At the Queen_s command cc-1

by Michael A. Stackpole

  "Give him one of our draft horses. I'll need it returned immediately. Give you an excuse to come back."

  Owen nodded. "If we leave now, I should get him there in time for Lord Rivendell's Sunday supper with his officers. Couple of his men are old poachers. They got pheasant and deer. He will eat well, off hanware plates with a silver service."

  "Can you suggest to him that he ask Rivendell to let him deliver his sermon to the troops?"

  "I'll do my best, sir." Owen sighed. "And since Rivendell will ask…"

  Vlad shrugged. "We have another week to Hattersburg, weather permitting. Two bridges, one ferry, twenty-nine miles uphill, three down. I hope we have a week's rest before we push on."

  Owen sloshed forward and patted Mugwump on the flank. "Lord Rivendell believes we have surprise on our side."

  "Rivendell is an ass." Vlad shook his head. "I'm sure someone has let du Malphias know about the brimstone, shot, and other supplies piling up in Hattersburg. Depending on how his forces are arrayed, he could just raid the town and burn everything."

  "Or cart it back to his fortress." Owen nodded. "I'd do it. He won't. He wants us to come to his fortress and be destroyed."

  "A great victory here would win him much support among the other Laureates." Vlad folded his arms over his chest. "Raiding Hattersburg is not his only option."

  "Agreed. I fear he might build his own Fort Hope. He would block our access to Anvil Lake."

  "Another wise strategy, and a contingency for which we should be prepared. I will have von Metternin scout ahead when we are in Hattersburg. You will go with him." The Prince pulled of his hat, soaked it in water, then put it back on. "Have you shared your thoughts with Lord Rivendell?"

  Owen opened his arms. "I would have to be invited into his counsels to have a chance to offer an idea."

  "He doesn't realize that you actually have experience out here?"

  "He does, but he is invested in proving me wrong. Colonel Langford, for obvious reasons, as well." Owen unslung a canteen, unstoppered it, and sank it, bubbling, into the stream. "A couple of sergeants have spoken with me. The soldiers will fight and fight hard, but they have a flock of featherbrains to lead them."

  "That is a lament often heard among soldiers."

  Owen shot him a sidelong glance. "Did my uncle give you a packet of sealed orders to be opened in the event Lord Rivendell loses his mind?"

  Vlad shook his head. "Why do you ask?"

  "He told me he did. He asked if you were sane and ambitious. And he asked if you would be able to take over the expedition and lead it militarily if Rivendell's sanity were in question."

  Vlad's eyes narrowed. "He said nothing of this to me. He encouraged me to use our men to build Fort Hope, since Rivendell will not use us in the battle. Your uncle never suggested a combat command, and, quite frankly, I am not suited to it."

  "He said you could use the Count as an advisor."

  "And I'm sure he would be most able. What are you thinking, Owen? There's a look in your eye."

  The soldier blinked. "I'm thinking that I've not been thinking. My uncle only ever does things for his own benefit. So his speaking to me as he did was for his benefit. He said nice things and apologized to me. I thought it was sincere, but how would I know? He's never been sincere before."

  Vlad nodded. "He told me that Rivendell would fail, and that next year he would be back with enough troops and artillery to destroy du Malphias. Fort Hope would be a stepping-off place. He would lead them, reap the glory."

  "That's part of it." Owen frowned. "But it makes me wonder, given what he told you and me, what has he told Rivendell?"

  "That's a very good question." Vlad glanced down, shielding his eyes with a hand from the sun's shifting reflection in the water. "Your uncle succeeds if Rivendell fails. This explains the paltry number of troops in Rivendell's command. A victorious du Malphias is a threat, so Norisle must increase the troops and resources sent next year."

  Owen's jaw dropped open. "Which would give my uncle the largest and most formidable force in Mystria. He could do what du Malphias' has threatened: make his own nation."

  "Possible, though a grateful queen could easily grant him a holding of the land he has secured, allowing him the benefit he seeks and giving him more power in Norisle."

  Owen chewed his lower lip. "There was another thing, Highness. He instructed me, when we take du Malphias' fortress, to secure possession of all du Malphias' papers. My uncle wants the secret of how to control the pasmortes."

  Vlad's head began to hurt. "So the only way to thwart your uncle is to see to it that Rivendell is successful, and that du Malphias' secrets never fall into your uncle's hands."

  "Impossibility stacked on impossibility."

  "So it would seem." The Prince nodded, then pointed back to the roadway. Bishop Bumble, clad in new white hose and with silver buckles gleaming on his shoes, waited impatiently. "Go, relieve me of this tiring cleric, and I shall see if I can find a way to unstack these impossibilities."

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  July 6, 1764

  Lindenvale, Mystria

  O wen Strake remaining crouched, turned back toward Lieutenant Marnhull. "For the last time, shut your mouth. Your babbling will get us killed."

  The blond officer sniffed. "I am not a coward, Strake! And this sentry duty is ridiculous."

  Owen could have taken Rivendell's little provocations easily. Picket duty had never bothered him, but to be stationed in the woods with a chatterbox put him over the edge. Shifting his musket to his left hand, he filled his right with his tomahawk. He darted forward, not certain if he just wanted to scare the man or murder him.

  Because of his sudden move an Ungarakii warrior's warclub only grazed his right shoulder instead of crushing his skull. Owen twisted from the impact, pain shooting down his arm. As he came around, he whipped his musket up and across the Ungarakii's painted face. Though deerskin sheathed it, the heavy steel barrel still cracked bone and spun the man away. A second warrior darted in from beyond the first, his warclub raised high for a heavy blow. Owen lunged, driving the musket's muzzle into his stomach. As the Ungarakii doubled over, Owen buried his tomahawk in the man's skull.

  "Sound the alarm!" Owen abandoned the tomahawk, and stripped the cover from his musket. He had no time to shift hand or aim. He simply thrust the musket at another Ungarakii, pressed his left thumb to the firestone and invoked magick.

  The brimstone's flash lit the small sentry post. The ball blew through the middle of the closest attacker and caught the one behind him on the hip. Flipping the musket around, Owen clubbed the wounded man to the ground. Another step and he smashed the butt into the first Ungarakii's head, crushing his skull.

  He glanced toward the others. Lieutenant Marnhull sat on a bed of rusty pine needles, his hat gone, his right ear missing as well. His right shoulder, shattered by a warclub, sank lower than the left. He rocked side to side, mumbling a lullaby and staring at nothing.

  The third sentry lay face down, his hair matted with blood, not moving.

  Owen tossed his own rifle aside and snatched up the dead soldier's. "Be quiet."

  The Lieutenant's voice shrank, obeying as if he were a scolded child.

  There has to be more out there. Owen kept slowly turning, not wanting to present his back to any direction for very long. He peered out into the darkness, waiting, listening as best he could. Nothing.

  His heart pounded and sweat stung his eyes. One of the Ungarakii grunted his last breath. Something snapped in the darkness. Owen turned, thumb on firestone. Silence again fell, broken only by the soft whisper of Owen's moccasins on dry pine needles.

  Then a new set of sounds arose. A squad of troopers came crashing through the woods to the sentry post. A Sergeant entered the clearing. Blood drained from his face. "What happened here?"

  "Sergeant, deploy your men in a square. They may still be out there."

  "Yes,sir." The Sergeant pointed at various men in his command. "You
heard the Captain. Fix bayonets. Form square. Keep your eyes open."

  Owen crossed to the Lieutenant. His mangled hat lay next to him, with the ear inside. An Ungarakii warclub had torn off his ear, then mangled the shoulder. How badly it had scrambled the man's brains would remain to be seen

  Lord Rivendell arrived with his shadow, Langford. "My God. What have we here?"

  Owen stood. "Ungarakii war party. I killed the four over here. The pair that attacked the Lieutenant and the Private got away."

  Rivendell frowned. "You say you killed four?"

  Owen nodded. "Clubbed the two at your feet, shot one, and my tomahawk is still in the head of the fourth."

  "And you say they killed none?"

  Owen sighed. "You have the evidence before you, sir."

  "I do, sir, and I know how to read it." Rivendell glanced at Langford. "Get this down, Colonel. Captain Strake claims to have shot one of the raiders, but you will note that his rifle is unfired."

  "This isn't my rifle. I picked it up from the dead trooper."

  "What happened here is very clear. The Twilight People killed the Private. Lieutenant Marnhull grabbed his rifle and shot one of the raiders before being gravely wounded himself. Citation for bravery. Captain Strake killed one man who had stumbled, and the cause of death of the fourth is still under investigation. Note that Captain Strake attempted to claim credit for all four dead men, clearly out of guilt at having led the raiders to this very post."

  "I must protest, my lord, this is not what happened."

  Rivendell's eyes narrowed. "I think you would do well to understand, Captain Strake, that this is my expedition. I am the sole arbiter of truth. I have rendered my decision and, depending on how things proceed from here, I might be called upon to revise my view. I might find that in the excitement of the event, you misremembered what happened."

  Owen tossed the Private's rifle down and recovered his own. He made a show of wiping blood from the brass butt-plate. "I'd be remiss in my duty, sir, if I did not point out that hostiles are still in the area and killing you would go a long way to destroying your expedition."

  Rivendell quickly shot glances into the darkness, but did not immediately retreat. "Sergeant, have two men conduct Lieutenant Marnhull to an aid station. Bring his ear. And you, Captain Strake. I have a message to go to Prince Vladimir immediately. Tonight."

  Owen looked at him. "Tonight, through these woods, knowing the Ungarakii are out there?"

  "Yes, he must be warned. You are his liaison officer. You will bear the message."

  At least, out there, I can kill my enemies. "Permission to reload my musket, sir?"

  "It should already be loaded, sir, but I shan't write you up for that breech this time." Rivendell sniffed with indignation. "The message shall be ready in an hour."

  After an hour's wait, Owen made it through to the Mystrian camp without difficulty. He had not traveled on the road, but nearby so as to avoid ambushes. Upon arrival he reported to the Prince and handed him the hastily scrawled note. Though Rivendell requested a reply to be sent back immediately by the same courier, the Prince declined to provide one and ordered Owen to remain with his party until they reached Hattersburg.

  This gave Rivendell two days of apparent joy at Owen's death. It evaporated when he spied Owen in the frontier town on the ninth. His fury should have evaporated in the face of an even larger difficulty, but he immediately convened a court-martial with Langford at its head. Charges were disobeying a superior officer's direct order.

  Prince Vladimir immediately invalidated the charge. "The order was never issued to Captain Strake by Lord Rivendell. The order was included in a confidential communication to me. I know his lordship would not presume to give me an order, nor did his message instruct me to instruct Captain Strake on what the message read. Since no order was issued, no order could have been disobeyed."

  Even with that direct evidence, the panel deliberated long enough for a work crew to set up a flogging cross. None of the men were happy to see that, and the Mystrians became restive. Owen might be a Norillian, but there was no disguising the fact that the charges were personal. Their general dislike for Rivendell worked in Owen's favor and the tribunal returned a verdict of not guilty, forestalling a general mutiny.

  Rivendell sulked for a while, then returned to high spirits when reunited with his school chums from the cavalry. The fact that their horses had not yet arrived did not seem to cause him much concern. Nor did the more distressing fact that the supplies that were supposed to be in Hattersburg had not made it in the promised quantities. The cavalry had done its best to eat their way through much of what had arrived-save for the horse fodder, which had come upriver in abundance.

  The evening of the ninth consisted of two basic operations. The troopers-Mystrians and Norillians-reported to the warehouses to draw rations. By Lord Rivendell's order, rice, beans, and other staples were doled out by a curious formula by which each Mystrian was only counted as two-thirds of a person. His rationale had been that since official ration tallies were set for Norillian fighting men, and that the Mystrians were not of that caliber, they should not need a full ration. This rationale also got applied to supplies of brimstone and shot, prompting one Mystrian to wonder how it was that his musket would be less hungry, being as how it was bigger than the cavalry carbines.

  The Mystrians did not complain too loudly, however. Hattersburgians learned of the injustice and opened their larders to their fellow citizens. Word circulated quietly, along with a guarantee by Prince Vlad in which he indemnified all Mystrians for the supplies they gave the troops. He even sent an order down-river with the Bookworms to send more supplies to Hattersburg to cover the donations.

  The supply barges had been able to bring the dozen light artillery pieces, their powder, and shot up to Hattersburg, but the horse teams needed to haul them still had not made it. Local farmers, again with an agreement through the Prince, supplied teams of oxen to drag the guns along. Given the painfully slow pace of the column, the oxen's lack of speed was not an issue.

  While the troopers collected their meager rations, Lord Rivendell invested Gates' Tavern and demanded a feast to celebrate his reunion with the cavalry. Two steers and a dozen chickens, a cask of whisky and a tun of ale, three dozen loaves of bread and a dozen puddings laden with sugar-sugar drawn from the warehouse before rations were issued-went into the meal. As an afterthought the Prince and Count were invited to join the festivities.

  Music, laughter, and cheers lasted late into the night.

  Owen didn't mind not having been included. Seth Plant had found him shortly after his arrival. He'd filled Owen in on the details of what had happened when Nathaniel and the others had come through two weeks earlier. He'd also managed to snag two letters that had come upstream from Temperance and presented them to Owen.

  "Thought these should get to you first thing."

  Owen thanked him and turned the first over. It had been addressed in a clean, feminine hand. Catherine. He read it quickly, the scent of her perfume rising from the page.

  She told him she missed him terribly. She felt so horribly alone since his uncle had departed-leaving his loathsome servant behind to help her-but Mrs. Frost had come to the rescue, having all but adopted her. Catherine said that her sewing skills had progressed admirably and that she had been appointed, along with Mrs. Langford, to the Citizen's Committee for the Homecoming of the troops. All the women were planning many festivities and she could not wait for his return because she had wonderful news.

  He had no idea what she meant, and she promised more details in her next missive. He glanced at the date, which was 15 June, almost a month previous.

  The second letter had also been addressed in a feminine hand. It bore a faint resemblance to Bethany's writing. He opened it. Hettie Frost had written it on 21 June.

  Dear Captain Strake,

  Two days ago your wife had quite a fright. One of the Twilight People spied in the window of her room. Your wife s
creamed and fainted, but Rachel Warren heard and ran to her aid. She got your wife into bed and we, the women of Temperance, have been seeing to her care.

  I am writing you to let you know that she is well, if a bit weak. She promises to write you when she is able. She says you should not worry about her, that she will be fine, and should not cause you the least bit of concern.

  We all hope you are doing well and we look forward to your homecoming as soon as the Good Lord permits.

  Sincerely,

  Mrs. Archibald Frost

  "Seth, no other letters?"

  "Just orders to the cavalry and some things to local folks."

  "How often have supplies come in?"

  "Some here and there. Bargers say normal traffic coming in and out of Margaretstown. Horses is waiting on a boat to bring them up from Temperance."

  "Why didn't they just use the Bellepheron? "

  "Heard tell she got loose of her moorings in the bay. Ran aground."

  Tharyngian agents or… Owen shook his head. His uncle wouldn't have engineered the ship running aground. It was unnecessary. Rivendell already had insufficient troops and the cavalry were the least of them. In fact, since the Fortress of Death would be especially difficult for the cavalry to attack, having them on foot made them better.

  Or is he hoping that Rivendell will see the impossibility of the attack and just build Fort Hope? Any other commander might have done that, but Rivendell? His grasp on reality was tenuous at best. If he went ahead with the attack, using dismounted cavalry as infantry, he would kill off the scions of many noble houses. This would poison their blood against Rivendell. The lack of horses did play to the outcome his uncle desired, no matter what Rivendell decided.

  "Seth, I will have two letters to head back in the morning. Will you see to it they get to Temperance?"

  The man nodded. "Be needing some time to myself after all the doings here. Glad to, Captain."

  "Thank you." Owen sighed. "First, I have to talk to the Prince. He needs to know what's been going on. Then, my friend, we have to pray he can fix it."