our enemy call themselves the Northern Alliance. I call them ‘Dead, but Don’t Know It’. We will train this winter and wait until we are called up to fight in the spring.”
The statement that Anchor wanted to hear was when and where, but the sergeant had ended up talking about personal tactics.
“We will teach you how to fight like soldiers, not like cutthroats. First we will assess your skills and then assign you to units of similar abilities.” The sergeant walked off of his little box and called up Shiro’s group. Shiro finally made eye contact with Anchor and nodded. The Ropponi looked worried.
They split into pairs and were given wooden swords and told to go at it. Shiro barely beat his opponent. He seemed to hold back showing any skills.
Three groups later, Anchor faced his opponent. He didn’t like the murderous glare. The man held his sword in a sure grip and tested out the balance of his blade. Anchor wouldn’t have the same kind of chance to beat this man like Shiro had his opponent.
The sergeant told the men to fight. The man launched a savage attack on Anchor that had him moving back. They both slid in the mud as they fought for proper footing. Anchor recognized significant military training in this man’s life and as they settled into their fight, the man began to tire. Anchor pressed his advantage and finally poked the man hard enough in the chest to send him reeling on his backside.
“Enough,” the sergeant said.
As Anchor came to his senses to realize that they fought after the others had stopped. Both of them were escorted to the growing group around Shiro.
His opponent rubbed his chest. “You could have crowned me any number of times,” his opponent said. “I’m Antzen of Bintz.” He put out his hand.
Anchor tried to remember the name he gave the officer. “Vance Dessolo of northern Venato.”
“No highwayman ever fought like you did. Where did you really serve?”
Anchor relented. “I fought under General Fellon’s command in the south Learsea army. I had to flee after their Marshal killed the good general. I was a lieutenant and we were going to join Duke Histron’s forces. Didn’t happen and now I’m here.”
“I heard something about that. How did you get here so quickly?”
Anchor paused. Too many questions, too good of a fighter. “My companion and I rode our horses into the ground escaping towards the south and east. We had planned on taking a ship to a Red Kingdom port, but never made it to Grianne. The mountains are already snowed in. We barely made it through Venato.”
“Hmmm. The alliance has stopped up just about every port north of Foxhome.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“You do now,” the man said. “Do as you’re told and you’ll make lieutenant again soon enough.” His opponent got up and walked away. No one stopped him. He hadn’t acted like a mercenary.
Shiro sat next to him. “I have very bad news. I received some kind of injury to my head and it has caused some loss of my power. I’m sure I don’t have enough for teleportation. Perhaps in a few days this dizziness will go away.”
Anchor nodded. “We’ll have to play our roles until you’re better. I’d still like to know what kind of strategy they will employ and who is behind all of this unity. No one’s been successful in banding the duchies together before and I’m sure that Antzen of Blintz wasn’t who he said he was.”
~
Shiro fell asleep early in the evening and woke up with a blinding headache. He struggled to the healer’s tent after he failed to keep down breakfast.
His arrival was met with sneers from the healers. ‘What’s your problem.”
“When pressed into service, someone hit me hard on the head. I can barely see.” He blinked as the healer held up a candle in front of his eye.
“Concussed. You even talk funny.” T
he healer ran his hand over Shiro’s scalp. “You’ve got the strangest hair. It feels different than it looks. Ah. Yep. I can feel the lump. You might even have a bit of a cracked skull. No training for a week.” He walked to a desk and took out a paper and scribbled something on it. “You show this to your group leader. It doesn’t mean you can’t work, but you’ll have to watch it. No sparring.”
“Do you have anything for my headache?”
The healer threw a packet at Shiro. “Powdered willow bark. That’s all I got.”
Shiro left the tent. Willow bark. He had harvested the same thing on Roppon. He wished he could teleport to Chika or Tishiaki. They could get him to a proper healer, but Shiro could barely touch his power. He shivered a bit at the thought of his disguise nearly being exposed. He considered himself lucky that he hadn’t reverted to his actual form.
At least the armies had withdrawn for the winter. It didn’t snow very often in Roppon except perhaps as far south as Sekkoro and Daikkon Island, so any battling between lords happened all year around.
He found his group leader, who gnashed his teeth when Shiro showed him the pass. The leader gave him a shovel and told him to muck out the horse lines for the week. Shiro didn’t mind, he could pace his work and gauge his recovery.
“You there!” an officer grabbed Shiro by the shoulder. “New?” He examined Shiro’s hand.
Shiro nodded. He didn’t detect any animosity on the officer’s face. “Everyone gets tested for the ability to do magic. We don’t want any spies. Get in that line over there.”
He still hadn’t taken any of the willow bark powder and put his hand to his forehead but it didn’t take any of the pain away. He looked around for Anchor and couldn’t see him among the ocean of men. His swordsmanship wouldn’t be very effective in his current state.
The officer still looked on as Shiro took his place in the back of a long line. He couldn’t run, but a boy brought a water bucket along the row of men. Shiro took advantage of that and mixed in the willow bark and drank deeply from the ladle.
