“You have outdone yourself, Hitomi.” Raegith dismounted Fenra and the Urufen Helcat transformed back to her normal form to follow him. He clasped her hand and pulled her close for an embrace. “I thought the plan was to wait for us to arrive before assaulting the fort.”
“My siege tactics proved overly effective against the pink-fleshed soldiers. They charged headlong into their doom over a week ago and we obliged them.”
Raegith felt her shudder in his arms as she made her report. “You’re cold?”
“It’s nothing,” the Helcat replied.
The snow had already begun well before Raegith arrived. The Urufen in his company carried on, unfazed, but the others fared much worse. The Rathgar and Lokai were unaccustomed to the cold. Temperatures in the Wilderness had not yet dropped to that of the Eastern Mountains in the Greimere, but winter had only begun.
Something along the far wall of the fort caught Raegith’s eyes and he pulled away from Hitomi to look at it closer. “What is that on the wall?”
Hitomi grumbled. “We had barely secured the fort before finding all manner of ‘artwork.’ I wanted to decorate the walls with the skeletal remains of our enemies and Ardyx fucked it up within hours. Why did you send him with me?”
“Honestly I just wanted him out of my hair for a little bit.” Raegith replied to Hitomi without moving his gaze from the colorful display along the wall. “He’s making his own colors now? Hey, I think that’s supposed to be me in the middle there. He’s starting to get really good.”
“He serves absolutely no purpose other than to annoy me,” Hitomi stated. “I wish a hawk would snatch him up and fly off with him.”
Raegith hugged Hitomi to him again and held her there for several moments. “You are the backbone of this campaign, Hitomi. What do you ask of me for this honor?”
“I ask nothing other than to remain forever by your side, Grass-Hair.” Hitomi bowed to him. Then she rose and motioned to the side. Qufeng stepped forward, her eyes low. “This is Qufeng, my protégé. When we took the fort, the men inside sent a much larger force north, intent on punching through our line. Qufeng’s team suffered many losses, but she alone prevented word from being sent across the river.”
Raegith looked the girl beside Hitomi over. Her lean, athletic body and flat face were not attractive to him, but he did not choose Helcats for their beauty. “She is from the Bogs, isn’t she? This is who you’ve decided to train? I don’t see a spear or naginata anywhere.”
“Qufeng refuses to use the gear of my Blade Dancers or even act like one. I have only ever seen her fight with bare fists.”
Raegith scowled at Hitomi and then looked the girl over once more. “Is that so? What is it you’re getting at, Hitomi?”
“You offered to grant me a reward, Grass-Hair. I humbly ask that you instead grant that wish to Qufeng, who seeks to be your disciple.”
Raegith shook his head and stared at Hitomi. “What?”
Hitomi nodded to the girl and Qufeng bowed before him, speaking for the first time. “I strive to fight, live and believe as the Grass-Haired Demon. I wish to know and follow the Path.”
Hitomi stepped toward Raegith. “She knows about the Junrei’sha; she’s seen one before. She wants to follow the Path, like you.”
“She won’t be able to do what I can do, Hitomi; you should have already told her that.” Raegith shook his head. “The things I had to do to gain this power...”
“She knows, Grass-Hair.” Hitomi put her hand on his chest. “She knows as much as I do, anyway. You’ve never told us everything that happened during your time with them. All I ask is that you indulge her just a little bit. She is devoted to the Greimere and capable.”
Hitomi backed away and placed her hand on the girl’s shoulder. “She is sixteen years old. The Sabans fleeing north outnumbered her team, but she stopped them. She killed three armed men with her bare hands, Grass-Hair. She has earned one lesson from the master at least.”
“Very well.” Raegith bid the girl to rise and looked her in the eyes. “Hitomi has chosen you to join my sacred order of bodyguards. Having a follower of the Path among my Helcats is not the worst idea she has had. When I am settled, I will call for you, Qufeng. Be ready.”
Raegith backed away from her and put his arm around Fenra beside him. He looked up at the warriors and families all along the walls that Hitomi had brought to the fort. “The cold is coming… a cold like most of you have never experienced in the west or in the Citadel. The Urufen know cold, however. They made their home in the coldest part of the Greimere. They will get us through the winter.”
“Grass-Hair, if the Sabans attack us here at this citadel…” Hitomi nodded toward the north end of the fort.
“They won’t attack us during the winter,” Raegith interrupted. “Rellizbix has three compounds south of the river. Galveronne was destroyed and we hold this fort. The last fort is Draymmond, a training fort much farther to the East.”
Hitomi looked eastward as if she could see the fort through the walls and over the miles. “I can take a group to raze it to be safe.”
Raegith stopped her. “Hitomi, you have to listen to me – we’re on defense for the moment.”
Raegith turned back to give orders to Helkree to get the convoy inside the walls and unpack. Fort Augustus was designed to accommodate three full Regiments. It would be snug with the abundance of Gimlets, but three Regiments equated to the entire Greimere Empire.
With Fenra and Naoko at his back, Raegith walked the courtyard with Hitomi toward the north wall. Reaching the top, the group gazed out over the sea of evergreens speckled with grey, leafless perennials. “Hitomi, do you know the true advantage we hold in this war?”
Hitomi turned her head toward him, but he still stared to the north. “The men of Rellizbix have been fighting the same war for centuries. They’re accustomed.”
Raegith nodded. “And that means that when they built this fort, they designed it to deter a siege. We have the high ground, there is only one road in and you know exactly what it takes to topple this defense. Even if they bring more of their cannons, they’ll have to wheel them right up to the wall or cut their way through the forest.”
Raegith caught a snowflake on his palm and his eyes lingered on it. His mind drifted back to when he was seven, spending his first winter in Forster’s Keep. It snowed in the North for the first time in a decade. His mother visited daily only to be turned away by the guards. He would stand in the window and shout at the guards below, begging them to allow her inside. He bartered things he did not own – childish bargains for toys and other things useless to a soldier. Helfrick’s orders rang fresh in their minds, however, and his mother was only allowed in once every month, even during the coldest winter Rellizbix had weathered in his lifetime.
Raegith broke from his thoughts and turned to Hitomi. “The men north of the river are not accustomed to weather like this, but they have no idea what we are accustomed to. Helfrick won’t press an attack if he even suspects we have the advantage.”
Hitomi frowned. “I would still like to send some scouts- Shit.”
The Helcat flattened Raegith with a shove. The blow caught him unexpected, but to put him down so easily with one hit was an impressive feat for the Lokai girl. Raegith looked up, curious about the unprovoked attack and saw a thin, feathered stick protruding at a downward angle under her right breast.
Hitomi turned toward the outside wall and lifted her heavy naginata over her head, but it slipped from her grasp before she could throw. Naoko pulled an arrow from her quiver and aimed down the wall, but another arrow grazed her cheekbone under her right eye so she dropped behind the rampart in a panic.
Fenra grabbed Hitomi before she hit the ground. Raegith checked her side and brought his hand away covered in blood.
“Single archer,” one of the Lokai girls on the wall yelled, firing off an arrow. “She’s heading into the woods. Damn, she’s too fast.”
“She?” Raegith looked ove
r the rampart and caught a glimpse of green cloak and a black, recurve bow. It was a Twileen Hunter.
“Grass-Hair.”
Raegith turned to see anguish on Fenra’s face. Blood emptied from Hitomi like wine from a broken spigot. The wall was crowding on either side from all the warriors trying to catch sight of the attack. Raegith looked over the edge into the courtyard thirty feet below.
He scooped Hitomi out of Fenra’s arms and leapt over the edge. As blue engulfed his legs, he called out for Izanami. The ground shook with his landing and the impact caused a coughing fit in Hitomi.
The witch appeared at his side in the next instant. “Oh damn. Arrow through the ribs and into the top organs. She’s done for.”
“She’s still alive, Izanami. Do something,” Raegith yelled. “Stitch her up like you did me.”
“You were merely exhausted, feverish and scraped up.” Izanami bent down and pulled a glass tube from under her robe. “If you would like me to ease her passing…”
“I’ll pull the arrow out and you mend her wounds.” Raegith grabbed the witch by the robe and yanked her to her knees beside him. She responded with a threatening hiss, but he ignored her. “Hitomi is one of my original Helcats and the engineer behind every victory we have won against Rellizbix. You will not dismiss her as a casualty until her body lies cold and stiff.”
“The arrow is likely barbed.” Izanami pulled back her robe, startling everyone who had not yet seen her bone-white face and blood-filled eyes. “If you pull that out, half her organs will come with it. Barbed arrows can only be pushed through. Her heart lies in front of the tip.”
Izanami leaned back and feigned sympathy. “The archer that took her down is both cruel and accurate. There is nothing anyone can do.”
“I can remove the arrow.”
Raegith looked up to see Ariadne, the Faeir prisoner he took from the battle at Galveronne. She stood over the others crouched near Hitomi. Magda, her handler, stood next to her.
The Mage pushed past the crowd and knelt beside Hitomi, studying the arrow. She immediately huffed in frustration and looked at Raegith. “Well, I could remove the arrow, but she’s lost so much blood…”
Raegith snatched the Faeir woman by the throat and screamed into her face, his voice straining with madness. “Fix her!”
“Can your witch close the wound?” The Mage remained calm before the fury of Raegith. “I cannot close the wound fast enough, even with my power, once the arrow is destroyed…”
Izanami switched to speaking the Rellizbix tongue. “I can close her up in seconds, but there is no way you can get that arrow out without shredding her insides."
Ariadne reached down and snapped off the shaft of the arrow right at the wound. “You know nothing of true magic, witch.”
Raegith looked on, holding his breath as the Mage called up a frail cyclone of wind before her. As she closed her hands around the cyclone, it shrank and spun harder. Slowly, she compressed the wind tunnel, increasing the speed and force the smaller it became. After moments, Ariadne manipulated a thin, ferocious drill of twisting air that whistled with such a terrible pitch that the Urufen close by retreated in agony. Only Fenra remained by Hitomi’s side, clenching her teeth against the pain, even as a small red line traced from her ear down to her neck.
Ariadne pushed the air drill into the broken shaft of the arrow and the wood disintegrated at the touch. The Mage looked tense and focused as she guided the drill into Hitomi’s body. “Hold her still if she begins to move. This magic will eat flesh just as easily as wood and steel.”
Raegith translated for the Mage. Magda, Fenra, Indie and Helkree braced Hitomi, holding her down hard. Each of them knew how strong the athletic Lokai could be and this was not a time for chances.
After several minutes, Ariadne took a deep breath and leaned her face right up against the Helcat’s ribs. “Now the tip. You cannot let her move an inch.”
Raegith hovered over Hitomi’s face and bent close to her ear. Tears dropped from his face onto hers and his voice strained. “Listen to me, Hitomi. You’re going to make it. This is a battle like any other. You do not lose battles.”
The Lokai Helcat lay unconscious, but some part of her must have understood the gravity of the situation. Hitomi’s muscles strained and her body went rigid as the Mage began to cut into the steel tip, but Hitomi did not struggle. Her sisters held her solid, and she did not twitch.
“Done. Close her now,” Ariadne commanded, spinning away from her patient as Izanami took her place and quickly stitched her up with the rejuvenating thread she used on so many other warriors.
Once Hitomi was closed up, Izanami commanded several Rathgar workers to carry her inside the closest building. Raegith took a shaky, involuntary breath, what felt like the first since he noticed the arrow in his Helcat. Fenra and Naoko wept beside him. Raegith felt like punching something.
“Grass-Hair, may I speak with you?” Ariadne approached him and looked at Helkree beside him with unease. “In private.”
Raegith scoffed. “Just speak, Mage. None but Beretta and I know your language.”
“They can hear my tone.” Ariadne pleaded with her eyes.
Raegith nodded toward an empty room and lead her there. Raegith followed her inside, along with Helkree. When she protested, he reminded her that Helkree remained at his side no matter what and that she did not know the Rellizbix tongue. Ariadne hesitated, but relented when realized he would not.
“Is there anything I can do to convince you to stop?” The Mage did not dance around her thoughts. “It is clear you feel kinship to these people, though I cannot imagine what drove you to it. I also see hatred in you for your true countrymen...”
“I’m going to stop you there, Mage.” Raegith approached her, standing intimately close. “If your intention is to try to evoke some long-buried allegiance to Rellizbix or convince me of my wrongdoing, my friend Helkree will gladly open you up from crotch to crown.”
“You are Twileen,” she continued. “The Faeir and Twileen have a strained relationship, but our races united behind the Sabans for a common goal and we each became better for it. What happened to you, Grass-Hair? I know that can’t be your true name. How did you find yourself in command of the Greimere barbarians and intent on the destruction of our great kingdom?”
“You don’t get to know, Mage.” Raegith roared and unleashed his rage upon the wall behind her, cratering the stone with his fist. “You speak of my countrymen? Countrymen who forced a mother from her crying son? Countrymen who dragged my mentor into the ground as he begged me to care for the last of his line? Countrymen who made me listen as they raped the bravest Saban I’ve ever known over and over? My time among the men of Rellizbix was short, but enlightening.”
“These things all happened to you?” Ariadne stepped away as if she looked upon a wounded fawn.
Raegith closed the gap between them, but he refrained from laying more hands on her. “I grew up with the same stories about the Greimere you likely did. But in my time among them I have learned they know more about honor than your kind or my kind. I aim to emulate that. If Hitomi lives it will be because you possessed the skill and the mercy to save her life.”
Raegith pushed his face close to hers. “At that time, you may ask anything you want of me. Until she is in the clear, you’re still my slave. Back to your post, Ariadne.”
When the Mage left the room, Helkree approached. “She may have saved my sister. I told you to kill her back at Galveronne and if you had listened…”
“I didn’t know either, Hel.” Suddenly, Raegith dropped to his knees and wrapped his arms around Helkree’s waist. He pushed his face into her stomach and unleashed the hell that raged inside him.
“Empty it all here, Grass-Hair, and go back out there clear-faced,” Helkree said as she placed her hands on his head. “The Greimere needs strength now. You are their strength.”
Raegith wiped his face and stood up, looking her in the eyes. “You’re right. You
always pull me back, Hel.”
“I know you, Grass-Hair. I know that this...” Helkree reached up with her thumb and brushed away a stray tear from his eye. “-is not weakness, but the trait of your kind that grants you strength. They do not know this about you.”
“A place for those the world rejects; that is why we’re here, Hel.” Raegith shook it off and steadied himself. “We will do anything for that one true goal. We will make any sacrifice for it.”
Chapter 16
Nero rode in the carriage through the Central Plains and avoided eye contact with the beautiful woman sitting across from him. Outside the carriage, members of the 1st Regiment Cavalry accompanied them on their tour of Rellizbix.
“You can speak to me freely, you know.”
Nero jerked away from the window to see Helfria Caelum staring at him. Her smile came naturally and for a moment he forgot that he sat an arm’s length from royalty.
“We’re going to be spending a lot of time together on this tour and if you don’t talk, I am going to go insane with boredom.”
“Forgive me, your Gra...” Nero caught himself and corrected. “-Senator. I apologize again for that.”
“I understand, Corporal.” She waved off the assumed offense. “I know these things are drilled into you as a soldier. I also know that Caelum daughters have been called ‘Grace’ and ‘Duchess’ for a very long time before one ever gained a different title for herself. I appreciate your attempts to change that for me.”
She adjusted in her seat and continued looking at him. “So, would you mind telling me a bit about yourself, hero of the Wilderness?”
“Please don’t,” Nero replied, wincing at the breach of protocol he just committed.
“I don’t mean that in jest, Corporal. What you did was quite heroic.” Helfria leaned forward. “Corporal Octavius Nero, the lone survivor of the 8th Regiment, sneaks through miles of occupied territory and swims across the Pisces River in frigid weather to return to his post; that’s the news on everyone’s lips from the World’s Edge Mountains to the Storm Line. You don’t see that as admirable?”
Wrath of the Greimere Page 11
