by Jane Shoup
He reached the room where a dozen men were gathered. He raised his fist to knock, but it froze in place. He was looking at the McKeaf. He was looking right at the man. His wits returned and he knocked to announce his presence. Most the men glanced his way, but the courier waited for the general to look at him.
“Yes?” the McKeaf said.
The courier stepped forward with the missive and handed it over. “Corin’s army is marching toward Rhuga, sir.” The McKeaf frowned so darkly, the young man nearly took a step back.
“In what numbers?” the McKeaf asked.
“Nearly the whole of their army, sir,” he replied solemnly.
“I knew it,” Anthony McKeaf exclaimed bitterly.
The courier tried to appear calm. He’d seen Anthony McKeaf triumph at the Games since he was a small boy and now he was standing only feet away from him.
“All those stories of a reforming king who suddenly acquired a conscience,” Anthony scoffed. “What a steaming pile of horse shit!”
“What do you think, Lucas?” Amador Ayala spoke up.
“Is Corin with the army?” the McKeaf asked the courier.
“Yes, sir. He is.”
Lucas McKeaf turned to study the military map mounted on the wall.
“Obviously, we have to send forces to N’awllah,” Anthony spoke out.
“Further,” his father rejoined. “To the border of Shilbridge.” He turned back to the men in the room. “The purpose of marching on Rhuga is surely to pressure Shilbridge, so we’ll do the same. We’ll send half our force to let them know what awaits if they side with Corin.”
“And the other half?”
“It doesn’t need to be half,” Lucas said thoughtfully. “A division or perhaps two will attack Bellux Abry.”
There was a ripple of agreement from the men.
“Corin should have something to do back home,” Lucas added.
“Once we’re in place, we could squeeze from both sides and crush them,” Anthony said.
Lucas shook his head. “That would be a blood bath that would crush Shilbridge and Ghlaxmire in the middle. No. If our intelligence is correct, much of Corin’s force has been pressed into service. Give them a chance to desert and Corin’s army may disintegrate from within.”
“We attack the city,” Matthew Reber mused, “and they’ll double back on us.”
“We’ll send word to Lere,” Lucas replied. “A division there will leave for Bellux Abry at once. The attack should take Corin by surprise and his army will return to defend it, but our troops will be gone by then.”
Anthony frowned angrily. “They’re to attack and leave?”
“Yes.”
“But what if we can take the city?” Anthony challenged.
“We neither need nor want it. Our purpose is to stop Corin’s aggression.”
“But if we can take it—”
“Then we’ll be able to take it later.”
It was apparent that Anthony vehemently disagreed, but he kept his mouth shut.
“Thank you,” the general said.
The courier realized the McKeaf was speaking to him. “You’re welcome, sir,” he stammered.
“What’s your name?”
“Henry Sykes.”
“You’re young for a courier.”
“Oh, no. I’m sixteen, sir. I just look young.”
A few men chuckled, and Henry felt foolish.
The general made a diligent effort not to smile. “Someone see to it that Henry is fed and taken care of.”
“I’ll do it,” a familiar looking man said as he stepped out from amongst the others.
“Come.”
Henry followed him. Midway down the hall, the man led the way into a dining hall where a woman was tidying up. “Deborah, this young man needs to be fed.
“I’ll see to it,” she said.
As the lady left the hall, recognition hit. “You’re Alexander Kievnall,” Henry blurted. “I’ve seen you at the Games.”
“I am.”
Henry beamed as he shook the hand the man extended. “I think—”
“What?”
“Never mind. It was a foolish thing I was going to say.”
“Say it, then. Please. Foolishness would be a nice change.”
“I was going to say that if Corin could see this place and all of you, he might back down.”
Alexander smiled. “I don’t think it would ever be that simple, but wouldn’t it be grand?”
“Yes, sir.”
Lucas turned to Richard. “It’s time for every able-bodied man to join us. Those that stayed behind for harvesting must come.”
“Where?” Richard asked.
“Lere. This camp will break down and move north.”
A guard appeared in the door, looking apologetic. “I’m sorry, sir, but another girl has come claiming to be your daughter.”
Richard sighed. “I’ll see to it.”
“No, wait,” Amador roared, incensed by another false claim. He glared at the messenger. “Go and tell her if we bother to send a man to investigate her claim and it proves to be false, she’ll be whipped. Ten stripes for our trouble. Tell her that. In fact, let it be the new rule of order. Before any woman is brought back here claiming to be our firefly, explain it to her. We are sick of it!”
Lucas pressed on the bridge of his nose, plagued by another headache. As much as he wished it, he could not always separate his mind from his heart, and his heart had been missing since the day Ammey left. They had scoured the countryside to no avail. His worry and grief affected his thinking, slowed it, and there were important decisions to be made. “Why?” he muttered. “Why do they come?”
“Pests,” Amador snapped. “Go,” he said to the guard.
“I don’t want her whipped,” Lucas stated.
“There should be a penalty for lying and wasting our time,” Amador said.
“I’ll see to her,” Richard said to his father.
Lucas nodded.
“I’ll write a message to Lere,” Anthony said. “David is there. We can direct it to him.”
Richard followed the guard to a haggard, clearly frightened young woman positioned between guards a foot taller than she was. Richard stopped in front of her and waited until she worked up the nerve to look at him. “I am Richard McKeaf. Ammey is my sister,” he stated calmly.
The young woman ducked her head in shame and began to cry.
“I suppose you’re hungry?”
She nodded, but did not look up at him.
“We’ll feed you,” he said. “But you cannot stay here.”
“I have nah-nowhere to go,” she admitted. She hiccuped and wiped her runny nose, making a mess of it.
“There is a village south of here called Pipers Glen. Try there. There is a couple who runs the Y Tree Tavern who can possibly help.”
She nodded and tried to thank him, but her voice caught. He glanced at the soldiers and then walked away.
~~~
Ammey took her clothes off and waded out into the frigid water of the river with A stick she’d just sharpened. Ignoring the stinging cold, she bent and focused. Clearing her mind of everything but the fish she desperately needed, she waited. When a large, whiskered fish come close, she drew a slow breath and then speared it. It shook and fought as she brought it back to shore feeling triumphant.
She got dressed again and roasted the fish. Before this experience, she had never survived on her own, nor had she imagined the country was so large that one could walk for days and not see a village or another living soul. In the last weeks, she had encountered travelers going southward only twice. Both times, she’d been offered a ride and gratefully accepted, usually riding in the back of a wagon. Naturally, she’d been asked her name and destination, but her answers had been received so oddly, she’d decided not to share it again. In a time of civil upheaval, it was better to keep her identity to herself.
After eating every morsel of meat from the fish, she located
the North Star, checked the position against the lighter sky in the west and began walking again, following the bank of the river. She could still cover a bit more distance before it was too dark to see. A large bird swooped gracefully over the surface of the water looking for fish. Suddenly, fat, black snakes surfaced behind it. It was so shocking a sight that she halted and gaped. One of the snakes shot up and its body altered to square-like before it struck its prey. Were those wings? Ammey stared with dread fascination as other snakes leapt and clung on to the screaming bird before it went down screaming and disappeared into the water.
She shuddered and began walking again, but the swirling black mass was so distracting that she accidentally stepped into a hole, twisting her left ankle again. She cried out as she went down. Her ankle throbbed sickeningly to the rhythm of her heartbeat. A black snake shot out of the water near the bank, startling her. The water seemed to have come alive as snakes swam toward her. She frantically crawled backwards on hands and feet, grunting in pain every time her left foot pushed off. When the lake grew still, she tried to get back on her feet, but the pain in her ankle was too sharp and she collapsed on the ground. A whimper escaped her and she broke down and cried like a child.
Chapter Thirty-One
Daniel Kerr peered through his spyglass at the palace of Bellux-Abry. He shifted the eyepiece slightly left to a military camp that had recently been set up. “Guards posted all around,” he said, “but there looks to be only a single battalion left in camp.”
David McKeaf was standing next to him studying the same view. He lowered his spyglass and looked back at the men awaiting orders. “We’ll take out the camp. No more loss of civilian life than is absolutely necessary. Destruction of property is what we’re after. We’ll hit what Corin most values.”
“Should we wait for morning?”
“No. We go now. Who knows? Perhaps we’ll spend a comfortable night in the palace.”
~~~
Marko Corin and Nafino Zephyr summited a hill to gain the best vantage point of the enemy camp. Zino lifted his spyglass to his eye and Marko lifted his goblet of wine to his mouth, both of them fixated on the ranks of the Peoples’s army forming on the opposite side of the Rhannalinx River.
“I’ll be damned,” Zino breathed.
It occurred to Marko what a fitting statement it was. He, too, was damned. It was certain. No one lost everyone in their life they cared about unless they were damned. Was that not the very definition?
“You may want to slow your drinking,” Zino suggested, glancing sideways at Marko. “Seeing that they have come to us.”
Marko narrowed his eyes at the tone of superiority. “Never forget who you’re speaking to,” he warned.
Zino lowered the spyglass and offered it to Marko. “War is a messy business, your majesty. You will need your wits about you.”
Marko took the spyglass in hand and watched as Zino turned and started back down the hill. Had it been his imagination or had that been a veiled threat? He turned back to the battalions of men on the far side of the river. “How many men would you say?” he asked, directing it a group of his officers who’d gathered nearby.
“Perhaps five thousand,” one said as the group came closer.
“Closer to six,” another spoke up.
“I agree,” a third offered.
“Then we should have no concern,” Marko reasoned. “We have more than double their number.”
“It is not the number, sire. It’s…the men,” one of the officers ventured carefully.
Marko looked at him. “Meaning?”
“Some of the greatest living heroes of the country are down there.”
The words rankled, but Marko tried to remain impassive. “Oh?”
“The McKeaf,” the man continued, “He’s the tall, broad shouldered man with the fair hair in the center of the front left flank. There,” he said, pointing him out. “He arrived a short while ago with some others.”
“Then there’s Lowell Swain and Peter Bloodworth,” one of the others said. “They’re living legends.”
“Most of the champions of the Games are down there, too,” the first man spoke again. “The Mosers, the McKeafs, Eli Jones, Robert Todd.”
“War heroes and champions,” Marko mused. “Who do they think we are?”
“The army of Bellux-Abry, sire,” the man standing closest to Corin replied steadily.
“Who attacks—” Marko said slowly.
“Because there should be one king of Azulland.”
Zino had trained them well, Marko thought bitterly. Zino had trained them all well. He turned and went back down the hill.
The officers stayed put and continued to study the enemy across the river. “They cannot win against an army that’s double their number,” Thomas Bisset said lightly. He was the youngest of them and new to his rank and he felt it as the others looked at him with mild disgust, as if he knew nothing.
Marko entered his tent to find Eskarne stretched out on his bed, naked. Her presumption grated on his nerves. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“I hope to provide you with distraction and pleasure, my lord.”
He walked to the table and refilled his glass. “Then fetch more wine.”
“I’ve been with you hundreds of times,” she said in a silky voice. “I know what you enjoy. Allow me help you to forget.”
Marko’s expression went cold. He turned to face her. “Forget?”
“Forget the pending battle, sire,” she stammered uncertainly.
He stuck a finger out at her. “Had you uttered her name, I would have had your tongue cut out. Now, leave me be.”
~~~
Zino was shaken awake by an aide. “What?” he barked. “What is it?”
“Sir, the city’s been attacked!”
“What?” Zino sat. “What city?”
“Bellux-Abry, my lord. A rider made it through.”
Zino blinked at the first gray light of morning beyond the open flap of his tent. He rubbed his face. “Tell the king and get the men up!” Zino struggled to his feet. “We must return at once.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
In the gathering darkness, seven men sat around a campfire roasting quail. Five of them were dark-haired and of ordinary build and appearance. One stood out for being particularly large and redheaded, and one for being fair-haired and handsome.
“You’re wrong,” Garid Lourd, one of the dark haired men said, directing it to his brother. “That’s not what the message said. Everyone doesn’t get a choice.”
“It is too what it said,” Jansen argued.
“Those with no experience have to go to the training camp at Lere.”
“We haven’t seen battle,” Jansen retorted.
“But we’ve all trained with sword and ax. We can hold our own.”
“Will you listen to that fine music,” the red-haired man mused, cocking his head.
Garid looked at him. “What music?”
“The tree frogs and the night wind,” Peter John replied. He looked pointedly at the Lourd brothers. “Your blatherin’ is drowning it all out.”
Garid pulled his meat from the flames to check its doneness. They were trekking southward to the camp at Stonewater Forge after learning about recent events and receiving a mandate to join the People’s Army. The message had been relayed through a lad two villages over after a courier had stopped there. The lad, who had memorized the message, said there were three camps and all able-bodied men were to report to one of them for duty. If the man had no training, he was to report to Lere. All who were battle ready were to report to Shilbridge. All others could report to Stonewater Forge to be directed as needed. Garid led the group and he had a feeling about going to Stonewater Forge. It wasn’t cowardice. They were ready to do their part, but he would keep his kinsmen safe for as long as possible.
“Shilbridge will be the first line of defense,” Jansen said. “That’s where we should be.”
“I’ve always been
partial to the back line of defense, myself,” Darius spoke up. “Safer.”
Garid scowled at Jansen. “No one knows where the first line of defense will be. Unless you know something we don’t.”
“Besides, which,” Peter John spoke up again. “Chances are, we’ll be stuck somewhere for the winter and it’s warmer in the southern valley.”
“It’s decided,” Jansen complained. “The point is, it would have been nice to have a say. To have a consensus.”
“Alright,” Garid said. “Let’s have a consensus. Who’s for going to Stonewater Forge?”
All hands were raised except Jansen’s.
“I mean, if we have to go anywhere,” Samuel spoke up. “Personally speaking, I’d rather be back in my own lodge pressing indecent-like against my wife and hearing her tell me to saw it off. How she’s not in the mood.”
Lott chuckled. “Is she ever in the mood?”
“You see any little versions of me running around?” Samuel asked.
Peter John laughed loudly. “That’s good,” he commented, “any little versions of you.”
“How long do you think it will take to get to the Forge?” Darius asked, glancing at the the men around the campfire.
“Depends,” Fin, the fair-haired man, replied. “I’d say two or three weeks if luck is with us and we move quickly.”
“I believe someone else is heading that way,” Darius said, pointing to distant campfire ahead.
“That could be anything,” Jansen scoffed.
Darius shrugged. “I saw it last night, too, although we’re gaining on them. A lot.”
“Do you have to disagree with everything that anyone says?” Garid asked his brother irritably.
“I don’t do that,” Jansen snapped. He looked around for support, but found all eyes conspicuously averted.
“Your bird is on fire,” Garid said.
Jansen made a sound of disgust as he withdrew his supper and began blowing out the flames.
