by S. J. Ryan
The woman stared at Carrot. A deep frown grew on her face. Her eyes rested a moment on Carrot's hair, which was glowing bright as the fire. Then she gazed at the blade in Carrot's hands, cocked her eyebrow and tilted her head. She gave a twisted smile.
“Seriously?” she asked.
Carrot wasn't thinking of revenge. It was more basic than that. She was filled with rage at what had been done to Bok. She wanted to strike at the cause. So it was that she approached with a mere sword as the woman raised a weapon that Carrot had just seen could kill from hundreds of meters at the flick of a finger.
The woman never pulled the trigger, for just then an arrow thunked into her arm. She gasped and whirled toward the direction the arrow had come. Mirian had another arrow already nocked. Before the woman could raise her weapon again, Mirian was joined by a mob of archers, all aiming toward the woman.
Carrot's rage still wanted the woman dead, but her mind wanted answers. Answers couldn't be provided by a corpse. She interposed before the archers, faced the woman and said coolly, “You will drop your weapon.”
The weapon was pointed down in one hand, while the woman's other hand clutched her arm where the arrow had pierced. She silently counted archers. She released the weapon.
Mirian ran to the woman and scooped the weapon. When she tried to pick up the basket that the woman had set down, the woman swung it away and glared.
“Give that too!” Mirian demanded.
“No!” the woman cried, as she pulled out the arrow. “You take it and I'll kill you! I'll kill you all!”
Her voice sounded like Inoldia, yet lacking the confidence or arrogance. Carrot thought her tone sounded like desperation. That, coupled with her snarling expression, convinced Carrot that the woman was serious.
“Let her keep it,” Carrot called. We can take it away later. “Let's escort her to the command hut.”
Within a score of archers at her back and Carrot wielding a sword alongside, the woman was brought to the command hut, where Norian was alone with Letos.
Carrot all but whispered: “General Faron, would you please have your men acquire some restraints for our guest?”
Letos stammered the orders. Ropes were soon brought by Leafmen and wrapped thrice around the woman, binding her arms and legs so that she could do little more than hop. One hand was allowed to be free so that she could continue to grip the handle of her precious basket.
“General Faron,” Carrot quietly said. “Would you please dismiss your men?”
Letos did so, and the soldiers streamed out of the hut, leaving only five within: Carrot, Norian, Mirian, Letos, and the woman. While Letos was relegated to sit on a stool in the corner, the woman was seated on his desktop. Carrot and Norian held their swords ready for any sudden action. Mirian, though, dropped her bow and arrow and examined the woman's weapon, probing the contours and protrusions of the smooth black metal. The woman seemed alarmed.
“Thank you for your rescue, Mirian,” Carrot said, plucking the device from Mirian's fingers.
Mirian returned a hurt look. “You're welcome. Can I see that some more? For study.”
“Later,” Carrot said. She wanted to study it herself, but for the moment she stashed it into the inner pocket of her coat. She turned her full attention to the woman.
“Who are you and where do you come from?” Carrot demanded.
The woman laughed. “I doubt it will mean anything to you.”
Norian interjected, “You'll treat the colonel with respect!”
“'Colonel?'” the woman asked. “She's just a girl!”
Mirian saw Carrot's confusion and explained, “Norian had Letos announce to his senior officers that you've been promoted to field commander, Carrot. It's the least Letos could do, considering that he's gotten us all trapped in a ring of poison – including himself.” Letos avoided Mirian's glare.
Before Carrot could speak, there was another knock. This time, a shriveled Letos held his tongue. Carrot realized if she was now the de facto commander of the base, it was for her. “Come in.”
Two soldiers entered. One of them was the man who had been posted outside the hut door. He nodded at the newcomer and said to Carrot, “Scout reporting, Colonel. It's about the Romans.”
She faced the other man. His face was pale and perspiring. His clothing reeked of an odor like damp hay. She had smelled it minutes before, at the perimeter of the encampment.
“The Romans are – “ The scout paused to cough. “The Romans are – in great activity. It appears they are preparing – “ He broke into another cough. “Preparing for march. They are – “ He bent into a spasm of hacking.
The poison ring, Carrot thought. She caught him as he collapsed. She helped him into the supporting arms of the other soldier and said, “Summon the senior officers here, extreme urgency. And see if you can find Senti and have her care for this man!”
They departed and Carrot returned her attention to the woman. Once again she noted the striking resemblance to Inoldia, and recalled what Matt had said that summer evening seeming ages ago when they had viewed Valarion and Inoldia through the telescope atop the aqueduct tower.
“I think I know who you are,” she said. “You are Athena Spencer.”
The smug smile on Athena's face evaporated. “So he told you about me. Well, I know who you are. You are Arcadia of North Umbrick, otherwise known as 'Carrot.'”
“Your flying craft must come from the other side of the world. What is the significance of the symbol on the rudder – the triangle and the fan?”
“The fan is the tail of a bird – a peacock. The symbol is for Pavonia, the nation from which I come, a nation with a hundred aerial warships that can destroy the Roman Empire in a day and Britan in no time at all. I suggest you release me, or the consequences for your people will be immediate and disastrous.”
What confidence and arrogance had been missing in her expression and tone of voice before had become double Inoldia's. Carrot's eyes drifted to the basket as she recalled what had disturbed Athena's composure before.
She pointed. “What's in there?”
“Nothing that concerns you.” But Athena tightened her knuckles white around the handle.
“Maybe we should open it and see if that is true.”
“I assure you that it is. I also assure you that if you so much as crack the lid, the consequences will be most severe.”
“You don't seem in a position to inflict punishment.”
Athena scowled but held her tongue.
Carrot decided that it was time to press the interrogation: “You have surrounded us with a ring of poison. Tell us how to make an antidote.”
“Certainly. Have a scientific revolution, and spend a hundred years learning the basic laws of biochemistry. Then develop the infrastructure of a chemical industry, and you should have no trouble synthesizing an antidote.”
“There is no other way to counter it?”
“If there was, I would not tell you.”
Norian stormed to his feet, brandishing his sword. “Let me at her for a minute, Carrot, and I'll get the answers you need!”
Carrot was somewhat shocked; she had seen Norian in battle and Norian in anger but never Norian in rage. She wondered if he was bluffing to intimidate the woman. She supposed that it might not be a bluff, given that the lives of thousands of his comrades were at stake.
Athena hissed, “Barbarians!” But she had watched Carrot's hesitation before doing so.
Carrot in turn had been watching Athena's eyes. “I think she's telling the truth, Norian. Anyway, we can't trust anything she says. She could claim an antidote and we could use it to walk through the ring fine, and drop dead an hour later.”
Norian flopped back into his chair alongside Letos. “I suppose so. But we can't just wait here while the Romans surround us.”
“I have no intention of that. Now, can you and Mirian watch these prisoners? I'm going to talk to Senti. She will have treated men who are suffering from the pois
on by this time, and if anyone will know how to counter it, she will be the one.”
Carrot exited the hut, adjusted her eyes to the dark, and headed back to the northern edge of the field. The airboat was smoldering embers and by its light Carrot saw that Senti was where she had last been seen, by the wreckage of the glider. In Carrot's absence, several men had been laid alongside Bok in a row, coughing and wheezing and thrashing as Senti moved from body to body with her satchel of potions. The healer glanced up as Carrot approached, then returned her attention to a patient.
“Bok is asleep and recovering,” Senti said. “His condition is 'stable,' as Matt would say, but I fear that he will need the Wizard's powers to recuperate fully.”
Carrot knelt alongside. “I thought you would be at the village this time of night. It is good fortune that you are here.”
“Nothing to do with luck. Even before this, the thousands here needed me more than the hundreds there, what with fistfights and belly aches. So I moved my clinic here a couple days ago.”
Carrot watched the intensity in the healer's eyes, the deliberateness of the placement of the healer's hands. “Senti . . . you have a partition.”
“I do. A little gift from Matt to care for his patients, in case . . . . “
In case he doesn't return, Carrot finished.
Without taking her eyes off the patient, Senti asked, “What can I do for you, Carrot?”
“I need to know all you can tell me about the poison.”
“No one has died yet, but I have never seen such coughing. It becomes worse and then they become very weak.” Senti made a sideways nod toward a blanket where she had set a lantern and spread spoons, knives, dozens of bottles, cups, and bags of chopped plants. “I've had time to do only a few simple tests. Galen – that is the name of the partition – says that the poison is a 'phosgene derivative' and will not kill immediately. However, in sufficient dose, death will come eventually.”
Carrot could see the wicked intent. Kill a man, and you stop him from fighting. Incapacitate a man, and you not only stop him from fighting, you burden the rest of the army with having to care for him, while his agonies demoralize the other soldiers.
“You are giving them medicines. So you have a cure?”
“What I am giving them now takes the pain away and puts them into sleep. I don't have an antidote. Galen says that if the Wizard were here, he could make one. Matt imparted to me many of his healing powers at risk of his own health, but the thought of something like this – it didn't occur to either of us.”
Senti lifted the head of her patient, tilting the cup to trickle liquid into his mouth. Several more patients were brought by soldiers and laid next to the others. Carrot, on her knees with knuckles on the grass, tightened her fists and felt helpless. Then it all became worse: she heard Senti cough lightly.
“You have it too.”
“Not too badly. But it is only a matter of time, Carrot. These men that I am treating, they fell sick immediately because they were by where the poison was deposited. But now the wind is blowing it over the whole base and we're all whiffing it.”
“Then we could all die soon.”
“It is not as dismal as that. Galen says the body can heal from the poison in low amounts, but Carrot, if the wind were to blow harder tonight – “
“I understand. Senti, is there a way we can neutralize the poison?”
“Neutralize? What do you mean?”
“That I intend to march all of us out of here, to somewhere the poison will not blow. I need to know of a way to pass through the ring without the poison affecting us.”
Senti thought for a moment. “Water. It breaks down with water. See how the clothing of my patients is wet? I've had my orderlies douse them before they are moved, so that we are not 'contaminated,' as Galen says.”
“How much water would it require to cleanse the ground so that soldiers could walk safely upon it?”
Senti tilted her head, listening to an unseen voice. “Galen says that a few minutes of rain will 'decompose' the poison. You could then safely pass over the ground.”
Carrot looked up the sky. It was overcast, but the clouds were not thick enough for rain. “Perhaps we could pour water onto a path through the ring?”
“I suppose that would work. But Carrot, how will you spread water on the poisoned ground, when you cannot go near it without becoming sick? And where will you find enough water? The cisterns are low but even if they were not, there would never be enough water here at the base to make such a path.”
Carrot blinked. “I will have to think about it.” She arose. “Thank you, Senti.”
Senti had already moved to the next patient.
Carrot pondered as she returned to the hut. There, she related the information that Senti had provided.
Norian scowled. “The clouds are high this evening. The Romans will encircle us before rain comes.” His face brightened. “The base cisterns are filled from a stream that pours into a pond in the southwest! If we cross the ring there – ”
“The stream is outside the circle,” Athena replied. “I made sure of that.”
Norian scowled. “Thank you for informing us. It saves the trouble of looking.”
Pond, Carrot thought. She well remembered the pond; it was where Matt had kissed her. Pushing away distracting thoughts, she focused and said, “If we could reach the pond, we could pour water to make a path through the circle, by which to escape.”
Their eyes inquired as to the obvious catch, but she had much to think and no time to explain. She went outside and waited, pacing. Within minutes, the officers that she had summoned arrived. She led them inside, spread a map of the training field's environs, and briefed them on the situation.
“Poison!” exclaimed Hagan, a major in the Eastern Leaf and appointed by the Eastern Leaf as second-in-command at Ravencall. He glared at Letos. “How could this happen, Faron? What was the purpose of having us all crowd into one bunch so that it could happen?” Then he glared equally at Carrot. “And why suddenly have you put the base under the charge of this – this – girl!”
Carrot prepared to have 'Faron' speak on her behalf, but then Norian coughed loudly – this time clearly as a means to attract attention. The pips of a Leaf major, the ones he had thrown away but Carrot had retrieved, had materialized on the collar of his shirt.
“Major,” Norian said, in a tone that indicated that despite his lack of official position in the base hierarchy he regarded himself as an equal, “unless you have an idea as to how to escape our predicament, you would do well to listen to this 'girl,' and then you will have answers to your questions in the form of results.”
Hagan's mouth flapped noiselessly, but he faced Carrot and waited.
In the silence of the hut, in the presence of majors and captains of the Leaf, while indicating on the map, she methodically outlined the plan that she had conceived only moments before.
Hagan asked quietly, “Are you sure this will work?”
“I am not.” Carrot smiled. “However, it is my own life at greatest risk, and if you do as I ask, you will either save all of our lives or be free of a troublesome 'girl.'”
She gave assignments and dismissed them. In an instant, the camp became a storm of activity. A catapult was brought and hitched to a wagon, while the sling was removed and a washtub was nailed onto the end of the arm. Meanwhile senior officers informed mid-level officers that they were on the move, and sergeants were soon barking at soldiers to gather their equipment and form into rank and file.
With Norian, Mirian, Athena and 'Faron' in company, Carrot mixed among the men, greeting the hundreds she knew by name, attempting to memorize the names of the thousands she didn't. Many of the newcomers were wary of having a leader who was only a young woman, and Carrot knew she had to win them over if they were to successfully engage the Romans in battle. She confided her concern with Norian.
“Don't worry, Carrot,” he replied. “They believe that 'blundering easterner
s' got them into this ring of poison. If you get them out of it, they will follow you anywhere.”
Athena laughed. “Yes, if you can escape the poison ring, all your problems will be solved! The men will march where she says and the Romans will fall like bowling pins!”
“Eh, what's a bowling pin?” Norian asked.
Sidestepping mention that she herself was an easterner, Carrot started to answer, but Norian began to cough. It was light, but he'd coughed before, and Carrot examined his face for signs of ill-ease. So far, he looked in health. But then he coughed again.
“You've been doing that a lot, Norian. Were you close to the ring?”
“No, not at all.” He coughed again. “The sooner we're away from here, the better.”
Carrot took a breath, and scented that the wet hay smell was indeed stronger, and coming in the direction of the breeze. She recalled Senti's warning. Among the men came the repeated sound of coughs. Some were already hacking.
The chaos of breaking camp coagulated into marching formations. Major Hagan approached Carrot's group. He looked to Faron, then faced Carrot. Without salute or address, he said stonily, “The men are ready.”
Carrot pointed to the southwest. “Follow me.”
Dawn was still hours away and the men required torches to negotiate the boggy terrain. Carrot saw clearly enough in the moonlight, yet still it was the wet-hay stench that alerted her to nearing the inner edge of the poison ring. She held up her hand and the column halted.
The ground ahead was a meadow. Moonlight glistened off the dew and mist filled the hollows. A hundred meters away, through the trunks of the intervening woods, the moon reflected from the ramshackle timbers of the abandoned mill and the placid surface of the pond. Carrot heard faintly the spill of the water over the dam.
Mirian bumped her arm, looked up and met her eyes. “Carrot, are you sure you can do this? And please don't say you are immune to all poison. It's gotten tiresome.”
“If anyone can do this,” Carrot replied, “it's me.”
Mirian glanced at the thousands of men gathered in the field. “I think you and I are the only ones who are not coughing.”
