Gerolf was buying the act, hook, line, and sinker.
“No, but my lovely ladies did help soothe my wounds and ease my mind as I plotted against them.” Gormer reached under the driver’s bench and pulled out a satchel. “A gift for you!” he exclaimed, and pulled out a thick scroll of parchment.”
“What is this?” Gerolf said, snatching the roll from Gormer and pulling him under the walkway. “Is this what I think it is?”
“Plans, troop numbers, weapons inventory, and maps to their weapons stores, and the names of the blacksmiths and craftsman who collaborated with the enemy!”
And it’s all bullshit, of course, Gormer allowed that thought to fuel the smile that disarmed Gerolf completely. I hope you follow it right into the trap Astrid set for you, you piece of shit.
“Oh, this is brilliant,” Gerolf declared. He unrolled the parchment and searched through the documents, then stuffed a few into his expensive coat.
“What are you doing?” Gormer asked in surprise.
“Oh, come now, old friend,” Gerolf said with a snicker. “You are the one who taught me never to offer all your goods at once. I’m holding back some so we can make more profit.”
“We?” Gormer asked, recovering. “I don’t recall you risking your hide for this information.”
“We can talk finder’s fees later.” Gerolf waved off the thought.
“I did teach you well!” Gormer exclaimed. “Too well!”
“You were always like a second father to me,” Gerolf replied.
Gormer clapped him on the back again…a little too hard. “In our business, don’t sons usually put their fathers out to pasture when they get the chance?”
“That’s the way we were raised,” Gerolf said. “The business gets stronger with each generation.”
“I miss the game.” Gormer pretended to laugh. You’re all a bunch of goat sphincters, he thought to keep the mirth flowing.
They had started walking toward…somewhere. Gormer wasn’t quite sure where. Concentrating on the illusion and trying to read Gerolf without relying on magic was taking its toll, so he let Gerolf guide him.
They made their way down the covered walkway, then Gerolf guided him into the main yard of the keep toward a sprawling two-story warehouse.
“I know you must be tired,” Gerolf said, “but I wanted to show you something spectacular. These foreign magic-users, they carry wonders with them.”
“Wonders are expensive,” Gormer replied. Rupert’s responses were becoming second nature.
“But I scored these wonders at a bargain. I came across the deal at the right time.”
Gormer followed his tour guide to a side door. When he pushed it open, two guards armed with magitech rifles barred their way until they realized it was Gerolf. They gave him a quick nod but kept a watchful eye on the pair. More armed guards stood over a line of workers wearing grease-stained village clothing.
It took Gormer a few seconds to process why none of the tunics had sleeves. The whirring machines they slaved over were composed of churning gears, rollers, and frantically oscillating arms that spat out a part every few seconds.
He had heard of this before but never seen it. This was a factory, much like the one that once churned out magitech and ground people up back in Arcadia.
The villagers had removed the sleeves from their tunics to keep their clothing from getting caught up in the works. Many workers had scabby, bleeding hands and fresh raw-looking cuts on their arms.
Gormer jumped back when he walked past a machine that spat red-hot sparks at him. None of the workers paid attention to the two of them. They could not afford to take their eyes off their work for a second unless they wanted to lose their fingers.
“Hurry up, there!” a shrill voice yelled from a catwalk that ran above the assembly line. “Your station has too many parts in the inbox! We’re not paying you to stand there and dream.”
Gormer forced himself not to wince when a guard came up with a switch and brought it down hard across the woman’s shoulders. Her hollow eyes widened and welled with tears as her trembling hands moved faster.
“That beauty is Liesel,” Gerolf announced. “She and her father are well on their way to making me a very rich man.”
“Aren’t you already a very rich man?” Gormer asked.
Before this is over I’m going to slit your throat, Gormer thought to deepen the smile on Rupert’s face.
“I am simply rich,” Gerolf replied with the smarmiest of smiles. “I want to be exceedingly rich. You can join me; the market is big enough for the both of us. We can be exclusive traders in magitech.”
“What will your generosity cost me?” Gormer asked.
Gerolf just kept smiling and ignored the question. He had caught Liesel’s eye and she came down off the catwalk to join them.
“Liesel, allow me to introduce a dear old friend of the family. This is Rupert Danut, who only just escaped the dreadful place the fortress wards have become.”
“Pleased to meet you,” Liesel said.
Gormer took her hand delicately, since it was customary to shake a woman’s hand…in Arcadia.
Shit, Gormer thought. That was a tell! If she noticed the customary greeting she didn’t let on, only cocked her head slightly. Did she notice? Gormer tried not to panic.
“Your work here is most impressive,” Gormer said. “When this is all over, you might consider setting up a factory in one of my many warehouses in the wards. They are much closer to the raw materials.”
“Ah,” Liesel exclaimed. “So you are familiar with manufacturing?”
“No,” Gormer replied. He had fucked up again. “But it is obvious to a seasoned man of commerce like me.”
“Of course,” Liesel replied. “I look forward to working with you. I hate to be rude, but these peasants need constant minding.”
Gerolf turned to Gormer. “Let’s get out of this racket. I want to show you one more thing.”
As they turned to walk away Gormer saw a long rounded vehicle at the end of the assembly line. It looked like a wagon clad in metal, but there was no place to hitch horses.
Astrid thought they’d destroyed that, Gormer thought. Unless there is another one…
Gerolf led him out another door at one end of the warehouse and in front of them was a monstrous conveyance. Gormer smiled even though his stomach churned. He might vomit. There were two!
“We call this ‘the Porcupine.’ See those doors near the top?” Gerolf pointed. “When the driver opens those doors, the fighters inside poke their rifles through the slots and fire from complete safety.”
“The prototype took three keeps for us with only half the men. Imagine what this will do! When the other one is complete tomorrow we’ll drive them both straight to the fortress wards, ripping everything to shreds as we go. We will exterminate every single person who opposes us and turn their families into factory workers! We already have plans to convert more keep warehouses into factories.”
“You’ve really outdone yourself, Gerolf,” Gormer said. He wanted to scream, but he slung his arm around Gerolf’s shoulders again and gave him another squeeze.
How the fuck am I going to get out of this? Gormer asked himself desperately.
CHAPTER THIRTY
The First Foray
They had a clear line of attack now. They had taken back the toll roads and feeder roads down to the lowlands. Astrid made her camp on a rise that overlooked an abandoned village. The word from George and Merg’s scouts was that the woods people had warned the villagers trouble was coming.
They’d retreated into the forest before the occupying force came to drag them away. Rumor was that towns that didn’t align with the turncoats were being taken over for forced labor.
She would have taken the village, but it was too low in elevation so there were too many points to guard. This rise afforded her a much better view, and it took far fewer patrols to cover the blind spots.
The morning was still young. C
ampfires were just being extinguished, and the night patrols were coming back for a quick rest while the day crew was just getting started.
The lieutenants who had pledged their estates to Astrid’s leadership had all been accounted for, and all but two of the loyalists had opted to join the battle. Those who remained in their keeps had perhaps the hardest job of all. They were asked to hold out as long as they could against any attack. They happened to be at the end of a long valley that gave access to a toll road that led to the Vasile Protectorate.
The last thing Astrid needed was for another protectorate to get involved. So far only the Petrans had taken sides. The other two were waiting to see who the victor was, or at least that was Jiri’s assessment.
But she hadn’t heard from Jiri, which had her worried.
She couldn’t afford to worry about things she had no control over, though. This was the waiting game. The two armies stared each other down to see who would blink first.
She peered at them through Vinnie’s looking glass. She smiled, since she had gotten the jump on them by capturing the high ground.
Whoever was leading them was smart. They obscured their numbers with constant maneuvering.
Astrid couldn’t tell where a potential attack might come from, but with their battlewagon out of commission she was certain they would have to attack on foot. She wasn’t sure what she would do if they still had that thing. Vinnie had gotten lucky in taking out its wheels. If they’d had more foot soldiers to support the wagon it would have been a far different story.
Another excellent stroke of luck was what was under the land. Tarkon had detected a significant vein of minerals behind the rise. Last night under torch and lantern light, Vinnie had expended a shocking amount of magical energy to remove the topsoil and expose the rock beneath.
She hoped he had recovered enough this morning to fight.
His students, on the other hand, seemed to have unlimited amounts of energy. Well, almost. The truth was that they had pushed themselves to near exhaustion and then rested so that they always had an effective amount of energy to work with.
Their methods were so practical that Astrid sent back to the wards for other Forge trainees to pull minerals from the rock. Jakub and his team had managed to make fifty more shields or so. Astrid even had one now.
This was the first time she had seen one up close. The shield was a little under five feet tall, and curved such that it came halfway around the arms if one pulled it close into the body. It was mobile cover. Astrid suspected they had made this one a bit taller to fit her.
A fighter could duck behind it to protect themselves or fire a crossbow over it with only their head exposed.
They had spent part of the morning practicing with the new tools, running drills to advance under fire. They used live crossbow fire during the drills, and the bolts didn’t even scratch the shields. The Dregs quickly learned how to use them.
Astrid was happily surprised to see them invent new moves while they practiced hand-to-hand combat. Her strategy had relied on getting to the enemy as quickly as possible to remove their range advantage.
She caught Woody’s eye when she went to the mess tent to go grab a quick bite.
“It’s nice to be out of the house,” the burly redhead said. His trademark ax rested on his shoulder.
“What do you expect to do in this fight with a wood ax?” Astrid wondered to his face.
“You’ll see,” Woody replied. If a leopard could smile, that was what it would have looked like.
The alarm sounded—they were coming. Still miles away across the fields, they looked like a creeping shadow. Astrid was skilled in martial calculus. It was one of the things that Knights learned early in their strategic training.
There must have been close to ten thousand fighters approaching. Even with her reserves, Astrid had just under eight thousand.
They were in trouble.
She ran down the hill to the rally point, where she met Vinnie, Tarkon, and Moxy on horseback, ready to go.
She only recognized Moxy by her size. The Pixie was clad from head-to-toe in black silksteel armor, obviously a custom job. The sacred steel plates barely covered her chest, abdomen, lower back, and a few other vital areas. It was designed to offer her maximum movement.
“Since when do you wear armor?” Astrid called to her.
“Since Vinnie’s students made this for me,” Moxy replied. “Said they’d been working on it since they met me.”
“How does it feel?” Astrid asked.
“Itchy,” Moxy replied. “But I think it will make me deadlier.”
“That,” Vinnie replied, “is a terrifying thought.”
Tarkon leaned over and managed to kiss her on the cheek before she lowered the faceplate on her helmet.
Mika, Hanif, and the other lieutenants joined them.
The enemy moved toward them in three columns to join what turned out to be a token force. Now that they had the numbers they didn’t bother to hide their strategy; they were moving into a delta formation.
The lead element should break their lines, and if the tip of that pointed formation succeeded in that aim the two ends would spread out and surround them.
Her heart raced. She was in uncharted territory, having only trained for an engagement this large in a classroom setting.
For a moment she feared that she would get them all killed.
Astrid closed her eyes and breathed deeply. She saw the terrain clearly, and they had the high ground. The enemy had a lot of room to maneuver, but they had to come through a narrower part of the land.
If they caught them while they were in that narrow part they wouldn’t have as much room to spread out.
“We move forward quickly,” Astrid said as she turned to Mika. “We need to keep the high ground. I say we put all our crossbows on those hills.” She pointed to land that was sparse with trees. “We put our shield troops right in the middle. Slow them down. Rain crossbow fire on them.”
Mika nodded and the other lieutenants shared looks that Astrid could not quite read.
“Good a strategy as any,” Mika said. The other lieutenants agreed.
Nobody looked too hopeful.
Astrid issued the orders through the lieutenants and their first charges, although it took longer than she wanted for the orders to be confirmed. Astrid took the low ground with the main force, which would confront the tip of the enemy formation. Hanif took the higher ground to the southeast, and Mika headed southwest. The other lieutenants commanded several smaller ranks of the reserves.
To her great surprise, one of the allied lieutenants intercepted her. “It’s an honor and a pleasure to work with you,” he told her before riding off with his forces.
What Were You Thinking?
Gormer knew he had failed when during a sumptuous dinner some psychotic bitch in blood-red armor gleefully announced that nine thousand troops were staged to march before dawn the next day.
Her name was Hagan, and she appeared to be in charge. The other first lieutenants seated at the long table seemed to defer to her. She was the woman with the plan, and her second was a large mean-looking fucker named Morgon. That shaved ape sat to her right.
A guy with recent burn marks on his face sat on her left hand, and the rest of the lieutenants spread out along one side of the table. Liesel, Yarik, Gerolf, and a host of rich-looking merchant types sat on the other side. It was the military opposite the monied class who had funded everything.
Gormer ended up sandwiched between Liesel and Gerolf. She was very charming, but asked too many questions. He was getting too mentally fatigued to keep up with all his lies. So far he thought he’d done very well. Gerolf was a bit too impressed with himself and a little bit drunk, so he barely paid attention.
Shit, Gormer thought. I’m supposed to be wreaking havoc by now. He was supposed to do that or find a way to escape with information. He doubted that he could get anywhere in time to do any good even if he could escape in the nigh
t.
Fuck. Think of something, Gormer.
He briefly considered a suicide move. He thought he could slash at least Hagan’s throat before she saw it coming. He’d have to spend the bulk of his magic to create the distraction, but after that adrenaline would take over and he’d get in some licks before he died. He was busy trying to decide on which hypothetical kill should come next when Liesel nudged his shoulder.
“You look kind of far away, Mr. Danut,” Liesel whispered in his ear.
“It must be the wine, dear,” he said. The room was filled with excited conversations about the battle to come and the profits to be had.
“No, I don’t think so,” Liesel purred.
“Oh?” Gormer asked. Oh, shit, he thought.
“Do you know what this is?” Liesel asked. She placed a fist-sized rectangular device on the table.
“Haven’t the foggiest,” Gormer replied. “Is it expensive?”
“Priceless in these parts, but not so much so in Arcadia, where magitech is quite common.”
“Arcadia?” Gormer asked.
“Why, yes,” Liesel replied. “You remember Arcadia, don’t you? It must have been the place where you learned mental magic.”
Gormer froze, then turned toward her slowly. He’d been made. Liesel tapped on the device with one of her long sharp manicured fingernails. That was when Gormer noticed a series of small dials on the device. The largest dial pointed directly at him. Liesel moved the device around on the tablecloth a little bit and the dial kept pointing toward him.
“I’m not sure what you mean,” Gormer began.
“Don’t worry,” Liesel replied. “I won’t tell them…yet. That is, provided you do exactly as I say, Gormer.”
He almost lost it. The shock of hearing his real name nearly made him panic. He held his breath as Liesel closed the device and put it back in the pocket of her long soft leather coat.
“Just act natural. When the dessert comes out, you will go to the door over there.” She nodded to a side door, where two guards stood with short-barreled magitech rifles held across their bodies. “If you’re anything like the man I heard of in Arcadia, we might be able to come to some agreement that might benefit both of us.”
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